Old Liberal Bishop of Des Moines Promotes "Medical" Cannabis

Some things just go together

Edit: it's interesting to note how some prelates like Msgr. Pates, camouflage themselves by perfunctory attention to social issues from a Catholic point of view, and spend the rest of their time pushing an overriding modernist agenda.  For example, few people know that Archbishop John Ireland was such a bishop since many of his public acts were irreproachable and even laudatory, but he was an Americanist and even contemplated a schism in the late 19th century.

[Des Moines Register] Des Moines' Catholic bishop is joining with Iowa lawmakers who are pushing to make medical marijuana legal in the state.

Bishop Richard Pates, the influential leader of 100,000 Roman Catholics in southwest Iowa, has asked House and Senate members to approve a comprehensive bill to permit medical cannabis. The Iowa Legislature is in an intense debate over medical marijuana legislation as the final days of the 2016 session wind down.

"I believe now is the time to help suffering Iowans and their families get access to this medicine," Pates said in a letter dated late last week.​

Story from Des Moines Register...
Photo from Spirit Daily...
AMDG

Bishop Pates of Des Moines is Challenging New Abortionist

COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa, November 30, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Bishop Richard Pates of Des Moines has not taken lightly the news that a notorious late-term abortionist is seeking to move into his backyard.

The Iowa prelate has issued a call-to-arms to local Catholics against plans by abortionist Leroy Carhart to move his business to the area.

Carhart left his longtime abortion location in Bellevue, Nebraska after the state passed a bill banning abortion after 20 weeks’ gestation. He has since aroused widespread indignation from Iowa pro-lifers with his plans to resume aborting late-term children in Council Bluffs, Iowa.

Read further... 

H/t: Stella Borealis

Bishop Pates puts the Smackdown on Iowa Newman Center

Bishop Pates has been a gay friendly Bishop in the past, so we're suprised to see him take such a principled stand at this. It's unfortnate that there has to be such a public disagreement on the issue. Perhaps the 100 people objecting to this would be more comfortable in the Episcopalian or Lutheran Church where these sorts of things are celebrated. Perhaps a better policy would be to simply ban the Paulists from the Diocese, close the Newman Center and give it to the SSPX?

[Catholic Culture] Nearly 100 laity are boycotting Mass at an Iowa Newman center after Bishop Richard Pates of Des Moines fired a transgendered housekeeper who had quietly offered counseling services and formed a transgendered support group there. Bishop Pates told Susan McIntyre, who was born as Jim Ford, that “your unauthorized representation indicating that you are employed by and operating on behalf of the Newman Center as a counselor or social worker” led to the housekeeper’s firing.

The bishop intervened after Father Joel McNeil, recently assigned to St. Catherine of Siena Catholic Student Center at Drake University, “noticed a piece of paper on a copy machine in the parish office,” according to the Des Moines Register. “On it was a counselor's authorization of hormone therapy for a transgendered person about to undergo a sex change. On a letterhead that included the center's name and address.”

The Register added:

There's a sign out front of the church that identifies it as Catholic, McNeil noted. It's a matter of truth in advertising, he said: Would the parish stick by Catholic teachings or have a set of beliefs that went outside the Catholic tent?

"For a person who sees Christianity as fidelity to what Christ began 2,000 years ago, we can't change that teaching," he said.