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KELLY'S CORNER

NY Archbishop Dolan wrong to call Times writer Maureen Dowd anti-Catholic

By
Kelly Fincham

Published Saturday, October 31, 2009, 6:50 PM
Updated Tuesday, November 3, 2009, 8:40 PM

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NY Archbishop Dolan wrong to call Times writer Maureen Dowd anti-Catholic | IrishCentral




Maureen Dowd: Archbishop Dolan probably thinks he's put another 'uppity' womanin her place
Maureen Dowd: Archbishop Dolan probably thinks he's put another 'uppity' womanin her place

With the greatest respect, Archbishop Dolan, I have to say I completely disagree with your attack on Maureen Dowd.

Dolan, whose blog is called "The Gospel in the Digital Age," denounced Dowd's column in The New York Times last week as an "intemperate" and "scurrilous" "diatribe."

Dowd's crime? She had the temerity to question why women religious — nuns — are still treated as second-class citizens by the Church. She could have widened the discussion to ask why the Church treats all women as second-class citizens, but she confined it to nuns, saying the Vatican was trying to herd this elderly population back into their "old-fashioned habits and convents."

She pointed out how nuns, for the most part, were ministering to the poor and vulnerable, while a plague of pedophilia ran unchecked through the Church.

For this, Dolan accused Dowd of "digging deep in to the nativist handbook to use every anti-Catholic caricature possible, from the Inquisition to the Holocaust, condoms, obsession with sex, pedophile priests, and oppression of women, all the while slashing Pope Benedict XVI for his shoes, his forced conscription — along with every other German teenage boy — into the German army, his outreach to former Catholics, and his recent welcome to Anglicans."

Ouch.

So, you go back to read Dowd's column, and you wonder if the Archbishop hasn't temporarily taken leave of his senses.

Dowd's first mention of Pope Benedict is in the fifth paragraph, in which she identifies him as the author of a 2004 Vatican document which "urged women to be submissive partners, resisting any adversarial roles with men and cultivating 'feminine values' like 'listening, welcoming, humility, faithfulness, praise and waiting'.”

I don't know about anyone else reading this, but "humility" and "waiting" might be wonderful  traits in a dog, or even a cat — but they're not values I would urge a young woman to cultivate.

In fact, qualities like "humility" and "waiting" have probably contributed to keeping women's earnings pegged at 77 percent of men's, with a national average of $45,556 for men and $35,471 for women.

Yes, she also revisits Benedict's conscripted history in the Hitler Youth, but only in the context of his pardon for the bishop who claimed there were no Nazi gas chambers.

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Most recent of 10 Comments - See all comments

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Posted by athlonejackie on November 21,2009 | 02:59AM
Your Catholic Bashing continues in evey issue.
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Posted by jerryoneill on November 11,2009 | 04:06PM
I think that the good bishop should explain the 630 million dollars paid out to victims of 500 clergy boys in Los Angeles and the mere 200 Billion paid out since 1950 because of shepherds having little problems with their staffs. After that minor explanation he could move on to the more important stuff like like the temerity of Maureen Dowd. Ite, missa est. fodder.
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Posted by BeepBeep2 on November 9,2009 | 08:19AM
I think the Archbishop should stay in his place and watch his own sheep and not worry about what women are doing in the church. I agree, if it wasn't for the nuns, think how much worse things would have been! The Archbishops think they are above the church law. Get a life!
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Posted by Rayosun on November 8,2009 | 10:02PM
"But don't mind me. I'm just another uppity over educated under represented American Catholic woman." That's what my wife was, and I was a more fanatical Catholic than you could ever be, and a priest to boot. If WE could "kick the habit" and never regret being liberated from that infernal institution,
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Posted by Rayosun on November 8,2009 | 10:01PM
Sorry, but my prior post was meant to be a comment about "DocMary". She is the one who wrote in HER response: "But don't mind me. I'm just another uppity over educated under represented American Catholic woman. "
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Posted by Rayosun on November 8,2009 | 09:58PM
But don't mind me. I'm just another uppity over educated under represented American Catholic woman. That's what my wife was, and I was a more fanatical Catholic than you could ever be, and a priest to boot. If WE could "kick the habit" and never regret being liberated from that infernal institution, YOU can too. See http://jesuswouldbefurious.org/Churchvsex.html and you'll finally understand WHY the R.C. is so hung up about just about everything that has to do with SEX, and with WOMEN.






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