Moore's relativism
A reader sent me a link to the following interview between Larry King and Michael Moore.
King: What about how he's handled the Rev. [Jeremiah] Wright thing?
Moore: Jeez, you know, I mean I go to Mass still. I'm a practicing Catholic. I've been that way all my life. But if I had -- if I had gotten up every time I heard a priest from the pulpit in my travels around the country say things like I've heard them say, that birth control is a sin, that women should not be priests, that women should have a different role in church ...
King: You'd be walking out all the time?
Moore: I would have been walking out so much -- that would have been so much aerobic activity for me ... I wouldn't look like this.
I thinks I will call BS on this. Either that or I would like a list of churches he has attended that actually mention birth control and women's ordination. But even if true it can't me much of a shock or surprise to hear a homily that actually teaches what the Church teaches.
Though what is really ridiculous is his comparison of Wright's rants with the constant teaching of the Catholic Church. As if the Church teaching against contraception is the same thing as saying that the government invented AIDS to kill black people. This is just relativism used to divert a question. Just like when Obama was asked about Ayers he said he was also friends with Sen. Coburn as if being friends with a pro-life senator is the same thing as opening your senate campaign in the home of a unrepentant domestic terrorist. In Moore's case just mentioning the Catholic Church is sure to get no follow up from Larry King since the Catholic Church is the epitome of evil for liberals.
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Of course, Moore won't admit that in as much as he dislike the alleged demagoguery streaming from the bully pulpits of Catholic churches and Pastor Wright's community, he's doing it himself in his own subtle, "artistic" way through his movies.
I know this isn't charitable, but if you disagree with pretty much everything the Church teaches, *why* stay?
I know this isn't charitable, but if you disagree with pretty much everything the Church teaches, *why* stay
A perfectly fair question rather than uncharitable. Naturally it is met with indignation in the How-dare-you! mode. The only thing I can come up with is that they really believe that there are no teachings binding on the faithful. The only fair-minded atheist I've ever known remarked that it's all or nothing--either Christianity is everything the Catholic Church teaches, or it's all bunk. The moment one says about binding teachings that, "Well the Church is right about this, but wrong about this." and you might as well join the Jesus mythers.
I wonder . . .
More: Jeez, you know, I mean I still live in America. I'm an American. I've been that way all my life. But if I had -- if I had gotten up and burnt an American Flag every time I heard a politician say things like I've heard them say: God bless America, Everyone is equal, liberty and justice for all, family is important, America is the best country in the world . . .
King: You'd be burning a lot of flags?
More: I'd have emphysema.
Who is Michael Moore's bishop and why is he still being allowed to come forward for communion? Enough is enough!
"Either that or I would like a list of churches he has attended that actually mention birth control and women's ordination."
AMEN!
I was in the USA only two years, and I never heard a word in church about either birth control or women's ordination.
In all my 35 years in Canada, I heard birth control condemned from the pulpit exactly once that I can think of, and women's ordination never.
"Moore: Jeez, you know, I mean I go to Mass still..."
What are the odds he misspoke and said "Mass" instead of "buffets"?
Strong to quite strong.
An interviewer asked a notorious dissenting feminist "theologian," why, if she hated the Church so much, did she stay?
Her answer: "It's where the Xerox machine is."
IOW, let my enemy pay for my war against him.
Fr. Philip, OP
Moore's full of it. Priests hardly ever talk from the pulpit about birthcontrol or female ordination or the rest of it.
But he's not only a relativist, he's intellectually dishonest if he really believes that the church ever will or SHOULD say, "hey, you know all that stuff we told you? We didn't mean it. Abortion, gay marriage, divorce? That's stuff's all okay!"
Being a fellow Michigander, I'm embarassed that our state has produced such a person as Michael Moore and set him loose on the rest of the US.
Michael Moore is even more despicable than I thought. Anyone who edits a loose affiliation of snippets into a film, refers to it as a documentary, spreads falsehoods and reaps riches in doing so, is unsurprisingly capable of some incredible mental gymnastics: perfectly capable of splicing, omitting, and convoluting the Faith in the same manner.
That said, we can't see into his heart of hearts... so, as disgusting as he is to my sensibilities, we should pray for his conversion and the sublimation of his self-aggrandizing motives to the Will of God.
I'd like to know where Mr. Moore hears these sermons. Sounds like my kind of parish.
We get homilies like that regularly in Lincoln, Nebraska. No one walks out though I know some who do mentally. I wish I had heard sermons actually advocating Catholic teaching when I was growing up, as it would have saved me a lot of grief later.
As came up in conversation with some newly arrived catholics from California, who were dismayed at the Diocese, I mentioned If I weren't here, I might not have come back to the Church at all.
"I'd like to know where Mr. Moore hears these sermons. Sounds like my kind of parish."
He could have heard it at St. Peter's Church, Waldorf, MD.
I'm guessing he heard it at St. Luke the Evangelist in Bellaire, which isn't far from where he summers in Torch Lake. That's in the Archdiocese of Gaylord, I think.
Who is Michael Moore's bishop and why is he still being allowed to come forward for communion? Enough is enough!
Well, if a fatass like Moore still receives Holy Communion, then you can forget about the bishops withholding it from Catholic politicians who support legalized abortion.
Besides, nothing is preventing Moore from converting to a mainline Protestant denomination that supports abortion, birth control and female priests. I think the Anglican Communion comes to mind.
Moore is truly a pathetic individual. It's even more pathetic that people consider this poseur to be a serious thinker!
Surely, though, Moore is correct in suggesting that American Catholics don't generally feel bound to identify with everything they hear from whoever happens to be pastor of their home parish. That observation doesn't amount to a defense of Obama, but it is true.
That said, I think we need to be extremely careful about saying things that could be construed as meaning that "birth control is a sin" and "women should not be priests" are pretty much everything the Church teaches. Let's let the anti-Catholics draw their own water.
Hey, there are sermons about birth control all the time! This dude begat that dude who begat that dude who begat ths one...
At least I think that's what they were saying. Some priests aren't that good at public speaking and Lord knows I'm not always paying attention.
:-)