From Maggie "Mo' Money" Gallagher's syndicated column, THE FUTURE OF CATHOLICISM, April 6, 2005, A.D.:

Pope John Paul the Great is not yet buried, but the divisions among American Catholics have already taken center stage on cable television: Will the next pope be Catholic?

Of course, JP II's critics don't put it that way. But the long-deferred hopes of this group (call them sexual liberals) -- that the Catholic Church is about to abandon its ancient teachings on premarital sex, abortion, divorce, homosexuality and, above all, birth control -- have burst out anew in the 24-hour coverage of the pope's death.

Sexual liberalism has a lot of powerful things going for it in terms of attracting adherents: passion, for instance, the difficulty of self-restraint, the attractiveness of choice as the highest moral good. But sexual liberalism's most powerful ally is the myth of progress. Sexual liberals, like Marxists of old, see themselves as the inevitable wave of the future. The Catholic Church is "out of step" with the future, they believe, and must eventually get in line with the poll numbers, or fade into irrelevance.

Ooooh, Marxists! Gay Marxists! Also, it's cute how she jumps the gun and calls him Pope John Paul the Great. (Okay, bad word choice.)