Lori in the Limelight: What about Those "Large Anonymous Gifts" Used to Fight Disclosure of Sex-Abuse Files?

And speaking of the USCCB religious freedom guru, Bishop William Lori and the increasingly high-profile role he's playing in American politics and the public square (I have been speaking of these matters lately, haven't I?):

Does it strike anyone other than me, I wonder, as . . . more than coincidental . . . that Lori's precipitous rise to power within the structures of the USCCB was preceded by his announcement in 2009 that his Bridgeport diocese had been given "large anonymous gifts" to enable it to fight against opening its files about priests sexually abusing minors to public inspection?

As the posting about this to which I've just linked notes, this is a recurring motif vis-a-vis the American Catholic bishops and their right-wing politicking: when the media, the courts, and the Catholic laity apply pressure for the hierarchy to be transparent and accountable in situations like their pastoral response to the abuse crisis, suddenly we hear of "large anonymous gifts" coming in to assist the hierarchy in its fight against transparency and accountability.

Or, as in Maine in 2009, when the Catholic diocese fought tooth and nail to remove the right of civil marriage from gay citizens of that state, or as in Minnesota, when the Catholic bishops of the state mailed a video against same-sex marriage to all Catholic households on the eve of the 2010 elections: suddenly, we're told, "large anonymous gifts" roll in to make all of this right-wing politicking possible.  (Links to the Maine story are embedded in the posting to which my previous link points.  For links to information on the Minnesota story, click "Minnesota" in the tags below this posting.)

Interestingly enough, we're never told who is providing these "large anonymous gifts."  In fact, when the media and lay Catholics press bishops on these points, they inevitably get shoulder shrugs, blank looks, and avowals that, "Shucks, I just can't remember where those several million dollars dropped down from."  Faith-based non-profits don't have to disclose such information to the American public.  Not even when the USCCB is second among all faith-based political lobbying groups in the U.S. in terms of the amount of money it spends to engage in political lobbying.

To connect the dots and return to my primary point, which is Lori's emergence now to the very center of the stage of both the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and of the American public-media square: "large anonymous gifts" pour in to enable him as bishop of the Bridgeport diocese to fight against disclosing his records about priests abusing minors and, voilà, he's suddenly right in the center of the stage and the eye of the media leading the U.S. bishops' battle against the Obama administration and for religious freedom.

It's almost as if the two are connected, isn't it?  It's almost as if whoever provides those "large anonymous gifts" is also greasing the palms of some powerful people somewhere to assure that these very same bishops whose fights against gay marriage or against transparency and accountability in the abuse crisis also occupy center stage in the fight against the Obama administration in a spurious battle for "religious liberty."

We can't know who this someone or these someones who provide the funding that oils these political machines happen to be.  Whoever they are, however, they appear to have a clear political agenda.

And the bishops appear perfectly willing to let themselves be used to further that political agenda.  Making their claims to be all about defending life--the lives of small defenseless fertilized-ova human beings, as Lori just put the point in his response to America to which my first posting above points)--appear rather ridiculous.  Not to mention, rather mendacious.

Because what does it say about your concern for life and for small defenseless human beings when you  fight against the attempts of the courts, the media, and lay Catholics to force you to be transparent and accountable as a pastoral leader in an abuse crisis in which you have subjected small defenseless already born human beings to untold misery by keeping priests known abuse minors in ministry (and here)?