There’s been an interesting confluence of events regarding the connection between church and state that points up the danger of religious entities relying on government funding for its charitable activities.
Anybody with an ounce of common sense and the most rudimentary knowledge of government’s unlimited appetite for power would appreciate the problems inherent in relying on officialdom to restrain itself when holding the purse strings.
It should be axiomatic by now that when you take Caesar’s coin, you are going to have to take Caesar’s law. The sovereign state of Massachusetts has just supplied us with a powerful example of that inevitability and it should prove instructive to leaders of religious charitable institutions who reach out to secular government for financial assistance.
In the case in point, the conflict between secular authority and religious doctrine could not be more clear cut, and as it always does, secular power overwhelms religious doctrine.
The Catholic Charities organization in Boston has for almost 100 years offered adoption services under contract with the state. Faced however, with a clear conflict between an exercise in political correctness that resulted in a coercive state law, and Roman Catholic doctrine, the arrangement has by necessity now come to an end.
The board of directors of Catholic Charities has announced that Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Boston, will not seek a renewal of its contract with the Commonwealth of Massachusettsto provide adoption services. The reason? State law requires them to consider homosexuals and lesbians as parents, an aberration in the eyes of the Catholic Church.
“We have encountered a dilemma we cannot resolve,” said Rev. J. Bryan Hehir, president, and Jeffrey Kaneb, chairman of the board of trustees in a statement. “In spite of much effort and analysis, Catholic Charities finds that it cannot reconcile the teaching of the Church, which guides our work and the statutes and regulations of the Commonwealth.”
Added Fr. Hehir “This is a difficult and sad day for Catholic Charities. We have been doing adoptions for more than 100 years. We would like to thank the dedicated, highly-qualified staff that have carried out this ministry, often with great personal sacrifice. They are a great source of pride to this entire agency.”
The organization’s adoption arm has been on the dole from the state – last year it received approximately $1 million in reimbursements for its adoption-related work from the Department of Social Services.
This was in addition to the $18 million-plus funding it gets from various levels of government, all of which come with some strings attached.
According the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, homosexual adoptions “mean doing violence to these children, in the sense that their condition of dependency would be used to place them in an environment that is not conducive to their full human development.”
In the eye’s of the state of Massachusetts that’s a no-no. The welfare of the children doesn’t matter if it conflicts with the alleged rights and sensibilities of the homosexual and lesbian communities.
Even Father Hehir, who like his Catholic Charities counterparts throughout the United States is hooked on the government dole, has said that homosexual placement “is never a good fit” for his agency. He fails to note that neither is taking government money in spite of the dangers inherent in it. Take Caesar’s rule and you take Caesar’s coin, or else.
This incident brings up the whole matter of The Catholic Church’s acceptance in America of the notion that it is government’s function to act as a charitable institution and, moreover, it is the Church’s function to accept a subordinate role in obeying Jesus’ admonition to Peter to “feed my lambs, feed my Sheep.”
Writing in the Wall Street Journal’s “Opinion Journal Online,” Joseph Bottum, editor of First Things, touched on this while discussing the arrogant “statement of principles,” regurgitated by 55 allegedly Roman Catholic Democrat members of Congress as their apologia for their willingness to participate in, and defend their party which has allowed itself to become the shill for the homicidal abortion industry.
According to the description of the document issued by Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro’s (D-Conn) office, it “documents how [the signers’] faith influences them as lawmakers, making clear their commitment to the basic principles at the heart of Catholic social teaching and their bearing on policy–whether it is increasing access to education for all or pressing for real health care reform, taking seriously the decision to go to war or reducing poverty…”
There we go. Somehow or other the Feed my Lambs, Feed my sheep, obligation has become the responsibility of the federal government which experience shows can’t do anything right (did you hear Sen Bryan Dorgan’s speech the other day about the truck driver hired by FEMA to deliver ice to the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricane Katrinna who spent days being told to truck the stuff to Alabama and everyplace else but the Gulf Coast, and was finally directed to take it to Massachusetts – for use perhaps, at some gay and lesbian cocktail party to celebrate their coming victory over Catholic Charities – all at a cost to the taxpayers of $15,000?)
What these people are mistaking for solid Catholic doctrine is actually the gospel according to Karl Marx. That doctrine always becomes by necessity coercive, and those who accept it end up bowing to its authority.
Feeding His lambs and feeding His sheep is my responsibly and your responsibility and above all the responsibility of the Christian churches. We can’t lay it off on government and echo Scrooge’s question “Are there no workhouses.” to fulfill Christ’s command. It’s up to us.
Bottum put it this way: “Syntactical clumsiness makes the drafters (of the document ) conclude the statement: “we have a claim on the Church’s bearing as it does on ours.” But the meaning seems to be: If the Church thinks it can order us around, it’s got another think coming, ’cause we are the Church and the Church are we, and so by simple logic we get to order the Church around just as much it orders us around.”
Exactly. Their Congressional eminences lay it on the line so all those Catholic Charity officials in the U.S. embracing the doctrines of Karl Marx as promoted by the National Socialist Democrat Abortion Party needn’t be surprised when they feel the shackles of the state on their wrists and ankles, just as the folks in Boston did before they chose God over mammon.
“Published originally at EtherZone.com : republication allowed with this notice and hyperlink intact.”