Cui bono?

By Phil Lawler ( bio - articles - email ) | Aug 20, 2004

When one Catholic publication deliberately sets out to damage the reputation of someone connected with another Catholic publication, you've got to ask yourself: Why?

What purpose is served, aside from character assassination, when the National Catholic Reporter does a "hit" on Deal Hudson? (And No, I'm not going to link to the story. It's disgraceful journalism, and I hope people don't read it.)

As a friend, I hope that the lurid allegations against Deal are at least exaggerated. But even if they were completely accurate, I would still wonder: What's the point of bringing them up now?

Then I read this telltale paragraph, in which I suspect the National Catholic Reporter exposes its real concern about Deal Hudson:

"They [the bishops] are scared of him, afraid that he's going to attack them," says a leading Republican Catholic layman with close ties to the American hierarchy.

We can't have the bishops worried about being attacked, can we? NCR doesn't want anyone exposing the dirty little secrets of the bishops' conference. Thus this pre-emptive strike.

It's a reminder that we're playing hardball. Bring it on.