Mirror of Justice

Bishop Gumbleton on Catholics and the Presidential Election

[This morning, my dear Aunt Betty, who is a Dominican (Sister Mary Brigid Gregory, O.P.), sent me the piece below, an Op-Ed by Bishop Thomas Gumbleton. Thought readers of this blog would be interested. Gumbleton is an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Detroit and pastor at St. Leo Parish in Detroit. His Op-Ed appeared in the Detroit Free Press on October 20.]

President's policies are in opposition to a culture of life

October 20, 2004

Bishop Thomas J. Gumbleton

President George W. Bush has visited Michigan many times during the campaign, including a recent visit to Farmington Hills, but he has never stopped in Detroit's inner city. If he did, he would meet firsthand many men, women and children who have dramatically experienced the effects of his policies.

When Bush travels the country, he often says that he stands "for a culture of life in which every person counts and every being matters." These words resonate deeply with Catholics. But is Bush's agenda really the Catholic agenda? Does he really stand for a "culture of life" that recognizes and celebrates the worth of every human being?

The United States Catholic Bishops have written that "any politics of human life must work to resist the violence of war and the scandal of capital punishment. Any politics of human dignity must address issues of racism, poverty, hunger, employment, education, housing and health care." Applying this agenda as the guide, it is clear that the president's words have not translated into action.

War: In a "culture of life," we are called to be peacemakers. Bush, however, chose to pursue a war over the moral objections of hundreds of religious leaders, including Pope John Paul II, the U.S. Catholic Bishops and the leaders of the president's own Methodist Church. The report released on Oct. 6 by chief weapons searcher Charles Duelfer definitively proves that Saddam Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction. The evidence is now clear that the Bush administration misled the American people into the war in Iraq.

Speaking at the United Nations this month, Vatican official Archbishop Giovanni Lajolo said, "Everyone can see that (the war) did not lead to a safer world either inside or outside Iraq."

Now, more than 1,000 American soldiers have been killed and upward of 7,000 have been injured. The sinful and systematic abuses committed in Iraqi prisons have rocked the moral conscience of our nation and soiled our credibility in the international community. An estimated 13,000 innocent Iraqis have died as the result of the invasion. All the while, the Bush administration refuses even to tally Iraqi civilian casualties.

Capital punishment: In a "culture of life," we are called to be merciful. As the governor of Texas, however, Bush approved the execution of 152 people. In one infamous incident, he publicly mocked a woman as she awaited execution on death row. The president's attorney general has ordered a federal prosecutor to seek the death penalty despite the prosecutor's own recommendation of a life sentence in at least 12 cases. In other words, current U.S. policy is that some human life does not matter.

Human dignity:In a "culture of life," we are called to care for the least among us, including human life in the womb. One proven way to reduce abortions is to reduce the numbers of people living in poverty. Unfortunately, under Bush, statistics show that the abortion rate has gone up. Since he took office, the number of Americans living in poverty has risen by 4.3 million, to a total of 35.9 million. I see these real people and hear their stories at the doorstep of St. Leo's every day. One of every three people living in poverty is a child. During the Bush presidency, the number of Americans without health insurance has risen by 5.2 million. Our economy has lost over 1 million jobs, and the wages that our families depend on have become stagnant. Meanwhile, the richest 1 percent received a tax break 70 times greater than the tax cut for the middle class.

How are Catholics to deal with this split between rhetoric and reality? Ours must be a prophetic voice. We must call on Bush to account for a deeply troubling record. And we must also challenge Democrats to embrace the entire culture of life, not just a selective economic and social agenda. The sad reality of American political life is that no candidate or party embraces and advances a "culture of life" in the fullest sense of the term.

Yet responsible citizenship calls us to cast our vote Nov. 2. How do we choose amongst imperfect candidates? We must each consult our conscience and consider the entirety of church teaching. And, as the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' voter guide, Faithful Citizenship, encourages, we should measure "all candidates, policies, parties and platforms by how they protect or undermine the life, dignity, and rights of the human person, whether they protect the poor and vulnerable and advance the common good."

What we will not do is vote for a candidate just because he uses words that we like to hear; remembering, as scripture tells us, that we must be "doers of the Word and not hearers only."

John O'Callaghan on St. Jude, Adam Smith, and Gov. Casey

Here are some interesting thoughts -- inspired by Michael P.'s recent post (below) quoting Adam Smith -- by ND Philosophy Professor John O'Callaghan.

