From Fr. Z:

Timothy Card. Dolan, President of the USCCB on Pres. Obama’s endorsement of unnatural unions as if they were marriage.

From the site of the USCCB with my emphases:

Cardinal Dolan: President Obama’s Remarks On Marriage ‘Deeply Saddening’

May 9, 2012
WASHINGTON—Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), issued the following statement:

President Obama’s comments today in support of the redefinition of marriage are deeply saddening. As I stated in my public letter to the President on September 20, 2011, the Catholic Bishops stand ready to affirm every positive measure taken by the President and the Administration to strengthen marriage and the family. However, we cannot be silent in the face of words or actions that would undermine the institution of marriage, the very cornerstone of our society. The people of this country, especially our children, deserve better. Unfortunately, President Obama’s words today are not surprising since they follow upon various actions already taken by his Administration that erode or ignore the unique meaning of marriage. I pray for the President every day, and will continue to pray that he and his Administration act justly to uphold and protect marriage as the union of one man and one woman. May we all work to promote and protect marriage and by so doing serve the true good of all persons.

What Pres. Obama did today, under the false guise of being “Christian” to people of the same sex who want to “marry” each other, as if that relationship could ever be like a true marriage, is tear at the very bonds of society.

The USCCB was correct to make a statement.

Remember to follow Card. Dolan on Twitter.  Read THIS, immediately after following ME on Twitter!

BTW… I picked up the link to Card. Dolan’s statement from his Twitter feed.  FWIW.

From NEWS.VA:

American Bishops from states as diverse as Montana, Oregon and Alaska are in Rome this week for their regular visits ad limina apostolorum, ‘to the threshold of the Apostles’. “The ad limina apostolorum is a time for each Bishop to re-connect with the Holy Father and the See of Peter,” said Bishop George Leo Thomas of Helena, Montana. He said the visit reminds Bishops of the “apostolic foundations” of their ministry, and serves as a retreat for the prelates.

Bishop Thomas spoke to Christopher Wells about the efforts made in his diocese to promote the New Evangelisation. “We’re beginning, first of all, by mobilising the diocesan clergy. They’re really the key to bringing the vision of the New Evangelisation to the people. So our presbyteral council – our priest council in our own diocese – and I are working together to create a very concerted plan in this upcoming Year of Faith, that would help each Catholic reclaim his or her own baptismal promise and identity as a Catholic, and then to very courageously invite others to see and taste the goodness of the Lord.”

He said, “My message, of course over and over again, is: No more ‘camouflage Catholics’ in our diocese! Mediocrity, the lukewarm spirit, is an enemy of the Church.” But, he added, his message is a very positive one: “The Church in the Northwest is very intentional, very dynamic… So I see it as a springtime in the Church.”

Bishop Thomas concluded with a call to Catholics throughout the world: “One thing that I would certainly want to share with the people of our own diocese, but certainly across the country and the world, and that is to take seriously your own individual call to holiness your personal encounter with Christ, and to remain very steeped in the sacramental life of the Church. It is an emancipating and joyful life as a Catholic.”

Listen to the full interview of Bishop George Leo Thomas with Christopher Wells by going >here<

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qw-reRnH5Dg

A “Good Job, Soldier!” goes to Curt Jacobsen for his relentless campaign to end this horror. Curt proves to all of us that our seemingly small efforts can make a BIG difference.

From LifeSiteNews:

LARGO, FL, April 30, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Children of God for Life announced today the stunning news that PepsiCo will not use aborted fetal cell line HEK-293 (human embryonic kidney) in their contractual agreement with Senomyx to develop flavor enhancers for their beverages.

Children of God for Life’s Executive Director, Debi Vinnedge, hailed PepsiCo’s decision as a major breakthrough and achievement by thousands of concerned consumers who have been writing and boycotting PepsiCo beverages since last May.

In a letter to Children of God for Life, PepsiCo’s VP of Global Public Policy, Paul Boykas stated that “Senomyx will not use HEK cells or any other tissues or cell lines derived from human embryos or fetuses for research performed on behalf of PepsiCo.”

“We are absolutely thrilled with PepsiCo’s decision,” stated Mrs. Vinnedge. “They have listened to their customers and have made both a wise and profound statement of corporate integrity that deserves the utmost respect, admiration and support of the public.”

