Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Comments

  1. …should have given them away, no?  Maybe they were hungry for biscut?  Perhaps you would like to call for a fatwa.

    • is that the Eucharist is the Body of Christ, and they have no right to desecrate the Sacrament.  I don’t hate gays.  I really don’t.  However, if I saw that happen with my own two eyes in front of me, I’d probably be spending a few nights in a cell for aggravated assault.  Unapologetically. 

      • how do you know that a man in a perfectly respectable 3-piece suit accepting the Eucharist is not the gravest of sinners?  these two Catholics were amazingly honest by approaching the alter in a way that showed their discomfort with the church.  the RCC used to actively pursue liberation theology.  whatever happened?

        • is that the man in the suit has his beef with God keeps it between himself and God.  These weren’t Catholics who were showing their discomfort.  These were activists who decided that it does their cause good to insult the most sacred tradition of my faith.  This wasn’t a subtle insult, this wasn’t a man committing a cardinal sin by taking the Eucharist under pretenses that go against Code of Canon Law.  This kind of behavior makes me want to put on a KKK Outfit (subtle irony) and go sit in on some Queer Comedy night and complain when people get upset at me. 

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          But I would never do that, because I’m not that ignorant and stupid. 

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          Apparently, these dipshits were.

          • you can read their minds better than i can. 

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            i can see why you might see this as an affront.  however, the church does create it’s own double-binds.  they supposedly don’t “hate the sinner”, yet they sure do hate to be seen giving those souls the benefit of the doubt.

            • http://www.vatican.v…

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              Can.  915 Those who have been excommunicated or interdicted after the imposition or declaration of the penalty and others obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to holy communion.

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              Can.  916 A person who is conscious of grave sin is not to celebrate Mass or receive the body of the Lord without previous sacramental confession unless there is a grave reason and there is no opportunity to confess; in this case the person is to remember the obligation to make an act of perfect contrition which includes the resolution of confessing as soon as possible.

      • if I saw that happen with my own two eyes in front of me, I’d probably be spending a few nights in a cell for aggravated assault.  Unapologetically.

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        …yeah, because that is consistent with Jesus’s teachings. And would that not put you at the same level as the sisters?

        • The story does not say “the sisters” were threatening anyone with violence.  In fact, there is nothing in the story that indicates the sisters were not taking the communion seriously.  Rather, the story says they are part of a group that does charitable work.  Sounds like they are closer to God than a lot of us.

      • But I don’t understand why “Tom” would be offended since his behavior here has been far from Christian. The last time I checked, this is not a Catholic website, so I don’t know why anyone would assume that the non-Catholics here would be equally offended.

    • TO subscribes to the GOP school of phony sanctimony and as digby has called it “the dainty republican fainting couch”.

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      I find this phenomenom interesting.  Some people think the GOP uses the phony sanctimony card to distract from other issues, but I think what the right tries to do is extract apologies over minor insignifigant events as a way to emasculate thier opponents.

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      Many people seem to think that apologies are the biggest sign of weakness, so if left leaning politicians or groups can be forced to apologize, it makes the insecure men of the right feel all big and tough and at the same time they accomplish the goal of castrating thier opponents.

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      And if the apology/outrage is all about a totally insignifigant event all the better – for that will make the apologist even more pathetic.

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      That’s why the right uses this bulshit tactic all the time, don’t you think?

      • I also detect a desire to pretend that everyone on the left and everyone who pretends to be on the left and everyone who is a member of a group defended by the left, all those people, every last one of them, they all represent the left.

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        We saw this a while ago when the right-wing blogs somehow thought Ward Churchill’s views were liberal views. Likewise, every utterance of Cindy Sheehan — whether brave or boneheaded — represents liberals according to our critics on the right.

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        This phenomenon reminds me of a relative I have who is always convinced he or she knows what I am really thinking. No amount of protestation and no quantity of evidence ever convinces this erroneous mindreader.

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        Such right-wingers are similar. They are convinced, just convinced, that Churchill and Sheehan are saying what we’re really thinking.

