Caught a long interview on EWTN last night with Bishop Burke of LaCrosse, Wisconsin (who later this month will become the archbishop of St. Louis). The bishop appears mild, soft-spoken, and scholarly. He explained that before banning the three pro-choice legislators in his diocese from receiving communion (the bishop still refuses to name the three, but Congressman David Obey has attacked the bishop publicly, making it clear that Obey himself is one), the bishop had corresponded with all three for months, stating the teaching of the Church while asking them to reconsider their positions. Only when all three insisted on remaining pro-choice did the bishop publish his notice—and even then he did so reluctantly.

By contrast with the late John Cardinal O’Connor of New York, who liked publicity and enjoyed a good brawl, Bishop Burke seems temperamentally ill-suited to a brouhaha. He did what he did for only one reason: He considered it his duty. As I listened to the bishop, I kept thinking of that quotation from Flannery O’Connor (and if anyone can provide the citation, I’d be even more grateful than I was for the John Quincy Adams citation): “When the age pushes you, you push back.”