In speaking with Mr. Boykas, Vinnedge noted that the company had conducted internal discussions, recognizing it was a highly sensitive and controversial subject that quite frankly, was not in the best interests of PepsiCo.

“We took the matter very seriously,” stated Mr. Boykas. “We have an official Statement on Responsible Research and we intend to live by that policy.”

That policy precludes any research by PepsiCo – or third parties they fund – from using human tissue or cell lines derived from embryos or fetuses.

The decision means an immediate end to the boycott that began in May 2011- welcome news to both PepsiCo and their customers who have abstained from their favorite beverages in protest.

“We are grateful to PepsiCo and especially to all those who sent a loud and clear message to the management of this company. It’s incumbent upon us to closely monitor the situation to be sure that PepsiCo remains true to their word,” said Brad Mattes, Executive Director of Life Issues Institute, one of thirty five prolife organizations that joined Children of God for Life in the boycott. “There are moral cell lines Senomyx can and should be using – not just for PepsiCo research but for all their customers.”

Senomyx receives royalties for products sold using their ingredients. If they do not use aborted fetal cell lines, they offend no one; if they do, they most certainly offend at least half of US consumers who are prolife.  But Children of God for Life also heard from a number of women who stated they were pro choice yet this use of aborted fetal cell lines, crossed the line and angered them as well.

“If for no other reason, it only makes financial sense for both Senomyx and their collaborators to avoid a substantial loss of potential market,” Vinnedge said. “Senomyx needs to stop using the aborted fetal cell lines entirely and we will continue to pressure them to do so.”

Vinnedge is strongly encouraging the public to take one more important step:  write to PepsiCo and thank them – and then go buy your favorite Pepsi products to celebrate!

“Too often we seem to focus on the negatives and forget to take the time to let others know we appreciate their efforts”, stated Vinnedge. “It is our sincere hope that the public will once again rise to the occasion en masse as they did in the boycott – but this time in appreciation and support of PepsiCo.”

For more information visit: www.cogforlife.org

“Local Catholic defense attorney, Joseph Sommers, has been attempting for years to get someone in a position of authority to address the documented evidence of prosecutorial and judicial misconduct, and corrupt law enforcement practices that he has uncovered. He has submitted the evidence to the U.S. Attorney General’s Office, the Wisconsin Attorney General’s Office, and the Wisconsin Supreme Court. None of these has denied that the evidence is compelling, yet none have acted to hold responsible parties accountable.

He has also informed media outlets and provided them documented evidence of the wrong doing that has led to innocent people being convicted, and has also allowed known criminals to remain on the street. Yet, for some reason, the media appears uninterested in pursuing the evidence and informing the public.

I have met Attorney Sommers and find the evidence of corruption that he has provided to me to be credible and disturbing. He is a faithful Catholic husband and the father of 13 children. He is a hard working attorney that has a strong record of defending his clients succesfully. Due to what he has uncovered through cases he has worked on, he has been compelled by his faith and conscience to blow the whistle on wrong-doing and not simply look the other way. For doing so, the justice system has systematically tried to silence him through threats, sanctions, and suspensions.

Because he believes that it is important for the public to be informed about the corruption, a website detailing much of the corruption with documented evidence has been established. I encourage readers to visit wicourtscorrupt.com and learn about how our court system has succumbed to practices that clearly jeopardize people’s right to a fair trial. Attorney Sommers is rightly concerned that if our justice system is allowed to be compromised by the unjust practices of its officers, then our ability to remain a free society is in peril.

Please pass this information on to friends and family and visit the “How to Help” section of the website and let your elected officials know you are concerned and demand that they act upon the evidence they have been provided.”

From Catholic Culture:

Bishop Daniel Jenky of Peoria told the 500 men who attended the diocese’s annual men’s march and Mass that “the days in which we live now require heroic Catholicism, not casual Catholicism.”

“We can no longer be Catholics by accident, but instead [must] be Catholics by conviction. In our own families, in our parishes, where we live and where we work–like that very first apostolic generation–we must be bold witnesses to the Lordship of Jesus Christ,” he preached. “We must be a fearless army of Catholic men, ready to give everything we have for the Lord, who gave everything for our salvation.”

