Italian Cardinal Warns Gay Activists Are Persecuting Christians

[Hissyspit]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/8140303/Italian-cardinal-warns-gay-activists-are-persecuting-Christians.html

Italian cardinal warns gay activists are persecuting Christians
By Simon Caldwell
Last Updated: 5:00PM GMT 17/11/2010
Christians must brace themselves for a "new form of persecution" driven by homosexual activists and their ideological accomplices, an Italian cardinal has said. Freedom of thought and expression is under threat from the gay rights movement, said Cardinal Giacomo Biffi, the retired archbishop of Bologna, in memoirs that are published on Thursday. And the result is that those people who disagreed with the homosexual agenda are being ostracised by society, he said.

- snip -

The remarks came as a British paediatrician lost a religious discrimination case after she was forced to step down from an adoption panel because she opposed adoptions by gay couples. Dr Sheila Matthews was employed by Northamptonshire County Council.

Peter Tatchell of the gay rights campaign group Outrage rejected Cardinal Biffi's claim that Christians were being persecuted by homosexuals and their supporters. "Gay human rights defenders are not persecuting Christians, we are simply asking them to stop persecuting us," he said.

Cardinal Biffi, 82, is seen as something of a maverick in Italy where he regularly made headlines with his pronouncements. He has attacked freemasonry, and feminism and once denounced journalists as "rats".

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[ck4829]

1. "We can't shove religion down their throats, we are soooo persecuted!"

[Renew Deal]

4. I think it's more "I don't want to be labeled a homophobe for hating the gays."

[av8rdave]

2. Oh, for f&%#s sake...

Why does anybody listen to or pay attention to that homophobic moron?

[Angry Dragon]

3. It seems the catholic leaders have gone out and bought

more shovels. They just must really like digging holes.

[AldebTX]

5. Am I Allowed to Call The Catholic Church Out

For how they have persecuted all non-believers?

[Angry Dragon]

7. Yes ......... Call out all you want

However, the church has its ears, eyes, heart, soul, and brain turned off.
The only thing that works for the church is its mouth

[Solly Mack]

6. Whiny bigots.

[Jack Rabbit]

8. Talk about blaming the victim . . .

What is Cardinal Bifi's take on the Spanish Inquisition? How was Giordano Bruno responsible for being burned at the stake? Does the Earth revolve around the sun, like the heretic Galileo said, or did it only start revolving around the sun when the Church decided that heliocentrism was no longer heresy?

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

9. I see no easy way to translate this into Italian.

[gratuitous]

10. Gay activists aren't persecuting my church, Mr. Biffi

But then, we're a publicly affirming congregation. Once we let go of bigotry and unreasoning hatred, it was astonishing how little we were persecuted by gay activists. Persecution from our fellow Christians continues apace, but we're used to that, so it's no big deal.

[Arugula Latte]

11. I really wish liberals would stop supporting this insanity.

I don't care how groovy your own parish (or whatever they call it) is, if your butt is in the pew even once a year you are supporting these repressive nutjobs in Rome.

[Lucy Goosey]

12. Argh - I hate these bullshit claims of "persecution"

Dr Matthews was not fired for her religion, she was fired for not doing her job. If I got a job at, say, McDonalds, but then requested to be allowed to abstain from selling meat to people because I don't believe in eating meat, it's not persecution of vegetarianism when they fire me. It's that the selling of meat to people is a legitimate, integral part of the job for a McDonald's cashier, and if I won't do it, I'm not doing my job.

"Persecution" my ass.

I googled "Dr Sheila Matthews" and found this interesting tidbit from 1999 - I wonder if it's the same Sheila Matthews?

Woman who sued anti-abortion doctor over brain-damaged son loses her court fight

In a nutshell, a suicidal, bulimic patient went to Dr. Matthews to ask about a referral for an abortion, the doctor lied to her that with her pregnancy at 14 weeks, it was too late for her to have one, and the patient sued for the costs associated with raising her brain-damaged son.

"Dr Matthews denied negligence and said she opposed termination as part of her Christian beliefs, but did not allow this to cloud her professional duty." :eyes:

[joeybee12]

13. What a sick, tiny little mind Biff has...knr

[RaleighNCDUer]

14. He's 82? Just the right age to have worshiped Mussolini in his youth.

Still holds all the right attitudes.

[Flubadubya]

15. Sure... just like the gays were persecuting the Catholics in the 1500s....

along with Jews and other heretics...thus, the Inquisition! :eyes: