Category Archives: Catholicism

The Revolution Begins at Home: A Clarion Call to Join the Wall Street Protests

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Our system is broken at every level. More than 25 million Americans are unemployed. More than 50 million live without health insurance. Perhaps 100 million Americans are mired in poverty, using realistic measures. Yet the fat cats continue to get tax breaks and reap billions while politicians compete to turn the austerity screws on all of us . . .

At Liberty Park, the nerve center of the occupation, more than 500 people gather every day to debate, discuss and organize what to do about our failed system that has allowed the 400 richest Americans at the top to amass more wealth than the 180 million Americans at the bottom. Read more . . . 

BIBLE PUSHERS PESTER, PROSELYTIZE STUDENTS Beware Gideons illegally handing out bibles on school grounds

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FFRF has received numerous complaints about bible distributions taking place on public school grounds and within school walls. Recent parent complaints about these bible pushers have come from all over the country . . .

FFRF’s legal team wrote superintendents to complain over all of these violations. In a letter from FFRF Staff Attorney Patrick Elliott to Rob Ring Jr., superintendent of Schools for Weld County RE-9, “It is unconstitutional for public school districts to allow the distribution of bibles on school grounds to a captive audience of students. Courts have held that the distribution of bibles to students at public schools is prohibited . . . “

“Courts have almost unanimously agreed that distribution of bibles in elementary schools is unconstitutional because young elementary school children are too impressionable to make the distinction between private religious speech and school-sponsored speech,” said Gaylor. “It is unconscionable,” she noted, “for predatory adults to target young children who are a captive audience in our public schools.”

I believe it to be equally, if not more, unconscionable for parents to target their children who are a captive audience in their own home as well [MSH]. Read more . . . 

See you at the Church-State Wall: Flagpole prayer organizers must play by the rules

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Today is “See You At The Pole 2011,” an annual prayer observance at public schools. Students gather around the flagpoles at their schools before classes to engage in Christian devotions . . .

AU Legal Director Ayesha N. Khan and AU Senior Litigation Counsel Alex J. Luchenitser asserted that SYATP observances are constitutional only if they are student-initiated and -sponsored and take place outside school hours. Teachers and other school officials should not participate, and students should not be urged to attend . . . 

While the specific flagpole prayers at public schools are generally student-led, the larger effort is carefully coordinated by fundamentalist Christian evangelists out to proselytize America’s youth. Read more . . . 

[Catholic] Church denies disabled kids’ sex abuse cover-up

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New evidence has emerged indicating that the Catholic Church in Adelaide sought to cover up a police investigation into abuse of intellectually disabled children at one of its schools . . .

The documents undermine church claims – then and now – that there had been no cover-up . . .

The Sunday after the report was delivered, parish priests across the archdiocese were instructed to read a statement saying there had been no deliberate cover-up of the abuse.
Read more, and watch two videos here . . . 

Essay: “A Call to Revoke the Religious Tax Exemption”

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By Madison S. Hughes (02.25.2011)

Abstract

It is time; nay it is long past time, to revoke the religious tax exemption. Granted, this proposition may instantly be viewed as yet another untouchable “third-rail” of politics; however, there are numerous economic arguments to be made against continuing this exemption. Past arguments against the religious tax exemption have largely fallen on deaf ears. Changing conditions, especially economic conditions, can place old arguments in a new light. The current government-funding crisis—at all governmental levels—is sufficiently dire, and it is long past time for a call to revoke the religious tax exemption. This paper will demonstrate that the religious tax exemption is responsible for considerable revenue loss, and has a negative impact on: school funding, public library funding, revenue generation, the U.S. Federal Budget Deficit, fairness, and equity. Additionally, the tax exemption: is not transparent, lends to corruption, does not hold persons or religious organizations accountable for corruption, and, therefore warrants a call to revoke the religious tax exemption.

Keywords: church, religious organizations, revocation of religious tax exemption Continue reading →

Real Class War Is Working to Keep Those Below You Down

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Taking pot-shots at another class isn’t war, nor is imposing a modest tax increase on those who have been showered with tax cuts for the last decade. Genuine class warfare is those at the very top working to keep everyone else far beneath them . . . 

Conservative discourse about the “undeserving” poor being where they are because of some inherent personal faults might make some sense if we were all born with the same opportunities to get ahead. Tragically, however, in today’s economy, the single greatest predictor of how much an American child will earn in the future is how much his or her parents take home . . .

In reality, the United States’ much-ballyhooed upward mobility is a myth, and it appears to be getting worse with each new generation.

The U.S. education system is largely funded through state and local property taxes, which means that the quality of a kid’s education depends on the wealth of the community in which he or she grows up. This, too, helps replicate parents’ economic status in their kids. Read more . . .