Contradiction in terms
Hunt, Michael J.
REPORT FROM A BULL SESSION CONTRADICTION IN TERMS? 'REALLY CATHOLIC, YET ELECTABLE' ut of the chaos of an election-year bull session, there emerged a challenge put to me—known to my students, I...
...There was one close at hand: Tufts is located in Medford, which abuts Boston, where Mayor Raymond Flynn recently won reelection in one of the most massive electoral triumphs in American history...
...Such a vision is not only compatible with the modern papal encyclicals but, in Delors's case, is drawn from them —though, with ecumenical nuance, he points to the importance given to subsidiarity in Calvinist traditions as well as in his own Catholic roots...
...It is telling, perhaps, that Margaret Thatcher was his most persistent critic...
...she shrewdly recognized that his philosophy is profoundly at odds with the ideology of rampant individualism and narrow nationalism that bears her name...
...His writings and speeches point to the common good as the focal point for the new, communitarian Europe he hopes to build...
...It isn't true...
...MICHAEL j. HUNT Michael J. Hunt, a Paulist priest, is the Catholic chaplain at Tufts University...
...Catholic bishops (see, "Operation 'Domestic Order,'" Raymond L. Flynn, Commonweal, April 19, 1991...
...Then one student pointed out that some Catholic politicians who position themselves as prolife depart from Catholic social teachings on capital punishment, the rights of labor, treatment of refugees, aid to the poor...
...He argues that the American tradition (and, he contends, his party's tradition) calls for the inclusion of more groups under constitutional and statutory protection, from the naturalization of immigrants to the reform of labor laws to the civil rights laws to equality for women...
...Besides meeting the Justlife criteria, Moakley has an unusually strong record on human rights...
...The European leader who most accurately read the signs of the disintegration of the Soviet empire and who moved most decisively to open up freedom there and in all of Eastern Europe is now the chancellor of a united Germany, Helmut Kohl...
...Casey himself has eloquently articulated a consistent ethic of life drawn from modern Catholic social teachings...
...For myself, it's clear that candidates and officeholders can find a coherent wisdom in Catholic teachings about the purposes and principles of governance, and that absorbing and projecting that wisdom doesn't mean you're unelectable...
...Against fears of dominance by a European supergovernment, he poses the principle of subsidiarity: problems are to be resolved at the lowest level that can accommodate them...
...It is out of that tradition that he argues for extending constitutional protection to unborn children...
...The political figures on my list are people they recognize...
...A consensus emerged: There are no prominent political leaders who consistently embody the values of the church's social teaching...
...intervention in Central America and was almost singlehandedly responsible for assembling and publicizing the massive documentation that drew back the dark curtain surrounding the murders of the Salvadoran Jesuits and their associates...
...The students gen6. 23 October 1992 erally agreed that all the "mega-Catholics" in politics—Kennedy, Cuomo, Foley, and Moynihan—are effectively prochoice...
...To their credit, the students were familiar with the two European leaders I named, but did not know that both are active Catholics strongly influenced by the church's social ethics...
...But the students were captured by a myth, a widespread and pervasive misunderstanding that colors much media coverage and commentary: the belief that Catholics who enter politics must, if they hope to be elected to office, either privatize their moral convictions on abortion or else embrace a full right-wing agenda along with opposition to abortion...
...And yet, I reported, every knowledgeable commentator about Jacques Delors says that Catholic ideas and principles deeply inform his thinking and his leadership role in the European community...
...he opposed U.S...
...Bravely, I take my stand: Not so...
...Skepticism showed its eyebrows, so I quickly showed my cards...
...Though U.S...
...One of the most persistent critics of the Bush administration, Flynn holds positions on poverty, immigration, welfare reform, health care, and housing that are precise political expressions of Catholic social teaching as applied to the American condition by the U.S...
...Off the top, I can think of two very significant world political leaders and three popular American politicians—including two right here in Massachusetts—who not only stand up for the whole range of Catholic social teaching but are upfront about it—and who consistently get elected and reelected...
...An outstanding example is Congressman Joseph Moakley, who represents portions of Boston and its suburbs...
...As I told the students, I would hardly contend that espousal of Catholic social teachings will guarantee a candidate's electoral success (though Governor Casey might argue that such a platform, advanced on its merits rather than in a sectarian fashion, would put the candidate in closer touch with many elements of the American electorate...
...But, until the recent death and replacement of Congressman Silvio Conte, six of the eleven Massachusetts members of the House of Representatives had solid prolife voting records, according to evaluations by Justlife, a political action group which assesses political figures on the basis of the "consistent ethic of life," including arms reduction, poverty, refugee and immigration programs, and opposition to the death penalty, as well as abortion...
...That's part of what Pennsylvania's Governor Robert Casey has tried in vain to convey to the leaders of the Democratic party...
...It happens that the particular college students in this discussion are well informed people who read the papers and watch the TV news...
...commentators may know the Catholic origins of Kohl's party, the Christian Democrats, they generally fail to acknowledge, as Europeans do, the seriousness of his commitment to Catholic social and political principles, concretely shown in his bold but carefully constructed overtures of support for Gorbachev's liberalization, his swift move to integrate the two Germanys after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, his decisive steps to resolve border disputes with Poland, Germany's leadership in recognizing the new republics of a disintegrating Yugoslavia, and Kohl's strong support for European unification...
...He is the author of the forthcoming College Catholics (Paulist Press...
...Respectful of national and cultural differences, he nevertheless eschews nationalism and pushes toward a common identity for Europe...
...True, even the very conservative Republican governor is vigorously prochoice...
...Flynn's popularity is not the only evidence challenging the conventional wisdom of Massachusetts pundits, who hold that the state is so solidly prochoice that anyone not committed to abortion on demand is unelectable...
...Eventually, it is true, Kohl may pay a price at the polling places for the sacrifices his programs have Commonweal asked of the Germans, but much of what he has helped the country to achieve is solidly founded and probably irreversible...
...The discussion started with the abortion issue (on which they were divided...
...Moreover, it was agreed, anyone who did subscribe to those teachings would be un-electable, whether in the United States or anywhere else...
...REALLY CATHOLIC, YET ELECTABLE' ut of the chaos of an election-year bull session, there emerged a challenge put to me—known to my students, I should add, both as a Catholic chaplain at Tufts University and as a current events buff with a special addiction to political news...
...But then it ranged further...
...Right, Father...
...With this, the skepticism of my students may have lifted a little, but I needed examples less remote from the students' lives...
...Flynn is respected by his peers—he serves as president of the United States Conference of Mayors—and is so popular with voters that he was mentioned as a vice-presidential candidate, only to be routinely dismissed in the media because he is forthrightly prolife on abortion—a stance that has become an absolute no-no for the Democrats...
Vol. 119 • October 1992 • No. 18
