Say what? Chicago’s Joe Scheidler taking a pass on a pro-life protest?
Earlier this week, Joseph Scheidler, director of the Chicago-based Pro-Life Action League, said his group strongly supports Pavone but would not participate in the Amarillo protests.
We try to discourage that, Scheidler said. The bishops are kind of a fraternity. You attack one bishop, you are attacking the whole episcopal gathering.
It’s huge, as we say these days — not Scheidler’s demurrer but the protest, which is about Fr. Pavone and his bishop.
Center for Bio-Ethical Reform Executive Director Gregg Cunningham and Operation Rescue President Troy Newman said Thursday they are mobilizing activists and billboard trucks from cities nationwide to converge next week in Amarillo for peaceful protests outside Diocese of Amarillo facilities and activities.
Cunningham and Newman said the groups will use graphic images of aborted fetuses in informational pickets designed to spur people to urge Amarillo Bishop Patrick J. Zurek to allow the Rev. Frank Pavone to return to his international pro-life ministry.
We’re talking trucks, planes, graphic images, etc. Enough to make you sympathetic with a bishop.
Blithe Spirit 
The heart of the Fr. Pavone story is so obvious that we are all missing it. Politics. No, not Church Politics, National Politics. In 2008, Fr. Pavone was outspokenly anti-Obama. In 2010, Fr. Pavone paticipated in the protest against Obama speaking at Notre Dame University. The Presidential election is next year. Right now, Obama’s poll numbers keep sinking. Obama needs every vote he can get to get re-elected. So how does this look to Obama and his people? Fr. Pavone needs to be taken out. This is National Politics, Chicago-Style. Where does Bishop Zurek come in? According to Huffington Post columnist Father Alberto Cutie (Episcopalian), Sept. 19: “His bishop in Amarillo is certainly much more progressive than he is, so there could be some ideological clashes there…” Okay, do these “ideological clashes” translate into the Bishop’s Democratic associations? Those associations include a relationship with former Mayor of San Antonio, Ed Garza. Garza appointed Bishop Zurek to serve on his Committee on Integrity and Trust in Local Government for the city of San Antonio. Ed Garza, sharing the Democratic leanings of other Hispanics in Texas, endorsed Obama in 2008, saying: “Senator Obama’s unique ability to bring people together and bridge partisan divides make him the best candidate to bring change we can believe in.” I don’t want to suggest that Bishop Zurek himself is being a party to a ‘dirty tricks campaign’ against Fr. Frank Pavone, but the possibility exists that circumstances around the Bishop have been manipulated, with an agenda in mind.
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Very interesting. And by the way, why did the bishop leave town as soon as Fr. Pavone returned at his suggestion or order? Knowing nothing else about this, one wonders. Where did the bishop go?
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