This week’s Faith On Trial Program:

Attorney Daniel Blomberg from the Becket Fund on their recent case, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship v. The University of Iowa. What the case means and the viability of the “qualified immunity” doctrine for college administrators, as well as other news of the day.

Disrespect Of American Indian Culture

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – One thing I remember from my childhood, among all the old black and white westerns that I watched on TV, was an interest in Cowboys and Indians. Of course, at the time most Indians were portrayed as the antagonists, except for Tonto and a few that were intended for comic relief.

That never seemed right to me, but what was a kid to do? So like all the other kids I just sat back and watched the boob-tube. But the portrayal of the Indians never seemed balanced, especially when in history class the nuns taught us how real the prejudice against them was, and how they were relegated to reservations and stripped of most of their natural rights as the white man moved westward.

Then one day I remember seeing a solicitation for a Catholic Indian mission in one of the Dakotas. The solicitation listed the prices of things they needed to acquire to make sure the mission was financially stable. Of course I wasn’t a rich kid and lived with my parents in modest style. But I was intrigued with the cost of one of the mission’s necessities.

Bricks for building classrooms were fifty-cents apiece. I remember talking to my dad about it, he gave me an envelope and stamp and I put a dollar bill in it with a note that I would like to buy two bricks for the Indian kids. I don’t remember if I ever sent them any more money, but I was hoping my dollar might contribute to a better life on the reservation for kids like me.

Now before you get the idea that I’m some sort of civil rights activist for Native Americans, I’m not. I know history has not been kind to them, I know they were here first, but I also know that there were many other injustices committed during the long history of white men in America. There, of course, is nothing that we can do about the past except trying to understand it, and to grapple with the legacy we have inherited, both the good and the bad.

One of the ways we deal with this history is to recognize the cultural beliefs that are represented by the indigenous peoples that inhabited our land before we did. That may sound pious, although I do not mean it in that way. What I mean is this: Just as we take umbrage when we see mobs of demonstrators tearing down symbols of our white, Euro-centric culture, we should be reticent to disrespect theirs.

A case on point is now before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in which the Klickitat and Cascade Tribes of the Yakama Nation have watched as the government has not only disrespected a small religious site that has been the center of rituals and burial ceremonies since long before we arrived, but it deliberately destroyed it.

And it was all done to widen a highway in Oregon, without notice to the tribe and in violation of an agreement between the tribal leaders and the government agencies involved.

The dispute goes back to 2006 when the Federal Highway Administration sought to expand U.S. Highway 26 which linked Portland to Mount Hood, an ancient and sacred site for the native Indians. Along the highway was a small sacred cite called Ana Kwna Nchi nchi Patat, the “Place of Big Big Trees.” It was not quite a full acre and consisted of “a dense stand of old growth trees encircling a historic campground, burial ground, and centuries-old stone altar. The site has been used by indigenous peoples since time immemorial, and by Plaintiffs personally since the 1940s for core religious ceremonies that cannot take place anywhere else,” according to the tribe’s petition to the appellate court.

While initially the government tried to work with the tribes, those negotiations failed as the government went ahead with its widening plans and in 2008 the tribal hereditary chiefs, Wilbur Slockish and Johnny Jackson, along with a tribal elder, Carol Logan, and two other entities, responded by bringing suit against the Federal Highway Commission to prevent the further destruction of their religious site.

To add the turning lane, and to protect nearby wetlands, the government “completely destroyed the sacred site — cutting down the old-growth trees, bulldozing the burial ground and stone altar, and covering the area under a massive earthen berm. It did this even though there were several feasible ways to add the turn lane without harming the sacred site,” the tribes argued in their brief.

The tribes alleged that this is a violation of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), claiming the governmental action posed a “substantial burden” on the tribe’s religious liberties. “Here, the sacred site’s destruction obviously imposed a ‘substantial burden’ on Plaintiffs’ religious practices because it makes those practices impossible,” the tribes wrote.

