{"id":7103,"date":"2004-06-24T08:28:25","date_gmt":"2004-06-24T08:28:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/viamedia\/2004\/06\/bishop_watch.html"},"modified":"2004-06-24T08:28:25","modified_gmt":"2004-06-24T08:28:25","slug":"bishop_watch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2004\/06\/bishop_watch.html","title":{"rendered":"Bishop Watch"},"content":{"rendered":"

First, the interim reflections on McCarrick’s task force, posted on the USCCB website. <\/a><\/p>\n

I think all of the statements here are well worth reading – necessary, in fact, if you’re a person with a serious interest in this issue. I have to say, though, that an element of all of these statements which I find irritating is the credit, for lack of a better word, that the bishops are giving these abortion-rights supporting politicians. The image you end up with is of noble folk valiantly struggling with their consciences, perhaps misinformed on some matters, who are really trying to do what’s right in terms of this issue, trying to balance the unborn’s right to life with the complexities of political decision-making in a diverse society.<\/p>\n

Maybe there’s one guy who’s like that. Somewhere. I don’t know who it is, but I’ll give them that. One guy.<\/p>\n

But otherwise…geez. Most of the statements and actions we’ve seen from abortion-rights supporting Catholic politicos have been of two kinds: First, simple and direct buying into the abortion-rights lingo and action, which cares not a whit about unborn human beings, and secondly, the “struggle” that results from a Democratic (and in some places, like MA, CA and NY – Republican, as well, of course) aspirant to higher office realizing, “Hey, I’m never going to get anywhere in this party if I keep voting pro-life. Better “grow in my views.”<\/p>\n

And just a quick read – I’ll come back later and read more, and correct myself if I’m wrong – shows another deficiency. The bishops emphasize the need to really proclaim the pro-life message, and the centrality of this issue over other moral issues, but what I don’t see is an equal emphasis on the need to really get down on the ground and re-catechize American Catholics as to the nature of Eucharist, and what it means to share in it – on a personal and corporal level. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

First, the interim reflections on McCarrick’s task force, posted on the USCCB website. I think all of the statements here are well worth reading – necessary, in fact, if you’re a person with a serious interest in this issue. 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The Catholicism comes from her side. Amy grew up in a number of places - Indiana - Washington, DC - Lubbock Texas - Arlington, Virginia - DeKalb, Illinois - Lawrence, Kansas - and Knoxville, Tennessee, where the family settled in 1973. She attended Knoxville Catholic High School, then the University of Tennessee where she majored in history. She received an MA in Church History from Vanderbilt University, where she wrote a thesis on the changing role of women in 19th century American Protestantism, and the ways Scripture was used to justify those changes. She worked as as a teacher in Catholic high schools and a Parish Director of Religious Education and started writing for the diocesan press - the Florida Catholic - in 1988. Amy has written columns for Our Sunday Visitor and Catholic News Service at times over the past twenty years. Her articles have been published in venues ranging from Our Sunday Visitor to the New York Times to Commonweal. She has written 17 books. 18, if you included the as yet tragically unpublished novel. Amy has five children, ranging in age from 26 to 4 and was married to Michael Dubruiel, who died unexpectedly in February 2009. She lives in Birmingham, Alabama.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/author\/awelborn"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/180"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7103"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7103\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}