Bar Owner Relents — Will Not Use Name of Virgin Mary for Pub
As the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts reported in May, a South Boston bar owner decided to expropriate the name of Our Blessed Lady, trivialize it, and exploit it for commercial marketing, by calling his pub The Hail Mary.
This was a callous and sacrilegious act of contempt towards the Mother of God, and a gratuitous insult to the beliefs and sensibilities of faithful Catholics.
The Catholic Action League was the only Catholic organization to speak out at a public meeting in South Boston against this buffoon receiving a City of Boston liquor license.
Confronted by outrage from concerned Catholics, criticism from elected officials and opposition from the League, the owner promised to drop the offensive name.
His attorney claimed, all along, that the original name was nothing more than an innocent reference to the Doug Flutie football phrase, and had nothing to do with the person of Our Lady.
Then, however, the alternative name offered by the owner, the Queen of the May, once again referred to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
The Catholic Action League was emphatic in urging community activists to continue to oppose the license transfer request until the offending name was renounced.
On November 20th, the Boston Licensing Board approved the opening of the Mother's East Tavern on Dorchester Street in South Boston, after the owner finally relented and abandoned all mention of the Blessed Mother in the name of his pub.
Catholic Action League Executive Director C. J. Doyle made the following comment:
"So it wasn't just a football reference after all! Was this character just being stubborn, or does he have some occult obsession with the name of the Blessed Mother?
This entire controversy would have been unimaginable forty years ago.
It speaks to the loss of numbers, reputation, moral standing, cultural influence, and political power by the Catholic Church in Massachusetts, much of it due to same-sex predation among the clergy in the Archdiocese of Boston.
The late radio talk show host, Jerry Williams, said it was impossible to criticize Catholicism on the Boston airwaves when he first began here in the late 1950s.
Now, more than sixty-five years later, any crackpot can insult us with impunity.
At a time when the Hierarchy seeks to ingratiate itself with pro-abortion financial, media and political elites in the Commonwealth, it will be up to the Catholic laity to defend what remains of the Faith here in post-Christian Massachusetts.
The Catholics of South Boston are to be commended for their determined and successful resistance to a tawdry attempt to exploit and demean the august name of the Mother of God."
(Republished with permission from Catholic Action League of Massachusetts)
