Write for God

Only God can give and take life, no matter the wrong. Abortion kills and it’s wrong. The death penalty kills and it’s wrong. Killing abortion doctors is murder all the same.

Regardless of our position against abortion, the late Dr. George Tiller’s ultimate judge will be God, not a man with a gun. Vengeance is the Lord’s, not ours. Murdering to make a statement that murder is criminal is still murder and it’s still a sin. Anyone who might weigh Dr. Tiller’s work versus the decision of the man who is alleged to have shot him at his church cannot somehow say that the abortion doctor deserved it or that it’s just as well.

Murder is murder, no matter who commits it. It’s just as wrong when it’s the State killing in our names as when it’s the killing that led to the sentence of death. Thou shalt not kill doesn’t have an asterisk next to it like Roger Maris’ homerun record.

Nonviolence shamed the British into leaving India, it fueled Dr. King’s stand for civil rights and it will someday win the abortion battle in our nation. We cannot debase life by taking it to make the point that life is sacred.

Havana's San Cristobal has been the city's cathedral since 1787.

A few miles east of our little town in Florida, there’s a busy street with two megachurches. By that I mean an auditorium with thousands of seats, a super sound and screen system, a preacher with his name on the marquee and–maybe–a cross on the stage to indicate it’s a church. These churches have concerts, musicals and a scrubbed minister whose face is on their advertising.

Our former pastor once explained during a homily why the Catholic Church doesn’t identify each church with an individual. He turned to the Risen Christ behind the altar and said, “Our Church is about Him, not about us.”

Indeed. I remembered that statement this week as the former Catholic priest Alberto Cutie preached at the Episcopal church he joined recently amid a scandal that involved a woman and compromising shots of the two at the beach. The overflow crowds at his new church took photos and gave him a standing ovation on Sunday, according to the Miami Herald.

A Catholic parishioner at Cutie’s former church was quoted as saying, “I come to the church for my faith, not for a celebrity priest.” Catholicism is not about matinee-idol priests or names on a marquee:  It’s about God.

In our diocese, there are priests born in India, Africa, Latin America and every nation in Europe. They may speak with accents foreign to our ears, but the Gospel message in every church around the world is the same no matter where you go. The Church, like Jesus, is the same yesterday, today and forever. In these times of upheaval and stress, the solidity of the Catholic Church is more comforting than ever. It’s still the one and only megachurch.