MORE EASTER

Can't help but notice a little mirth at the the "resignation" or "farewell address" of Mr. Focus-on-the-Family. Seems Mr. Dobson is lamenting the "loss of the culture war." . LOST is lamenting the adulteration of the faith of LOST's Father by nutty 5 issue, Shiite-Catholics. The people who think that your faith is the sum total of your answer to the questions of abortion, stem cells, euthanasia, same-sex marriage and, wait for it . . . . human cloning. They've taken over all of the local parishes. Those who disagree with them are being squeezed out or cowed into silence. It is true that there are some enlightened catholics in each of the local parishes - there is no other way to explain how Ayatollah Perozich in the next parish over could get his wrist slapped by the Diocese for bulletinizing his fatwa on the President ("one Hundred Days or End of days" - essentially labeling Obama as the antichrist. Nitwitted, collared b*st*rd). But as Truman said, there's loud shouting in the Amen corner these days, and its the 5 issue crowd. So it is that abortion abortion abortion is the issue. Nothing else matters. Our local Deacon said as much a few weeks ago, when he blithely dismissed Iraq war casualties as being less than one day's worth of the slaughter of the unborn. Thanks, Deacon. War is okay, got it. Just gotta criminalize abortions and all will be well. These extremists operate from a fantasyland perspective that abortions never happened before Roe v. Wade and that somehow, magically they'll all disappear within minutes of Roe's overturning. Well, what then? Imprison doctors? Why stop there, why not the abortion demanders - the women and men who seek them? Will police departments have unborn crimes units - and detectives investigating miscarriages?

Seriously, Abortion is an important moral issue. LOST believes that it is morally wrong to use it as a means of dispensing with unwanted pregnancies. But LOST believes that no-fault divorce at the drop of a hat is morally wrong, too, yet it exists; and it exists without so much as a whisper from the Shiite catholics, despite their vitriolic family-values-and-we-must-defend-marriage-by-keeping-Chuck-and-Ted-apart (or at least in the closet). LOST does believe that greater forms of contraception deserve to be accepted or at least "decriminalized" by the Vatican's impure thought police, instead of running around Africa claiming that condoms cause AIDS. LOST also believes that the immorality of abortion must yield to the immorality of disproportionate consequences which would be occasioned by a denial of access to abortion to those victims of rape or incest, or those whose own life is jeopardized by unanticipated labor and childbirth. An organization so easily painted with the multi-millenial stain of misogyny ought to readily realize this and be more open-minded on the issues. At the very least it should be tolerant of those in the faith who recognize these issues are complex beyond zebra shades of black and white.

LOST doesn't think the Messiah died and was resurrected to maximize opportunities for a reactionary partnership between laity and clergy to condemn others, or read edicts into the Faith that seek to divide by fostering blind obedience. The days of blindly following the collared ended in 2002, when the scandals broke, and we were all shown-through the magic of television that large sectors of the clergy and hierarchy were more about protecting and preserving their own than they were about continuing the business of the Good Shepherd. That's an Easter message that all should embrace, and the Ratzinger pope should lead, follow, or get out of the way.