Senator John McCain was asked today about the criticism he has taken for speaking highly of Rev. John Hagee. His initial response was to say that he was “very proud” of Hagee’s “spiritual leadership,” noting, however, “That does not mean that I support or endorse or agree with some of the things that Pastor Hagee might have said or positions that he may have taken on other issues.” Now, in an official statement, he is saying that “in no way did I intend for his [Hagee’s] endorsement to suggest that I in turn agree with all of Pastor Hagee’s views, which I obviously do not.”

Catholic League president Bill Donohue responded this way:

“McCain’s latest response is helpful, if disappointing. I expected more from the self-described ‘Straight Talk’ presidential candidate. Why couldn’t he have spoken specifically to the Catholic-bashing record of John Hagee?

“Contrast McCain’s tepid response to what George W. Bush said in a letter to Cardinal John O’Connor regarding his 2000 appearance at Bob Jones University. Bush said he did not approve of ‘the anti-Catholic and racially divisive views associated with that school.’ He added, ‘Such opinions are personally offensive to me, and I want to erase any doubt about my views and values.’ Moreover, Bush opined that ‘I reject religious intolerance—because faith is defined by grace and hope, not fear and division.’ Right after Bush sent his letter, Cardinal O’Connor sought my response. I appeared on the ‘Today Show’ to say I was satisfied; this effectively put an end to this issue.

“McCain will have other opportunities to address this issue. He would be well advised to model himself on Bush’s Bob Jones response if he wants to bury it altogether. Meanwhile, it would be even better if Hagee would cease and desist from demonizing my religion. And we would really appreciate it if McCain gave Hagee some ‘Straight Talk’ and told him to zip it.”

Yesterday, Catholic League president Bill Donohue criticized Senator John McCain for embracing Rev. John Hagee; the Texas minister has a long record of Catholic bashing. Referring to Hagee’s endorsement on Wednesday, McCain reiterated his position on Thursday saying he was “pleased” to “have received the endorsement of Pastor John Hagee.”

Interestingly, the Hagee endorsement didn’t sit well with presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee; he expressed his “disappointment and surprise” with Hagee for not choosing him.

Donohue weighed in on this today:

“If Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator Barack Obama were fighting over the support of Louis Farrakhan, we’d say they’re nuts. So what are we to conclude about McCain’s embrace of Hagee, and Huckabee’s lament for not getting the bigot’s endorsement?

“I am pleased to have the unsolicited support of Rabbi Irwin Kula, president of the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership; he is one of the nation’s most prominent Jewish leaders. Here is what he told me: ‘We Jews should know best, from our own history, that looking away and ignoring someone’s hate and bigotry because it is pointed at another group and not at us is short-sighted and wrong…Jews as well as all Americans need to make equal demands of our political leaders to renounce support from bigots and hate-mongers.’ He concludes by imploring McCain to ‘reject Pastor Hagee’s hate whatever the political calculations and consequences.’ [To read Kula’s entire statement, click here.]

“Just this week, McCain repudiated the remarks of talk radio host Bill Cunningham. He should now repudiate Hagee’s long record of bashing Catholicism. After all, George W. Bush apologized for speaking at Bob Jones University, and Hagee makes Jones look like a lightweight in the ring of bigotry.”

Yesterday, Senator John McCain said he was “very honored by Pastor John Hagee’s endorsement.” The Republican presidential hopeful also called Hagee “the staunchest leader of our Christian evangelical movement,” citing the minister’s pro-Israel stance.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue addressed this today:

“There are plenty of staunch evangelical leaders who are pro-Israel, but are not anti-Catholic. John Hagee is not one of them. Indeed, for the past few decades, he has waged an unrelenting war against the Catholic Church. For example, he likes calling it ‘The Great Whore,’ an ‘apostate church,’ the ‘anti-Christ,’ and a ‘false cult system.’ To hear the bigot in his own words, click here. Note: he isn’t talking about the Buddhists.

