As we celebrate last week's "victory" and "miracle" for the Catholic tribe, it may be important not to lose sight of who we really are as a church. As we celebrate our tribe's coming out on top in the HHS contraception battle--We're number one!--we might want to take a little peek in the mirror and remind ourselves of some of the beyond-cosmetic work we need to do to project a really compelling face as a religious body teaching moral truths in the American public square.
To my way of thinking, one of the most important things we need to face--and to resolve--as a Catholic community in the U.S. right now is that we still have a sitting bishop exercising pastoral leadership in one of our dioceses, who has been convicted by a court of law of the crime of endangering children's welfare. I'm referring, of course, to Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City, who still occupies his ecclesiastical see despite his criminal conviction last February.
If you want to make your voice heard about Finn's refusal to resign his episcopal office despite his criminal conviction, you may want to consider signing Jeff Weiss's petition at Change.org calling for Finn's resignation. And as I mention Jeff's petition, I don't want to forget to issue a reminder as well of Jerry Slevin's petition, also at Change.org, calling on President Obama to investigate child sexual abuse by religious leaders.
Two worthy petitions that allow us to do something and to make our voices heard.
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