A stunning example of the way dissident Catholics think was recently brought to our attention. Last August, Ian Brennan, co-creator of the Fox program, “Glee,” was honored by Catholics in Media Associates; this is the same group that liked the show which the Catholic League killed in the 1990s, “Nothing Sacred.” Here is a selection of Brennan’s brilliance:
“I think that being Catholic is a lot like being Jewish. I believe that it is not a set of beliefs, but a heritage, a two thousand year meditation on the very idea of belief. I consider this its enduring beauty. I believe that therefore, almost by definition, you can disagree with most things the Catholic Church does, and still be Catholic.
“But it’s difficult, as Catholic, to see William Donohue go on TV and claim to speak for me and all other Catholics, as if he had that right.
“My mom and I were at Wendy’s for lunch and there was this old man sitting by himself just drinking a coffee and eating like just a plain hamburger, like one of the 69 cent ones with just a coffee — and I just… I felt so bad for him, or like didn’t feel bad, really, I just kinda felt for him, I wanted to like be with him, I just wanted to sit there and keep him company, and my mom and I sat there and ate and she was talking and the whole time I just like wanted to go over and sit with him, this old man I didn’t even know just sitting there alone, eating a 69 cent hamburger by himself in the middle of the day… And there was like no way he could ever know that, you know? Like there was no way he could ever guess that. That I felt that way. And like I thought to myself: just as I secretly love this old man who I don’t know sitting across the restaurant from me and there’s no way he would ever know, like I believed there could be something, like, way across the cosmos, unbeknownst to everyone, just, like, loving us. And there’s no way we could ever know it. It would just be there. And it was like this weird, incredible gift. And I think I’ve stopped even like needing that love for myself; it was enough to just stand near it and watch it and know it exists. And I think it makes the rest… I don’t know. I think it makes everything else pretty easy.”
It’s like, we couldn’t make this up.
This is the way dissident Catholics show their love for the dispossessed: they do absolutely nothing about their condition but nonetheless congratulate themselves for feeling their pain. Just like Father Ray.
