NPR Interviews Kmiec
June 4, 2008, 5:46 pm
Posted by Cathleen Kaveny
I cannot forget that Archbishop Burke and Archbishop Chaput strongly implied in 2004 that voting for a pro-choice candidate was a serious sin. I suspect this priest is simply walking in their footsteps.
If this is the case, it seems to me that they bear indirect, and partial, responsibility for what happened to Professor Kmiec. It would seem to me that this would be a teachable moment for them. Has either one commented publicly on this event?
on June 4th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
“If this is the case, it seems to me that they bear indirect, and partial, responsibility for what happened to Professor Kmiec.”
Cathleen, using your logic, would that mean that those of us who do not speak out against abortion also bear indirect, and partial, responsibility for what happened to the Human Life that was ended as a result?
I would suggest that Professor Kmiec use this teachable moment to speak out against abortion and try to convince Mr.Obama that the destruction of innocent Human Life is not just against Constitution Law, it is against God’s Law as well.
on June 4th, 2008 at 6:39 pm
Cathleen, I don’t have an answer to your question.
However, we’re familiar with the old saying “Desperate times call for desperate measures.”
The “fundies” in the church apparently are desperate when they must resort to threats (”praying for your immortal soul,” ad nauseum) or denial of communion to politicians with whom they disagree.
As others have pointed out, we do have hierarchs (think Pell) who wish to downplay, if not downright deny, official Catholic teaching that a person must follow his or her conscience, even an erroneous conscience.
If God should inform me someday that I’m being sent to hell because I acted on the basis of an erroneous conscience, I shall inform God that he won’t need to “send” me to the netherworld: I’ll go there on my own initiative!
Really, who in his/her right mind would want to spend eternity with a damning God???????
on June 4th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
Actually, Joseph, spending eternity with a “damning” God is not one of the options.
on June 4th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
Well, then, Nancy, you might want to inform Raymond Burke, Pell, and some of their like-minded hierarchs.
on June 4th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Nancy, I think Professor Kmiec has made his position on abortion crystal-clear over the years. As I said in 2004, I think it’s one thing to say that he (and others who agree) are wrong; it’s another to say that they’ve put themselves outside of the communion of the Church.
on June 4th, 2008 at 7:25 pm
Then why not make his position crystal-clear to the Democratic Party and help change the platform to one that is Pro-Life?
Joseph, the official Catholic teaching is that one forms their conscience in communion with God.
on June 4th, 2008 at 7:40 pm
Nancy says, “Joseph, the official Catholic teaching is that one forms their conscience in communion with God.”
Joe replies, “Nancy, you will find the ‘official Catholic teaching’ at http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/pt3sect1chpt1art6.htm .”
on June 4th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
If voting for a candidate who does not advocate criminalizing abortion under all circumstances is a serious sin, and the only candidates in a particular case are all failing to profess such advocacy, do their Eminences say that voting at all in such a contest is a serious sin?
on June 4th, 2008 at 10:03 pm
“….using your logic, would that mean that those of us who do not speak out against abortion also bear indirect, and partial, responsibility for what happened to the Human Life that was ended as a result?”
Nancy, do you speak out against the war in Iraq and torture or did I miss it? Do you have any responsibility to speak out for the tens of thousands of lives and hundreds of thousand injuries that have resulted because of this war?
on June 4th, 2008 at 11:30 pm
To be fair to Archbishop Chaput, I think his position on this issue has developed over the past four years. I think that while he still wants to take a forceful stand on this issue, the arguments made (by Cathy among others) that the distinction between formal and material cooperation applies to voting decisions has had an impact on his thinking (see below).
I also think that the discussion the USCCB had around the Faithful Citizenship this time around has been influential among the bishops. I am told by people close to that work that this was really the first time that the various committees of bishops and the conference as a whole had come together in a structured way to deliberate on the document. In the past, I think, it had been issued earlier by the Administrative Committee. So the bishops as a whole really “owned” the process this time and I think that is why you have not, by and large, been seeing bishops in this election cycle taking a public position that to vote for a pro-choice is a sin. The issue of pro-choice Catholic politicians, of course, is a different issue.
Back to Archbishop Chaput for a moment, here is his recent statement on the issue:
“So can a Catholic in good conscience vote for a pro-choice candidate? The answer is: I can’t, and I won’t. But I do know some serious Catholics— people whom I admire—who may. I think their reasoning is mistaken, but at least they sincerely struggle with the abortion issue, and it causes them real pain. And most important: They don’t keep quiet about it; they don’t give up; they keep lobbying their party and their representatives to change their pro-abortion views and protect the unborn. Catholics can vote for pro-choice candidates if they vote for them despite—not because of—their pro-choice views.
But they also need a compelling proportionate reason to justify it. What is a “proportionate” reason when it comes to the abortion issue? It’s the kind of reason we will be able to explain, with a clean heart, to the victims of abortion when we meet them face to face in the next life—which we most certainly will. If we’re confident that these victims will accept our motives as something more than an alibi, then we can proceed.”
on June 5th, 2008 at 2:27 am
This is unspeakable. As a priest, I really can’t imagine refusing anyone communion, unless I knew that their plan was to desecrate it. Jesus is big boy. He can take care of himself.
This sets up a very bad precedent. Do you make an announcement before communion that in addition to being a Catholic in good standing, anyone not voting for Barack Obama may receive communion? Sounds kind of silly doesn’t it? But that is what this priest did! Shame on him.
on June 5th, 2008 at 6:37 am
Peter, I’m afraid I have a rather different take on Archbishop Chaput. I am afraid he has not really changed his position, but altered his expression of it on account of political expediency. Why? In one sense, the shift is too dramatic, and he makes absolutely no attempt to account for it. II still remember old pctures of him beaming with President Bush, columns entitled “How do you tell a duck from a fox?”, etc. In another sense, there is no shift–bottom line: the only issue politically “interesting” to him is abortion. The rest are invisible. He’s changed his rhetoric, not his mind.
When people really change their minds, they usually provide an explanation–an account, of what happened. In fact, changing one’s mind requires the development of such an account. He hasn’t done so.
Much of the religious right has recast itself rhetorically to survive politically –that’s part of American politics. Witness Tony Perkins’s new book.
My own view is that people’s true character is revealed at the moments when they have untrammeled power–not when they’re hemmed in by political expediency. So without a good account of the “evolution” or “conversion”, I am highly skeptical about growth and change on his part since 2004.
The doctrine of cooperation with evil was on the table in 2004–it hasn’t changed much before or since then. Chaput (and others) were advocating for a highly distorted understanding of the doctrine of cooperation with evil in 2004. He’s on record, as equating voting for a pro-choice candidate as formal cooperation with evil. Frankly, if he took intro to moral theology he ought to have know better. I wouldn’t be surprised if that group was pushing for that equation, in Rome, and lost. Furthermore, even in his treatment today of “proportionate reason” he’s distorting, in my view, the way it’s used in the manuals.
on June 5th, 2008 at 7:18 am
J. Peter Nixon,
Did not Ab. Chaput issue a clarification of the quotation you cited in First Things last month, and the way it is used by some? In response to “Catholics for Obama ‘08″ who invoked it, he pointed out that they omitted words, which he believes puts the quotation in its proper context:
“But [Catholics who support pro-choice candidates] also need a compelling proportionate reason to justify it. What is a “proportionate” reason when it comes to the abortion issue? It’s the kind of reason we will be able to explain, with a clean heart, to the victims of abortion when we meet them face to face in the next life—which we most certainly will. If we’re confident that these victims will accept our motives as something more than an alibi, then we can proceed.”
http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/?p=1073
I think Cathleen is correct about his understanding of proportionality. I would add that it looks like the Ab could use a good course in eschatology, as well.
on June 5th, 2008 at 7:41 am
Alan, that’s right–and there was a big discussion on the blog. One of my worries was why the unborn are the only ones who get an explanation.
I don’t have time for this now, but I suspect that the Archbishop is working with a version of Germain Grisez’s moral theology which requires us to evaluate foreseen but unintended side effects by putting ourselves in their position for a Golden Rule analysis.
If this is the case, he’s working with a distortion of Grisez, no less than was working with a distortion of the manualists on cooperation with evil. Grisez thinks everyone potentially affected by a side effect needs to be taken into account. In contrast, the only people who seem to matter to Chaput are the unborn. In effect he’s suggesting that the unborn are special–privileged, better than rest of humanity–no on else gets an explanation.
These are two pretty elementary mistakes in moral theology. So, the question becomes for me: Who is the Archbishop’s theological ad visor?
on June 5th, 2008 at 7:46 am
Father John,
You can’t see denying “anyone” communion?
Why is the physical desecration of the eucharist more sinful than receiving it when not in a state of grace?
By “anyone” do you include those who are clearly not in communion with the Church? What about someone who denies the divinity of Christ?
Jesus may be a “big boy,” but what about the recipient? Scripture and Church doctrine teach us that the person who unworthily receives condemns himself. It is a mortal sin. Don’t priests have some obligation to the person himself? Are there other sins that you may turn a blind eye to?
on June 5th, 2008 at 7:53 am
Assuming for the sake of argument that we will have to justify ourselves in a next life to those who have grievances, I would much rather explain why I was one sixty-millionth of the reason Obama got elected than explain to the hundreds of millions who starved to death during my lifetime how I could justify having so much when they had nothing.
on June 5th, 2008 at 8:10 am
Sean,
Isn’t a person who unworthily receives communion already in a state of mortal sin? While I wouldn’t want to suggest that people in a state of mortal sin should just go ahead and do anything they want, as I understand mortal sin, it is knowingly, deliberately, and completely cutting oneself off from God. Assuming that is possible, in some sense you can’t commit a second mortal sin after you have committed the first one. So I don’t see how a priest could protect a person from himself (or herself) by withholding communion.
on June 5th, 2008 at 8:11 am
Sean: Just for my own reference, what scriptures do you have in mind when claiming that “Scripture and Church doctrine teach us that the person who unworthily receives condemns himself”? I get the Church doctrine part, but I would value knowing the scriptural support on which you are drawing.
on June 5th, 2008 at 8:36 am
Joe:
1 Corinthinians 11:27ff
For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes.
