Offering a benediction to close the Democratic National Convention last night, many wondered if Timothy Cardinal Dolan would raise the issue of religious freedom. He did.
Many wondered if he would pray for the unborn. He did.
Many wondered if he would pray for the sanctity of marriage. He did.
The DNC asked Cardinal Dolan to offer the benediction after he had been asked to offer the closing prayer at the RNC event. The invitation could be seen as a bit awkward as Dolan’s Archdiocese of New York is currently suing the Obama administration over the HHS contraceptive mandate.
But Cardinal Dolan didn’t seem awkward. That seems to be the thing with Cardinal Dolan. You ask for Cardinal Dolan, you get Cardinal Dolan. He doesn’t seem to shape himself to his setting.
But consider for a moment the bravery it takes to step to the podium in front of thousands and thousands of people who had just voted for a DNC platform that called for federal funding of abortion, supported a redefinition of marriage, and excluded (albeit temporarily) God from its official statement of beliefs.
But Cardinal Dolan wasn’t there to convince them of anything. In fact, he wasn’t even there to speak to them. He was there to speak with them. To God.
Everyone in the room knew what Cardinal Dolan meant when he thanked God for religious liberty:
We praise and thank you for the gift of liberty. May this land of the free never lack those brave enough to defend our basic freedoms. Renew in all our people a profound respect for religious liberty: the first, most cherished freedom bequeathed upon us at our Founding. May our liberty be in harmony with truth; freedom ordered in goodness and justice. Help us live our freedom in faith, hope, and love.
Dolan also prayed for the unborn saying, “We ask your benediction on those waiting to be born, that they may be welcomed and protected.”
This was a beautiful prayer. And a brave prayer.
It was not an admonishment. It was Cardinal Dolan’s prayer for this country.
Here’s the full transcript:
With a “firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence,” let us close this convention by praying for this land that we so cherish and love:
Let us Pray.
Almighty God, father of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, revealed to us so powerfully in your Son, Jesus Christ, we thank you for showering your blessings upon this our beloved nation. Bless all here present, and all across this great land, who work hard for the day when a greater portion of your justice, and a more ample measure of your care for the poor and suffering, may prevail in these United States. Help us to see that a society’s greatness is found above all in the respect it shows for the weakest and neediest among us.
We beseech you, almighty God to shed your grace on this noble experiment in ordered liberty, which began with the confident assertion of inalienable rights bestowed upon us by you: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Thus do we praise you for the gift of life. Grant us the courage to defend it, life, without which no other rights are secure. We ask your benediction on those waiting to be born, that they may be welcomed and protected. Strengthen our sick and our elders waiting to see your holy face at life’s end, that they may be accompanied by true compassion and cherished with the dignity due those who are infirm and fragile.
We praise and thank you for the gift of liberty. May this land of the free never lack those brave enough to defend our basic freedoms. Renew in all our people a profound respect for religious liberty: the first, most cherished freedom bequeathed upon us at our Founding. May our liberty be in harmony with truth; freedom ordered in goodness and justice. Help us live our freedom in faith, hope, and love. Make us ever-grateful for those who, for over two centuries, have given their lives in freedom’s defense; we commend their noble souls to your eternal care, as even now we beg the protection of your mighty arm upon our men and women in uniform.
We praise and thank you for granting us the life and the liberty by which we can pursue happiness. Show us anew that happiness is found only in respecting the laws of nature and of nature’s God. Empower us with your grace so that we might resist the temptation to replace the moral law with idols of our own making, or to remake those institutions you have given us for the nurturing of life and community. May we welcome those who yearn to breathe free and to pursue happiness in this land of freedom, adding their gifts to those whose families have lived here for centuries.
We praise and thank you for the American genius of government of the people, by the people and for the people. Oh God of wisdom, justice, and might, we ask your guidance for those who govern us: President Barack Obama, Vice President Joseph Biden, Congress, the Supreme Court, and all those, including Governor Mitt Romney and Congressman Paul Ryan, who seek to serve the common good by seeking public office. Make them all worthy to serve you by serving our country. Help them remember that the only just government is the government that serves its citizens rather than itself. With your grace, may all Americans choose wisely as we consider the future course of public policy.
And finally Lord, we beseech your benediction on all of us who depart from here this evening, and on all those, in every land, who yearn to conduct their lives in freedom and justice. We beg you to remember, as we pledge to remember, those who are not free; those who suffer for freedom’s cause; those who are poor, out of work, needy, sick, or alone; those who are persecuted for their religious convictions, those still ravaged by war.
