Anti-Family, Anti-Catholic Activists hosted at Most Holy Redeemer

Today's California Catholic Daily reports on SF's Most Holy Redeemer Church's January 22 hosting of a town hall meeting for the LGBT political action group Equality California. The article is aptly titled "Is this a Catholic Church?"

Of all the anti-Catholic events hosted at MHR, and there have been many (drag show, obscene bingo, years of sado-masochistic gatherings, etc.) this is the most obscene and the most anti-Catholic. No group that MHR has hosted, not the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, or the S/m Golden Gate Guards or the Inter-Club Fund are worse than EQCA.

The meeting was sold as focusing on access to health care. But that took up only a small part of the meeting. The majority of the discussion covered Equality California's broadening political agenda. That political and legislative agenda is diametrically opposed to the Catholic Church, That agenda will also target individual Catholics and Christians who attempt to uphold the truth of the faith.

The transcripts of some of the items under discussion, taken from the California Catholic Daily article are reproduced below in red. The speaker is Executive Director Rick Zbur.

On EQCA's opposition to religious exemptions to laws that the Catholic Church and its members could not obey without violating their faith, the moderator asked: "Do you see some of these religious liberty laws they’ve tried to get started in other states over the last year or so? And they did have an effort in California that I don’t think went anywhere. Do you see this happening again in the legislative session, and if so will Equality California oppose that?"

“Well, we definitely would oppose it. You know, I haven’t heard very much about them doing that, I think they’re focus is on unraveling AB 1266, that’s what we we’re hearing their focus is, but in California I haven’t heard anything recently, but obviously we would oppose it. The thrust really though, I think is at the federal level with the version of ENDA that passed the Senate that included a broad religious exemption that we were very very uncomfortable about, and most of the LGBT organizations that weighed in expressed a lot of nervousness about the decision to pass it with that broad religious exemption, and so we’ve already spoken out against that. 

“I think the thing that makes me nervous is the fact that it passed with that version and we’ve got a lot of states now that I don’t think that the next phase of us earning civil rights protection is going to happen at the federal level with Republicans in control of both houses of Congress. It’s really going to happen, as it has in California, in the states that don’t have that. So I’m really nervous about this religious exemption being used to sort of weaken civil rights laws that pass in the states. So that’s, we’ll continue engaging on that where we see it.”

This means EQCA opposes an exemption for, say, a photographer or a baker who refuses to participate in a same-sex 'wedding.'  They will work to prevent a Catholic from being faithful to the Church. They are announcing this intention in what calls itself a Catholic Church.

Note that in his answer, Mr. Zbur brought up AB 1266. The California Catholic Bishops were very clear about that bill: "If signed into law by the governor, AB 1266 will require public schools to allow a child of any age 'to participate in sex-segregated school programs and activities, including athletic teams and competitions, and use facilities consistent with his or her gender identity, irrespective of the gender listed on the pupil’s records.'"

What the bill means is that if a second grade girl (who is biologically a female) decides she wants to be a boy, she can use the boys’ bathroom if she chooses. She can insist on being called 'he' instead of 'she'. If a twelve year old boy (who is biologically a male) self-identifies as a girl, he—or 'she'—must be allowed to play on the girls’ softball team and share the locker room with the girls.

Explain that to your eight or ten year old, or your six year old."

The moderator followed up: "You just mentioned AB 1266, which is the law that went into effect last January, that provides that all students have access to the same facilities [bathrooms], including transgender students too, athletics and other things too. What do you see in different parts of the state around implementing that and how can Equality California help with that. You did mention earlier you were working on some school issues." Zbur responded:

“We’ve been partnering with other LGBT organizations, not us alone. The ACLU, one of our partners, has been really taking a lot of leadership on this. For example, I think it’s next week we are participating in a pretty big convening meeting in the Coachella Valley in which I think there is something like 8 or 9 smaller school districts that the ACLU and Equality California are helping provide some training for members of the school district and administrators and the school board on AB 1266 implementation. 

“What we’re finding is implementation is spotty, that a lot of districts really don’t want to do it, that AB 1266 is one of those laws that there is a fair amount of controversy on. We saw a member of the California Assembly who lost re-election in Orange County and one of the key issues that was raised in her political campaign was the fact that she voted for AB 1266. So I think our opponents know that is an area where the public, where there is a lack of full understanding among the public. And they’re using that as a bit of a wedge issue.

