The Divine Lamp

Over at THE CLOSED CAFETERIA there was a post up about an idiotic Washington Post piece concerning Archbishop Burke, who recently made headlines by objecting to the appearance of singer Sheryl Crow at a Catholic charity function.  In the combox a woman named Katherine wrote:

You are kind to Archibishop Burke by not posting his most embrassing comment in the [i] “What if, for instance, there were someone appearing who we discovered was openly racist and who made statements and took actions to promote racism? Do you think that I would let that go on?”[/i]

Gee, Archbishop Burke, why not? That exactly describes the man the hospital is named for, Archbishop Glennon. So much for backbone and courage.

Whether or not the Bishop Glennon, who died about sixty years ago, was a racist is unknown to me.  What is clear is this woman’s fallacious logic.  In essence she is trying to argue that it’s okay for Ms Crow a pro abortion advocate to appear at a Catholic charity event named in honor of Glennon because Glennon was (allegedly) a racist.  In other words, his (alleged) wrong makes her support of Crow right, and Burke’s opposition wrong!

In response to her I wrote this:
Katherine, if you think racism is wrong would you nonetheless do a charity event with a known racist? If Archbishop Burke thinks abortion wrong then why should he give Miss Crow the time of day? Simply because others (such as yourself, apparently) are of lesser moral fiber? Just because other do or have done something wrong is no excuse for the current Archbishop (or you) to act in the same way.

To which she responded:

Heck, I have Thanksgiving Dinner with a known racist every year.

And then latter she gives this gem:

As for working with a racist to raise money for a hosptial named for a racist, why not?

Woe to you Katherine!  Hypocrite!  You raise money for children using a known advocate of baby killing and embryonic stem cell research while appealing to alleged racism to justify it.