As a general principle, I try to avoid writing about religious matters because my views on that subject are well known. Simply put, I am a non-believer. But in the past week or so, I almost became a believer. There was a development that simply had to be commented upon, which is the subject of this essay. The story involves the National Conference of Catholic Bishops coming down on the wrong side of history, while the Association of Catholic Nuns came down on the right side. In this debate, I hope that the nuns will win every round. In so doing, they may clean the bishops’ clocks immaculately.
This story goes back to the 1960s when I was privileged to serve as a member of the Washington office of AT&T. There are many people who describe my duties there as being a lobbyist. I don’t really disagree with them, but the fact of the matter is that the duties of the Washington office were to make the federal government feel better about AT&T. My boss at that time was an Assistant Vice President named Ben Givens, who supervised me not at all. I remember Ben for his spoonerisms which provided endless delight. For example, there was a very popular sports restaurant run by a gentleman named Duke Zeibert. Ben invariably pronounced his name as Zuke Deibert. Ben was not much of a boss but we got along well during the nearly four years that I worked in Washington. And so it is that I conclude that it was my privilege to work there and to have a good bit to do with the federal government.
In the early fall of each year, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops holds a conference in Washington, D.C. These conferences attracted wide press attention and were covered in detail by the two Washington newspapers that existed at that time. They were The Washington Star and The Washington Post. I subscribed to both papers.
The first year that I was in Washington, the Conference of Catholic Bishops held their annual conference in early September. One of the bishops made valiant attempts to bring up the subject of purgatory. That bishop was in a distinct minority. The rest of the conference seemed not to share his interest in purgatory.
My recollection is that in the following year, the same bishop again brought up the subject of purgatory. Reading between the lines, it became quite clear that the rest of the conference again wanted little to do with that subject. I would go so far to say that not all of the Catholic bishops believed in purgatory. A film clip on television seemed to indicate that the other participants in the conference would sigh when this bishop got up to make his remarks about purgatory. I thought that I could learn something about this most divisive issue. For example, where is purgatory located. But from what I was able to read and able to see, there was no unanimity on the subject of purgatory.
Apparently the time spent in purgatory before admission to heaven or to hell could be almost endless. I gathered that escape from purgatory had to do with the people remaining on earth praying and contributing to the church. But if the bishops wanted little to do with the subject of purgatory, I was intrigued. Unfortunately, I found nothing conclusive on the subject of purgatory from the Conference of Catholic Bishops. It appeared that the bulk of the bishops wanted to talk about something else beyond purgatory.
Now if you will, I would like to fast forward to March of the year 2010. Unbeknownst to me, Catholic nuns have formed some sort of organization, somewhat resembling a union. I observe that there are many more Catholic nuns than there are Catholic bishops. From my standpoint, they have come down on the right side of history in the healthcare debate. They wish to insure the uninsured and they wish to do away with such things as pre-existing conditions. On the other hand, the bishops seem to have come down on the side of the big insurance companies that wish to deny the benefits of insurance to those who are unable to pay for it or who have limited means to afford it.
I am delighted to see such spunk on the part of the nuns. I gather that in the history of the church, these nuns did what they were told and asked no questions. But now the nuns are standing on their own hind feet. They’re telling the bishops to get lost. I like a good fight where the underdog has a chance of winning.
In the interests of full disclosure, I will tell you that the Catholic nuns have all of my best wishes and have had them for many years. For example, in 1947, when my father fell out of the tree he was trimming and fractured his skull, it was the nursing nuns at St. Mary’s Hospital, Richmond Heights, Missouri who nursed him back to health. In 1961, when my mother had her final illness, again it was the nuns of St. Mary’s who comforted her in the final weeks of her life. For all that, I am quite grateful. But in this fight with the bishops, my sentiments are always for the little guy. I am so delighted to see that the nuns are standing up for their rights. And in the end, they seem to have prevailed.
Now, about my prejudices. I have told you that, all things considered, I am prejudiced in the favor of the Catholic nuns. Similarly, I have a prejudice against the Catholic bishops in that they are well-fed rotund fellows who have the world on a string or so they think. The question that follows is whether or not anyone has ever observed a bishop of the Catholic faith or any other faith who was not well fed. I would not be surprised but that the nuns probably do some of the cooking for the bishops. And so these are my thoughts about the dispute between the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and the nuns.
As things now stand, the nuns seem to be on the winning side and the bishops are on the losing side. Are the bishops going to maintain their stance when they are confronted with small children who are denied insurance because of some pre-existing condition? If the bishops maintain their alliance with the big insurance companies, they will be portrayed as totally heartless.
And so it is that I salute the nuns in their fight with the bishops of their own church. Without a doubt, they are going to find that the bishops will probably retaliate in one way or another. I hope the nuns stand firm. As a matter of fact, I hope that they stand more firm than I have been in my desire to avoid commenting on religious matters. But the subject of the dispute between the nuns and the bishops came to me as a gift from some celestial being, perhaps the Holy Ghost. I can only look at the sky and shout “thank you” in Aramaic, which was the language of Jesus. My accent in Aramaic says, “How to go, nuns.”
E. E. CARR
March 24, 2010
Essay 445
~~~
Kevin’s commentary: I can see no religious reason for the Bishops to take the stance they did, and feel like I should do a little more research to ascertain the reasoning behind it. That type of position just seems baffling given that the church is supposed to be committed to charity and helping the poor and that sort of thing. Supporting the efforts of the insurance giants to screw over the people most in need of health care would probably be pretty far down on ol’ Jesus’s list, I feel.