Noting that “the world, the flesh, and the devil will always love their own, and will always hate us,” Bishop Jenky preached:

The Church survived and even flourished during centuries of terrible persecution, during the days of the Roman Empire. The Church survived barbarian invasions. The Church survived wave after wave of Jihads. The Church survived the age of revolution. The Church survived Nazism and Communism. And in the power of the resurrection, the Church will survive the hatred of Hollywood, the malice of the media, and the mendacious wickedness of the abortion industry. The Church will survive the entrenched corruption and sheer incompetence of our Illinois state government, and even the calculated disdain of the President of the United States, his appointed bureaucrats in HHS, and of the current majority of the federal Senate.

May God have mercy on the souls of those politicians who pretend to be Catholic in church, but in their public lives, rather like Judas Iscariot, betray Jesus Christ by how they vote and how they willingly cooperate with intrinsic evil.

“As Christians we must love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, but as Christians we must also stand up for what we believe and always be ready to fight for the Faith,” he continued.

After referring to Otto von Bismarck’s Kulturkampf and the persecution of the Church in France in the early twentieth century, Bishop Jenky said that “Hitler and Stalin, at their better moments, would just barely tolerate some churches remaining open, but would not tolerate any competition with the state in education, social services, and health care. In clear violation of our First Amendment rights, Barack Obama–with his radical, pro-abortion and extreme secularist agenda–now seems intent on following a similar path.”

“Now things have come to such a pass in America that this is a battle that we could lose, but before the awesome judgement seat of Almighty God this is not a war where any believing Catholic may remain neutral,” he continued, adding:

This fall, every practicing Catholic must vote, and must vote their Catholic consciences, or by the following fall our Catholic schools, our Catholic hospitals, our Catholic Newman Centers, all our public ministries–only excepting our church buildings–could easily be shut down. Because no Catholic institution, under any circumstance, can ever cooperate with the intrinsic evil of killing innocent human life in the womb.

No Catholic ministry–and yes, Mr. President, for Catholics our schools and hospitals are ministries–can remain faithful to the Lordship of the Risen Christ and to his glorious Gospel of Life if they are forced to pay for abortions.

Bishop Jenky concluded:

The Risen Christ is our Eternal Lord; the Head of his Body, the Church; our High Priest; our Teacher; our Captain in the well-fought fight. We have nothing to fear, but we have a world to win for him. We have nothing to fear, for we have an eternal destiny in heaven. We have nothing to fear, though the earth may quake, kingdoms may rise and fall, demons may rage, but St. Michael the Archangel, and all the hosts of heaven, fight on our behalf. No matter what happens in this passing moment, at the end of time and history, our God is God and Jesus is Lord, forever and ever.

Christus vincit! Christus regnat! Christus imperat! Christ wins! Christ reigns! Christ commands!

From Fr. Trigilio:

Legally and morally speaking, as a Catholic priest and pastor, I cannot and will not tell my parishioners (or anyone, for that matter) who they should vote for in an election. I can say who I myself will choose in the voting booth, but I won’t since we have a wonderful tradition in the United States of the secret ballot.

Nevertheless, as an ordained priest of the Catholic Church and as a pastor of two parishes, I can and must inform my people of the principles they need to know and use in their selection of a candidate. Pope Benedict XVI, while he was still Josef Cardinal Ratzinger and prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith under Pope John Paul II, issued a statement in June 2004. That document explicitly states that abortion and euthanasia are always grave and mortal sins. Furthermore, not only are politicians who support abortion guilty of formal cooperation in evil, voters are likewise culpable if  [they] were to deliberately vote for a candidate precisely because of the candidate’s permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia.

This is found in the Nota Bene found at the end of the letter.

What happens, though, when the voter is pro-life and the candidate-politician is pro-abortion (alias ‘pro-choice’)? Cardinal Ratzinger continues: “When a Catholic does not share a candidate’s stand in favor of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons.”

This sentence, like any verse in the Bible, must be taken in context with the entire document in order to be accurately understood and interpreted. The N.B. is attached to the entire letter, and specifically paragraph three states emphatically:

‘Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.’

There it is in plain English. There is no legitimate diversity of opinion among Catholics with regard to abortion and euthanasia. Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia.

