CatholicVoteAction.org

I have many follow-up thoughts about the Prop 8 trial, but I am also pressed for time so I’m going to condense them….

First, much has been made in the mainstream press about Judge Walker’s “findings of fact” – almost all of which rest solely on his assertion that these facts are, in his opinion, simply true. Here’s Fact #77 (brought to my attention by the NOM blog):

“Religious beliefs that gay and lesbian relationships are sinful or inferior to heterosexual relationships harm gays and lesbians.”

Notice that Judge Walker adds no caveats to his claim – he simply states it as a matter of fact (in his view) that religious beliefs as religious beliefs, whenever they express the claim that an active homosexual relationship is anything but fully equally to a heterosexual marriage … this religious belief, says Judge Walker, harms homosexual people. This is the sort of language that implies a homosexual couple could conceivably sue someone on the basis of their religious beliefs for damages if those religious beliefs hold that homosexual acts are sinful or in any way inferior to heterosexual acts.

The homosexual movement is not about equality, it is about reshaping the cultural landscape in a way that is totally at-odds with conventual morality and the truth claims of Christianity and traditional morality.

I hope it is also evident that Judge Walker’s other, numerous findings of fact need to be taken with a whole shaker full of salt.

I’ve been covering this issue over at the APP blog with some frequency:

• Video: Dr. Robert George discusses on PBS the legal future of the Prop 8 case
• Video: Maggie Gallagher defends marriage and the Constitution on CNN
• NRO: Judge Walkers Phony Facts
• Jennifer Roback Morse with the quote of the day: “By the time Judge Walker and his ilk are finished, there will be nothing left of marriage but a government registry of friendships.” [Read more here.]
• Rich Lowry also has a good one: “Behold the boundless power of Judge Walker — even gender distinctions can’t survive the awesome finality of his pronouncements.” [Read more here.]

More on this as I find the best of commentary, analysis and argument on it.

Another day, another legal step towards outlawing pro-life free speech:

 A Chicago man says he’s fighting charges of disorderly conduct for simply standing on a public sidewalk and praying.

Joseph Holland, a 25-year-old graduate student at Northwestern University, says he was standing still praying the rosary outside a Planned Parenthood facility in downtown Chicago July 3 when police arrested him for violating the city’s new “Bubble Zone” ordinance. (Fox News)

More from LifeSiteNews, and from the Thomas More Society (which is representing him).

Update – Matthew Archbold at CMR found video of the alleged violation:

Pretty outrageous, right?

This story serves as a sad reminder that there really are crazies out there who wish to banish the Church back into the catechombs.

Tim Graham at Newsbusters calls this out for what it is:

“For all the daily talk on the Daily Kos that conservatives are dictatorial, their cast of bloggers isn’t without grand designs for social control. Take this post: “Time to begin working for the death of religion (a rant).” The diarist “BlueMoon” expressed no attempt to disrupt free speech, but the “end of organized religion” must be attempted.” [Read more at NewsBusters.]

I can’t even begin to imagine the waves that would be generated if a church said that legal action should be pursued to eliminate the expression of progressive-liberalism. That’s because Christians believe in free speech, and in freedom in general.

More to the point, we believe in religious freedom, which this writer in the Daily Kos clearly does not.

It’s been a few days since I’ve posted an update on the Dr. Ken saga, but today there is legitimate reason to do so.

The University of Illinois has responded, as CNSNews reports:

 Threats of legal action persist after the University of Illinois responded to demands by the Alliance Defense Fund to fully reinstate a professor relieved of duty for teaching Catholic doctrine on homosexuality in a Catholic doctrine class.

The university said that the professor had not been “fired” — and “there is no case or controversy” at this time.

This, of course, is total baloney:

In its response to Veazie’s letter, the ADF reiterated that Howell’s First Amendment and 14 Amendment rights were violated when the university relieved the professor of his duties, due to the content of his speech.

