Cardinal Francis George opened the annual U.S. bishops' meeting today
by stressing that Catholics “should not fear political isolation” when
upholding their beliefs in the public square.
The U.S. Bishops' Conference leader also touched on the brutal
terrorist attacks that killed dozens of Iraqi Catholics in Baghdad's Our
Lady of Salvation cathedral recently, calling the act a “martyrdom” of
our “brothers and sisters.”
Cardinal George – who completes his three year term as president of
the U.S. bishops' conference this week – kicked off the bishops' Nov.
15-18 assembly in Baltimore this morning.
The cardinal opened his remarks by recalling the bishops' public
involvement in opposing President Obama's health care bill which passed
this last March.
Although he called health care a “moral imperative,” he decried the
removal of the Hyde Amendment from the legislation – a clause which bars
federal funding for abortion except in cases of rape, incest or
endangerment to the life of the mother.
Laws “that have permitted now 50 million children of our country to
be killed in their mother's womb” are “immoral and unjust,” he said.
“They are destroying our society.”
Cardinal George then referenced challenges to “unity” within the
Church on its position in the health care debate, saying there are
“those who want to remake the Church according to their own designs or
discredit her as a voice in the public discussions that shape our
society.”
Catholic Health Association leader Sr. Carol Keehan and the social
justice lobby of sisters called Network incited controversy this year
for their public support of the health care overhaul in opposition to
the bishops, a move that some have claimed was critical for the bill's
passage.
Who “speaks for the Catholic Church?” the cardinal asked.
“The
bishops in apostolic communion and in union with the successor of Peter,
the Bishop of Rome, speak for the Church in matters of faith and in
moral issues and the laws surrounding them.”
The role of Catholics in political debate was also touched on by
Cardinal George, who called for “orthodoxy in belief” and “obedience in
practice” from the faithful.
“Orthodoxy is necessary but not enough,” he said, “the Devil is
orthodox. He knows the Catechism better than anyone in this room; but he
will not serve, he will not obey.”
“We should not fear political isolation,” Cardinal George added,
saying the “Church has often been isolated in in politics and
diplomacy.”
“We need to be deeply concerned, however, about the wound to the
Church's unity that has been inflicted in this debate,” he said,
expressing his hope that “ecclesial communion” could be restored.
Cardinal George then said that the “voice of Christ speaks always
from a consistent concern for the gift of human life.”
He decried birth
control, embryonic stem cell research, in vitro fertilization, and
abortion as “the technological manipulation of life.”
Closing his speech, Cardinal George said he cannot depart from his
role as president without speaking of “our Catholic brothers and sisters
in Iraq.”
On Oct. 31, gunmen linked to al-Qaida took over 120 faithful hostage
at the Syriac Catholic Cathedral of Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad
during Mass, demanding that the Coptic Church of Egypt release the wife
of one of its priests, whom the extremists claimed voluntarily converted
to Islam and was subsequently locked up in a convent.
When the Iraqi military raided the cathedral to free the hostages,
over 50 people, including 2 priests, were killed in a firefight and the
explosion of suicide vests by the terrorists.
As he spoke about the attack, Cardinal George paused with emotion as
he recalled the story of an American Dominican sister currently in Iraq.
The religious sister told a friend of Cardinal George that witnesses
saw a three-year-old boy named Adam follow the terrorists after the
murder of his parents, admonishing them by repeating the words “enough,
enough,” until he himself was killed.
“Dear brothers and sisters,” Cardinal George said, “we have all
experienced challenges and even tragedies that tempt us to say
'enough.'”
“Yet all of our efforts, our work, our failures and our sense of
responsibility pale before the martyrdom of our brothers and sisters in
Iraq and the persecution of Catholics in other parts of the Middle East,
in India and Pakistan, in China and Vietnam, in Sudan and African
countries rent by civil conflict.”
“With their faces before us, we stand before the Lord, collectively
responsible for all those whom Christ died to save,” he said. “May the
Lord during these days give us vision enough to see what he sees and
strength enough to act as he would have us act.”
“That will be enough.”
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