Denver Newsroom, Sep 4, 2020 / 06:00 pm (CNA).-
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco said Friday that the city’s current restrictions on public worship— which prohibit indoor services of any kind, as opposed to other entities such as retail which have been allowed to reopen indoor operations— show “callous unconcern” for people’s spiritual needs.
“Let alone the fact that the city is judging religious services as less important, and treating them more harshly than other activities— the city has no authority at all over the Church’s right to worship,” Archbishop Cordileone told CNA Sept. 4.
“It is not the job of the state to decide what religious services are essential or inessential: that is the Church’s job.”
The San Francisco County Department of Health is currently limiting outdoor worship services to 12 people, with indoor worship services prohibited. The archdiocese covers the city and county of San Francisco— where the cathedral is located— as well as San Mateo and Marin counties.
The state’s legitimate concern for health and safety does have some bearing on how the Church operates, he said— for example, there are good reasons why church buildings must be built with respect to code.
“But the state does not tell the Church how to arrange the liturgical space—that pertains to the internal life of the Church, over which the state has no authority. The same principle applies to worship services: the state has no right whatsoever to tell the Church it cannot worship, but it has every right and responsibility to tell the Church which practices it must observe to keep people safe during worship,” Cordileone continued.
“Those practices, though, cannot be so restrictive as to effectively ban public worship, such as only outdoors with no more than 12 people.”
Cordileone said priests at many parishes around the archdiocese, including the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption, are celebrating multiple Masses every Sunday— outside, and spaced out— in order to adapt to the restrictions.
“The Body and Blood of Christ is the source and summit of our Faith. People are hungry for the Eucharist, and many priests are responding to the call as best they can,” he said.
The City of San Francisco has been closely monitoring Catholic churches in the city and has repeatedly issued warnings to the archdiocese for apparent health order violations.
Cordileone said he himself has noted “very few” violations of the city’s health orders by parishes in the archdiocese, although the few that have occurred have garnered heavy criticism in the secular press.
Even while protesting the city’s apparent unequal application of health restrictions, the archbishop has encouraged his priests to lead their parishes in following the city’s guidelines.
“Wearing a face covering is one of the simplest and most effective things you can do. And if that is not enough, then wear one simply for the sake of good manners,” he appealed.
“Do not show a lack of compassion for people who are afraid of catching a disease that is quite deadly to many people with comorbidities and the elderly, which we Catholics should particularly respect and protect.”
While Cordileone said city officials have been “cordial and respectful” in their dialogue with the archdiocese, Cordileone said the city still has not responded to the archdiocese’ safety plan— outlining how churches could be safely opened for indoor services— which they submitted in May.
“Whereas retail stores sent in safety plans, had them approved by the City, and then resumed indoor retail at 50% capacity. And yet, churches can be safer environments than stores,’ Cordileone noted.
In a letter to San Francisco’s Mayor London Breed and other city officials, Cordileone last week called on the city’s secular authorities to, “at a minimum, remove the excessive limits on outdoor public worship.”
“Particularly for us as Catholics, attending the Mass and receiving the Body and Blood of Christ in person is the source and the summit of our faith, and we have shown we can celebrate the Mass safely,” Cordileone wrote Aug. 31.
He cited a recent article on Mass attendance and COVID-19, authored Aug. 19 by doctors Thomas McGovern, Deacon Timothy Flanigan, and Paul Cieslak for Real Clear Science.
Over the last 14 weeks, the doctors said, approximately 17,000 parishes have held three or more Masses each weekend, as well as daily services, combining to equal more than 1 million public Masses celebrated across the United States since shelter-in-place orders were lifted.
By following public health guidelines, these Masses have largely avoided viral spread. The doctors said in their article that there is no evidence that church services are higher risk than similar activities when guidelines are followed, and no coronavirus outbreaks have yet been linked to the celebration of the Mass.
“Catholics have developed responsible safety protocols to conduct the Mass safely. The evidence shows these protocols are working,” Cordileone told CNA.
“San Francisco’s excessive limits on the Mass are not only a violation of Americans’ First Amendment rights, they show a kind of callous unconcern for our parishioners’ emotional and spiritual needs.”
In a July 30 memo, Cordileone exhorted his priests to be as diligent as possible in bringing the sacraments to their people, including celebrating outdoor Masses each Sunday, and providing Confession in a safe manner as often as possible.
“Please regularly remind people to follow the safety practices necessary to curb the spread of the virus. This is real, it is dangerous, and it has to be taken seriously,” he added.
“The resurgence is due in no small part to people becoming lax once the shelter-in-place rules began to be lifted. Please urge these practices upon them; absolutely do not give them the impression that the coronavirus is not a serious threat to the physical health of our community.”
The Benedict XVI Institute for Sacred Music and Divine Worship, which provides liturgical resources in the archdiocese, shared a petition Aug. 31 in support of Cordileone’s statement calling for the lifting of restrictions on the Mass. To date more than 1,400 people have signed.
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Honor to this President for standing up for Palestinian rights and for warning our nation against the inordinate influence of Israel.
May God grant salvation to President Jimmy Carter.
Yes, let’s pray for his soul. But let’s not forget that Carter—in addition to being pro-abortion, pro-“gay marriage”, and slanderous towards pro-lifers—praised Castro and Cuba, China, Tito (“a man who believes in human rights”), Kim Il Sung, Yasser Arafat, and the PLO, Mengistu, Cédras, Assad, and Hamas. Jimmy was most inept (whereas Joe is mostly corrupt), but he was also a sanctimonious embarrassment far more often than his hagiographers (that is, the legacy media) will ever admit. For more, see my July 2009 post at Insight Scoop.