“While he continues to hold his appointment as adjunct professor, that title is virtually meaningless if he has no classes to teach,” ADF attorney David Hacker wrote in a letter to the university.

Hacker pointed out that Dr. Howell was scheduled to teach during the fall 2010 semester, but currently has no teaching assignment.

The next stage:

“Thus, absent written assurance that Dr. Howell will continue to teach his regularly assigned courses in the fall of 2010, he will proceed to litigation,” Hacker wrote. The legal group is demanding Howell’s reinstatement by July 27.

It’s disappointing to see that the University attempt to dig a hole for itself. You would think thousands of emails would have made them wake up to the fact that there is a problem here. 

Trisha Tan, who has been organizing the pro-Dr. Ken efforts (including his facebook support group – now at almost 6,000 members, as well as the new Facebook fanpage), recommends these two action items:

1) If you have not already done so, call the University of Illinois Foundation at 217-333-0810 and the College of LAS Office of Advancement at 217-333-7108, and inform them that you will not be donating any money until Dr. Howell is reinstated.

2) Write to President Hogan and Chancellor Easter in support of Dr. Howell (presmike@uillinois.edu and reaster@illinois.edu, respectively), and impress upon them the importance of reinstating Dr. Howell NOW.

I have not heard about the results of the meeting between the University and the Catholic Diocese of Peoria which took place yesterday (more details when I hear them). The University of Illinois Board of Trustees holds its monthly meeting today so we may something come out of that. You may email the board at uibot@uillinois.edu (but I doubt the board will actually see it). The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education is also joining ADF in demanding action from the University.

As a reminder, all emails to university officials should be forceful and uncompromising, but also charitable.

I believe that, with continued and focused pressure, we will prevail on behalf of Dr. Ken, and on behalf of the freedom to teach according to the principles of our Catholic conscience.

One week ago today I posted the late-breaking story of Dr. Ken Howell’s dismissal from the University of Illinois for his simple presentation and defense of Catholic teaching.

One of the outstanding mysteries surrounding this situation has been the attitude and involvement of the local diocese and their Newman center (for the record, I always gave them the benefit of the doubt).

Yesterday they released a statement which I am now posting (along with a preface by Msgr. Ketcham, the director and head chaplain of the Newman Center) below:

Many of you have inquired of the upsetting news of the University of Illinois’ supposed dismissal of our Professor that we employed to teach Catholic courses on campus for University credit.  The Catholic Diocese of Peoria felt that it would be irresponsible to react too quickly making a public statement without first giving the University of Illinois the chance to speak with us.  It wasn’t until July 10 that we finally heard from the University, and the Diocese of Peoria will be speaking with the University early next week.  St. John’s Catholic Newman Center (SJCNC) and the Catholic Diocese of Peoria firmly proclaim all the truths of the Catholic Faith!  Dr. Ken Howell was primarily employed by SJCNC to teach Catholic courses on campus for University credit and we will seek to lobby for him to continue to do that and for the Catholic cause on campus.  Please find attached the Diocesan Statement regarding this matter. Also, please pray for the success of the Diocese’s meeting with the University of Illinois.

PR U of I – Howell 7-15-10

In related news, the Save Dr. Ken facebook group has passed 3,000 members.

Thank you to all of you who have contacted the University over this unjust action. I know their attention to the matter has been motivated in no small part because of the awareness you succeeded in creating about what they did to Dr. Ken.

I’m facing several end-of-the-week deadlines, so I’ll just hit the highlights:

1. The organizers behind the “Save Dr. Ken” facebook campaign (with a membership of support nearing 3,000) are organizing a cease-donation campaign among UofI alumni, and want to remind us that ADF is accepting donations to offset the costs of representing him (they do great work so I need little excuse to promote helping them).

2. The Atheists, Agnostics, and Freethinkers at UIUC (AAF) came out with a statement “more or less in support of [Dr. Ken]“, so UofI’s decision is running afoul of other folks besides Catholics.