“In Hagee’s latest book, Jerusalem Countdown, he calls Hitler a Catholic who murdered Jews while the Catholic Church did nothing. ‘The sell-out of Catholicism to Hitler began not with the people but with the Vatican itself,’ he writes.

“For the record, Hitler persecuted the Catholic Church and was automatically excommunicated in 1931—two years before he assumed power—when he acted as best man at Joseph Goebbel’s Protestant wedding. Hitler even bragged about his separation from the Church. As for doing nothing about the Holocaust, Sir Martin Gilbert reminds us that Goebbels denounced Pope Pius XII for his 1942 Christmas message criticizing the Nazis (the New York Times lauded the pope for doing so in an editorial for two years in a row). Much to Hagee’s chagrin, Gilbert also says that Pius XII saved three quarters of the Jews in Rome, and that more Jews were saved proportionately in Catholic countries than Protestant countries. Indeed, Israeli diplomat Pinchas Lapide credited the Catholic Church with saving 860,000 Jews. No religion can match that.

“Senator Obama has repudiated the endorsement of Louis Farrakhan, another bigot. McCain should follow suit and retract his embrace of Hagee.”

In last night’s debate between Senator Barack Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton, MSNBC moderator Tim Russert asked both presidential candidates whether there was “any word or vote that you’d like to take back” in your “careers in public service.” Senator Obama cited his role in a unanimous decision by the U.S. Senate regarding the Terri Schiavo case. He said it was “a mistake” for the Congress “to interject itself into that decision-making process of the families” to settle her fate.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue addressed this issue today:

“So now we know that Obama thinks it was a mistake—the biggest mistake he’s ever made in public life—to allow Schiavo’s parents the right to petition a federal court over the withdrawal of food and medical services necessary to save her life. Never mind that the vote was merely procedural: it simply allowed the patient’s parents the right to ask for federal review, never guaranteeing a particular outcome. Moreover, the bill was case specific—it had no bearing on any case other than Schiavo’s, and it explicitly said that ‘nothing in this Act shall constitute a precedent with respect to future legislation.’ Yet Obama now says his vote ‘was not something I was comfortable with, but it was not something that I stood on the floor and stopped.’ How revealing.

“Just as important as what Obama said is what he didn’t say: He could have taken the opportunity to say that the biggest blunder of his career in public life was his vote to kill a bill in the Illinois legislature that would have provided medical care for infants who survive abortions. In 2003, while chairman of the Health and Human Services Committee of the Illinois Senate, he led the fight to oppose a bill that would have mandated health care for a baby who survived an abortion, and he did so even though the bill explicitly said it would not imperil Roe v. Wade.

“In conclusion, Senator Obama thinks it is none of the federal government’s business to allow doctors to intentionally starve a person to death, nor is it the law’s business to require doctors to attend to the health care of a fully born baby who has survived an abortion. All this from the Minister of Hope.”

A bill has been introduced into the Colorado legislature that would inhibit the right of a Catholic order of nuns to purchase two non-Catholic hospitals in the Denver area. The Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth Health System is seeking to acquire Lutheran and Good Samaritan hospitals, something the proposed legislation wants to thwart.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue supports the efforts of Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput and the Colorado Catholic Conference to help the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth succeed in their quest to obtain the two hospitals. Here is what he said:

“The idea that the Catholic Church wants to impose its will on the public is one of the oldest and most invidious canards ever expressed. Ironically, here we go again—except in reverse: It is the Church’s adversaries who want to impose their secular conception of health care on the Sisters. What is bothering some Colorado lawmakers is the right of Catholic hospitals not to perform operations, or make available certain drugs, which violate their ethical standards.

“The Catholic League stands with Archbishop Chaput when he says, ‘They [the Sisters] can’t compromise their Catholic beliefs without undermining their whole mission.’ It is for this reason that we strongly urge all members of the Colorado legislature to protect the religious liberty rights of the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth to exercise their religious strictures.”