Additionally the tribes contend the government violated the Free Exercise Clause by carving out secular — but not religious — exemptions from the negative consequences of its actions. Specifically, while the government altered the project to accommodate nearby wetlands, it refused to make the same accommodations for plaintiffs’ sacred site.

In addition, the suit alleged that the government violated the National Environmental Policy Act, the National Historic Preservation Act, and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act.

The lower court, however, was not kind to the tribes. It dismissed the suit saying that since the religious site had been destroyed and it was no longer accessible to the tribes, the destruction of the site did not impose a substantial burden on their religious exercise under RFRA. The case bounced around in the district court for a while until the court entered a final decree from which the tribes took this appeal to the circuit court.
In its brief, the tribes appealed to the court of appeals:

“Some cases present an irreconcilable conflict between the protection of a sacred site and the accomplishment of the Government’s goals. Not this one. Plaintiffs sought to protect a tiny, 0.74-acre site where they worshiped for a half-century, and where their ancestors worshiped for centuries before them.

“The Government knew about the site, sending an archaeologist to examine it. The Government protected the site, changing prior projects to preserve it. But then the Government knowingly destroyed it, rendering Plaintiffs’ religious practices impossible. That the Government deemed the site insignificant, or wanted to finish its project more quickly, does not justify its actions. It only shows why we have laws like these in the first place — so our nation’s tragic history of destroying sacred sites does not senselessly repeat itself.”

“For centuries Native Americans have endured the destruction of sacred places by the federal government, and it’s heartbreaking that the court would say this completely preventable destruction was okay,” said tribal elder Carol Logan, and one of the plaintiffs in this case. “All we want is the return of our sacred artifacts, the rededication of the area for our ancestors, and the promise that we can continue to worship as our tribes have done for centuries.”

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty and two local firms are representing the tribes.
This case has had a long and complicated history. This appeal was only filed May 3, 2021 so there might be a while longer before the tribes get justice. But this is one of those cases that will get little note by the press or legal commentators. For most, unless you live in the area, you will never have heard of this dispute. But it is real, it affects real people who want to protect their religious heritage and practice.

We would want the same thing.

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMike@q.com and listen to him every Thursday at 10 a.m. Central on Faith On Trial at IowaCatholicRadio.com.)

 

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Faith On Trial: this week's program

Thomas More Society Special Counsel Charles LiMandri on his suit in against the San Diego United School District in California, and the principle of Junipero Serra High School for illegally changing the school’s name to erase the name of a Catholic saint who is prominent in the history of California.

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Faith On Trial this Thursday 7-22

A San Diego principal and school board circumvented the law in their rush to erase California history and the legacy of a Catholic saint. They are now being hauled into court for their hasty and unlawful actions. On July 14, 2021, Thomas More Society Special Counsel Charles LiMandri filed suit in California Superior Count against Junipero Serra High School Principal Erica Renfree and the San Diego Unified School District, on behalf on a group of the school’s alumni families and residents of the surrounding community.

Mr. LiMandri will join Gina and Deacon Mike this Thursday at 10 a.m. (Central) on Faith On Trial 1150 AM, 88.5 & 94.5 FM and streaming on IowaCatholicRadio.com.

Deacon Mike's Sunday homily -- July 18

Readings: Jeremiah 23:1-6;  Ephesians 2:13-18;  Mark 6:30-34:

Good Morning –

           Today’s readings about the role of shepherds have come at an opportune time. But when I looked at Jeremiah’s opening line, “Woe to the shepherds who misled and scattered the flock …” I thought of all the Church critics, mostly inside the Church, who would love to run with that idea to continue their criticism of our bishops.

            But that is not the theme of our readings, nor is it my message today.

            Let’s take our first reading. Jeremiah lived in about the sixth century before Christ. He challenged the political class of his day. He castigated the government and kings for having led their people astray, and for their moral decline; he portrays them as faithless shepherds, particularly King Zedekiah, who was a vassal king to the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar.

            Zedekiah was the last king of Juda after his revolt against Babylon caused Nebuchadnezzar to invade and sent the Jewish people into the Babylonian exile.