27
Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will have to answer for the body and blood of the Lord. 12
28
A person should examine himself, 13 and so eat the bread and drink the cup.
29
For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment 14 on himself.
on June 5th, 2008 at 8:38 am
Thanks, Elaine. I guess it all depends on what is meant by drinking unworthily.
on June 5th, 2008 at 8:42 am
Joe,
1 Corinthians 11:26-29
For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes. Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will have to answer for the body and blood of the Lord. A person should examine himself, and so eat the bread and drink the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself.
David,
Yours is a very strange way of looking at sin. Certainly the consequences as to a state of grace don’t “get worse” after a second mortal sin, but that doesn’t mean it is not sin and does not have consequences. First, the habituation of sin, being confirmed in it, makes it more difficult for the sinner to come home. We know this from our own experience and scripture confirms it. Second, if a person is to confess and return to a state of grace, he doesn’t stop at the first mortal sin, does he? There is also the temporal punishments that are consequences for that sin.
Finally, and most importantly sins are wounds on the Body of Christ. They injure you and me and even generations yet to be baptized. The Catholic Church doesn’t subscribe to the, it’s just me and Jesus, and Jesus can take care of himself, kind of Christianity.
on June 5th, 2008 at 9:18 am
Sean,
If you look at sin in terms of willfully breaking off a relationship, instead of as performing an action defined as a “mortal sin” on a list of sins, it makes sense to me to say you can’t commit a second mortal sin. Mortal sin would be analogous to divorce. The idea of getting a second divorce after you have the first one doesn’t make any sense.
Do you really think endorsing Obama, or voting for him, is a mortal sin?
I am leaning toward feeling that the statements made about voting invoking principles like “remote material cooperation” aren’t really helpful. If they result in different people arriving at different conclusions, they haven’t clarified the situation much, and if the clear conclusion is that it really is a grave moral evil to vote for Obama, then the people responsible for explaining the principles should just come out and say so. It seems to me that nothing was needed beyond saying, “You cannot vote for a pro-choice candidate because he is pro-choice, but you can vote for him in spite of the fact that he is pro-choice.” I think it is silly to argue that voting for a particular candidate in the 2008 presidential election might be a mortal sin.
on June 5th, 2008 at 9:21 am
Sean Hannaway,
It may be well to attend to the text you cite, including what you omit, and its original circumstances in order to make an apt application to a different set of circumstances today.
First, Paul is not making a general rule in 1 Cor 11:17-33. He is addressing a particular problem in Corinth where some upper status Christians were having a meal in conjunction with the Lord’s Supper, from which they had excluded lower status Christians.
Second, he says that those who eat and drink without discerning the body, eat and drink judgment against themselves. But he does not leave it there. The statement is paranetic with the intention of getting the offenders to stop the practice in question. So he adds, if we would judge ourselves we would not be judged. But then if one is judged, it is by the Lord, and it is for discipline in order to avoid condemnation (1 Cor 11:32).
Third, Paul is not speaking about the “desecration” of the Eucharist as the Church has come to understand that. Neither does he have a notion of “mortal sin.” He is trying to foster unity in the Corinthian community, especially between those of differing statuses.
Now if one were to actualize the text for today’s circumstances the message would still be that the person judges himself or herself, and that no one else needs to do that, except the Lord to whom they would be accountable. For Paul, in this instance the way to bring someone into communion is by instruction, inclusion, and not exclusion. He did not tell the offenders in Corinth that they could not share the Lord’s Supper. He just wanted them to include everybody (1 Cor 11:33).
Seen this way, in my opinion, Paul’s words would move the practice in the opposite direction of what you envision.
on June 5th, 2008 at 10:05 am
People’s true character is revealed when they hav euntrammled power”
I think Cathy is correct. And the point is critical because educated folks will no longer just take words, but focus on behavior.
So the use of power (here’s the notion again”( is “soft” if it wishes to bring truth.
The Lisantre thread below indicates (while the Msgr, and fr. Pflegler speak to the what their specific congregations fel), how power is exercised in the domain of Bishop Murphy.
Since BXVI’s departure, a lot of what’s discussed re Church here has been about exercvises of power by various Bishops, including Burke and Chaput.
I just looked again yesterday at the late Msgr. Phil murnion’s letter to the Bishops a few days before his death. It called for dialogue and listening repoeatedly.
I don’t see much of that in the behavior of those Bishops..
“People’s true character…”
on June 5th, 2008 at 10:15 am
David,
It is an interesting way to look at sin, as I said, but I don’t think it is correct – or at least consistent with Catholic teaching. Yes, sin is breaking a relationship, but it is also an act or ommission with consequences. Following your logic, if I lived a life with hundreds of mortal sins and went to confession I would only have to confess and be contrite for the first one, and that certainly isn’t what the Church teaches.
Do I think voting for Obama is a mortal sin? That’s too complicated for a definitive answer, but unlike you I do think it can be one – it would depend on one’s reasons. The reality is, and I think this is what the bishop’s concern is, is that most people aren’t even considering abortion or any other aspect of Catholic teaching when they vote. I will say, point blank, that I suspect (who can ever know) that politicians like John Kerry or Dick Durbin or Barrak Obama are committing grave sins by their public votes and positions, and I think ignoring this is problematic for a Catholic.
Alan,
Certainly we have to consider the full context, including the historical context. of scripture, but we also can’t limit the underlying principles only to those contexts. The letter itself really has nothing to do with including or excluding from the Eucharist, but on what the Eucharist is and what our responsibility is in relation to It.
Regarding judgment, what he says is that if we are not self-examining, self-critical, we bring judgment on ourselves. He does not say that other Christians should ingnore sinfulness of other and leave it at that. Indeed that makes no sense since whole letter is basically a critique of the Corinthians’ sinful behavior. What he is saying is that we can’t behave one way in our “non church” life and then be worthy of the Lord’s Supper.
on June 5th, 2008 at 10:35 am
I may sound like a broken record, but I keep returning to the words of Jesus, to wit:
“Let the children come to me…”
“All you who are heavily burdened…”
I can’t immediately recall any gospel passage where the Lord tells a person not to approach.
We (or at least some of us) can quote Paul, the Fathers, etc., but when all is said and done, I think we must return to the words and actions of Jesus in the gospels.
Jesus wants us to approach him, regardless. Mortal sins, venial sins, etc. be damned.
“Let he who is without sin…”
I suspect Burke et al are gonna’ have a hard time doin’ their explainin’ to the Lord! (I want to hear Jesus read these fellas the “riot act.”)
on June 5th, 2008 at 10:41 am
Sean,
not only Fr John but the pope gives communion to everyone.
BXVI actually does it in Italy very often: on 17 June 2007 in Assisi and 21 October 2007 in Naples BXVI himself gave Communion to Prodi, prime minister and pro-choice, also he gave communion to Rutelli, former mayor of Roma and pro-choice, Andreotti former prime minister and now senator( he signed the abortation law in Italy) , and so on. JPII made the same.
What do you think about this?
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:02 am
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,336330,00.html
Sean,
Is it possible that someone who votes for McCain will be committing a mortal sin if he or she does so in the hope that McCain will do less to protect the environment, less to address social injustice, and less about the unequal distribution of wealth?
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:24 am
This post shows a stunning lack of perspective.
Kmiec’s denial was wrong. Almost everybody agrees, and people from all over are coming to his defense. Yet, Prof. Kaveny still finds it necessary to look for people to blame for it.
An earlier commentator noted that Jesus is a big boy. Well, so is Kmiec. What happened to him was wrong, and should be corrected, but is pretty far down on the list of injustices that cry out for my attention.
But 1000 unborn children are going to be killed today, and this launches no similar search for culprits. Or, if you prefer, you can talk about people around the world dying from hunger or from violence.
And how do we do this? By discounting Archbishop Chaput’s latest words on the matter, instead asserting that his previous words were more telling of his character.
Well, excuse me, I didn’t realize we were discussing the personal character of Archbishop Chaput.
All this from the person who claims to be weary of the “culture wars.”
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:30 am
In short, I think Abp. Chaput’s statement offered much more charity to Catholics who vote for pro-choice candidates, “But I do know some serious Catholics— people whom I admire—who may. I think their reasoning is mistaken, but at least they sincerely struggle with the abortion issue, and it causes them real pain. And most important: They don’t keep quiet about it; they don’t give up; they keep lobbying their party and their representatives to change their pro-abortion views and protect the unborn. Catholics can vote for pro-choice candidates if they vote for them despite—not because of—their pro-choice views,” than is being offered to him here by Prof. Kaveny and some of the other commentators here.
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:32 am
“not only Fr John but the pope gives communion to everyone.
BXVI actually does it in Italy very often: on 17 June 2007 in Assisi and 21 October 2007 in Naples BXVI himself gave Communion to Prodi, prime minister and pro-choice, also he gave communion to Rutelli, former mayor of Roma and pro-choice, Andreotti former prime minister and now senator( he signed the abortation law in Italy) , and so on. JPII made the same.
What do you think about this?”
Tell it like it is Mary. It shows the hypocrisy, through and through.