Contact: Morgan Carroll, chief sponsor of this draconian legislation:morgan.carroll.house@state.co.us

Catholic League president Bill Donohue takes issue with a column by Joe Feuerherd that appeared in yesterday’s Washington Post:

“According to Feuerherd, his decision to vote for a pro-abortion candidate in the Maryland primary, namely Barack Obama, means that the bishops have consigned him to Hell. Indeed, his vote means that he has put his ‘soul at risk,’ all but assuring himself of a ‘ticket to Hell.” He concludes by charging, ‘the bishops be damned.’ In between, Feuerherd manages to impugn the motives of the bishops, offer snide remarks and misrepresent Church teachings.

“The bishops’ document that Feuerherd references, Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship, says at one point that ‘It is important to be clear that the political choices faced by citizens…may affect the individual’s salvation.’ Two paragraphs above that one it explicitly says that when all candidates ‘hold a position in favor of an intrinsic evil,’ the voter may decide not to vote or to ‘vote for the candidate deemed less likely to advance such a morally flawed position and more likely to pursue other authentic human goods.’ In the next paragraph it says, ‘In the end, this is a decision to be made by each Catholic guided by a conscience formed by Catholic moral teaching.’ Does this sound like the bishops have condemned Feuerherd to Hell?

“Feuerherd would have us believe that the document lists as ‘intrinsically evil’ such things as ‘abortion, stem cell research and same-sex marriage.’ He is twice wrong. The document does not call either stem cell research or same-sex marriage ‘intrinsically evil.’ There are eight acts which merit that label: abortion, euthanasia, human cloning, the destruction of embryos, genocide, torture, racism and targeting noncombatants in war.

“Feuerherd is angry because issues like ‘affordable housing’ are not given the same preeminent status as killing the innocent. He is entitled to his opinion, but he is not entitled to bash the bishops or distort their words, not even in his quest for martyrdom.”

·  Instead of punishing child molesters, they’re simply moved from place to place without anyone getting a heads up.

·  It takes almost a year-and-a-half to investigate claims of abuse.

·  If the accused is guilty of touching a minor or accessing porn on a computer, he can continue working provided he sees a shrink.

·  Even molesters who admit to their crimes are given a second chance.

·  Those empowered to do the investigation are mandated to seek rehabilitation for the offender.

·  The investigators are not commissioned from the outside, rather they are all staffed from the inside.

·  Deals are routinely cut for accused molesters in secret, protecting the identity of the molester from the community.

·  The accused molesters not only walk, they walk away with cash settlements, health insurance and letters of recommendation—just so long as they agree to get lost.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue commented as follows:

“The above is taken from a splendid two-part series on the problem of child sexual abuse in the Oregon public schools; it was published on February 17 and 18 in The Oregonian. The same problem—molestation, secret deals, inside investigations, rehab—exists nationwide. Oh, yes, so does the phenomenon of ‘passing the trash’ to other school districts.

“So where’s the outcry? If this were the Catholic Church, there would be calls for resignations and punitive measures. It only goes to show that kids don’t matter—what matters is the identity of the alleged abuser.

“True to form, when a Republican lawmaker in Oregon wanted to suspend rules to deal with this immediately, he was denounced by the Democrats. By the way, of the $53,000 given by the Oregon Education Association to legislators since November 2006, over 90 percent went to the Democrats. Not until the public schools model themselves on Catholic reforms will this problem be checked.”

Maryland lawmaker Eric Bromwell has introduced legislation that would suspend the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse cases for almost two years. It would allow alleged victims to sue the predator and the organization where the abuser worked. The bill, however, does not apply to public institutions, which are subject to less punitive measures.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue spoke against the proposed legislation today:

“Unlike some lawmakers in other states who have sought to penalize private [read: Catholic] schools while giving public schools a pass, Delegate Bromwell appears to have benign motives. But he is wrong on the issue nonetheless. It is simply intolerable to allow one set of penalties for private institutions and another for public institutions. If protecting students is the goal, then justice demands that all institutions be treated equally. It is mind-boggling to think that a young person who was previously abused by a public school teacher should be afforded less justice than a neighbor who was molested by a Catholic school teacher.