            So as we look around, what do we see today? What would Jeremiah see?

            Our beliefs, our traditions, everything we have held sacred and honorable are under attack. Marriage has been re-defined, the wanton slaughter of the unborn is promoted as a civic virtue by Catholic political leaders, and even the concept of sex and gender is under re-evaluation.

            We are constantly “shepherded” by an entertainment industry which admits to no moral bounds and a Caesar who is establishing a new religion to rival the old.

            People of good will are seeking answers, but often differ among themselves, and become confused by the alternatives. But there is nothing new here. History is sometimes like a broken record, it plays the same old verse over and over again, until we catch on, which we seem never to do.      

            But Jeremiah says God does not give up on his people. He will not only punish the unfaithful shepherds but will gather his people and appoint faithful shepherds to replace the unfaithful ones.

            Of course, he did do that. He ultimately sent his only son who established this, his Church, to shepherd his people, to warn them of danger, and to teach in his name. This, of course, is the authority and the mandate of the Catholic Church: to unite his flock in truth and love.

            Yet just as in the Old Testament days of Jeremiah and the other prophets, people can still get confused. We live in a time of transition. Like the crowds that heard Jesus in person, we are told to adjust our worldview, or even to embrace a new one. So where do we go?

            The world if full of conflicting voices.  Just within Christianity there are over 33,000 denominations. That means that as we sit here there are Christian pastors around the world who are preaching the word that suits their fancy and will appeal to those who are seeking a God to conform to their own beliefs, rather than the other way around. They cater to those who see God in themselves, a God of their own making; not the God that made them.

            And of course we even see it within our own Church, a Church with specific doctrines, written for anyone to read. Yet there are still those – including some clergy – who think they can still be Catholic by selecting only those teachings with which they agree and reject all the others.

            They believe in the kind of moral relativism that Pope Benedict warned us about.

            You see, like the prophets of ancient times, who were called by God to proclaim the truth to all, the powerful and the lowly equally, Jesus established this Church to proclaim his truth to the entire world: The Truth; the Absolute Truth; not a watered-down version of truth, but the clear unblemished truth.

            I understand that some things are tough to accept or comprehend. It’s easy to say, “Well, the Church has it wrong on this issue, or its teachings are out-of-date,” especially when we consider some of the pressing moral and societal issues of the day.

            But God has always wanted his people to know the truth. Jeremiah and all the prophets were sent to do just that, and over the centuries the Church has produced holy men and women who continue in that tradition, as Jeremiah did: preach truth to power.

            And most people of good will are craving for the truth … you can see it in today’s Gospel where the crowds, who were like sheep without a shepherd, came to hear Jesus’ words.

            So as we look around at the current state of affairs in our world today, and wonder what our response should be, remember the words of Peter found in Chapter 6 of John’s Gospel, the Bread of Life Discourse.

            If you recall, Jesus had told the crowd that he was the bread of life and those that ate his flesh and drank his blood would be raised on the last day. Naturally, many found that hard to believe; and most walked away.

            Note that Jesus did not chase them; he didn’t try to sugar coat his message, or have it re-interpreted. He just stood there, sadly, watching the crowd dissipate.

            Then he turned to his disciples and asked them, “Aren’t you going, too?” To which Peter replied, “Where would we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

            Peter, I’m sure, had no better idea of what Jesus had just told the crowd then the crowd did. But he was humble enough to have faith. And while he may not have understood, he knew that when he looked at Jesus he was looking at the Son of God and humbly accepted what he did not understand.

            And I think that’s the heart of God’s plan. He provides us with shepherds – today it is Holy Mother Church – to teach us his ways and to keep us out of danger, just as true shepherds guide and protect their sheep.

            The challenge for us, however, is this: Are we humble enough to accept that guidance, as Peter was, or in pride do we place our opinions above the institution he has given the authority to teach in his name.

            The first sin of Adam was the sin of pride. He and Eve believed the serpent that they could be like God and know good and evil, if only they would eat the fruit of the tree in the center of the garden. They did, and they failed.

