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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The role of Catholics in the U.S.'s recent financial brinksmanship

It is unusual for me to have two articles back-to-back in the same day but I’m getting ready to travel for several weeks in the U.S., Asia and Europe including my upcoming visit to the Vatican.  I am unsure when I will have time to write again until perhaps the end of November though I might have the privilege to meet some readers in person at the Call to Action conference November 1-3.  Regardless of the rigors of my upcoming travel schedule, there is another topic of great importance I think worthy of pondering.

This past week, the United States Congress put much of the world through unwarranted angst about my country’s willingness (not ability) to pay its financial obligations.  Globally, markets and businesses sat in great anxiety anticipating whether the U.S. legislature would “do the right thing” so that it could be a good global citizen repaying its debts.  Economists predicted the U.S. defaulting upon its financial obligations would make the 2008 bank crisis pale in comparison to the global economic impact it would wrought.  This would have been felt especially by people already on society's financial margins but also likely would have thrown many more people into that category by manufacturing more unemployment and poverty.

How did U.S. Catholics play in all this?

The U.S. Senate has 100 members and 28 of them are Catholic.  429 members of the U.S. House of Representatives voted on the debt ceiling this past week and of them, 135 or 31% are Catholic.  I commend the 24 Catholic U.S. Senators and 101 Catholic U.S. Representatives who supported the moral decision of paying this country’s financial obligations.  They include my own Representative, Mr. David Camp of Michigan.

I am sorry to report that there were any Catholics who voted that the U.S. renege on its financial commitments to the world and likely manufacture additional global unemployment, economic instability and poverty.  However, there were 4 such Catholic Senators and 34 such Catholic Representatives.  They are:

U.S. Senators voting for the U.S. NOT to honor its financial obligations:

James Risch of Idaho

Marco Rubio of Florida

Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania

David Vitter of Louisianna

Members of the U.S. House of Representatives voting for the U.S. NOT to honor its financial obligations:

Kerry Bentivolio of Michigan

Kevin Brady of Texas

Steve Chabot of Ohio

Chris Collins of New York

Ron DeSantis of Florida

Sean Duffy of Wisconsin

Renee Ellmers of North Carolina

Chuck Fleischmann of Tennessee

Virginia Foxx of North Carolina

Phil Gingrey of Georgia

Paul Gosar of Arizona

Andy Harris of Maryland

Tim Huelskamp of Kansas

Walter Jones of North Carolina

Steve King of Iowa

Bob Latta of Ohio

Blaine Luetkemeyer of Missouri

Thomas Marino of Pennsylvannia

Michael McCaul of Texas

Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina

Steven Palazzo of Mississippi

Trey Radel of Florida

Tom Reed of New York

Jim Renacci of Ohio

Todd Rokita of Indiana

Tom Rooney of Florida

Keith Rothfus of Pennsylvania

Ed Royce of California

Paul Ryan of Wisconsin

Steve Scalise of Louisianna

David Schweikert of Arizona

Ann Wagner of Missouri

Brad Wenstrup of Ohio

Ted Yoho of Florida

You might ask what could have possibly motivated any Catholic to vote to throw the entire world into severe financial turmoil.  The answer might lie in a letter sent from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) to members of Congress.  In this letter, the bishops position as a non-negotiable matter in the debt-ceiling discussions their desire that Catholics in the healthcare profession be able to impose their religious beliefs upon others, allowing people like doctors, nurses, pharmacists, and hospital workers to deny things of patients such as filling a prescription for Sprintec – a medication which solves many female reproductive health issues but which also is a contraceptive. 

Specifically in the letter dated September 26, 2013 Cardinal Sean O’Malley and Archbishop William Lori wrote on behalf of the entire U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops the following statement, “We have already urged you to enact the Health Care Conscience Rights Act (H.R. 940/S. 1204). As Congress considers a Continuing Resolution and debt ceiling bill in the days to come, we reaffirm the vital importance of incorporating the policy of this bill into such “must-pass” legislation.”

You see, my dear friends around the world, the U.S. Catholic bishops, led by a U.S. Cardinal hand-selected by Pope Francis to be in his special gang of eight advisors, wanted the entire world to suffer additional poverty and unrest unless they could have their way continuing their crusade against women, women’s rights and women’s health.  Quite simply the bishops said the U.S. should not honor its financial commitments to the world unless Congress makes it more difficult for women to obtain certain medical services and medications.

What is the proper response to the bishops and members of the U.S. Congress who were willing to do this?  I urge you, no matter where in the world you live, to communicate your opinions on the morality of their stance and decisions to these politicians – both the ordained and elected ones.  It might be worth expressing to Pope Francis any concerns you have about his judgment in selecting as a top advisor Cardinal Sean O’Malley – a ringleader in trying to bring about global financial devastation unless he got his way.

As a side note, Catholic hospitals in the U.S. are a growing force as they acquire formerly secular hospitals.  They operate by a set of USCCB directives which already deny numerous types of care based on claiming a moral high ground.  What is the proper response to this trend also?