Workers must vow not to break church tenets

And who is to determine what will, in the long run, "promote the best interest of our faith and church?"

Any parish priest will tell us that one on occasion must forgo a battle to win a war. And that sometimes, "charity towards all" is done as a "witness" to faith and not in any attempt at conversion or at directly altering the behavior of others.

The provision seems like a sort of carte blanche to enble any supervisor to dismiss a Catholic Charities employee for making a decision to help someone whose behavior, in the moment, is at odds with Church teaching.

We see Catholic Charities making "charity" more and more conditional in these times.

One is reminded of the "good" folks who stepped around the victim laying in the road, and that it was a Samaritan (one who was not "one of us") who actually stopped to help.

That's what ALL businesses that I have ever worked for have done. Why should Catholic Charities of Washington be any different? In fact, it makes doing charity work easier if every worker is on the same page.

"Wake-up call", huh? Enough of a wake-up call that the diocese has abandoned adoption. Maybe they should make the bishop sign the letter as well.

"Big Church" is, as usual, preoccupied with control.

The exact opposite of Christ.

"And Jesus wept."

The abortion angle is one that America Magazine's coverage did not mention. It kind of explains it, otherwise one would get the impression that this is about the Archbishop's desire for a red hat.

"Employees of the Archdiocese of Washington's social service arm "are expected to act in ways that promote the best interest of our faith and church,"

Why would Catholic Charities hire and/or keep as an employee anyone who DOES NOT promote the best interest of our faith and church??? Why would my employer hire or keep me if I do not promote the best interest of the company? Enough is enough. I'm sick of the Catholic-bashing. I don't deny that our church has problems, that it needs improvement. But so doesn't everyone and so doesn't every church or organization. Abortion supporters, homosexuals and the like have available to them countless other churches where they may be employed. What rots their gut is that the Catholic Church says, "No." to their lifestyles and/or actions. If the National Catholic Reporter doesn't see it this way, it should rename itself the National Anti-Catholic Reporter.

There seems to be a feeling that the Archdiocese of Washington is the one doing wrong here and blame is not being put where it belongs--on the D.C. City Council. The D.C. Council should have permitted conscience exceptions to their draconian measures. Archbishop Wuerl must be commended for striving to serve the poor while being true to the Gospel and Church teachings. Would the liberal D.C. council prefer that the Archdioces discontinue its wonderful work assisting the poor and unfortunate?

This is an example of what the Church was never intended to be: a political arm of the right wing Republican Party. This is hardly an act of charity but more an act of WAR by the right wingers in the hierarchy. Disgusting and unacceptable behavior like this only enhances the speed of decay and rot that is advancing rapidly to the Catholic Church in America and in Europe.

Does one have to be a staunch Catholic to be a good janitor, a bookkeeper or even a nurse or any other vocational non-theological calling???

Of course not, so why is the DC diocese putting this religious test as a condition of employment at all?? How can the interviewer determine whether applicants are being "good Catholics" without invading privacy or asking illegal questions??? Catholicism is not a BFOQ (Bona fide occupational qualification) for any job that has both secular/religious practitioners in its ranks.

I will concede that being a Catholic theologian might require Catholic standing, since there is no secular equivalent to that religious profession...

But then, as I recall from visiting there in the early 1960s, the Catholic leadership of that time and place did not require any avoidance of Jim Crow segregationist behavior by its employees or institutions in the nation's capital before the 1965 Civil Rights law required all to change such discriminatory behavior.
Yet in my home state of California at the same time, most of the parish priests were frequently speaking out to condemn both de jure and de facto segregation as un-Christian behavior...

Finally. We're getting some progress in response to the liberal inroads made into the Church these past few decades.