By SUSAN HAIGH

QuoteThe sponsors of the now-withdrawn proposal, both Catholics themselves, have received thousands of mostly angry e-mails from across the country, as well as threats on their lives, state Capitol police said.

Leaders of the General Assembly's Judiciary Committee pulled the bill from consideration Tuesday, but an estimated 3,500 people — led by the archbishop of Hartford and the bishops of Bridgeport and Hartford — rallied on the Capitol steps, demanding religious freedom.

"No other church or religion in this state is being subjected to this maltreatment," said the Rev. Michael R. Cote, bishop of Norwich. "Today it is the Roman Catholic Church. Who will be next?"

Some of the estimated 1.3 million Catholics in Connecticut — a state of 3.5 millon — have complained about the state legalizing civil unions for same-sex couples, approving state funding for embryonic stem cell research and considering legislation that bans discrimination against transgender people.

The Church truly gets nasty when there's a notion that someone can tell them how to run their business. The complaints about civil unions, trans-protections and setm-cells sound real good until you get to the real spre spot: the bishop wouldn't get a say in the parish finances and a child-abuse report law would override the "snactity" of the confessional. There are the real causes of the outrage.

Nichole