On March 19, two days after New York’s St. Patrick’s Day parade, Bill Donohue asked officials at the Heritage of Pride parade, New York’s annual gay march, if he could enter with his own unit, “Straight is Great.”

Donohue’s gambit was a ploy: gays had objected to the house rules of the St. Patrick’s Day parade barring any unit from honoring anything but St. Patrick—they sought to march under their own banner (the parade also bans pro-life Catholics from marching under their own banner)—so Donohue sought to test their house rules.

The ensuing controversy validated Donohue’s point: he objected to their rule requiring him to attend gay “training sessions” as a condition of marching. When he refused, they replied that the rule was “mandatory.” The following article, reprinted from Newsmax, explains exactly how this issue unfolded.

My bid to march in The Heritage of Pride parade, New York City’s annual gay event, has occasioned many patently false statements. It’s time to set the record straight.

Mid-afternoon on March 20, I was interviewed by Steve Malzberg on his Newsmax Internet show about this issue. I was surprised when Steve asked me to respond to the news that the organizers of The Heritage of Pride parade had agreed to allow my proposed unit, “Straight is Great,” to march. This was the first I had heard of it. Moreover, no such invitation was ever made to me.

Steve was referring to a Newsmax article by Bill Hoffmann, which was posted at 1:53 p.m. that day, titled, “Donohue Gets Green Light to March in NYC Gay Parade.” This was false, but neither Steve nor Bill were to blame. Here is exactly what happened.

On March 19, at 1:09 p.m., I made my initial request to march; I emailed Chris Frederick, the parade’s managing director, about my bid. Shortly after midnight (at 12:16 a.m.) an email was sent to me by David Studinski, the march director. He said I had to register, adding, “you must attend Group Leader training to participate.”

I didn’t field Studinski’s late-night email until the morning of the 20th. When I responded at 9:56 a.m. asking questions about participating, little did I know that literally six minutes earlier — at 9:50 a.m. — an article would be posted on the website of Gothamist saying I was welcome to march. But there was a hitch: conditions were announced by Frederick. “He [Frederick] emphasized that Donohue and his fellow Catholic Leaguers can join in what is certainly one of NYC’s most joyful parades ‘as long as he’s not infringing’ on other people’s beliefs.”

Let’s stop right there. Studinski never told me what he told Gothamist, but someone, presumably either he or Gothamist — told GLAAD President Sarah Kate Ellis; she put out her own statement shortly after the Gothamist piece appeared.

At about the same time, Ivan Pereira of amNewYork was also quoting Studinski. The next day, Newsday carried the amNewYork story, and, more important, The Associated Press also carried the amNewYork story, citing Newsday.

None of these people ever contacted me. The AP reported, falsely, “Gay-Marriage Foe to March in NYC Gay Pride Parade.”

Never mind that I never agreed to march; I find it ironic that the parade organizers were insisting on certain conditions.

First, I must attend their “training sessions,” and second, they announce their right to check my speech.

Not to be misunderstood, I have no problem with parade organizers insisting that marchers refrain from “infringing on other people’s beliefs.” This is exactly why the St. Patrick’s Day parade organizers do not allow gays, or pro-life Catholics, to march under their own banner: It infringes on the message of honoring St. Patrick.

The hypocrisy is incredible. It should be obvious that these gay activists were only proving my point: all parades have strictures; their content may vary, but house rules are universal.

Adding to the hypocrisy were lesbian writer Jamie Manson and gay activist Michelangelo Signorile. She wrote that I would be carrying a “Gay is Great” sign, which, of course, I never agreed to. He advised parade organizers to insist on celebrating LGBT pride, “so perhaps Donohue has to tweak that banner a bit to say, ‘Straights Who Support Gays Are Great,’ or ‘Catholics Who Support Gays Are Great.'”

Again, this is not what I agreed to. Gays were making up conditions as they went along, and they weren’t even associated with the parade.

On March 21, I emailed Studinski saying, “Regarding the requirement that I attend a gay training session as a condition of registration, I object. I don’t agree with your rule. Please advise.” He wrote back saying this requirement was “mandatory.”

Thus did they prove my point, once again. Gay parade organizers have rules just like everyone else, and when someone objects to them, they rightfully refuse not to honor the objections.

