Beginning late October, we rallied behind Kansas City-St. Joseph Bishop Robert Finn with vigor: we saturated the community with an ad that the Kansas City Star rejected for political reasons. Indeed, we hit virtually every Catholic church, school and lay organization in the area, along with other religious organizations, public and private schools and colleges, government officials, businesses [...]
WAR ON CHRISTMAS November Bellevue, WA – Shortly after Thanksgiving, Bob McLean, a United States Postal Service letter carrier, was taken off his route by his supervisor because someone complained about his Santa Clause uniform. “The government is shutting me down because it’s a non-postal regulation uniform,” said McLean, a USPS employee since 1971. In past [...]
MISCELLANEOUS January 20 The president of Al-Azhar, an Egyptian university, Sheikh Ahmed el-Tayeb, along with the leading members of the Islamic Research Academy, announced they were breaking off dialogue with the Vatican in response to Pope Benedict XVI’s criticism of Muslim violence against Christians. After he denounced the suicide bombing of a Coptic Christian church in [...]
Executive Summary Anyone who seeks to have an impact on the culture is bound to be controversial: it comes with the territory. Moreover, this is not a job for wimps. Judging from the reactions that were garnered in 2010, it is safe to say we made our mark. To be exact, we ignited more than one [...]
Activist Organizations January 12 In an article posted on TheWeek.com, Democratic consultant Bob Shrum took a shot at Catholic bishops for their opposition to abortion in the proposed health care bill: “Having abetted thousands of priests in molesting children, they’re now set on abusing health reform.” We called for an apology. Shrum couldn’t fight the bishops [...]
February 11 – 28 Tampa, FL – The Shimberg Playhouse hosted “Agnes of God,” a play based on the notoriously anti-Catholic movie by the same name. In the play, a novice nun gives birth in a convent and claims that the baby, who is murdered, was the result of a virgin conception. August 14 Hammonton, NJ – The musical “Bare” [...]
January 4 Celebrity Cruises announced that it would no longer have priests on board to celebrate daily and Sunday Masses. We immediately followed up by questioning the cruise line about its new policy. Celebrity replied to our inquiry by saying, “Out of respect for our guests of all religious faiths, Celebrity has chosen to align the [...]
Education January 17 Colorado Springs, CO – A wooden cross was placed at a prayer circle for Wiccans and pagans at the United States Air Force Academy. The reaction of the Academy was boilerplate. Air Force Academy Superintendent Lt. Gen. Michael Gould said, “We absolutely will not stand for this type of destructive behavior.” He continued, “I [...]
Government January-August San Francisco, CA – On January 20, a judge in a San Francisco court allowed attorneys David Boies and Theodore B. Olsen to submit e-mails they obtained between the director of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the bishops regarding support of Proposition 8, the 2008 California proposition which affirmed marriage as a union [...]
Media Archbishop Dolan’s Critics Freak Out In November, following the election of Archbishop Timothy Dolan as the President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, critics of the New York archbishop went ballistic. Here are a few examples: NPR was worried that Archbishop Dolan is “overtly conservative,” and Tim Rutten of the Los Angeles Times fretted about [...]
