Sara Lin Wilde is a recovering Catholic (and cat-holic, for that matter - all typographical errors are the responsibility of her feline friends). She lives in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, where she is working on writing a novel that she really, really hopes can actually get published.
Australian Cardinal George Pell has admitted during a parliamentary inquiry in Victoria that the Catholic Church has worked to systemically cover up child sexual abuse in Australian parishes. The recent papabile described the rape of children as young as five-years-old in response to questions from the inquiry. He declared that he was “fully apologetic and absolutely sorry” for the Church’s complicity, and — when asked whether he considered the acts “totally un-Christ-like” — admitted, “I would have to agree with you.” [Click headline for more…] Read more
Cardinal Timothy Dolan is leading the charge against Obama’s HHS Mandate, which requires all employers — even Catholic ones — to provide health plans that cover “preventive health services” for women. Listening to him speak on the subject, you’d think a mandate that businesses must pay for employees’ contraceptives and abortions would utterly and absolutely destroy the Catholic Church — and America! — as we know it. It’s about religious freedom, he insists, and it’s a slippery slope towards the removal of that freedom: [Click headline for more…] Read more
Changes in the economics of providing health care have led to a wave of hospital mergers, many of which include wealthy Catholic organizations buying up struggling secular hospitals. We’ve already covered how these mergers can affect patient care by pushing religion-based standards of care onto non-Catholic patients. Now Washington, among the bluest of blue states when it comes to medical ethics, has become a flashpoint in this particular conflict, and the rights of patients rest in the balance. [Click headline for more…] Read more
A little while ago, I reported on the Vatican’s plans to bring the “Courtyard of the Gentiles” to Mexican non-believers, with the prediction that the Church wanted to proselytize — not dialogue — and aimed to tell everyone in attendance why their beliefs were wrong and Catholicism is right all the time. It turns out, though, that even Catholic-identified Mexicans can’t escape criticism for how they practice their faith. Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, has taken aim at the popular Mexican cult of Santa Muerte. The roots of the iconic skeletal figure famously honored in colorful Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) celebrations can be traced to the historical blending of Old-World Catholicism with indigenous beliefs and practices, and she is honoured in many Mexican homes and families today: [Click headline for more…] Read more
