FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, September 28, 2012
Contact: John Becker, Director of Communications
Phone: 920.265.6023
Email: john@truthwinsout.org
Truth Wins Out Condemns Illinois Bishop For Implying that Catholics Must Vote Republican or Go to Hell
Politicization of the Catholic Pulpit in an Election Year is Alarming, Says TWO
BURLINGTON, Vt – Truth Wins Out slammed Springfield, Illinois Catholic Bishop Thomas Paprocki today after the prelate released a video message in which he implied that, because the Democratic Party is pro-choice and supports marriage equality, casting one’s vote for a Democratic candidate threatens one’s eternal soul. After specifically pointing out what he called the “intrinsic evils” endorsed by the Democratic Party platform, the prelate told his flock, “…a vote for a candidate who promotes actions or behaviors that are intrinsically evil and gravely sinful makes you morally complicit and places the eternal salvation of your own soul in serious jeopardy.”
“We are incredibly alarmed by the blatant politicization of the Catholic pulpit in this election year,” said Wayne Besen, executive director of Truth Wins Out. “The bishops are trying to turn Catholic parishes into political precincts.”
“This is a contemptible and transparent attempt by Bishop Paprocki to use fear to bully and manipulate Catholics into voting for the GOP,” added John Becker, TWO’s Director of Communications. “It’s incredibly clear: in their crusade against the civil rights of LGBT people, the American Catholic bishops have essentially jumped into bed with the Republican Party in a truly unholy alliance.”
TWO also questioned the timing of Bp. Paprocki’s video as it became public just 40 days before the November elections, at a time when political campaigning has reached a fever pitch.
“Bishop Paprocki’s timing is dubious and highly questionable,” said Besen. “It’s hard to believe that the release of such a video so close to the election happened by chance. If there is indeed a concerted effort on the part of Catholic bishops to meddle in election-year politics, the Church needs to be investigated for repeatedly violating its tax-exempt status.”
Paprocki’s video is just the latest in a long string of anti-gay activities on the part of Catholic leaders:
- The Minnesota Catholic Conference, the policy arm of the state’s Catholic bishops, is sending out a letter to every Catholic household in that state, asking them to vote yes on a constitutional marriage discrimination amendment on the ballot this November and urging them to donate money to the main group working to ensure its passage. Twin Cities Archbishop John Nienstedt has also injected a prayer for marriage discrimination into the Mass, ordered his priests to organize grassroots political committees in their parishes – at parish expense – for the express purpose of drumming up support for the amendment, attempted to silence any dissenters within the clerical ranks, mandated marriage discrimination lectures in Catholic schools across the archdiocese, and caused pro-equality lay employees to fear for their jobs. In 2010, the Catholic Conference mailed an anti-gay DVD to all 400,000 Catholic households in Minnesota.
- Archbishop George Lucas of Omaha, Nebraska recently sent a letter to every parish priest in his diocese in which he gave them permission to devote parish time and resources to an anti-LGBT group that’s gathering signatures in order to force a referendum on Omaha’s sexual orientation nondiscrimination ordinance, with the goal of overturning the law.
- In a recent interview with the Los Angeles Times, Salvatore Cordileone, archbishop-elect of San Francisco, said that gay and lesbian Catholics in sexual relationships of any kind should not present themselves for the Sacrament of Holy Communion.
- Newark, New Jersey Archbishop John Myers equated same-sex marriage with incest in a pastoral statement earlier this week, saying that Catholics who support marriage equality are unfit to partake in the Eucharist and should “refrain from receiving Holy Communion.”
- Last Sunday Chicago Cardinal Francis George, who came under fire last year for comparing the LGBT movement to the Ku Klux Klan, used his homily at a Mass celebrating couples’ golden anniversaries to take a swipe at marriage equality and trivialize the relationships and marriages of loving, committed same-sex couples, characterizing them as merely “friendships.”
- Peter Sartain, Archbishop of Seattle, recently posted a video message in which he ominously warned that society “would be harmed beyond repair” if voters in Washington upheld that state’s marriage equality law in the November election.
- This summer, the Diocese of Worcester, Massachusetts backed out of a real estate agreement after it found out the buyers were a gay couple, possibly violating state law in the process.
