Catholic Church, Alleged Arson in San Francisco: Media Sometimes Sets Its Own Fires Too

On the Catholic Sabbath just past, Sunday, a man in San Francisco undressed, painted himself in colored paint, showed up on the steps of Grace Cathedral armed with small explosives, allegedly with the intent to set the church on fire and any people in it.

But, the news story has devolved into the following loudness in some radio and TV talk venues: Is the Catholic church (Grace is an Episcopal Church) a good or bad force in the world? Are people attacking the Catholic Church? Who will or won’t condemn this alleged arsonist? Was this man protesting the Church’s stance on homosexuality? And, How dare anyone criticize the Catholic Church? And on and on.

……..Instead of: What the ‘h.e. double hockey sticks’ was a person, any person, doing running around loose with “an ammunition belt of small explosives strapped around his waist,” who had allegedly been overheard by (or I think, possibly might have arranged for) a neighbor who called police, saying Mr. Paul Addis, a 35-year-old averring he is a performance artist, had planned to set fire to the old French Gothic cathedral and thereby any persons in it.

REGARDLESS of the ‘bomber’s’ political interests or mad-on… what is the real story under the screech-fest already rolling over the airwaves? Is the man insane? Has he hideously bad judgment? Does he confuse ‘acting out’ with performance art? Why would he be willing to threaten human lives? If it is about the Church’s understanding of homosexuality, how is threatening or pretending to threaten to harm the people inside a church better than a KKK line of logic?

How does he fit in with the recent spate of people acting publicly when they a) know cameras are present (don’t tase me bro,) or when a show is being taped live (Bill Maher ran off the stage to help eject a screamer from his audience)? Performance art and threatening to do actual harm in real time context, are two different ideas, yes or no? How can street theater be used in time-honored ways, and where /when? Surely there are

many analytic questions that could reveal context, teaching, learning, facts perhaps?

If Mr. Addis is tried and found guilty of coming to the cathedral with intent to set it on fire, and/or to endanger others, then the courts will speak for the community and take care of a critical threat within their midst.

But the story devolving to one about the ‘popularity’ of the Church, or not, wouldn’t seem to clarify the legal process. The Church from which all once came, whether Episcopal, Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, has certainly had its problems, its incomprehensibles, and its horrendous intrusions, by some, on innocents.

But, Mother Church also has legions of quiet people who have dedicated their lives to goodness, who do not trumpet it, whether priest, nun or ‘layperson.’

If one really wanted to offer a panoramic photograph of the church, they would have to find the faithful who are the santitos, as in any faith, “the little saints,” and those who are trying to be. The public, most often, rarest of rarely, hears of them. But then, they don’t seek attention; they’re often too busy washing another leper.

Regarding the actual story of the alleged arsonist on the steps of Grace Cathedral, (he is also accused of setting fire to the Burning Man effigy, destroying a festival icon a couple months ago… out on bond when he showed up at Grace on Sunday) if the media’s spin of this story is just one more contrivance to drum up another round of “Catholic Church is Good.” “No it isn’t.” “Is too.” “Is Not.” “Is not too….” then, we’ll all need the sacrament of Holy Absolution

– because when speaking of arson, there’s journalistic arson too… setting up straw men in order to set fire to them and thus run in waving the flag of one kind of another of righteousness, all whilst trying to look heroic.

There are thousands of able and hardworking journalists who do their work with true craft. But, surely setting straw under a story to make it flame up, or in order for the readers to be falsely inflamed when they hear/read it, is one of the seven cardinal sins of journalism… as well as that of the predictable spokespersons invited to put out such false fires.

And that falsely inflaming people by putting piles of dry straw under a story too wet to ‘travel’… applies to all stories, including in this time especially, the health of our nation and the world, as well as the current candidates for office.