On December 3, the Catholic League issued a news release regarding the decision of the Meriden Public Library in Meriden, Connecticut, to ban portraits of Jesus from an artist’s exhibition. The artist, Mary Morely, was told she could not show her reverential paintings of Jesus because it violated a library policy that disallows “inappropriate” and “offensive” fare. Catholic League president William Donohue immediately sent a letter to Keith Michael Fiels, executive director of the American Library Association in Chicago, requesting an end to any future grants to the library. On December 15, the library’s board of directors voted unanimously to allow Morely to display her paintings of Jesus.
On December 12, the Catholic League issued a news release on the decision of the affirmative action office at Central Michigan University to put out a “Warning” document regarding campus celebrations of Christmas. The document, which was not targeted at celebrations of Hanukkah, Kwanzaa or Las Posadas, warned Christians that their holiday “may be offensive to others within a place of employment.” Christians were told, “It is inappropriate to decorate things with Santa Claus or reindeer or other ‘Christmas’ decorations.” Later in the day, after the Fox News Channel was going to do a story on this, the “Warning” document was withdrawn. Now there is an innocuous three line statement about showing sensitivity to others, and it is not specifically targeted at Christmas.
Catholic League president William Donohue was pleased:
“What both of these cases have in common is the tendency of well-educated people to engage in thought control. The cultural fascists in the U.S. are more likely to be found in salons than in saloons; more likely to be intoxicated with ideology than booze. Given a choice between dealing with old-fashioned rednecks and the Multicultural Gestapo, I’ll take the former any day—at least they’re capable of sobering up once and a while.”
