God Gives Us Science Too

 

I am genuinely sorry that as of this writing, Cardinal Raymond Burke has succumbed to COVID-19 and breathes via a ventilator.  I wish him well.

 

I learned of his illness via an email from Catholic Healthcare International (CHI), an organization embraced by Cardinal Burke which wants to build within my diocese a “peaceful pilgrimage site” devoted to Padre Pio.  This pilgrimage site hopes to be a veritable piety amusement park wherein one can partake of numerous pious activities all in one convenient location:

1.     Gaze upon a life size statue of a saint (Padre Pio)

2.     Visit a replica chapel of Rome’s Padre Pio chapel  

3.     Enjoy an outdoor grotto with a mural portraying this same chapel

4.     Pray the stations of the cross outdoors

5.     Walk and meditate along three scenic walking trails

 

The organization says it hopes the pilgrimage site inspires needed prayers so that they can ultimately build an entire healthcare related campus there including:

1.     A “Home for the Relief of Suffering” hospital

2.     A “truly Catholic medical school that will be fully faithful to the Magisterium of the Church”

3.     A public policy center related to healthcare

4.     A Terry Schiavo Home for the Brain Injured

Based upon the substantial capital needed to build these structures, I suspect a very serious objective of the pilgrimage site is also to generate funding to build their broader campus.  Thus, I’m pretty sure you’ll be able to buy copious amounts of religious souvenirs or just plunk down a wad of cash for the cause.  They might even take a personal check or credit card donation.

 

I cannot let the irony escape mention that Ray Burke, a man who has a history of spouting premium-grade scientifically void bullshit about the important healthcare topic of COVID-19, wants to jump headfirst into healthcare by building a hospital and starting a medical school.  It’s a safe assumption that his influential position amongst the uber-pious means his trumpeting COVID-19 vaccine misinformation, such as that it “implants microchips in people” so they “can be controlled by the state,” has deterred more than a few people from becoming vaccinated.  I can imagine this has had an impact on the resurgence of the virus and virus-related deaths. I don’t know about y’all but that’s a “hard pass” for me on wanting to be treated at a healthcare facility or by any professional taking medical guidance from someone whose utterances repeatedly belie a rejection of science while embracing and propagating false medical information. 

 

Gosh, can we hope that the proposed medical school would regress to teaching old-timey favorites like Aristotelian biology and the four humors?  I know how much the hierarchy depends upon Aristotelian biology to marginalize and discriminate against women.  Only problem is that key facets of Aristotelian biology have also been proven incomplete or false.  That’s the thing about science and medicine.  They keep seeking truth by making adjustments based upon new findings and understandings.  However, when you put on a pointy hat, plant your crosier in the ground and declare infallibly and immutably such and such is a “truth,” it doesn’t actually allow room for the truth.  It creates a fear of the truth.  That’s likely why Ray and his groupies fear science and medicine and spread misinformation about it.   

 

Side note to Ray and his fan club: the commandment against bearing false witness remains in full effect and Ray’s propagating false information falls squarely within that realm.  Furthermore, spreading false information that leads to anyone else's demise probably also violates the commandment against killing people.

 

I must confess that CHI’s endeavors have indeed already inspired my prayers because I pray to God that no one educated in medicine who must first bow and kiss rings and possibly the asses of prelates espousing medical advice from the “University of Kooky Conservative Social Media Memes” is ever permitted to practice medicine on anyone anywhere in the universe.  I also pray that my bishop stops lending his endorsement and support to such a project.  (Don’t make me regret the nice things I said about you last year, early on in the COVID pandemic.) 

 

I didn’t think that huffing too much incense caused brain damage, but I’m starting to wonder….

 

In all seriousness, my bishop is a smart, educated man, having earned a PhD in Church History.  But my daughter and son-in-law also are smart, educated doctors and, thus far, they have not yet – not even once - needed to refer to Eusebius’ “History of the Church” to treat a patient.  Just like you don’t want my daughter or son-in-law (especially not my daughter because – you know – girl cooties) to write homilies or Canon Law because it’s outside of their area of training and expertise, please dear bishops, dispense with the hubris of practicing medicine without a medical license or worse yet, of trying to gain legitimate medical credentials for people who practice medicine only according to how you think science should work. 

