The 2nd Trumps the 5th

I believe Catholics in America are a bit confused. They seem to be under the mistaken impression that the recently re-discovered constitutional right to own (and use) a gun under the 2nd Amendment to the US Constitution overruled the 5th Commandment (the one handed down by God to Moses).

That is the only explanation I can fathom for the reaction by some members of the Catholic faith to the "outrageous kidnapping" of Christ by a University of Central Florida student. The college student did a dumb thing (can I say, no really?) by going to mass in a Catholic Church and walking out with a communion wafer rather than swallowing it. The The Calladus Blog does a good job summarizing the situation:

A University of Central Florida student, Webster Cook, attended Catholic mass on campus, and while there received the Eucharist, (a small cracker blessed by a priest). Mr. Cook, who is also a student senator at UCF, went with a friend who was apparently not a Catholic, and didn't receive the Eucharist. So, Cook wanted to show his friend the Eucharist, and instead of eating it as the priest thought he would do, he took it back to his seat.

Well, he tried. After blessing a cracker the Catholic church believes that it takes on mystical properties and actually becomes the substance of Jesus Christ. And walking away with an undevoured chunk of Jesus flesh gets Catholics very upset. Members of the university church tried to physically stop Cook from walking back to his seat with his Eucharist.

Stupid of Webster Cook to mess with Christ (who can't fight for himself, since he doesn't believe in violence). So, God's saviors on earth responded in true Christian fashion -- by making death threats to Cook. Student Who Took Religious Icon Getting Death Threats. CNN has a Video on the story.

But wait. As Jon Stewart would say, it gets better. Blogger Pharyngula wrote an irreverent post about the snatched cracker, IT'S A FRACKIN’ CRACKER!, mocking those who likened it to a hate crime. As he noted:

Wait, what? Holding a cracker hostage is now a hate crime? The murder of Matthew Shephard was a hate crime. The murder of James Byrd Jr. was a hate crime. This is a goddamned cracker. Can you possibly diminish the abuse of real human beings any further?

Naturally, the good Christians have turned on the blogger, PZ Meyers, who is a professor at the University of Minnesota. They are even trying to get him fired from his job at the University. As he explains, in Fight back against Bill Donohue!:

So far today, I have received 39 pieces of personal hate mail of varying degrees of literacy, all because I was rude to a cracker. Four of them have included death threats, a personal one day record. Thirty-four of them have demanded that I be fired. Twenty-five of them have told me to desecrate a copy of the Koran, instead, or in some similar way offend Muslims, because — in a multiplicity of ironic cluelessness — apparently only some religious icons must be protected, and I would only offend Catholics because they are all so nice that none of them would wish me harm. I even have one email that says I should be fired, that the author would like to kill me, and that I only criticize because Catholics are so gentle and kind.

Oh, and of course, the university president's office has also received lots of mail demanding my immediate ouster (keep in mind, though…Catholics are no threat to anyone at all.) I don't know how much, but since Donohue published the president's email address and not mine, I imagine it's much greater than what I've seen. Those lovely Dark Age fanatics at the Catholic League have started a write-in campaign to start up an inquisition.

Now, I was born & raised a Catholic and I spent more years of my life than I care to enumerate (from Kindergarten through Law School) being educated by various catholic institutions, so I can speak fairly authoritatively on the subject of Catholic doctrine. You know, the love thy neighbor stuff. That "Thou Shalt Not Kill" 5th Commandment rule.

I really don't think God likes us anymore. These people do not represent any Catholic Church I am familiar with. They are no more Christian than the Taliban, trying to impose a warped (hateful, narrow-minded, violent) view of the world on the rest of us.

That's why religion is the cause of most of the world's woes -- crack pots like these people making a fuss over a cracker!