NY Gov. Cuomo: opponents of un-natural “marriage” are “anti-American”

From LifeSite, a story from a few days ago:

New York governor: opponents of same-sex ‘marriage’ just ‘want to discriminate,’ are ‘anti-American’
BY PATRICK B. CRAINE
Wed Oct 26, 2011

NEW YORK, October 26, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – An employee with the New York Archdiocese warned of an “impending persecution” after New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo called same-sex “marriage” opponents discriminatory and “anti-American” last week.

The governor, who was instrumental in the state’s passage of same-sex “marriage” in June, was asked at a New York Times forum which arguments against same-sex “marriage” he found compelling.

“None,” he said. “There is no answer from the opposition. There really isn’t. Ultimately, it’s, ‘I want to discriminate.’ And that’s anti-New York. It’s anti-American.”

Ed Mechmann of the Archdiocese of New York’s Family Life Office said it is “chilling” that the state’s top official would declare such a large segment of the population as “political pariahs.” He warned Catholics of an “impending persecution,” saying that Cuomo has effectively “declared us to be enemies of the state and nation.”  [And there you have it in one. WDTPRS kudos to Mr. Mechmann.]

“In reality, Mr. Cuomo doesn’t just disagree with our arguments, he denies their existence,” said Mechmann on the archdiocese’s blog. “He clearly believes that they are pernicious, beyond the pale of proper discourse, and motivated only by hatred.”

“That is why he has now declared that we are ‘anti-American’ — that is to say, enemies of our nation,” he continued.

“This is legitimately frightening. We all know what the power of the state can do to its enemies,” he added.

This week, Rev. Jason J. McGuire of New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms issued an open letter calling the comments by Cuomo an “attack” on half of America’s population and demanding an apology.

In July, New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan warned that, if experience in other jurisdictions was any indication, believers in the traditional family “will soon be harassed, threatened, and hauled into court for their conviction.

Christians in the UK, Canada, and elsewhere have lost their jobs, been dragged through lengthy “human rights” proceedings, and faced steep fines for questioning the dangerous homosexual lifestyle, declining to facilitate gay “marriages,” or even failing to acknowledge “gay pride” events.

“Like St. Thomas More, we’re willing to take the heat and even lose our head from following a conscience properly formed by God’s revelation and the teaching of His Church, even if it is politically incorrect, and clashes with the King’s demands to re-define marriage,” said Dolan.

Immediately following the passage of same-sex “marriage”, New York state officials moved to force marriage commissioners to sign marriage licenses for same-sex couples.

Reacting in July to the news that the first commissioner had resigned as a result, Cuomo insisted that commissioners must put the law above their religious beliefs. “When you enforce the laws of the state, you don’t get to pick and choose which laws,” he said. “You don’t get to say, ‘I like this law and I’ll enforce this law, or I don’t like this law and I won’t enforce this law’ – you can’t do that.”

“The laws would have to be paramount, and would have to be paramount to your religious beliefs,” he added.

New York was the sixth U.S. state to recognize homosexual “marriage,” in addition to the District of Columbia.

Bishops must take a stand and do something.  There are bishops in New York state.

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40 Comments

  1. In other words, sayeth Gov. Cuomo, “You have no king but Caesar.”

  2. JohnE says:

    If Cuomo’s idea of America is one of tyrannical relativism then consider me anti-American.

  3. Fortiter Pugnem says:

    Discrimination upon discrimination. Are they discriminating against discriminators? How discriminatory. Man, that word is getting boring and tongue twisting.

  4. Brent S says:

    And, just what can bishops do about this? Their opinion matters not to the people of the USA anymore. They have lost credit with the vast majority of the population through various scandals through the years.

  5. benedetta says:

    Do Catholic leaders care about the next generation of Catholics? Do they really support what will come which will be that children will be beat up and ostracized if they volunteer that they are Catholic? Do they want to go down in history as supporting that outcome. Because where this is going, it will not matter what the individual child’s opinions or beliefs, nor will the child even be given a chance to make up his or her own mind about the facts, but will be bullied just for the sport of it, just for the power of it, to be able to put down another human being for the folly of willing to be called a Catholic.

