And the Alienation of Progressive Catholics Begins...

Thanks to our new pope and his officials in the Vatican for calling on people in Spain to resist a new law legalizing gay marriage.

Interviewed in the Italian newspaper, Corriere de la Serra, Cardinal Lopez Trujillo said the Church was making an urgent call for freedom of conscience for Roman Catholics and appealing to them to resist the law.

He said every profession linked with implementing homosexual marriages should oppose it, even if it meant losing their jobs.

I can understand calling on Catholic priests to resist the law and avoid marrying gays, if that is the official stance of the church. No law should force a religion that doesn't support gay marriage to recognize it.

However, I can't condone calling on "every profession linked with implementing homosexual marriages" to resist. That's overstepping a bit. There are other religions other than Roman Catholicism out there. Seems the new pope doesn't understand that very well.

There are approximately 1.1 billion Catholics worldwide. I wonder how many of them will abandon the church in the coming years as Benedict XVI alienates progressives with antiquated policies like this. I'm not saying the RC Church should recognize homosexual marriage if it doesn't want to, but I don't think it should be trying to influence how non-Catholics lead their lives either.