Rick

William McGurn, Notre Dame, and Apologists for Pro-Abortion Politicians

Journalist William McGurn delivered the first Bob Casey lecture in the Archdiocese of Denver earlier this week. He has much to say that is directly pertinent to the discussions we have had on the Mirror of Justice about abortion and politicians and those Catholics, especially when affiliated with Catholic institutions such as Notre Dame (notably Dean Roche), who ask us to look past a politician’s uncompromising support for the war on the unborn when casting our vote. As did the last-Governor Casey, Mr. McGurn is speaking to the consequences of pro-abortion orthodoxy, and the failure of pro-life Catholics to speak more clearly and unequivocally, for the Democratic Party. The full lecture, which is most powerful, can be found here. The following is but a sample from his lecture:

“And just as we now see that abortion is not simply a procedure but the lynchpin in an entire culture given to death, the nature of the Democratic argument to American Catholics has shifted steadily downhill, to the point where it has been largely reduced to the They Are Just As Bad As We Are line of attack.

The rationales, which carry the Notre Dame label, are not merely academic musings that disappear in the faculty lounge ether. They may and do irritate those of us who believe differently. But the consequences do not fall on me. They fall heaviest on pro-life Democrats who are working, with little internal support and virtually zero favorable publicity, to grow little blades of pro-life grass through the party concrete. Of articles such as Dean Roche's, Brian Golden, a Massachusetts Democratic state representative, told me, 'They cut us off at the knees.’”

Tomorrow I will offer some additional thoughts, drawing not only from Mr. McGurn but also from statements by those of a diversity of perspectives as participating on our blog, about whether there is any possibility of Catholic unity to make a meaningful difference on this, the signal social crisis of our time.

Greg Sisk

which is the pro-life party?

Mark Roche claimed that the Democratic Party was, in fact, the pro-life Party because the Democrats had, despite their enthusiastic embrace of abortion rights, had more success in reducing the abortion rates than had the Republicans. Readers who are interested in this issue might want to take a look at this article by Professor Michael New, or at this information on the National Right to Life Committee website. According to these articles, "the success of pro-life candidates has resulted in real reductions in the abortion rate," in the words of Professor New.

Challenges to Tax-Exempt Status

The issue of tax-exempt status of religious organizations is is not one to which I've given a lot of thought, but I note that Catholics for a Free Choice has filed its second complaint asking the IRS to revoke the tax-exempt status of an archdiocese, claiming violation of public charity status based on the archdioceses' efforts to influence voters. This latest was filed against the Archdiocese of St. Louis; the first was filed against the Achdiocese of Denver. Akthough I haven't read the complaint, and as unhappy as I have been at the behavor of some bishops, it is hard for me to see how there is any merit to the claim.
--Susan

Notre Dame Erasmus Lectures

If you are near South Bend, consider attending these lectures, on "Islam and Christianity," offered by Gerhard Böwering, S.J., Professor of Islamic Studies at Yale University.

Rick

Ratzinger on Islam, Europe, and Secularism

We've talked a lot on this blog about the pluralism / democracy / religious freedom cluster of issues. In light of our conversations on these matters, I thought this story -- about Cardinal Ratzinger's recent remarks on the effort to include an explicit mention of Christianity in the constitution of the European Union -- was interesting.

Rick

Something to think about: Adam Smith on infanticide

When I first read this passage, a few weeks ago, I thought: Hmmm--has a contemporary relevance, doesn't it?

"[T]he murder of new-born infants was a practice allowed of in almost all the states of Greece, even among the polite and civilized Athenians; and whenever the circumstance of the parent rendered it inconvenient to bring up the child, to abandon it to hunger, or to wild beasts, was regarded without blame or censure.... Uninterrupted custom had by this time so thoroughly authorized the practice, that not only the loose maxims of the world tolerated this barbarous prerogative, but even the doctrine of philosophers, who ought to have been more just and accurate, was led away by the established custom, and upon this, as upon many other occasions, instead of censuring, supported the horrible abuse, by far-fetched consideration of public utility. Aristotle talks of it as what magistrates ought upon many occasions to encourage. Plato is of the same opinion, and, with all that love of mankind which seems to animate all his writings, no where marks this practice with disapprobation."

Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (rev. ed. 1790; V.2.15; republished, Oxford: Clarendon Press 1976), p. 210; quoted in Amartya Sen, Elements of a Theory of Human Rights, 32 Philosophy & Public Affairs 315, 354-55 (2004).

Michael P.

This sounds like an interesting essay ...

Some readers of this blog may be interested in this essay:

"Two Concepts of Immortality: Reframing Public Debate on
Stem-Cell Research"
Yale Journal of Law & Humanities, Vol. 14, No. 73, 2004

BY: FRANK A. PASQUALE
Seton Hall University
School of Law

Paper ID: Seton Hall Public Law Research Paper No. 14

Contact: FRANK A. PASQUALE
Email: Mailto:[email protected]
Postal: Seton Hall University
School of Law
One Newark Center
Newark, NJ 07102-5210 UNITED STATES

ABSTRACT:
Regenerative medicine seeks not only to cure disease, but also
to arrest the aging process itself. So far, public attention to
the new health care has focused on two of its methods: embryonic
stem-cell research and therapeutic cloning. Since both processes
manipulate embryos, they alarm those who believe life begins at
conception. Such religious objections have dominated headlines
on the topic, and were central to President George W. Bush's
decision to restrict stem-cell research.

