Anthony Esolen Rips Some 'Journalists' a New One!

Dr Esolen's response to a filthy piece of disinformation and anti-Catholic twisting of facts in the Providence Journal, Priest: No Communion for R.I. lawmakers who supported abortion law.

From Dr Esolen's Facebook Page


By Dr Anthony Esolen
 
My courageous pastor for the 21 years we lived in Coventry, RI.

This, ladies and gentlemen of the press, is why conservatives and faithful Catholics place you somewhere between maggot and snake. What in the name of God does something that allegedly happened to this woman's sister thirty or forty years ago have to do with THIS priest, and THIS funeral Mass? Why, you journalists, you worms, would you lead a story about two things -- a legislator who attempted to travesty a funeral Mass, and the business of Catholic legislators who vote for abortion -- with utterly prejudicial and irrelevant business, unless you want to smear, to vilify?

Where in this article does the author actually ask what, specifically, happened at the Mass? The woman in question was told beforehand, as everyone at Sacred Heart is told, that eulogies are not permitted at a funeral Mass. She was slated to do one of the readings. Instead of doing that -- this would be right in the middle of Mass, the reading of the Old Testament text or the epistle -- she introduced herself, and began to deliver a eulogy. AT THE EPISTLE. Got that? AT THE EPISTLE. I am sixty years old and I have been going to Mass all my life. I have never, in all those years, seen somebody introduce himself at the epistle, and begin to chat. You know what that would be like, you filthy calumniators? It would be like interrupting the rabbi at a Seder supper by introducing yourself and proceeding to make your own comments on the night. It would be like interrupting a Quaker meeting, when everyone is sitting in silence to hear the call of the Spirit, to introduce yourself and pass out political flyers. I am trying to imagine this woman attempting something comparable in a mosque. Honestly, I do not understand this sort of behavior. You would never have tried to pull a stunt like that in the old days, because a couple of ushers with iron grips, and some altar boys old enough to shave, would quietly and firmly escort you off the premises.

The most disgusting thing about the calumny, you slime, you journalists who are too damned lazy to Find Things Out, is not only that Father Bucci a long time ago took personal action against one of the abusive priests -- as you note only because HE MADE YOU ADMIT IT, "in his own defense" -- as if HE needed to defend himself against anything! He was sent to diocesan Siberia for it, by a bishop who was just the kind of liberal fellow that you dearly loved and never said a critical thing about.

Meanwhile, you idiots, Father Bucci does not make the rules. If you are a Catholic, you are not permitted to promote abortion. That's it, that's all. If you are not persuaded of the Church's teaching, you may yet remain a loyal son by refraining to act against it. If you do act against it, you should be honest, and you should leave the Church. A Quaker who takes up arms is no longer a Quaker. In any case, a funeral Mass is no place to make a political spectacle of yourself. The legislator here evidently has hated Father Bucci for a long time; she was trying to pay him back. Shame on her for abusing the funeral of her own uncle, a faithful Catholic man, and attempting to turn it into a stage.

Journalists, is it really too much to ask you to DO YOUR HOMEWORK?