As you know I did an interview with Jesuit-run, liberal Amerika Magazine. The combox over there has been… interesting.
I sincerely believed that doing the interview would be an “olive branch” moment.
Today, I noticed that Amerika has an interview with Mary Gordon.
You will immediately ask me: “Who?”
She is a sometime writer, and a teacher, and a signer of the infamous New York Times pro-abortion ad in 1984, which featured many Catholic dissidents.
That said, in the combox under my interview I spotted this comment:
Frank Gibbons | 8/11/2014 – 8:09am
Why are these negative comments about Father Z allowed to stand and critical comments about Mary Gordon deleted?
Good question.
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It’s the liberal/progressive/leftist dialectic, that’s why. It’s pervasive in the church, media and amongst ourselves. Traditional solid living is bad, decadent is good.
Well, progressivism would cease to exist without the double standard. Remember, all animals are equal but some are more equal than others. By the way Fr.Z, I loved your “I don’t accept your premise” response. The Church of Nice is not happy!
Well, when a commenter cites Fr. Richard Rohr to validate his distaste for Fr. Z., what can one expect?
I’d forgotten Fr. Rohr existed–it was a happy life =-p
When a writebackers on Amerika when referring to our Fr. Z “continually resort to over-generalizations, projection, name-calling and belittling”, to say nothing of reference to Eichmann, “they lose their credibility”.
“If you’re not catching flak, you’re not over the target”
It was an excellent interview. America had fair open-ended questions and Fr. Z could reach new readers. Win-win.
Being called “odious” pales to in comparison to being accused of “invoking the bizarre clerical sacerdotal myth of the delusional St. John Vianney”! How have you attracted such a crowd of humorless haters, Father? Perhaps it’s that occasional good meal you eat.
Sigh. Anybody who hates St. John Vianney is either not someone who reads primary sources, or has a really bad attitude about life. Or both, of course.
See, if one were a progressive and informed, one would probably have some kind of comment about how Vianney supports your position. He was poor, he came from a poor family, he worked with the poor, he had trouble with advanced studies at seminary, he spoke truth to power, he was responsible for a popular movement (sorta), etc.
But nope, this guy is totally ignorant of Vianney and proud of it.
That interview with Fr. Z was a generally nice and positive article. But the question still lingers as to why they did the interview. 3 options come to mind:
1) a cynical attempt to rally their base by giving them a focus for their dissenting hatred;
2) a different cynical attempt to portray Fr. Z in a favorable light, prior to attacking him with another article, while pointing to the interview to show they are “evenhanded”;
3) a desperate attempt to widen their readership in the face of the biological solution causing declining subscriptions.
Oh, and inquiring minds here still want to know what they edited out :).
Dear God in Heaven,
How we miss this Pope we had to short a time! Benedict was and is a wonderful teacher…..please grant him good health and happiness in this life, we know he will be with you in the next…..
Pope Benedict, Santita, how you are missed is not easy to put into words, :(:(:(
Taliban moderator at the America combox (and Commonweal’s?) LOL…
Very good article. Thanks, Fr. Z. And for your comments on bloggers….ta muchly
Wish I’d read the interview before. I learned much about who Fr Z is — a better man and a better Catholic than I had inferred from reading this blog.
The main complaint in the “Amerika” comments is the tight management of access to his combox. Most are not regulars and understate the degree to which Fr Z tolerates disagreement. We (regular but “awaiting moderation”) visitors would not want to see the equivalent of bare-bosomed protestors dancing on the altar. But I do wonder whether loosening things up even a little bit more might help with his credibility. Anyway… his call.
That was a good interview Father. I especially liked that last answer you gave.
One person made several generally disapproving comments on the interview about Fr Z. I noticed something curious about her approach. I asked my computer to count 1st person forms (I, me, my, mine). In all of Fr Z’s answers to questions about himself, he used the 1st person 61 times (2% of 2829 words). In her comments on the article about Fr Z, she used those 1st person forms 122 times (6% of her 2021 words). What does it all mean?
Unwilling…it appears that the Amerika combox is not quite so tolerant as you say…as to permit criticism of a high minister of the idolatrous sacrament of abortion which heightens sexual libertinism for that many more minutes even at the cost of innocent life itself for no apparent or good reason?
I will say also that having spent some time over there in a previous era, far too much actually, they have some commenters, some actually writers there, who call out fellow commenters engaged in “dialogue” by name in humiliating fashion. I’m talking someone’s actual name, not a username. And there is frequent disparagement of “prolifers” as this or that calumny. That’s why their appeals to charity are always so amusing. I never read those comments and so much as I can avoid all of their articles entirely. The results of their “dialogue” with people advocating for life for the most part has been laughable and only reflects why the Dem Party will not permit any prolife voice to speak, at all. Taliban.
One omission in the America article raised a question: Did the magazine not discuss the issue of reverence during Mass, or did they simply not publish that part of the interview?
Gaetano says: omission in the America article
Nope. Not that either.
I think America readers don’t know the difference between an ‘olive branch’ moment and a ‘white flag’ moment?
And the omitted portion of Fr Z’s interview involved his admission that he uses a punching bag at the gym with a picture of Hans Peter Kolvenbach on it.
There. I’ve said it now.
Actually, correction, the public humiliation was over at Commonweal’s combox…not America’s.
At any rate. It was surprising that the interview with Fr. Z was published. An update of where is she now a study in how to get many more abortions to occur and be pleased about it…not so surprising.
An olive branch, Father Z., is not going to mean that hardcore prochoicers hanging out in the Church are going to go all…Zagano now does it. Yet, cool that she is unafraid. I guess they make an exception in her case, for obvious reasons. Yet even that they don’t actually listen to what she says on life do they. On the choice issue, we already know how vital it is to a certain political agenda to have more abortions as much as possible. It’s going to be difficult to let that one go. People I think, on that one, are, by and large, despite whatever appearance of authority and righteousness and with it ness…very afraid to try something different.
Father Z., perhaps the bit that was cut from your interview related to an observation about the culture of death which enslaves us all or the Christian hope of prolife? Am I getting warmer?