Well, since so many already know I am a cafeteria Catholic – since I don’t fall lock, stock and barrel in line with the USCCB (United States Catholic Conference of Bishops) and the pope, on many things then I might as well keep stirring the pot.
Yesterday I saw that the USCCB has now come out against the Graham-Cassidy bill on healthcare, even though it would de-fund Planned Parenthood and get rid of all the mandates. I appreciate their “concern” for the poor, but what about us who are stuck in the middle? We haven’t been “marginalized”, (middle class people who have worked their asses off and supported the church for years), so we don’t count.
It doesn’t matter that many of us have monthly premiums for insurance that are higher than a mortgage payment, but hey, we have insurance! It doesn’t matter that we have deductibles so high that that we cannot afford healthcare, but hey, we have insurance so what do we have to complain about?! We, who are lucky enough to go to work everyday, need to just get a grip and happily open our pocketbooks to the government to take more to give free healthcare to the “poor & marginalized” – then maybe, just maybe, after we work and work but have nothing to show for it, one day we will be deemed “marginalized” too then perhaps our bishops might have some concern for us.
Perhaps it’s time for the USCCB to really read Jesus’ words in Matthew 25 (they do like to quote them, but do they really take them to heart?). For the life of me I cannot find where Jesus told us to encourage the government to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, welcome the stranger, etc – He only says what YOU did to the least of these.
Has our church, has His Church, lost touch? Have we lost what we have been called to? Have we sold out? I truly believe that the USCCB will never support anything that this administration does, if they did, it wouldn’t make them popular and loved among the masses! Or least among the vocal, “inclusive” masses.
If the Catholic Church truly believes that she has a mission to provide healthcare to the poor, then she should do it. And she should do it without any government money at all. Once you get in bed with a sugar daddy who keeps your standard of living at a certain level, it’s hard to go back – but I believe that’s exactly what we need to do.
Catholic hospitals are finding ways to work around what our core beliefs are, or turning a blind eye, so the money keeps coming in. Catholic healthcare workers are forced to do things that go against what they have been taught as true and right in order to keep their jobs. I know so many hate the “slippery slope” line of thought, but what else is it? You give up one thing that is supposedly an important core belief, than it becomes easier to give up the next and pretty soon, there are no more core beliefs, and no more reason to be church. And all of this has only to do with money! Catholic hospitals were never established with the goal of seeing federal funding – they were established to serve sick people – to care for sick people, no matter their ability to pay.
Look at what has happened to Catholic universities – many of them should shed the title Catholic. Once again, money talks! Between federal grants, federal loans, work-study programs, research grants, etc, it’s no wonder our universities have to be politically correct. I think Father Stephen Theodore Badin, Proto-Priest of the United States, Apostle of Kentucky, and securer of the land where Notre Dame sits, probably rolls over in his grave at Notre Dame on a regular basis. Especially since he knows first hand what happens when the Church gets in bed with the state and was forced to flee his native country to escape prison and perhaps death for the crime of being Catholic clergy.
And again I go to Matthew -“No one can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” 6:24
Now let’s go to immigration and refugee resettlement. It is very hard to make the case that this is all because of a Gospel mandate when you take $91 million from the federal government for refugee resettlement. Can you really say the money has nothing to do with it? If the church truly believes this is a mandate from Jesus, it should be, it must be, done without getting in bed with any government entity. Once again you cannot serve two masters.
When you take that much, or heck when you take any, money from an entity, how do you, how can you, have any boundaries that can stand up against that funding? How can you say no?
Perhaps it’s time that the Catholic Church, if She wants to remain true to Her Founder, (remember, it’s not our church, it’s His Church), should give up all government money, including a tax exempt status, and get back to the mission that Christ commissioned the eleven on the mountain in Galilee to do – “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.” Matthew 28:19-20
Remember we are not a church with a mission – we are a mission with a church!
Just a Fat Sassy Grandma 