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Archdiocese tells city councilor to leave it out of his holy war
By adamg on Fri, 11/04/2022 - 9:26am
GBH gets comments from the Archdiocese of Boston on Councilor Frank Baker's anti-Protestant assertion about City Council redistricting.
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Comments
This goes right to the top!
Even the Cardinals are in on it! St. Louis, Arizona, Stanford, everybody! Frank, DO SOMETHING!!!!
What's his point anyway?
Can anyone explain what effect having the city district boundaries not line up with parish boundaries would have, other than that the guy who sits next to you in church might be voting for a different city council seat? Is there any actual point (however small) to Frank Baker's rant other than just to stir up trouble?
Reelection
He's whining because he might lose reliable voters. That's all.
His point is that Catholics
His point is that Catholics in Boston have a cohesive identity and specific political interests; for example in public transportation routes that include parochial schools, designation of religious holidays as public holidays, access to public resources for parades and processions, and deference to community standards. The attempt to gerrymander districts to guarantee seats for members of other identity groups discriminates against Boston Catholics, whether intentionally or unintentionally.
His actual point
Was exactly what you said it was.
I'll defend Frank Baker from time to time, but not for this. His mouth sometimes is his worst enemy. Conflating parish boundaries with political legislative boundaries is a head scratcher, as was going all sectarian on his Ulster bred colleague.
To be fair, he did apologize.
Forced apology, retracted
He was forced to apologize at the meeting, but has since retracted the apology. From the WBUR article:
It wasn't retracted
He apologized for his choice of words in describing Breadon's rationale in putting forth the map, as he should have.
WBUR then puts words into his mouth. That's what the brackets are doing. He probably said "them." At the end of the day, those who live in Adams Village are being shifted into a district they most likely don't want to be a part of without any say in the matter. The BS about parishes and Ulster Protestants was just a sideshow, an unforced error on Baker's part which, again, he apologized for.
You're deliberately ignoring some of those words
Baker's statement says specifically that the redistricting is happening because of who those people are. The obvious implication there is that it's due to those people being Catholic, which is of course farcical.
You're assuming
The stated reason, given by the proponents of the map, why those precincts are being moved is because there are more white people in them than in the precincts D4 is shedding. Then there's the reason a lot of people note, which is that they are Baker supporting precincts and there are people who want him gone. That's two definitions of "who those people are" that have nothing to do with their religion. Fair enough, Baker for unknown reason inserted religion into the discussion in the first place, but the implication is far less than obvious.
Terrence Donilon
Are you going to call him an anti-Catholic bigot?
I guess you haven't been to mass in a while
There's been plenty of room to spread out in the pews for years now. Even before Covid you could just wave instead of shaking hands as a sign of peace.
Boston is as …..
…. provincial as ever. Old habits die hard.
Poor old Catholic Church! Bad Boy Baker should know this just distracts from the abortion debate.
Not exactly the same
As recently as 30 years ago everyone on the council was like Baker. Boston is much less of an old boys city today vs when I moved here. Of course, still plenty of problems.
The biggest problem is that councilors have any say in redistricting at all. It's the mother of conflict of interest! The boundaries should be decided by experts who have no personal stake in how the lines are drawn. The council and mayor shouldn't even get a vote on the final maps.
I agree.
It’s definitely improving since the days when my mother had to get her diaphragm under the counter at Phillips Drug.
And your second point is correctamundo!
Not everyone, but most.
And forget about that school committee!!!
The point which is annoying
The point which is annoying is that the questioning of these statements and behavior is our country, by Constitution does not recognize any religion. Religion should not even have been discussed on any level.
wait
wait until the satanic temple sinks its teeth into this.
if you thought the noise over the stupid invocations was dumb, just you wait
My favorite part of the 'GBH article
“I was moreso trying to keep the district united under one councilor,” he said of his letter, which contains no references to Breadon’s religion. “I was taken aback by Baker’s comments. I didn’t even know she was Protestant.”
Jack Ahern, pastor at St. Gregory’s Parish in Dorchester’s Lower Mills section
Obviously this Priest is not part of the clergy Frank Baker was talking about.
“I got a call from a longtime friend [Wednesday] morning, happens to be a Catholic priest. ... He said that the clergy in Boston, they’re all talking about this process right here and they’re viewing this exercise as an all-out assault on Catholic life in Boston,”
Frank Baker