A Thunderous Silence

The day before President Obama's commencement speech at Notre Dame, TIME Magazine ran the following story by Amy Sullivan stating that the Vatican had remained completely silent on the issue.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/08599189875600

This is not the case. At least two American members of the Roman Curia, the body of cardinals and bishops which functions as the Pope's cabinet, have spoken out on the issue. I fact, Sullivan quotes one, James Francis Cardinal Stafford, in her article.

Sullivan totally ignored the remarks of Archbishop Raymond Burke on the matter. Archbishop Burke is the Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura, an office roughly corresponding to a combination of Chief Justice and Attorney General for matters pertaining to Canon Law. In remarks to the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in Washington, DC on May 2, Archbishop Burke said:


"In a culture marked by widespread and grave confusion and error about the most fundamental teachings of the moral law, our Catholic schools and universities must be beacons of truth and right conduct. Clearly, the same is true of our Catholic charitable, missionary and healthcare institutions. There can be no place in them for teaching or activities which offend the moral law. Dialogue and respect for differences are not promoted by the compromise and even violation of the natural moral law. The profound granting of an honorary doctorate at Notre Dame University to our President who is as aggressively advancing an anti-life and anti-family agenda is a source of the gravest scandal. Catholic institutions cannot offer any platform to, let alone honor, those who teach and act publicly against the moral law. In a culture which embraces an agenda of death, Catholics and Catholic institutions are necessarily counter-cultural. If we as individuals or our Catholic institutions are not willing to accept the burdens and the suffering necessarily involved in calling our culture to reform, then we are not worthy of the name Catholic. "

Archbishop Burke reiterated his position on the EWTN news program The World Over in a taped interview conducted by Raymond Arroyo, which was broadcast on Sunday.

If that is silence, it is a most thunderous silence indeed.

So-called "liberal" Catholics and the toady media outlets are currently gloating over Monday's editorial in L'Osservatore Romano applauding the President's words at Notre Dame encouraging dialogue on the abortion issue, but have totally ignored the statements made by these prelates of the Church. They fail to notice that the Vatican newspaper and its editorial staff are not part of the Curia. If we compare the relationship of newspapers to members of the cabinet to the Vatican newspaper and members of the Curia, we must ask an important question, "Is an editorial in the New York Times as authoritative as the statements of the Attorney General made in an open forum?"

Further evidence of the Vatican's displeasure with the views of the Obama administration lies in the fact that the Holy See has rejected three candidates proposed thus far for the post of ambassador to the Holy See based upon the "pro-choice" views of the candidates. (BTW, Mr President, if you're reading this, I'm available). This would seem to me to underscore the Vatican's viewpoint that there is no room for "dialogue" on life issues.

If Ms Sullivan thinks that this is silence she would do well to think again. The Pope himself does not need to address this issue individually, it has been addressed in such Church documents as Ex Corde Ecclesiae, which outlines the role of Catholic institutions in the world, and those documents remain in force.

Til next time, all the best. Joe