        • yes.  what is sad is that Tom and JoeTS and others don’t realize that there are LGBT people who absolutely loath the Sisters.  not because of their protest against the RCC, but because there can be 5,000 average LGBT people and 2 sisters at an event, and who do the cameras focus in on?  Happens all the time.  And then the who crowd is somehow branded with a Sisters patina in the unthinking person’s mind.  That that whole RCC service in the video was chock full of standard issue fags and dykes seems totally lost on the outraged.

          • Ok, then say something.  Don’t go “6”ing the guy who says “there’s no big deal”.  Say “they’re ignorant assholes.” 

            • In my experience, Catholicism profoundly affects even those who have turned away from it. I have another (!) close relative who is an ex-Catholic and the his exness was almost an obsession for over a decade. It doesn’t surprise me that some gay ex-Catholics somewhere might have an extreme and theatrical response. Since I’ve never been a Catholic — devout, lapsed, or ex, these sorts of displays have always seemed excessive and obsessive to me. They remind me of people who dressed up in Star Wars costumes for the opening of a Star Wars film — something else I’m not interested in.

              • …some gays are drawn to the Roman Catholic Church, Inc. (the RCCi) because it is a “grosses Theater”–a big theater.  People play dress up in marvelous robes and Prada shoes.  And they even swing around “burning purses” (the incense thingies). 

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                Of course, they flung around the incense because, in the olden days. their Theater stank like hell, and the incense covered the stench.  Much like room deodorizers that nowadays are sold for household use.

            • i said that some LGBT people are annoyed with them.  why do you assume i or anyone else counts themselves among the annoyed?

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              if you want to know my personal opinion on the sisters i’ll give it to you.  but i speak only for myself. got it?

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              my opinion:  i have mixed feelings about them.  i would never ask them to stop what they are doing.  they annoy many, perhaps, but hurt no one and are beneficial to many.  but i do know that there are many deliberately ignorant people out there who love to conflate all LGBT people with the sisters, or other unusually (un)dressed people at pride events, etc.  well, that’s the price for freedom of expression.  i;d rather pay it than be obedient to someone else’s rules of conformity.  what does mindless conformity get us?  priest pedophiles.  right-to-lifers that get abortions and lie about it.  “family values” adherents who vilify non-conformists yet personally help keep the porn industry afloat.

            • Liberals will, next week, find some outrageous thing said by Pat Robertson, or some kooky conservative Catholic, and demand that you apologize for it.

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              Doubtless these charming folks were hoping to provoke a scene in the middle of Mass upon being denied communion.  Kudos to the bishop for not allowing that disruption, and for denouncing it later.

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              Every political faction is well-populated with obnixious assholes whose loud voices overcompensate for their extreme marginality.  The other side loves to single it out and then demand that everyone apologize for it, as if moderates hold these extreme views.  Best to let it go without being baited and move on.

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              I am pretty sure that the population of practicing Catholics is more liberal and more friendly to gay marriage than the practicing population of many other Christian Churches, the “official” Vatican position notwithstanding.  Some in the Vatican view this phenomenon as part of a broader Americanist heresy.  I recall, but cannot find a link to, a figure that lay Catholic support for gay marriage was in the mid 40 percents (that may be Massachusetts only).

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              I therefore wonder why it is generally the Catholic Church, rather than some of the more conservative Protestant Churches, that get singled out for this kind of crude protest.

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              My mother would say, JoeTS, that maybe receiving communion will help these people in some way– not necessarily to make them straight, but to make them more Christian.

  4. Being sickened by the lighthearted Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence is right up there with arresting Don Novello for “impersonating a priest” as Father Guido Sarducci.  Why don’t we also excommunicate John Powers for writing Do Black Patent Leather Shoes Really Reflect Up?

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    Lighten up, people.  Look at the crazy world we live in – fair bet that if there is a God, she enjoys a good joke.

  5. …the outrage is against Archbishop George H. Niederauer, because that’s who everyone was mad at in the report?

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    Any way you slice it, what’s the big freakin’ deal?

  9. It sickens me when so-called Christians seem to forget what the core principles of Chritianity are- love and  forgiveness.  It looks like the Archbishop was being, or trying to be, as perfect a Christian as possible. 

