American Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke has been placed on a ventilator. A statement issued Tuesday evening said that he was in “serious but stable condition.” Burke, a major critic of Pope Francis -- so much so that he led a drive to cast doubt on the Pope’s legitimacy -- and a COVID skeptic, was placed on a ventilator in a Wisconsin hospital, after getting what Burke had repeatedly termed the “Wuhan Virus.”
According to The Daily Beast’s Barbie Latza Nadeau, Burke, 73, was as ugly as an ugly American can be abroad, “publicly scoffing at Italy’s strict lockdown measures during the height of the pandemic and [he] was even seen strolling around Rome mask-free even when face coverings were mandated outside.”
Born in Wisconsin, Burke served as bishop of the diocese of La Crosse from 1995 to 2004 and later became the archbishop of St. Louis. In 2010, the ultra-conservative Pope Benedict XVI named Burke a cardinal. When Francis became Pope, he “almost immediately demoted him from his high-ranking Vatican position as head of the justice department in 2014,” Nadeau recently reported. He was reassigned to the position of Patron of the Order of Malta, a position with few responsibilities.
Burke began rallying “conservatives to question the legitimacy of Francis’ papacy through the publication of dubia, or doubts, about what the pope has preached.”
Burke ranks up there with the most conservative Cardinals in the U.S.: He refused to grant Holy Communion to former Secretary of State John Kerry over his stance on abortion rights, and he actively campaigned against Joe Biden, urging voters to stick with Donald Trump.
During the coronavirus pandemic, Burke has been a vociferous anti-vaxer. He advanced anti-vax conspiracy theories, claiming that it was “never morally justified to develop a vaccine through the use of cell lines of aborted fetuses,” adding that “the thought of the introduction of such a vaccine into one’s body is rightly abhorrent.” He also bought into the vaccine chip theory maintaining that “a kind of microchip needs to be placed under the skin of every person, so that at any moment he or she can be controlled by the State regarding health and about other matters which we can only imagine.”
In May 2020, Burke spoke at the Rome Life Forum and said "Vaccination itself cannot be imposed in a totalitarian manner on citizens. When the state takes on such a practice, it violates the integrity of its citizens. While the state can provide reasonable regulations for the safeguarding of health, it is not the ultimate one, it is not the ultimate provider of health, God is. Whatever the state proposes must respect God and His law."
Burke has said that while he had never worked with Steve Bannon, President Donald Trump’s former chief strategist, he had met with him "on occasion to discuss Catholic social teaching regarding certain political questions." Burke broke with Bannon in July 2019.
The National Catholic Reporter recently pointed out that Pope Francis had joined a global ad campaign advocating vaccinations. "Being vaccinated with vaccines authorized by the competent authorities is an act of love. And contributing to ensure the majority of people are vaccinated is an act of love -- love for oneself, love for one's family and friends, love for all people," he said in a public service announcement released Aug. 18 in Rome.
“The video message,” according to NCR, “was part of a global effort by the U.S.-based nonpartisan, nonprofit Ad Council and the COVID Collaborative's ‘It's Up To You’ campaign to increase people's confidence in COVID-19 vaccines by reminding them that the vaccines are safe, effective and save people's lives. The Vatican's Dicastery for Integral Human Development also cooperated with the educational initiative.”
We hope that Cardinal Burke is removed from the ventilator, and fully recovers from COVID. We also hope that he will redeem himself by becoming a vaccine advocate.