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:34 am
Thank you Alan for saving me from having to explain the scripture. Also Joseph, your point of looking to the actual words and DEEDS of Jesus is what drives my pastoral practice. Jesus ate at Matthew’s house, he ate with prostitutes, and he even gave his body and blood to the man who betrayed him.
I never felt it my job to determine who is or is not in a state of grace, for whatever “state of grace” means. For me, the Eucharist, or as it is also commonly known, “Communion” is also one of the primary sacraments of reconcilation. Didn’t the Lord say that it was the sick who needed the doctor and not the healthy?
I believe that the sacrament of the Eucharist can be a very powerful means to conversion and healing. When all is said and done, I’d rather Jesus be upset with me for being to generous with him than denying him to those who wish to know him and be one with him.
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:44 am
Mary,
My point wasn’t about specific cases, but about the principle involved. When I read these arguments it is easy to slip from priests should not deny communion for these reasons to they can never deny for any reason. That is what I am getting at. In order to avoid critically considering whether denial is appropriate in a particular case or class of cases, we ought not conclude it is never appropriate. If it is appropriate in some cases, then we ought to critically examine what those cases should be.
David,
Here we go again.
Unlike abortion, which involves an absolute value – life – these other issues involve many considerations. Including some that “trump” the ones you are mentioning.
For example, the environment. There may be circumstances in which doing less to “protect the environment” is not only not a sin, but is something that we ought to do to be consistent with an ethic of life and even to help the poor. This is a cannard that the left uses. No one wants to pollute the environment for its own sake, that of course would be sinful. The question has to be, what is gained by the environmental degradation, and what is its effect on the lives of people. If any degradation of the environment is impermissible, you should park your car in the garage and start growing food in your backyard. Which, by the way, would probably result in even more environmental degradation and disease. Any environmental policy decision is a question of trade-off’s and invariably involves some prudential judgment. You show me a politician who says, “Let’s drill in ANWAR so we can watch caribu die,” and I will agree with you.
And who says unequal distribution of wealth is in itself sinful? If I live in a society where everyone drives a Lexus except for 2% that have Bentleys and Ferraris, that’s unequal distribution, but it is not sinful. It is sinful to accumulate wealth at the expense of the poor and to fail to regard their welfare, but that’s not the same thing. Indeed, I will specifically not vote for a politician who says he is addressing unequal distribution of wealth, because this usually results in equal distribution of misery and poverty.
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:52 am
Joseph, thank you for the official Catholic teaching regarding conscience. To understand the truth of this teaching, like all truths, one must start with the beginning. This moral conscience was inscribed by God. If one’s conscience is reflective of what God has inscribed in each of us, than one’s conscience would be consistent with the Word Made Flesh. There is only one Word of God, Jesus.
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:53 am
Sean,
Many environmental policies, if enacted, would materially impact me.
If I thought a particular policy was in the environment’s best interest, and yet I voted for a candidate on the hopes that he would not enact that particular policy so that I would not be personally materially impacted, then I am probably enaging in sinful activity. I’m not qualified to judge whether such a sin is venial or mortal, but if I place my own interests over those of others, particularly the poor or voiceless, then I am sinning.
This is not to say that those who oppose certain policies because they in good faith believe that they would not be the most effective in addressing the problem, or because they would have negative unintended side effects, are wrong. But if my primary motivation is my own self-interest, then there’s something wrong.
I suspect this describes a non-negligible portion of the electorate.
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:53 am
Tell it like it is Mary. It shows the hypocrisy, through and through.
Yes it is hypocrisy.
If Kerry was an italian politician or Obama was italian and catholic you know very well
that if they go in st Peter square BXVI will give them Communion without any
problem.
So, I repeat, what REALLY is your problem?
on June 5th, 2008 at 11:56 am
Father John,
As I often say to the, “He ate with prostitutes,” comment, he didn’t then rush through desert so they could get back to work. The good news is not just of forgiveness but of repentance as well.
Recognizing sin and facing up to it is not incompatible with forgiveness, in fact it is necessary. If you knew a member of your flock was stealing from widows and orphans would you not address it with him? Does it help people who’s souls are in jeopardy to say, “none of my business.”
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:02 pm
Bill, ALL abortion goes against the Law of God.
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Sean
“prostitutes and publicans precede you in the Kingdom of Heaven” and not “prostitutes and publicans REPENTED precede you in the Kingdom of Heaven”.
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Some wars are justified. I am not sure how Iraq should have been handled when they refused to comply with the requests of the U.N. I do believe that if the U.N. had been consistent with the message they were sending to Iraq, Iraq would have complied. Torture, as it has been defined by the U.N. is torture.
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
Mary, I think we can all agree, that Jesus knew some, such as these, would repent and thus be restored to a state of Grace.
“Go, and sin no more..”
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Sean Hannaway,
“Certainly we have to consider the full context, including the historical context. of scripture, but we also can’t limit the underlying principles only to those contexts. The letter itself really has nothing to do with including or excluding from the Eucharist, but on what the Eucharist is and what our responsibility is in relation to It.”
If by letter you mean 1 Corinthians, I strongly disagree. The letter is all about factionalism in Corinth, part of which is driven by the division between upper and lower status Christians. What Paul writes about the Lord’s Supper is directed to that problem.
I do not know what you mean by “underlying principles” in this instance. The “principle” Paul invokes in this text is Christian unity, which is violated when some people are excluded from the Lord’s Supper by others. And so, this part of the letter is very much about including or excluding from the Lord’s Supper. The tradition he hands on about that Supper as a memorial of the Lord’s death (11:23-26) is not free floating, as the “therefore” in 11:27 shows. Rather, it functions to make his point about how the Lord’s Supper should be properly shared.
The Church has every right to prescribe about the Eucharist, who is worthy to receive it, and how those deemed to be unworthy should be treated. I just do not think that the Scripture you cited helps much to justify the current Church discipline on this matter.
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:23 pm
I have, on a previous post, analyzed Archbishop Chaput’s latest statement, not merely his early statements. Close analysis shows that it’s a change in wrapping, not a change in substance. I don’t see his change in tone as charitable — I see it as politically strategic. He still puts anyone who would vote for a Democrat on the defensive, without creating similar questions for Republicans.
Unlike many other bishops in the country, in his public statements, Archbishop Chaput is holding himself out as a moral leader for all American Catholics –not merely for those in his Archdiocese He has no canonical authority over anyone else. So, if we’re not going to totally ignore his statements (which some do), we need to decide how to evaluate the statements and the impact on the public discussion. I don’t think civility requires that we ignore obvious questions about the consistency of his past statements and his present statements.
Politically, I think Archbishop Chaput has quite an effect. I think it’s a mistake to ignore his statements–I think his interventions helped reelect President Bush in 2004.
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:39 pm
I recall a preivous dotCommonweal thread where Prof. George and the Asncombe Society stood accused of “making political hay” out of incident where a student staged an “attack” on himself.
I think this thread is doing something similar in attempting to “make hay” out of Kmiec’s denial.
Kmiec’s denial was wrong, and I and almost every Catholic wishes it didn’t happen. But it is not in itself an indictment of Abp. Chaput’s or Abp. Burke’s statements, and pales in comparison to the injustice they were attempting to confront, even if we think their means were ineffective.
—
Was anyone asking you to ignore his statements? No. I am asking you to employ charity when you are doing so. You have apparently chosen a different course. Chaput must be punished for his role in getting Bush elected in 2004, and whatever he says today can thus be discounted.
You are free to choose that course, but it makes your criticisms of “culture war” rhetoric ring hollow.
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:39 pm
Question for anyone: What would you say would be an excuse for abortion that would be acceptable to God and His unborn children?
on June 5th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
If I may, I’d like to quote several paragraphs from “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship”, the US bishops’ teaching document intended to guide Catholics in making decisions about how to vote in the upcoming elections.
In my opinion, Professor Kmiec’s support for Senator Obama is well within the spirit of these guidelines.
Individual bishops, such as Archbishop Chaput, are free to interpret these guidelines, or, presumably, even to teach something apart from them. But this document represents the collective wisdom of the American bishops as a body, and I believe that the vast majority of bishops in the US view this as what the church in America actually teaches on this matter.
[Begin quote]
34. Catholics often face difficult choices about how to vote. This is why it is so important
to vote according to a well-formed conscience that perceives the proper relationship among
moral goods. A Catholic cannot vote for a candidate who takes a position in favor of an intrinsic evil, such as abortion or racism, if the voter’s intent is to support that position. In such cases a Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in grave evil. At the same time, a voter should not use a candidate’s opposition to an intrinsic evil to justify indifference or inattentiveness to other important moral issues involving human life and dignity.
35. There may be times when a Catholic who rejects a candidate’s unacceptable position
may decide to vote for that candidate for other morally grave reasons. Voting in this way would be permissible only for truly grave moral reasons, not to advance narrow interests or partisan preferences or to ignore a fundamental moral evil.
36. When all candidates hold a position in favor of an intrinsic evil, the conscientious
voter faces a dilemma. The voter may decide to take the extraordinary step of not voting for any candidate or, after careful deliberation, may decide to vote for the candidate deemed less likely to advance such a morally flawed position and more likely to pursue other authentic human goods.
37. In making these decisions, it is essential for Catholics to be guided by a well-formed
conscience that recognizes that all issues do not carry the same moral weight and that the moral obligation to oppose intrinsically evil acts has a special claim on our consciences and our actions. These decisions should take into account a candidate’s commitments, character, integrity, and ability to influence a given issue. In the end, this is a decision to be made by each Catholic guided by a conscience formed by Catholic moral teaching.
