In response to a statement by 55 Catholic Democrats decrying their occasional characterization as "good" or "bad" Catholics based solely on their positions on abortion, a Catholic vice president at the Family Research Council spake thusly:

"What is at the core of being Catholic is the life issue, and that's something the pope has never strayed from. While other issues are important - such as helping the poor, the death penalty, views on war - these are things that aren't tenets of the Catholic Church."

As someone whose Catholic upbringing has lapsed to such an extent that I literally forgot that Mardi Gras signalled the beginning of Lent, I think he's wrong, but I'm not emotionally invested enough to get worked up about it. I can be sure, though, that there are many members of my family - proud and practicing Catholics - who would react to that statement with some variation on "Who the fuck is this guy to tell me what it means to be a Catholic?" The Church has plenty of problems these days, and it's probably a little unfair to expect them to respond every time some crazy Catholic says something with which many Catholics would disagree. But if I'm running the Church right now, I come out yesterday with a disclaimer that the Family Research Council doesn't speak for the Vatican. That particular camel's back is pretty fully loaded, and hell if I'm going to let some right-wing mouthpiece add his straw.