If You Gave Bill Donohue An Enema, He Would Disappear

Not sure if Bill Donohue pissed off? Check his pulse. If he has one, then yes, he’s pissed off.

What do you call a loudmouth Catholic with nothing better to do than whine and issue press releases in response to perceived blasphemy against his religion? Why, a Bill Donohue, of course.

Donohue is head of the Catholic League, which, contrary to popular belief, is not an Italian soccer association. The League states that it is “for religious and civil rights,” but this is a crock because Donohue and the CL completely lose their shit every time some public figure or celebrity exercises free speech and disses Catholicism. As P.Z. Myers recently pointed out, Donohue is currently having a meltdown over an episode of Penn and Teller’s Bullshit! scheduled to air August 27 on Showtime.

Donohue is calling for Showtime—a subscription-based channel owned by CBS Corp.—to fire the comedy duo because he claims that the upcoming episode will defame Catholics. He says this because the show’s website contains a warning about the upcoming program that states, “Graphic Warning, Adult Content.” And he’s probably right about this, but who cares?

In his cute little press release titled, THIS IS THE FINAL STRAW (his all-caps, not mine), Donohue’s words drip with an indignation that would impress Bill O’Reilly:

“This is not the first time Showtime has featured a vile Penn & Teller show. In 2005, Mother Teresa was called ‘Mother F---ing Teresa,’ and her order of nuns were branded ‘f---ing c--ts.’ The year after, Jillette said on his CBS radio show that Mother Teresa ‘got her [sexual] kicks watching people suffer and die.’

“Just recently, Jillette took after me again in his usual foul way. That doesn’t matter, but what matters greatly is his pathological obsession with bashing Catholics and their religion. There is no legitimate place for this kind of frontal assault on any demographic group.”

Waaa, waaa. A couple of comedians are picking on Catholics. Boo hoo.

Somebody get Donohue a pacifier to suck so he’ll shut up. Or a dick. I don’t care which.

Since we’re talking about Catholicism, I’m going to make a confession. While I love blasphemy and religion-bashing in general, I particularly relish “this kind of frontal assault” on the Catholic Church about which Donahue is speaking. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I was forced to go to C.C.D. (Catholic indoctrination) for ten years, but my main reason for this is a bit nobler.

As I mentioned in my letter requesting that I be excommunicated, the Church essentially owned most of Europe for centuries. The Vatican enjoyed vast resources and political power, could make or break kings, and pretty much went hog-wild. Pope after pope demonstrated an unyielding desire to punish seemingly anyone whose opinions or actions went against official Church dogma. And by punish I mean utilize some of the most fucked up methods of inflicting maximal amounts of pain the world will ever see. In fact, the holy inquisitions ushered in a golden age of torture devices which are now, thanks to the relative impotence of the abominable Church, curious relics of a bygone age of incomprehensible Catholic sadism. During this period, the Vatican scared the ever-living shit out of everyone and cast a dark fog over the European continent that stymied intellectual development and non-torture related technological innovation.

No thanks to the alleged god who watched these monstrosities unfold, the party has been over for some time and the Church has been defanged. Nowadays, the pope has been relegated to some sort of advisory role, admonishing the increasingly skeptical faithful not to do this or not to do that. Prominent Catholics are no longer the beneficiaries of preferential treatment, but must be content to bitch and moan about getting disrespected. A crotchety papist ass-hat such as Donahue—who was probably Torquemada in a previous life—is so bloated with self-righteous BS and subconscious Irish guilt, he doesn’t see the irony in crusading against mere verbal assaults that are in opposition to an institution which has caused more pain, suffering, death, and general misery than Satan would ever even want to.

So pardon me for relishing in some sweet Catholicism-bashing every now and then. I don’t believe in the divine, but if I did, I would certainly regard the Church’s dramatic decline over these past few centuries a form of divine justice. It isn’t often that massive historical injustices get rectified, and even if they do, the victims are hardly ever around to see the perpetrators receive their comeuppance. However, this heretic considers himself a sort of heir to those brave men and women who dared to say “no” to one of the most terrible, sadistic, and murderous institutions, and who paid quite dearly for it. They may not be around to enjoy the increasing irrelevance of the Church and the flak it gets, but I am. It’s true that the Catholics and other Christians of today hadn’t anything to do with the atrocities of the past, but the Church certainly did.

When I lay my head on the pillow tonight, I will close my eyes and let my mind wander back through the annals of time and keep my ears open to see if I might catch a faint echo of the gut-wrenching screams of those long-forgotten oppressed and tortured victims of the Vatican. I will then wander back to the present, and recall the petty grumblings of the politically impotent Bill Donohue. And then I’ll see if I can enjoy a little sardonic chuckle before drifting off to pleasant oblivion for a few short hours.

- Max