Truthfully, I don’t care a fig about “training” sessions — if that is what they want, it is their business, not mine. But they have no right to claim victim status when their bid to get others to alter their rules falls flat. Nor do they have a right to misrepresent how this story unfolded.

One more thing. One of the gay parade rules reads: “Nudity. The law prohibits nudity below the waist. Police will be present at the March and it is assumed that they will enforce the law.”

Perhaps gay officials can explain why this is the only parade in New York City that feels compelled to issue such a rule. I know why — I have the pictures from the 1994 march — but that is for another time.

The April edition of “The Limbaugh Letter” features an extensive interview with Bill Donohue. Here is an excerpt. The complete version is available on our website; see the “Special Reports” section.

Rush: Dr. Donohue, this is great. I have wanted to talk to you for the longest time, and I’m really appreciative that you’ve been able to make the time here.

You intrigue me. I’ve been watching you for years on TV. I don’t think there’s an advocate who does it better, and you do it in a way that’s not overtly devout or religious.

Donohue: Well, you’ve got to have a sense of humor. I’m Irish. I come from a blue-collar background. My father left me when I was a child. I was raised by my grandparents who were born in Ireland, didn’t have any education. My mother was a nurse. I got taught by the Marxists at NYU and The New School for Social Research, but it didn’t have any effect on me because I had common sense. I’m fed up with the left in terms of their hypocrisy. I think that’s what drove me. I started as a Democrat. I became Republican, but I’ve been happily independent over 20 years.

Rush: Okay, I wanted to set the table with that. What is your assessment of the state of religious freedom in the country today, and how has it changed since you took over the Catholic League?

Donohue: When I took over in 1993, quite frankly, I wondered if I would have enough work to do. That’s because, like a lot of Catholics, I was not myself a victim of discrimination. That existed in the 18th, 19th, and maybe the first half of the 20th century. I’m not just using JFK as the proverbial example, and it is true that in the 20th century the progress that individual Catholics made was gigantic. But while individual Catholics have made tremendous progress, the denigration and defamation of the institutional Church through the movies, through TV, what’s said in the schools, and artistic exhibitions and the like — it’s incredible the double standard, the hate-filled obscene comments that are made and lies about the Catholic Church. I think a lot of Catholics have said: “Well, that’s for Father Murphy to take care of.”  No. We need something like Article 5 of NATO: If there’s an attack on my church, it should be viewed as an attack on me.

Rush: Bill, that’s one of the reasons why this is so important. I think the flock, if I can term it that way, is somewhat like many in the Republican Party. They’re just scared. They’re scared of media. The Church is not reaching out and demanding these people be anything. If you don’t want to be a Catholic, don’t go in. Stay away. What is the threat? Why does the Catholic Church, religion in general, threaten so many on the left?

Donohue: The biggest threats today come from government. They used to come from the media. The biggest change, and this is pernicious, it’s not just coming from Hollywood, it’s now coming from government which obviously is much scarier. Now, why the threats? Most of the attacks — not all, but the lion’s share of them — have to deal with matters that are sexual. Evangelicals, Orthodox Jews, Muslims, Mormons, and others share the same idea of sexual ethics, which is what I call “sexual reticence.” In other words, the necessity of restraint. “Restraint” is not a dirty word. It’s actually good if people practice it. The people who don’t practice it, well, they wind up dead. Physically dead, spiritually dead, morally dead. Why the Catholic Church? We’re the big fat target.

Orthodox Jews are too small, so are the Mormons, so are the Muslims and they fear the Muslims. Evangelicals they don’t like, but they’re kind of scattered. They don’t have that same kind of institutional big target. We’ve been around for 2,000 years. We’ve got the Pope at the top. If your goal is libertinism, which essentially means license to do whatever you want, no holds barred, if the three most dreaded words in the English language are, “Thou shalt not,” no, you’re not going to like the evangelicals, the Orthodox Jews, the Mormons, and the Muslims, but boy, the one you want to get, the big fat target, the bulls-eye, is the Roman Catholic Church. Because to the extent you can weaken its moral authority, its moral voice, you will have largely been able to win. That’s what is driving almost all of it.

Rush: Are they afraid that you’re judgmental of them? Are they afraid that you are going to succeed in curtailing their freedom?

