Chicago's Cardinal Francis George apologized Friday for remarks aired on Christmas Day comparing the gay pride parade to the Ku Klux Klan.But is the cardinal sorry for his words?
"I am truly sorry for the hurt my remarks have caused," George said in an interview with the Tribune. "Particularly because we all have friends or family members who are gay and lesbian. This has evidently wounded a good number of people. I have family members myself who are gay and lesbian, so it's part of our lives. So I'm sorry for the hurt."
"When I was talking, I was speaking out of fear that I have for the church's liberty and I was reaching for an analogy which was very inappropriate, for which I'm sorry," George said. "I didn't realize the impact of what I was saying. ... Sometimes fear is a bad motivation."Come now, Cardinal George, fear for the liberty of your church? Visit the Middle East, where, in certain countries, Christians are being killed for the faith, and perhaps you'll gain a bit of perspective about the threat to your church in the US.
George said he didn't expect the public uproar over the comments.Well, now he knows.
Photo from Wikipedia.
UPDATE: Oops, I forgot. H/T to Ann Fontaine at The Lead.
I agree. Cardinal ¨sort´a¨ lacks genuine humility...I kept thinking about him all morning while working in my taller...when are these overblown religious paraders, like HIM, going to start realizing they are quite simply not representative of a loving God...this guy is half mean nun and half benevolant dictator...one could become bi-polar trying to follow his shifty lead...only underscores the fact that he is confused and uninformed as he lashes out to save his sinking ship of a man.
ReplyDeleteBy apologizing for the 'hurt' rather than for his remarks which inflicted the hurt, he puts the onus on the victims if his ugly words. Not satisfactory!
ReplyDeleteIt boils down to the "How dare those whom we are free to designate as 'objectively disordered' and 'evil' have the nerve to disagree or object, via parades or other means, to our religious beliefs!" It is the clueless, "No Fair Fighting Back" of those accustomed to having their own way with their own, neglecting to note that others will not be so compliant.
ReplyDeleteIf I critique the RCC from time to time on this ground it is only because they critiqued me first!
I happen to think the Cardinal's apology is a good START.
ReplyDelete...but the proof will be in the pudding.
[Can ANYONE imagine now-Cardinal Dolan saying as much? That guy's a GradeA horse's posterior.... >:-/]
Tobias, exactly. They started it!
ReplyDeleteJCF, I wonder if even the non-apology apology would have been forthcoming if the cardinal had not been called to account.
If he's a Cardinal, why isn't he wearing a red dress?
ReplyDeleteWade, an excellent question, though one to which I have no answer.
ReplyDeleteHe probably figures black is more slimming...
ReplyDeletePossibly. Black usually is more slimming.
ReplyDeletePerhaps he felt red would say "AH HA HA HA HA I'M NOT SORRY AT ALL."
ReplyDeleteTrue, Cathy. Red is not a 'Sorry' color.
ReplyDeleteA big hunk of the problem is that most people think that a Bishop/Cardinal,as a leadership figure, should be a person who understands people and their needs in a realistic way. But many of these men have been on a career track since their teens, living intellectually sheltered lives and wrapped in the mantle of "obedience". As they go along in their careers, their advancement is a reward for burying their heads in the treacherous sands of church proclamations, and they become further and further removed from
ReplyDeletethey realities of everyday lives and problems of society.
And so we have the situation of people in the real world trying to follow and make sense of rules issued by people who might as well live on another planet.
I worked for a priest who refused to allow the creation of a Boy Scout Troop in the parish because he said that Boy Scouts were "Secular Humanists" and when he was questioned about this, he revealed real panic about the Boy Scouts and "Secular Humanism", but couldn't really say what he meant by either.
This was a man who had been sent abroad to a minor seminary at age 13 and had never been a Scout. His whole life since age 13 had been in a church organization, and he was actually afraid of the world outside of his Rectory and Church.
As u can imagine, people who tried to follow his leadership became more and more confused and angry.One exasperated parent said to me "the more I listen to him, the more confused I get."
Being rewarded for blind obedience leaves one blind and ineffectual.
nij
Nij, thanks for your thoughtful reply. The RC priests I knew as a child and as a young person all were formed in just such the manner as you describe, and they were out of touch with life out there in the real world.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't a priest or in formation to be a priest (Of course not! I am a woman!), yet I was well indoctrinated into the ways of obedience.
The priests did not know what life in the rest of the world was like, and if the priest had aspirations beyond being a parish priest, then he had to keep his nose clean and follow orders.
Still, within the parishes, the priests sometimes acted like petty dictators with their do-it-because-I-say-so mind-set, when their life experiences were so far distant from those of their parishioners.
Yes, Mimi, it reminds me of a fellow student, young man, who was in a Pastoral Ministry track with me in a predominantly women's Catholic college. He was always dressed in casual clothes and was a lot of fun and seemed to like and understand people. After a while I found out that he was actually a priest from another state incognito. Seems he wanted to further his education and had been denied permission to do so by his bishop. (This was a form of keep-them-pregnant-and-down-on-the-farm for priests who were marked for parish ministry forever.) So he enrolled in a woman's college, out of his state (almost 3 hour drive each way) and attended class on his one day off every week. He was determined to get his Master's. I often wonder if he stayed in the priesthood or transferred to an Order. Needless to say, he got a lot of sympathetic co-operation from the Sisters who ran the college!
ReplyDeletenij
Nij, that is a sad story.
ReplyDeleteI have mostly fond memories of the nuns in my RC schools. I well remember that a goodly number of them were more intelligent and common-sensical than the parish priest.
I do know other people raised in the RCC and they say you were just expected to do whatever the priest said. That seems inconceivable to me.
ReplyDeleteThat's how it was, Cathy. Now, it seems inconceivable to me, but I played the game far too long.
ReplyDelete