DB's Pixnet

20111223 International Herald Tribune

Page 9, Views 

Newt and state, by Maureen Dowd, Washington

...In a shot across the bow to President Obama, who is considering whether to bow to Catholic pressure and to grant an exemption from covering contraception in health plans sponsored by employers who object, Gingrich said he would support "the right of individuals, business and religious institutions that have a conscientious objection to providing or engaging in services that support values they oppose."

...Gingrich was born a Lutheran, became a Southern Baptist at Emory University and converted to Catholicism in 2009. He and Callista, who is a paid singer in the Basilica choir, have made the shrine their stage, becoming stars on the Eternal Word Television Network, which films there.

   The Basilica Bookstore sponsored a book signing for Gingrich's 24th book, "To Save America: Stopping Obama's Secular-Socialist Machine." And the Gingriches produced a documentary last year about John Paul II, celebrating the pope who rejected attempts to liberalize the church.

   For anyone who grew up with relatives who could never get annulments even when their spouses abandoned them after a brief time, it was galling to see Gingrich--who divorced twice to marry younger mistresses, and who left his wives when they were sick--be celebrated at a conversation Mass by Washington's church hierarchy at St. Joseph's on Capitol Hill, where Robert Kennedy attended Mass daily when he served in the Senate... 

David CK Chang, SSN057-86-4042,

December 23, 2011, Friday,

National Central Library,

Taipei City