Donohue: I think they are afraid that I would succeed in getting forth the message to enough people that these attacks are malicious, that they’re unfair, and that we need to have a respectful voice for the Catholic Church. But our side has been intimidated. I can’t tell you the number of Catholics who have wined and dined me, who are good men and women, but I’ve just about given up on them. I said to them, “Listen, guys, I can give you the talking points. I can frame the issues. You know what I can’t do?” And they ask, ‘What’s that, Bill?’ Courage: it’s not transferable.” The reason you’ve made it, Rush, is not just because you’re a brilliant commentator, but because you have courage. If you don’t have it, forget it.

Rush: Are you worried the Church will succumb? That there might be enough pressure brought to bear that the Church would dramatically alter its position, say, on female priests? You’ve never had any doubts about that?

Donohue: No. And I’ll tell you why. One, they can’t change. We can change meat on Friday; we can change celibacy. That’s a man-made rule. That’s what they call in the Catholic circles a “discipline.”  It’s not dogma. It wasn’t written in Scripture. It was optional for the first thousand years, and then they made it a requirement. They can change that next week if they want. But there are certain things they can’t change, such as women priests, positions on abortion and marriage, and the like. So I’m not worried about that. And there’s another reason. When Napoleon told Cardinal Consalvi he was going to destroy the Church, Consalvi said, and I’m paraphrasing, “Listen, if we cardinals and bishops with all the people that we’ve had screwing up for 18 centuries haven’t destroyed the Church from within, you’re not going to do it from outside either.” There is a Holy Spirit. We blunder, we make our mistakes, but no, we’re going to be here and I’m not worried about that.

Rush: What about the priesthood? Some say that the abuse of children thing is the result of infiltration, to create the exact image of the Church that has happened.

Donohue: The sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church was an absolute, utter disgrace. John Jay College of Criminal Justice, not an arm of the Catholic Church, put the timeline as overwhelmingly from the mid-60s to the mid-80s. Mid-60s, the beginning of the sexual revolution. Mid-80s, because I would argue AIDS was discovered in ’81 and that put the brakes on people. Why did it affect the Catholic Church? When the winds of culture change dramatically, it gets through the military, it gets through the churches, everybody. That’s not an excuse. You had two principle actors: the molesting priest and the enabling bishop. Most of the molesting priests, according to John Jay, were men who had sex with men. Now they don’t use the word I’m going to use: homosexuality. John Jay said less than five percent were pedophiles. In other words, it was guys hitting on adolescent guys. Now, I can say this to you because you’ll give me a chance to say it. I’ve said it a million times, but nobody wants to quote me on this. Most gay priests are not molesters, but most of the molesting priests have been gay. Now, I’m Irish. My people have a problem with alcoholism. It doesn’t mean if you’re born Irish you’re going to become an alcoholic. It means that maybe you ought to take a look at certain communities. That’s all I’m saying. Now, the enabling bishop. What drove him? Clericalism. That’s the term that’s used in Catholic circles. Those who are not Catholic would probably understand it more in terms of elitism, arrogance, pomposity. Also, “give the poor devil therapy” was the zeitgeist. That was the spirit of the times in the 60s and 70s. You could rehabilitate anybody. Therapy was for everybody. People were bragging about their analysts, and too many bishops got advice from the psychiatrists and they accepted it.

Rush: Look, since we’ve ended up here, back on February 27 you were on CNN with Chris Cuomo, who went after you for your support of that vetoed bill in Arizona, the religious liberty bill. The words “gay” or “homosexuality”  weren’t in it. But few people — you were one — stood up and defended and properly explained that bill. Cuomo said to you, “Nobody’s saying that a religious organization has to perform gay marriages because of this.”  You said, “Oh, wait a minute…”

Donohue: That’s where we’re going.

Rush: So clearly you think this bill could lead some day to somebody suing or demanding the Church marry a gay couple. Right?

Donohue: Let me be more specific even. I played a role along with others in killing the nomination of Dawn Johnsen, who in 1988 worked on an ACLU case to strip the Catholic Church of its tax-exempt status because the Church is pro-life. I know where they’re going. Which brings me back to HHS. I refer to Obamacare as “the abortion-inducing-drug mandate.” Contraception is not exactly a hot-button issue with Catholics, including practicing Catholics, these days. But abortion is a different matter altogether. Why did they throw in the abortion-inducing drugs? Because that’s the camel’s nose under the tent. That’s where they want to go. The big prize is not contraception. It’s abortion.