            Peter, however, gives us the opposite response: trust and humility – not pride – before our God.

            As we see from the readings, God is and will always provide the proper guidance. But do we hear?  Is it the voice of God or one of society’s competing voices? What shepherd do we listen to?

            Jesus says in John’s Gospel “My sheep hear my voice. I know them and they follow me.” Of the multiple voices out there, which one do we hear? The ones that provide an easy path to an earthly life, or the one that demands faithful adherence to what Scripture teaches?

            So which voice do we follow? Do we walk with the crowd, or do we stand with Peter?

            That answer, my friends, will help shape our eternal destiny. 

# 

Deacon Mike Manno

St. Augustin Catholic Church, Des Moines, Iowa

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Faith On Trial this week

Jordan Buzza from Christ Medicus Foundation on religious liberty in health care and news updates.

Looking for a good read? How about some chocolate and wine?

This Thursday, July 15, Deacon Mike and four fellow authors will be at Chocolaterie Stam, 2814 Ingersoll, Des Moines from 4 to 7 p.m. with their books. You’ll be able to meet the authors and buy their books; chocolate, wine, and books, what more do you want. BTW, Deacon Mike’s books are murder mysteries.

After Fulton, what next?

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – A  couple of weeks ago, as I write this, the Supreme Court, in a case called Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, delivered what we had hoped would be a knockout blow for religious liberty. But after reading the opinion, what we had hoped for turned into a dud, as the good guys won, but not with the victory they might have had.

Let’s set the stage: For at least a century Catholic Social Services of Philadelphia (CSS) had operated a foster care agency. In 2018 the local media reported on the efforts of a same-sex couple who requested foster care information from another agency, Bethany Christian Services. The couple was told that it could not foster through Bethany because it had a policy not to foster to same-sex couples, which led to the media discovering — as if this was a shock to anyone — that CSS had the same policy.

The upshot was that the local department of human services, which oversees foster-care agencies in the city, began an investigation, which turned up the fact that of all similar agencies working under contract with the city, only CSS and Bethany had such policies. The city decided that something must be done to CSS and Bethany since their policies discriminated against same-sex couples.

There followed a lot of back and forth between the city and CSS, much of which took on an anti-Catholic animas. The two agencies were warned that if they did not agree to working with same-sex couples their contracts with the city would be suspended and would not be renewed. Bethany ultimately threw in the towel and agreed to comply with the city’s demand.

CSS, however, stuck to its guns, refused to compromise its Catholic values, and — you guessed it — sued the city, claiming that its contract provisions violated its rights under the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, among other assertions. It asked for an injunction against the city’s actions. The federal district court ruled against the city, and that decision was upheld by the court of appeals. CSS then reached out to the Supreme Court which agreed to hear the case. It was argued before the justices last November.

The result was a unanimous victory for CSS. One would naturally think that a 9-0 victory for religious liberty would be a landmark decision. But one would be wrong. It seems that the tsunami we expected turned out to be only be a trickle. And the reason goes back to a 1990 case about peyote-smoking members of the Native American Church, Employment Division v. Smith, in which the Sainted Justice Anton Scalia wrote the decision of the court.

In Smith, Alfred Smith and Galen Black were fired from their jobs because they smoked peyote “for sacramental purposes” in their church. Peyote, as you might have deduced, is a hallucinogenic drug. The employer who fired them was a drug rehabilitation center. Smith and Black then filed for unemployment benefits which were denied because the employment division deemed their discharge was due to work-related misconduct. The Oregon appeals court reversed holding that the pair were discharged in violation of their free exercise rights under the First Amendment.

Originally Oregon’s Supreme Court held that the denial of unemployment benefits for misconduct in this case was not part of the state’s enforcement of drug laws but to protect the state unemployment compensation fund which was inadequate to justify the burden that was placed on religious practice. To make a long story short, after going back and forth between the U.S. Supreme Court and the state’s top court over issues of religious exemptions — there were none applicable under the state law — the case was finally resolved by the Supreme Court and the denial of unemployment benefits was upheld.

