Sunday, March 28, 2010

A Nope for Pope? How About a Clean Maureen?

In an op-ed in today's New York Times entitled "A Nope for Pope", Maureen Dowd holds Pope Benedict's feet to the fire for ignoring the horrifying sexual abuse of young boys by Catholic priests. My online response, if The Times deigns to post it:

A Nope for Pope? How about a Clean Maureen?

Dowd complains that the pope turned a deaf ear to the horrifying molestation of some 200 deaf boys.

Are you really any better, Maureen? You traveled to Saudi Arabia and ignored countless "honor killings" perpetrated against Saudi women and dared not lift your pen to describe recent instances where Saudi women were gang raped and then sentenced to prison and lashes.

Sorry, Maureen, but this is rank hypocrisy on your part.

Dowd would send Benedict home to Bavaria. I agree, and I think Maureen should also be shipped home for her willingness to turn a blind eye to Saudi barbarities.

[As might be expected, my online comment was censored by The New York Times.]

4 comments:

  1. Does criticizing Dowd in any way justify the heinous crimes of Ratzinger?

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  2. Libhom, you miss the point.

    I have fought legal battles over the course of many years to ensure that children who are molested receive treatment, and I am nauseated by the behavior of Pope Benedict.

    I also believe, however, that Dowd had a duty to present the plight of Saudi women honestly and forthrightly. For her own reasons, she chose to ignore the desperate position of these women.

    Although Dowd is not the pope, she had the power, owing to her position at The New York Times, to make a difference. She chose not to do anything.

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  3. Dowd went to Catholic University in Washington. Commendable, of course, that she is willing to condemn the pope's behavior, but why is she unable to make her voice heard concerning the abuse of Muslim women?

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  4. Commendable? Please Sir or Ma'am. Dowd is just juicing her secular left, anti-Church constituency. That requires neither intelligence or courage (as a long-time student of Jesuit schools I could outdo her in spades, if the spirit so moved me...).

    Many of the basic contentions of the original Times story have been seriously questioned ...

    http://headlinebistro.typepad.com/headlinebistro/2010/04/defending-pope-benedict-rounding-up-the-responses.html

    Yes, it is from a pro-Catholic source, but that the chattering classes have never thought to second guess the major media line on Benedict XVI speaks volumes. And much of his ongoing, active response to this crisis over the years never gets mentioned. Yes, there have been and still are terrible problems that need dealing with... but a blanket presumption of guilt on the entire Vatican and the 'heinous crimes of Ratzinger' shows less reflection than willingness to believe all the worst that ones hears, usually from sources with an ax to grind. Cheers,.

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