Editorials: 'Catholic' voters?
'Catholic' voters? The good news is that younger Catholic voters may decide this year's presidential election. The bad news is that many of those young Catholic voters aren't very Catholic-at least...
...The Catholic tradition offers a reasoned approach to moral decision-making that provides an essential safeguard of the right to life, and may even help turn our politics away from focus groups and "spin doctors" and back toward meaningful deliberation...
...as keynote speaker at the Republican convention...
...be done...
...Church social teaching reminds us of the social nature of the individual and of the state's responsibility for the common good...
...There are many reasons for the loosening of those ties, not all of them negative...
...What is worrisome, however, is how very tenuous the connection between young Catholics and the church appears to be...
...The political principles developed within Catholicism, especially during and since the Vatican II, can provide an antidote...
...The evident failure of church teaching on abortion to find a receptive hearing among these young people seems yet another sad reminder of how little credibility the church has with them and with women in general...
...What Leege calls the baby-boom and post-baby boom generation of Catholics are better educated, more prosperous, more mobile, and more politically independent than their elders...
...In and of itself, such a disparity between pulpit and pew is not fatal...
...On abortion, for example, these young Catholics are more prochoice than evangelicals and tend to swing toward Democratic candidates if Republican rhetoric becomes too strident about the so-called "profamily agenda...
...But they also attend Mass less frequently and are less knowledgeable about the church's social teaching...
...Being Catholic does not mean that one must agree with the pope or the bishops about public policy on welfare, euthanasia, immigration, and abortion...
...The absence of such a dialogue is as much a loss for American society as it is for the church...
...Moral law cannot simply be translated into public policy...
...On that score, there is lots of work to be done...
...As David C. Leege explains (see page 11) with the help of some fascinating historical and demographic examples, the "Catholic vote" is likely to figure prominently in this November's election...
...On abortion and a range of personal moral issues, the views of these young Catholics more often reflect the premium most Americans place on individual liberty and choice than the church's belief in objective moral norms and the sanctity of all human life...
...As a result, we see our common life diminished, vital institutions of civil society undermined, and the weak increasingly left undefended and exploited...
...But if Catholic principles are to make a contribution to the American political debate, they first have to be known and acted upon by Catholics themselves...
...These younger Catholics are not nearly as tightly "woven" into the church as their parents or grandparents were, Leege explains...
...Molinari is a Catholic ethnic of the baby-boomer generation who is (a) prochoice, (b) divorced, and (c) a mother with a professional career...
...Following the results of polls and focus groups, both parties are trying to appeal to voters with similar profiles...
...Catholic political and moral thought can help steer a middle way between the economic libertarianism of the right and the moral agnosticism of much contemporary culture and many on the left...
...The United States faces challenges in both the economic and moral realms, challenges that threaten the well-being of working families and the elderly, and the fundamental human dignity of the unborn, the poor, and the dying...
...But it should require a serious engagement with what the church teaches about the relationship between our moral obligations and our political responsibilities...
...An exaggerated sense of individualism harnessed to a utilitarian ethos too often dominates public and political debate about everything from economic efficiency and the role of government to abortion and euthanasia...
...Moreover, these younger, Republican-leaning Catholics are irregular churchgoers who, unlike their evangelical contemporaries, are not likely to be influenced politically by church leadership...
...These young Catholics came of political age under the charismatic Ronald Reagan and are also drawn to the Republican party on economic issues, but surprisingly they hold much more "permissive" social and moral views than most Republicans, especially Christian Coalition members...
...The bad news is that many of those young Catholic voters aren't very Catholic-at least not if being Catholic means going regularly to Mass and having some modest acquaintance with the church's social and moral teaching...
...Several factors account for this, the most important being that young Catholics form pluralities in the large Midwestern and Midatlantic states that could tip the balance in the electoral college in a close presidential race...
...This political dynamic was readily evident in Bob Dole's selection of Staten Island's Congresswoman Susan Molinari (R-N.Y...
Vol. 123 • September 1996 • No. 16