- Catholic high schools and universities now routinely rescind speaking invitations to LGBT people and even straight allies.
- Pope Benedict XVI endorsed the American bishops’ anti-LGBT efforts in an address at the Vatican in March.
- Also in March, the Catholic Diocese of Sacramento de-funded a local nonprofit agency serving that city’s homeless population after finding out that the agency’s newly-hired (non-Catholic) director supports marriage equality.
- Earlier this year, a Catholic priest in Maryland denied a lesbian woman communion at her mother’s funeral.
- An openly gay music teacher at a St. Louis-area Catholic school was fired in February after an archdiocesan official overheard him talking with co-workers about his upcoming New York wedding to his partner of nearly twenty years.
- In November, Dan Avila, then serving as the USCCB’s “Policy Advisor for Marriage and Family,” resigned in disgrace after TWO and many other groups condemned him for writing that homosexuality was caused by Satan entering the wombs of pregnant mothers and messing with their hormones.
- Last year, as lawmakers in New York debated a marriage equality law, now-Cardinal Timothy Dolan equated allowing same-sex couples the freedom to marry with North Korean-style communist dictatorship and compared marriage equality with incest and polygamy. After the law passed, Dolan complained that he had been tricked by pro-equality politicians and claimed that churches in his diocese were being threatened with lawsuits intended to force them to perform same-sex weddings, despite the fact that New York’s marriage equality law explicitly prohibits such suits.
“It is the height of arrogance for prelates like Bp. Thomas Paprocki to use the power of the pulpit for partisan political purposes,” said Becker. “A church that protected pedophile priests has no moral authority whatsoever to condemn LGBT people or their healthy, adult relationships, nor does it have the right to order Catholics to vote to support anti-gay oppression.”
Truth Wins Out (TWO) is a nonprofit organization whose goal it is to create a world where LGBT people can live openly, honestly, and true to themselves. TWO monitors anti-LGBT organizations, documents their lies, and exposes their leaders. TWO specializes in turning information into action by organizing, advocating, and fighting for LGBT equality.
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What’s this? Playing the guilt and emotional blackmail cards. How… typical.
The institutional Catholic Church — in which I was raised — is apparently operating in a terminal self-destruct mode. It’s utterly confounding to watch this meltdown happen before our very eyes. There will always be a Community of Faith, as long as there are human beings on this planet. But the institutional Church has clearly lost the thread of the mission which Jesus Himself gave to it: “This is my Commandment: Love one another, as I have loved you”.
I have a feeling that there has got to be something in this for the bishops and the church to go so far and be so blatant about warning their parishioners on which way to vote (w/o actually “telling” them for whom to vote). I know they love the feeling of power, but what are they going to get from the Republican party for all this help? One certainly can’t buy the crap notion that their sole interest is stemming the evil of “equal marriage rights” or the saving of their beloved believers souls.
John, I’ve said it before, but it’s just great that you and TWO continue to expose these scoundrels and their corrupt church.
I must keep these comments positive because if I wrote what I really think, it would be unprintable.
Gianni, these closeted Queens are groveling at the feet of John Pall and Benedick (sic) and pandering to their hyperconservative rich donors in order to protect the power and the privileges they have worked for so hard to accumulate in their career trajectories. If you want to be a CEO in Big Catholick or even a middle manager, you lay conscience aside and follow the party line. This is nothing new. When the roman church was a minority religion they were much quieter, but with breakup of mainstream protestantism into more conservative sects over the past 40 years, there is a new wave of militancy in this “Church Triumphant” as the largest religious denomination left standing in America,and it mostly comes from the top. Karol Wojtyla started it all by removing Vatican II progressives from bishoprics and education over the last 30 years and it is bearing fruit today. No one in power is left in the romanist church to resist anymore.
And the laity keeps sending in their tithes and offerings. Go figure.
