In the Babylon Bee (an Onion-like evangelical parody site) two weeks ago: “Pope Says He Will Address Sex Abuse Scandal Once He’s Finished Talking About Climate Change.” In an interview with NBC Chicago news, Cardinal Cupich (ellipses showing breaks in the interview for statements by the reporter): It’s not as though I just fell out of the sky. . . . The pope has a bigger agenda. He’s got to get on with other things, talking about the environment and... Read more
The University of Illinois is getting in on the “free tuition” game: as reported by NBC Chicago, incoming students from families with less than the Illinois median income (now $61,000) and assets of less than $50,000 (excluding home equity and retirement accounts) will be eligible for free tuition and fees, so long as their family income stays within 10% of the threshold in place at time of admission. If your family income is $61,001 or if your family has assets... Read more
From the National Catholic Register: “Ex-Nuncio Accuses Pope Francis of Failing to Act on McCarrick’s Abuse.” Some excerpts: In an extraordinary 11-page written testament, a former apostolic nuncio to the United States has accused several senior prelates of complicity in covering up Archbishop Theodore McCarrick’s allegations of sexual abuse, and has claimed that Pope Francis knew about sanctions imposed on then-Cardinal McCarrick by Pope Benedict XVI but chose to repeal them. Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, 77, who served as apostolic... Read more
Two items from my twitter feed: First, The Anchoress, Elizabeth Scalia: “Dear Bishops: Don’t Wait Until November to Take Action.” Missing from Pope Francis’ letter was any mention of bishops, any recognition that by the inhumane, sometimes criminally negligent responses to the abuses perpetrated by their priests, and by their dishonest cover-ups, some must own a particular and stated blame for the severe wounds inflicted upon the Body of Christ through the destruction of innocence — the very definition of... Read more
Longtime readers will know that my husband grew up in Germany; he came here for grad school, we met, and he stayed, not so much because America is the Land of Milk and Honey as that it was clearly far easier for him to integrate into the U.S. (in terms of job opportunities, language, etc.) than the reverse. For many years, though, he had chosen to stay with the Green Card because the German government required that anyone naturalizing elsewhere,... Read more
Two items: First, have you read about the batty redefinitions of genitals? It’s in the LGBTQIA Safer Sex Guide, as available at Healthline.com, and received tons of publicity in the past, say, 24 hours. I won’t tell you how they’ve renamed basic human body parts, but you can click the link if you like. The site has now put out a clarification, titled, “We’re Not Renaming the Vagina,” in which they say that the alternate term used was intended “specifically... Read more
Elizabeth Warren has introduced a new bill called the “Accountable Capitalism Act.” Writing at Vox, Matthew Yglesias calls it “a plan to save capitalism” and says that it would redistribute trillions of dollars from rich executives and shareholders to the middle class — without costing a dime. Kevin Williamson, writing at National Review, calls it a plan to nationalize every major business in the United States of America and writes that Senator Warren’s proposal entails the wholesale expropriation of private... Read more
Last week, I wrote about Cardinal Cupich’s letter, which was woefully incomplete in addressing the issues at hand. Today I’m taking it a step further, with a letter addressed to the Cardinal. (Readers will recall that I live in the Chicago area, which is the reason for addressing him, not any particular reason to identify him as a culprit.) Dear Cardinal Cupich, Growing numbers of bishops are publishing their attempt at a letter to Catholics in the wake of the... Read more
At last! Cardinal Cupich has released a statement: “Letter from Cardinal Blase J. Cupich to the People of the Archdiocese of Chicago in Response to the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report.” Here’s what it contains: A statement that the bishops as a whole will investigate McCarrick’s misdeeds, and add to their reporting system methods of reporting misconduct by bishops. A list of actions undertaken by the Catholic Church in America as a whole, starting in 2002, and by the Archdiocese of... Read more
They’ve issued a statement now. It’s as trite and useless as you’d expect from a corporation, from bureaucrats, from a Hollywood celebrity hoping that some minor scandal will blow over soon enough and they’ll be able to resume business as usual. But it’s not from any of these groups; it’s from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, and it reads, in part: As a body of bishops, we are shamed by and sorry for the sins and omissions by... Read more
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