Cardinal Mahony's Tidings runs a Fr. McBrien post-election attack on the pro-life bishops

The little baby in the 4D ultrasound photo above, who is eight weeks old and already playing inside mama, counts not at all with some Catholics, including those in the hierarchy and clergy.

What else can we conclude from this week's (November 21) issue of The Tidings, the newspaper of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles?

In that issue this publication, which has seen better days by far, carries one of Father Richard McBrien's worst columns ever: He wants the faithful, orthodox Catholic bishops who issued pro-life statements before Election Day to get with it, stop saying aborting millions of babies is the preeminent issue, and just plain shut up.

Father McBrien starts out this way:

"... Catholic voters are paying less and less attention to the urgings of some of the Conference's most theologically rigid and politically partisan bishops... This was in spite of the efforts of a vocal handful of bishops, including Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver and Bishop Joseph Martino of Scranton, to try to persuade Catholics that a vote for the Democratic ticket was tantamount to a vote for abortion and, therefore, gravely sinful."

In Father McBrien's twisted Liberal World, 110 pro-life bishops are only "a vocal handful." He continues:

"This vocal minority of bishops have to ask themselves whether their one-issue approach is actually counter-productive, not only in terms of its effectiveness with Catholic voters but also in its effectiveness in actually reducing the number of abortions in the United States.

"This year, in any case, their narrow approach to life issues has stirred other pro-life Catholics to fight back and to reject the focus on the abortion issue to the practical exclusion of all others."

Again, in Father McBrien's sick Liberal World, he thinks speaking up for MILLIONS of BABIES is "narrow."

Father McBrien also imagines that the best way to fight baby-killing is to stop talking about it. He also pretends that Catholics who want us pro-lifers to silence ourselves about aborting millions of babies are somehow "pro-life" themselves. He goes on:

"In the future, Conference leaders must make it unmistakably clear that, while individual bishops are free to issue statements and take stands within and for their own dioceses, such bishops have no personal authority beyond their dioceses, and indeed that their views are contrary to the stated teachings and policies of the Conference itself."

In Father McBrien's Liberal World, things get really bizarre; he doesn't want us to know that our U.S. bishops have said, in their Living the Gospel of Life (1998), that appeals to other issues are suspect if they do not make fighting abortion the priority. He continues:

"The Democratic ticket won the support of 66 percent of voters between the ages of 18 and 29, and 57 percent between the ages of 30 and 44.

"These voters are not only the future of the country; many of them are also the future of the Catholic Church. Do our pastoral leaders really want to be so far out of step with this crucially important constituency?"

Like all denizens of Liberal World, Father McBrien wants us pro-lifers to get in "step" with those who want us to shut up about the slayings of millions and millions of God's little babies.

Sorry, Charlie -- I mean, Father McBrien -- no dice. No matter how much you dislike us and our defense of the babies, we're here to stay and we'll be all the louder in defending the little ones.

And that goes for you, too, The Tidings.

(P.S. The baby photo above and many more like it are viewable at www.prolifeamerica.com)