  10. In 2004 for the first time in a long time, Catholics voted for a Republican for President.  For over 50 years the Catholic vote was part of the winning Democratic coalition. 

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    Many Catholics have woken up and seen the absolute bile that those who are now in charge of the Democratic party have for them.  That bile is on  display here. 

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    I am a non-practicing Catholic. I have problems with the Church that stem from different areas than you.  Some of them have to do with the penis grabbing priests and others have to do with the choice of which churches were closed.  For instance in Lowell all the French Canadian churches were closed while the Irish Churches were allowed to stay open.  It was a slap in the face to my family and the hundreds of families like mine that built those churches that not one of them would remain open, but turned into condos.

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    That being said, I don’t take communion when I am at church for a wedding, funeral, or during the holidays.  I know it is an affront to do so. 

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    That is the problem here, these people took communion.  I have no problem with satire.  For instance I was not offended by the gay “Last Supper” ad that got Miller Brewing company in trouble. I am offended by this. 

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    Keep up the good work BMG.  Perhaps you’ll lose this vital part of your coalition in 2008 as well.

    • A couple of ignorant, vulgar little children, dressed in their little clown suits, happen to wander into a church during communion. So what?  I’m sure God wasn’t too p.o.’d about it.

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      Making a big deal about it will only encourage other ignorant, vulgar little children to behave in a like manner.

    • Many Catholics have woken up and seen the absolute bile that those who are now in charge of the Democratic party have for them.  That bile is on  display here.

      So I reviewed this thread. The closest anyone has come to expressing anything approaching bile toward the Catholic Church is — you with your “penis-grabbing” comment. Coming in second is Raj. Raj, alas for your argument, is not in charge of the Democratic party. Raj is not even a Democrat. In fact, Raj will tell you he is not even a progressive or a liberal.

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      What your comment does indicate is why the Republicans are losing the libertarians. If I may be bold, Laurel, tblade, HR’s Kevin, Bean in the ‘Burbs, potroast, davesoko, and I all took a standard libertarian line: no one was harmed; it might be offensive to some; we live in a free society; so what.

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      Losing the libertarians would be a disaster for the Republicans. A recent Wall Street Journal article indicates business folk are abandoning the GOP. They’re not terribly socially conservative and Republican fiscal responsibility has become a thing of nostalgia. Let’s see you guys are also losing younger voters and Hispanics. Who’s going to turn out the lights?

    • and don’t bother to read anything written above your own comment.  more hollow EaBoesque ramrod republicanism.

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      EaBo, just be glad that i don’t judge all republicans by your use of promote-the-ignorance tactics.  i know better.  i bet you do too regarding dems.  sad that you won’t be honest and admit it.

      • Is that a new promotional night at the popular Boylston Street establishment? You should post that on the calendar at RMG. Or maybe not; if a certain “opinionated” person finds out we might have another New Bedford on our hands. 

    • It would be interesting though to see what the reaction would have been if these two blasphemous clowns tried this crap in a Synagogue or a Mosque. I think we know the answer as to the Mosque..these two despicable cretins wouldn’t be wearing their headdresses  because they wouldn’t have any heads to put them on. As to a Synagogue? I can’t imagine a Rabbi putting up with this kind of shit beyond 20 seconds not to mention what the ADL would do. But somehow its “OK” ( as we see on this thread) to totally trash and defile the religious beliefs of the Catholic Church because the secular progressives know the Catholic Church won’t fight back.
      After talking with my neighbors over a glass of wine who are two recently married gay men that I’ve known for years, the outrage they expressed is ,I’m sure, the same feeling of the vast majority of decent gay/lesbian people throughout the country. What these two sick “sisters” did was beyond disgusting and sickening but , as we see, has now become the “norm” in what used to be one of America’s greatest cities ..San Francisco… now America’s Sodom and Gomorrah .

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      I think Eabo is correct in saying that there will be a political price for liberal democrats to pay for not condemning this incredibly offensive act against one of the nation’s largest religious denominations.

      • Shetland pony  and dispense with your attempt at faux indignity.

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        As to After talking with my neighbors over a glass of wine who are two recently married gay men that I’ve known for years, I’m sure that some of your best friends are Jews, too.  Some of us have learned to see through you guys’ little charade.