And most of all, God Almighty, we thank you for the great gift of our beloved country.
For we are indeed “one nation under God,” and “in God we trust.”
So dear God, bless America. You who live and reign forever and ever.
Amen!
September 11, 2012 at 3:11 am
Clinton, criticizing me only reveals your own succumbing to mindless groupthink and your ignorance of Catholic history. For far too long, popes and bishops have concerned themselves more with temporal matters that God's righteousness. The fact that neither you nor anybody else answers my question to Pope Benedict regarding the widespread rejection of Canon Law by bishops tells me that, like most Catholics, you really don't give a damn as long as your own theological fantasies remain intact.
September 11, 2012 at 3:25 am
But that is not how it is today – if it ever was that way. So, why harp on the failings of the Church in the past. Even the first pope denied the Lord 3 times but repented.
September 11, 2012 at 6:24 am
Rick, first of all, it was that way and, in many cases, still is. Why don't you read some medieval history? Second, why is the USCCB so quick to issue papers on political positions yet was so inert on clercial sex-abuse until the dioceses' financial resources were threatened? Finally, why hasn't Pope Benedict, Cdl. Burke — or anybody else at the Vatican — done anything about mass disregard for Canon Law? Why didn't JPII do anything?
Why harp on the past? Because the past, all too often, is prologue to the future.
If the members of the hierarchy truly are successors of the apostles, they would repent of their infatuation with power, wealth and prestige. But they won't because they can't. They can't because doing so would ruin the ecclesiastical system that has provided them and their predecessors with perks and cover for centuries.
Do an internet search for the vision of Pope Leo XII.
September 11, 2012 at 7:04 am
Ah, now I get it! Joseph isn't a Catholic, he's a Donatist!
Wow, I thought they died out centuries ago!
Anyway, I think we can all agree (Joseph aside) that His Eminence did
a great job at the DNC.
Good night.
September 11, 2012 at 10:45 am
Joseph if you are in FB, you will see that I have a few bishops as friends. I studied and lived with these people. I KNOW who they are. They are not " infatuated with power, wealth and prestige."
And even today, everyone can see how Archp. Chaput is selling off the Church's properties to help the poor in his diocese and how he is moving to a more modest dwelling.
September 11, 2012 at 6:52 pm
Rick, would Absp. Chaput do that if he didn't have to? Would Absp. Chaput do that if he were in the same position 20, 30 years ago? Besides, he is only one man. I'm talking about institutional repentence worldwide, including (and especially) Rome.
Clinton, if I'm a Donatist, then so was Jesus. After all, He was the one who expelled the moneychangers from the Temple (twice!). He was the one who called the Pharisees "hypocrites" and a "brood of vipers." So did John the Baptist. I would suggest they knew far more about what they were dealing with than either you or I.
September 11, 2012 at 7:10 pm
Joseph: I don't know where you're living i.e. place and time. Like I said, I know bishops here and in other continents and they are not like the caricature that you have made.
You and I have lived through times of the late Bishop Oscar Romero and Cardinal Sin. So, you should be fimiliar with contemporary Church history and revise your opinions of the Church.
September 12, 2012 at 12:08 am
Rick, I've also lived through Mahony, Law, Weakland and others of their ilk. Obviously, good and bad people exist in every walk of life. But the Church hasn't been called to be just another organization; it has been called to project the "fullness of the Gospel." The fact remains that no effective internal structures exist for the Church to hold priests and prelates accountable. Any attempt to impose such order through Canon Law are ignored blatantly.
If that's not true, then why has Cdl. Wuerl in D.C. refused to implement Canon 915? Why has nobody in Rome called him to account?
Human nature doesn't change over time, Rick. Give people a chance to collect power, prestige, secular wealth and influence — and put them in a structure that encourages institutional entitlement — and you sew the seeds of corruption — whether that structure is political, economic, academic or religious.
Romero and Sin might well be the exceptions but the exceptions justify the rule.
BTW, you know the expression "power corrupts but absolute power corrupts absolutely," right? Do you know who made that up? Lord Action, a British historian and a devout Catholic who witnessed Vatican I.
September 12, 2012 at 12:30 pm
What you call exceptions in my opinion is pretty much the rule in today's Church. There is much holiness among our hierarchy and laity than there is maliciousness. And the popes in my lifetime i.e. from John XXIII to Benedict XVI are all holy people in my sight.
Which brings us back to my first post about the falling tree and the silent forests.