Bob Waldrop, founder of the Oscar Romero Catholic Worker House in Oklahoma City, writing at his Bobaganda! website:
In the future, when sufficient time has passed that historians can reflect on this era, I think their judgment will be that during these critical and turbulent times, one of the great historical tragedies has been the "Republican Captivity" of the United States Catholic Bishops.
And:
This naked emperor should be publicly called out. The crusade against "gay marriage" is not about protecting marriage. It’s about getting votes for Republican politicians.
And then, as if to prove Bob Waldrop's point, here's John Shimek of the Catholic Vote site shouting about how "faithful Catholics" will go to war with the Obama administration when/if President Obama signs into law an executive order protecting LGBT federal employees from discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation:
So, get set for another big fight. Just like with the HHS Mandate, we’re not going to budge. We refuse to go down without a fight. This is far too important an issue.
And if that's not overtly political in a partisan sense — and indefensible on "faithful Catholic" grounds, because "faithful Catholicism" is all about loving and affirming everyone and protecting the human rights of everyone — I'll eat my hat. Bob Waldrop is exactly right to call this mentality the new Babylonian-Republican captivity of the U.S. Catholic church.
It's deeply disturbing to many of us for whom the Catholic faith means, at its very core and from its very foundations, something quite different from what the bishops and their epigones like Mr. Shimek want to maintain.
(I'm grateful to Dennis Coday's "Morning Briefing" column at National Catholic Reporter for the link to Bob Waldrop's blog, and to Frank Strong at his Letters to the Catholic Right site for the link to John Shimek's Catholic Vote Posting.