No ads for Sisters
The bishop of Greensberg, Pennsylvania, Bishop Lawrence E. Brandt, is not allowing the Sisters of St. Joseph of Baden, Pennsylvania to promote their recruitment events in the diocese’ media outlets, according to a National Catholic Reporter article.
The reason? The leadership team was a signatory on Sr. Carol Keehan’s letter to Congress in support of health care reform.
Is this really necessary? Even had I not been personally in support of health care reform, I would be outraged that a bishop was blocking the recruitment efforts of a women’s religious community. I’d like to ask the bishop, does he really think this is a prudent use of his energy? What kind of effect does he think it will have on the Sisters of St. Joseph? Will they learn their lesson and not speak up for causes they think go a long way in protecting life? (My apologies for the sarcasm. It's been a long day.)
The good news is that U.S. Catholic has a lot of readers from Pennsylvania. I should know, too. I just completed compiling the Reader Survey for June. And, the Sisters of St. Joseph have a website.
So, readers from the diocese of Greensberg, if you are trying to discern if you are called to religious life, I encourage you to take a look at what they have to offer.
Comments (19)
Bishop Lawrence E. Brandt
By Anonymous (not verified) on Saturday, May 1, 2010How deplorable and is the Bishop getting away with this. Who is he punishing anyway? The young women who might be interested in a vocation - who would probably end up catering to his needs. Please, this is the 21st century.
What if the bishops turn out to be wrong?
By John Blaney (not verified) on Saturday, April 17, 2010The sisters specifically said they believed the bill would not fund or otherwise enhance abortion services. Their disageement with the bishops was over their reading of the bill, not abortion itself.
If, in the next few years, abortion rates remain stable or even decrease, the bishops will have a lot of explaining to do for their willingness to forfeit health care for millions for their suspicion that someone somewhere might get a subsidized abortion.
the mechanism
By Anonymous (not verified) on Wednesday, April 28, 2010http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2010/04/1280
An article that explains the methodology for using the healthcare plan to fund abortion.
you hear what you want to hear...
By Anonymous (not verified) on Sunday, April 25, 2010If the legislators that WROTE the bill believed that it needed the amendments to protect life, why would you believe differently? (except for your predisposition to disagree with Bishops)
The sisters that supported it made it clear that it was about the money, based on their expertise as nurses and administrators, they had to have it. How about based on their vows as nuns? Claims of how underserved women and children are? Shame..the nuns run some of the largest hospital networks in the country and profitable ones at that. Why weren't the underserved given charity care by the good sisters? For 18,000 a year that die(by the nuns estimate)we should help fund 1.2 million abortions a year. With that kind of math used by the nuns, it is a wonder they have any hospitals at all, but they do. One of their vows is obedience. It is easy to promise and hard to live. In the end you have to wonder if they weren't a little flattered by Obama's invitation to the White House. They are human after all. Are they still as flattered now that he knows what they are?
I have no predisposition to
By John Blaney (not verified) on Tuesday, April 27, 2010I have no predisposition to disagree with bishops. Once again, the sisters specifically said they too did not want abortion funding, and after studying the bill, they concluded the bill didn't provide it. No disrespect to the bishops.
We'll know soon whether it was the bishops or the sisters who were mistaken. We should all hope it's the bishops. In the meantime, this vindictiveness of certain bishops and many laypeople toward the sisters is something I don't get.
not vindictiveness but rather discipline
By Anonymous (not verified) on Tuesday, April 27, 2010The good sisters are free to be disobedient and break their vows. Just like my child is free to disobey me with regard to drinking and driving. When they wreck the car and hurt themself or someone else, they do not have the right to expect me to give them the keys to the other car. They will claim that I am ruining their social life or that they cannot get to work. I will claim that it is a consequence of their free choice not my punishment.
As unfair as it sounds the nuns promised fidelity to their vows not to Federal money.
If the legislators with their years of experience, said that the bill needed ammendments to protect life, what hubris leads the sisters to say it does not?
No vindictiveness
By Helen Welter (not verified) on Saturday, May 1, 2010The "good sisters" were neither disobedient nor did they break their vows for speaking out in defense of the healthcare bill. We all have the responsibility to stand up for what we believe, in good conscience, to be right and just. In advocating for the healtchare bill, the sisters were advocating for the right to healthcare and human dignity. It is because they are on the "front lines" and see what devastation occurs because of lack of healthcare that they were compelled to speak out. Can the bishop say the same thing- that he has witnessed first hand the results of lack of healthcare in American? I doubt it. The bishop needs to get out of his ivory tower and stand in the street with those who do not have healthcare.
Well it just goes to show
By Dox (not verified) on Thursday, April 15, 2010Well it just goes to show you....life to so many in the "pro-life" movement is only apparently valuable until the moment of birth...
May God bless the sisters, who see on a day-to-day basis the suffering and need of those who are already born.
Pax,
Doxy
P.S. To label the healthcare bill as supporting abortion in any way, shape, or form, is to commit the sin of bearing false witness.
bearing false witness...
By Anonymous (not verified) on Tuesday, April 27, 2010Does Cardinal Mahoney lying about the content of the illegals bill in Arizona constitute false witness too?
so quick to judge
By Anonymous (not verified) on Tuesday, April 27, 2010"P.S. To label the healthcare bill as supporting abortion in any way, shape, or form, is to commit the sin of bearing false witness" I am curious what part of the language of the legislation you crafted Doxy?
"May God bless the sisters, who see on a day-to-day basis the suffering and need of those who are already born", and respond to it. Yes, they see them standing outside their hospitals suffering from want of charity care by those same tender hearted sisters, because they won't help them without money from the government or insurance. lol the stink of the hypocrisy offends heaven.