3. Dr. Ken appeared on the Kresta in the Afternoon show. UPDATE: You can watch/listen to the interview on Ustream here.

4. CNA reports that “Administrators at the University of Illinois are asking a faculty committee to review the case of [Dr. Ken.] Chancellor Robert Easter has asked the University of Illinois’ Senate Committee on Academic Freedom and Tenure to determine whether the university violated the academic freedom and right to free speech  of adjunct professor Dr. Kenneth Howell.” 

5. The situation of the local Catholic Newman center and the local diocese of Peoria is still murky. UPDATE: The meeting between the Diocese of Peoria and the University of Illinois will take place next Tuesday. Until then we must ensure that they continue to hear from concerned Catholics about their unjust behavior.

One important clarification I have learned recently is that the Diocese of Peoria was the employer of Dr. Ken, and that he was able to offer his teaching free of charge to the University through that agreement. I am still unclear what the precise role of the Newman Center was in this setup, but knowledgeable folks may clarify it in the comment box. UPDATE: Fr. Rob Johansen’s contribution in the comment box below clears up many of my questions.

In the meantime, I remain focused on the actions that the University of Illinois takes in the coming days and weeks.

The alert I published at the end of last week has gained a great deal more attention over the weekend.

I can reveal that officials from the local Catholic Diocese of Peoria, IL have a meeting with University of Illinois officials this Thursday. It’s safe to assume UofI is getting a great deal of blow-back for their decision to dismiss Dr. Ken Howell. The facebook group in support of him has almost 1,600 members now.

[UPDATE - the relationship between the University of Illinois and the Catholic Newman Center clarified by an informed source: "UIUC did not provide any funds whatsoever for Dr. Howell's position - he taught there for free, essentially, and was paid by SJCNC through the Diocese [...] The decision to terminate his position at SJCNC after his adjunct position at UIUC was terminated came from the Diocese, to the best of my understanding [...] the greater issue is the University one, while the exact situation with the Diocese is still unknown.”]

The Alliance Defense Fund, which is representing Dr. Howell, is demanding that the University reinstate him immediately (here is the PDF of their demand letter - and here is their online press release). I think if the University chooses choose not to reinstate him they still owe him a public apology, for the restitution of his good name.

An AmP reader brought up the point that the University’s decision to fire Dr. Howell is in contradiction to their own institutional pledge to be “inclusive” (emphasis mine):

[Inclusive Illinois] encourages the exploration of how perceptions, ideas, and experiences influence conduct and behavior. The University’s goal is to heighten awareness and engagement about issues of identity and importance of examining and respecting differences based on race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and gender identity, age, physical ability, religion, as well as the multiple and intersecting ways we see ourselves and others.

In other words, UofI claims to promote tolerance of all views, but in practice tolerates and promotes all views except those of religion, and those of Catholics in particular. This is the sort of “dictatorship of relativism” that the Holy Father has counseled Christians and other people of good will to oppose.

Other bloggers have promoted awareness and prayer in response to the University’s decision, here at Catholic Vote Action we also believe in promoting charitable actions which will cause the University either to explain and defend their actions, or to apologize and amend for their unjust decision (as they should).

If you have not yet sent an email to publicaffairs@illinois.edu please do so now. Once you have, please post a comment below telling us you have. I have a feeling that dozens (if not hundreds) of AmP readers have brought their concerns before the administration this weekend.

Together, we can stand up for the right of Catholics to proclaim the truth about the most important of issues facing our society today in the public education institutions that are dedicated to pursuing the truth.

At the University of Illinois, being Catholic gets you fired:

“The University of Illinois has fired an adjunct professor who taught courses on Catholicism after a student accused the instructor of engaging in hate speech by saying he agrees with the church’s teaching that homosexual sex is immoral.