[End quote]
The entire document is well worth reading. http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:-BYOT9Z-rDUJ:www.usccb.org/faithfulcitizenship/FCStatement.pdf+faithful+citizenship&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=3&gl=us
on June 5th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
Sean,
I think you misinterpreted my question. Assuming one can commit a mortal sin by voting, I am asking if abortion is the only issue that can make a vote a mortal sin. For example, McCain is in favor of stem-cell research. That is a life issue, too. Suppose someone is indifferent to the issue of abortion, probably wouldn’t vote for a Democrat in any case, but votes for McCain because they believe he will actually do a better job of promoting stem-cell research. Or suppose they vote for McCain because they own a company that they know to be polluting the air or the water, against the public good but to their own personal gain, and they believe they are more likely to get away with it under McCain. I am asking if voting for the candidate who is more pro-life satisfies the only requirement for casting a mortal-sin-free vote.
Are you seriously arguing that no businessman or politician has ever made a decision about public health or the environment while selfishly disregarding the public good for personal gain? Just because an issue is complex and there are plausible arguments on both sides doesn’t mean there aren’t bad people making selfish decisions for their own benefit. Would you want to defend everything done by tobacco industry executives?
In a world in which everyone had more than enough, unequal distribution of wealth might be just fine. But we live in a world where some have much more than enough, and others don’t have any. Would you say Bishop Girotti is wrong?
Bishop Girotti [head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, the Vatican body which oversees confessions and plenary indulgences] said that mortal sins also included taking or dealing in drugs, and social injustice which caused poverty or “the excessive accumulation of wealth by a few.”
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,336330,00.html
on June 5th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
Alan,
Apparently I am not the only one who thinks that scriptural passage relates to receiving when not in a state of grace – From the Catechism:
1385 To respond to this invitation we must prepare ourselves for so great and so holy a moment. St. Paul urges us to examine our conscience: “Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For any one who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself.”216 Anyone conscious of a grave sin must receive the sacrament of Reconciliation before coming to communion.
My point is that a scriptural passage can’t be limited only to the specific historical context in which it was made. Yes, the Epistle relates to disunity within the Church in Corinth, but that doesn’t mean every principle reflected in it is limited to that context. It also talks about sin and repentance and forgiveness in any context. It talks about the nature of the Eucharist and our obligations in that regard as well – at least the authors of the Catechism think so.
on June 5th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
John Mc G,
Challenging someone’s logic–critically examining their analysis and questioning their own account of the import of their statement, is not uncharitable or engaging in “culture war” rheotoric.
Being civil doesn’t mean you have to take every statement at face value–every statement of a bishop or every statement of a politician. Criticism is not inconsistent with civility.
Civility means, centrally, not engaging in name-calling. To engage in culture war rhetoric is to engage in name calling. To call someone akin to a Nazi, a minion of the culture of death, making a deal with the devil, worse than Stephen Douglass, for voting for a pro-choice politician is, in my judgment, uncivil.
Civility also means giving someone a chance to explain. I have read Apb. Chaput quite carefully. How, precisely has his mind changed? I’d like to hear a response to that. Four years is a short time in the life of the church–people are implementing an approach he advocated loudly in 2004–what does he have to say to that?
on June 5th, 2008 at 1:27 pm
1. I sincerely believed that abortion was not the killing of a person. I believed in something akin to the notion of “quickening,” and I believed that no human life–no person–was present in the first few months of pregnancy.
or
2. As a Jew, I understood that the life of the mother was of primary concern, taking precedence over the life of an unborn fetus, and as rabbis have taught for millenia, human life begins at birth, not at conception. I followed my conscience and the teachings of my religion.
Of course, this discussion is not about abortion itself, but about voting. Even if God has made it clear to the Catholic Church that abortion is never permitted, has he really made it clear how one must vote in an American democracy, where there are other issues that also directly impact life and death? What does the Bible say about voting?
on June 5th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
Before the train flies off the rails entirely, could someone help me clear up a confusion?
There seems to be an argument here that a Catholic, being by definition opposed to abortion, is therefore required to vote for a candidate who calls him or herself “pro-life” and vote against a candidate who calls him or herself “pro-choice”. Some people also make a further argument that in a case where one has two candidates claiming to be “pro-life” one is obliged to vote for the one belonging to the political party that claims to be “pro-life”.
If one argues that there are other serious moral issues besides abortion to consider, the retort (and this retort is not unreasonable in my opinion) is that abortion is the most important of the pressing moral issues and that it therefore trumps all of the other issues.
Here is where I get confused. If I grant that it is in fact the case that 1) a Catholic is obligated to be completely against abortion and 2) that abortion is the most important issue to consider in choosing a candidate because it is the primary moral issue of the times, then it would seem to me to follow that we should not just be voting for a person who claims to be “pro-life”. We should be voting for a person who claims to share this entire Catholic position on abortion. In other words, an absolute obligation to vote for a “pro-life” candidate would only seem to me to hold only if the candidate were supporting a Catholic pro-life position rather than some other “pro-life” position that denies number two above.
Some may argue that someone who claims to be “pro-life” in some way is more likely to support pro-life political initiatives than someone who claims to be “pro-choice”. But I think that the history of the last four decades shows that in fact there’s a hard line Catholic position (outlined above), a hard line left position of no abortion restrictions whatsover, and a vast bulk of people in the middle holding “moderate” positions, holders of whom call themselves pro-life or pro-choice based on criteria not having much to do with abortion as such.
It seems to me strange that one would argue that we have a moral obligation to vote for someone who holds only part of a Catholic position. If a politician is not hard line about abortion (and few of them if any seem to be, at least at a national level), then we are simply thrust into the realm of political practicality over the issue, where both sides can fairly claim that they represent the idea that abortions should be limited before they can be eliminated. And this actually where we are in these threads.
I think that the anti-abortion movement (from a Catholic point of view) has failed precisely because Catholic anti-abortion voters who use abortion as a litmus test have not been doing what they think they are doing. For good hard line ethical reasons they have continually helped to vote into office people who do not in fact share their ethic on abortion. By fighting what is probably a fruitless battle to convert the Left (while waiting for a white knight to enter the Supreme Court) they have enabled the Right to get away without doing much of anything. And as the country in the meantime has shifted towards a “moderate” position (I put this in quotes because I don’t share it), the argument about waiting for a Supreme Court Justice to die and get replaced becomes a more strident reason for in effect not really pushing the issue on the Right, election cycle after election cycle.
One may argue that if Catholics demand that the politicians they vote for embrace the entire Catholic position on abortion and other issuse, no politician would ever get elected. But again, this kind of argument thrusts us back into the issue of political strategy. Really being pro-life in the sense proposed means more than having a “pro-life” sentiment or attitude. But this should also go for people who are telling other people that they are sinning if they don’t vote for someone who belongs to the “pro-life” party. I would argue that these people should themselves consider the possibility that they themselves have been enablers and that perhaps we should stop looking into other people’s souls and start thinking about what we can do in the short term. Because the short term is in fact all we have.
on June 5th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
Sean, I think you bring up a good point of the need to recognize that something is sinful and being willing atone for it. Also, that the occurrence of sin can be a teaching moment. I guess we differ on the teaching moment.
I do not think that communion time is a teaching moment for an individual. If I knew someone was not doing what was right and continually presenting themself for communion, I would talk to them personally. However, I would continue to give them communion because, lest we forget, the graces the sacrament offers. How can we be in a state of grace apart from Jesus? If someone asks to receive Christ into their body, don’t you think that that presence of Christ on a sacramental level can help restore that person to a more graced level? Who is in perfect grace or “good standing” at any time? Without the presence of Christ or a loving faithfilled community – it is impossible.
on June 5th, 2008 at 2:24 pm
Prof. Kaveny,
It seems your target is either the person of Abp. Chaput or his 2004 statements. Your goal seems to be, in general, to discredit the person of Abp. Chaput. That may not be specifically “name-calling,” but is not, in my opinion, a model of civil discourse, of which you have set yourself up as an arbiter with your criticims of “cutlure war” rhetoric (if only from one side).
It seems apparent to me that Kmiec’s denial is inconsistent with Chaput’s current statements, so it seems odd to me to use that denial as an occasion to set about to discredit Abp. Chaput.
It may be true that Abp. Chaput has insufficiently distanced himself from his 2004 statements to earn your personal forgiveness. That is not my concern, nor a pertinent matter for public discussion.
on June 5th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
David, as Catholics, we believe in the Word as He has revealed himself in the Trinitarian relationship of Sacred Tradition,(oral as well as written), Sacred Scripture, (the Canon of Scripture as determined by the early Fathers of the Catholic Church) and Magisterial Teaching. One can not subsist without the other.
It is a Truth of the Catholic Church that life begins at Conception. To be in communion with the Catholic Church one must believe the Truth of the Catholic Church. To deny a Truth of His Church is to deny Christ.
A sin is a willfull act of disobedience against the Law of God. One has to be aware that one has disobeyed the Law of God in order for a sin to be a sin. One can acknowledge one’s sin, repent, and through the Mercy of God, be restored to a state of Grace.
on June 5th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Sean,
The example you give from the Catechism is called proof-texting. It happens all the time in Vatican documents. Its purpose is to illustrate a point the document is trying to make, but not necessarily to interpret the text cited. Such a practice can sunder a text from its historical context and often does. The general principle espoused by encyclicals, recent Council documents, statements from the Pontifical Biblical Commission and reliable Catholic scholars (see Joseph A. Fitzmyer’s excellent new book, The Interpretation of Scripture: In Defense of the Historical-Critical Method) advise that there be some continuity between the historical context of a text and its subsequent interpretations. I am not saying that the original meaning of a text is its only meaning, but that whatever later meaning is attributed to it should have a reasonable connection to the meaning that the author intended the text to have. Were that not the case, we could make scripture say anything we want it to say. Since the Catholic tradition on the interpretation of Scripture is not fundamentalist, history and context are important controls for a proper interpretation of Scripture.
on June 5th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
P.S. There is also a sin that is refered to as formal or material cooperation. This would be when we fail to prevent a sinful act by not speaking out against it . Charity, out of Love, requires that we always speak the truth. I would hope that when Mr.Kmiec publically endorsed
Senator Obama, he spoke the truth regarding the issue of abortion.
on June 5th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Nancy,
However, Senator Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John McCain are not Catholics, and neither are about 75 percent of the American people. Even if Catholics are obliged to accept that life begins at conception, non-Catholics should not be considered evil because they do not believe the same thing as Catholics believe.
