We live in strange times. Consider that in early June, a defrocked Catholic priest from Missouri was sentenced to nearly five years in prison on charges he possessed child pornography. In the latter part of the month, a former New York Law professor was sentenced to six months in jail for collecting 150,000 pictures of the most cruel and obscene portrayals of child pornography.

This last case gets more bizarre when one considers that the judge, Brenda Soloff, said she struggled over whether to send Professor Edward Samuels to jail. Adding to the controversy is the fact that the professor was kept on the payroll by New York Law School for nearly a year after he was turned in by two technical staff members; the two who reported Samuels were instantly fired.

Now juxtapose this with the reaction of secular elites to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling of June 24. The high court ruled that if public libraries want to continue receiving federal funding, they must install filters on computer terminals that prevent children from accessing pornography. The American Library Association quickly denounced the decision for interfering with freedom of speech and so did the New York Times.

In a statement to the press, we said: “Is anyone noticing what’s going on here? Our cultural elites are outraged over priests who collect child porn but not when the guilty is one of their own. Furthermore, secular elites defend unlimited access to pornography of the worst sort and get exercised only when told they must restrict access to kids.

“This is one more example where those who are shouting the loudest that the Catholic Church has gone soft on abusing priests are playing politics.”a

Given the heightened interest the media have regarding the sex abuse scandal in the Catholic Church, we thought it would be nice to see if what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. William Donohue wrote the following news release of June 12 that explains what we did:

“The sexual abuse crisis in the New York City public schools dwarfs the scandal in the Catholic Church, yet state lawmakers are doing nothing about it. This outrageous condition demands a response from Albany.

“In today’s newspapers, it is reported that four teachers with a history of misconduct are being removed from the classroom by New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein because he is convinced that they are a threat to children. Of the three teachers involved in sexual misconduct, one male teacher is accused by male students of paying them $100 each for the privilege of performing oral sex on them during school hours. Administrators, teachers and students all knew about it for six months. When the teacher was finally investigated, he was allowed to remain in the classroom for three months. Another teacher is charged with fondling a handicapped student; the third teacher is charged with rape and sodomy. And what was the response of teachers union president Randi Weingarten? She blasted Klein for his decision to protect the kids from these teachers.

“These are not isolated incidents. A previous study by the New York Post revealed that at least one child is sexually abused by a school employee every day in New York City schools! One third of the accused are repeat offenders and more than 60 percent are simply transferred to desk jobs. And each time reforms are proposed, the unions invoke state law protecting tenured teachers at the expense of innocent children.

“I am writing today to Governor George Pataki and every member of the New York State legislature to conduct an investigation of this incredible abuse of power and to enact new laws that put the safety of children first. Predator teachers are no more acceptable than predator priests.”

We’ll let our members know if and when any legislator has any interest in following through.

To demonstrate how equal justice for the Catholic Church remains elusive, we decided to choose one day, May 22, and point out how utterly absurd things have become in the wake of the sex abuse scandal. Here’s what we said to the press:

“It is reported today that a Cincinnati priest, the Archdiocese and the archbishop are being sued by four boys on charges that a priest molested them in the 1970s. We know the name of the accused priest but not the name of his alleged victims (their right to privacy is being observed).

“It is reported today that a man is suing a retired priest in Iowa about an alleged abusive incident in 1967. We know the name of the accused priest but not the name of his alleged victim.
“It is reported today that a San Francisco priest will appear in court next week on charges that he molested a teenager 30 years ago. We know the name of the accused priest but not the name of his alleged victim.

“It is reported today that a man is suing a San Diego priest for molesting him in the 1970s. We know the name of the accused priest but not his alleged victim.

“It is reported today that a man is suing the Archdiocese of Boston about an alleged abusive incident that occurred decades ago. We know the name of the accused priest but not his alleged victim. We also know that the priest died in 1975.