            • …I got used to personal attacks.  I ignore the attacks.  The attackers were doing nothing but making fools of themselves.

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              The wingnut that you were responding to apparently doesn’t know that I have asked a number of questions here.  Obviously, that would more than suggest to a normal person that raj (me) does not claim to “know it all.”

              • “The attackers were doing nothing but making fools of themselves.
                Maybe Busch ,tblade, et al  will get the hint?

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                raj was doing pretty good right up until” The wingnut that you were responding to ” attack and his hypocrisy made be burst out laughing.

      • We all know that you aren’t really upset by this.

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        I don’t think what they did was “ok”, but I also don’t think it is anywhere near as bad as you are trying to make it out to be. As I said, I would not be surprised if some Catholics are deeply offended, but we are not all Catholics here, so I don’t see why you should expect us to feel that way.

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        Also as I said, it is perfectly clear that you do not try to hard to emphasize Christian virtues, so your outrage is clearly fake.

        1. “what the reaction would have been if these two blasphemous clowns tried this crap in a Synagogue or a Mosque” Guess what? Judaism and Islam are minority religions. Of course the reaction would be different. Why the surprise?
        2. “these two despicable cretins wouldn’t be wearing their headdresses  because they wouldn’t have any heads to put them on.” That’s clearly absurd. No such thing has happened in an American mosque. Do not substitute paranoid fantasy for reality.
        3. “to totally trash and defile the religious beliefs” A small amount of political theater somewhere is enough to “totally trash and defile”. Hyperbolic nonsense.
        4. “San Francisco… now America’s Sodom and Gomorrah .” More ridiculous hyperbole.
        5. “there will be a political price for liberal democrats to pay for not condemning this incredibly offensive act ” There’s never any polling data from you. Hillary Clinton beats all Republican candidates in the Ohio polls — and the Democrats have not even begun to excavate Giuliani’s ties with Kerik or Romney’s lack of principle. Party identification tilts more toward Democrats than it has in long time. What about the Wall Street Journal article or the polling indicating that the GOP is losing the independents?

        • Tom/Asa is an out and proud homophobe over on RMG.

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          I don’t have the stomach to search for one of his rants on how gay marriage violates his rights, so will just ask why he spends so much time posting here on the “Gay mass Group.”

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          http://www.redmassgr…

        • KBusch, just so you know, these guys descrated what may be the most sacred ritual in Catholicism.  It is hard to imagine what they could have done to be more offensive than this.  It approaches and may equal the deliberate desecration of the Torah or Koran.

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          I susoect that the bishop just decided that he wasn’t going to allow these people to disrupt the Mass, and decided to denounce them later.

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          That said, you wrote:  “Guess what?  Judaism and Islam are minority religions.  Of course the reaction would be different.  Why the surprise?”

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          What the heck does being a “minority religion” have to do with anything?

          • …the Roman Catholic Church, Inc., did not try to pollute the civil law, maybe it would not be satirized.

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            Quite frankly, if the RCCi tended to their own knitting, I for one, wouldn’t give a tinker’s damn what they did regarding their own membership. 

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            But they don’t.

    • Forgive me if I don’t take much interest in the musings of someone who was regularly and spectacularly wrong on the MA-05 race for months.

      • a few thousand votes against a dumb farmer after spending 4 million bucks and bringing in every Dem superstar except FDR cause he’s dead? You mean THAT election? LMAO!

    • Why they stay in the church, I don’t know, but they’re out there.  You shouldn’t assume that the sisters aren’t sincere in taking communion, just because they’re doing it in their nun costumes. 

        • Did you actually watch the clip?  The two sisters are noted in it to be Catholics who just wanted to take communion.  They aren’t attired as clowns, but in the group’s stylized nun costumes.  The group is a registered non-profit organization.  It’s mission is

          to promulgate universal joy, expiate stigmatic guilt and serve the community…

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          They have a nearly 30 year history in SF, where they’ve raised money – in their own light-hearted way – for AIDS services, the ’89 Earthquake relief fund, and local charities.

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        • not to mention a santa hat from time to time.  so i really don’t see you have much to stand on.

