In one corner, we have the ultra-conservative archbishop, the one who excommunicates like he's writing speeding tickets, who declines communion to politicians who don't toe the catechism line. The zealot brought in from the hills of Wisconsin to lay down the law of hard-line Catholicism to a traditional, self-doubting Catholic metro community. Who stepped down from a disease charity foundation board when they featured ~gasp!~ Sheryl Crow at their fundraiser. He's downright creeeeepy, and that's one of his strengths!
I half think the Church brought him in as one final stab at getting Catholic Metro America to choose religion over culture (even though NO community EVER adopts external religion without adapting it to their own culture). As if they said, "if we can't make St. Louis Catholics do exactly as we say, we can't do it anywhere in urban America."
The desire, of course, is to have all the flock take their direction on morals, politics, their interpretation of god, etc. from the Church without exceptions.
But what they don't realize is how utterly foreign he seems to most people in this city who still consider themselves some form of Catholic. Not that I'd expect more understanding from the organization that never saw what the big deal was about "reassigning" its pedophiles to other holy jobs around kids.
The Jesuit
In the other corner, you have the strong-willed, Jesuit president of the local "Catholic" university. The one whose university last year won a court battle for public funding by declaring it was controlled by no religion or creed. This guy always sounds more into reshaping his university and making a name for himself -- Church desires be damned -- and he has wildly succeeded on both counts, though the process has involved stomping on opponents in a most un-Jesus-like, Giuliani sort of way.
Both are regarded by objective-but-devout Catholics I know as Grade A Arseholes. They deserve each other.
The Big Coach
So this year the Jesuit university president decides to bring in a big-name coach for the previously underfunded basketball team in order to make it "big time," and that coach -- like all big-name coaches -- has baggage. And when a local TV reporter sees the coach at a Hillary Clinton rally, the reporter smells blood and asks him about abortion and stem cell research.
(Under the archbishop's rhetoric, holding political views that do not align with Church teaching essentially excludes you from the Church. No more "cafeteria Catholics" -- now you either repent or are unwelcome. Thus John Kerry could not receive communion, the archbishop said in 2004. But through a canonical loophole, molesting boys was only cause for reassignment so long as you had a white collar.)
Sure enough, the coach tells the reporter he's a Catholic who is pro-choice and in favor of stem cell research. Next the reporter contacts the ever-willing-to-condemn archbishop for comment, and he cryptically says the coach, as a representative of the university, should be disciplined. No word on how many lashings or rosaries that entails.
Though "representative" is a stretch -- the coach was brought out of retirement on a short-term contract as a pure mercenary to give the program some buzz and life before it moves into an expensive new arena. We eagerly await hearing whether the Jesuit president gives a damn about this latest advice from the guy in the funny hat. (Sounds like he doesn't.)
And the Roman club of followers gets ever smaller. Abuse the flock enough, and they stop drinking your brand of apostolic Kool-Aid.
True, there's the wine. And the fankincense is nice, too. And the absolution from sin comes in handy. But I believe the first two are available in stores.
Nice URL.
By Dominik - 1/23/2008 7:50 AM
don't forget the aquaduct...and the sanitation...and the public baths.
As you may have noticed, the site has changed. Sampa, the free-site host, did a version 2 of some sort.
Despite an FAQ that made it sound like allowing one's site to go through v.2 surgery would be okay, there were several flexibilities that surprisingly disappeared with the click of a button. (e.g. I cannot believe sidebars like this one are even narrower than before.)
And I'm told -- miraculously! -- that the conversion cannot be undone. Truth be told, I'm actually quite pissed. But free is free. Sampa has otherwise been good to me.
So I need to sort through site "features" to see how I can make do. Except that I don't have the time at the moment, in the middle of graduate classes and Lighthousehockey.com. (btw, I've removed that Lighthouse RSS feed so that you're not clogged with random Islanders hockey gibberish).
But I promise to touch up the accessories when I get a chance, and return to irregularly scheduled blogging.
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Comments (3) for "Scaring the flock away"
February, 2008