A teachable moment

It is well known, to Catholics and non-Catholics alike, that there are homosexuals who wear cassocks, and that celibacy is just a system to maintain control of the Church’s economic wealth.  So we ask them to cease with the attacks that only foment hatred and discrimination.

Red Nacional Católica de Jóvenes por el Derecho a Decidir (National Conference of Young Catholic for Choice)

OUCH!

Not that Cardinal Sadoval Íñguez is going to cease with the attacks on Marcelo Ebrard nor is Mexico City’s Jefe de Gobierno about to back down. Ebrard is planning to file a denunciacíon today for “daño moral” — specifically because the Cardinal claimed Ebrard “maiceado” the ministers of the Supreme Court (who ruled in the Federal District’s favor, much to the chagrin of His Eminence, over the right of the legally married same-gender couples to adopt children under the same guidelines as those used for opposite gender married couples).  Get the palmonitas ready… it’s going to be quite a show.

I admit it, I’d never heard the word “maiceado” before (and those of you non-native Spanish speakers who have, raise your hands), and it’s not in my McGraw-Hill Diccionario del Argot (2001) or on the Diccionario de la Jerga website, nor in my 21st edition of the DRAE. From the online version of 22nd edition of the DRAE, I was able to piece together that it means “well-fed” …. “fat and happy”… (and, in Nicaragua, “drunk”), but the sense is getting one’s nose in at the trough… “bribed”.

Which is the basis of the “daño moral” — basically damages, not necessarily monetary (like to one’s reputation) caused by a third party to a dispute. Which sent me to a long, long learned article by Alicia Elena Pérez Duarte y Noroña in the Boletín Mexicano de Derecho Comparado, Nueva Serie Año XVIII, Número 53 Mayo-Agosto (1985), pp. 625-638.

All very interesting and educational, but I’m on deadline to finish an article (with footnotes and end papers) on the Mexican-American War of 1846-48 and there’s another book editing project under way.  I don’t expect to update any posts for the rest of the week, so tune in to  Aguachile and Gancho for politics, Maggie’s Madness and Malcolm Beith for mahem, From Xico for analysis and Burro Hall for snark.

Back in a couple days.