From Phil Lawler at CatholicCulture.org:

More and more often, the charitable agencies run by American Catholic dioceses are doing business with the government, providing contract services to fill various social needs. The offices of Catholic Charities, at both the local and national levels, receive the lion’s share of their funding from government programs. They have become agencies of the welfare bureaucracy. The agencies themselves are no longer truly acting for the Church, carrying out the corporate charity of the faithful. They are now wards of the state.

Another problem with Catholic Charities becoming wards of the state, is the cooperative relationships that are formed with pro-abort politicians. Locally, pro-abort, pro-gay marriage Catholic Assemblyman Joe Morelle is an occasional rainmaker for Catholic Charities. Last year, he published a campaign flyer which included a photo of him with several of our diocesan priests.

These kind of photo-ops give Morelle credibility with the Catholic voter even though he consistently takes legislative positions that are contrary to the Church’s teaching. Also, perhaps because of the Catholic Charites funding, he is never publicly (or privately?) censured by the diocese for his votes against life and sexual morality.

The recent incident in Boston over the diocesan Caritas Christi health care system was a wakeup call for Catholics all across the country. More and more of these government/Church associations will be under increased scrutiny as a result of this near scandal in Boston.

One day, these corrupting government partnerships will come to an end. Then the Church in America will once again be uninhibited in its mission of proclaiming the truth.