UNITED STATES
Huffington Post
Steven A. Krueger.
President, Catholic Democrats
When John F. Kennedy was asked during the 1960 presidential campaign whether he wanted to either meet with a group of nuns or bishops on a tightly scheduled day, he was said to have replied, “The nuns I’ll see. But not the bishops, they all vote Republican.”
In retrospect, those seem like the good ole days of the Church.
Today, at a time when a divided Catholic Church is still in need of healing, particularly as a result of the clergy sexual abuse crisis, a new predicament has emerged: the bishop Republicanization crisis, most recently characterized by the U.S. bishops focus on the contrived issue of religious liberty at the expense of their advocacy for the record numbers of people living in poverty. This crisis is defined by the degree to which many of the U.S. bishops have allowed their political affiliation with the Republican Party to effect their pastoral responsibilities. In the last week, it has been thrust onto the national stage again with efforts by Cardinal Timothy Dolan to insinuate himself into both parties’ political conventions.
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