There is a game being played in this presidential campaign about religion, but the players are not the candidates—the culprits are the pundits and activists. It started on May 3, when Chris Matthews asked Governor Mitt Romney during MSNBC's Republican presidential debate, "What do you say to Roman Catholic bishops who would deny communion to elected [...]
On May 7, Rev. Al Sharpton debated noted atheist Christopher Hitchens, author of God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, at the New York Public Library on the question of God's existence. In the course of the debate, Hitchens made a snide reference to a Mormon candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, Governor Mitt Romney. When [...]
On its May 10 front page, the New York Times offered the headline "In Large Immigrant Family, Religion Guided 3 Held in Fort Dix Plot" for an article about the men arrested for plotting a terror attack against soldiers based in New Jersey. Inside the paper, another headline read, "Suspects Are Described as Working People for Whom Religion [...]
In a May 14 story on Pope Benedict XVI's address to bishops in Brazil, the Associated Press reported that the pope "defended the church's often bloody campaign to Christianize indigenous people…." The same day, a story by McClatchy newspapers said that the pope "defended the Roman Catholic Church's often bloody campaign to Christianize indigenous people." There [...]
Eighteen Democratic members of Congress sent out a statement dated May 10 criticizing Pope Benedict XVI for his supposed stance on Catholic politicians and abortion. The Democrats chided the pope for allegedly agreeing with Mexican bishops for invoking excommunication in dealing with Catholic lawmakers who voted to legalize abortion. These Democrats are twice a disgrace. First, [...]
The Rev. Jerry Falwell, one of America's most prominent religious leaders, passed away on May 15 at the age of 73. Jerry Falwell did more to mobilize evangelicals than any other leader in the nation. He not only inspired them to become active politically, he encouraged them to rethink their positions on a host of issues, [...]
Hiding the truth about something is just as dishonest as telling a lie. Last month, the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) was guilty of both forms of dishonesty. On May 1, Catholic League president Bill Donohue attended a private screening of "Islam vs. Islamists: Voices from the Muslim Center" and was impressed at how the film shows [...]
Every organization has its bad apples and dirty laundry, but most people know that this alone doesn't disqualify any group of people from exercising the freedoms of speech and religion. Unless that group is the Catholic Church, that is—plenty of people use the sex abuse scandal to try to silence the Church, especially when the Church [...]
Literally thousands of incidents involving "creative liberties" with Catholic practices have come to the attention of the Catholic League over the years. Many of them are minor in nature, if not entirely innocent. However, the April 29 episode of the Fox TV show, "Family Guy," definitely crossed a line. The program assaulted and demeaned the Eucharist, [...]
After the Supreme Court upheld the partial birth abortion ban on April 18, Bill Donohue predicted that anti-Catholic bigots would "go bonkers over the fact that all five of the justices who voted against infanticide are Roman Catholic." Donohue's prediction was right on target. Most of the bigots expressed their anti-Catholicism orally or in print. But [...]
