This is the article that appeared in the July/August 2023 edition of Catalyst, our monthly journal. The date that prints out
reflects the day that it was uploaded to our website. For a more accurate date of when the article was first published, check out the news release, here.
The Dodgers and the Giants are not only longtime baseball rivals, they handle similar controversial issues in an entirely different matter. Over the past few decades, both teams have reached out to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, but after the Catholic League criticized each for doing so, their responses were quite different.
The Dodgers controversy was the most recent one.
The decision by the Dodgers to honor the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence on “Pride Night”, June 16, triggered a robust response from us: our email subscribers unloaded on Rob Manfred, Commissioner of Major League Baseball. The next day, the “Sisters” were disinvited. But then the Dodgers succumbed to pressure from the other side and reinvited them.
This is in stark contrast to how the San Francisco Giants handled a similar matter almost three decades ago.
In 1995, the Giants held a fundraising event to combat AIDS (which we applauded), but at the event were the “Sisters.” Bill Donohue objected and about a week later he got a letter of apology from Peter A. Magowan, president of the Giants; he pledged to never allow something like this to happen again.
So there we have it. There are two models: the responsible one, as exhibited by the Giants; and the irresponsible one, as exercised by the Dodgers.