So how should Catholics live in a society in which they are a minority? If they insist that everything, or even the most important things, must be dealt with from a Catholic point of view, they might have to become like the Amish (whom I admire) and opt out of society altogether. If they don’t do that, they must necessarily compromise in some way.
I never hear you mention the Supreme Court, which has a majority of Catholics, which has the power to overturn Roe v. Wade, and yet does not. I know Sean’s theories about judges, but I read in the Bishop’s statement of November 2007, “It is a mistake with grave moral consequences to treat the destruction of innocent human life merely as a matter of individual choice. A legal system that violates the basic right to life on the grounds of choice is fundamentally flawed.” And yet the Supreme Court is at the very pinnacle of our (fundamentally flawed?) legal system, and the five Catholic justices seem to have found a way to compromise, which they are not criticized for, yet many say no compromise may be made by the average voter!
on June 5th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
Alan,
My mother used to be fond of saying that the Bible says, “Judas went and hanged himself,” and also, “Go thou and do likewise.”
However, regarding Fitzmyer’s two new books The Interpretation of Scripture and The One Who Is to Come, I can only say what I said in the 1970s when I read the Pelican New Testament Commentaries, which was that the average Christian would be disconcerted and probably shocked to know what the best scriptural scholars think about the Bible. This was not what I learned in Catholic grade school and high school and not what I heard in church.
Not that it’s particularly relevant here, but I remember reading
on June 5th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
David, ALL Catholics are obliged to speak the Truth without compromise.
on June 5th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
To call someone akin to a Nazi, a minion of the culture of death, making a deal with the devil, worse than Stephen Douglass, for voting for a pro-choice politician is, in my judgment, uncivil.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is an implicit accusation that Abp. Chaput engaged in this behavior. (leaving aside that the fallacy that therefore your incivilities are justified).
I read your post in which you criticize Abp. Chaput, and in the linked articles from him, the only one of these accusations I could find support for was that his contention that Catholic pro-choice politicians have made a deal with the devil, which was a thesis he attempted to support with his article, not “name-calling.”
Perhaps he did the other things you list there, but then it would seem odd you did not link to them in that article. I tried to find them. a couple times.
You don’t have to like Abp. Chaput personally, or how he impacted the 2004 election. But you do owe him common charity, and not implying that he said or wrote things that he did not.
on June 5th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
David,
I rather like your mother’s take on Scripture.
on June 5th, 2008 at 4:19 pm
A point to consider if we’re to parse political candidates according to their agreement with or advocacy for Catholic doctrine. Current magisterial teaching hods that directly ending the life of an embryo or fetus is never justifiable. Even a stark choice between saving the life of the mother and that of the fetus is, we’re taught, always to be decided in favor of the fetus. In reality, where the death of the woman generally results also in the death of the fetus in such rare circumstances, magisterial teaching still forbids terminating pregnancy. The well-known exception for tubal pregnancy is a subset of those cases, so does not apply to all such. An appeal to self-defense on the part of the mother in such cases has been ruled out as well. These cases are, I repeat, rare, at least in the developed world.
How would a politician go about making a case to the American public that the life of the mother must not be a consideration that would permit termination of a pregnancy? Would such a position stand Constitutional muster? On what Constitutional grounds do women’s lives count for less than the fetuses they carry? Less starkly, most Americans support the option of safe and legal abortion in cases of rape and incest, while Catholic teaching does not admit to any exceptions. Will Americans really come to agree that a 12 year old girl raped and pregnant by her step-dad should continue the pregnancy? Again, these are rare cases, but absolute prohibitions do not admit of exceptions.
My point is this–Catholic magisterial teaching on abortion is far more stringent that anything most Americans, including many evangelical pro-lifers, could support in conscience. If we require any “acceptable” politician to toe the Vatican line, we require them to work for an absoutist stance that many Americans of good will, Catholic and otherwise, would find morally repugnant in extreme cases.
on June 5th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
I think Archbishop Chaput is in part responsible for the people denying communion to Kmiec. I’m judging the fruits of his very public actions, not his heart. I think he needs to take more responsibility for his actions. A cursory review of the conservative Catholic blogosphere demonstrates that he was lionized for his old stand –which is precisely the stand instantiated by the priest who denied communion to Kmiec. So I just don’t agree with you that all Catholics think Kmiec shouldn’t have been denied communion– I think Apb. Chaput making a statement in that regard could be helpful
On the examples, I was giving examples of what I consider uncivil language, not attributing them all to him. I’m sorry if that caused confusion. For shorthand cites, Donohue (recently) the Nazi analogy, George and Bradley, the pro-slavery analog (2004), culture of death language, all over the place.
But as you helpfully call to our attention, Chaput did use the phrase “deal with devil” in a way which I think was uncivil.
“Next month, October, is Respect Life month. It’s a good time to reflect on the meaning of the Kennedy-Cuomo legacy. In brief, it’s OK to be Catholic in public service as long as you’re willing to jettison what’s inconveniently “Catholic.” That’s not a compromise. That’s a deal with the devil, and it has a balloon payment no nation, no public servant and no voter can afford.”
More important, I can’t see the path from then to now. So my question for him is: why was voting for a prochoice candidate a deal with the devil then and not now? Why can he respect people who vote for a pro-choice candidate as acting in good faith now, but not then? What’s changed, other than the political climate?
I don’t it is uncivil to ask for an explanation. He’s holding himself out as a moral authority, not just for his flock, but for everyone who is Catholic.
Moral analysis is not a question of “like” or “dislike” –except for children. We need to focus on his arguments, and the effect they have had on the life of the church and the life of the nation. In my judgment, those effects have been more harmful than beneficial. Obviously, you disagree.
on June 5th, 2008 at 4:57 pm
Miss Fullam is mistaken in her opinion about Catholic teaching that a choice between the life of an infant and that of a mother must always be decided in favor of the infant. If one does one’s best to save both, the matter is finally decided by God.
Mr. Nickols’ putting a question mark after “fundamentally flawed” with reference to our legal system seems to question the statement that our legal system is fundamentally flawed. That our system like any human system is fundamentally flawed is but a derivative of the [unpopular] notion of original sin. The North American polity is not the City of God come to earth.
That the five Catholic justices have not yet reversed Roe v. Wade is a matter that the court cannot merely act on its own. Apparently Justice Kennedy was suckered into going along with the Casey case when it might have been. But then he is not the brightest bulb on the tree. There have been Catholic justices who have supported abortion. Brennan comes to mind. And their have been Catholic justices who were uncompromising in their support of Catholic principles, such as Pierce Butler over eugenics [sterilization]. He was quite absolutist about this.
And then the High Priestess of Abortion and Eugenics, Margaret Sanger, was an Irish American.
Abortion in cases of rape and incest seems to be punishing the innocent infant, a strange position for those opposed to the death penalty.
on June 5th, 2008 at 6:43 pm
Sean and Nancy,
Does repentance precede forgiveness, or does forgiveness precede repentance?
on June 5th, 2008 at 7:16 pm
Let’s think for a moment about what makes a good citizen. Jill is a good citizen because she keeps herself informed about the important issues that face her community. She is a good citizen because she tries to talk sensibly, with a sense of justice and fairness, to her fellow citizens about these issues. She votes regularly, paying attention not only to the particular candidates but also to their supporters and the proposals they make for dealing with the community’s problems.
In other words, plucking a particular vote for a particular candidate in a particular election is a strange, even bizarre, way to evaluate Jill’s citizenship.
When Jill votes she casts links her support with those of any number of other people in favor of a candidate who belongs to a party that has a platform and a record. Notice that Jill cannot revise the party or the platform as she chooses. She stays with a party and its candidate FOR NOW but not necessarily forever.
She uses her practical judgment to determine whether to stay with her usual decisions in these matters or to change them and support a different candidate. Of course the alternative candidate also comes from a party with a record and a platform, etc.
Frankly, I can’t see how anyone, even archbishop, can say that Jill is being a bad citizen, or, if she is Catholic, a bad Catholic, however she votes in some particular election. It is legalism run mad to pretend that one could so judge her.
I grant that in extreme circumstances, e. g., Nazi Germany in its heyday, one may well have had to refuse to acknowledge its legitimacy in any way. Short of that, any particular vote. or petition signature, or letter to the editor, or blog, cannot reasonably be taken to establish whether Jill or anyone is being a faithful Catholic or much of anything else.
What happened to Douglas Kmiec is objectively a disgrace, whatever the motives of the perpetrators.
on June 5th, 2008 at 8:41 pm
Alan,
I understand what proof-texting is – although I suspect the theologians that prepared the Catechism disagree with your characterization.
I agree that the historical context of any text is critical to understanding it, but it does not place an absolute limit on it. Paul’s purpose in making the statement may have been in relation to promoting unity, but it still warns against approaching the sacrament in a state of sin.
on June 5th, 2008 at 8:45 pm
“P.S. There is also a sin that is referred to as formal or material cooperation. This would be when we fail to prevent a sinful act by not speaking out against it . Charity, out of Love, requires that we always speak the truth. I would hope that when Mr.Kmiec publicly endorsed
Senator Obama, he spoke the truth regarding the issue of abortion.”