That, of course, struck a lot of people as odd. Why was the sacramental use of the drug not given First Amendment protections? And that was at the heart of the Philadelphia case.

In Smith the court found that Oregon’s controlled substance law contained no religious exemptions for their use. Thus the court found that the enforcement of “a neutral law of general applicability” was not a violation of an individual’s First Amendment rights even though it may have the effect of an infringement.

What the court said, and this is key to the Philadelphia case, is that if a law does not seek to directly limit religious freedom, “neutral,” and applies to everyone “general applicability,” it satisfies the constitutional test of such state action.

Now back to Philly. In the contract between the foster-care agencies and the city, there was no religious exception; however, it did have a provision where the department head might, upon request, grant an exception to the contract’s terms. Thus, since there was a possibility of exceptions being granted, the contract rule was not one of “general applicability” and did not fall under the protection of Smith, and was thus unenforceable as a violation of CSS’s religious freedom.

The uproar over the Smith ruling led to Congress passing the Religious Freedom Restoration Act in 1993. Smith’s holding was condemned in many quarters and it was thought that the Fulton case was going to be key in overruling it, as many religious liberty stalwarts had hoped.

But it was not to be.

Thus the victory, although unanimous, was not the harbinger of things to come that conservatives were seeking.

Justice Samuel Alito, concurring in the judgment, wrote a scathing opinion of his own, writing “Smith’s holding about categorical rules does not apply if a rule permits individualized exemptions, and the majority seizes on the presence in the city’s standard contract language giving a city official the power to grant exemptions…if the city wants to get around today’s decision, it can simply eliminate the never-used exemption power.”

Now we’ll wait for another Fulton, one that might garner a couple of more votes to overrule Smith and put some sense into religious liberty and the law.

As I am writing this the Supreme Court did give us a victory on the last day of its term. It invalidated a California requirement that the names of donors to charities, political organizations, and other nonprofits must be given to the state. This rule was adopted by then-Attorney General Kamala Harris as a method of policing fraud.

I’ve written about this before (“To disclose or not to disclose: That is the political question of the day” August 2019), where several organizations were challenging the requirement that they turn over a list of certain donors as part of their annual reporting. One of the main objections to the rule was that the AG’s office tended to leak certain names which fed cancel culture, and we’ve seen what has happened to folks in California who have donated to certain conservative propositions. They and their employers have suffered boycotts and harassment.

Not surprisingly, all three liberal justices voted to uphold the law.

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMike@q.com and listen to him every Thursday at 10 a.m. central on Faith On Trial on IowaCatholicRadio.com.)

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Faith On Trial program July 8, 2021

John Burch, senior counsel with the Alliance Defending Freedom, joined Deacon Mike and Gina to discuss the California donor disclosure case and other religious liberty cases that are in the system.

 

Meet the New Racists

By Catholic League president Bill Donohue 

Many conservatives deny that systemic racism exists. They are wrong. Racism runs deep into our institutions, and it explains why African Americans are being held back. 

Does this mean that the Left has the right analysis? No, it only means they have correctly identified a serious problem. Where the Left errs is in its diagnosis. Systemic racism today is largely the result of "progressive" initiatives, policies and laws. In other words, the Left is responsible for the malady it purports to abhor. They are the new racists. 

Dictionary.com defines racism as "a form of prejudice in which a person believes in the superiority of what they consider to be their own 'race' over others." That is what the Klan has long believed, and it is what the Left believes today, with one important difference: most of those who espouse this view are white, and it is their contention that while they are not racists, white America is. 

The Left is twice wrong: a) white America, like every segment of the country, is extraordinarily tolerant and fair-minded and b) this is not true of the new racists, namely, those who are indicting America. Here is the evidence. 

To combat racism, Idaho passed a law in April that bans schools from teaching that "any sex, race, ethnicity, religion, color, or national origin is inherently superior or inferior." Other states have since passed similar laws. 

