Ever since he took on the Episcopal Church's sexual demagogue, Jack Spong, when they were both bishops in New Jersey, I have been impressed by Washington's Catholic archbishop, Theodore Cardinal McCarrick.
Which is why I was so disappointed to see Page 1 of Wednesday's New York Times, with his eminence as one of the speakers at what was labeled by the Times as "an immigration rally on the Mall in Washington."
How many in that crowd of so many thousands were not criminals – in being in the United States as illegal aliens?
But Cardinal McCarrick is quoted as telling CNS News writer Nathan Burchfield:
"The problem with the House-passed immigration bill is that it made all these people who are illegal criminals. There's a big difference between being illegal and being a criminal."
But your eminence, Webster's New World Dictionary defines criminal as: "Having the nature of a crime, being a crime, involving or relating to crime, guilty of crime."
How is it possible to avoid crime when you violate U.S. immigration law?
So, I repeat the question: How many in those crowds totaling more than 2 million were not criminals – in their violation of United States law?
There was no way of knowing. And it is fully understandable, if also regrettable, that there were no reported law enforcement attempts to arrest any of what can be reasonably estimated as hundreds of thousands of lawbreakers in our nation's capital and at the same time in other cities all over the United States.
There was no reported violence. But the numbers – which almost surely included many thousands of illegals (who are lawbreakers) present a major problem to our country. This problem will be no more solved by President Bush's worker amnesty program than was the 1986 amnesty plan. That plan simply increased the millions who disregarded our law as they violated our borders.
For the cardinal archbishop of our nation's capital to be a participant in the rally of lawbreakers is not as violent but is surely as much of a defiance of law as those who for the sake of promoting sodomy-acceptance disrupted Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York.
It's most important this week – and on May 1 (or May Day) when there is planned another such event of massive advocacy of lawbreaking – to remember that all these parade participants together – say 2 million max – are still a very small minority of the total population of California and Texas.
Their more-than-obvious intention is to massively increase the estimated 15 million illegals to 30 or 40 million, in order to control the legislature of even one state. And then, probably without any need for 1861-type secession, simply continue massive illegal immigration until they control more states.
According to repeated polls, the overwhelming majority of U.S. citizens – including most of the Mexican-Americans who obeyed the law in obtaining citizenship – are appalled at this invasion of illegals.
This should be the No. 1 issue in November's congressional elections – and in the presidential nominee selections and election in 2008.
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