Catholic-Schmatholic

Not to be outdone by the Archdiocese of Boston's elaborate funeral for abortion supporter Edward M. Kennedy, Cardinal Schönborn of Vienna last month gave permission for a funeral mass to be celebrated at St. Stephen's Cathedral (where Mozart's funeral was held) for the Austrian artist Alfred Hrdlicka, an unrepentant and self-described "Stalinist."

This Sunday an Austrian state-artist, Stalinist, blasphemer and pornographer Alfred Hrdlicka was buried in Vienna.

The media hungry vienese Cathedral Priest Anton Faber provided a Catholic burial for the blasphemous artist.

What followed was a cabaret act where many of Vienna's leftist politicians came to mourn in the presence of unappealing bronze statues where Father Faber in his solemn black cope read the blessing for the unrepentant Communist and blessed him with holy water as his red lacquered casket was lowered into the ground with a hammer and chisel atop it in place of the traditional crucifix; meanwhile a gypsy choir sang Communist songs predicting the victory of the Red Revolution...

In the case of the late Senator Kennedy, it has been rightly pointed out he may well have repented of his sins on his deathbed, particularly of his support for abortion, let us hope, and thus received absolution; we will never know, of course, but at least Teddy considered himself Catholic.

Not so with Comrade Hrdlicka, who was an Old Catholic, a nineteenth-century breakaway sect formed by German Catholics upset over papal infallibility, and not in communion with Rome. Since only Catholics may receive Catholic burial rites (duh) we have to wonder how Cardinal Schönborn could possibly have seen his way to approving a Catholic funeral for a non-Catholic--and an atheist-communist to boot. Unless, of course, Hrdlicka not only repented of his sins on his deathbed but was then received into the Holy Catholic Church. I have my doubts.

Thanks to Augustine.