 

Had Cardinal Burke only had access to healthcare based upon scientific advances throughout history which aligned to his uninformed views of medicine and science, it’s unlikely that he’d have the ventilator which is currently keeping him alive.  (And my hope is that by the time this is published and read by folks, he’s still alive.)  When are the uber-pious hierarchy members and their followers going to accept that God gave us science too? 

 

I’m not even going to get into the hypocrisy of Cardinal Burke having access to expensive healthcare services while he fervently supports political candidates who think healthcare is not a universal right and instead should be meted out according to people’s ability to pay.  Nor shall I delve into a similar hypocrisy of the Cardinal railing against wealthy people donating money to fund certain healthcare programs while he is able to pay for his expensive healthcare due to socialistic pooling of money which is redirected to him via the Church.  Of course, the hierarchy happily redirects money from the wealthy or the poor towards themselves, so at least in this regard, they do not discriminate against the poor.

 

Currently the property where CHI hopes to build this pious amusement park and University of Memes Medical School is zoned for agriculture and country estates.  Therefore, establishing a place of worship on that property requires granting a special use permit.  Please note the word “special” which implies, they are not entitled to this permit.  Rightly so, local residents are concerned about potential increased traffic and noise that would arise from a pilgrimage site.  Therefore, the township board has rejected CHI’s zoning use exception for even just the pilgrimage site.  I’m not sure if CHI has been upfront about the full medical complex they hope to create there.  However, that definitely would increase traffic and noise.  And, if CHI wasn't forthright about their full set of plans for the site, again, that's violating the commandment against bearing false witness. 

 

Predictably, CHI has filed suit against the township board claiming violation of their religious liberty.  As is currently common amongst the uber pious in this country, they believe not getting their way equates to persecution.  My children when they were toddlers felt the same way.  However, just like my kids were not persecuted when they didn’t always get their way, CHI isn’t being persecuted either.

 

I pray that the special use permit continues to be denied and that the courts uphold this decision.  Look at that – another fervent prayer inspired by this whole project!

 

Again, in all seriousness, I am disturbed that rather than invest in the existing outstanding Catholic medical schools and hospitals which embrace and advance science and medicine such as Georgetown University, University of Notre Dame, Boston College, and about 50 other Catholic universities with medical schools, in addition to Ascension, St. Joseph, Trinity and dozens of other Catholic healthcare systems, the Cardinal and CHI wish to create a parallel system for medical training and healthcare practice.  My guess is they eventually hope to side-step the credentialing requirements of the American Medical Association (AMA) for those doctors trained by them wishing to practice in their hospitals and thus, operate outside of the mainstream governing bodies for medicine and healthcare.   

 

I hypothesize about CHI eventually hoping to sidestep credentialing governance because currently to become a licensed doctor, one must be able to perform an abortion.  Common medical situations such as a miscarriage (medically referred to as a spontaneous abortion) require this procedure and about 20% of pregnancies result in miscarriage by week 20 of gestation.  The AMA thinks any doctor should be able to competently address this common occurrence.  There are numerous other situations involving women’s health and end-of-life care about which people like Cardinal Burke make uninformed pronouncements based upon a lot of emotionally charged catch phrases.   I think it is a tragic day for women’s health the day that CHI gets to operate their medical school.

 

Is this inspiring you to pray too?

 

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How to discuss sexual formation without discussing sexual development ... or... how not to teach sex ed

The Vatican’s Pontifical Council on Family, an organization absorbed into the new Vatican dicastery for Laity, Family and Life, recently issued a sex education program entitled, "The Meeting Point - project for affective and sexual formation."  The first curious aspect of this sexual formation program’s material is the absence of any content on human physical sexual development. 

Inspired by Pope Francis’ pontifical exhortation, Amoris Laetitia, as well as other comments by the pope, such as ones from his May, 2015 general audience in which he criticized “intellectuals” who “silence” parents in an attempt to protect youth from harm…such as bullying…the curriculum offers an alternative approach to teaching sex education...one that promotes sexist stereotypes and omits biological development information.    Pope Francis evidently scorns "intellectuals" who think kids should be armed with facts and shouldn't have to deal with good old-fashioned sexism, bullying, harassment or abuse.

The sponsoring hierarch, Archbishop Paglia also feels parents are being shafted by, “Cultural, legislative and educational projects..." which use silly tools such as science and facts to teach sex education.   He expressed concern that such fact-based approaches "directly or indirectly challenge the Christian vision of the body, of the difference and the complementarity between man and woman, the exercise of sexuality, marriage and the family."  It seems he prefers contorting allegorical writings into scientific truths rather than allow scientific advancements to call into question centuries old hierarchical stances about marriage, sexuality and women written by unmarried men with classically unhealthy sexual identities and relationships, especially with women.