Not too long ago, if someone were to object to what this Idaho law says, that person would be branded a racist. Today those who object include the National Education Association (the NEA), the nation's largest teachers' union, and virtually every politician, activist, and media outlet on the Left. It is they who have embraced the deeply racist agenda that marks critical race theory. 

Critical race theory, which will be taught in the schools this fall, thanks to the NEA, holds that white people today are inherently racist and are responsible for past racial injustices even if there is zero evidence that most white people have never discriminated against a single African American. Being white is all that counts. 

According to this perspective, there are no individuals in white America—just clusters of white people. In other words, it is the immutable characteristic of race that determines who we are, not the biographical data that makes us all unique individuals. If this isn't racist, the term has no meaning. 

Critical race theory, however, is only one weapon in the arsenal of the new racists. Others simply resort to hate speech. Their hatred of America is palpable. 

Over the Fourth of July weekend, one left-wing pundit and politician after another declared how racist America is. None was more forceful than Rep. Cori Bush, the newly elected black Democrat from Missouri; she quickly joined the Squad this year, the anti-American contingent of House Democrats. "Black people still aren't free," she exclaimed.   

To the extent that blacks are not free, is due almost exclusively to people like her. For example, blacks are the biggest victims of abortion and crime: she champions the former and wants to defund the police. She apparently does not care that innocent blacks pay the biggest price in both instances. 

Blacks are overrepresented in the armed forces and have served our nation with distinction; they have also used their service as a lever to achieve a middle-class status. She wants to defund the armed forces. Blacks strongly favor school choice, but Bush, who attended a Catholic high school, wants to deny poor blacks the right to go to a charter, private or parochial school. 

What Bush is promoting is systemic racism—it is baked into her policy preferences. Moreover, if she really believed that black lives matter, she would seek to curb the killing of innocent black lives in the womb, and would go into East St. Louis on a Saturday night demanding that blacks stop killing each other. Instead, she wants more funds for abortion and none for the police. Thus has she systematized racism. 

Nothing epitomizes systemic racism more than denying poor black people the right to compete equally with whites, Hispanics and Asians in school. Bush, however, wants to make sure that her own people are locked into failed public schools, the kinds of schools her parents rejected when they enrolled her in a Catholic school. 

The reality is that it is not white supremacists whom African Americans need to fear today—it is those who champion their cause. The new racists need to be outed, confronted and defeated. They are threat to the wellbeing of African Americans, and to the nation as a whole.

 

Faith On Trial -- July 6 program

The Hubris Of Pro-Abort Democrats

By Deacon Mike Manno

(The Wanderer) – Our bishops are struggling with a fundamental issue of life in all its forms as they continue to proclaim that life, from conception to natural death, belongs only to God. The struggle for the bishops is how to address those pro-abortion politicians who continue to support, and often act, to expand abortion. While some give the impression that the issue is of little consequence and they wish they didn’t have to deal with it, most are forthright prelates who are trying to balance the moral issues with how the Church interacts with society as a whole.

Many may have legitimate questions about how to deal with the issue without alienating the faithful, especially when so many Catholics already reject certain teachings, such as contraception and same-sex marriage. And now, in a demonstration of hubris I’ve never seen before, a group of 60 pro-abortion Catholic congressmen have thrown down the gauntlet at the feet of the bishops, a challenge that simply makes their decision more problematic.

They recently released a Statement of Principles, saying, “As Catholic Democrats in Congress, we are proud to be part of the living Catholic tradition — a tradition that unfailingly promotes the common good, expresses a consistent moral framework for life, and highlights the need to provide a collective safety net to those individuals in society who are the most vulnerable.” Then they go on to state, “We believe the separation of church and state allows for our faith to inform our public duties and best serve our constituents. The Sacrament of Holy Communion is central to the life of practicing Catholics, and the weaponizing of the Eucharist to Democratic lawmakers for their support of a woman’s safe and legal access to abortion is contradictory.”