I think this would also cover voting for people over the years who claimed to be pro-life and who in fact turned out not to be. No Republican who has run for president since Roe v Wade has embraced a Catholic position on abortion. “Speaking out” on one hand and voting for people who don’t do anything on the other hand seems to me to be tacit support. “Speaking out” itself instead of acting looks more like a salve to one’s conscience than radical conviction.
on June 5th, 2008 at 9:32 pm
Abp. Chaput has been know to personally respond to e-mail questions? Have you asked for an explanation before publically calling him out for not doing so?
on June 5th, 2008 at 9:46 pm
Now here is something I can deal with. Let the bishops become more humble. They sure need it and the pope agrees with me.
http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=58857
And here is someone who really understands the abortion issue.
Evangelicals are adamant, but religion really has nothing to say about the
issue.
By Garry Wills
November 4, 2007
What makes opposition to abortion the issue it is for each of the GOP
presidential candidates is the fact that it is the ultimate “wedge issue”
— it is nonnegotiable. The right-to-life people hold that it is as strong
a point of religion as any can be. It is religious because the Sixth
Commandment (or the Fifth by Catholic count) says, “Thou shalt not kill.”
For evangelical Christians, in general, abortion is murder. That is why
what others think, what polls say, what looks practical does not matter
for them. One must oppose murder, however much rancor or controversy may
ensue.
But is abortion murder? Most people think not. Evangelicals may argue that
most people in Germany thought it was all right to kill Jews. But the
parallel is not valid. Killing Jews was killing persons. It is not
demonstrable that killing fetuses is killing persons. Not even
evangelicals act as if it were. If so, a woman seeking an abortion would
be the most culpable person. She is killing her own child. But the
evangelical community does not call for her execution.
About 10% of evangelicals, according to polls, allow for abortion in the
case of rape or incest. But the circumstances of conception should not
change the nature of the thing conceived. If it is a human person, killing
it is punishing it for something it had nothing to do with. We do not kill
people because they had a criminal parent.
Nor did the Catholic Church treat abortion as murder in the past. If it
had, late-term abortions and miscarriages would have called for treatment
of the well-formed fetus as a person, which would require baptism and a
Christian burial. That was never the practice. And no wonder. The subject
of abortion is not scriptural. For those who make it so central to
religion, this seems an odd omission. Abortion is not treated in the Ten
Commandments — or anywhere in Jewish Scripture. It is not treated in the
Sermon on the Mount — or anywhere in the New Testament. It is not treated
in the early creeds. It is not treated in the early ecumenical councils.
Lacking scriptural guidance, St. Thomas Aquinas worked from Aristotle’s
view of the different kinds of animation — the nutritive (vegetable)
soul, the sensing (animal) soul and the intellectual soul. Some people
used Aristotle to say that humans therefore have three souls. Others said
that the intellectual soul is created by human semen.
Aquinas denied both positions. He said that a material cause (semen)
cannot cause a spiritual product. The intellectual soul (personhood) is
directly created by God “at the end of human generation.” This
intellectual soul supplants what had preceded it (nutritive and sensory
animation). So Aquinas denied that personhood arose at fertilization by
the semen. God directly infuses the soul at the completion of human
formation.
Much of the debate over abortion is based on a misconception — that it is
a religious issue, that the pro-life advocates are acting out of religious
conviction. It is not a theological matter at all. There is no theological
basis for defending or condemning abortion. Even popes have said that the
question of abortion is a matter of natural law, to be decided by natural
reason. Well, the pope is not the arbiter of natural law. Natural reason
is.
John Henry Newman, a 19th century Anglican priest who converted to
Catholicism, once wrote that “the pope, who comes of revelation, has no
jurisdiction over nature.” The matter must be decided by individual
conscience, not by religious fiat. As Newman said: “I shall drink to the
pope, if you please — still, to conscience first, and to the pope
afterward.”
If we are to decide the matter of abortion by natural law, that means we
must turn to reason and science, the realm of Enlightened religion. But
that is just what evangelicals want to avoid. Who are the relevant experts
here? They are philosophers, neurobiologists, embryologists. Evangelicals
want to exclude them because most give answers they do not want to hear.
The experts have only secular expertise, not religious conviction. They,
admittedly, do not give one answer — they differ among themselves, they
are tentative, they qualify. They do not have the certitude that the
religious right accepts as the sign of truth.
So evangelicals take shortcuts. They pin everything on being pro-life. But
one cannot be indiscriminately pro-life.
If one claimed, in the manner of Albert Schweitzer, that all life deserved
moral respect, then plants have rights, and it might turn out that we
would have little if anything to eat. And if one were consistently
pro-life, one would have to show moral respect for paramecia, insects,
tissue excised during a medical operation, cancer cells, asparagus and so
on. Harvesting carrots, on a consistent pro-life hypothesis, would
constitute something of a massacre.
Opponents of abortion will say that they are defending only human life. It
is certainly true that the fetus is human life. But so is the semen before
it fertilizes; so is the ovum before it is fertilized. They are both human
products, and both are living things. But not even evangelicals say that
the destruction of one or the other would be murder.
Defenders of the fetus say that life begins only after the semen
fertilizes the egg, producing an embryo. But, in fact, two-thirds of the
embryos produced this way fail to live on because they do not embed in the
womb wall. Nature is like fertilization clinics — it produces more
embryos than are actually used. Are all the millions of embryos that fail
to be embedded human persons?
The universal mandate to preserve “human life” makes no sense. My hair is
human life — it is not canine hair, and it is living. It grows. When it
grows too long, I have it cut. Is that aborting human life? The same with
my growing human fingernails. An evangelical might respond that my hair
does not have the potential to become a person. True. But semen has the
potential to become a person, and we do not preserve every bit of semen
that is ejaculated but never fertilizes an egg.
The question is not whether the fetus is human life but whether it is a
human person, and when it becomes one. Is it when it is capable of
thought, of speech, of recognizing itself as a person, or of assuming the
responsibilities of a person? Is it when it has a functioning brain?
Aquinas said that the fetus did not become a person until God infused the
intellectual soul. A functioning brain is not present in the fetus until
the end of the sixth month at the earliest.
Not surprisingly, that is the earliest point of viability, the time when a
fetus can successfully survive outside the womb.
Whether through serendipity or through some sort of causal connection, it
now seems that the onset of a functioning central nervous system with a
functioning cerebral cortex and the onset of viability occur around the
same time — the end of the second trimester, a time by which 99% of all
abortions have already occurred.
Opponents of abortion like to show sonograms of the fetus reacting to
stimuli. But all living cells have electric and automatic reactions. These
are like the reactions of Terri Schiavo when she was in a permanent
vegetative state. Aquinas, following Aristotle, called the early stage of
fetal development vegetative life. The fetus has a face long before it has
a brain. It has animation before it has a command center to be aware of
its movements or to experience any reaction as pain.
These are difficult matters, on which qualified people differ. It is not
enough to say that whatever the woman wants should go. She has a
responsibility to consider whether and when she may have a child inside
her, not just a fetus. Certainly by the late stages of her pregnancy, a
child is ready to respond with miraculous celerity to all the personal
interchanges with the mother that show a brain in great working order.
Given these uncertainties, who is to make the individual decision to have
an abortion? Religious leaders? They have no special authority in the
matter, which is not subject to theological norms or guidance. The state?
Its authority is given by the people it represents, and the people are
divided on this. Doctors? They too differ. The woman is the one closest to
the decision. Under Roe vs. Wade, no woman is forced to have an abortion.
But those who have decided to have one are able to.
Some objected to Karl Rove’s use of abortion to cement his ecumenical
coalition, on the grounds that this was injecting religion into politics.
The supreme irony is that, properly understood, abortion is not even a
religious issue. But that did not matter to Rove. All he cared about was
that it worked. For a while.
Garry Wills is the author of numerous books, most recently “Head and
Heart: American Christianities,” from which this article is adapted.
on June 6th, 2008 at 7:24 am
In the event that you have asked for an explanation and one was not given, I’ll offer my suspicions.
Abp. Chaput’s harshest words, including the “deal with the devil” stuff, were reserved for Catholic politicians who do not use their positions to protect the unborn, and indeed proactively act to keep such protections from being enacted. He refers explicitly to the Cuomo-Kennedy position of politicians being “personally opposed” to abortion, yet not wanting to use the power of the state to prevent it. This was a particular focus in 2004, since, as we know, the Democratic nominee for president was a Catholic with a near perfect rating from NARAL, so I suspect Abp. Chaput and other bishops felt compelled to make a strong statement that this was not an acceptable position for Catholics.
This particular issue is not in play this year, since neither of the (presumptive) nominees are Catholic, so if there has been a change in the tenor of Abp. Chaput’s comments, I suspect that is the primary reason. I also suspect that if Rudy Giuliani were the Republican nominee, Abp. Chaput would be equally strident in saying that his positions were unacceptable for Catholics.
–
Of course, Abp. Chaput did not limit his comments to Catholics, he also spoke of the reaponsibilities of Catholic voters. In particular he said, ““If you vote this way, are you cooperating in evil?” he asked. “And if you know you are cooperating in evil, should you go to confession? The answer is yes.” As Prof. Kaveny has noted, this comment fails to distinguish between formal and remote material cooperation, and I would agree that it was probably ill-considered.
Nevertheless, it takes two leaps in logic unsupported by Abp. Chaput’s comments to conclude that Prof. Kmiec should be denied communion. Abp. Chaput implied that someone who supports a pro-choice candidate should go to confession (we should all probably go to confession more, but such a reading would be bending over backwards to be charitable). It would be another step to say that someone who supported a pro-choice candidate should not present himself for communion, and yet another step to say the if he does present himself for communion, he should be denied.