Rush: Before we go I need to ask you something I’ve observed. The left in this country has traditionally opposed the Pope. They like this one. What is it about Pope Francis that they like? Do they think he’s in the process of rejecting Catholic doctrine? He supposedly said, “Who am I to judge gays?” Are leftists looking at that as though the Pope might be malleable?

Donohue: See what they do? The left obviously lusts for power, and they’re dishonest. What the Pope actually said was: “If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will,” two conditions, “who am I to judge?”  What the left does, and the Catholic left is the worst, they take that and run with it because they’re trying to tell the bishops and the priests and the laypeople in this country, “You’ve got to get with the program.”  Cuomo tried to do this with me, “You’re out of step with your Pope.”  But the Pope never said that. They try to create momentum. Now, it is true that when it comes to socioeconomic issues, he’s out of Latin America, he has a different model. People are free to disagree on that. People said to me, “Why didn’t you come against Rush Limbaugh for criticizing the Pope on that?”  I said, “This is really stunning. Rush Limbaugh didn’t say anything. He never used an insulting term like Bill Maher and you people do all day long. He disagreed with the Pope. You’re the guys who disagree with the Pope for a living.”

Rush: By the way, thank you for defending me on that and speaking up properly. You nailed that.

Donohue: It was just so unfair. It was so transparent.

Rush: Bill, I want to thank you for your time. There is no better advocate for what he believes than you, and I’ve long admired your work. I wish you all the best and if there is ever anything we can do to help, would you please let me know?

Donohue: I would. Thank you, buddy.

Reprinted with permission from “The Limbaugh Letter,” ©2014 Premiere Networks, Inc.

For additional information, or to subscribe to “The Limbaugh Letter” please be sure to visit Rush’s website  www.thelimbaughletter.com

Data was recently published by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops that was collected by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate. The annual report by CARA on sexual abuse allegations confirms what we have known for a long time: the Church is largely free of this problem.

A total of ten credible accusations were made against priests or deacons involving minors in 2013. As usual, 8 in 10 involved male-on-male sex and the most common time period for allegations reported in 2013—including all years, past or present—was the first half of the 1970s.

Homosexuality was implicated once again, though political correctness inhibits an honest discussion. To be explicit, most of the male-on-male sex involved postpubescent boys. Regarding the timeline, it is hardly surprising that the 1970s proved (once again) to be the most common period when the alleged abuse occurred. Though the ideological roots of the sexual revolution are traceable to the 1960s, its rotten fruit was not reaped until the 1970s.

It was not the Catholic Church’s teachings on sexuality, which stress the virtue of restraint, that brought about the sexual revolution; rather, it was the frontal assault on that virtue that gave birth to this mess. Yet those responsible, many of whom are intellectuals, continue to dodge responsibility for their destructive contribution to American culture.

In the past five years, there has been an average of 7.6 credible accusations made annually against roughly 40,000 priests. There is no institution in the nation that can even come close to that proportion. But don’t look for the media to report on this; it gets in the way of its contrived narrative. And don’t look for Bill Maher to start going after other segments of the population where this problem is exploding. No, his pathological hatred of all things Catholic will not allow it.

Former President Jimmy Carter recently made the rounds on CNN, championing women’s rights and criticizing the Catholic Church. Perhaps some gutsy reporter will ask him about his own record.

Carter has been a volunteer and supporter for Habitat for Humanity since 1984. Habitat was founded by Millard Fuller in 1976. In April 1991, Fuller was forced to resign as president. He was accused of sexually harassing five female employees; hugging, kissing them on the mouth, touching their buttocks, and making inappropriate comments. He ultimately apologized to them.

When Carter learned of the accusations in 1990, he wrote a letter to the Habitat board arguing that a “national scandal” would ensue if Fuller was fired. “Without minimizing in any way the significance of what has happened at Habitat, let me say quite frankly that I have had some similar kinds of relationships with some of my own female employees and associates. If one ever complained officially, there could be an avalanche of similar charges.”

