Maybe It'll Rain

CARDINALS AND BIG-CITY MAYORS OUGHT TO HAVE greater concerns than deciding who marches in local parades. But in New York City's hopelessly fractious public discourse, a spat over including homosexuals in the annual St. Patrick's Day celebration has once again grown into a political war. After the organization that has staged the parade for more than 150 years refused to permit gay groups to march under their own banner, Mayor David Dinkins handed control of the parade to an ad hoc group that favored including the gays. John Cardinal O'Connor used his pulpit to decry Dinkins' transmogrification of "the religious to the political." A judge will rule whether the parade is a religious or public event.