mercy

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MIT chaplain sacked for his thoughts, as a Catholic priest, on mercy, justice and George Floyd

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MIT chaplain sacked for his thoughts, as a Catholic priest, on mercy, justice and George Floyd

Earlier this year, a Catholic priest published a book entitled "Mercy: What Every Catholic Should Know," focusing on doctrine and discipleship issues that, ordinarily, would not cause controversy.

But these are not ordinary times. Acting as a Catholic chaplain at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Father Daniel Moloney tried to apply his words about mercy and justice to the firestorm of protests and violence unleashed by the killing of George Floyd by a white Minneapolis police officer.

In the end, the priest resigned at the request of the Archdiocese of Boston, in response to MIT administration claims that Moloney, in a June 7 email, violated a campus policy prohibiting "actions or statements that diminish the value of individuals or groups of people."

Moloney wrote, in a meditation that defied simplistic soundbites: "George Floyd was killed by a police officer, and shouldn't have been. He had not lived a virtuous life. He was convicted of several crimes, including armed robbery. … And he was high on drugs at the time of his arrest.

"But we do not kill such people. He committed sins, but we root for sinners to change their lives and convert to the Gospel. Catholics want all life protected from conception until natural death."

Criminals have human dignity and deserve justice and mercy, the priest said. This is why Catholics are "asked to work to abolish the death penalty in this country."

On the other side of this painful equation, wrote Moloney, police officers struggle with issues of sin, anger and prejudice. Their work "often hardens them" in ways that cause "a cost to their souls." Real dangers can fuel attitudes that are "unjust and sinful," including racism.

In a passage stressed by critics, the priest wrote that the officer who knelt on Floyd's neck "until he died acted wrongly. … The charges filed against him allege dangerous negligence, but say nothing about his state of mind. … But he showed disregard for his life, and we cannot accept that in our law enforcement officers. It is right that he has been arrested and will be prosecuted.

"In the wake of George Floyd's death, most people in the country have framed this as an act of racism. I don't think we know that."


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The Washington Post analyzes an assumed hate crime that became something else

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First things first. You are not seeing double.

Terry Mattingly and I have, in fact, written separate responses to a very interesting feature story called “The Confession.” This has happened two or three times in 17 years, with our pattern of calling dibs on new articles via email. After seeing that our pieces focused on different angles in the report (click here for tmatt’s take), he suggested that we hold my post for a bit and then run it as a kind of year-ender. I thought this was one of the best long forms of the year. Here, then, is how I saw it.

The Washington Post’s series on hate crimes has delivered another wonderfully complicated story, and this time it includes notes of forgiveness and grace.

The 5,300-word story by Peter Jamison does not engage this point directly, but calling the behavior of Nathan Stang a hate crime illustrates the occasional oddities of the category. Stang, an atheist gay man pursuing doctoral studies in music at Indiana University, served as the paid organist about 35 miles away at St. David’s Episcopal Church in Bean Blossom.

Stang claimed to have discovered the swastika and two messages left in black spray paint on the church’s exterior. “Heil Trump,” one message said. “Fag church,” said the other. 

The latter invective led to rapid cries of a hate crime. Within six months, the Brown County Sheriff’s Department arrested the perpetrator, and it was not a neo-Nazi wearing a Make America Great Again cap or carrying a sign filled with vile insults. It was Stang, who confessed his act of vandalism to sheriff’s deputy Brian Shrader. 

The deputy had suspicions about the malicious graffiti from the beginning, and Jamison’s choice of adjective for the congregation helped unlock the mystery.

 Jamison writes:

The detective had put his finger on what was bothering him: the words “Fag Church.” St. David’s was indeed a beacon of support for gay rights. But the fact had gone all but unnoticed outside the church’s several dozen parishioners.


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Crux warning: That automatic good pope, bad president, framework can skew the news

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Into the GetReligion guilt file we go once again, as I continue to dig out from a recent one-two punch of travel and sickness that, truth be told, still has me down quite a bit.

However, I called "dibs" some time ago on a very interesting Crux think piece by Vatican correspondent Ines San Martin that I really think GetReligion readers will want to see.

It's about Pope Francis, of course. And it's about President Donald Trump, of course. Obviously, these two men have some past history. It's also safe to say that, at this point, it's hard to get a fix on what either of these men stand for without taking into account the way the mainstream press has framed almost everything that they say or do.

In the case of Pope Francis, this has led to a very important question that pro-Catechism Catholics have been asking pretty much since the start of this papacy. The blunt way to state it: Is Pope Francis the "reform" pope that The New York Times and other elite media seem to think that he is? 

In this context, of course, "reform" means going soft on lots of icky ancient Catholic doctrines linked to morality and, especially, sex. It also means that Francis is supposed to be carrying out a consistent agenda of punishing, or at the very least throwing cold water, on doctrinal conservatives in the church. It also means that his emphasis on the care of the poor and weak is "liberal" or "progressive," as opposed to being an expression of basic Christian orthodoxy.

But back to the press. As I have stated before, concerning the conservative Catholics debates about Pope Francis and the press:

There may be a few -- repeat few -- who (1) see him as a secretly liberal Machiavelli who is steering the Catholic boat toward icebergs in order to cause massive doctrinal changes. There are others who think (2) he is fine, when you read him in context, and that the press is to blame for any confusion that exists. There are others who (3) think he means well, but that he is naive when it comes to how his off-the-cuff papacy will be presented in the news media. I am sure there are other options on the right that I missed.

Now, if you overlap these Francis issues with the "meltdown" mindset that continues to frame much of the media coverage of Trump, you have an interesting dynamic.


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Mercy vs. justice: What do religious leaders say about the death penalty for Boston Marathon bomber?

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It's complicated.

Asking where religious communities stand on capital punishment is not a simple question.

But in the wake of the death sentence handed down Friday for Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, give the Boston Globe credit for recognizing the news value in that question.

The Globe's compelling lede captures the emotional nature of the faithful's reactions:

They are torn.
The congregation at St. Ann Church where the family of Martin Richard attends Mass is struggling with a federal jury’s decision Friday to sentence Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to death.
“You don’t want to see another life gone, but when you know the family, you’re sad,” said Kathy Costello, 54, a member of the Dorchester church and a teacher at Pope John Paul II Catholic Academy, where Martin went to school.
The video showed he placed the bomb very close to the Richard family, she noted. “We’re torn.”
A similar sentiment was expressed in Greater Boston’s churches, mosques, and temples Sunday as religious leaders and congregants largely condemned the sentence.

Keep reading, and the Globe quotes a half-dozen other sources, including more Catholics, Muslim leaders, a Jewish rabbi and Protestant pastors.

While I applaud the Boston newspaper pursuing this timely angle and reflecting a diversity of sources, the story itself presents a rather shallow view of this complicated subject. 


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Pope Francis' 1st miracle: media coverage of mercy

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A day after Popocalypse 2013 happened, we have the actual transcript of the remarks that got journalists worldwide going. And it’s safe to say that a quick read of it gives a different impression than the headlines or tweets that blasted out the news.


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