Contact: Jeff Field, Director of Communications, Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, catalyst@catholicleague.org, 212-371-3191

MEDIA ADVISORY, April 7 /Standard Newswire/ -- Maureen Dowd has an article in today's New York Times titled, "The Church's Judas Moment." Catholic League president Bill Donohue couldn't resist a rejoinder:

It is next to impossible for Maureen Dowd to write a piece about the Catholic Church without sounding whiny. Always the victim, Maureen is forever put upon by the boys in robes. That she desperately wants to try one on for size is obvious, but, alas, this is a problem without a remedy. Well, not quite: there are still a few mainline Protestant churches open that might welcome her.

Maureen confesses that she is so flustered by the Vatican, New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan and me that she could not write today's column, and that is why she invited her "devout Catholic" brother Kevin to pen one in her place. That was a mistake.

Dowd's brother writes that since Vatican II, laypeople have been "performing the sacraments." He later writes that "Married people and laypeople giving the sacraments are not going to destroy the church." Someone needs to inform Devout Kevin that laypeople are not permitted to give the sacraments. 

Devout Kevin also seems confused about another matter, although this time he is not alone. He cheers the "liberalized rules of the Vatican," but notes with sadness that celibacy was not dropped. As a result, he says, the Church ended up "drawing on men confused about their sexuality who put our children in harm's way." But homosexuals are no more confused about their sexuality than heterosexuals. He does deserve credit, however, for noting that too many of the wrong guys got into the Church following Vatican II.

We wish Maureen a speedy recovery and hope the R&R will have an alembic effect. And we hope Devout Kevin accesses a copy of Catholicism for Dummies.

www.catholicleague.org/release.php?id=1824