Larry Doyle and the Game of "Spot the Idiot."

I agree with this column by Harold Ficket in the Catholic Exchange, which argues that Catholics shouldn't ask Larry Doyle to apologize, rather they should thank Doyle for his honesty and hold his honest opinion up for all to see:

Should we be shocked and appalled by this? Hardly, it only means that today’s Catholics are getting back to being authentic Christians in an increasingly pagan society. “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. Rejoice and be glad,” says the Lord (Matt 5:11-12a). Jesus does not say, Kindly ask them to mind their manners and treat the faith as too precious for open discussion.

In a subsequent posting Doyle mocked the pro forma apology being required of him, and frankly, I don’t blame him. He said what he said because he hates Catholicism for standing in the way of a secular agenda. I’d much rather have frank and honest hatred exposed for what is it than Orwellian expressions of “respect” for religion that are really just a smoke screen for the tyrannical imposition of secular values.

When we ask for apologies from such people, we are asking that faith enjoy a privileged status where it’s largely treated as out-of-bounds for frank criticism, and therefore, in fact, irrelevant to public issues.

If we want to reintroduce the Christian vocabulary into the conversation, then we are going to have to let criticisms, even vicious attacks, flow freely. Do I really need to point out that Doyle’s commentary–and anything else like it–does more to expose the vile nature of anti-Catholic prejudice and its prevalence in our society than anything Bill Donohue and The Catholic League could possible do? (For the record, I admire Donohue and The Catholic League’s work tremendously.)

It’s time to grow up and mix it up, rhetorically. The best satire–much better than Doyle’s, in fact–has always come out of Christianity, because satire as a form depends on a consistent moral viewpoint. See Jonathan Swift and the wonderful work in the last decades of the twentieth century of Walker Percy. The first a devout Anglican priest and the latter a devout Catholic.

Larry, you are wrong, and if you’d like to talk about it, we’re ready. That’s all that needs saying. Put away the calls for apologies and group pressure tactics in favor of censorship. As Catholics we are here, we are relevant, and we are totally unafraid of debate or crude and self-refuting jokes.

Exactly.

Doyle looked like an asshat with his claim that it was okay for a liberal secularist to indulge in a bigoted screed in order to parody things that no one other than a liberal, secularist bigot had said.

The irony of that bit of circular reasoning speaks volumes about the intellectual poverty of the world in which Doyle lives.

What also speaks volumes is the silence on the Left that has followed Doyle's bigoted anti-Catholic screed.

Playing "Spot the Idiots" has never been easier.