http://networkedblogs.com/2T7jV
Vatican Official Slams ‘Obstinate Betrayal’ of Nuns, Cath. Health Assoc.
Catholic consecrated religious who openly dissent from the authority of Rome and the church’s teaching on life are “an absurdity of the most tragic kind” and should cease identifying themselves as Catholic, said Archbishop Raymond Burke, the head of Rome’s Apostolic Signatura.
Burke gave the remarks in his keynote address Friday at the Institute for Religious Life’s national meeting at Mundelein Seminary in Illinois. The Institute also honored Burke with their Pro Fidelitate et Virtute Award at a celebration of the legacy of Servant of God Fr. John Hardon, SJ.
In excerpts of the address published by Thomas Peters of the American Papist blog, Burke took a moment to express his exasperation with the defiance of Catholic religious sisters in the U.S. who supported the federal health care bill – a measure dubbed the most pro-abortion piece of legislation since Roe v. Wade, thanks to its vast expansion of government abortion funding.
“Who could imagine that consecrated religious would openly, and in defiance of the bishops as successors of the apostles, publicly endorse legislation containing provisions which violated the natural moral law in its most fundamental tenets – the safeguarding and promoting of innocence and defenseless life, and fail to safeguard the demands of the free exercise of conscience for health care workers?” Burke questioned.
The Vatican official also severely criticized “public and obstinate betrayal of religious life by certain religious” towards Rome’s ongoing apostolic visitation into U.S. religious orders.
This article came from a link from a Catholic friend on facebook. I am posting it here because I want to comment.
I get really sad and worried when I see comments made that seem to condemn the actions of other Catholic religious and lay people who for whatever reason supported the health care Bill.
I will confess that one of my faults of later years is that I am not always faithful to attend Mass every Sunday. I pray the rosary and chaplet of divine mercy and read the daily readings and so I do keep my spiritual faith as a Catholic. The constant complaint of other Catholic brothers and sisters because of how they voted politically or supported politically is going down a slippery slope, that I would hope other Catholics do not want to go down.
Yet, it seems that very few of my Catholic friends are worried with the direction that the church is taking and as long as the church says something is ok, they do it with a passion. Those Catholics who because of moral reasons who support the Health Care Bill are treated as traitors to the faith and to the country.
There are Catholics besides these nuns who because they see the moral need for all Americans to have access to health care and want a single payer system like other countries worked very hard to make the Bill a Bill that Catholics could vote for and support. What was their reward for standing up and fighting for the life of the unborn child? They are called “baby killer”. We are loosing a good man in Congress when we loose Bart Stupak. I was very sad to hear he is retiring. I tried to email him and tell him that I admire and respect him so much. I don’t know if he ever got it though.
The election of 2008 was a terrible election for me. Do you want to know why? The Catholic church and my fellow Catholic brothers and sisters made me and other more Progressive Catholics feel like we were in moral sin for even considering voting Democrat. In the booklet my Bishop in AZ put out, it was quite clear to remain a Catholic in good standing my choices were to not vote or vote Republican. Somehow being a Republican meant one was a good Catholic and being a Democrat meant one was a bad Catholic. In the end I did what I had to do as a good Catholic in good standing. Obama hadn’t proved he was worthy of my respect or vote so I decided he wasn’t worth going against my Bishop for.
I believe we need single payer health care. I also believe that abortion is not nor should it be part of health care. I hate abortion. As a woman who was forced to have an abortion at 16 by my parents, I hate abortion. No teen mother should be forced to kill their child by their parents when they wanted adoption. The other side who is pro abortion denies that there are women in this country who are forced to murder their child. They are wrong!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was one of those girls so don’t tell me that I am lying, wrong, or any other word because you don’t want to deal with the truth of what is happening in this country.
Children in this country are growing up with PTSD. I am one of those too. There are a lot of us in this country. There is a trial in MI right now about the parents of a 16 year old whose parents abused, tortured and chained to her bed. She died when the house caught fire. The government had been told of the abuse but like a lot of people in government took the attitude ” IT ISN’T MY PROBLEM” and did nothing. I could relate to this girl. My parents didn’t chain me to my bed, but they made me murder my own child instead of allowing me to put my child up for adoption. I still carry the emotional scares and a part of me died when my child died. The pro abortion side doesn’t talk about the emotional scares, the physical damage, or women dying, but those things do happen. Besides the emotional damage I got physical damage. ABORTION SHOULD NOT BE USED AS BIRTH CONTROL which is what is happening today in America.