      • Many of my friends have had a hard time leaving the faith.  some of them have become Episcopalians, but others have remained true to their church and are active in Dignity. 

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        Just because someone is in drag doesn’t mean they haven’t been to confession.

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        Speaking of which, a friend and former Republican aide was over for the Sox game last night.  He calls BMG the Republican Drag Ball for the number of people over here pretending to be moderates.  An example: a year or so ago he dragged me to a Young Republican Meetup in hopes of convincing me the party wasn’t intolerant.  There I met a person who used the word “faggot” 17 times in the course of a 10-15 minute conversation (as in “fucking liberal faggots.”)  Last night I found out that person is EaBo Clipper.  Small world.

        • I’ve never used the word “faggot” at a YR meetup.  I don’t normally use the word ever. I’ve also never heard it uttered at a YR meetup I’ve been at. 

          • But it was definitely you. 

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            The memory is a very vivid one. It led to my friend doing a lot of soul searching and eventually leaving the party. 

            • From the relative anonymity of the web, you make a disgusting and unprovable accusation. (not surprisingly, of bigotry – standard fare)

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              Oh. by the way, didn’t I see you on the green line yesterday, snatching an old lady’s handbag?
              Yes, yes, now that I vividly recall, it definitely was you.
              Ain’t you a class act now, huh?

          • I’m not in the habit of recording conversations, so except for my friend, all I’ve got is my memory.  I’m not particularly keen on revealing EaBo’s secret identity, either. 

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            I will say I’m embarrassed not to have made the connection myself.  I even posted about EaBo hoping Rob Willington would energize the anti-gay marriage crowd :

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            http://bluemassgroup…

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            I really don’t think the claim is that extraordinary (and certainly didn’t mean to cause a ruckus). My point was more about people judging others while not being exactly pure themselves.

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            That said, did you somehow think Mass. GOP meetings are gay positive?  To continue the story, my friend ended up leaving the party, not because of this incident, but because he felt the Mass. GOP was becoming an arm of the Mass. Family Institute (aka Vote On Marriage).  And that was before Rob Wellington became Executive Director.

            • It’s plausible that Eabo has talked about “liberal faggots” at a YR meeting, but it doesn’t seem likely. It’s plausible that you believe that whichever slur-happy Republican you met that night was in fact the Eabo Clipper, but that you are mistaken. It’s also plausible that you’re making this up. I’m agnostic on the whole deal.

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              Hey, if it happened the way you said it did, most of us would like to know about it.  But considering that anyone can say anything about anybody on the internet, I think the last thing BMG needs is people making incendiary unsupported claims about members. If someone was mistaken about me, I wouldn’t want it all over BMG.

              • And if I had, why would I do it in a sub-sub-sub reply to a non-front page post? Unless that counts as “all over BMG” these days. 

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                I’m not even sure it’s really incendiary, unless, again, you somehow believe that people fighting gay marriage aren’t homophobic. 

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                Put another way, if I were really looking to somehow damage EaBo (for whatever reason), wouldn’t I have done it when he was carrying the torch for Ogo? 

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                Again, my point was about sanctimony and pretending.  Guess I should have stuck with the RMG cross-posting. 🙁

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                BTW, why doesn’t it seem likely?  Have you met EaBo and had a different experience?  If so, I’d love to hear about it.

                • I appreciate tblade’s care and principled response, but I also tend to believe huh who is credible.

                • If I could figure out how, I’d delete the reply and use another example, since it’s diminished my actual point.

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                  Just Googling around, I found EaBo’s blog from last year.  The “Open letter to Dan Grabauskus” from 6 October works just as well and is more pertinent to recent discussion of immigration.

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                  http://eaboclipper.b…

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                  p.s. Not surprisingly, EaBo’s blogging on the Tsongas election  strongly mirror his archived comments on Deval.

                • I’m just a natural skeptic. It’s your word and memory from an event a year ago vs. Eabo’s. What can I say?

