Droppings from the Catholic Birdcage: Fried Chicken, the Deposit of Faith, and the Big Gay Gestapo

When I invented the birdcage droppings meme, little did I know that American Catholics would be intensely involved in a discussion about chicken sandwiches in the middle of the long, hot summer of 2012.  Little did I know, that is to say, quite how to the point the birdcage meme would be.

Or the droppings meme, either, for that matter.

For some . . . interesting . . . new droppings, have a look at the thread that has developed in response to Michael O'Loughlin's sane, measured posting at America about the Chick-fil-A controversy.  Who'd have thought that a thread which began with such sanity and measure could devolve into an accusation that 

[t]he big gay gestapo has now killed the head of PR for Chick Fil A . . . . 

Or to a lengthy list of Chick-fil-A servatoria in the D.C. area?

Who'd have thought this is where American Catholics would have decided to end up, some of us, in the long, hot summer of 2012: hotly proclaiming that eating fried chicken sandwiches served with sides of hate is a sacred obligation seemingly not far removed from a sacramental obligation?  Fried chicken-sandwich servatoria as sanctuaries, in which the righteous commune with their God and with other righteous folks who know that some sandwiches function as outward and visible signs of the grace within the truly holy . . . . 

For those who want to read the thread at America, better get it while it's hot.  This is one I could see the moderators eventually culling.  That charge that "the big gay gestapo" has killed a Chick-fil-A official is pretty inflammatory, and it's surprising to see it standing on the thread of a Catholic blog site.

And it's pretty shocking to find that the woman making this wild allegation has been "a psychiatric social worker / psychotherapist for many decades," and that she writes frequently on America threads about how Jesus's great command is that we love one another--provided, of course, that we "review the Catechism" and have a "full understanding of the deposit of Faith."

I'm madly thumbing my Catechism of the Catholic Church this morning for references to my sacred obligation to consume chicken sandwiches with sides of hate, but not finding the specific passage.  I'll admit that the book is recondite and as stuffed with, well, stuff as a good chicken sandwich is, and I may be missing the passage I'm seeking.

So much, after all, has been deposited over the years, in the Roman Catholic birdcage deposit of faith.