The Church Also Wants To Kill The Bill, Though Not For The Same Reasons Howard Dean Does

As I mentioned yesterday, I'm spending some time in Rome this month, getting to know the city a little more in depth than on previous visits, which were always for just a day or two here and there, rather than for an extended stay. This time I've been meeting lots of Romans and, since it feels like we're one of only a small population of hearty tourists braving the cold, wet Roman winter, people have time and inclination to talk with us. I'm sure someone thinks highly of Catholics, Inc-- but no one we've met. I mean, maybe they like it or revere it deep down somewhere but all we hear is a lot of resentment towards the Church. Around a third of Italians are active members of the Church. Over two-thirds aren't-- and many of them aren't happy with the power the Church exerts over their country, a power that is at all times extremely reactionary when it comes to politics.

The Church doesn't exactly rule Rome any longer. Not exactly. In 1870 what was left of the Pope's temporal empire, the Papal States-- after 1860, namely Rome-- was absorbed into the new Kingdom of Italy. In 1929, by virtue of the Lateran Treaty, Mussolini made a deal with the Pope giving him sovereignty over 110 acres in the middle of Rome (Vatican City)-- plus Castel Gandolfo and other Church-owned properties scattered around Rome-- in return for the Church opening up its incredible art collections to the public (and the Pope ceasing its campaign to undermine the legitimacy of the Italian state). The Lateran Treaty and Concordat also made the Roman Catholic religion the Kingdom's official state religion. The influence of the Church on the state is conservative and anti-democratic and always holds Rome back in terms of progress on every front. When Italians are able to vote against the Church's policies they do-- in overwhelming numbers. For example, in 1981 when the Church backed a proposal to repeal the 1978 law making abortion in the first trimester legal and free, it was defeated in a national referendum by nearly 70%. According to wikipedia "Italian women are eligible to request an abortion for health, economic or social reasons, including the circumstances under which conception occurred. Abortions are performed free-of-charge in public hospitals or in private structures authorized by the regional health authorities. The law also allows termination in the second trimester of the pregnancy only in one of the following cases: a) when the life of the woman would be at risk if the pregnancy is carried to term; b) the fetus carries genetic or other serious malformations which would put the mother at risk of serious psychological or physical consequences."

The Church has actually exerted more power over abortion politics in the U.S., though, of course not on a grassroots level, than in Italy! The Church has been firmly aligned with the most reactionary political forces-- i.e., the Republican Party-- in a quest to overturn legalized abortion. In Rome people see how the Church has stolen everything they could get their hands on in terms of the city's natural heritage. The ancient ruins didn't just fall apart because of inclement weather. Every inch of magnificence of Vatican City-- all the marble, the mosaics, the bronze, the ancient sculptures...-- was looted from the Imperial Roman masterpieces that hover over the city today as ruins. The popes ruined them by appropriating whatever they could carry away.

In our own country, the extreme right-wing organization known as the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, has been working overtime to use the debate over healthcare to weaken the legitimacy of safe and legal abortion. They've gone well beyond working with Republican Party and conservative Democratic politicians, and well beyond threatening and even banning liberal politicians. They have been actively participating in the details of the healthcare bill in terms of Choice. Robert Casey (D-PA), generally a moderate-to-progressive senator considered staunchly anti-choice has been the go-between with the Church and the Democrats. Friday they said they're not satisfied with the deal he helped broker between the Democrats and Ben Nelson, the deal which looks like the end of the debate.

Galveston-Houston Archbishop Daniel Cardinal DiNardo, the chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Pro-Life Activities, rejected the compromise language Casey has been working to craft on the bill's federal support for purchasing insurance plans covering abortions.


“I welcome Senator Casey’s good-faith effort to improve this bill," DiNardo said in a statment. "However, these improvements do not change the fundamental problem with the Senate bill: Despite repeated claims to the contrary, it does not comply with longstanding Hyde restrictions on federal funding of elective abortions and health plans that include them."

...Casey unveiled his abortion language on Friday afternoon, touting support from a number of faith-based groups, including the Catholic Health Association, Evangelicals for Social Action, and the National Hispanic Leadership Conference.

The Casey proposal would assure segregate private premiums from taxpayer subsidies for plans, and allowing individuals to opt out from their premiums going to subsidize plans covering abortions.

The Catholic bishops had been instrumental in working to attach Rep. Bart Stupak's (D-Mich.) amendment curtailing support for abortion coverage to the House bill. A similar amendment failed to muster the votes in the Senate. Casey's proposal is an attempt to bridge the current legislation and the Stupak language.

I'm not one who thinks the whole Church hierarchy should be rounded up and put on trial for systematic child rape. I'm not one who thinks there is collective guilt for the Church and that they should all be severely punished. Trials where trials are due, of course, but there are some decent priests who actually care about Jesus' message of love and peace and who are dedicated to helping the poor and not just catering to the wealthy and powerful. Sure, they're a tiny minority and have no power whatsoever in the Church hierarchy but I just want to be clear that I don't think every singe priest is a villain. On the other hand, the Church's interference in politics has been so overwhelming and systematic and detrimental to the country that there is no doubt that these crooks should have been paying taxes for decades.

[A]ny religious organization that lives up to its commitments to its congregation and community would have nothing to fear from filing a tax return, just like every other non-profit... [and] when these institutions pay taxes like every other non-profit, each citizen's tax burden is significantly lessened and consequently he or she may better endow a worthy institution with individual support... It will be obvious to rational people that exempting religious organizations from paying any taxes is a clear case of government "respecting an establishment of religion." But throughout history we have seen many otherwise-lucid thinkers insist otherwise, including Supreme Court justices who uphold biblical views when their taxpayer-funded jobs explicitly require them to uphold the Constitution of the United States of America.

...Many [churches] are among the wealthiest organizations in the world: by 1971, the amount of real and personal property owned by U.S. churches was approx. $110 billion. In New York City alone, the amount was $3 billion in 1989. A 1986 estimate showed religious income in that year of approx. $100 billion, or about five times the income of the five largest corporations in the U.S.  All tax free.

Long past time for that to end. Long past time for the taxpayers of this country to be subsidizing the Church's pernicious reactionary politics and their perverted and predatory towards children. At the very least, they should be put on the defensive trying to hold onto their ill-gotten wealth and power instead of having them interfere with public policy they way they've been doing in the healthcare debate. The Pope didn't like this speech JFK gave in Houston in 1960 when he was running for Congress: