A Sore Loser?
William A. Dinges, a professor of religious studies at The Catholic University of America, is steamed. Addressing a national gathering of 100 or so diocesan social-action leaders in Washington, D.C., Dinges says that “polarization” in the Catholic Church has reached a new peak with the 2004 presidential election (according to a Catholic News Service report, Feb. 22).
Who’s to blame? It’s largely the right-wing Catholics, who insisted that the election hinged on abortion and embryonic stem-cell research. Dinges says the rhetoric has been “vitriolic” and the behavior “uncivil,” being characterized by “confrontation, harassment and attempts at intimidation.”
Dinges deplores all this “rancor,” “incivility,” and “name-calling.”
You May Also Enjoy
We’ve heard about the campaign by students at Georgetown to get crucifixes placed in the…
In the long run, for my pastor, for me — for all of us — praying together at Mass in one voice of obedience and trust in the wisdom of the Church is the bottom line.
Certain Catholic publications tend to soft-pedal and even back-pedal on tough subjects, particularly when something might be embarrassing to the hierarchy.