Cardninal Burke denies La Crosse Tribune editor interview

Cardinal Burke "fund raising"

From Chris Hardie, the executive editor of the La Crosse Tribune:

What question would you ask one of the most powerful figures [...and I guess it also turns out that he's from this area too...] in the Catholic Church?

Cardinal Raymond Burke, the prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura — in layman’s terms he’s the Catholic Church’s highest-ranking judge [Actually that would be the pope, but that's a common misconception]— returns to La Crosse for the first time since being named a cardinal Nov. 20.

Burke was in La Crosse last week for several days, attending various events and raising money for the $25 million-plus [Badger Catholic, owner of a $800 auto repair bill, Don Quixote, owner of skinny horse Rocinante, Pres Obama and his $14 trillion debt] Shrine of Our Lady Guadalupe. [More on that below.]

The La Crosse Tribune requested an interview with Burke but was told — through a shrine spokesman — that the cardinal does not want to do interviews and wants to just enjoy the celebration. [Seems reasonable, after all his visit here was not a business trip.]

I think that’s unfortunate, because there are lots of issues in the church that serves 200,000 people in our region and more than 1 billion in our world that deserve discussion. Who better to talk about the church — local, national and international — than Burke, who served as bishop in La Crosse from 1995 to 2004?

Here are some questions we would ask:

• Does Burke think there is a separation between how the Vatican views the church compared to how American Catholics view the church?  [I would ask it a bit more spot on, since American Catholics embrace contraception in clear contradiction to the Church's 2000 year old teaching on the matter, do you think they should start their own protestant church or just keep on being protestants within the walls of the Catholic Church?]
  
• What are the church’s plans to continue to address social justice issues? [Hardie is pro-abortion; endorsed taxpayer-funded-abortion Ron Kind.  I assume this is a question about abortion.  I cringe when I see "social justice" now because the term has been hijacked.  A person has to believe in virtue before they can believe in justice as a whole or even social justice for that matter.] 
  
• The pope recently made a significant announcement regarding the use of condoms [for homosexual prostitutes]. Is the church changing its stance on this issue? [No but this has been rehashed to death already.]
• Has the shrine turned out to be what Burke expected? What does it represent today and what will it represent in the future?
  
• As a cardinal, Burke will be part of the selection process for the next pope. Does he ever foresee a pope coming from a continent other than Europe?
  
• How does a church steeped in ritual and history interact with the technology-driven society of today?
  
• What is the future of ecumenical dialogue and common understanding with other religions?
  
• How is the church addressing the shortage of priests and responding to pressure from some to allow priests to marry or for women to become clergy members? [The question itself is fair.  Especially with certain Milwaukee clergy advocating publicly in newspapers.] 

I have to admit that at times it has been a frustrating year covering the Catholic Church, particularly the La Crosse Diocese. We’ve been greeted with lots of no comments and ignored phone calls when trying to report on: A priest charged with embezzling money from the church; another priest charged with sexual assault and later acquitted; a third priest accused of possession of child pornography; and criticism over the diocesan sex abuse policy, saying it is flawed because it encourages people to report the abuse to the church and not to civil authorities.  [He's right.  I've said in the past, I think this might be due to overprotective lawyers.  I know in one of these cases the diocese would have been vindicated but chose to sit on information that would affirm faithful Catholics.  Even the Vatican press office has been proven to be...  shall we say ...less than adequate at times, so I guess it is to be expected that dioceses not know how to engage the press.  It would serve the diocese well to effectively communicate its abuse reporting policy to the press(ie. not all charges against priests are true, and in fact malicious in intent).  The woman who went after Donkor-Baine had in other diocese made similar false accusations and asked for shut-up money(she also tried to confront Burke during his time here).]

I think it would be appropriate to ask for Burke’s reaction to the challenges of this past year in his former diocese[Actually I really don't think that it is appropriate at all considering Burke had no involvement and could hardly comment without reviewing the cases.  Funny that none of the questions he wanted to ask had anything to do with what Burke would actually be doing in his new role or what he does in his current role.], just as it would be to ask about his direction that Catholic politicians who support abortion rights and same-sex marriage should not receive communion and that Catholics must never vote for a politician who espouses such views. [That IS a fair question since he is thee expert on Canon Law and how it applies to the faithful.  But asking on the occasion of his elevation to the College of Cardinals? ]

Burke certainly pulls no punches and does not apologize for what he says is “simply announcing the truth.” I’m sure some of his responses would have been considered controversial; the same consideration some gave to his plan to build the shrine.  [So he wanted to ask controversial questions in his trip home to celebrate his elevation to the College of Cardinals?  That sounds a bit disingenuous.  If the Green Bay Packers came to town after a Super Bowl victory, would you be asking Mike McCarthy about inappropriate actions taken by Mark Chmura in 2000?  Nope.  Funny how that double standard works.  If the story doesn't fit the mold being used, then make it fit.]

Perhaps we’ll catch him the next time he’s in town.  [I DO hope Hardie gets his interview.  Although throughout the article it is obvious he's not a fan of Burke, he does have some fair questions to ask.  I think the main problem is that Hardie doesn't care about Burke as a person.  He doesn't want to know anything about him, he just wants to stir up some controversy to sell newspapers.  Controversy does sell, but so do historic events.]

Jackson County Reporter

While Cardinal Burke was in town, this was not published but I think worth mentioning.  There is a long time member of the Cathedral parish dying from cancer.  His Eminence took time out of his grueling schedule to go and visit and pray with this parishioner.  It was a very touching moment for the parishioner and assisted parishioner in preparation for the inevitable.  As another parishioner told me, "If somebody goes after that good man[Burke], I will ..." the words did not come to her but rest assured she would be not be happy.  I think there's a few of us that share that sentiment.