“Why are so many alleged victims coming forth now—decades after the alleged incident? Why does the public know the names of accused priests, living as well as deceased, but not the names of their accusers? How much of this is motivated by justice? By greed? By vengeance?

“Maybe it’s time the Church started acquiring some ‘Dream Team’ type lawyers. Maybe then equal justice would be served.”

The four bishops of Massachusetts have taken a stand against same-sex marriage. Their statement comes at a time when the state’s Supreme Judicial Court is contemplating a decision on the constitutionality of homosexual marriage. On June 1, gay activists objected to the bishops’ position by protesting during Mass in the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston; about a dozen people walked out during the homily given by Monsignor William H. Roche.

We wasted no time coming to the defense of these bishops. Here is the text of our news release:

“More disturbing than the temper tantrum that took place in the Cathedral of the Holy Cross is the political agenda of the activists. Their goal is to silence the bishops, especially on matters of sexual morality.

“Protesters told reporters that Church officials have no right to try to influence public policy. Gary Daffin, a member of the Gay and Lesbian Political Caucus, goes further by saying the Church has ‘no moral authority to be beating up on gay people.’ David Breen, a board member of the group, says the bishops have no credibility to be speaking to the issue of same-sex marriage; he invokes the passage from Scripture about throwing the first stone to make his point. An official from the state’s chapter of NOW says the bishops are trying to deflect attention from internal Church problems. Holly Gunner of the state’s ACLU affiliate questions the right of the bishops to speak to the issue at all, holding that in this country ‘we don’t have one religion using the government’s laws to get everybody else to follow that one religion.’

“These activists are out to silence the Church. Their goal is to intimidate the bishops, and other Catholics, from exercising their free speech rights. They need to be told, in no uncertain terms, that despite the failures of some of the Church’s teachers, there is nothing flawed about the Church’s teachings. This is not the time to lower the bar; rather it is time to help everyone clear it. This is also not the time to allow our foes to muzzle the Church’s voice. Kudos to the bishops of Massachusetts!”

Two professors from Notre Dame Law School, Gerard Bradley and Rick Garnett, are each filing a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the Catholic League in two very important cases affecting school vouchers that the U.S. Supreme Court will rule on next term.

In the first case, a coalition of liberal organizations is relying on anti-Catholic legislation to defeat a voucher program in Colorado designed to help poor minorities. The program, recently signed into law by Colorado Governor Bill Owens, allows poor students attending failing public schools to attend private or parochial schools.

Fighting the law are Americans United for Separation of Church and State, People for the American Way, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Colorado chapter of the NAACP, the American Jewish Congress, the American Jewish Committee, the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association.

Representing the Catholic League in this case is Professor Bradley. In a statement to the press, William Donohue commented as follows: “This is quite remarkable. The professed advocates of tolerance and diversity, who never tire of championing the rights of minorities, are shamelessly going to the well of anti-Catholicism to punish African Americans, Latinos and Native Americans.”

The liberal coalition is relying on a clause in the Colorado constitution that was modeled after the notoriously anti-Catholic legislation of Congressman James Blaine. Written in the 19th century, the Blaine amendments were used by the Ku Klux Klan and others to force Catholic schoolchildren to attend public [read: Protestant] schools. Now they are being used by liberals to stop poor minorities from advancing.

In another Blaine amendment case, Professor Garnett is writing an amicus brief for us that deals with a student from Washington state who won a partial college scholarship but was subsequently denied because he wanted to attend a college affiliated with the Assemblies of God. At stake is equal treatment before the law and the codification in law of a particular sectarian claim about the nature and role of religious belief. By the way, Garnett is working with some of his Jewish friends on this case; they also recognize the high stakes involved.

The Catholic League will be well represented before the high court. Bradley and Garnett are two highly competent constitutional scholars, as well as committed Catholics.

