Margie Robben

“GOING FOR THE VATICAN JUGULAR”?

Bill Donohue, President of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, ran an advertisement today (3-30-10) on the Opinion Page of The New York Times, called, “Going for the Vatican Jugular,” in which he defends the Catholic Church and its response over the years to the predatory child molestation behaviors of some of their priests.

Mr. Donohue, in his role as “protector” of the Church, offers seven talking points in which he blames everyone else for the crisis except the Church. He states that in one case from 1950, the victims’ families never contacted the police until the mid 1970s. He said the Vatican didn’t learn of Father Laurence Murphy, of the diocese of Milwaukee, charged with the sexual molestation of over 200 deaf children, until 1996. He blames the Media and their editorials, he blames radical lawyers out to get the Church, and on and on.

Nowhere in Mr. Donohue’s advertisement of protection of the Church was there a mention of how the Vatican and the Church failed to protect its’ children, nor how they will protect them in the future. I find this very sad.

It was comforting as a child to grow up in the Catholic Church. My family was caring but somewhat chaotic and unstimulating and I was always on the lookout for activities that I could participate in. I went to public school and attended weekly Catechism classes at St. Francis Xavier in the Bronx. On Friday afternoons Father Quinn had a girl’s program of running races that I absolutely loved.  He called it St. Theresa’s Little Flower of Jesus Program.  Since I was a good runner I always left with a handful of wonderful candy that was the reward for the winners. During the Lenten period I would save all the Friday candy until I could start eating it on Easter Sunday.

The Little Flower Girl’s Club was a hit with me and my friends.  Somehow most of us knew to stay clear of old Father Quinn who sat on a bench and watched the games. He always had one of the little girls sitting on his lap. The girls would say “Yuk!” and secretly laugh at the smell of Father Quinn’s odorous breath.

There was another priest, Father Kilmartin, in the parish. He was extremely handsome and enjoyed dancing with the older girls. He attended the Friday night basketball games and dances, having the greatest time laughing and dancing. He made quite an impression.  He didn’t last long. He was transferred out of the parish. It wasn’t known where or why.

Why did the Church go wrong? The world grew and changed but the Church didn’t. The Church remained static in a “job protection” mode.  The Church did not recognize as their responsibility the protection of their children.

Mr. Donohue presents many excuses for the Church’s failures. None of his comments take an interior look. He only blames others. The excuses don’t fit with an effort to change and to see the priesthood as it is. The Church continues to have no use for women as priests or as partners. The Church sees children as captive receptacles for their sexual frustrations. The priests are not real “fathers” and have no personal experience living with the valuable children and women they represent. When a father is a real “Dad” and “husband” he experiences first hand the love and responsibility that his children and partner give him and he can more joyously live out his life.

The Catholic Church hierarchy as an all-male society is flawed by not including married men and women in the mix. Not having a more diverse priesthood is a recipe for failure. The laity has been working for the expansion of the priesthood for years but to no avail. The priesthood likes things just the way they are.

The hierarchy of the Catholic Church fails to see sexual abuse of children as a crime. They have fooled themselves and others into believing their Brothers in Christ have fallen into sin and can be saved, forgiven, transferred or hidden. In order to survive, the Catholic Church must change and expand its views and behavior toward children and see sexual abuse as a crime. No more secret files, payoffs and quiet lips. The predators must quickly be turned over to the authorities, put on trial, and if proven guilty, be prosecuted, and taken out of circulation. If they make these beginning corrections maybe there will still be hope for the Catholic Church.

March 24, 2009

The blog below was written and published in the Greenwich Times on August 13, 2009. The Health Care Reform Bill was signed into law yesterday, March 23, 2010. The violence has started again, whipped up by the right-wing media, and various Republican Senators and Congressmen urging the fringed right-wing crazies on the balcony and in the halls of Congress. The crazies are throwing bricks and breaking the windows at Democratic headquarters, severing gas lines of Congressman who passed health reform, sending death threats and urging Americans to get out and clean their guns.  Some of these radicals think God is on their side,  while professing to being “pro-life”.  Some people feel their freedom is being taken away from them, and the top-rung guys are feeling the deprivation and withdrawal from losing power.  God bless us all.

MBR

SEND IN THE MOB!

SEND IN THE CLOWNS!

THE CIRCUS HAS COME TO TOWN – again

The political mob has three distinct tiers. On top are the “rich and powerful”. In the middle are the “communicators”. And on the bottom are the “action heroes”.

Usually, the “rich and the powerful” quietly enjoy the good life. They are successful, hard working and elegant puppeteers who eat in four-star restaurants, live in beautiful homes, have commanding jobs, went to the finest schools and belong to prestigious country clubs. Some of them are CEO’s bankers, insurers, money managers and drug manufacturers.  Their lives are predictable. The idea of “change” in them causes distress and alarm. Change is not predictable!  They don’t like it. It never occurs to them that change may be good for the other 99% of Americans.

At the present time we have seen a small amount of “change” – in the car industry, the monetary system, the Supreme Court, and choosing a mixed racial President. And, it looks like the health care industry may be about to make big changes.

 The “rich and powerful” must have a big stake in the health care system not changing because they have reached down into their storage chests and pulled out their marionettes to perform. They are going full American stage on this one. They have elicited both their second tier “communicators” and their third tier “action heroes”.

