01/12/2004: 
Criminally Absurd
Archbishop lobbies against gay marriage
from AP
BOSTON - Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley urged Catholic lawyers Sunday to oppose gay marriage.
O'Malley said in a homily that the institutions of marriage and the family were under assault in America, and attorneys needed to help protect them.
"The social cost of the breakdown of family life has already been enormous," he said at the annual Red Mass, which is dedicated to judges, lawyers and others in the legal system.
"This point in history requires the diligent commitment of lawyers on behalf of marriage. ... The stakes are very high. The law is a powerful teacher. What do we want to teach our young people about marriage? It's not a question of live and let live, it's a question of right and wrong," he said.
Brilliant. This is just the sort of rhetoric that will attract liberal catholics still pissed for paying for Cardinal Law's mansion while priests are diddling and local parishes are about to be sold off. Genius. From a public relations standpoint, this is the best thing the church could have done, except maybe for still begging for forgiveness from the thousands of families trust that was betrayed. Oh, the church is against homosexuality! THEN STOP LETTING THEM BE PRIESTS. What? They wouldn't be any priests left you say? Open mouth, insert sandal.
More
Archbishop lobbies against gay marriageBy Theo Emery
Associated Press
BOSTON - Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley urged Catholic lawyers Sunday to oppose gay marriage.
O'Malley said in a homily that the institutions of marriage and the family were under assault in America, and attorneys needed to help protect them.
"The social cost of the breakdown of family life has already been enormous," he said at the annual Red Mass, which is dedicated to judges, lawyers and others in the legal system.
"This point in history requires the diligent commitment of lawyers on behalf of marriage. ... The stakes are very high. The law is a powerful teacher. What do we want to teach our young people about marriage? It's not a question of live and let live, it's a question of right and wrong," he said.
His call for action didn't include specifics on what the lawyers could do to protect marriage and the family.
But afterward, he said in an interview: "We hope that they will use their profession and their understanding of the law to defend marriage. They're in a better position than any of us to understand what needs to be done to correct a very complicated situation that the court has put us in."
Several hundred people attended the service at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross, which was to be followed by a Catholic Lawyers Guild luncheon at a hotel.
Later, at the luncheon, former Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork assailed a recent state Supreme Court ruling granting same-sex couples the right to marriage, calling it "untethered from the state and federal Constitution."
"If anything justifies the term ‘judicial tyranny,' this one does," said Bork, who converted to Catholicism last year.
O'Malley was installed July 30 as the head of the Boston Archdiocese, which has an estimated 2.1 million parishioners.
His first priority was to settle hundreds of clergy sex abuse lawsuits filed by people who accused priests of molesting them and the archdiocese of covering up the scandal. In September, the church reached a $85 million agreement to settle the cases.
Within weeks after the settlement, O'Malley began speaking out on social issues, leading an anti-abortion march and speaking out against gay marriage.
Former Supreme Judicial Court Justice Joseph R. Nolan, president of the Catholic Lawyers Guild, said he was "delighted" by what O'Malley said. He called gay marriage an "abomination."
"We should speak against it. We should have the courage to speak against it," he said.
Attorney James Kenneally, of Medford, a guild member, said, "I am wholeheartedly in favor of what the archbishop is saying," calling O'Malley "a man for the times."
Fliers on the tables at the luncheon urged lawyers to write their senators and representatives, opposing gay marriage.
Gary Buseck, executive director of Gay & Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, didn't immediately return a telephone call Sunday afternoon.
Gay marriage is a hot topic in Massachusetts. The Supreme Judicial Court ruled in mid-November that same-sex couples had a right to marry in the state.
The ruling was applauded as a civil rights milestone by gay activists. Plaintiffs in the suit were ecstatic, celebrating with immediate proposals of marriage to each other.
But there were plenty of critics, too, including the Catholic church. And politicos at the Statehouse have been looking into whether the court would be satisfied by the passage of a "civil union" law such as that passed in Vermont.
4 Annotations Submitted
Monday the 12th of January, rafuzo noted:
Why is this news to you, Jesuit-educated Prof_Booty?
Monday the 12th of January, prof_booty noted:
Well, I suppose I thought the new archbishop would have better sense to insert himself in to a political debate
a)so soon after a nearly crippling crisis
b)on a subject on which he seems hypocritical
c)knowing that most of the catholics around here are as liberal as Ted Kennedy.
Welcome to the new archdiocese, same as the old archdiocese. i hope BC buys the Chancery and turns it in to an institute to educate wicked liberal kids from New Jersey.
Monday the 12th of January, rafuzo noted:
So the wicked librul new joisey kids can roll doobs under the White Stripes poster that replaced the portrait of Cardinal Cushing
Monday the 12th of January, santo26 noted:
And you're surprised? Just because this touchy- feely Fransiscan became the Ahchbiship of Bawstin doesn't mean he isn't a Roman Catholic. He may wear a brown dress, but he gets his marching orders from the Pope just like Bernie did. I would be more surprised if he came out FOR gay marriage. Jesuit assassins would get him on TV, like Lee Harvey Oswald got gatted by Jack Ruby.
No matter which way you slice it, Roman Catholicism is Roman Catholicism, and they're still against abortions, gay marriage, and any other gays who don't try to suppress their wicked ways (unless, that is, you join the priesthood). If you want Catholicism Lite, join the Unitarians.
