Archbishop Sean O’Malley celebrated the annual Red Mass on Sunday and called on lawyers to fight the attempt to create gay marriage. The Red Mass is an annual Mass for the Catholic Lawyer’s Guild and this year the luncheon afterward was addressed by Judge Robert Bork.
O’Malley said the gay marriage question is “not a question of live and let live. It’s a question of right and wrong.” Bork said in his remarks that the court ruling had no basis in constitutional law. (Notice, in the linked article, how the reporter phrases it: “[He] said the 4-3 SJC decision upholding gay marriage had no basis in constitutional law.” Upholding? How can you “uphold” something that does not exist? Rather the court created gay marriage.)
Meanwhile, single-issue zealots, protesters standing outside the cathedral “to mark a second year of protest on the clergy sex abuse scandal,” said O’Malley was just posturing to divert attention from the Scandal: “‘It’s a diversion tactic,’ he said. ‘He’s trying to re-establish moral authority, which is long lost.’” Yep, because there is no other issue of importance in the whole wide world.
I know some of my readers are local lawyers. Did any of you attend? Any reflections?
What impressed me was O’Malley’s way of linking both the Gospel reading and the profession of the congregation with his message.
John the Baptist, he reminded us, was a martyr for the sanctity of marriage.
As was Saint Thomas More—one of the greatest legal minds of all time—and the patron saint of lawyers.
Great stuff, as David says.