Friday, October 29, 2004
CRISIS MAGAZINE E-LETTER
Frances Kissling and the IRS
October 29, 2004
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Dear Friend,
As you’ve noticed, there’s now a new name at the top of this
e-letter. I imagine it’s like inviting a friend over for dinner, only
to have a complete stranger show up and start eating.
With that in mind, and to make us strangers no more, let me
introduce myself. My name is Brian Saint-Paul, and I’ve been the
editor of Crisis Magazine for about three years. Before coming to
Crisis, I was the associate director of a health research institute
in Baltimore. And prior to that, I worked for a number of Catholic
organizations.
My wife, Zoe, and I live in a 100-year old rowhouse in a historic
section of Baltimore. And yes, we’re gloriously close to the water,
where we can smell the crisp and briny wind blowing off the
Chesapeake Bay each morning. That makes it a little bit easier for us
to get up for the early commute into Washington, D.C. Since neither
of us are morning people, we try to use any motivation we can get.
When I’m not working on the magazine, I read voraciously, sip coffee
with the wife while watching the boats drift into the harbor, and
cook Asian cuisine (our kitchen is a maze of woks and Chinese
cleavers). I do most of our cooking, since I enjoy it so much. Zoe is
happy with this arrangement, though she put her foot down once when I
simmered fish stock for 3 hours and made our house reek like a
dockyard.
As we move forward, we’ll get to know each other better. But for
now, let’s get to my main reason for writing to you today.
You’ve probably heard of Frances Kissling and her pro-abortion
sideshow, Catholics for a Free Choice (CFFC). Well, Ms. Kissling has
been awfully busy this past week.
On Monday, her organization filed a complaint with the IRS, asking
that they remove the tax-exempt status of the archdiocese of Denver.
It seems that Denver’s archbishop, Charles Chaput, O.F.M. Cap., has
been a bit too vocal for Kissling’s liking. And if you read his
wonderful Op-Ed in Friday’s New York Times, you can guess why CFFC is
falling over itself to silence him. In it, he exposes the folly of
being a "pro-choice Catholic:"
"For Catholics to take a ‘pro-choice’ view toward abortion
contradicts our identity and makes us complicit in how the choice
plays out. The ‘choice’ in abortion always involves the choice to end
the life of an unborn human being. For anyone who sees this fact
clearly, neutrality, silence or private disapproval are not options.
They are evils almost as grave as abortion itself. If religious
believers do not advance their convictions about public morality in
public debate, they are demonstrating not tolerance but cowardice."
Strong words, but true ones. And that’s what drew the ire of Frances
Kissling.
But Archbishop Chaput wasn’t her only target. Just one day after
filing the complaint against Denver, CFFC sent a second to the IRS,
this time zeroing in on Archbishop Raymond Burke and the archdiocese
of St. Louis.
Archbishop Burke, like Chaput, isn’t afraid to stand up for the
moral teachings of the Catholic Church. It is, after all, in his job
description.
Kissling hopes to change that. In her complaint against Burke, she
called on the IRS to "immediately exercise [its] authority to revoke
the tax-exempt status of the Archdiocese of St. Louis and bring an
action to enjoin it from conducting further efforts to intervene in
the imminent elections."
You see, in Frances Kissling’s mind, a bishop who defends the moral
teachings of the Church is, in doing so, making a specific political
statement. And that political statement, she claims, runs contrary to
the candidacy of "Catholic" Senator John Kerry.
What Kissling misses here is that she’s getting the matter
backwards: The fact that a bishop’s defense of the Faith appears to
criticize John Kerry says less about the bishop and more about
Kerry’s distorted Catholicism.
And so Frances Kissling frets and stews and shoots off her letters
to the IRS.
Amusingly enough, the tag-lines to the press releases announcing
both complaints carry this statement:
"Catholics for a Free Choice is a non-partisan organization. We do
not support or oppose candidates for public office."
And yet, on their website you can find a press release entitled,
"Catholics for a Free Choice Supports Proposition 71: The California
Stem Cell Research & Cures Initiative."
The tag-line of that document, incidentally, is identical to the
others in all respects but one: It omits the line about being "a
non-partisan organization."
I‘ll keep you updated as events develop.
All the best,
Brian Saint-Paul
P.S. In the November issue of Crisis -- arriving in homes any day
now -- you’ll find a feature article by Archbishop Chaput on the
obligations of Catholics in public and private life. This is a
masterful piece that everyone needs to read, so I’ve put it up on our
website to make it immediately available. You can find it here:
http://www.crisismagazine.com/feature1.htm
Please feel free to forward this link to anyone you think might
benefit from the article.
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