In short, I find it much easier to see a line from Abp. Chaput’s 2004 comments to his present comments than from his 2004 comments to Kmiec being denied communion.
on June 6th, 2008 at 9:44 am
Cathleen,
I am wondering if everyone agrees that the appropriate way to frame the question about voting for a pro-choice candidate–not because, but in spite of–his or her position on abortion is that the vote is indeed remote material cooperation with evil and can only be justified if the voter can come up with proportionate reasons. Accepting this line of reasoning means agreeing that Obama voters are presumed wrong unless they can make a case that they are right. It is kind of like “guilty until proven innocent.”
Also, I wonder about the implicit argument of many pro-life advocates (and seemingly of Archbishop Chaput) that the concept of proportionate reasons requires that Obama voters simply count numbers, and if they can’t come up with a number to balance out the expected number of abortions at the current rate during the next presidential term, they don’t have proportionate reasons. That argument is made explictly in the following from Jimmy Aikin of Catholic Answers:
http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/2004/0411fea4.asp
I can’t accept that argument, but at least to some extent it is the logical conclusion of the “proportionate reasons” argument. Or it is at least the conclusion that, implicitly or explicitly, some Catholic pro-life advocates are promoting as the intended meaning behind Cardinal Ratzinger’s statements and the pronouncements of the American bishops.
on June 6th, 2008 at 9:53 am
I agree that simply tallying up the numbers of various affronts to human life is too simple an approach is discerning the correct reason.
For one, there is the matter of incremental deaths. Abortion has not decreases in eight years of a “pro-life” presidency. Do we think it will increase, or not decrease, with a pro-choice president? The data from the last several administations does not suggest so.
Secondly, introducing new manners of affronts to human life into society ought to weigh more. Therefore, even though it may be that only a few dozen people were tortured, the introduction of torture into American military operations weighs more heavily for me than maintaining the current legal regime on abortion. But others may differ.
on June 6th, 2008 at 10:25 am
In his 2004 interview with the NY Times, Archbishop Chaput explicitly rejected the “simply count numbers” approach:
“And, it’s not calculating 40 million abortions against 40,000 deaths in Iraq. That’s not how you do the calculus.”
http://www.archden.org/images/nyt_transcript.pdf
on June 6th, 2008 at 10:47 am
“The time when the fetus can survive outside the womb”
I do not know of any fetus that could survive, on its own, outside the womb. A child is not capable of surviving on it’s own. Does this mean that children are not persons? We can no longer claim to be ignorant of the fact that Science has proven that Human Life begins when Dna is present that supports the existence a unique individual Human Life.
on June 6th, 2008 at 10:48 am
oops, that would be of a unique
on June 6th, 2008 at 11:01 am
I think the original question about a “teachable moment” should be answered, not likely.
The Xatholic Theolgical Society kicked off its meeting yesterday, and as John Allen reports, there is a big disconnect between generationally based culture one and culture two Catholics -and a good deal of tension as the Davidson and O’Connell presentations indicated.(So it is in this thread 9and others here as well.)
If folks are talking a kind of different language as they deal with heavy subjects , such as The Eucharist, its importance in unity and reconciliation or the correlative issue here of the role of the Ordinary as pastor, the conflict will obviously go on.
I thought it interesting that O”Connell noted she felt “pressure” to be the “right” kind of theologian.
Strikes me that not reallly dialoging across lines widens the divide and the disregard for what others think feeds on itself further.
That’s why the question of the Eucharist that both symbolizes and generates the unity we’re to find in the One Who is Head of Our Body is so vital.
on June 6th, 2008 at 11:17 am
Tom,
Thanks for the link to the interview. But it seems to me that Archbishop Chaput’s “calculus” is far more extreme than even Jimmy Aikin’s. He is not counting lives. Lives themselves do not seem to mean very much. Say the pro-choice candidate could prevent millions of deaths from illness, war, crime, and malnutrition. Archbishop Chaput is saying lives lost in those ways cannot compare to lives lost due to intentional intrinsically evil acts, and nothing can outweigh that.
It would mean that even if you believed the pro-choice candidate could avoid the otherwise certain outbreak of World War III, you would still have to vote “pro-life”!
on June 6th, 2008 at 12:19 pm
One of the things I hate about the current state of discourse is that “extreme” is used as a synonym for “incorrect.”
The position you describe is not “more extreme” than the position that affronts to human life should be assigned importance based on the number counts; it’s looking at the issue from another direction.
Catholic teaching is that just ends cannot justify immoral means. If shooting one innocent person in the head could prevent World War III, it would still be immoral for me to do it.
Abp. Chaput extrapolates this to voting. The validity of this extrapolation can be argued — I don’t it’s valid, as I am not convinced that voting for a pro-choice candidate qualifies as an immoral means.
But I think it deserves a better response that being dismissed as “extreme.”
on June 6th, 2008 at 1:07 pm
David,
Archbishop Chaput is saying that moral choices are not to be determined by arithmetic estimates. He is arguing against consequentialism. (Consequentialism, incidently, would benefit Republicans in this case.)
This is not the same as saying that arithmetic estimates are always and everywhere irrelevant to moral choices.
on June 6th, 2008 at 1:22 pm
John,
I don’t accept Archbishop’s argument, but I was not using extememe to mean incorrect. I am saying his argument goes farther than Jimmy Aikin’s or anyone else’s I have ever heard in defining what “proportionate reasons” would be for voting for a pro-choice candidate. It goes beyond counting numbers of lives (as Aikin does) to counting numbers of “intrinsically evil” acts of deliberately taking lives. (”The calculus is on the intrinsic act itself.”) It basically says that, given the principles laid out by Cardinal Ratzinger and the USCCB, voters simply have no choice than to vote on any issue other than abortion. I call that extreme.
One obvious weakness I see is that the argument seems to assume the pro-life candidate will actually do something the end abortion, and that whatever he or she does will be effective. How many abortions has George Bush prevented since 2004 that John Kerry would not have? Certainly not a million plus a year. Also, it seems dubious to me to impute blame to government officials for acts they permit (or even facilitate) as if they committed the acts themselves, and then impute those acts to the people who voted for them.
Further, it seems doubtful to me that a moral theory of voting would narrow the criteria for a “correct” vote to one issue. Suppose abortion somehow becomes irrelevant. Woud everyone then be obligated to vote on what is now the secondmost life issue after abortion? Isn’t there always going to be one life issue that trumps everything else, if one’s theory is constructed along these lines?
on June 6th, 2008 at 1:26 pm
Tom,
That’s not how I read him. He is not dispensing with “calculus,” but rather replacing one calculus with another.
on June 6th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
I’d also call getting crucified extreme; that doesn’t mean it was the wrong course for salvation.
I agree with those weaknesses, and I am increasingly troubled with the pro-life strategy of getting “our kind of judges” on the courts. I don’t think victories gained by these means will be considered legitimate.
But I think you would acknowledge that it is theoretically possible for one issue to be of prominent importance, and “trump” all other issues. If one of the two candidates this year were promoting a total war of annexation against Canada, I would think that thwarting that would be sufficient to trump all other issues — abortion, the war in Iraq, global warming, et al.
Indeed, if one of the candidates made a prominent theme of his campaign a pledge to order the execution of a single innocent person, I would have great difficulty voting for him, regardless of his position on other issues.
For Abp. Chaput and many pro-lifers, abortion rises to that level, due to a combination of the scale and that it is an intrinsic evil. My opinion is that these commentators put too much weight on “intrinsic.” If the invasion of Iraq was unjust, those who were killed are just as dead, regardless of whether war is intrinsically evil. I also think this emphasis has resulted in many of our moral arguments coming down on whether a particular act is an intrinsic evil, with the default position being that if something is not an “intrinsic” evil, it’s OK, and we are losing the art of prudential discernment.
on June 6th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
I think the question about what counts as proportionate is a good one. In the end, you can’t avoid it.
The labeling of intrinsic evil doesn’t avoid it. The common discussion of intrinsic evil, like the discussion of cooperation with evil, seriously distorts the tradition. An intrinsic evil describes WHY an act is wrong, not the seriousness of it. An intrinsically evil act is wrong by reason of its object, not by reason of its circumstances. So lying is intrinsically evil, contraception is intrinsically evil, masturbation is intrinsically evil. It follows from this that an intrinsically evil act is always wrong; it does not follow that it is always a grave wrong. Furthermore, not all intrinsically evil acts are worse than non-intrinsically evil acts. Inflicting disproportionate collateral damage in a war is worse than contraception. Moreover, there is no greater moral requirement to intervene to protect people who are victims of intrinsically evil acts than those who are victims of actions wrong by reason of their circumstances, not their object. The fact that an act is intrinsically evil says more about its implications for the character of the agent than for the victim.
I think the term “intrinsic evil” is often used s a shibboleth, rather than as the technical term of moral theology which it is.
on June 6th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
David:
“Calculus” here means a way of determining what choice to make. So thankfully, no, he’s not dispensing with “calculus.”
on June 6th, 2008 at 4:00 pm
Check out this report in the daily drivel from the California wingnuts, and don’t miss the comments for a real flavor of the worst of theocons:
http://www.calcatholic.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?id=7dfed4b7-2e85-4390-88c4-4465181a7cec
on June 6th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
Thanks Jimmy, we were starting to have something approaching a productive discussion. I’m glad you brough us back to our real purpose, slamming our political adversaries.
on June 6th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Forgive me for not referencing specific prior contributions to this thread – it’s grown quite a bit since my last visit. But the question has been raised here, ‘If Catholics are opposed to abortion, and the bishops say we have to take abortion seriously as the greatest evil of our times, then we must vote for the pro-life candidate, right?’.