The ‘proportionate reasons’ is an essential qualifier. Hence, if there are only two candidates running for the office of president, senator, representative, governor, and so on, and both are pro-abortion, a Catholic May vote for one of them (1) as long as they do not personally agree (which would be formal cooperation in evil) and (2) they must choose the candidate who is more pro-life or less pro-abortion than his or her opponent.

In other words, Candidate A favors unrestricted abortions on demand at any time of pregnancy, and Candidate B only tolerates abortion in cases of rape, incest and when the life of mother is in jeopardy. Neither position conforms to the natural moral law or the magisterial teachings of the Church. Yet, the lesser of two evils can be tolerated when there is no alternative. Whether Democrat, Republican, Independent, Libertarian or tea party, when the choice is between two candidates who are not 100 percent pro-life/anti-abortion, the one who is more pro-life and less ‘pro-choice’ must be selected over his or her opponent.

Even though there are many valid and important issues (like the economy, the environment, death penalty, war, health care, family and marriage rights), there is a hierarchy of values. The right to life trumps all other rights and privileges. The Declaration of Independence clearly states: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Notice that the inalienable right to life is mentioned first, even before liberty and the pursuit of happiness. There is no ‘right’ to an abortion. Abortion is legal, but so was slavery and racial segregation at one time in America. There is no ‘right’ to contraception, either. Both abortion and contraception are legal in the United States, but they do not and should not be financed by the government since the taxpayers are the ones who pay the bills.

Bottom line is that no priest, deacon or bishop needs to say who to vote for in any election. We do not and should not mention any names or political parties. On the other hand, we must and are obliged to inform our people of their moral duty to use a well-formed conscience in choosing a candidate. Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI) and the CDF made it crystal clear: Not all moral issues are of the same moral weight. The right to life is paramount; economic, environmental, military, and social issues are secondary, if not tertiary. When the choice is between a candidate who manifests his or her pro-abortion position and a candidate who professes to be pro-life, the moral obligation is to choose life by choosing the pro-life politician.

It is not that we are single-issue voters, but there is a proportion, a hierarchy of values in which the right to life outweighs all other concerns. The unjust killing of innocent lives is not eclipsed or overshadowed by any other concern. When there are two candidates whose stand on abortion is basically the same, then other issues can and must be brought into the equation to make a prudent vote. When Election Day comes this November, we should know well who is more pro-life and who is more ‘pro-choice.’ Then our well-formed conscience should tell us to choose the former over the latter.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9vQt6IXXaM

From Rorate Caeli:

May I also remind you once again that in all Churches and Chapels in the Archdiocese Holy Communion is to be administered only on the tongue and kneeling. This should be implemented as normal use even at Holy Mass celebrated with the participation of a big crowd outdoors. On such occasions at least the youth and the children as well as the “youthful” should be called upon to kneel and receive the Lord. This is the most appropriate way of expressing our profoundest belief in the continuous and personal presence of the Lord in the most Sacred Host as we acclaim “down in adoration falling, lo! the Sacred Host we hail”. And in all our Churches, as an expression of that faith our people should be called upon to receive the Holy Communion, kneeling. And so kindly take steps to fix the altar rails and a cushion line fixed to the ground before the railing so that all could kneel and receive easily. It is also good for us to explain to our people about the teaching of the Church on the Most Holy Eucharist as found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church Nos. 1373-1381.