                • Here’s an example using words from EaBo’s pre-RMG blog.  Please bleep over my earlier example and substitute this:

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                  Speaking of which, a friend and former Republican aide was over for the Sox game last night.  He calls BMG the Republican Drag Ball for the number of people over here pretending to be moderates.  As an example, here’s EaBo on Spanish language announcements on the T:

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                  http://eaboclipper.b…

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                  Friday, October 06, 2006

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                  Open Letter to Dan Grabauskus
                  Mr. Grabauskus,

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                  I supported you when you ran for state treasurer in 2002. I’ve been a big fan of yours. However some things at the MBTA have rubbed me the wrong way. Most of them have to do with the MBTAs insistence on bilingulaism.

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                  For instance, this evening I entered the Blue Line at the Aquarium station at about 11:45 pm, and what did I hear, some sort of announcement in Spanish as I went down the escalator. Perhaps it was an important announcement, I wouldn’t know, because I’m an AMERICAN citizen who speaks ENGLISH!!! Luckily it wasn’t an emergency annoucement, at least I don’t think it was.

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                  Just because I use the Blue Line, and live in East Boston, with undocumented workers from El Salvador, doesn’t mean I need to listen to announcements en espanol.

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                  Please refrain from the Spanish, and only use English. If the riders don’t wan’t to learn it, tell them in English, to go home. When my mother came here in the 1960s from French Canada, she learned English. They should too.

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                  Thanks,

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                  EaBo Clipper

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                  posted by EaBo Clipper @ 11:08 PM

                • …good grammar, a rational argument, or people who speak Spanish?  I wonder if Eabo is aware that there are citizens who speak spanish.

                • When I was on the Shinkansen this summer, I was happy to hear station announcements in Japanese and English.

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                  I was thrilled to see ATMs and railway vending machines where I could hit a button and the Japanese faded into English.

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                  If we want to be a world-class city, we need more signs and more ATMs and more announcements in more languages.

  11. As a lapsed Catholic, I struggle with my involvement with the church. Even in high school, where I was part of a folk group that sang at Sunday Mass, I found myself questioning the judgmental attitude of the church. Conversely my experience with the priests in my parish were the opposest – they were understanding and interested in keeping youth involvement in the church.

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    For me the RCC lost all moral authority to comment (or condemn)when the Church leadership – from top to bottom – hid/protected sexual predators rather then protecting children. Any attempst to speak on moral issues (or issues they frame as moral ones – equal marriage for example) fall on deaf ears with me.

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    I understand the rituals within the RCC open themsleves to lampooning. (and have for a long time  – listen to Tom Leher’s Vatican Rag). Any question raised on the sexual crimes condoned by the Church are legit. Humor at the RCC expense seems a given.

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    All that said – Tom – as a Catholic all my life, I have no problem with what the Sisters did. It was protest -silent and non-distruptive. The RCC by taking public policy positions invites public protest. The RCC doesn’t act as a private club – admission to the church involves no more then opening a door. (admission to the faith involves much more but that is another issue for another post). So protest while making some Catholics uncomfortable is totally acceptable to me.

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    To me religion is a personal matter, private and not to be forced upon others. However, I do have problems with those who attack people of faith simply because they have faith. To denegrate a ritual based on faith and symbolism as one post here did  – “ritual canabalism” I believe was the term use to describe cummunion  – I find more objectionable then to silently protest church policy.

    • …is that the idiot archbishop who conducted the ritual cannibalism ceremony (aka “communion”) in San Francisco was apparently unable to determine that the member of the Sisters of the Perpetual Indulgence were male. 

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      Sorry, I find that very difficult to believe.  It was the idiot archbishop who conducted the ritual cannibalism ceremony with them.  He has only himself to blame now that he is shocked, shocked!! at what he did. 

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      Tom O’s faux indignity is really rather hilarious.

  12. I’ve read this thread, and I have to say that although I’m not a Christian, let alone a Catholic, and although I don’t think I’ve agreed with many of Tom’s posts, I agree with him on this one. Even if it’s legal to poke a stick into somebody’s eye, it’s not the right thing to do.

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    It’s possible to be funny while scoring progressive points (Billionaires For Bush and Steven Colbert at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner are my two favorite recent examples), and if we are concerned with making liberal politics seem appealing to people who don’t describe themselves as liberal, I believe “funny” may work better than “angry.” But this stunt wasn’t funny, it was puerile and offensive.