  6. BV says:

    Next time I go to NYC, I’ll be thinking to myself, “Man, am I welcome here? The governor doesn’t like me and says I am anti-American”. Does this mean Gov Cuomo believes us all to be guilty of treason? Hmmm…

    Glad I didn’t get any NY Rangers or NY Philharmonic tickets.

  7. mrose says:

    Excommunicate him.

    The biggest scandal here is the lack of action on the Bishops’ part. Archbp. Dolan wrote a great letter; now do something.

  8. Joseph-Mary says:

    “the folly of willing to be called a Catholic”
    Yes, I wish that for my children and grandchildren and all descendents. I wish it for myself as well. What happens on this earthly plane to us, even if it be persecution, prepares us for Heaven. The world as we know it is passing away.

    Cuomo, who lives in sinful concubinage, has no clue as to what true marriage is.

  9. JonPatrick says:

    Mr Cuomo – back when state laws in the South forbade African Americans to use whites only facilities, then you would have applied the same arguments as the segregationists did back then? Is Martin Luther King un-American then? Or what about Nazi Germany, when Jews were required to wear distinctive insignia? You have opposed people refusing to wear it because “you don’t get to pick and chose the laws you follow”?

  10. wmeyer says:

    “When you enforce the laws of the state, you don’t get to pick and choose which laws,”

    And yet, when Obama chooses not to enforce the border, or voter intimidation laws (based on the intimidated voters being white), that’s OK. Check.

    I’m thinking if we tossed all the elected hypocrites, we’d be replacing pretty much all of them.

  11. irishgirl says:

    I never liked his father [Mario] when he was governor, and I like the son [Andrew] even less now that he’s governor. Both were, and are, arrogant.
    ‘Excommunicate him’? I think that’s pretty darn late. His Bishop is not in NYC (Dolan), but Albany (Hubbard). And we all know what happened the day Andy was sworn in. He had the gall to go to Mass at the Cathedral in Albany with his live-in girlfriend and receive Communion from Bishop Hubbard.
    Hubbard won’t excommunicate him–fat chance of that happening!
    I think that all the horrible weather we’ve been having in NY State lately is God’s way of telling us that He is NOT PLEASED with the passage of homosexual ‘marriage’. We are in deep, deep trouble….
    Holy Martyrs of Auriesville, please pray for the faithful Catholics [and other God-fearing people] of New York State who oppose this abomination.

  12. RichR says:

    Cuomo is trying to call Archbishop Dolan’s bluff. I guess we’ll see.

    Sad that a soul has gotten to the point where he believes that God’s law is trumped by secular law.

  13. Hidden One says:

    “The emperor is in the church, not above the church.” – St. Ambrose of Milan

  14. disco says:

    “The laws would have to be paramount, and would have to be paramount to your religious beliefs”. The laws of man supersede the laws of god? He really just said that. If that were true then let him tear apart the declaration of independence which states plainly the opposite.

  15. thefeds says:

    If only all of our so-called Catholic politicians had paid attention in Religion class, instead of buying into what the secular education elite were vomiting up and calling it worthy of belief, they wouldn’t be giving scandal to so many people! Actually, if the religious educators (read: Jesuits and many others) had paid more attention to the Charisms of their founders (apologies to St. Ignatius) we wouldn’t be in this mess…

  16. keithp says:

    This is just the begining of the coming persecution.

    I do appreciate AB Dolan. But, where was he when NY Gay Marriage was legitimized? Why is Cuomo not being denied communion?

    I just don’t see another “strongly worded letter” having much impact on Cuomo or those carefully watching what the Catholic Church and how it reacts in these matters. We need our leaders to lead. From lay people, deacons, pastors all need to get more involved.

  17. everett says:

    Dolan has no control over Cuomo being denied communion. Cuomo is in Albany, not NYC.

  18. mdinan says:

    +Hubbard and +Clark are the last two reigning members of Jadot’s Boys. They believe in homosexual so-called marriage. Hubbard even thinks the Church should provide needles to intravenous drug users. Upstate NY has two of the least Catholic Bishops in the world, and Governor Cuomo and Lt. Governor Duffy are their lost sheep. Here’s an idea, your excellencies: DO YOUR JOB!