Although they are now politically potent, the present
religious objections to regenerative medicine will soon become
irrelevant. Scientists are fast developing new ways of culturing
the biological materials now exclusively produced by embryos.
Given their expressed commitment to the "sanctity of life,"
religious leaders will soon find the tables turned: researchers
will accuse them of causing death if they fail to support
medicine that cures the sick without harming embryos.

Perhaps anticipating this development, those uneasy with
regenerative medicine have tried to shift the debate to focus on
its long-term effects. They believe that innovations that now
look benign might lead to an era of untrammeled biotechnological
manipulation of our lives. For example, the same technology used
to eliminate disease-causing genes or to clone embryos may
eventually be deployed to produce genetically engineered
children. That could, in turn, entrench class differences, since
only the wealthy could afford the most desirable genetic
enhancements.

Such objections may be speculative. Nevertheless, they deserve
more attention - not necessarily as predictions of the future,
but as indictments of the present. We are all disturbed by
hypothetical dystopias like Huxley's Brave New World. But their
most important flaws - the inequality, degradation, and moral
irresponsibility of their inhabitants - are already apparent in
the distribution of regenerative therapies. The world's
wealthiest nations spend hundreds of millions of dollars on
elaborate technologies of life-extension, while contributing
only trivially to efforts to assure basic medical care to the
poorest. Public debate on regenerative medicine must acknowledge
this inequality. Societies and individuals can invest in it in
good conscience only if they are seriously committed to
extending extant medicine to all.

Response to Russ Hittinger

Dear Russ,

I write this in some haste--and more abstractly than I would like.

Let me begin with a (perhaps needless) clarification: I have not argued that a faithful Catholic--which for present purposes I define as a Catholic who accepts the magisterium's teaching on the morality of abortion--should vote for Kerry (or for Bush). Rather, I have argued that the kindred arguments for doing so that have been made by Mark Roche, Cathy Kaveny, and Peggy Steinfels are not unreasonable arguments for faithful Catholics to make.

In particular, it is my judgment that faced with a choice between four more years of a Bush-Cheney Administration and four years of a Kerry-Edwards Administration, a faithful Catholic could reasonably decide that, all things considered, and in the longer run, the domestic and/or foreign policies of a Kerry-Edwards Administration would be less destructive to human life--to all the human life that is at stake--than would be the policies of another Bush-Cheney Administration. That is, a faithful Catholic could reasonably conclude that the most effective way to express "solidarity" with all human life--with all our brothers and sisters, born and unborn--is to vote for Kerry-Edwards. Such, at least, is my judgment. John Langan's essay, which I posted last week, is quite relevant here. I suspect that the fundamental reason why some insist that the decision/conclusion is *not* reasonable is that they evaluate the national and international policies of the Bush-Cheney Administration much less harshly--in particular, as much less hostile to human life, in the longer run--than others of us do.

(Imagine that it is a long time ago, the issue is slavery, and there are two candidates for the presidency: Candidate A opposes slavery on moral grounds and will work to abolish it. Candidate B does not oppose slavery on moral grounds and will not work to abolish it. However, B's economic policies happen to be subversive, in the longer run, of the institution of slavery, while A's economic policies happen to be, in the longer run, not at all subversive of the institution of slavery. Assume too that there is good reason to believe that notwithstanding A's moral opposition to slavery, neither A nor anyone else will be able to achieve a legal ban on slavery. (A does not plan to start a civil war over slavery.) Assume further, however, that B's economic policies will very likely result, within a generation, in the withering away of the institution of slavery. In my judgment, a faithful Catholic could reasonably decide to vote for B, notwithstanding the fact that A is morally opposed to slavery and would try to abolish it and B is not morally opposed to slavery and would not work to abolish it, as a way of expressing "solidarity" with the victims of slavery.)

I will not vote, next Tuesday, for another four years of Bush-Cheney. Between now and next Tuesday, I will decide whether to vote for Kerry-Edwards. If Kerry-Edwards prevails, faithful Catholics who voted for Kerry-Edwards will face this challenge: What to do, over the next four years, to maximize the chances that the national and international policies of the Kerry-Edwards Administration will be policies that, in the longer run, are more congenial to human life--to all human life--than the policies of another Bush-Cheney Administration would have been. In any event, my judgment is that there is room for a reasonable difference of judgments, among faithful Catholics, about how to vote next Tuesday.

Now, against the background of Vince Rougeau's posting today, let me ask readers of this blog to compare Russell Hittinger's challenging posting today with the Bradley-George piece in National Review Online. The former is an invitation--a fraternal invitation--to constructive dialogue; the latter, with its peremptory "We are reasonable and you are beyond the pale!" tone, is anything but an invitation to constructive dialogue. The latter, unlike the former, nourishes the worst features of our public discourse in this lamentable season of degraded politics.

All the best,

Michael