Hmmm? They seem to think that the bishops who want to speak out on the issue have simply found a “new issue” to try and control them. Some even tried to up the stakes, like Cong. Jared Huffman, who is not a Catholic and once told The Washington Post, “I suppose you could say I don’t believe in God.” He tweeted, “If they’re going to politically weaponized religion by ‘rebuking’ Democrats who support women’s reproductive choice then a ‘rebuke’ of their tax-exempt status may be in order.”

Not to be outdone, fellow Californian Ted Lieu also took to twitter. “I’m Catholic and I support: Contraception, a woman’s right to choose, treatments for infertility, the right for people to get a divorce, the right of same-sex marriage. Next time I go to Church, I dare you to deny me Communion.”

What hubris! Just who are these Democrats who believe they can tell the Church what it can and cannot do? Unfortunately my own member of Congress, Cindy Axne, while claiming to be an “active” parishioner at Sacred Heart Parish in West Des Moines, also signed the statement.

And, of course, this comes on the heels of a new CatholicVote poll showing that 83 percent of churchgoing Catholics believe politicians who oppose Catholic teachings “create confusion and disunity.” It also found that 74 percent believe that “Catholic public officials who disagree with their Church on serious or grave matters” should “avoid creating confusion and disunity by not presenting themselves for Communion.”

Perhaps the Democrats are just on another hungry power-grab, but if they feel as they do maybe we ought to find them another religion to practice, since they don’t seem content with ours. This issue should not surprise them, nor is it an attempt to weaponize the Eucharist. That is a bedrock of Church teaching for over 2,000 years and it has been clear from its inception. Consider:

In what might be called a foreshadowing of our Catechism, the first-century Didache affirmed that the act of abortion has always been forbidden and considered a grievous sin against life. So if anyone is confused that this is some new thing with the Church, or is a deliberate rebuke of women’s rights, or even Democrats, let me disabuse you of that idea. This is what the Church has always taught.

The Didache on the subject: “You shall not commit murder . . . you shall not murder a child by abortion nor kill that which is born” (chapter 2, Grave Sin Forbidden).

From today’s Catechism of the Catholic Church: “Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person — among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life” (CCC, n. 2270). It also goes on to teach, “Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life” (CCC, n. 2272).

And from the Code of Canon Law: “Those . . . obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion” (canon 915).

Back in 2004 then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who later became Pope Benedict XVI, in reply to a query from the American bishops, wrote a memo entitled, “Worthiness to Receive Holy Communion: General Principles.” It came on the heels of Sen. John Kerry’s presidential candidacy; Kerry, a Catholic, was an unrepentant supporter of abortion. Ratzinger wrote:

“Regarding the grave sin of abortion or euthanasia, when a person’s formal cooperation becomes manifest (understood, in the case of a Catholic politician, as his consistently campaigning and voting for permissive abortion and euthanasia laws), his pastor should meet with him, instructing him about the Church’s teaching, informing him that he is not to present himself for Holy Communion until he brings to an end the objective situation of sin, and warning him that he will otherwise be denied the Eucharist.

“When ‘these precautionary measures have not had their effect or in which they were not possible,’ and the person in question, with obstinate persistence, still presents himself to receive the Holy Eucharist, the minister of Holy Communion must refuse to distribute it.”

Unfortunately, then-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who was the head of a USCCB taskforce studying the issue to which the memo was addressed, failed to report the contents of the letter correctly to his brother bishops, thus giving the impression that it was okay for these politicians to receive.

So let this disabuse anyone of the notion that this is a made-up or novel doctrine of the Church. It has been taught since the days of the apostles. It is clear, it is authoritative, and it is — if you want to be in full communion with the Church — what you must accept! If anyone cannot accept it, if you accept the killing of the unborn child, Democrat member of Congress or not, you should prayerfully seek counseling with your confessor, but you should not present yourself for Communion.

And let’s understand who is weaponizing what. Is it the Church that is following centuries of definitive and unchanging teaching? Or is it dissenting members who for political reasons are warning that the government might take action against the Church over its enforcement of doctrine?