  19. John V says:

    Meanwhile, Governor Cuomo’s Bishop, Howard Hubbard, in writing about the Failings of the Church, summarizes things that people have mentioned to him: clergy sexual abuse, parish closures, anemic parish life, pastoral insensitivity, poor preaching/liturgies, deficiency in technology, feeling unaccepted/exploited. His conclusion: “In light of these responses, I am conscious of an address that Rev. Timothy Radcliffe, OP, the former master general of the Dominicans, delivered to a group of priests. He noted that “we must rejoice in the very existence of people with all their fumbling attempts to live and love, whether they are married, divorced or single; whether they are straight or gay; whether their lives are in accord with the Church or not. The Church should be a community in which people discover God delights in them.” Let us pray that a better understanding of the cultural climate in which we live and a better addressing of the above-mentioned and other pastoral issues will enable our Amazing God initiative to respond to the deep, spiritual hunger in our midst.”

  20. jaykay says:

    “And that’s anti-New York.”

    Pardon a foreigner’s ignorance, but what exactly is that supposed to mean?

    Oh, ok, I think I get it… there’s a Spirit of New Yorkness, a New York Geist. Right.

    And, em, it just happens to agree with his own worldview…

    Convenient, that.

  21. Michael J. says:

    What Governor Cuomo is saying is both chilling and un-American. To turn our backs on Western Civilization and its normal rules for morality is truly un-American. Has he finally said enough to be excommunicated, or at least denied the Blessed Sacrament? Our Bishops need to stand up to these liberal bullies and let them know that there is nothing that they can do that will get us to changed both the Natural Law and Church Teaching. Hauled into court for their convictions? That is what we must now do to stand up for Traditional moral living. How about the example of Gov. Cuomo living with his girlfriend. That is setting a good example for Our Nation but denying homosexual lifestyle as normal and stating the truth that it is unnatural is now the crime. See, it started by not enforcing the sodomy laws, then by taking them off the books, and now civil society is legalizing what they are doing.

  22. ceolfrid says:

    Mr. Cuomo may in fact be right: opponents of Sodomite ‘marriages’ may very well be ‘anti-American’.

    The problem is that — thanks to the heresy of Liberalism, and its bastard off-spring Diversity, Multiculturalism, and Tolerance — there is no objective definition of what being ‘American’ really means.

    Clearly, Mr. Cuomo thinks being ‘American’ means rejecting the traditional definition of the term marriage and, even more significantly, demonising those who defend that definition.

    Octave Day of All Saints
    A.D. MMXI

  23. DisturbedMary says:

    All this, and the Governor was invited and attended the Al Smith dinner a few weeks ago sponsored by the Archdiocese. There he yucked it up with Archbishop Dolan, Mayor Bloomers, Koch and the rest of the tax collectors. Go figure.

  24. HyacinthClare says:

    John V, you have nailed it. That’s what the governor knows his bishop believes. He’s not in the least danger of excommunication or embarrassment. God “delights in us”, sins and all.

  25. TC says:

    @ Sean P Dailey
    In other words, sayeth Gov. Cuomo, “You have no king but Caesar.”

    Well, they don’t call it the Empire State for nothing.

  26. Bryan Boyle says:

    Riddle me this, Batman….is anyone REALLY surprised?

    And, no, +Hubbard will do nothing. Doesn’t want to be off little Andy’s holiday party invite list, probably. Would rather ‘dialogue’ the situation to death.

    Remember that scene from the Kevin Costner version of “Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves” where Friar Tuck confronts Nottingham’s bishop after he performed that sham marriage under duress…loaded down with his bags of gold and pushed out the tower window? I’m not a violent man, nor do I approve of man going to that extent..but I’m sure more than one of us felt silent satisfaction….

    The Greeks had a word for the attitude of this creep: hubris. I won’t judge…but, I would not want to be a witness at his particular judgement. It might not be pretty.

  27. Sigh– another two years to Bishop Hubbard’s retirement. Makes you wish that he could be kicked upstairs somewhere in some obscure dicastery as a titular archbishop or something. Or maybe Rome could at least appoint a coadjutor bishop (I know– normally the ordinary must request one). It looks as though it will take someone as arrogant as Cuomo is to stand up to him. All I can say is that if I were his bishop and he said something like that, I would demand that he report to my office immediately for a good dressing down, and I would ban him from setting foot on any other diocesan property until he repented. I wish pro-lifers didn’t have to dream any more.

