Sunday, May 08, 2011

Cardinal George's Prediction - Faith in the Face of a Dark Future


"I expect to die in bed, my successor will die in prison and his successor will die a martyr". Francis Cardinal George, 2010.

Illinois Civil Unions will be blessed by Governor Pat Quinn at Millennium Park on June 2, 2011. Prior to that Bishop/Governor Quinn will see to it that homosexual couples will adopt children and that Catholic, Lutheran, or Jewish social service agencies be forced to drop adoption services.

There will be no conscientious objectors tolerated in Illinois.

Cardinal George, I believe made that prediction in reaction to the fury by which Gay Marriage advocates and their allies and pressure mounted on the thin shoulders of elected officials around the country where Same Sex Marriage initiatives took root - Massachusetts in particular. Governor Mitt Romney (R.) was especially spineless:

It's a complicated story. Massachusetts law prohibited "orientation discrimination" over a decade ago. Then in November 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ordered gay marriage. The majority ruled that only animus against gay people could explain why anyone would want to treat opposite-sex and same-sex couples differently. That same year, partly in response to growing pressure for gay marriage and adoption both here and in Europe, a Vatican statement made clear that placing children with same-sex couples violates Catholic teaching.

Then in October 2005, the Boston Globe broke the news: Boston Catholic Charities had placed a small number of children with same-sex couples. Sean Cardinal O'Malley, who has authority over Catholic Charities of Boston, responded by stating that the agency would no longer do so.

Seven members of the Boston Catholic Charities board (about one-sixth of the membership) resigned in protest. Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, which lobbies for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender equal rights, issued a thundering denunciation of the Catholic hierarchy: "These bishops are putting an ugly political agenda before the needs of very vulnerable children. Every one of the nation's leading children's welfare groups agrees that a parent's sexual orientation is irrelevant to his or her ability to raise a child. What these bishops are doing is shameful, wrong, and has nothing to do whatsoever with faith."

But getting square with the church didn't end Catholic Charities' woes. To operate in Massachusetts, an adoption agency must be licensed by the state. And to get a license, an agency must pledge to obey state laws barring discrimination--including the decade-old ban on orientation discrimination. With the legalization of gay marriage in the state, discrimination against same-sex couples would be outlawed, too.

Cardinal O'Malley asked Governor Mitt Romney for a religious exemption from the ban on orientation discrimination. Governor Romney reluctantly responded that he lacked legal authority to grant one unilaterally, by executive order. So the governor and archbishop turned to the state legislature, requesting a conscience exemption that would allow Catholic Charities to continue to help kids in a manner consistent with Catholic teaching.

To date, not a single other Massachusetts political leader appears willing to consider even the narrowest religious exemption. Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey, the Republican candidate for governor in this fall's election, refused to budge: "I believe that any institution that wants to provide services that are regulated by the state has to abide by the laws of the state," Healey told the Boston Globe on March 2, "and our antidiscrimination laws are some of our most important."


From there, it was only a short step to the headline "State Putting Church Out of Adoption Business,"
Catholic Services for orphans will disappear. Care for orphans as well as most 'social justice' initiatives - poverty programs, convict rehabilitation, industrial training and food distribution were pioneered by Catholics in Illinois. Civil Unions for homosexual couples was signed into Illinois Law in 2010 to the huzzahs of the Media. Immediately, the ramifications became clear. Any and all religious disagreement as to abortion or gay marriage at any level will be silenced.

American Clergy Sexual Abuse scandals and subsequent episcopal mishandling there of are the immediate and most handy straw men to toss up in editorials, op-ed pages and protest signage. Planned Parenthood, NOW, Immigrant Amnesty, Anti-War and Third World Solidarity movements, Public Service Unions, politicians and the media work together to advance each others mutually approved Progressive Brahmin agenda.

It is important that abortion be euphemized Woman's Choice.

It is important that homosexuals be married.

It is important that women be indistinguishable from men, if the fetus comes to term that is.

The Catholic Church is a problem and it will be silenced. Cardinal George of Chicago has never caught a break from the time that he put on the Red Hat. No matter what, Cardinal George would do or say he found himself the target of hostile media.

The Illinois Legislature will go along with the Same Sex/Gay Marriage coalition. That is a political given.

Illinois Catholics can expect a steady Chicago media bombardment of non sequiturs and straw men Sex Abuse calumnies in order to pin down elected officials, as was done in Boston, Baltimore and elsewhere. Catholic lobbyists will be about as welcome as a laugh on Channel 11.

The sad reality is that the State of Illinois was incapable of treating children services all through the 1980's and early '90s - Catholic lobbyist for Illinois Bob Gilligan notes -

Gilligan recalled that in the 1990s “the department was in disarray, so the state turned to Catholic, Lutheran, Jewish and many good private agencies to help them.”

The state went from having 46,000 children in the foster care system in 1997 to 16,000 today.

“The reason that is, is because the private agencies stepped up to the plate and they cooperated with the state to provide adoptive homes for children that were lingering in foster care far too long,” Gilligan said.

The conference director called it a “tragedy” that the same religious principles held by faith-based agencies that were so helpful to the state in the past could now be rejected under the new civil unions law.


It is all about agenda power and money. The Catholic Church is facing a dark future at the hands of Progressives, whether the agenda be Race, Women, Public Service Labor, Anti-War, Feminist, Green, or Abortion.

Cardinal George's words above should sober Catholics. Francis Cardinal George's words are coming true.


http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/illinois-catholics-fight-to-keep-adoption-services/

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