Marilyn Manson’s new CD, “Holy Wood,” is replete with assaults on religion and celebratory comments on violence. On the cover is a picture of Manson on a crucifix with his jawbone removed; both Circuit City and Best Buy have required Interscope Records to put an alternative cover on the CD.

The new single from the album is called “Disposable Teens.” Its lyrics include multiple obscenities, along with such poetic fare as “I got a face that’s made for doing violence upon, I’m a teen distortion, survived abortion, a rebel from the waist down.” On the cover is a depiction of an aborted baby nailed to a cross. Other songs on “Holy Wood” are called “Godeatgod,” “Cruci-fixion in Space,” “President Dead,” “In the Shadow of the Valley of Death,” “The Death Song,” “The Lamb of God,” “The Fall of Adam,” “Burning Flag,” “King Kill 33° ” and “Count to 6 and Die.”

We immediately sounded off on Manson’s latest tirade with the following statement to the media:

“‘Holy Wood’ is vintage Marilyn Manson. Preoccupied with violence and religion, Manson uses infantile expressions to convey his perverse vision of reality. But reviewers who remark that Manson assaults religion shoot too broadly: it is Christianity that he hates and it is Catholicism that he hates most of all. Why else would he appear dressed as a bishop with a cross behind him in his video for ‘Disposable Teens’? And why else would he wear a pope’s miter while performing live? No, this is a guy at war with Christ and the Vicar of Christ on earth.

“The appropriate response for Catholics is to boycott all Marilyn Manson CD’s and to return any albums that might be offered to any family member as a gift this Christmas. It would also be an opportune time to explain why this is being done. As for the Catholic League, we will ask Interscope if there is any reason other than greed that is motivating its promotion of Manson’s ‘Holy Wood.’”

Our news release led Manson to attack the Catholic League: “I can’t possibly be at war with Christ, because your religion killed him and what he stood for. But if you want to be at war with me…bring it on.” This remark was posted on the Internet on Manson’s home page.

The Catholic League will not shy from criticizing Manson but it refuses to take the bait of this madman. The vile and illiterate response we got from his fans demonstrates what happens when people overdose on junk.

Readers should know, however, that no matter how outrageous Manson is, there are some media barons who love him. Unless, of course, he attacks some group they consider off-limits.

Ann Powers of the New York Times recently reviewed a New York concert by Manson. She noted, without disapproval, his anti-Catholic taunts. But then he apparently stung her. “His negativity,” she wrote, “is inching toward thoughtless conservatism: at the concert he cursed the homeless as well as priests and teachers.”

We have the strange suspicion that Powers would be utterly unable to identify thoughtful conservatism anymore than she could identify thoughtless liberalism. But we can say this: God bless the homeless—had Manson not railed against them, priests would never have made the cut.

Officials at Denver International Airport (DIA) have decided that the Mass schedule for Catholic passengers cannot be announced on its public address system. The ban comes in the wake of several months of deliberation: one person had previously complained that it was improper to announce the schedule of Masses on Sunday and holy days of obligation on the public address system; religious services are held in the airport’s chapel.

Jews and Muslims have opted not to use the public address system to announce the time of their services. More important, they do not object to the system being used to announce the schedule of Masses. The only group that supported the ban was the local chapter of the ACLU.

On December 5, DIA made public its new rule, which reads as follows: “The airport’s interfaith chapel is open 24 hours for quiet meditation on terminal level 6 southeast. For scheduled service information, please dial 2036 on a white paging telephone.”

Our reaction, which was not positive, drew a mixed response from Denver media outlets. Here is the statement:

“DIA officials have delivered a ‘compromise’ which compromises no one’s rights save Catholics: since it was only Catholic services that were being announced, the decision to neuter this information by going with a generic substitute is both cowardly and offensive. In effect, lawyers for the airport are saying that they would rather issue a gag order before ever confronting the censors at the ACLU.

“DIA authorities want us to believe that their decision followed ‘months of legal research, weighing of public opinion and exhaustive internal discussion.’ Yet what they produced suggests that it is their commitment to principle that is really exhausted.”

In 2000, the online magazine, Salon.com, published several articles attacking one aspect of Catholicism or another. Most of its attacks were centered on the Church’s teachings on sexuality. Its latest foray occurred on December 13 when it published a statement allegedly written by a 15 year-old girl charging that her Catholic school is anti-gay. The piece, “Teens, sex and God,” accused the Catholic Church of hating gays and contributing to “intolerant attitudes” that “contribute greatly to teen depression and suicide.”

The Catholic League registered its thoughts on this matter with media outlets across the nation:

“A review of Salon’s articles on religion demonstrate an hostility to Catholicism that is unique in its coverage of other religions. For example, on November 22, in a story on a young woman who decided to become a nun, it was said, ‘The Catholic Church is hardly the center for the young, brilliant and inspired these days.’ Makes us wonder whether the author had mistaken the Church for Salon. No matter, now we have a broadside against the Church for its alleged anti-homosexual teachings. Indeed, we learn that Catholic teens pick up on the idea of ‘If Jesus hates fags, religious leaders (e.g., Jerry Falwell) hate fags, then I can hate fags too.’ Now couldn’t the author have found at least one Catholic leader who ‘hates fags’ instead of citing the Baptist Jerry Falwell? Probably not.

“Salon’s fascination with sex is jaded at best. Today it has two pieces, one on teens who perform oral sex on each other and the other on a woman who bit off a man’s testicle. It is not surprising that with this kind of journalism Salon is going belly up. On December 11, the Los Angeles Times wrote, ‘Salon.com’s stock has tanked,’ explaining that what saved it from going under is the round of layoffs it experienced last summer. With its stock now in the penny-stock range, it is only a matter of time before Salon declares bankruptcy. That it is already morally bankrupt is beyond dispute.”

