Outrage over Vatican request to US bishops for funding

The comments on Tom Fox's article yesterday about Cardinal Rodé's request that the US bishops fund the $1.1 million investigation of American women religious have been so vitriolic (and, unusually for an NCR article, largely in agreement with one another) that Fox has written another article just about the comments.

It is rather astonishing that, in the midst of a recession, with churches being closed left and right due to a lack of money, the Vatican expects the US bishops to cough up that much money for something that is already so controversial among American Catholics. Really, how do they think people are going to react to that?

Well, Pope Benedict has said he wants a smaller church.

Colleen Kochivar-Baker has a nice post on this, accompanied by an amusing photo of Cardinal Rodé wearing an outfit that has to be seen to be believed, at her blog Enlightened Catholicism.