“So we think that we need to really engage in education ahead of a potential ballot measure that they may very well try to put back on the ballot in the 2016 election cycle. They did try to gather signatures for 2014 and just fell short in gathering enough signatures to get on the ballot but we’re hearing that they are going to try again and so that’s an issue that we’ll be working on with the Transgender Law Center & the ACLU & National Center for Lesbian Rights and all of our partners”

AB 1266 is a vastly unpopular law, certainly opposed by a majority of Californians. As Zbur admits even "a lot of (public school) districts really don't want to do it." And we repeat: it was publicly opposed by the California Catholic Bishops. But EQCA announces, in what calls itself a Catholic Church, that, working with the ACLU, will be forcing compliance with this idiotic and immoral law in direct opposition to the Catholic Church.

EQCA's actions corrupt the minds of California's children by teaching them that it is simply their decision which determines whether they are a boy or a girl. But AB 1266 is not the only attack EQCA is making on children, the family, and reason in the public schools.  The moderator asked Mr. Zbur what EQCA's priorities were for the coming year. Zbur listed three, one of which was:

“We are talking to the ACLU about co-sponsoring a bill that would update sex-education criteria that are imposed in the schools, and there are requirements now that sex education programs in a very general way address and educate kids about the diversity of what a family looks like and because the standards are so general most school districts don’t really do what was intended by the existing legislation. So that the curriculum is being updated, the ACLU really wants more standards than that, so we’re really going to be focused on that as well.”

So the propaganda that goes under the name of 'sex education' in the public schools does not go far enough in Mr. Zbur's (or the ACLU's) opinion. To 'educate kids about the diversity of what a family looks like' is simply propaganda against the family, what Pope Francis himself called on January 16 the 'new ideological colonization that tries to destroy the family.'

Once again, Zbur announces that he will attack the fundamental teaching of the Church (exemplified by Pope Francis words) on the reality of man and woman and the family. Once again he announces his attack on the faith, (and the Pope), in what calls itself a Catholic Church.

Mr. Zbur is also seeking clerical allies in castrating the Churches. (He has two--two priest were in attendance at the meeting, probably Frs. McClure and Link of MHR). He unveiled EQCA's 'Faith Initiative'--apparently made public for the first time, at Most Holy Redeemer.

The moderator asked: "I know that when we talked you had mentioned something about Equality California planning a faith initiative. What would that entail?"

Mr. Zbur: “So we’ll be announcing the details, but I’ll give you a little bit of a preview. We’ve been in discussions with a group of faith leaders throughout the state who’ve actually already been engaging in work to both educate and outreach to the faith communities about the LGBT community and to advance LGBT equality and acceptance in the faith community, talking with them about providing a home and support for that and part of their ministry. 

“The group of faith leaders are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, includes a large group or them, so for us it recognizes the fact that some of achieving our goal of full acceptance of LGBT people will require us I think to have more outreach and education within faith communities and so that’s a priority for us and we are hoping that this new initiative is completed, but we’re hoping soon to announce the details of the faith initiative that is sort of really aimed at more outreach in the faith communities in California. 

“I think that other than that what makes me really excited is that you look at where the opponents of full equality are coming from, they’re using faith based arguments and religious exemptions to try and carve away the legal rights that we have already earned here in California and in other parts of the country, so having a group of faith leaders who are standing with us in our fight for full equality and acceptance, I think will be something that’s going to be important for us all as we engage in the political advocacy that we need and in the public education to sort of protect the rights that we have already earned.”

Equality California is at war with the Catholic Church. Inexplicably, the Archdiocese of San Francisco provided them with a beachhead. That Most Holy Redeemer would provide aid and comfort to the enemies of the Church will surprise no one who has been paying attention. As far back as August 28, 2007, in the post 'MHR and how it got that way,'  I argued that, existentially, Most Holy Redeemer is not a Catholic Church, it is a gay spiritual institution. I wrote at that time:

"The moral credibility of the Catholic Church, then, will be determined (by the members of MHR) by the extent to which it supports, or fails to support, the community-forming experience of the gay community. If...the sexuality is experienced as more important than the doctrines of the Catholic Church, one would expect the doctrines of the Church to be discarded when they come into conflict with the community-forming experience. And this is exactly what happens...And this leads to the acceptance of blasphemy in an ostensibly Catholic Church. But such events will not be experienced by the parishioners as blasphemous, because they validate the community-forming experience...Indeed, at this point, what will be experienced by the parishioners as blasphemous is that which denies the value of the community-forming experience." Such as the teaching that marriage is only between one man and one woman.

I also wrote at that time that the fault does not lie with MHR but with the Archdiocese.