I thought the Pope fixed all that Priest + little boy shit. Doesn’t he just wave a wand or something? What the fuck’s the point of that ridiculous outfit if you can’t just wave a fucking wand?

As I’ve said before of Bill Donohue: who died and made that fucker Pope?

The Catholic Church is not short on hierarchy, and it’s about fucking time that the press got some bishops on record either supporting him or washing their hands of his exact words, because outsourcing the hellfire and brimstone to that gobshite is starting to look pretty fucking cowardly.

(Wingnut welfare roll call: the bastard gets $400,000 a year out of his ongoing grift.)

Thank you, TBogg, for that Kathy Griffin moment. It made me smile.

Here’s another : ‘also’

Bus loads full of school kids handed over to the tender ministrations of Catholic Bishops. What could possibly go wrong?

Maybe we should place a few of these signs around the capitol.

You know, Bill Donohue spends A Lot of time talking about anal sex. Just sayin’.

“This is going to be fought out with lawsuits, with court decisions, and, dare I say it, maybe even in the streets,” Donohue said.

Do you think BillDo even cares that 28 states already have similar requirements? A few of them don’t even allow exemptions for churches.

I’d say the only street in any real danger from Billdo and the Pope’s men is Sesame Street.

It’s all the fault of the dirty fucking hippies.

Speaking of effed-up priorities: a priest in Belleville, IL, was
asked to resign recently. Was it over buggering nuns? Altar boys? Nooooo. It was because he wouldn’t recite Mass word-for-word from the new Missal!

Bugger boys or nuns: keep your job. Alter the text of the missal: be asked to leave.

If anything better illustrates the effed-up priorities of the Church, I would be interested to see it.

“The overwhelming majority of those abused were postpubescent males–they are not children.”

Okay, so if the majority were adolescent males, then I guess that makes said “priestly” conduct…erm… What? The kid’s own fault? Not all that bad? Just a priest and underage boy thing, you know how it is?

Notice how Big Windy conveniently glided over the fact that some were NOT postpubescent males. In fact, not all the child victims were even male–not that girls count for much, seeing’s they grow into women and who cares about them?

Were I one of those men in high hats, I’d get out my shepard’s crook and yank Donohue off the public stage before he torches the whole theater.

Perhaps we can come to a compromise. If the catholic institutions cover birth control costs, taxpayers will supply them with wetsuits and dildos.

Also, I think this is a positive;

“Never before, unprecedented in American history, for the federal government to line up against the Roman Catholic Church,” said Catholic League head Bill Donohue.

So Bill and his band of Merry Fiddlers in Robes supported the Roe vs. Wade decision? That is shocking.

Bill Donohue is hardly worth all this venom – but whatever floats your boat. The mix of truth and non-truth in Bill Donohue’s statements is classic “Fox news” summarization.

Abuse of children is always horrible, but as to trusting children to one of the 70 million Catholics in this country, even the priests and Bishops, on a bus trip, well I suspect they will be as safe as they would be with one of the 6 million adult atheists in this country (the number of accused priests is less than 1% of those in the priesthood – the equivalent access to children profession would be grade school teacher and scout leader and I can find no studies – just stories – about those without religion who have harmed children in those professions – it would be, for some, an interesting comparison if a study was done – but I doubt it will be done since there would be no one to sue using its data).

The law is absolute in not allowing the government to tell a church how to use its money on its priestly work force, how to pay its priests. When one moves from working for the church in a priestly function to working in a secular function the rules change – so I don’t believe Bill Donohue’s outrage will lead to any change.

OT: I’m seeing tweets that are quoting AP as reporting that Karen Handel is OUT at SGK.

Taking the fight over contraception to the streets? How exactly would you do that?

Occupy Vaginas?

I’m trying to imagine the chants and the language on the signs…..

Aaaand, her resignation letter (linked by Think Progress tweet; appears to be legit).

Hmmm, looks like a brand new website.
I assume MartyredByBabyKillingHarryLeggedFemiNazis.com must have been already taken.

Donohue isn’t worth the venom? Really?

I am not religious. I stopped attending devout observances when I was 18 and I am now 62. I TRY not to let the fact that this country is awash in religious nutcases bother me. But I must say, whenever that ignorant bigot shows up on television the thought flows through my head, “So THAT’S why my ancestors were willing to die horrible deaths to avoid being Catholic!”