On June 17, the Catholic League issued the following news release on the decision by the American Medical Association (AMA) to allow research cloning:

“What is the purpose of allowing research cloning if not to allow reproductive cloning? There is no way to gently open the door to therapeutic cloning without opening the door to wholesale abuse. At a time when the House of Representatives has already banned both types of cloning, and the Senate has yet to vote, it strikes us as if the ‘Doctor Knows Best’ syndrome has once again struck the AMA. To intentionally create human life—which is what a human embryo is—only to destroy it is immoral. That others might benefit does not justify such a crass manipulation of the human species.

“Dr. Leon Kass, chairman of President Bush’s Council on Bioethics, has said that all human cloning involves ‘the expanded power to manipulate nascent human life and thus to master the very technique that will make cloning to produce children possible.’ He then perceptively noted, ‘Were this danger better understood, opposition to the practice would mount.’

“That is why today’s decision by the AMA should be condemned: it seeks to bypass a national conversation on the subject by imposing elite opinion on a still uncertain public. We went through this once before when nine judges discovered a constitutional right to abortion, and the results have been anything but sanguine.

“It is our hope that the Senate will ratify the decision of the House and stop all stages of human cloning. The AMA is an important body but it is no substitute for a democratic airing of life and death issues. Religious leaders, among others, deserve a place at the table.”

The Catholic League’s statement was picked up by the leading media outlet in France, as well as other places.

Beginning June 6, San Francisco’s Museum of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender History began featuring an exhibit on Harvey Milk, the deceased gay San Francisco supervisor. Milk was killed 25 years ago and was the first openly gay elected official in a major American city. This is the inaugural exhibit of the Museum of GLBT History.

Included in the exhibit is a portrait of Milk by Robert Lentz called “Saint Harvey.” It pictures Milk with a halo behind his head holding a lit candle. We couldn’t resist commenting on the portrait:

“It is a tribute, however backhanded, to Roman Catholicism that gay activists in San Francisco would choose to honor their slain Jewish, homosexual, agnostic martyr by cribbing from Catholic iconography. Bereft of sacred imagery in the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities, it was only logical to turn to Catholicism for help. Hopefully, those involved in this tribute will now look more closely at what Catholicism has to offer in other areas as well.”

We were delighted that the San Francisco Chronicle printed our news release on June 18.

The July issue of Playboy has a picture of Hugh Hefner praying with the three stars of “Charlie’s Angels 2”; Lucy Liu, Cameron Diaz and Drew Barrymore are dressed as nuns in full habit. There is also a picture of Hefner with his arm draped around a large statue of the Virgin Mary. It seems that “Charlie’s Angels” and Hefner were taking time out between scenes of the new movie when they decided to transform the Playboy Mansion into what they call “Our Lady of Perpetual Virginity.”

We noticed that Hefner was wearing his smoking jacket when he got religion. This made us wonder—what was he smoking? Not having seen a picture of him for a while (at least not since he got a prescription for Viagra), we were struck by that same hallmark stupid grin on his face; it never seems to change.

In any event, we let Hef know that we were delighted that his spiritual epiphany led him to discover the one true religion.

Ever since we criticized Bill O’Reilly for attacking the pope, he won’t let up on us. On June 3, he took two more shots at us.

Bill Donohue has never flinched from debating anyone. Any time O’Reilly wants to mix it up with our Bill, all he has to do is give us a call.

This past spring we read how the Jewish faculty at Santa Rosa Junior College were unimpressed with the free speech rights of an anti-Semitic student. The president of the college, Robert Agrella, also took exception to the article that appeared in the school’s newspaper. It was titled, “Is Anti-Semitism Ever the Result of Jewish Behavior?” Curious, we decided to see if anti-Catholicism was tolerated on the campus. And guess what?

We found on the college’s website a listing for “Lutherans on Campus.” It contained the assertion that Martin Luther was a “recovering Catholic.”

Not amused, William Donohue wrote to President Agrella to see if he was as interested in cleaning up anti-Catholicism on his campus as he was anti-Semitism.

Dr. Agrella proved to be a good man. The offensive reference has been removed, an apology has been issued and school officials have scheduled a meeting with the offending students.