The professor, Ken Howell of Champaign, said his firing violates his academic freedom. He also lost his job at an on-campus Catholic center.” (AP)

A friend of Dr. Howell’s has provided me with the professor’s own description of the events leading up to his firing:

Factual Description

The local press has published the email of Dr. Howell’s that prompted the student complaint as well as the complaint itself. It’s pretty clear that the university chose a poorly presented student complaint (who did not even understand what was being taught) over Dr. Howell’s reasonable and rational presentation of the material.

As Catholics, we can’t allow this injustice to stand. If a university can have valid grounds for firing a professor as upstanding a this one for an opinion so universally held by the Church, other universities will be able to gradually push out faithful Catholic teachers from their institutions once they decide the positions taken by the Church and being defended by such-and-such a teacher are inconvenient or offensive.

I am happy to know that the Alliance Defense Fund is representing Dr. Howell and that they are in the process of deciding how best to proceed legally.

In the meantime, there is something we can do.

Let’s swamp the University of Illinois Public Affairs office with emails from concerned Catholics letting them know how offensive and unjust it is to fire a teacher simply for being Catholic. You can contact them at publicaffairs@illinois.edu

You are also welcome to join this Facebook page (already 500+ strong) which was setup by friends of Professor Howell to show him support: “Save Dr. Ken“.

I’ll be posting updates on this story as they come up.

Thank you for helping defend the Church’s teaching – a lonely voice for truth – in our public institutions!

Our President has the Catholic health care system in his crosshairs.

Barack Obama believes abortion should be basic care for women (and that the government should pay for abortion with public funds), therefore he believes Catholic hospitals are discriminating against women whenever they refuse to offer abortions.

His push to expand the role of government in our American health care system, and his willingness to allow more ways for contraception and abortions to be paid for with public dollars are part of his plan to push those who disagree with him (and his ideological brethren) out of the health care marketplace. And he knows that Catholic hospitals are the big kid on the block he has to push over first.

If Catholics take their eyes off the ball for a moment, we can be sure that Obama will take the opportunity to move it farther down the court.

Yesterday, while Congress is away, Obama used his executive power to recess appoint Donald Berwick to become the director of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (that’s governmental gobbledygook for “rationing czar”) without allowing Congress to debate Berwick’s fitness for the position or his views on dispensing health care. Steven Ertelt explains:

The position is important because it will oversee implementation of the massive government-run health care plan that pro-life advocates say will foster rationing and also contains taxpayer funding of abortions.

Berwick’s ideology is clear when it comes to refusing care in government health care programs:

“It’s not a question of whether we will ration care,” the Obama nominee said in a magazine interview for Biotechnology Healthcare, “It is whether we will ration with our eyes open.” (source)

“Berwick’s advocacy of the decimation of American health care is long-standing. In a 1994 Journal of the American Medical Association article, he wrote, “Most metropolitan areas in the United States should reduce the number of centers engaging in cardiac surgery, high-risk obstetrics, neonatal intensive care, organ transplantation, tertiary cancer care, high-level trauma care, and high-technology imaging.” (source)

Now, some may say that I’m being dramatic and overly-worried about the threat that Berwick’s appointment could pose to the ability of Catholic hospitals to operate according to their Catholic principles. But the other side of this debate sees in Berwick an ally for their agenda.

Last week, in response to the now-infamous Phoenix abortion case, the ACLU sent a letter to this same Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that Berwick now controls, demanding that the agency crack down on hospitals receiving government funds who deny patients what the ACLU considers to be “emergency reproductive care” (a euphemism, in this Phoenix case, for abortion).

In other words, to put it simply, the ACLU is lobbying the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to begin reducing the amount of government funding that is given to any (and let’s be honest, it will be a Catholic) hospital that dares to deny women what the ACLU (and CMMS director Berwick) would consider “emergency reproductive care.” In other words – Catholic hospitals that refuse to perform abortions.