I mean, outside of the Catholic church’s frontal attack on public education (vouchers) and their willingness to destroy the Democratic party over reproductive issues, I could even ignore their creepy clergy with their disgusting views on sex. But since the mother church HATES democracy, I am glad my tribe starting ignoring it back in 1517.

There is a simple solution to BigBill’s concerns about his churches having to pay for contraception: national single payer health care. But that idea makes the baby Jebus cry*.

* and by “baby Jebus”, I mean our corporate overlords.

Over at TPM, Josh Marshall gets concern trolled by someone who was a liberal until Obama forced Catholic-run healthcare groups who are accepting taxpayer money to abide by the same rules as everyone else who gets taxpayer money:

I’m a long time reader. I gave several hundred dollars to the Obama campaign in 2008 (and am sure I was well over a thousand given to all Democrats I supported). I worry about conservative Catholic bishops. I worry about the GOP in this time of talk radio and Fox News. I fear greatly the possibility of the GOP winning in 2012. I am not a conservative, by any stretch of the imagination.

However, I am a liberal Catholic, and I am very disappointed by the restrictive conscience clause concerning requirements to provide contraception. I am even more disappointed, and surprised, by your coverage of this issue. Your report today by Sahil Kapur writes: “But the policy itself carves out an exemption for churches and doesn’t require any individual or employer to violate a religious belief —”
How do you know that this does not force an employer to violate a religious belief? Have you interviewed knowledgeable Catholic moral theologians to get their take? (Even liberal ones!) If you did, I can find no evidence of that in your report. If you did not, how do you know that it does not violate their beliefs? I am not advocating for some kind of even handed he said/she said. But it sure would be nice to see at least some effort to hear from the folks who say that they do, indeed, need to violate their beliefs (or to stop providing insurance), due to this decision. This is shoddy journalism.

I have suspended donations to the President over this issue. America Magazine (hardly a conservative mouthpiece) has railed against it. Some folks at Commonweal (though not all) have complained. Same with the liberal National Catholic Reporter. E.J. Dionne and Mark Shields have spoken out against it. The folks from the Catholic health system whose support was likely essential for the Affordable Care Act have spoken out against it. What I hear from you is the sort of casual dismissal of alternative points of view that I mostly associate with the political right.

I stopped reading the Washington Monthly because their presentation of religious concerns showed a clear lack of effort to understand the point of view of people who are religious. I never thought I would need to worry about that with TPM. Now I do.

And now he will do what – donate to Rick Santorum? You know, fuck these people who are so fucking concerned with the GOP taking over America that they feel the only solution is to do whatever conservatives want, especially if that means relegating the medical care of half of America to the tender mercies of the pedophile-ridden Catholic Church. Fuck Bill Donohue, too.

I say if Bill and the bishops want to find out just how many American Catholics support the use of birth control, bring it on!

“What do we want? Forced Childbirth! When do we want it? Now!” I imagine that the chantees will have a distinctly baritone sound to them, though.

I’m one hundred percent in favor of Bill Donohue using some form of birth control. Like castration, for example.

My mom was a devout Catholic….she got her BC from her OB/GYN – my Uncle, who was also a devout Catholic. He was a Holy Cross/Georgetown Med graduate…and I can tell you that he was held in very high esteem in our community and church. He didn’t do abortions…he did D & C’s. There were many holiday gatherings my aunt and uncle would have where the local parish priest would preside over the blessings of the meal – assuming he wasn’t incapacitated by the scotch and soda hi-balls in the run-up to the meal.

Back in the 70′s, I knew a lot of committed Jesuit Priests and Scholastics that were big into social justice. I’ve been a practicing lapsed Catholic for about 30 years now and I suspect it’s a different kind of thinking permeating the priesthood today. It’s becoming a refuge for socially maladjusted individuals with conservative tendencies. Back in the 90′s, my wife and I finally had a marriage ceremony in a Catholic Church. We did it because it meant so much to my mom. Soon thereafter, that priest was indicted on charges brought by a brother(!) who claimed he had been sexually molested by him as a child. His replacement later Confirmed my kids – he ended up committing suicide for reasons unknown to me.