As our members know, the Catholic League fights anti-Catholicism by putting the media spotlight on the offender. A group that fights anti-Catholicism in the courts is the Thomas More Center for Law & Justice.

Richard Thompson runs the Ann Arbor-based organization. We are pleased to work cooperatively with him; expect to hear more about the Thomas More Center in the future. Contact him at 3475 Plymouth Road, Suite 100, Ann Arbor, MI 48105.

The Redbud Gallery in Houston, Texas is home to a blasphemous, obscene and racist exhibit. The exhibit in question, “Sextablos: Works on Metal,” is a play on the Spanish word, retablo; retablos are Mexican paintings of saints on sheets of tin.

“Sextablos” features many pornographic images, but by far the worst is the one by Michael Thompson that shows a naked woman performing fellatio on Christ nailed to the cross. A book of the display is also available from Bad Press Books. The exhibit began in November and extends to mid-January.

Catholic League director of communications Patrick Scully called the owner of the Redbud Gallery, Gus Kopriva, to ask him about the exhibit. Kopriva agreed that it was offensive to him as a Catholic to show Christ receiving oral sex. Nonetheless, he said, he didn’t have any choice to show part of the exhibit. He then defended the piece by saying that “the idea is to shock the mainstream establishment—pure shock.” When asked if he would show an exhibit that ridiculed the Holocaust, he said, “Oh, yes, I would have to.” He then offered, “Would I accept an exhibit that espoused the KKK? No.”

We jumped on this subject by issuing the following news release:

“Everyone has a hot button and now we know what offends Gus Kopriva—he doesn’t want to offend African Americans. But Catholics and Jews, that’s okay.

“To believe that showing a naked woman performing oral sex on Jesus Christ would shock the mainstream establishment demonstrates how out of touch Kopriva is. Indeed, had he asked someone in the Clinton administration to arrange for a federal grant from the NEA, he surely would have gotten one. All he had to do was call an intern for some help.”

Our news release generated a lot of discussion in Houston on this issue, especially on talk radio. It wouldn’t be a bad idea if you contacted Gus Kopriva as well. He can be reached at Redbud Gallery, 303 East 11th Street, Houston, Texas 77008-7003. Or give him a call at (713) 862-2532.

The New Republic printed a letter from William Donohue on a cartoon drawing that appeared in its November 20 edition. After noting that the cartoon showed Barbara Bush holding George W. in the pose of Michelangelo’s Pieta, he commented: “Now it is obvious that you could have made your point without insulting Christians. What’s not so obvious is why you chose to do anyway.”

Father Robert Batule is a member of the Catholic League, a sociology professor, author, Chaplain to the Society of Catholic Social Scientists and is associate pastor at Corpus Christi in Mineola, New York. His homilies are uniformly outstanding. On Christmas Day, he shared these thoughts with the congregation:

“In late November, the lower house of the Dutch parliament voted by a margin of 104 to 40 to sanction euthanasia. Little notice was taken of this development—perhaps because the practice has long been tolerated in the Netherlands. That, by the way, is usually the way it works. The culture of life loses incrementally to the culture of death—inch by inch, foot by foot and yard by yard until eventually the whole field is covered by shadows and darkness.”

Father Batule ended on a high note by reminding us that “Christmas is a fitting moment to renew our dedication to the Holy Eucharist.”

The November Catalyst carried an article, “The Deepest Bias,” that mentioned a positive review of an anti-Catholic book published by the American Library Association (ALA). Steve Schroeder reviewed the book, The Jesus Mysteries, in the ALA newsletter, Booklist. Donohue complained in August to Bill Ott, the editor and publisher, but did not hear back. But when we asked our members to write, Ott wasted no time responding.

Ott’s letter was long, thorough and honest. While he did not share all of our objections, he did criticize Schroeder for his “unfortunate flippancy of tone” and “inappropriate choice” of words. In short, he clearly understood the point our members were making.

Ott’s honesty is important and that is why Donohue wrote to him thanking him for his candidness, letting him know that he would share this with readers of Catalyst.

Irving Louis Horowitz is publisher of Transaction Press, a world-renowned sociologist, and a supporter of the Catholic League. His range of subjects is absolutely startling. One of his areas of expertise is Cuba, and what he recently had to say regarding the status of Catholicism there is deeply disturbing.

Castro has now suspended diplomas or degrees of professionals who enter a seminary or religious order; this has impacted mostly on medical students who have joined the Jesuits or Franciscans. Textbooks have been purged of Catholic pictures and stories and there is new crusade against dissidents. Indeed, Cuba’s best-known Catholic political prisoner, Oscar Elias Biscet Gonzales, is now being silenced because of his anti-abortion activities.

The Cuban people have suffered greatly. Those who have managed to emigrate here have been a real plus for the U.S. Please keep them in your prayers and let your congressman know about the latest round of persecution.

The witch-hunt against Pope Pius XII never ends. Yale University Press has now published Under His Very Windows: The Vatican and the Holocaust in Italy by Susan Zuccotti. The publisher describes the book as follows: “This meticulously researched and balanced book examines exactly what the pope, his advisers, and his assistants at the Vatican Secretariat of State did to help the Jews of Italy. It finds that they did very little. The notion that Pius Xii was benevolent and helpful to Jews behind the scenes proves to be a myth.”

Historical fact, however, is a problem that Zuccotti can’t overcome. Nowhere in Europe were more Jews saved than in Italy—85%. To think that Pius XII wasn’t the one orchestrated this effort is the real myth.