“This bill should either be amended to blanket all institutions equally or withdrawn altogether. To discriminate on the basis of religion—even if it is not the intent of the legislation—is indefensible. We are contacting the House Judiciary Committee about this issue.”

UPDATE, 2-28-08: Delegate Bromwell has withdrawn the bill.

Last week the Catholic League criticized a bill introduced by Colorado Rep. Gwyn Green that would make it easier to sue private institutions in cases involving child sexual abuse. Our criticism centered on one objection: public institutions were given a pass. Rep. Green said at the time that she would introduce another bill that would address public institutions. She has now done so. Here is what Catholic League president Bill Donohue says about it:

“Rep. Green is to Colorado what George Wallace was to Alabama: a public official who promotes the invidious doctrine of ‘separate but equal.’ Just as it is morally and legally indefensible to have one law for whites and another for blacks, it is just as reprehensible to have one law for Catholic teachers and another law for public school teachers.

“Here’s what Green’s bills do: (a) if Johnny was abused last year in the Catholic schools—or was abused 50 years ago—the school can be sued, but if Johnny was abused in a public school over the same period, his parents are denied the right to sue (b) if Johnny is abused next year in a Catholic school, his parents can sue, but if Johnny is abused next year in a public school, the only way his parents can sue is if the school failed to conduct a background check of the teacher (c) if Johnny is abused in a Catholic school, it is possible—under the provision of ‘vicarious liability’—to sue the principal as well as the diocese, but if Johnny is abused in a public school, neither the principal nor the superintendent of schools can be sued, and (d) if Johnny is abused in a Catholic school, there is no monetary limit on what it can be sued for, but if Johnny is abused in a public school, the most the school must pay is $150,000.

“We are contacting the entire Colorado legislature about this matter. ‘Separate but equal,’ as the U.S. Supreme Court said in its 1954 Brown decision, is ‘inherently unequal.’ Nothing has changed since, and it matters not a whit whether the bigotry is based on race or religion.”

Contact the Chairman of the Colorado House Judiciary Committee, Terrance Carroll, at terrance.carroll.house@state.co.us

Colorado lawmaker Gwyn Green has introduced a bill that would lift the statute of limitations on all future cases involving the sexual abuse of children; it would also grant a two-year period that allows those who are currently barred from doing so the chance to file a lawsuit.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue explains what else is going on:

“This has nothing to do with justice—it’s pure politics. Two years ago, similar legislation was proposed that specifically targeted private institutions, giving public institutions a pass. When this was exposed as a witch hunt, the public schools were blanketed with the same legislation. But then the Colorado education establishment saw the handwriting on the wall and effectively killed the bill. For the record, Colorado bishops, led by Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput (as well as the Catholic League), favored the bill as long as it was inclusive of all institutions.

“Now Rep. Green is back, targeting only private institutions again, saying she will introduce another bill that will address public institutions. What a shell game: If there is to be no difference in liability for private and public institutions, then they can be treated equally in the same bill.

“When interviewed, Green likes to boast of her Catholic credentials. Why, then, does she smear her religion? For example, she knows full well that the Colorado bishops have never opposed bills that treated all institutions equally, but that didn’t stop her from issuing this snotty remark last month: ‘I think it’s really ironic that the leaders of a church that profess to follow Jesus would be working against the protection of children.’ She has yet to apologize for this blatant lie.

“Finally, we know of few Catholic lawmakers—in any state—who have earned a 100% score from Planned Parenthood. Green has. Indeed, it is the only endorsement she has highlighted on her website! This, along with her endorsement by NARAL Pro-Choice, undercuts her purported commitment to the welfare of children. We’re contacting Colorado lawmakers asking them to nix Green’s politicized effort.”