November 16, 2009
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The "Catholic" Campaign for Human Development, CCHD has a charter to donate to politcal and non-Catholic organizations that "work with the poor". Last year the CCHD had to stop funding for the voter fraud and prostitute promoting group ACORN (we await the forensic accounting report on that fiasco). This year, after calls from Catholic grass-roots organization Bellarmine Veritas Ministry, the CCHD defunded anti-life/pro-abortion groups such as the Chinese Progressive Association of San Fransico, which also supports same-sex marriage, the Rebecca Project for Human Rights, which worked with Planned Parenthood to sign a "wish-list" of reprductive rights, and Young Workers United, which in addition to same-sex marriage and abortion also promotes legalizing prostitution and whose 2008 Voting Guide counsels voters to vote against parental notification of abortion for minors. The Los Angeles Community Action Network, LA CAN, remains funded by CCHD even though LA CAN members worked with the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force campaign to defeat Proposition 8, which repealed the right to marry for same-sex couples.
The CCHD continues to fund a long list of grantees, including PICO and the Woman's Community Revitalization PRoject, who are actively pushing for the current version of health care reform in Congress without qualifying that health care reform should not include federal funding for abortion.
The question is why are we even having this discussion concerning donations to CCHD? As Fr. Richard John Neuhaus (RIP) has said "The bishops could really help poor people by promptly shutting down [C]CHD and giving any remaining funds to, for instance, Catholic inner-city schools."
Jay G
2 comments :
Two good bishops and the CCHD itself give the collection a clean bill of health:
Archbishops Nienstedt and Chaput defend CCHD as criticisms continue
Minneapolis, Minn., Nov 21, 2009 / (Catholic News Agency).- Responding to concerns about the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD), Archbishop John Nienstedt and Archbishop Charles J. Chaput have said the CCHD still does “much good,” despite several “disturbing” incidents and “mistakes” in which the campaign funded groups that worked against Catholic teachings.
In his Nov. 19 column Archbishop Nienstedt of St. Paul and Minneapolis called attention to the collection for the CCHD on the weekend of Nov. 21-22.
He said the Campaign aims to “break the cycle of poverty” for 40 million people in the U.S. by funding local “self-help, anti-poverty” organizations. Many of these are not under the auspices of the Church, but agree to follow guidelines which prevent them from violating Catholic teachings, the archbishop explained.
He then noted recent controversies in which the CCHD had to stop funding for three projects that violated those guidelines. He said CCHD funding was “immediately cut off” when violations were made known ...
In November the CCHD issued a document “For the Record – The Truth about CCHD Funding” to respond to various charges and criticisms.
In that document, the CCHD said it “fully upholds” Church teaching on the sanctity of life ...
Archbishop of Denver Charles J. Chaput also commented on the CCHD controversy in an interview with Mike Sullivan of the group Catholics United for the Faith. He said that people should be “prudent” and shouldn’t jump to “rash conclusions.” He said that he believed that some CCHD staff has made mistakes, but he said some blogs had been “excessive in their judgment.”
“People shouldn’t believe everything they read or be upset with the kind of intensity that I’ve seen, because I think that intensity leads to blindness.”
He said that people could contribute to the CCHD collection without worrying that they are supporting causes that conflict with Church teaching.
“If people don’t like the decisions of the Campaign staff and their allocations, one of the ways they can show their displeasure is by withholding funds from their diocesan collections,” the archbishop added.
“We bishops serve ourselves and the collection well if we are honest about mistakes, try not to make them again, and move on appropriately.”
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