The point is, Bishop’s exert a lot of influence on who gets into the Priesthood today…and they are not much interested in those individuals that want to advocate social justice and support enlightened social thinking – liberalism. Bishop’s are the Republican class of the Catholic Church and they operate as unit VP’s tasked with running their operations with a positive cash flow. Much like the Republican Party, they don’t really give a shit about the needs of the Congregation and aren’t dependent on the collection plate. They are into bigtime fundraising and getting their endowments/bequeathments from the 1% and that’s the values that are being reflected today.

…(the number of accused priests is less than 1% of those in the priesthood …

If it were simply a matter of a few bad priests you might have a point. Since, however, the entire Catholic church has worked very hard to cover up the assaults and continues to protect the criminals, by order of the Vatican, the claim, ” only a few of ‘em did it so it’s unfair to blame the church” is just sophistic bullshit.

I wonder what their stance is on covering Viagra for unmarried men? I mean, they have no business getting a hard-on. They can’t even jack off. I’m serious.

Rome has deliberately forgotten that what the Vatican II Council was really about was returning power back to local bishops and laity. Paul VI reneged on that immediately, and John Paul II killed it completely. The Church is more hierarchical now than it was before John XXIII.

The Curia is textbook on a top-down, center run institution. The rules are more important than the people. Every priest on the planet knows the score: obey or be posted to Siberia. It’s time for a Occupy Vatican movement, but then they’d all just be excommunicated.

They can’t even jack off. I’m serious.

They aren’t supposed to be doing that even if capable. It’s a sin.

Edit: on re-reading your comment, it seems I’ve just repeated what you said. Doh!

“Abuse of children is always horrible, but…” Yes it is and there are no excuses allowed, yours or anyone else’s.

owlbear, it appears that papau just wanted to mention that there are a lot of atheists (and [s]he assumes they would have a high rate of pedophilia because, jeeze, you know, atheists) and who knows how many of them have access to children and nobody is making reports about that, so everybody can just shut up about Catholic priests and bishops. Some people would rather we stopped discussing Bill Donohue or his church, and will throw up any straw man to make it so.

Hundreds of priests reading anti-birth control letters to their flocks of contraceptive pill-popping, condom-wearing, IUD-harboring normal American Catholics. Yup, that’ll make a difference.

The Catholic hierarchy apparently doesn’t know many ordinary Catholics.

Over at TPM, Josh Marshall gets concern trolled by someone

That sounds like the same concern troll who concern-trolled Balloon Juice. Concern troll’s concern is noted.

Seriously, WTF? Catholic hospitals in Canada deal with it. Catholic hospitals in 28 states deal with it. That’s because the Catholic medical-industrial complex knows what side its bread is buttered.

If Catholic hospitals are operating solely on their own, obtaining no funding from any govt entity, then they can pick & choose the services they render, I guess. However, if they’re getting tax dollars (you know, as in from: me), then I want them to follow the LAW.

It’s pretty simple really. Pick your poison.

And for the record, anyone who wants to give the Catholic church a “pass” on their very very huge problem with pedophilia – based on the fact that “others” do it, too – please spare me the guilt trip. Yes, others do it, too, for sure. But many of these “others” are not in an organized, hierarchical stucture that calls itself a “church” purported to be ministering to millions of people globally. I don’t believe, either, that it’s “less than 1%” of priests who have abused children. Not for an instant.

If the Boy or Girl Scouts (or other similar organizations) are proven to have as serious of a problem as the RC Church, then I would full expect that organization would be under very close scrutiny. And parents would be on notice of what’s going on and could act accordingly.

IMO, there is no “but” when discussing child abuse. JMHO, of course.

Agree with everything everybody says about Gasbag Bill O’ (Donohue, this time around, not Reilly).

But there’s just something about Kathy Griffin that makes me turn into Cosmo Kramer every time she opens her mouth:

Now you gotta shut up!

So if Catholic women who’ve used BC are the 98%, is church hierarchy the 2%? Without dollar signs involved you gotta track the power relationship old school.

I’d add that if they don’t want to pay for BC for their employees, they can stop serving and hiring people who aren’t practicing Catholics. (That is, Roman Catholic. I’m not sure the various other flavors of Catholic care so much about it.)

Maybe he couldn’t stomach that line in the new Apostles’ Creed: “He descended into hell.”

Looks like the church is moving back from the spirit to the letter — which killeth.