Calling himself a “collapsed Catholic,” well “beyond lapsed,” [NY Times] Bill Keller said the liberal spirit of Vatican II died when it “ran smack-dab into the sexual revolution. Probably no institution run by a fraternity of aging celibates was going to reconcile easily with a movement that embraced the equality of women, abortion on demand and gay rights.”
The archbishop offered his “Foul Ball!” commentary to the Times editors, who declined to publish it. [Timothy] Dolan then posted the essay on his own Web site, while also offering it to FoxNews.com — which promptly ran it.
Dolan was, of course, livid about Dowd’s broadside, calling it an “intemperate,” “scurrilous … diatribe that rightly never would have passed muster with the editors had it so criticized an Islamic, Jewish or African-American religious issue.”
I guess the Times isn’t concerned so much any more with “All the news that’s fit to print.” And they wonder why their sales are in free fall.
The free fall death spiral happening to the New York Times will be welcomed by millions of people. NYT, Newsweek,CNN now only pander to the cynicism of a very small market and compelling news reading can be found with a click of a mouse.
Intercessor
Good on Archbishop Dolan for calling out the bias and scorn with which Catholics (but also other Christians) are subjected by irresponsible “journalists”.
Good for Archbishop Dolan, but I still read the NY Times. Bias can be accounted for. Lack of news cannot.
No surprises here, except perhaps that it’s still so easy for people like Maureen Dowd to get away with all sorts of hateful, inaccurate attacks on the Catholic Church without fear of being criticized. I welcome ++Timothy Dolan’s fine piece, exposing once more the blatant anti-Catholic prejudice that is so deeply rooted in American society. It may well be our oldest and most virulent prejudice in the United States, or at least the most socially acceptable. Among the cultured elite, that is.
David Handy+
P.S., when I saw Terry Mattingly’s name in the thread title, I assumed this was a piece on his blog, GetRelgion.com. I’m glad to see that it actually ran by the ScrippsNews Service, which should give it wider distribution.
Mattingly is right. The controversy pver Dowd’s outrageous article may die down soon, but the underlying conflict is here to stay. But what still amazes me (even after so long) is that the NYTimes is willing to offend such a large portion of its potential customer base, when Catholics make up such a large proportion of the population of NY City. Very revealing.
But I’m afraid the archbishop’s baseball analogy was a bit off. The allusion was certainly timely, with the Yankees in the World Series and all, but I think the deeper problem is that there is no umpire to referee the Culture War in this country. Not only is there no one to call the balls and stikes, or foul balls, but there is no one to eject players from the game. The real situation here wasn’t a “foul ball,” but unsportsmanlike conduct, for which Dowd ougfht to have been tossed from the game. And Bill Keller too.
David Handy+