The Los Angeles Times agrees that the threat of Catholic hospitals losing funding is real:

In some extreme cases, proper treatment involves terminating a pregnancy. With 15% of the country’s hospital beds operated by Catholic hospitals, the risk that some of them may be violating the law is real.

The ACLU outlined three cases in which women already in the midst of miscarriages were denied necessary care by Catholic hospitals; one of those women “developed pulmonary disease, resulting in lifetime oxygen dependency” as a result, the letter says.

This is the grim future Catholic hospitals face: government cutting off their funding because they refuse to compromise their Catholic principles.

Think for a moment about how lucky Catholics are to be able to visit a Catholic hospital for their health care needs, knowing that the procedures performed in these hospitals and offered to them will not contradict their Catholic values. This is what Barack Obama and his ideological brethren are threatening. The fact that the health care bill recently passed by Congress contains no conscience clause protections (despite the President’s promise that it would) does not help matters, either.

Threats such as the ones I explain here are part of the reason why CatholicVote is eager to rally support for the Protect Life Act (now at almost 40,000 signatures) and to solidify Catholic support for the right of Catholic hospitals and individuals to practice medicine according to the dictates of their faith.

And throughout this struggle, you can bet we’ll be keeping our eye firmly on the ball.

Well, I went there.

My post from last Friday (”Photos: Macy’s Gay Wedding Street Ads“) made it into the Washington Times’ Culture Briefs section, earned me a “Malkin Award” nomination and the title “Christianist” from the popular gay blogger Andrew Sullivan at The Atlantic, provoked an individual on Twitter to call me the “best American Taliban template for bigotry”, and resulted in far, far nastier things to be blasted into my email inbox and comments section (per usual AmP policy, hateful comments are screened out whenever spotted).

What prompted all this? Apparently my audacity in saying I wouldn’t want to raise my kids near advertisements for gay marriage (for the record, I don’t have any kids, but I may some day and I think about these things now).

Well, guess what? The negative responses to my comments confirms my fear.

Some folks translated my comments to mean I hate gay people (I don’t, I simply think they are not capable of entering into marriage with individuals of the same sex), that I would raise my children as “bigots” (if you define bigotry as understanding the meaning and purpose of marriage) and that I would hope gay people would be treated as second-class citizens (of course not, as I’ll explain further).

But here’s what I really meant: because I am a faithful Catholic, who believes what the Church teaches (and has taught for over two thousand years) – many people today consider me to be a bigot, and would consider my children to be bigots if they grew up to inherit my (Catholic) views on the nature of human sexuality and the meaning of marriage. I wrote nothing mean or hateful in my original post, yet the vast majority of negative comments I have received are obviously hateful (foul language, intimations about my personal morality, family history, etc).

Evidently, some people think that if someone considers you to be a hater, it’s okay to hate you back … and much more viciosuly.

Rather than engage the whole homosexual marriage question at great length and detail here, I’ll simply remind my critics of two simple points: first, what I wrote in my first post is what the Catholic Church believes. The Catholic Church in its prudence has concluded that normalized, state-sanctioned homosexual marriages are not personally a good example to children (thus the prohibition against gay adoptions), or a good thing for a healthy culture (which is why the Church opposes initiatives to redefine the definition of marriage to include homosexual unions). 

Second, if the arguments for state-sanctioned homosexual unions are so crystal clear – why the violence, and why the anger directed at anyone who dares to support arguments against the proposition? This is not an example of me being thin-skinned (over five years of blogging my Catholic convictions has toughened me up plenty); rather, the verbal and public abuse that has become acceptable against proponents of traditional marriage is shameful. Even Newsweek published a story last week about this growing, troubling phenomenon (”Why Antigay Activists are Afraid to Testify“):

One of the hot new trends in litigation this year is fear. Witnesses in important gay-rights cases have claimed they were too afraid to testify because they feared they would be subject to reprisals for their views. It’s one thing to hear this kind of talk from eyewitnesses in gang shootings. But now it has become a common complaint among opponents of gay rights who say they are afraid to take part in civic life.