I’d reply that it’s not that simple. The decision of whom to vote for is at least one degree removed from an accurate reading of the “signs of the times”.
As I’ve mentioned a couple of times, I think it’s plausible to be in concert with the church on life issues, yet in seriously and prayerfully weighing those issues along with all the other issues, come to the conclusion that it’s best to vote for Candidate X, even though he/she is not pro-life.
What about politicians like Senator McCain or President Bush, who are pro-life in some sense but don’t subscribe to the fullness of Catholic teaching regarding the sanctity of life? I’d say, see my answer in the previous paragraph – that’s yet another factor to weigh.
I’ll add a personal opinion. I’m sure I’m not alone in seeing a greater stridency and militancy in tone and content from the bishops around voting and life issues in the last ten years or so. What I read there is frustration on their part: not that Catholics aren’t voting for their favored candidates, but that Catholics don’t seem to take the trouble to read the signs of the times. I think, if the bishops sensed that Catholic voters were actually taking church social teaching seriously and bringing it to bear in their voting decisions, they’d click their heels in glee – it would be a major step forward.
on June 6th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
“For Abp. Chaput and many pro-lifers, abortion rises to that level, due to a combination of the scale and that it is an intrinsic evil. My opinion is that these commentators put too much weight on ‘intrinsic.’”
They can’t help it because “intrinsic” supports their entire positon. Without that one singe word, abortion falls off the radar scope as the great evil of our time. What keeps abortion different from all other evils in this world according to the “calculus” is that it has been designated “Intrisincally” evil. How “intrinsic evil” differs from your normal garden variety evil remains a mystery. The use of the word avoids the need to address otherwise valid comparisons of abortion to acts that are not intrsinsically evil yet cause the death of innocent people.
But the entire weight of the argument rests on that one word.
on June 6th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
But that of course is the problem–”intrinsic” simply isn’t used that way in the moral theology tradition. It’s carrying some symbolic weight–but “intrinsic” doesn’t have that weight –a jocose lie is intrinsically evil. Jim is right–it sounds mysterious it sounds quasi-technical. But it doesn’t do the work they want it to do.
And that what makes the whole thing so frustrating–distortion after distortion of the tradition. The tradition isn’t being used to guide practical reasoning, it’s being used to give mysterious, post hoc justification to positions held on some other ground.
on June 6th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
Joe’s complaint about the use of the word “intrinsic” loses most of its force when you realize that abortion is, in fact, intrinsically evil.
Cathleen’s complaint about distortion of the tradition loses most of its force when you realize that it’s based on the moral similarities between an abortion and a jocose lie.
True, it is sloppy and wrong to say that what makes abortion such a grave matter for voters is the mere fact that abortion is intrinsically evil. What makes abortion such a grave matter for voters — not just one issue among many but one that must always be opposed — is the fact that abortion is utterly contrary to moral principles that do not admit of exception, compromise, or derogation. What is at stake with laws regarding abortion is the essence of the moral law, which concerns the integral good of the human person. (I steal from the 2002 Doctrinal Note on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life.)
My impression (offered with no guarantee of support from the historical record) is that the term “intrinsic” was introduced into the debate in response to claims that what went for abortion had to go for capital punishment, then prominently emphasized in 2004 to distinguish opposition to abortion (which admits of no exception) from opposition to war (which need not be absolute).
What I find frustrating is the spectacle of Catholics who are more offended by Archbishop Chaput’s position on abortion than they are by Senator Obama’s.
on June 6th, 2008 at 9:26 pm
“What makes abortion such a grave matter for voters — not just one issue among many but one that must always be opposed — is the fact that abortion is utterly contrary to moral principles that do not admit of exception, compromise, or derogation.”
And yet pro-life voters who want to use abortion as a litmus test utterly refuse to punish politicians who only say they are pro-life but do nothing about it. The key case of this is that the “pro-life” party held the presidency, Congress, and the Senate and they did nothing to advance the cause.
And any excuse for this is simply an admission of compromise. An excuse that says that America’s heart isn’t ready to ban abortion (G W Bush) is a tactical argument like any other tactical argument, left or right. The Bishop may have the right moral position as such, but his interventions simply enable the politicians that have failed the movement. So why shouldn’t an activist admit failure? When one drops from principles to tactics, tactics work on another level. And that is what Kmiec is saying.
on June 6th, 2008 at 9:41 pm
Tom,
I don’t find Archbishop Chaput’s position on abortion offensive. It is his position on voting that I have a problem with.
on June 7th, 2008 at 5:59 am
Tom, I’m telling you what the MEANING of the term intrinsic evil is in the Catholic moral tradition. The manualists, the moral theologians, Veritatis Splendor would all agree.
It’s precisely because a jocose lie, masturbation, and abortion are all intrinsically evil ls that merely calling attention to abortion’s nature as an “intrinsic evil.” doesn’t do any work whatsoever. Intrinsic evil simply MEANS an action that it is wrong by reason of its object not its circumstance. I agree with you that a jocose lie isn’t the same thing as abortion. But they both qualify as intrinsic evils. So saying something is an intrinsic evil isn’t decisive. And yet it is some pro-lifers who invoke it as if it is a decisive factor–it’s not.
“Abortion is utterly contrary to moral principles that do not admit of exception, compromise, or derogation”. This statement is philosophically incoherent as it stands. Moral principles admit of exception,compromise, and derogation. Moral rules (some moral rules) do not. the rule at stake here isn’t “Don’t have an abortion,” but “Don’t intentionally kill an innocent human being.” Rules are also regularly interpreted and applied. There is an enormous debate in the tradition about what counts as intentional killing –some abortions (removing a cancerous uterus) are permitted precisely because they don’t count as intentional killing.
The rule “Don’t intentionally kill an innocent human being” holds always because the actions’ object picked out “intentionally killing an innocent human being” (the finis operis) is always wrong. It’s an intrinsically evil act. Every intrinsically evil act is always wrong without exception. The church teaches you cant’ use contraception to save the life of the mother, because her uterus can’t support another baby. . You can’t use a condom to prevent HIV=AIDS, even if you’re married, and (by the way, some think a woman has an obligation to continue to render the marital debt under these circumstances.) You’re not supposed to lie,according to this view, to save the Jews from Nazis at the door. Better to permit many deaths than to commit one moral wrong.
Now, the fact that an act is intrinsically wrong doesn’t always say how wrong it is. But you’re never allowed to commit ANY intrinsically evil act no matter what the consequences.
The pro-life people who invoke it as if it is a decisive factor are merely using it like a term of incantation–they are not making an argument. If the only thing that mattered were the “intrinsic evil” part, we, need to organize to prevent people from engaging in the other actions too. Is that what you want to do, Tom? If not, why not? The no “derogation, exception” stuff doesn’t help. If you want to argue action theory, I’ll argue action theory. But it’s a dead end for your argument.
You need to argue that abortion is a 1) a graver evil than other sorts of killing; and 2) that it is an evil third parties have a greater duty to intervene to prevent; and 3) the best way to do this is to vote for a Republican candidate. And some who votes for a Democrat needs needs to make the parallel argument on the other side. That’s where the discussion should be. And it’s not clear-cut how to think about it. It needs a lot of work.
As for offense, I think David hit the nail on the head. I am also offended by people who systematically distort the Catholic moral tradition (on cooperation, on intrinsic evil, on proportionate reason) in order to pressure good-meaning people less familiar with that tradition than I am to vote one way rather than the other–and tell them they’re committing a serious sin if they don’t go that way.
on June 7th, 2008 at 10:25 am
Cathleen, there is nothing to debate here. It is a truth of the Catholic Church that the willfull destruction of innocent human Life is ALWAYS intrinsically evil. How wrong is it? It is ALWAYS wrong. What is not clear is your view on abortion. Why have you not made a statement regarding the fact that the Catholic Church has stated that the willfull destruction of innocent Human Life is ALWAYS evil?
on June 7th, 2008 at 10:45 am
“Why have you not made a statement regarding the fact that the Catholic Church as stated that the willful destruction of innocent human life is always evil.”
I did, in the post above. (Except that I would say, “intentional,” not “willful,” because intentional is the term used in the tradition). “Willful” is sometimes used to encompass foreseen but unintended side effects. Foreseen but unintentional killing of innocents –born and unborn– is sometimes wrong, sometimes not, depending upon the circumstances.
on June 7th, 2008 at 11:47 am
And by the way, “innocent” in the tradition doesn’t mean little and cute. It means not judged guilty by law and not in the midst of an act of aggression. It too is a technical term.
on June 7th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
I have never heard of an aggressive infant.
on June 7th, 2008 at 3:45 pm
David:
It’s a sophistical distinction, but if you and Cathleen prefer it, what I find frustrating is the spectacle of Catholics who are more offended by Archbishop Chaput’s position on voting than they are by Senator Obama’s position on abortion.
on June 7th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Archbishop Chaput is not afraid to speak the Truth.
on June 7th, 2008 at 8:29 pm
How insightful for the 100th post.
Have you ever been in a room where folks keep making the same points repeatedlty tojustify themselves and you want to tell them (nicely) to take the proverbial?
By the by, the issue, I thought, was the use of power, with political overones, by clergy to proclaim a point of belief.
on June 8th, 2008 at 7:15 am
101 posts. . . .
Seems enough to me.
Have a good weekend, all.
on June 8th, 2008 at 7:50 am
The Truth is powerful. Peace.
on June 11th, 2008 at 2:43 pm
In case anyone is still reading this thread, last night Keith Olbermann voted this Holy Priest of God (Ontologically Favored Man) his “worst person” award.
Perfect award for an imprefect awardee.