I’m not a constitutional expert, but this one could be handled by a first-year law student. Makes you wonder what they honestly believe (or understand) about anything.
But that still leaves the question of what the bishops should do to enforce dogma against dissenters. I have my idea about what they should do — it’s time to end the dialogue and reinforce the traditional teachings. How many more babies must die while we talk? But the bishops are the ones who must grapple with the problem and the best we can do right now is to pray they make a wise decision.

If you read the results of the CatholicVote poll, which was of churchgoing Catholics, you’ll quickly realize the faithful are looking to the bishops for honest leadership and instruction that is devoid of political partisanship.

“The overwhelming majority of Mass-attending Catholics want their bishops to lead and speak even on difficult questions and teach the truth of the faith even if it is unpopular,” CatholicVote President Brian Burch told our audience on Faith On Trial.

In other words, just tell us the bottom line and let the political chips fall where they may!
There is one thing the bishops could do which could ameliorate things a bit and demonstrate their commitment to the policies of life. They should schedule an annual nationwide Right to Life Sunday collection (which they do not have now), the funds from which could be used to help educate the rebellious in our midst as well as supporting pro-life ministries.

Let’s answer it in prayer. I think that just might find a welcoming reception up there.

(You can reach Mike at: DeaconMike@q.com and listen to him every Thursday at 10 a.m. on Faith On Trial on IowaCatholicRadio.com.) 

The DeLauro Democrats and the Bishops, National Catholic Register

COMMENTARY: By George Weigel, National Catholic Register

The days are past when the American hierarchy could be cowed by the political and journalistic principalities and powers and the “progressive” Cat...

US Supreme Court today: Americans must remain free to support causes without harassment

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday in Thomas More Law Center v. Bonta and Americans for Prosperity Foundation v. Bonta that Americans are free to support nonprofit organizations and their causes without fear of harassment or threats. The court determined that state governments cannot force charities and other nonprofit organizations to disclose their donors and thereby subject them to the possibility of adverse treatment simply for supporting causes with which some people may disagree.

Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys represent Michigan-based Thomas More Law Center, which filed suit after the California Attorney General’s Office demanded the names and addresses of its major donors. A district court trial showed that the office leaked such information like a sieve and created a perfect target for hackers by storing confidential donor information on the internet, where the data could be easily discovered.

“The Supreme Court has confirmed that every American is free to peacefully support causes they believe in without fear of harassment or intimidation,” said ADF Senior Counsel and Vice President of Appellate Advocacy John Bursch. “Public advocacy is for everyone, not just those able to weather abuse. Forced donor disclosure is a threat to everyone and discourages both charitable giving and participation in the marketplace of ideas. The court correctly upheld the First Amendment’s promise of the freedom to associate with like-minded groups, which includes the right to donor privacy.”

“California casts a dragnet for sensitive donor information from tens of thousands of charities each year…,” the Supreme Court wrote in its opinion. “There is a dramatic mismatch, however, between the interest that the Attorney General seeks to promote and the disclosure regime that he has implemented…. We therefore hold that the up-front collection of [donor information] is facially unconstitutional.”

Accordingly, the court remanded for the district court to enter an injunction prohibiting California from blanket collection of charitable organizations’ confidential donor information.

Thomas More Law Center is a nonprofit organization based in Michigan that defends and promotes religious freedom, moral and family values, and the sanctity of human life. Roughly 5% of its donors are California residents, and it has operated as a charity in good standing with California’s attorney general for many years. Beginning in March 2012, the Attorney General’s Office began to harass the center, demanding the names and addresses of its largest financial supporters.

“Potential givers to charities have good reason to fear being doxed—that is, having their public information spread for malicious purposes,” Bursch added. “Too many are quick to ostracize, lambast, and threaten those with whom they disagree. Everyone should condemn this behavior—often described as ‘cancel culture’—and we’re pleased the Supreme Court did so today.”

Parties across the ideological spectrum—including 22 attorneys general, the American Civil Liberties Union, the NAACP, the Human Rights Campaign, ChinaAid, and others—filed friend-of-the-court briefs in support of the Thomas More Law Center.

Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization committed to protecting religious freedom, free speech, parental rights, and the sanctity of life.