I was going to write it, but over at CatholicVote (keep praying for Thom Peters’ complete recovery!), Matt Bowman beat me to it with a great look into the wacky world of the Fishwrap‘s (aka National Schismatic Reporter) support of Pres. Obama’s impending attack on Syria.
Yes, you read that.
HOW NCREPORTER LEARNED TO LOVE THE BOMB
BY MATT BOWMANThe U.S. Bishops are urging Catholics to contact Congress to oppose President Obama’s desire to bomb Syria.
Pope Francis is insisting that more bombing is not an answer.
Even Jon Stewart (explicit content warning) doesn’t hesitate to call President Obama’s bomb proposal absurd.
But pundits of the Catholic Left can’t muster up the courage to unequivocally oppose their Democratic president’s bomb-mongering.
The National Catholic Reporter’s Michael Sean Winters has written a meandering screed supporting Obama. He doesn’t even mention the Pope, or the Bishops, much less rebut their statements. Can you imagine Winters failing to mention Pope Francis and the U.S. Bishops if they called for action on any other issue such as immigration, guns, or for that matter a Republican-instigated war?
On the NCReporter’s main page, it has forgotten how to plainly condemn bombing. It lists some articles in favor of the bishops’ view, yet at the same time it hosts what can only be called a “diversity” of views on the topic.
In addition to Winters, NCReporter’s exclusive Jesuit “analyst” Fr. Thomas Reese wrings his hands about whether more bombs should be dropped. Fr. Reese cannot muster simple condemnation of more bombs. Reese prominently features the thoughts of William Galston, who offers a variety of justifications for the president.
So when Pope Francis, the Vatican, and the U.S. Bishops criticize Republican-led wars, or capitalist economics, pundits on the Catholic Left treat their messages as ex cathedra doctrine. When these same Catholic bishops strenouously oppose President Obama’s desire to drop bombs on Syria, Catholic Left pundits start to wonder if bombs aren’t so bad after all. [I wonder what Sr. Simone thinks? Sr. Keehan? Sr. Chittister? The LCWR?]
I don’t remember NCReporter hosting bloggers who defended dropping bombs in Iraq, or offered pro-waterboarding “moral voices,” or theological defenses of nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
[…]
Read the rest over there.