After Fuller was forced out, Carter issued a statement expressing his “disappointment” with his resignation; he wasn’t happy with the board’s decision. Indeed, he branded the ruling “disturbing.” Carter admitted that Fuller had “made some mistakes,” but he encouraged the board to find a role for him. In June 1991, only two months after the board canned Fuller, it voted to reinstate him as president.

In January 2005, Fuller was fired by the board for touching a female employee while in a car, and making suggestive comments to her. Carter twice tried to broker an agreement that would keep the accusation quiet and allow Fuller to retire honorably.

Carter has his own baggage when it comes to women’s rights and is not in a position to lecture the Church about its Scripture-based teaching on ordination. If he needs to mend his reputation as a failed president, he ought to choose another subject, and another target, for discussion.

On March 22, NPR flagged this comment by Jimmy Carter:

“The fact that the Catholic Church, for instance, prohibits women from serving as priests or even deacons gives a kind of a permission to male people all over the world, that well, if God thinks that women are inferior, I’ll treat them as inferiors. If she is my wife, I can abuse her with impunity, or if I’m an employer, I can pay female employees less salary.”

So many women have been beaten, gang raped, tortured, and murdered in Islamic nations—that it would take the most advanced computers to run a tally. Moreover, there is no penalty for doing so. The barbaric practice of female genital mutilation—nowhere sanctioned by Catholicism—has been visited on hundreds of millions of Muslim women. Why is this so? Because the Catholic Church doesn’t ordain women.

Carter’s scorecard on women appointees stinks to high heaven. When he became president, he appointed 13 cabinet officers; three were women. He appointed 18 women to cabinet and cabinet level positions; his predecessor, Gerald Ford, who was in office for only two-and-a-half years, appointed 22 women. Of the 5 members of Carter’s White House staff, one was a woman. He appointed 259 judges to the federal bench, and 15.8 percent were women.

So according to Carter’s logic, if the Catholic Church is responsible for women being abused across the globe because it doesn’t ordain women, then he is a co-conspirator in these crimes. Which raises the question: Why is Jimmy Carter walking around a free man?

A new program called “Greatest Mysteries: Vatican” recently premiered on the Travel Channel. Lies about Catholicism abound, and the intentional distortion of the truth is also commonplace. We’re used to it at the Catholic League. But there are times when the source astounds us. This happened recently when John Mulvey, a policy analyst, watched the recklessly inaccurate portrayal of Catholicism that aired April 6 on the Travel Channel. At times the material seemed straight out of the annals of sci-fi.

Yes, there were rogue popes, none more disgraceful than Rodrigo Borgia, Alexander VI. But if the goal was to promote skepticism of all matters Catholic, then the savants who worked on this program should have stopped there. To say they put their foot in it when they invented a female pope would be a gross understatement.

Just as there are people who believe that the earth is flat, there are those who believe that Pope Joan ruled in 855. Among the true believers is Candida Moss, a Notre Dame professor who is mostly known for discounting the persecution of Christians in the early Church. The fact is that Pope Joan is pure myth: the fairy tale began in the middle of the 13th century, making inexplicable (from the perspective of the true believers) why no historians in the intervening years managed to write about Ms. Popess. Here is an inconvenient fact: Leo IV died on July 17, 855, and he was immediately followed by Benedict III. There was no pope in between. But if Moss wants to persist in her fantasy, and the Travel Channel wants to challenge the historical record, then they need to contact Eamon Duffy, author of Saints & Sinners: A History of the Popes, the most authoritative volume on the subject. The University of Cambridge professor never heard of the gal.

“Unsealed: Alien Files,” is a television show that recently aired on the Science Channel. The program speculates that “new evidence may prove the Vatican is hiding actual aliens from the public.” Either that or the channel will rename itself the Sci-fi Channel.

The priest who directs the Vatican observatory, Dr. Jose Funes, was interviewed for the program, and he made the rather unexceptional remark that the universe is so huge that “it would be possible that life could evolve the way we know it on Earth.” This is soon followed by a voiceover that says, “Vatican officials have publicly acknowledged the likelihood of alien life. This dramatic reversal of Vatican policy demands an explanation. What does the Church know, or what have they found that causes them to reverse a 2000-year-old teaching?”

While we’re demanding that the Vatican provide an explanation for its “policy” on aliens, Bill Donohue would like to demand an explanation from the Science Channel: Must one be nuts to work there?

