I heard about this billboard...

...recently and thought about it when reading my Sunday Times this morning. Nicholas Kristof and Maureen Dowd were beating up on those mean ol' Catholic bishops. 

Kristof writes in "We Are All Nuns": 

They are also among the bravest, toughest and most admirable people in the world. In my travels, I’ve seen heroic nuns defy warlords, pimps and bandits. Even as bishops have disgraced the church by covering up the rape of children, nuns have redeemed it with their humble work on behalf of the neediest. 

So, Pope Benedict, all I can say is: You are crazy to mess with nuns. 

The Vatican issued a stinging reprimand of American nuns this month and ordered a bishop to oversee a makeover of the organization that represents 80 percent of them. In effect, the Vatican accused the nuns of worrying too much about the poor and not enough about abortion and gay marriage. 

What Bible did that come from? Jesus in the Gospels repeatedly talks about poverty and social justice, yet never explicitly mentions either abortion or homosexuality. If you look at who has more closely emulated Jesus’s life, Pope Benedict or your average nun, it’s the nun hands down. 

Dowd, meanwhile, writes "Bishops Play Church Queens as Pawns": 

 It is an astonishing thing that historians will look back and puzzle over, that in the 21st century, American women were such hunted creatures.

Even as Republicans try to wrestle women into chastity belts, the Vatican is trying to muzzle American nuns.

Who thinks it’s cool to bully nuns? While continuing to heal and educate, the community of sisters is aging and dying out because few younger women are willing to make such sacrifices for a church determined to bring women to heel.

Yet the nuns must be yanked into line by the crepuscular, medieval men who run the Catholic Church.

How do you take spiritual direction from a church that seems to be losing its soul?

And that's where my "issue" with Catholics lies. For the problem with the Catholic Church isn't the priests, the bishops or even the Pope. The problem is the laity. That's right; like the billboard above, the problem is you. Because every time you enter a Catholic Church or write them a check, you are sending a clear and unambiguous message: I approve.

So stop whining about the Catholic hierarchy. (News Flash: They aren't going to change.) Only you can change. 

Like the sign says, YOU ARE NOT STUCK IN TRAFFIC. YOU ARE TRAFFIC.