Jerry, you’ve got it EXACTLY RIGHT! The much-loved Pope John XXIII presided over a much-needed REFORMATION (yes, yes!) of the antiquated and counterproductive attitudes of the RCC. His immediate successor, Pope Paul VI, was a wishy-washy half-liberal-half-conservative — who (FYI) was “outed” by a former seminarian as having had a homosexual affair with him!!! The very honest and courageous Pope John Paul I, an honest man with diplomatic credentials, lasted 30 days, before he was assassinated by the Vatican Mafia — many of whom are reported to be practicing CLOSET SATANISTS. It’s reported that the Vatican Mafia were LOOKING DAGGERS at him as soon as he was elected, and his fate was thereby sealed. He was assassinated because he was about to blow the whistle on the horrible internal corruption within the Vatican, and probably move to reform it. His successor, John Paul II, had a phenomenal curriculum vitae: actor, poet, playwright, underground resistance fighter during the Nazi occupation of Poland. He looked like an ideal Pope for modern times. But Polish Catholicism — largely because of its “in extremis” status under Communism — became extremely conservative. And John Paul II, sadly, returned to those ultra-conservative roots, and began to nourish and encourage them. He was both a great Pope, and a tragic Pope, in his inability to understand what the Church REALLY NEEDED to come to grips with the challenges it faces in the modern world. That’s where we are today. I’m still a practicing Catholic, at a major state university (which has a splendid Newman Catholic Center) — but I maintain a fierce independence of personal conscience. I urge ALL remaining practicing Catholics to do the same.
Friends, I knew most of what you wrote. All very interesting and thanks for the reply. I took a different route, however. Back the late fifties, after about 2,000 hours of “reparative” psychotherapy at a major Midwestern clinic, (yes, reparative at that time yet), plus leaving the Methodist church and becoming a Catholic, thinking it had more miracles, plus hundreds of hours of praying to have my “awful sin” removed, it didn’t happen. Coming out of the closet at age 36 was literally like being let out of prison! My next “release from prison” a couple years later was putting all religion out of my life. For the first time in my life, I was free—free to be who I was and free from the guilt imposed by religion. I have no argument with religion for those who love it and feel the need for it, but it’s not my cup of tea. I get my spiritual nourishment by listening to great music and the magnificent trees and orchids in my yard here in Cambodia where I live.
What nonsense in the comments following this article. It is clear that the contributors have absolutely no understanding of the Church, what it teaches, or of the mission of the Bishops. Ignorance can be excused, but to deliberately spread falsehoods about the Church and to malign the character of individuals without knowing what is in their hearts is diabolical. It shows your true characters. And just to enlighten you a little, the mission of the Bishops is to teach and guide the Catholic faithful in their moral life,and to guard the souls of those within their dioceses – which does encompass the decisions about how they vote on issues that are intrinsicly evil – because these voting decisions do impact that state of their souls. A person can NEVER affirm, assist, support, or participate in evil withou personal consequence to their own soul. Voting for a pro-abortion president who embraces the mission of the pro-gay agenda which seeks to destroy the traditional -natural- God-given family is morally WRONG. Thus the Bishops have to speak out or fear for their own immortal souls.
First prove your silly god exists, then you can try to base laws on it. Catholics can vote for or against anything they want, but churches may not get involved in politics without the risk of losing their tax-exempt status. Also, if your churches insist on spreading hatred about millions of US citizens, you should be prepared to pay the price for that too, which is labeling as hate groups. Until you prove your grim fairy tales are real and true, with testable, concrete evidence, they belong only in your personal life and not tied up with laws that affect all citizens. Who do you uneducated religious wackos think you are? Your privileges are disappearing and you just can’t handle it. Grow up and come out of the cave.
Oh Jean, Jean, Jean. How misguided you are. Let’s break it down for you.
1. The “Pro-gay agenda” has no intention of destroying anything. What do you people NOT understand about CIVIL marriage? That has NO bearing on anything going on in your church. None, Zip, Zilch, Nada. Hate to break it to you, but when we get marriage equality, we’re not going to storm your gates demanding you marry us. Nor are we going to demand your marriage be somehow changed in ANY way.
2. Pro Choice does NOT MEAN pro abortion. That is a soundbyte that sounds good to rile up the ignorant masses. Pro choice means I have no right to make such a personal and difficult and impacting decision for ANYONE, and neither do you. Here’s a shocker for you. I’m basically anti-abortion and vehemently pro choice. Which means, I’m against it personally but had no business deciding for anyone else. Got it?