The work assumes most parents disagree with science-based curriculum foisted upon them by governments and educational institutions.  Maybe it's less an assumption than a hope that parents scorn institutions operating in facts rather than unquestioningly adulate whatever proceeds from the mouths of clerical men.  A recent Pew Research study found most U.S. Catholics do not agree with the hierarchy's long held views on sexual sin.  So, it seems actually the majority don’t feel harangued by educational institutes' pesky science and facts.

The curriculum uses standard misinformation tactics such as intermingling valid points with wildly absurd ones.  For example, it tries to promote healthy relationships, which is laudable.  However, the Unit 2 educators' manual blatantly promotes the notion that men and women have intellectual differences wherein, "man is more analytical and has a greater capacity for analysis" than woman. 

It's hard to believe, I'm sure, but I as a woman was capable of analyzing that statement and realizing it is unsubstantiated, degrading, damaging sexist bullshit.  I also have a university degree in computer science, an engineering curriculum based upon logic and analysis.  After reading the Vatican's sex ed curriculum, maybe we should all be amazed that I successfully completed an engineering curriculum.  Those darn intellectual elitists!  They must have both silenced my parents and fed my delusions of analytical capabilities by permitting me into the program and placing me in the top quartile of my graduating class. Is it too late to get a refund on my tuition?  (By the way, my success as an engineer would be called a "primary source" of evidence invalidating the Vatican's sexist stereotypes.  And, I am not the only female engineer on the planet...more data points invalidating the sexist stereotype. We can add in the many other women doctors, analysts, teachers, moms and basically any women capable of problem-solving too.)

Instead of having intellectual capacity, the curriculum asserts that, "Women tend more toward what is transcendent, while men are more pragmatic," when it comes to spirituality.  I am again going to step into this scary, scary analytical land for women, but if women are more capable of spiritual transcendence, then why are men leading the Catholic spiritual organization?  Why would anyone take a shred of spiritual guidance from a man?  Based upon the Vatican’s curriculum, it would seem they are less capable, if capable at all.

Some of the curriculum’s more blatant sexist stereotyping involves side by side comparisons.  For example, one lesson presents various social situations and asks which type of bag a man or woman would use.  In the man column, every situation from school, to vacation, to picnics, to beach activities is best accented with a black backpack while in the woman column a wide array of pink specialty bags for each occasion are presented as the norm.  Oddly, this portrayal of women as impractical fashionistas is promoted by men who wear different colored ornate silken gowns for every liturgical season.

I confess I do not own a single pink bag and I use the same brown backpack whether heading to a school, office, resort, or beach...because it's practical....  Oh, darn again!  I can both analyze and be practical! Clearly the intellectual elite have created a monster in me!  I'm happy to report that I have a master degree in theology so as to at least fulfill that stereotype of spiritual transcendence.  Without that we might start to wonder if I am actually a cross-dressing, gender-confused person who had to adopt children since conceiving them in my body should have been impossible.  After all, how could I have both a uterus and a critically analytical, practical brain?

My favorite sexist side-by-side "the differences between men and women are so blatant" set of comparisons involves showing isolated body sections of men and women.  For example it shows a person wearing a sports bra working out compared to a picture of a person with biceps the size of a cantaloupe.  Another comparison is between the mouth of someone wearing lipstick and the mouth of someone with razor stubble.  The text explains that differences between male and female should be obvious.

My analytical mind found that statement so interesting that I decided we could play a short version of that game here, right now.  I'm going to show some pictures and you decide if it is a man or woman.

1.

2. .

The answer key is:

1.  No, that is not a grandmother bedecked in her latest Easter bonnet; it is a man - Cardinal Raymond Burke.

 

2.  No, that is not a female bride in her extravagant wedding gown; it is a man - specifically Pope Francis.

 

See how easy this game is?  Men who dress counter to gender attire stereotypes like to impose gender stereotypes on everybody else.

Folks, let's call this curriculum what it is.  An attempt to get more parents to join the "blind obedience club" so that church hierarchs who are increasingly losing their secular power might regain it.  And nothings seems to heighten their sense of losing power more than women achieving their full God-given potential.