Upon Carter’s election, the astute and long-time Singapore President Lee Qwan Yew wrote (of world leaders) in his own autobiography, “we knew we would just have to put up with him for four years.”
And, on the domestic scene, we recall that it was President Carter who gave us the cabinet-level position U.S. Department of Education, surely as a reward to the teachers’ unions that helped him get elected (formed on May 4, 1980, as a result of the Department of Education Organization Act–Public Law 96-88–of October 1979; President Jimmy Carter signed the bill into law.) The gift that keeps on giving.
Educationally speaking, Shakespeare gives us a clue: “The fault is not in our ‘stars,’ but in ourselves” (“Julius Caesar”). That is, the fault is not in those who are elected but in those who elect them. The corporate Peter Principle transferred to the gummint.
Yes, the establishment of the Department of Education was foolish. Yet, who kept it going, despite, as I recall, promises to the contrary? Oh, yeah, his successor, that “great conservative” Ronald Reagan.
Bravo! Sick to death of the hagiographies popping up everywhere.
Not that Pres. Carter endorsed this policy, but something to keep in mind from the late, great Huey Long:
“I don’t know much about Hitler. Except that last thing, about the Jews. There has never been a country that put its heel down on the Jews that ever lived afterwards.”
— Huey Long
For all his faults, Huey had some wise insights. May he & Jimmy Carter rest in peace.
Palestine must earn nationhood. Terrorism must never be rewarded. For over three quarters of a century, the only thing that Palestinians have excelled in is their ability to inflict incalculable suffering on a global scale, not only on others, but also on themselves.
It will only be by a direct intervention from God Himself that the hearts and minds of radical Islam will be converted.
It is for this we must pray.
Aside from rationalizing numerous acts of Islamic terrorism, possibly to downplay and make his years of cowardice not seem so bad while president, the post-president, “great humanitarian,” Carter met with leaders of the terrorist group Hamas. He embraced Nasser al-Shaer, the man who ran the Palestinian education system, brainwashing children into believing Jews are the descendants of pigs and dogs. He laid a wreath at the grave of Yasser Arafat, the most notorious terrorist thug of the 20th century.
Oh I forgot. Francis seems to indicate the Islamic world can’t do much that is morally wrong. He once reminded us that beheading children was the equivalent of domestic abuse, which he assumed was done by Catholic men since he read it in an Italian newspaper.
Freemasons defend the reputation of fellow members. Not suggesting that is what Bergoglio is doing at all, what so ever.
Thanks for your counter-witness, Carl. I confess my (naive) views of Carter have hitherto been based on the so-called mainstream media.
If Carter was mainly inept, what does that make Francis with his (supposed) assessment of him?
I volunteered in Jimmy Carter’s campaign & he was the first president I ever voted for . (And the last Democrat.) He really was a decent & faithful man in many ways but a very incompetent president.
In the beginning we believed he was a solid Christian believer but over time he veered off in some strange directions. God rest his soul.
Good question. I think there are a few factors involved. First, Pope Francis had to say something nice; it would be uncharitable to do otherwise. Secondly, Francis (I’m guessing) knows very little about Carter’s faith, life, policies, etc. Some of that is to be expected, as the Pope isn’t supposed to be an expert on all previous and current world leaders. But, thirdly, his remarks (praising “the deep faith” of Carter) just follow the standard, mainstream line, which is par for this pope and his inner circle. Fourth, I think that Francis is so keen on politics and political gestures that he probably believes Carter was a good president of deep faith. After all, that’s what the media legacy is trying to feed us here, even though the record says otherwise. Fifth, I think both men, in real ways, are 1970s liberals who have “evolved” on certain stances. Carter (as noted already) ended up embracing a hazy form of liberal Protestantism—or, better, of Protestantized liberalism—and jettisoned core moral beliefs, which in turn meant dismissing any sort of traditional, biblical Christian anthropology.
The bottom line, for me, is that Carter was mostly a disaster as POTUS and while he did some good things afterwards, he was a pro-tyrannical, pro-abortion, pro-“gay marriage”, post-1970s liberal whose Christianity was thin at best.
Carter’s was a failed presidency and American voters rejected him and his policies. I find it amusing and laughable how the leftists (inclusing Bergoglio) are tripping over themselves to canonize this man. Some of us are not fooled by the posturing. The guy was book smart but had the leadership skills of an idiot.
Carter was not a good President. I voted against him twice. He let the Iranian Shiite fanatics push him around, that said, he did become a decent ex President with the Habitat for Humanity business. I recall seeing a picture of him years ago, after he left the White House, wearing a tool belt and hammering nails at a construction site. I thought that was nice that he found some task that he can accomplish.
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Agreed on his presidency. It was, overall, a train wreck. Carter was a nice guy, and that meant that he did some nice and good things. But “nice” isn’t the same as principled or strong, and Carter (in my estimation) was neither of those.
Jimmy Carter’s single greatest accomplishment was in giving the United States of America eight years of Reagan.
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I took your recommendation, Carl, and read your 2009 article. I believe I am now sufficiently inocculated against the current media and papal hagiography.
I do think Habitat for Humanity does good work.
Respectful farewell to Jimmy Carter. RIP.