Editorial: Communion politics
C o 1~1 P1 0 N W E A L Communion politics hat do bishops who propose refusing the Eucharist to prochoice politicians hope to accomplish? St. Louis Archbishop Raymond L. Burke has been the most...
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...But of course there is a legitimate diversity of opinion among Catholics on this tortuous question, especially about the legal status of abortion...
...Burke and Myers have already captured the headlines and sound bites, prompting many citizens, Catholic and not, to wonder if the church hierarchy is now committed to a campaign against prochoice, meaning mostly Democratic, STAFF Editor: Paul Baumann Managing Editor: Patrick Jordan Associate Editors: Daria Donnelly (At Large) Grant Gallicho Maurice Timothy Reidy Production Editor & Webmaster: Tiina Aleman Business Manager: Sandra J. Taylor Copy Editor: Susanne Washburn Poetry: Rosemary Deen, Daria Donnelly Screen: Rand Richards Cooper, Richard Alleva Stage/Media: Celia Wren Columnists: E. J. Dionne Jr., John Garvey, Andrew Lustig, Jo McGowan, William Pfaff Circulation Manager: Malena Seldin Administrative Assistant: Quanda Williams Advertising Manager: Roth Advertising Commonweal, [ISSN 0010-33301 A Review of Public Affairs, Religion, Literature, and the Arts, is published biweekly except Christmas/New Year...
...Abortion is a grave moral evil, but it does not follow that it should be criminalized in every instance, or that support for its criminalization is the only moral, let alone the only "authentic" Catholic response...
...The committee need not issue its full report, but it should at least let Catholics and others know that no simple equation can exist between Catholic principles and a vote for any one candidate...
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...Here the prudence that has traditionally characterized the Thomistic approach to criminal law can be a guide...
...In New Jersey three bishops recently issued public warnings, some veiled and some not, to that state's prochoice Democratic governor, James McGreevey...
...If the USCCB doesn't act as a body, it will be assumed by many that Burke and Myers speak for the church as a whole...
...At the same time, only a small minority wants to outlaw abortion in every instance...
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...Laws that do not reflect a moral consensus are inherently unstable, even unjust,and the police and prosecutorial action of the state in such circumstances will inevitably threaten other liberties...
...II Syndicated columnist Robert Novak, a vehement convert to Catholicism and an old hand at invective, recently joined the right-wing chorus demanding that bishops refuse Communion to prochoice politicians like Senator John Kerry...
...Instead, bishops should patiently continue to make the case that for women, as well as for their unborn children, abortion is a great and unnecessary tragedy...
...McCarrick and his committee should speak out soon...
...The more difficult question, however, is what steps can realistically be taken to end abortion practice as we know it...
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...Nor is it clear, at least in Myers's case, how broadly his condemnation of those who support legalized abortion reaches...
...It is not clear whether Myers contacted Governor McGreevey privately about these concerns, as good pastoral practice requires...
...Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) charged with studying the problem, has said that he doesn't think the Eucharist should be used as a sanction against prochoice politicians...
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...That some Catholics, who claim to believe what the church believes, are willing to allow others to continue directly to kill the innocent is a grave scandal...
...A politician's views on war, capital punishment, care for the needy, and other life issues must all be weighed in the balance...
...The damage done by the unrestricted abortion franchise cannot be undone by suddenly and broadly recriminalizing the procedure...
...His pastoral letter suggests that all Catholics, not just Catholic politicians, who op-pose the recriminalization of abortion, or who vote for prochoice politicians, are under a similar obligation to refrain from receiving Communion...
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...If bishops want to change that culture, they will refrain from banning prochoice politicians from Communion, which in all likelihood will only revive fears of the church's authoritarian and antidemocratic character...
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...That would spell disaster, much as happened when Cardinal Bernard Law's egregious handling of sexual abuse in Boston came to be widely, if erroneously, accepted as the measure of the church's actions nation-wide...
...There is even a difference of opinion among bishops, at least on how the church should deal with Catholic politicians who support abortion rights...
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...But it is a tragedy that will end only with a change of heart, not just a change in the law...
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...Barring someone from Communion should be a last resort, Gregory has said...
...Most Americans now support some restrictions on access to the procedure...
...The attempt to enforce a law opposed by the majority of citizens is futile, and breeds contempt for the very idea of law itself...
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...Even President George W. Bush, whose prolife credentials are rarely questioned, has acknowledged that "the culture has [not] changed to the extent that the American people or the Congress would totally ban abortions...
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...As the passage of the ban on partial-birth abortion demonstrated, the campaign to restrict abortion has made strides in recent years by patiently informing the public of what abortion, especially late-term abortion, entails...
...Every faithful Catholic must be not only 'personally opposed' to abortion, but also must live that opposition in his or her actions," Myers wrote...
...In any event, McGreevey has graciously acceded to the bishops' demands, saying he will no longer receive Communion, at least not in public settings...
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...The question all but answers itself...
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...As Aquinas wrote, there are limits to what the criminal law can do to compel virtue...
...Writing in the New York Post (May 3), Novak accused Washington Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who had met with Kerry but failed to denounce him, of "giving cover" to politicians who were defying church teaching...
...Novak quoted an anonymous, supposedly highly placed priest, saying that bishops would "finally 'out' liberal Catholics for what they are at heart, Protestants...
...It is no secret that certain conservative Catholics would like the American church to be purged of so-called liberal Catholics, reduced to a kind of holy remnant...
...Now is not the time to revert to extreme rhetoric and draconian sanctions against those who support abortion rights...
...But the USCCB may not have the luxury of waiting until after the election to make the legitimacy of diverse Catholic opinion better known...
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...A careful reading of canon law also suggests that withholding the Eucharist without due process violates a Catholic's rights...
...In welcoming Novak into the fold, however, someone forgot to tell him that policing the Communion line is just not very, well, Catholic...
...Does the anathematizing of Kerry and McGreevey by some bishops make it more or less likely that the prolife message will be heard...
...Cardinal McCarrick's committee is not scheduled to deliver its recommendations until after the November election, another sign that the vast majority of bishops is skeptical (and rightly so) of demanding that Catholics vote in a certain way, and is resistant to the idea that the church should favor one presidential candidate or one party over another...
...On the question of abortion, Myers insists, "there can be no legitimate diversity of opinion" among Catholics...
...Bishops have every right, indeed a duty, to challenge self-identified Catholic politicians, such as Kerry, who dogmatically champion unrestricted abortion rights...
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...Bishop Wilton Gregory, president of the USCCB, agrees...
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...Louis Archbishop Raymond L. Burke has been the most vocal in resorting to this tactic, demanding that Democratic presidential candidate Senator John Kerry not receive Communion in Missouri...
...As voters, Catholics are under an obligation to avoid implicating themselves in abortion, which is one of the gravest injustices...
...In a May 5 pastoral letter, Newark Archbishop John J. Myers wrote that prochoice Catholic politicians have "abandoned the full Catholic faith" and thereby separated themselves from the church...
...If the USCCB is unable or unwilling to act, individual bishops should challenge Myers and Burke on their notion that abortion trumps every other issue when Catholics consider a candidate's merits...
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Vol. 131 • May 2004 • No. 10
