I'd read about this, but I didn't realise it was Ray Bourgeois.
This post highlights my own very conflicted attitude toward The Church. On the one hand, I was raised very much in the progressive, liberation-theology wing of the Church. I've been to the SOA protests twice; my high school organised petitions for the Drop the Debt campaign; my entire devoutly-Catholic family is pro-choice, pro-ordination of women, and pro-gay marriage. I know that a lot of my own radical politics can be traced back to being raised Catholic, and in radical circles, I often find myself defending religion, in general, against accusations of being inherently reactionary.
But the Catholic Church itself is moving further and further to the right, and further and further away from any real commitment to social justice. Church leaders in the US were expecting everyone to vote Bush, despite the war and his indifference-at-best towards the poor - all because Obama is pro-choice. Ruth Kelly, who is a former cabinet minister in the UK is in Opus Dei and as such is vociferously anti-choice - yet voted in favour of the war in Iraq!!!
Progressive Catholics of my mother's generation stayed in the Church, despite their differences. But most of the progressive Catholics of my generation are leaving in droves. And the more progressives leave, the more conservative the Church gets - until it's a completely reactionary, yet marginal, institution.
This post highlights my own very conflicted attitude toward The Church. On the one hand, I was raised very much in the progressive, liberation-theology wing of the Church. I've been to the SOA protests twice; my high school organised petitions for the Drop the Debt campaign; my entire devoutly-Catholic family is pro-choice, pro-ordination of women, and pro-gay marriage. I know that a lot of my own radical politics can be traced back to being raised Catholic, and in radical circles, I often find myself defending religion, in general, against accusations of being inherently reactionary.
But the Catholic Church itself is moving further and further to the right, and further and further away from any real commitment to social justice. Church leaders in the US were expecting everyone to vote Bush, despite the war and his indifference-at-best towards the poor - all because Obama is pro-choice. Ruth Kelly, who is a former cabinet minister in the UK is in Opus Dei and as such is vociferously anti-choice - yet voted in favour of the war in Iraq!!!
Progressive Catholics of my mother's generation stayed in the Church, despite their differences. But most of the progressive Catholics of my generation are leaving in droves. And the more progressives leave, the more conservative the Church gets - until it's a completely reactionary, yet marginal, institution.
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