One sustained blast of online attacks against me is not going to phase me out of civic life, but I know the possibility of being attacked in this way prevents so many other folks from witnessing to the truth. But I know the truth is too important. Especially if it is a truth that tens of millions of people across the world share, and are progressively being persecuted more and more blatently for acknowledging.

After all, it is only the truth, clearly seen and articulated with love, which will convert either side.

For my part, I follow Christ, the constant teaching of His Church, and a whole healthy dose of rational consideration. It’s my hope that these quiet truths will in time overcome the eardrum-shattering shouting Catholics are subjected to today on this issue. But if those who believe in the justice of gay marriage are on the right side of history, what should my quiet musings matter? Why be so threatened?

Papists,

Because of your active efforts in contacting Hyundai in the last twenty-four hours and charitably letting them know how offensive you believed the “Soccer Mass” ad I posted yesterday was to Catholics, I was informed today that Hyundai has decided to discontinue airing the ad completely and that they are now removing its traces from YouTube as well. Josh has posted a copy of the statement they are sending in response to your enquiries. 

Many of you will remember that back in March the efforts of the CatholicVote community prompted Kayak to remove its offensive anti-Catholic ad as well. These two actions demonstrated that companies and ad agencies will respond to the Catholic community when it presents itself as a unified voice for sanity and fairness. There are plenty of ways, after all, to sell products without needlessly attacking Catholics. And I’m happy that Hyundai has joined Kayak in realizing this simple point.

Well done.

Philip Jenkins, who I’ve said before is the one of the world’s leading authorities on the clergy sexual abuse controversy, has an excellent article in USA Today which asks, “How serious is the ‘predator priest’ problem?”

Jenkins is a hero for the work he has done on this issue. He is a first-class academic who does not lightly take a side on a complex issue. And yet take sides he does on this issue – against those who attempt to villainize the Church:

No reputable scholar has ever conducted a survey of the abuse problem as it affects any other profession, in a way that would allow us to make direct comparisons with the Catholic clergy. If anyone believes that priests offend at a higher rate than teachers or non-celibate clergy, then they should produce the evidence on which they are basing that conclusion. I know of none. Saying “everybody knows” does not constitute scientific methodology.

… Why, then, do we hear so much about Catholic cases? What is different about the Catholic Church is the manner in which its problems have come to light, and this involves both the nature of the institution itself and the workings of the law. As a result, the church is much more open to civil litigation than any other institution. These lawsuits allow the exposure of numerous cases that would never have surfaced if the perpetrators were not priests.

Jenkins proceeds to make many more excellent points. I’ll leave you with his conclusion:

The sexual exploitation of children is a heinous offense with lifelong consequences, and the trauma is all the greater when the offender is a trusted mentor, a pastor, priest, or teacher. It is profoundly unjust to focus all our attention on the victims of one type of perpetrator to the exclusion of others.

I believe this article is required reading for anyone who is seriously questioning their Catholic faith because of the scandal of clergy sexual abuse. Moreover, it strikes me that this is a very good article to send to our non-Catholic friends who are trying to understand this issue but only learn about it from the mainstream press, which so often makes the mistakes that Jenkins highlights.

On a related note, I just received the newly-published Pope Benedict XVI and the Sexual Abuse Crisis: Working for Reform and Renewal in the mail. Published by the fine folks at OSV it promises to be an excellent explanation of the crisis and provide information for a charitable conversation.

OSV has also launched a blog where the authors of the book are keeping up on the latest news coverage, including a response to that horrible Time Magazine cover article “Why Being Pope Means Never having To Say You’re Sorry: The sex abuse scandal and the limits of atonement” (which Kathryn Lopez also responded to on NRO: “Being Catholic Means Not Feeling Sorry about Being Catholic“).

Praise God that the Church is not lacking for brave defenders.