The Vatican Rag

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The New York Sun

Efforts by the Vatican to walk back the Pope’s reception of Kim Davis remind us of nothing so much as Tom Lehrer’s “Vatican Rag.” Lehrer, a Jewish liberal, was ribbing the Church at a time of liberalization. It’s not that he was, so far as we can deduce, against liberalization. It’s more that once one starts down the road of liberalization, the logic of other things grows clouded, no doubt more than intended. It’s fun to imagine what Lehrer would have made of the current contretemps.

The latest news is that the Vatican is saying that Mrs. Davis, the clerk of Rowan County, Kentucky, and a former Catholic who is now a Pentecostal Christian, did not have a formal “audience” with the Pope. The Vatican is warning that Pope Francis’ greeting of Mrs. Davis, who is in a constitutional battle over whether she can be compelled to issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples, “should not be considered a form of support of her position in all of its particular and complex aspects.”

No one ever said it did. The Vatican acknowledges that the Pontiff greeted Mrs. Davis at its embassy at Washington. Mrs. Davis’s lawyer reports that the cell-phone messages left for her by Church aides make it clear the meeting was no accident. The Vatican is not denying, so far as we can tell, the statements by Mrs. Davis’s lawyer that Francis hugged Mrs. Davis and urged her to “stay strong.” Or the pontiff’s support of the right to conscientiously object and stand on religious principle.

Far be it from us to lecture the man who sits on the Throne of Saint Peter on how to conduct his papacy. It is in the realm of newspaper work, however, to suggest that the Church risks its credibility in the political realm if it fails to articulate its laws and doctrine in clear language. And if it shrinks from defending those who are on its side, as Mrs. Davis seems to be in respect of same-sex marriage. How can she stay strong if the Pope who whispered for her to do so fails to stay strong himself?

It is important to remember that the case arising at Rowan County is not about the constitutionality of same-sex marriage. The Supreme Court has spoken on that head, its authority will be acknowledged by all, and same-sex couples in Kentucky will be given their licenses. The Kentucky case is about the right of individuals who fear God to object as a matter of religious conscience. It is a principle that has been recognized by our military for centuries, is protected for government employees by statute, and is as American as a crabapple pandowdy.

Nor is anyone suggesting Francis ignore gay Catholics. The Pope also turns out to have received at Washington a gay couple, one member of which had been a friend of Francis going back to Argentina. Like the Pope’s reception of Mrs. Davis, that, too, was an imporant gesture. It was warm, inclusive, and clearly from the heart, reassuring to all of us who cherish our various differences. It could only be diminished were it to come at the cost of excluding those who stand for the very religious principles the Pope professes. Maybe Tom Lehrer will write a new verse.


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