3. “Traditional – natural – God given family” (which, if you have read your bible is defined by multiple wives, mistresses, concubines, selling and/or killing their children) is in more danger of destruction by divorce (currently a strictly heterosexual process) and pedophile priests and the CHURCH’s coverup than gay rights… but you folks don’t seem to attack those with the same vigor you do gay rights.
Bottom line, we have NO PLANS that include any impact on your daily lives. You don’t have to marry us, you don’t have to even acknowledge us. But what you DO have to do is stop demonize and lie and discriminate against us. We have silently taken it for too long, and frankly we’re mad as hell and not going to take it anymore. Basically, we want you to leave us alone and we will do the same. See how that works? Only one side is seeking to take away from the other, and baby it aint us.
Many of us used to be Catholic Jean. That you and your “bishops” call us evil for loving others speaks of your character. No one is spreading any falsehoods. You’ve already shown what’s in your hearts by your unprovoked attacks on people who have done nothing to harm you or anyone else.
Jean,
You can believe (take without any supporting evidence) any damn nonsense you want, and you can also do anything within your Constantinian created 1700 year old club you want to, but when your club starts imposing its invented, unverifiable and irrational stories on non romanists of any religion or no religion you’ve crossed the line. Many of your beloved Bishops have led inquisitions, promoted slavery, been pedophiles, secretly married, directed persecutions of “heretics” and enriched themselves at the expense of others for CENTURIES. Many would still do all of that if they could get away with it.
And what’s the romanist hierarchy’s obsession with abortion, Jean? Why not the same obsession with supporters of the war in Iraq or Viet Nam or the death penalty? Or some obsession about poverty, worker righs and environmental destruction? When are your beloved bishoprics going to start denying their holey communion to Santorum and Newt Gingrich, Paul Ryan & the Koch brothers? The answer: never. They know which side their bread is buttered on.
And Jean, study a little anthropology before making unverifiable claims about the “traditional-natural-God-given family”. You are ignorant and I suspect a shill for the Blue Army or some similar group. Wake up. This is the 21st century.
“Voting for a pro-abortion president who embraces the mission of the pro-gay agenda which seeks to destroy the traditional -natural- God-given family is morally WRONG”
Jean, here’s your lie, and the bishops’ lie, which means that your whole morality is a lie.
The pro-gay- agenda seeks to destroy the traditional family? we wish to destroy the our families, our friends’ families, our siblings’ families, and the families of everyone? On what evidence? Where has it happened? Why would we want to do that? How is my quite legal marriage destroying the hetero family, anyone’s hetero family?
You people are very, very sick. You would believe anything about gay people, as long as it defames, denigrates, and dehumanizes us., and not coincidentally, might help to restore the previous hegemony of the Catholic Church.
The good news is that I think you are attacking your own church by attacking us with blatant propaganda and lies. Nice going.
Jean, dear, the “gay agenda” (as you religious people like to intone) is only one thing: to be FULLY equal Americans in the eyes of the law. We hear about this gay agenda thing all the time like it is some plank in a platform. It’s CIVIL EQUALITY, you religious bigots. Accepting Jesus into your hearts supposedly opens your minds to the truth. I’ve yet to see the actual truth get in between those ears. Church members are required to follow the tenets of the particular religion and the bishops, priests, and ministers are required to teach and guide according to the particular beliefs. BUT, calling on believers to divest themselves of fairness, justice, and loving consideration for their fellow gay Americans is too much. Are you followers too dumb to figure things out, that you need the leaders to warn you about losing you soul because you might use your hearts and minds to vote for legal (not church) equal treatment? God actually hates legal equality and fairness? Something is sick here.
TWO headline lies – here’s the truth:
“TWO Condemns Illinois Bishop For Implying that Catholics Must Vote Republican or Go to Hell”
He never said you MUST vote, let alone must vote Republican…
He did say, “you need to think and pray very carefully about your vote, because a vote for a candidate who promotes actions or behaviors that are intrinsically evil and gravely sinful makes you morally complicit and places the eternal salvation of your own soul in serious jeopardy.”
