I will concede that a well-reasoned anti-abortion person could indeed vote for Mr. Obama, especially if abortion is not that voter's #1 issue or if there are other factors in play. The Catholic Church has said as much. But where the lunacy comes in is when Catholics, taking a cue from Archbishop Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco, claim to speak for the Catholic Church.
Douglas Kmiec has become a prominent self-appointed spokesman for the Catholic Church. An Obama supporter, he assures Catholics that it's OK to vote for the pro-abortion candidate.
He Is Wrong.
How do I know? Catholic bishops have said so. Catholicism is a religion with established doctrine and a visible hierarchy that explains and protects it. Bishops are the guardians of the faith. What they say goes. Now, you may disagree with a church being run that way, and indeed, you are free to worship where you want. But it is clear: Just as the US State Department is the official spokesman for our country to the world, the Catholic hierarchy is the official spokesman for the faith.
Kmiec and others err when they distort Catholic teaching on abortion. For Catholics, it is not a matter of personal judgment: If you sign up to be a Catholic you sign up to be opposed to abortion. Period. The church believes that it is always wrong except in extreme case like ectopic pregnancies. This differs from their view on war. The Catholic Church believes there can be such a thing as a just war, but there can be no just abortion. And speaking of war, lest anyone accuse the Catholic hierarchy of being Republican, the bishops are almost unanimous in opposition to President Bush's foreign policy in general and the Iraq war in particular.
Archbishop Chaput of Denver has set the record straight:
... Chaput labeled Barack Obama the "most committed" abortion-rights candidate from a major party in 35 years while accusing a Catholic Obama ally and other Democratic-friendly Catholic groups of doing a "disservice to the church."If you are Catholic or Evangelical or belong to any church that is anti-abortion, you are nonetheless free to vote how you wish. This is a free country. But these OxyMorons go a step further and lie about what their church believes.
"To suggest - as some Catholics do - that Senator Obama is this year's 'real' pro-life candidate requires a peculiar kind of self-hypnosis, or moral confusion, or worse," Chaput said according to his prepared remarks, titled "Little Murders."While applauding Kmiec's past record, Chaput said: "I think his activism for Senator Barack Obama, and the work of Democratic-friendly groups have done a disservice to the church, confused the natural priorities of Catholic social teaching, undermined the progress pro-lifers have made, and provided an excuse for some Catholics to abandon the abortion issue instead of fighting within their parties and at the ballot box to protect the unborn."
Pro-Obama Catholics "seek to contextualize, demote and then counterbalance the evil of abortion with other important but less foundational social issues," said Chaput, who wrote a book this year, "Render Unto Caesar," about Catholics and politics.
If you want to know the Philadelphia Phillies' perspective on instant replay, you go ask the Phillies organization, not a fan. If you want to know what the US policy is on South Asia energy development, you ask the State Department. If you want to know what the Catholic Church believes, you don't ask a pro-Obama lawyer; you ask a bishop.
5 comments:
Alas! So many reject these words from one who gave this authority to the Bishop of Bishops you speak of. "Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." Matt 16:19
The rules of this faith are certainly not easy but they do come with the security of knowing we stand behind a promise that will never be broken....This is a campaign that will one day create a new nation governed by a leader who will reign forever....
Respectfully, the oxymoron is "Pro-Abortion Christians," comprised of Catholics and Protestants who don't understand that Jesus the Christ was a giver of life and liberty -- and the Bible says that the Lord God knew each of us before we were even formed in our mothers' wombs.
Actually, given that the Book of Genesis says that humans are formed in the image of God, Christians who support abortion actually support the killing of a piece of the Grand Divinity's creation.
In that sense, they also oppose God.
I've been arguing with the Obama Worshipers at WaPo over this. If you want to see a vile sewer of immature thought, check it out:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/18/AR2008101801665_Comments.html
Thanks, but, through what's coming from Obama and his camp, as well as over-the-edge and not-so-over-the-edge devotees and apologists, I've already reached my life-time dose of that "vile sewer of immature thought."
I hope you hold up.
Remember, too, what Christ Jesus said to his 12 disciples when he sent them out (it's in Matthew 10): "Whatever town or village you enter, search for some worthy person there and stay at his house until you leave. As you enter the home, give it your greeting. If the home is deserving, let your peace rest on it; if it is not, let your peace return to you. If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that home or town."
Know when it's time to shake the dust off your feet and depart.
Remember, too, that Proverbs talks about different types of fools.
The King James says to "speak not in the ears of a fool, for he will despise the wisdom of your words."
Respectfully, that does seem to characterize a lot of so-called Democrats but, particularly, liberals and leftists these days.
Thanks for the advice. I do indeed have to end up shaking the dust from my feet. There is no reasoning with most of them. It's just all rage all the time.
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