The Rotten Core of The Catholic Church

Once again Archbishop Charles Chaput of the Denver Roman Catholic Archdiocese has demonstrated his pettiness and lack of true Christian faith. In the latest of many hateful acts by this archbishop, a young preschooler at Boulder's Sacred Heart of Jesus will not be allowed to return to the center because their parents are gay women.
Yep, kids with gay parents aren't allowed in Catholic day care because their parents are living a lifestyle contrary to the dogma of the Church. This is the same Church that concealed predatory, child molesting priests for decades rather than dismiss them and comfort the child and the family of the child. This is the same Church that cries out against the intrinisic evil of abortion but still fails to object to the intrinisic evil of the wars George W. Bush started for the evil reason of American empire and greed.
Chaput should particularly be singled out as he has consistently gone along with the hateful anti-gay and pro-war crowd of politicians. I've previously mentioned his participation in Presidential prayer breakfasts with Dubya. There's a telling photo of Bush and Chaput together smiling and laughing with Chaput touching the leg of Bush. There's the attempts by Chaput to influence Catholic voters against candidates opposing Bush because of their political stand concerning abortion and gay marriages. Chaput joined the growing number of evangelical right wing Catholic leaders in suggesting communion should be denied any politician or follower who didn't agree with the Church dogma concerning gays and abortion. These leaders had much in common with the war mongering evangelical Protestants such as the Focus On The Family group in Colorado Springs led by James Dobson. Chaput seemed to always overlook the mean spirited policies of the Bush-Cheney administration that gutted social programs and programs meant to help the weakest and most at risk, however.
Chaput wrote he opposed war but sometimes there were "justifiable wars". Apparently his failure to lash out against the wars as strongly as he has against gays and abortion suggests he considers wars for oil and empire fall into the justifiable column.
What's incongruent with Chaput and the Roman Catholic Church being so loudly vocal about abortion and the intrinsic evil of abortion is they fail to recognize the number of innocent children from age one day to adolescence killed by American bombs, rifles, rockets and mortars. They fail to recognize the number of children living well below the poverty level in starvation throughout the world, including here in America. They fail to recognize children dying in gang wars, children dying from addiction and abuse.
The answer for the Catholic Church is not allowing a woman any form of birth control and then calling her a killer should she decide an abortion is necessary to prevent her other children from starving. The woman is a killer if she doesn't want to carry the child of her rapist. She's a killer if she has an abusive husband who has raped her other children. She's a killer if giving birth will cause her family to fall further into poverty.
The Church talks a great story about how they will provide for unwanted children but the astronomical number of orphans and unwanted children throughout the world are testimony to the abject failure of  promises by the church.
I've sat through many a homily directed by Chaput and the Church's leadership in Denver bashing gays and women who have had abortions. The original Church of Jesus Christ has forgotten the very tenets of their Savior. They have failed in Christian charity and understanding. They have failed to live up to the beatitudes of Christ.
What purpose does barring a young child from being with other children they have come to know accomplish for the Church? What message does the hateful ban against gay parents give to us? One message is the Church doesn't want gay parents adopting children. This flies in the face of the Church telling women they should preserve life by carrying their child throughout the pregnancy and if need be, put the child up for adoption. Another message to the child barred from a Catholic day care is somehow the child is "bad" and the child's parents are bad. How Christian is that?
But what do we expect from this Church so full of misogyny and hatefulness led by men only? What can we expect from a Church that has such a bloody and evil history toward women? What should we expect from a Church more worried about image problems than children molested by priests? What should we expect from a Church that had priests encouraging young men enlist to fight the Godless communists in Vietnam as they did with my friends back in the 60's and 70's?
What should we expect of Charles Chaput who told a woman heading a priest abuse panel of victims to shut up and allow the Catholic Bishops Conference to decide the course of victim reparations? The same Charles Chaput who aligns himself with fanatics and intolerance of the right wing evangelical movement that has led this nation to illegal wars and the financial ruin we now face.
This latest action by Chaput and the Denver Archdiocese is symptomatic of the disease of hate that has rotted the core of the Catholic religion. Chaput and the Church may defend themselves by citing Christ as an opponent of gay marriage and abortion but there is no such evidence Christ believed any of this hateful dogma. The Church may rail against gay marriage being a threat to the traditional marriage but their logic is failed logic that assumes men and women can be "converted" to being gay rather than accepting there are men and women born with a genetic code causing them to love persons of the same sex. And let us keep in mind the Church objects to loving couples because they happen to be same sex but fails to take a moral stance against the illegal wars our sons, daughters, husbands, wives, mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters are sent to die in. What moral sense does it make that a relgion hates a couple in love but endorses a war?
The Church is really big on talking about the culture of death when it comes to abortion but what about the culture of violence and hate that is so historically associated with the Catholic and Christian religions? Did Christ really want what has occurred to be done in His name?
I have long believed in Jesus Christ but I just don't know the Christ of the Catholic Church. I converted to Catholicism many years ago but came to realize the Church leadership has infected the Catholic religion with hate. This latest action by the Church only confirms what I've sadly come to realize, the Church has a rotten core.

Wm. T. Leichner, RN
Denver VVAW