My favorite Norman Rockwell painting

[Cartoonist]

Norm is known for his cloying humor that appeals to grandmothers and republicans, but I like this one.
I can't speak for him or pretend to divine his message here, but I think he is trying to shame the father.

My interpretation is one of applause for the stay at home dad. I can almost hear his thoughts. "You want to go listen to some pedophile preach to his enablers? Go ahead. I'll just sit here and wait for the ballgame to come on."

[northoftheborder]

1. Reminds me of my dad!

[rurallib]

2. I like your interpretation

[BeyondGeography]

3. I find a lot of his work to be quietly subversive

I think he understood us on a very deep level. Didn't always feel that way because he was typecast as uncool when I was growing up. But look at Freedom of Speech, for instance, which is seen as quintessential apple pie Rockwell. To me, it could also easily be read as every blowhard has an opinion and some people are credulous enough to believe anything.

[AtheistCrusader]

11. That's why it's so good.

It is subversive, but it's also deeply true. It's like a good joke. Always has a vein of truth buried somewhere in it.

In his own way Theodor Geisel (Dr. Seuss) was very much the same.
“all the turtles are free – as turtles and, maybe, all creatures should be.”

[rug]

4. Which of these are the pedophile enablers?

[edhopper]

5. Priest with white hair

Top right.

This is fun, like where's Waldo.

[Bretton Garcia]

6. He looks brooding.

He's standing a step or two behind a black guy - and one of the kids.

[rug]

7. You call him a pedophile with absolutely no evidence other than his collar.

No, there's no anti-Catholic bigotry here, is there.

Thanks for supplying the proof. That was fun.

[tonedevil]

8. The cover up...

exponentially increased the offense. I feel about the Catholic Church the same way I feel about any institution that systematically protects paedophiles. Given the widspread occurrence of the practice and the church moving offenders to protect them I am having a hard time being understanding of the continued existence of said institution.
To your narrow complaint we don't know that every priest is a paedophile, but as widespread the occurrence and as dodgy the behavior of the church should we assume innocence? Is it reasonable for parents to leave their children alone with Priests anymore?

[rug]

12. I feel the same way about your post as I do about any other broadbrush bullshit.

You have chosen to consider the entire institution to be no more than institution "that systematically protects paedophiles." Period.

You have firmly reshaped the RCC into being only that, which you would be calling for its extinction but for some residual caution in expressing yourself.

Ignoring your grandiose "we", you, in particular, are broadbrushing Priests and Catholics who practice their faith because you have, contrary to evidence, concluded that priests are more likely to be pedophiles than the general population.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and conclude you're peddling bullshit rather than bigotry.

[tonedevil]

16. Did the Catholic Church...

move Priests, that they knew were sexually assulting children, to avoid prosecution? I must assume the church was ok with that behavior given the institutional cover up. To me that doesn't mean priests are more likely than any other individual to be paedophiles it just means the Catholic Church will protect them and abandon the victims.

[guillaumeb]

20. Following your "logic",

because some teachers molest students, we should close down schools.

Because some Scout leaders molest Scouts, we should shut down the Boy Scouts.

because some gun owners murder, we should ban all guns.

Agreed? or is your "logic" reserved for religion? If so, it is bigotry disguised as concern.

[tonedevil]

31. You would leave alone...

a school that knew teachers were molesting students, but refused to take any action to remedy the situation? If the Boy Scouts were moving troop leaders who molested scouts to other parts of the country so those leaders were safe from prosecution and free to molest other scouts that wouldn't be good reason to disband the organization and jail the leadership? The gun thing is just gratuitous I won't even bother to address it.
So no I don't agree with your tortured logic that deceptively removed all mention of the organization actually protecting the molesters. Religion isn't the issue criminal behavior at very high ranks of the organization, that just happens to be the Catholic Church, is. Can you discuss that or do you need to build a strawman?

[edhopper]

9. I didn't call him a pedophile

You asked which one in the painting was the enabler, I think it was that guy.

I thought it was a contest.

[rug]

13. I didn't ask you.

But since you answered, what about that figure, as opposed to the others, caused you to pick him? Try not to be coy.

[edhopper]

14. He looked like

a Catholic Priest. His collar is hidden.

[greyl]

23. You mean, the collar is ...

covered-up?

[edhopper]

24. yes

just like the pedophile scandal.

[greyl]

25. Not to put too fine a point on it. nt

[Okasha Skatsi]

29. Why do you think he looks like a Catholic priest,

given that you can't see any identifying clues?

Why do you think he's clergy at all, given that there's no sign that any of the other figures are?

(Yep, I'm back after technical difficulties with my old account.)

[edhopper]

32. just trying to solve the puzzle

of which is the pedophile enabler.

[Cartoonist]

34. The collar

you can just barely see a piece of it. It looks as though he's munching on the Eucharist.

[Bretton Garcia]

35. "Eating Jesus," some terrible irreverent Catholics call it?

I agree it looks like the Host, the body of Jesus. Though it is open to another reading: it also looks like a piece of paper. Maybe a sermon, or homily, or some quotes from the Bible.

So he may also be hiding behind the Bible, or pious sermons.

As usual for priests, he is wearing black. The color priests wear to signify their place in the Light of the World.

[AtheistCrusader]

10. 'I've got better things to do'.

Smoking and reading the funny papers is quite likely a higher quality of life than going to church.

[Cartoonist]

15. I just noticed this

Was it intentional?
The hair on the dad's head has two tufts sticking up that look like horns.

[trotsky]

17. Haha, true.

Also wearing red.

[Bretton Garcia]

33. More moderately, reading the news is more secular

[Ron Obvious]

18. The boy at the back wishes he could stay home too.

He's looking at his father with envy.

[Act_of_Reparation]

19. The best part about it:

The painting's called "Easter Morning."

Dad's not just staying home while mom and the kids go to Church. He's staying at home on the most important holiday in the Christian calendar. To drink coffee, smoke cigarettes, and lay around in his pajamas.

This is a lovely little subversive piece of art.

[Mosby]

22. Look at it more closely

Rockwell gave the father little hair horns and is wearing a red robe in contrast of all the others in grey. The father is surrounded by a mess while the wife and kids are perfectly dressed and so focussed on church that they completely ignore dad.
O
The painting was part of a print ad campaign to encourage church attendance.

Eta its called sunday morning.

[flyingfysh]

26. You may not realize how liberal Rockwell was

He did a famous picture of a black girl going to school, protected by Federal marshals. He refused to do anything to support the Vietnam War.

The Norman Rockwell Museum is on Stockbridge MA (the same town where Arlo Guthrie lived, and sang about in "Alice's Restaurant&quot . Among other things, they display ever cover for the Saturday Evening Post ever done by Rockwell. The museum is worth a visit.

[Cartoonist]

27. He was a decent fellow

I just think his work was more in the line of Currier & Ives. Americana that didn't offend anyone. He never really spoke truth to power.

Here's a take on one of his paintings that does just that.

[dflprincess]

28. And this one he painted after the murders of Schwerner, Goodman & Chaney in 1964

[KT2000]

30. OMG - I had the same outfit

the girl in the front is wearing.
My parents just dropped us off at church until we got to choose.