Here's Maureen Dowd in an Op-Ed from The New York Times (March 21, 2010, p.W11) concerning the dissent of women religious and why they are more qualified than the bishops on matters of healthcare reform:
On Friday, Tim Ryan, an antiabortion Democrat from Ohio, took to the House floor to say he had been influenced by the nuns to vote for the bill.
“You say this is pro-abortion,” he said to Republicans, and yet “you have 59,000 Catholic nuns from across the country endorsing this bill, 600 Catholic hospitals, 1,400 Catholic nursing homes endorsing this bill.”
For decades, the nuns did the bidding of the priests, cleaned up their messes, and watched as their male superiors let a perverted stain spread over the entire church, a stain that has now even reached the Holy See. It seemed that the nuns were strangely silent, either because they suspected but had no proof — the “Doubt” syndrome — or because they had no one to tell but male bosses protecting one another in that repugnant and hypocritical old-boys’ network.
Their goodness was rewarded with a stunning slap from the über-conservative Pope Benedict XVI. The Vatican is conducting two inquisitions into the “quality of life” of American nuns, trying to knock any independence or modernity out of them.
The witch hunt has sparked the nuns to have a voice at last. Vulnerable children were not protected by the male hierarchy of the church, which treated sexual abuse as a failure of character rather than a crime. The men were so arrogant it never occurred to them that they should be accountable to the secular world. In their warped thinking, it was better to let children suffer than to call the authorities, embarrass the church and risk diminished power.
Now the bishops think that it’s better to deprive poor people of good health care than to let the church look like it’s going soft on abortion.
Under the semantic dodge of ideological purity, the bishops also are doing the bidding of the Republicans, trying to kill the bill and weaken the president. But the nuns are right when they say that “the Senate bill will not provide taxpayer funding for elective abortions” and that its protection of pregnant women is the “real pro-life stance.”
The nuns stepped up to support true Catholic dogma, making sure poor people get proper health care.
Crooks and Liars sums up the dissent of the nuns from the Catholic bishops succinctly:
This is huge for a number of reasons. The nuns signing this letter are the ones in the trenches, serving in Catholic hospitals and health care clinics across the nation. They represent those who see the wreckage left behind when people are denied access to care until it's too late, the damage done when poor women cannot get prenatal care, and when the sick are left to their own devices.
Maybe instead of picking on the church's women religious, Pope Bentdickt should investigate his own hypocritical actions in the handling and cover-up of sexual abuse cases.
3 comments:
I always loved the nuns in the Catholic schools I attended. They were for the most part no-nonsense people but had memories like elephants.
I recall my first grade teacher, Sister Mary Florentia. I saw her 25 years later at a theater of all places and she remembered me, and I remember her too.
She was right off the boat from Ireland had the brogue and all.
The in fifth grade it was Sister Claire Marie, and in 10th Sister Maureen. That woman had eyes in the back of her head.
Sister Maureen was the only plain clothes nun and she liked us to call her Mo.
I hope there is a schism between the American Catholic church and Rome sooner than later.
And wonder of wonders, we even have Bishop Thomas Tobin when questioned about abortion saying that "...on laws that protect and preserve human right.." Little slip up there Tobin?
Human right? Do I get those rights too even though I'm gay?
The nuns and religious women are the prophetic voice in the Catholic desert.
I have to throw the caveat in that while nuns committed less sexual abuse than priests, it's primarily because women commit it less frequently than men. The link isn't to any specific woman (that wouldn't be fair) but allows searches which will allow a user to see for himself the scope of the problem, and the fact that it crosses gender, and sexual orientation issues.
It's difficult to stay on one topic, but if you're going to merge them, be aware of consequences. This is primarily directed at Maureen Dowd, more than anyone here.
The Bishops were, and are, for health care reform, to include universal healthcare--much to the chagrin of many of the laity, at least in my diocese. They're simply opposed to abortion funding, which in the bill existed, and still exists, even after Obama's executive order.
Post a Comment