The “communicators” are usually not as rich as the “rich and powerful”. They are rough around the edges but have a way of speaking which appeals to the average man. Their job is to project onto their audience feelings of anger and rage. They are very interested in the rating system and they work to get higher ratings and stimulate into action the common folk.  If they do their job well they will see their own staged anger and rage exhibited in their audience, the man on the street. The “communicators” are entertainers, and are not true news people, even though they like to think they are “fair and balanced”. It is part of their “emperor has no clothes” mentality.

The communicators are guys and gals like Rush, Hannity, O’Reilly, Beck, Palin, Coulter and Bachman. They are masters at the tricks of language and confusion and get the man in the street to take what they say as the truth. They don’t allow fair debate. They don’t use fact or reasoning. They distort history. Their job is to excite the masses into action.  They are trying to make a living and make a good salary at what they do. The “communicators” are all pretense.

The third tier is the real scary lower level puppets. They are the front line soldiers. Some are true believers of the message of the “communicators” while others are hired thugs. They are ready to go anywhere at any time. The busses, cars and planes are waiting to take them to where they are needed.

The “action heroes” put their bodies at risk and fight. They have a job, they are brave, and they will do whatever has to be done. They will shout, push, verbally assault, and kill when necessary. They believe what they do is right.  We have seen them before. They killed Lincoln, Kennedy, Martin, and Bobby. They have killed great men and women before and they will do it again

In the political arena of the past, when a crime has been committed, it is usually the “action heroes” who go to trial and get convicted for their crimes. They do the crime and take the punishment. When the crimes are over, the “communicators” sometimes change their tune, sometimes lose favor with the people, or sometimes get fired. After the crime the “rich and the powerful” may have fleeting feelings of remorse, a few change their ways, but go on living the good life. The truth is: if a crime has been committed, every actor on this stage is guilty, whether they are the “rich and powerful”, the communicator”, or the “action hero”.

The atmosphere during this summertime 2009 is a time bordering on chaos, fear, mutiny and possible crime. We are in a time of “déjà vu all over again” as Yogi Berra liked to say.  So………It’s time to stop the staging and the false rhetoric. It’s time to live the truth. It’s time to do the right thing. It’s time to work diligently on making the American Health Care System the best we can.  History is watching us and will record what we do. …….just…… Cool it!   

August 8, 2009

On March 5, 2010 I sent a letter to Congressman Bart Stupak urging him to vote for health care reform. Today, March 21, 2010 we will hear if he says “yes” or “no” to the bill.

Just this week it was reported that Bart Stupak told reporters that when he drafts right-to-life language, he listens only to Catholic Bishops, and anti-abortion groups. He does not listen to Nuns because they are “not the recognized spokesperson for the Catholic Church”. I am certain he does not listen to me!

In trying to get Bart Stupak to expand his thinking by including us feminine folks, I sent him a true story about my Mother. It wasn’t until Margaret Higgins Sanger opened a family planning and birth control clinic in New York City in 1940, staffed entirely by female doctors and social workers that Mom was helped.

To help get Margaret Sanger’s clinic open the clinic received money anonymously from John D. Rockefeller, Jr’s Bureau of Social Hygiene. The grants to the Sanger Clinic had to be kept secret to avoid public exposure of the Rockefeller name. The Bureau did not want it known that they were helping women in this area.  When Sanger first tried to open a woman’s clinic in 1916 it was raided 9 times by the police and she served prison time. It wasn’t until 1918 that doctors were allowed to prescribe contraception. 

My Mother, Josephine Heckman Burger was a poor 16 year-old girl with a third grade formal education living in New York City who married a handsome, 16 year-old boy also with a third grade formal education.  They had four children and seven abortions between 1929 and 1945. Contraception as an option hadn’t yet filtered down to the poor women in New York City.

My Father was “naughty” at times. As a boy he would stand on a roof threatening to jump off if his mother didn’t give him a quarter. He spent time in the Catholic Protectory in New York City and was a member of the original “forty thieves” of Harlem when Harlem was an all-white community. As a partner with Mom, he wanted what he wanted when he wanted it. Birth control was not an option for Mom, thus the seven abortions.

Margaret Higgins Sanger came to Mom’s rescue. Margaret Sanger, working in the Lower East Side of New York City had seen personally too many poor women performing their own abortions and dying. She also believed that in order for women to have more equality with men they had to be able to decide when a pregnancy would be most convenient for them.

Sanger died in 1966, but not before, after 50 years of working for women, she witnessed a bill coming out of the Griswold v. Connecticut decision legalizing birth control for married couples in the United States.

For many reasons some people in the Catholic Church see no difference between birth control and abortion. They say that both are equally immoral. I find it difficult to understand the comparison. Women are nurturing by nature and the last thing they would wish upon themselves is the necessity to get an abortion. Only women can make that decision.  Bart Stupak can’t make the decision, the Catholic Bishops can’t make that decision, and the anti-abortion believers can’t make that decision. Only a woman can make the decision to continue a pregnancy and deliver a child who they will be responsible for nurturing until adulthood.

Even though Mr. Stupak has been told that the present health reform does not include monies for abortion he is not satisfied and he will not vote to reform health care. Stupak may even reject a Presidential Executive Order saying the health care bill will not provide money for abortion. If Bart Stupak is waiting for the Catholic Bishops and the anti-abortion people to say “yes” to health reform before he says yes he may have to wait a long time. The Catholic Bishops and anti-abortion believers may have other agendas – besides, the Bishops have their own “naughty boy” problems they are dealing with.