I Dislike Your Favorite Team

"I'm pro-choice, personally." That was all it took to start a controversy.

Rick Majerus who is now coaching at St. Louis University managed to put himself in the middle of a political controversy. Last weekend, Coach Majerus showed up at a Hillary Clinton rally (really, Coach? Hillary? feh.) and happened to mention that he's a supporter of pro-choice candidates. It should be noted that I've given Majerus a hard time in the past (deservedly), but I'll state right now that I think he's on the side of the abortion-providing angels on this one.

St. Louis University, while not directly affiliated with any Catholic diocese, is very much a Catholic school. Somewhat notable dickbag Archbishop Raymond Burke got his wimple in a scrunch, and demanded that the St. Louis powers that be castigate their employee for publicly airing his own beliefs.

(Burke is notable because he's the one who said he would deny John Kerry communion because Kerry was a pro-choice Catholic (as are a large percentage of American Catholics) but never said anything about politicians who supported the Death Penalty, or the War in Iraq. The hypocrisy is what makes him so dick-baggy. In fact, one could argue that Burke said what he did to help promote the failed presidency of a non-Catholic who was waging a stupid war, and has been known to giggle at Death Row appeals. Stay classy, Archbishop!)

Our big-media friend over at CBS Sportsline, Gary Parrish, quoted Burke on this "controversy" of an employee of an entity that the Catholic Church has zero control over, having an opinion that doesn't sync with the Catholic Church.

"It's not possible to be a Catholic and hold those positions," said St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke. "When you take a position in a Catholic university, you don't have to embrace everything the Catholic church teaches. But you can't make statements which call into question the identity and mission of the Catholic church."

If The Archbishop really believes that last sentence, it seems that he may be trying to destroy the Catholic Church from the inside. What Burke seems to be saying is, "You can work here, but you can never, ever, suggest that we are wrong about anything ever." Which is kind of a really, really old-school Catholic argument (Galileo would certainly find it familiar). And again, Burke has no real authority over St. Louis U--they are Catholic culturally, but not within the diocese. Take that quote, and now take a look at Majerus' own defense (from that AP article):

"These beliefs are ingrained in me," Majerus told the paper. "And my First Amendment right to free speech supersedes anything that the archbishop would order me to do. My dad fought on Okinawa in World War II. My uncle died in World War II. I had classmates die in Vietnam. And it was to preserve our way of life, so people like me could have an opinion."

His take on Vietnam aside, I think Majerus wins the American Values argument. Majerus has an opinion, he voiced it. To me, it is rather immaterial whether the Catholic Church pays his salary or not. But let's be clear--the Catholic Church does NOT pay his salary.

Now, we can talk about the moral underpinnings of this argument for just a moment (which is something most sportsblogs won't do. That's what makes us special. Give us a hug). Actually, we won't talk morality, we'll talk religious history perspective, and why this "moral" argument is outdated and out-of-sync.

Religions struggling to gain a foothold almost always have a prohibition against abortion or family planning of any sort. The ones that don't tend to die out (see: Shakers). When the religion gets big and powerful enough, the reason for the prohibition is forgotten, but the prohibition is not. So you get Catholics refusing to wear condoms and relying on the rhythm method, and fucking themselves into poverty. Or you have Catholics ignoring the Pope and the Archbishop and actually being smart about their family size. Condoms and abortions aren't evil, or even immoral--the prohibitions against them were made at the same time that prohibitions on "unclean" animals were based on the sanitation of the day. A Catholic who is pro-Choice should be seen in the same light as a Jew who enjoys bacon. Not living up the standards of the religion, sure, but hardly the end of the world.