Because I oppose abortion so much I believe that Catholic girls should not be told it is a sin to use protection. We are not living in the same world today where girls wait until marriage before having sex. boys today don’t want old fashion Catholic girls who want to wait until marriage. If the world was still a place where no one had sex before marriage so therefore there is no need for birth control, than that rule would make sense to me. We aren’t living in those days. Plus we are living in a world that we can’t have as many children because of climate change. So while I agree with the church about abortion I disagree about the use of birth control.
So where does that leave me and other Catholics who birth control? I know Catholics who believe in abortion being legal many times have been made a scapegoat to get the message out that if a Catholic believes as this person believes they are not welcome in the church and are not allowed to take communion. I don’t know what the punishment is for those of us who believe that Catholic women should be allowed to take birth control without being told they are in sin, when the world we live in today is not the world our grandparents lived in.
Does the fact that I believe in birth control make me a terrible Catholic too? After all I am going against one of the teachings in the Catholic Church. Does anyone who supported the Bill an evil person who is in sin? I was against the Bill until Rep. Bart Stupak and his Pro life Democrats got what they needed for us to be able to vote for the Bill. In part if blame the pro life people who called him baby killer, and making it known that they were against thim. Not only did we loose a good man we are loosing a man who had the courage to stand up for what he believed in. He was going to be the target of other Progressives who are pro abortion and do not care that teens are being forced to have an abortion by their parents against their will. If they did care than they would at least listen and not make it to where we are anti women because we oppose abortion. I am not anti women, but I am anti teens being forced to have an abortion against their will. There is a part of me who will never heal.
The person who posted this is a good friend of mine, and of course she supports the Bishop in his comments about these nuns.
Jesus says we are to help the sick. If we as a nation are moving in the direction that more Americans will be covered than I don’t see it as by being anti Catholic. No American should be denied basic health care. I believe it is a right. Many Catholic Religious believe in single payer too so I don’t think that makes me a bad Catholic or a Commie.
I don’t like this Bill because there is not single payer. The large companies benefited and the American people lost again. Alot of Progressives are single payer so on that issue we are coming from the same playbook.
I don’t know the nuns personally who endorsed the health care bill. When I was still in my youth I had thought about becoming a nun. I went to convent school. The order I was thinking about joining was the Religious of the Scared Heart of Mary. I loved the nuns and one of them I loved as an older sister. She is a good person and has taught many of us over the years. She was principle of the Catholic grade school when I knew her before her being transfered to an university. Another nun who was a sweetheart was one who I drove for her treatments as she was sick. Oh how I enjoyed our talks. If the nuns were anything like the nuns I knew in CA than these are smart women who are doing what they feel in their heart the Lord would have them do.
I am not saying all nuns are wonderful. When I was in Boston, I knew a nun who was not a very kind person I had gone to Emmanual to decide if I felt God was calling me to become a nun or a wife and mother. In the end I knew in my heart that God was calling me to be a wife and mother, or the desire to marry and have children wouldn’t be so strong.
Catholic nuns over the years have worked in hospitals, teaching and other vocations. If the nuns who wrote their support for the health care Bill are nuns who nurse and work in Catholic hospitals than they see first hand what is going wrong with our health care system. I am sure they prayed about this before they threw their support.
I do not think it is very Christ like for us as Catholics to judge other Catholics and Catholic nuns because they disagree with us. Why is it that instead of looking at the best in people we only see the worst and judge them harshly. I am so sick and tired of people doing that. WE ARE ALL CATHOLICS AND WE BELONG TO THE SAME CHURCH. Yet, Catholics bashing other Catholics, thinking the worst of them, and refusing to face the truth that we could be wrong. It is not always easy and fun to be forced to face the truth and then admit to ourselves and the person we wronged that we are sorry for the pain our actions or lack of actions caused them our fellow Catholic.
Bishops are not perfect either. This Bishop that so many are praising is not being fair to the nuns and talking to them alone and listening to what they say with an open mind before condemning them.