The Democratic party supports such actions and behaviors – e.g. abortion and homosexuality.
He’s doing his duty to warn Catholics – and hopefully others – to put their soul in danger.
Gotta love it – evil, souls, salvation – stuff that causes libs/dems/leftists/socialists/communists to go bonkers
It’s called subtext fred.
“evil, souls, salvation”
All silly fake fairy tales, fred. Grow up. Feel free to believe them and spew them but make sure you keep them off laws and out of free citizens’ bedrooms. You are deceived and also obsessed with sex. Imagine how great the world would be if religious nuts spent as much energy on helping the poor as they spend trying to control sex. And progressives are angry because we are surrounded by the ignorance, intolerance and stupidity of uneducated dark-age myth-believin’ religionist cave folks!
“…but to deliberately spread falsehoods…”
Honey, that’s a quote. It’s about as close to the opposite of deliberately spreading falsehood as you can get. Now, the content of the quotes themselves… Oh hey, I found the deliberate falsehood!
Being a bishop does not excuse that–exactly the opposite, he must be held to a *higher* standard and not a lower one.
“A person can NEVER affirm, assist, support, or participate in evil withou personal consequence to their own soul.”
I’m sorry, are you not advocating voting in a certain way just to harm people you don’t like? Pretty sure that’s evil.
“The Democratic party supports such actions and behaviors – e.g. abortion and homosexuality.”
Homosexuality is neither an action or a behavior. It is a trait. This is not a subjective, debatable suggestion–it is a fact. The Catholic Church has actually acknowledged this fact, which is a new thing for it (look what happened the first time it was proven that the Earth revolves around the sun and not the other way ’round) although I would have preferred if they had acknowledged this fact and then continued thinking for a few seconds about how that fact should impact their conclusions, but I digress.
Homosexuality is not an action or a behavior. Bigotry is.
And the funny thing is, if you’re a religious person than for you bigotry is the belief that God made some people wrong and wants you to sweep those people under the rug. Not only is it internally inconsistent since you tend to call a lot of attention to what you think is God’s failure, but I’m pretty sure it’s blasphemous.
This kind of behavior is mentioned a *lot* more in the Bible than something you can pretend you think was about gay people–there are only a few passages like that.
Well said Jean. The homosexuals on here want everyone to tolerate, condone, and accept their immorality as normal. With them, good has become evil and evil has become good.
Steve,
First, I highly doubt that god tells you his relationship with others so please stop acting like your side has some sort of righteous background.
Second, we would like to be treated like human beings. It’s not too hard of a concept really so I don’t understand why you don’t seem to get it.
Third, you have absolutely no basis for any of those statements. Please offer some objective proof that homosexuality is not a normal part of the continuum. Republican Jesus does not count as proof.
Fourth, haven’t you been on here before? What exactly do you get out of this? I know why I follow this site; because I want to stay informed about the ongoing struggle that I am a part of in our quest to be recognized as citizens, as humans and deserving of love and decent treatment. Why do you show up and try to insert useless comments about how awful we are?
Fifth, before you make a statement about our immorality and evilness, I think you should actually know who you’re talking about. We ARE people too. I’m a teenager and a first year college student interested in studying history. I want to be a teacher because I value education. One of my hobbies is playwriting. My favorite book is “Macbeth”. I like classical music but also classic rock. I was raised by my mom and my dad in a suburb of a bigger city in the US and I’m very close to both of my parents. I’m a lesbian. Now that I’ve introduced myself, tell me again that I’m unnatural and wrong. If you can’t make that statement to me now that you know me a little, reconsider. This isn’t an abstract concept. You can’t be anti-gay rights and not anti-gay any more than you can be against letting Jews own businesses because they’re subhuman but not anti-Semitic (my family background is Jewish).
Sixth, please explain in specific terms the impact that gay people have on your life.
Thanks and I hope that maybe this made you think.
[...] right people. And if there’s one thing that the leadership of the Catholic Church has made abundantly clear, it’s that homophobic bigotry is both institutional policy and a top priority. Stay tuned, [...]