  28. Cuomo does not reside in the governor’s mansion in Albany. His legal residence is in Westchester County in a home owned by his live-in girlfriend. He makes his home, then, in the Archdiocese of New York. He is of course frequently in Albany. Archbishop Dolan is the metropolitan of all New York State. Certainly eight men can put their heads together and address this!

  29. Nicole says:

    By reasoning that anyone who opposes an attempt at an unnatural and impossible marital union is “anti-American” is in fact calling one’s self anti-American…hahahaha! From what I hear, any sort of intollerance is anti-American…and therefore Cuomo is anti-American… :)

  30. oricol says:

    obviously the cuomo’s have never read the Bible nor do they seem to care to ever do that – if they had any notion of Who GOD really IS and about HIS words, they would take to heart the words of JESUS Who said: “stay alert as you do not know the hour The Son of Man will come…”…they can behave as the biggest shots that ever existed, but when The Son of Man comes for them …WOE! WOE!….’the proudest shall be humbled…’
    they could begin by simply reading the first letter of St Paul to the Romans, 18-32….
    it is quite elementary actually: man with man and woman with woman….does NOT add up = no children no future, no world, no existence….
    marriage and union of a man and a woman is from GOD, immorality is NOT natural and therefore, NOT acceptable by GOD and those who believe in HIM. HIS true followers
    i am proud to admit this to all who come daily into my life, and shall continue to do so until the end of my time and am teaching it and will teach it to my 7 (seven) grandchildren without fear but with deep TRUST in JESUS The DIVINE MERCY
    having said all this, i humbly pray for the alike of the cuomo’s, for my country and for the world, but especially for the children of tomorrow who will have to carry the burden of our silence and our shame,
    in JESUS, MARY, JOSEPH,
    rick lemus

  31. Hidden One says:

    Bishops are bishops, period. I fear that this discussion may not be according certain bishops the respect due to them qua bishops. I could be mistaken, but that is my impression.

  32. Johnno says:

    “When you enforce the laws of the state, you don’t get to pick and choose which laws,” he said. “You don’t get to say, ‘I like this law and I’ll enforce this law, or I don’t like this law and I won’t enforce this law’ – you can’t do that.”

    Oh? Then how Cuomo put his own personal convictions aside and uphold the law of DOMA protecting and defining marriage as one man and one woman, or that protecting conscientious dissension on religious grounds? I love how people like him can freely be contradictory hypocrites without realizing it! Why don’t any reporters have the cajoles to call someone like him out on his skewed logic?

  33. Raymond says:

    I know that we Christians should be ready for persecution and even martyrdom if the situation calls for it. But when secularists such as these push hard, we should also push them back just as hard! Although we may not see eye-to-eye all the time, how about an alliance with our Muslim countrymen and women for the protection of the traditional family?

  34. JohnRoss says:

    His eminence should issue a decree excommunicating all “Catholic” politicians who back the redefinition of marriage. I’d say they are guilty of the sins of heresy and apostasy in addition to everything else.

  35. Supertradmum says:

    Like father like son, and no offense to Democrats on this blog, but this is typical of East Coast Catholic Democrats. Why are these people voted in over and over? You get what you want…..

  36. BV says:

    Let us not forget…

    Matthew 5:11-12 (RSV-CE)
    Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so men persecuted the prophets who were before you.

  37. Kerry says:

    Ah yes, Antipas the Pious, son of Mario the Pious.

  38. Kerry says:

    There is a cartoon here somewhere…a speaker buried in burning pitch, feet only visible saying, An’ then they told me ‘The Church should be a community in which people discover God delights in them.”
    Un huh.

  39. zama202 says:

    Let’s not forget the Bishop of Albany and/or the Bishop of Brooklyn-Queens (I don’t know where Cuomo is officially domiciled) who continue to allow him to be a Catholic in good standing. Great job boys! Good to see you leading your flocks – over a cliff that is.

    Charles

  40. aviva meriam says:

    I’m confused by one aspect: if Andrew Cuomo doesn’t accept Church teaching in so many areas, why does he persist in self identifying as Catholic?

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