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    Can’t folks see that?

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    TedF

    • If you aren’t, then you aren’t really agreeing with “Tom”.

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      I agree that the stunt was childish, but I am not personally offended by it in the way that “Tom” pretends to be. Are you?

      • I would say yes, I am sickened. My reaction is surely not the reaction of a Roman Catholic. But I have empathy for them here, that is, I feel something of what they feel. One way to have empathy is to imagine how you would feel if your own community (religious or otherwise) were the victim of this kind of stunt. But I don’t think it’s necessary to do this kind of thought experiment for one to feel a little sickened after learning about an episode like this.

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        Do you not sometimes feel hurt simply because you see a stranger has been hurt? If so, why not here?

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        • when i see a stranger suffering.  in this case, i hurt for all the LGBT catholics who have had the door slammed in their faces, who are vilified by the leader of their religion, and who endure the silent acquiescence of the majority of their co-religionists.  i think you’re not seeing who is really being hurt here, and that is a tragedy.

          • Laurel, what you say is consistent with what I have said, and in fact I agree with you that the RCC treats gay and lesbian Catholics hurtfully. What does that have to do with what I have said? I don’t believe that victimhood gives anyone a license to be as offensive to others as they want to be. Look, I’m Jewish, a member of a group that has in the past suffered much at the hands of the Roman Catholic Church. Do I have license to make merry with their worship? (No question that relationships between Jews and Catholics on an institutional level are now much healthier now than the relationship between the Catholic Church and gay and lesbian Catholics).

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            • that’s not what you said you were sickened over.  you agreed to be sickened as per tom.  are you trying to tell me that in his posts, you see empathy for gay people?  LOL!  riiiigght!  well whatever, go ahead and have a bleeding heart for the poor downtrodden roman catholic church.  they are, no question, the lamb in the lion’s mouth. 

              • Laurel, I think you’ve misunderstood me. I agree with you that Tom’s views on gays and lesbians are wrongheaded. My point was that the communion stunt was offensive, not that I agree with Tom’s views on homosexuality generally. (You do agree that it’s possible to find the stunt offensive without being a homophobe, right?)

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                • I said way up-thread that I could see how some catholics could be offended at this.  however, giving it more than a passing glance, given the enormous hate directed by the RCC at gays, is, to put it mildly, disproportionate.  the extent to which you do not see that is the extent of our disagreement.

        • and although I am no longer religious, I was once part of that community and still have sympathies for it. However, this stunt just doesn’t push my buttons in that regard.

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          Lets keep this in proportion. How badly was anyone hurt by this? Empathy is a great virtue, but if you really are “sickened” by this then surely the real tragedies of this world such as what is currently going on in Darfur should cause you to go insane.

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          Also, does “Tom” seem in any way to be an empathic person to you? Do you really think that he posted this diary out of a heartfelt consideration of other people’s feelings? He seems to have negative empathy for immigrants, gays, liberals and anyone who disagrees with him.

          • Kevin, good comment.

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            Also, does “Tom” seem in any way to be an empathic person to you? Do you really think that he posted this diary out of a heartfelt consideration of other people’s feelings? He seems to have negative empathy for immigrants, gays, liberals and anyone who disagrees with him.

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            Agreed, but ad hominem and irrelevant.

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            How badly was anyone hurt by this? Empathy is a great virtue, but if you really are “sickened” by this then surely the real tragedies of this world such as what is currently going on in Darfur should cause you to go insane.

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            Fair enough. I’m not losing any sleep over this. If the point is that there are lots of things going on in the world that are worse than this, then I agree. But I think it’s too easy just to say that no one was hurt or even that no one was badly hurt. Again relying on my experience as a Jew, I can think of lots of things that would be deeply offensive to me but probably inexplicable to others. I suppose that on this point, where I differ from Tom is that I don’t generally go around beating my chest when something does offend me in that way–much better to wait for realization to dawn on the empathetic people around me.

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            And anyway, if we all must strictly rank-order the things that upset us and devote our attention and emotion only to the most serious, this would be a pretty boring blog: all Darfur, Iraq, and ice caps melting all the time!

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