It gets better. Evidence of alien life, we learn, is available in the “Vatican secret archives.” But thanks to the Science Channel, it is a secret no more. “The Vatican secret archives is approximately 52 miles of shelving we’re told, and over 32,000 archives.” The guy who said this did not disclose who told him this “secret,” but who needs evidence? Then a voiceover gets really melodramatic: “But the secrets hidden within the Vatican can’t stay buried forever. Now new evidence may prove the Vatican is hiding actual aliens from the public.” That’s right—they can’t play “hide and seek” forever. Send in the Navy SEALs.

The program also claims that skulls with elongated heads and small faces, resembling aliens, were found in 1998 under the Vatican Library, but that access to the site has been denied. A voiceover asks, “Could these skulls be the remnants of aliens who once lived in the Vatican?” Either that or the Vatican employs coneheads to work in its “secret” archives.

A new TV series will soon air about a fictional American pope, His Holiness Pope Lenny. Paolo Sorrentino, the Italian director who won an Oscar for best foreign film, “The Great Beauty,” is planning a TV series about the Vatican. According to Religion News Service, it will be about a “scandal-rife Vatican.” Imagine that—viewers will be treated to a Vatican riddled with corruption!

Religion News Service implied we should not be concerned because the new series “will be no less controversial” than the movie, “This Must Be the Place.” That film featured Sean Penn as a Nazi hunter. Is Donohue missing something? What exactly is controversial about hunting down Nazis? Indeed, the U.K.’s Jewish Film Festival hailed it.

Paolo Sorrentino’s “The Great Beauty” was slammed by one Vatican reviewer as being nothing more than a “useless” Fellini rip-off. The New York Times was tougher: it said that Sorrentino’s “portrayal of the Roman Catholic Church is particularly scathing.”

The Hollywood Reporter also tells us not to worry about Sorrentino’s TV venture. “Interest in the papacy and the Vatican has risen dramatically with the popularity of the new pope.” Imagine what Catholics would be treated to if the entertainment industry didn’t like Pope Francis? In any event, Bill Donohue can only guess what the “Lenny effect” will be.

Bill Donohue received a sincere letter of thanks from Sr. Mary McManus of the Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary in Blackrock, Cork. Her letter was a testimony of the gratefulness expressed by all the sisters at the convent for our work in debunking the film “Philomena.” She expressly thanked us for defending Sr. Hildegarde, who was defamed in the film.

Sr. McManus worked in the Mother and Baby homes in Ireland since 1948, and stays in touch with many of the parents of their children. They should never have been maligned by these Irish, English, and Hollywood bigots.

In 2012, Karen L. King presented a small piece of papyrus with an inscription that indicated Jesus had a wife: “Jesus said to them, ‘My wife….'” She was ecstatic, as were many in the media. It has now been determined by some scientists that the fragment, the size of a credit card, is likely of ancient origin and not a forgery. But not everyone agrees.

Some scholars say the text refers to the “bride of Christ.” Others, like those at the Vatican, say it is a fake. Dr. Leo Depuydt, a professor of Egyptology at Brown University, said it is so fake that it “seems ripe for a Monty Python sketch.” He noted that the “gross grammatical errors” are an exact match to writings found in the Gospel of Thomas, and that “an undergraduate student with one semester of Coptic” could have forged the lines.

Another issue is King herself. According to New York Times reporter Laurie Goodstein, King “has said all along that it [the papyrus] should not be regarded as evidence that Jesus married….” But she was much more confident initially about her claims. Indeed, in 2012, King said, “certainly the fact that this is the first unequivocal statement we have that claims Jesus had a wife, is of great interest.”

Fact. Unequivocal. Those words do not spill out of King’s mouth anymore. This may explain the contrast between the way the media first reported on her claims, and now. In 2012, 128 newspapers covered this story. In 2014, only four did. In 2012, ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and PBS reported on this story. In 2014, there was no coverage by NBC, CNN, or PBS.

King, a professor at Harvard’s Divinity School, does not believe in the divinity of Jesus, though she has invented a wife for him. She also thinks Mary Magdalene was an apostle. And she still won’t disclose the identity of the donor. It’s a secret. Sounds like more fodder for Monty Python.