Cardinal Dolan ...
(UPDATE: You can read more about Dolan's misdirection at dotCommonweal - Fact-checking Cardinal Dolan.)
... was on tv to speak about the HHS contraception mandate and to give his "religious liberty" spiel. What he said about the provisions of the mandate was a misrepresentation of the truth. Even worse, he seemed to be almost blackmailing the government and the rest of us with the assertion that if the mandate goes through, the church will be forced against its will, to choose to stop doing charity work (and thus give up the yearly 2.9 billion dollars the government contributes to Catholic charities? I don't think so).
Here's something from Bryan Cones at US Catholic on this .... Is the government "strangling" the church's ministries with the HHS mandate? Cardinal Dolan thinks so
Watching Archbishop Dolan on the CBS This morning, I was a little surprised with how inflammatory his rhetoric was about the HHS mandate. In between his jocular exchanges with "Charlie and Paula" about the green room bagels were pretty strong accusations that the "straitjacketing, handcuffing" exemption for religious institutions is "strangling" (at least four times) and "choking" (at least twice) the church's ministry.
Dolan was eager to make clear that the bishops were worried about religious liberty around issues of immigration, human trafficking, and soup kitchens--suggesting that these good works are somehow endangered by this controversy, and forgetting that the current administration has actually awarded more funding to Catholic-affiliated organizations for these works than its predecessor. (Sounds rather more like the administration is trying to drown us--in money.)
Dolan goes on to misrepresent even the original exemption the administration carved out--that an exempt organization can employ and serve "only" Catholics, which it never said--and then goes on to suggest that it is "almost like we're being punished because we serve a lot of people"--as if Catholics are the only people doing just that. Poor us ....
... was on tv to speak about the HHS contraception mandate and to give his "religious liberty" spiel. What he said about the provisions of the mandate was a misrepresentation of the truth. Even worse, he seemed to be almost blackmailing the government and the rest of us with the assertion that if the mandate goes through, the church will be forced against its will, to choose to stop doing charity work (and thus give up the yearly 2.9 billion dollars the government contributes to Catholic charities? I don't think so).
Here's something from Bryan Cones at US Catholic on this .... Is the government "strangling" the church's ministries with the HHS mandate? Cardinal Dolan thinks so
Watching Archbishop Dolan on the CBS This morning, I was a little surprised with how inflammatory his rhetoric was about the HHS mandate. In between his jocular exchanges with "Charlie and Paula" about the green room bagels were pretty strong accusations that the "straitjacketing, handcuffing" exemption for religious institutions is "strangling" (at least four times) and "choking" (at least twice) the church's ministry.
Dolan was eager to make clear that the bishops were worried about religious liberty around issues of immigration, human trafficking, and soup kitchens--suggesting that these good works are somehow endangered by this controversy, and forgetting that the current administration has actually awarded more funding to Catholic-affiliated organizations for these works than its predecessor. (Sounds rather more like the administration is trying to drown us--in money.)
Dolan goes on to misrepresent even the original exemption the administration carved out--that an exempt organization can employ and serve "only" Catholics, which it never said--and then goes on to suggest that it is "almost like we're being punished because we serve a lot of people"--as if Catholics are the only people doing just that. Poor us ....
posted by crystal | 6:09 PM
2 Comments:
Really, Crystal, it makes me sick. I saw a great little piece earlier that had been on MSNBC, with one of the nuns from NETWORK, that was great. She said this talk of "religious persecution" made her ashamed, because there were so many place in the world that experience REAL religious persecution! Of course, here you see why they want to investigate the sisters...
Hi Denny,
Yes, I'd like to see a public debate on the issues between someone like Sister Sandra Schneiders and Dolan - he wouldn't stand a chance.
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