Ben Shapiro, editor of The Daily Wire, appeared Wednesday night on Fox News’ “The Story with Martha MacCallum” to discuss what he sees as the mainstream media’s defense of Pope Francis — in the wake of allegations that the pontiff covered up or at least ignored sexual abuse within the Roman Catholic Church, as The Daily Wire reported.
Shapiro (pictured above) denounced the left-wing media in blunt terms on the program.
“I’ve rarely seen a more disgusting example of press behavior than this,” he said.
Host Martha MacCallum asked, “How far might liberals go who are very fond of Pope Francis to protect him? Once hailed for his progressive views on issues like homosexuality and climate change, he is now facing some very disturbing allegations by one of his own archbishops, suggesting that he knew about the sexual abuse that was happening within the church ranks, very near the top, and then helped cover it up.”
“It’s pretty astonishing,” Shapiro replied.
“Several years ago, obviously, when the media started to delve into all of the sex abuse allegations against the Catholic Church, there was a great deal of enthusiasm, I think rightly so, in the press, for investigating all of that,” added Shapiro.
“But now that Pope Francis is at the head of the church and they like Pope Francis more than they liked Pope Benedict, in the left-wing press, suddenly they have to rush to Pope Francis’ defense over these allegations,” he continued.
“And The New York Times ran one of the worst headlines I’ve ever seen today [“Vatican Power Struggle Bursts Into Open as Conservatives Pounce”], talking about how as the allegations against Pope Francis mount, conservatives pounce. ‘Conservatives pounce’? How is ‘conservatives pouncing’ on sex abuse allegations the story?”
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Shapiro pointed out the salient fact about The Times’ story: “It’s an amazing accusation that the story is not actually, ‘Serious Allegations Levied at the Head of the Catholic Church by Other Lead Members of the Catholic Church Over a Cover-Up of Sex Abuse of Children.’ No, the real story is that conservatives might use this to go get an icon for the political Left.”
MacCallum then played an interview with Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, in which the religious leader said, “The pope has a bigger agenda. He’s got to get on with other things of talking about the environment and protecting migrants and carrying on the work of the church. We’re not going to go down a rabbit hole on this.”
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Shapiro responded incredulously, “How exactly is what Cupich just said not the headline on every major paper in the United States? The only possible rationale is that a lot of the members of the press actually agree that when it comes to choosing between leftist politics in the Catholic Church and protecting children, leftist politics have to take center stage.”
The two continued to talk about the church’s sexual abuse scandal and the mainstream media’s treatment of it.
“I would suggest that you’re the evil one in the scenario.”
Shapiro concluded, “When you are treating the pedophilia of children and the mistreatment of children, abuse of children, as a political football in order to protect your guy, I would suggest that you’re the evil one in the scenario.”
See the conversation in the video below.
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