I would also like to insist with you on the culture of priestly vestments at Holy Mass. In a sermon Pope Benedict gave at the Chrism Mass held at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome on 5th April 2007, he explained this need in relation to what happens at Baptism where we put on Christ. St. Paul said so: “for as many of you as were baptized into Christ, have put on Christ” [Gal. 3:27]. The Pope continued: “This is what is fulfilled in Baptism; we put on Christ, He gives us His garments and these are not something external. It means that we enter into an existential communion with Him, that His being and our being merge, penetrate one another” [Priests of Jesus Christ, Family Publications, Oxford 2009 p.31]. The challenge to let Christ live in us is indicated by this putting on of Christ – “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” [Gal. 2:20]. The Priest is one who is called upon to live that intimate spirit of communion with Christ even more intensely, especially when he celebrates the Eucharist. It is the highest point of our communion with Him, when we become totally identified with Him in His salvific sacrifice on Calvary. States the Pope “at the moment of priestly ordination, the Church has also made this reality of “new clothes” visible and comprehensive to us externally through being clothed in Liturgical vestments……the “putting on of Him” is demonstrated again and again at every Holy Mass by putting on the Liturgical vestments……the fact that we are standing at the altar clad in Liturgical vestments must make it clearly visible to those present that we are there ‘in the person of Christ’ ”[ibid p.32]. Indeed we ought to recall how Jesus explaining the parable of the wedding feast stressed on the need to be attired in a proper garment. He who was not thus dressed was ordered to be thrown with hand and feet tied into the dark where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. [cfr. Mt. 22:13]. The Vatican Instruction Redemptionis Sacramentum of 2004 states on the matter: “the vestments proper to the priest celebrant at Mass, and in other sacred actions directly connected with the Mass, unless otherwise indicated, is the Chasuble, worn over the alb and stole” [123] and then it states “the abuse is reprobated whereby the sacred ministers celebrate Holy Mass or other rites without sacred vestments or with only a stole over the monastic cowl or the common habit of religious or ordinary clothes” [126]. The same document states that the “ordinaries should take care that in all Churches and oratories subject to their jurisdiction there is present an adequate supply of Liturgical vestments made in accordance with the norms” [ibid]. And so dear fathers, kindly ensure that in each Church in your parishes there is an adequate supply of a sufficient number of amices, girdles, stoles and chasubles for daily use. When I come for my parish visits starting from January next year, I will check on this matter personally. Kindly begin celebrating your daily sacrifice of the Eucharist properly clad and that means dressed with the alb, with or without the amice, the girdle, stole and chasuble. This should start immediately. The Auxiliary Bishops and Episcopal Vicars should kindly ensure that this is strictly followed in your areas.

Be Courageous!  Be a leader!  Kneel and receive on the tongue!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ap1KL2D5ae4

From National Catholic Register:

State Rep. Babette Joesephs says that female legislators who support pre-abortion ultrasound laws must be “men with breasts,” and not actually women.  She said it twice during a rally organized to protest the bill:  “I don’t understand it … I don’t believe they’re really women. … I believe they’re men with breasts.”

Pro-life news outlets are rightly responding with disgust, calling her remarks misogynistic; and so they are.  The representative’s crass phrase, “men with breasts,” shows a level of contempt for women which is hard to countenance.  In her view, woman are made of two things: breasts, and the freedom to kill.

But the thing that strikes me about her remarks is how anti-man they are—not just anti-pro-life-man, but anti-men-in-general.  Calling your opponent “men with breasts” implies that all men are, by definition, the enemy.  It’s like saying “the devil in disguise” or “a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”  It assumes that the worst thing you can say about a woman is that she’s like a man.

Every once in a while, I do come across an anti-abortion man who is a true oppressor—who thinks that women are silly, uppity creatures who must be controlled, shamed, reminded daily of her own constitutional weakness and treachery.  It happens so infrequently, though, that my first response is always to laugh.  Who are these guys?  What the heck do they see when they look into the mirror?  Very often, their personalities and beliefs are so repellent that they’re single anyway, so their theories on how to control women remain in the theoretical realm.

And how often have I met pro-life men who respect women, who care about their health, safety, and happiness, and listen to them, and are willing to be corrected if they’re mistaken when it comes to matters like pregnancy, childbirth, and female sexuality?  Oh, eleven billion times.  This number includes priests, married men, old men, traditionalists, up-and-comers, zealots, lukewarm nice guys, and so on.  Pro-life is pro-woman.

Now, there have been many, many times when I have met with an impregnable wall of contempt and condescension from men—from pro-choice men.  When men have fully swallowed the story that they have no right to an opinion about any “women’s issues,” they are invariably breathtakingly rude and condescending toward pro-life women.  They actually do what feminists insist that pro-life men do:  they tell us what we really want, they tell us what’s good for us, they tell us to shut up and let the big boys do the heavy lifting.

And I can imagine why they are so harsh and bitter:  they’ve been told for their entire lives that they are the enemy, they are nothing, they have nothing to say, and that every move they make harms women.  They are only applauded by the cognoscenti when they take over things that used to be women’s jobs, and never when they’re brave or strong, never when they sacrifice themselves.

So when they come face to face with a woman who does not see herself as a victim of biological injustice, who is smart, capable, fulfilled, and happy, it must sting like a sonofagun.  After all those years of hearing that women want them to stop being men, it must hurt where it counts when they discover that that was a lie—that there is a whole population of women who still value men for who they are, and not just as breastless, inherently guilty, malleable pseudo-women.

I often think of one of the final scenes in The Mummy Returns, where the hero and the villain are both dangling over a molten pit of some kind of deadly, otherworldly, condemned-soul-lava.  The wife of the hero sees her husband’s distress, and without hesitation darts out between falling boulders and burning stalactites as they hurtle down from the roof.  She pulls him out and the two struggle away to safety.

The villain then calls to his beloved—the one who cost him his life and whom he’s worked for millennia to be reunited with.  She looks at him, looks at the peril she faces, and cries, “No. . . no!” and dashes away, to save herself.  It takes the villain only a moment to realize that he has lost her—that she never really loved him, even after he gave her everything she wanted.  And with a look of hellish calm, he does the only thing left to him:  he lets himself go, falling backwards into the abyss.

Listen, men.  You don’t have to be “pro-choice” to be appealing to women.  You may have been told that that’s what women want, but let me tell you:  be a good man, be a real man, and there are real women who will run across that burning room to be with you.  The feminists are right when they say that women don’t want to be told what to do.  Women don’t want to be treated like children or idiots.  Unless there’s something wrong with them, they don’t want to be lectured or shamed or pushed around.  But they do want to know that there is someone on their side, someone who will fight for them, someone who will make it safe for them to give themselves away.

Supporting a woman’s right to choose is not the act of a real man.  It’s the act of a castrato, a disemboweled mummy of a man who has nothing to live for but to serve the snakelike and the faithless.  Women don’t want someone who’s so supportive, he’ll go halvsies on the abortion bill.  They want someone who will make such a good life with you that choosing death is the last thing on anyone’s mind.  They want someone who is worth yanking out of that pit—someone you’d never even consider running from.

You know what?  Sometimes life is that burning room.  Sometimes a sexual relationship is full of falling boulders and burning peril.  If you’ve been the man you ought to be, then the woman you love will come across it after you.  Love makes us strong enough to yank each other out of the pit.  Be strong, men.  That is what women want.

By George Weigel:

It involves an attempt by the government to compel Catholic institutions that serve those of many faiths and no faith to violate Catholic teachings within the Church’s own institutions, which is both an intrinsic injustice and a gross intrusion of state power into the Church’s evangelical mission.

And it involves a violation of the civil rights of individuals, who will be compelled to act against their conscientious convictions, “whether in their sponsoring of, and payment for, insurance as employers; their payment of insurance premiums as employees; or as insurers themselves.” This utter disregard for religious convictions and the rights of conscience is also, the bishops note, “unprecedented in federal law, which has long been generous in protecting the rights of individuals not to act against their religious beliefs or moral convictions.”

Thus those who expected the bishops to try and find some 50-yard line of agreement with the administration, a middle ground on which the Church’s institutions would be protected while individual Catholic employers would be left to the tender mercies of HHS, were proven exactly wrong: The bishops intend to defend religious freedom in full, and that defense will be all-in.

“United for Religious Freedom” concludes with a commitment to “accept any invitation to dialogue with the Executive Branch to protect the religious freedom that is rightly ours” — a formulation indicating that they will not come to any such further conversation as a supplicant, but as a defender of American tradition. The statement expresses support for a legislative remedy to the depredations of the HHS mandate, which, one assumes, will now focus on the Fortenberry bill in the House of Representatives. Finally, the statement reiterates the bishops’ determination to pursue a remedy in the federal courts, which is their likeliest path to success. The reference to both the Constitution and “federal laws that protect religious freedom” suggests that the conference knows it has a strong case under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and will vigorously pursue it.

In sum, the bishops have rebuffed calls for a tactical retreat; the analysts who have not grasped the sea-change in perspective of the bishops’ conference have been confounded; the Catholic Lite brigades have been challenged to think again about the gravity of the theological and constitutional issues involved in the mandate; and those who have supported the bishops thus far have been affirmed in their work.

There will be no compromise here, for there can be no compromise of first principles. Those who understand that will gather their energies and continue to defend both Catholic and American tradition.

— George Weigel is Distinguished Senior Fellow of Washington’s Ethics and Public Policy Center, where he holds the William E. Simon Chair in Catholic Studies.