With Pope Francis having said since the beginning of his papacy that there are more moral issues in the Church than just abortion, he also said, that everyone knows the Catholic position on abortion but not so much on other issues of social justice or social morality.
Just to whom was His Holiness speaking? I happen to think that His Holiness was speaking to political ideologues who have criticized the Catholic Church for being more concerned about the unborn and not doing anything for the born. That is a caricature, of course, but an apologetic often used against the Church’s pro-life teaching as it concerns abortion immorality in all circumstances and without exception.
From Vox: (In His Holiness’) 22,000-word Gaudete et Exsultate (“Rejoice and Be Glad”), a type of papal document known as an apostolic exhortation, represents a reiteration of Pope Francis’s core values as pontiff. Throughout the document, Francis repeatedly stresses the importance of mercy and everyday acts of holiness over a narrow focus on judgment and righteousness. He condemns those who “feel superior to others because they observe certain rules or remain intransigently faithful to a particular Catholic style.”
And Vox quotes the following:
Francis also condemned “single issue” Catholicism
Francis also argued that while opposition to abortion is an important hallmark of the Catholic faith, it shouldn’t be used as a wedge issue, or replace a wider concern for Catholic social justice. Critiquing those for whom “the only thing that counts is one particular ethical issue or cause that they themselves defend,” Francis wrote:
While these views aren’t new for Francis — he’s long been a particularly fierce advocate for social justice, for refugees, and for the poor — it’s nevertheless significant that he’s using his pulpit to advocate for a less narrow focus on abortion, long a crucial issue for Catholics.
My final comments: When one humbly listens to all that Pope Francis has written and said about abortion, there is no question that he sees it as a crime against humanity, like hiring a mafioso hitman to snuff out a life in the most heinous way possible. Think of some the the gang style killings graphically depicted in the movie trilogy, The GodFather.
In another post below this one, we saw were Pope Francis says that those who belong to the Mafia in Italy are excommunicated (without explicitly excommunicating them or making it a canonical issue in Italy for each bishop there to do so).
But who is worse? The hitman or the one who enables the hitman to do what he does? Who is worse, Hitler who we believe never killed anyone himself in a concentration camp, but the hitmen he enabled to do the Holocaust and to do it legally? Both are equally culpable and deserving of condemnation and criminal sanctions.
We must pray that Pope Francis, the bishops in union with His Holiness and the Vatican itself understand that Catholic politicians, be they the President of the USA or any other country or Speaker of the House or any other legislative body, are equally to be held accountable before God and the Church through their enablement of others to be like mafioso hitman hired by others to legally kill someone.
The crimes against humanity that the president and speaker enable should be treated as such and maybe one day there will be an international tribunal to place them on trial as well as those they enable to act like hitmen.
In the meantime a spiritual and physical excommunication is needed. In doing so, this upholds the entire body of social justice teachings in the Church, from the womb to to natural death. Pull out the foundational of all morality, the protection of innocent unborn and born human life, then the whole edifice of Catholic social teachings collapses.
26 comments:
"WHEN POPE FRANCIS WARNED THAT CATHOLICS SHOULDN’T BE SINGLE ISSUED IN TERMS OF THE CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY OF ABORTION, JUST TO WHOM WAS HIS HOLINESS SPEAKING?"
Gee! That's a tough one! Maybe he was speaking to those Catholic who are single issued (sic) voters in terms of the crime against humanity of abortion!
It's clear that Francis has had about enough of the United States' dominance in world affairs and he has made it his business to promote other areas of the world over the US. Also it's clear that Francis doesn't care much about doctrine and he has demoted the CDF from being the premier dicastery to some secondary status. As far as I know, the US is the only large nation where voters and bishops even occasionally require their Catholic politicians align their votes with their Catholic principles.So it strikes me odd that he and his CDF have focused so much energy on a basically US problem. Was he so horrified by Trump that he is determined that the main "Catholic" issue that has been used against Democrats in the past can't be used in the future so that no Republican can ever get elected again? I suppose if the Bishops coalesced around gender identity and gay marriage as Catholic issues we'll get an encyclical about how those are off the table too?
Maybe he was giving political cover to the Party of Intrinsic evil because they are Global Warming and Illegal Alien worshippers like he is?
There are many Catholics who despise the very idea that a single issue like abortion could drive the vote.
The reason is simple: It convicts them.
Rather than own up to their failure to vote with the convictions of their faith, rather than have the humility to admit they might be wrong, rather than give up their other political sacred cows, they have invented "moral equivalency" issues and the entire "seamless garment" fraud.
They can explain all they like, but no one can explain away the more than 60 million children who have been legally "choiced" out of their lives in the U.S. since baby-slaughter was legalized from the bench in 1973. There is no moral equivalency.
So what do you do when someone else's convictions and faithfulness bring shame upon you? Easy: Flip the script and blame the other guy and create a lie to support your blame.
We are up to our necks in that lie right now. It won't last forever.
A@9:18, you are showing grotesque hypocrisy! Illegal Aliens, substitute intruding fetus! Global warming, the heat of abortifacients that could wipe out humanity. All things and rhetoric and interconnected and yours needs calling out as I would call out someone using fetus to dehumanize the life in the womb.
Father,
Don't work yourself up for a troll who isn't interested in a debate. He just enjoys trying to "push buttons".
Oh dear, the 3 most dangerous words during these times are "Pope Francis says..."
I am sure HH knows that the vast majority of political thought falls under what Rome would call "Prudential Judgement"
Gaudete et Exsultate (“Rejoice and Be Glad”),
"Equally sacred, however, are the lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute, the abandoned and the underprivileged, the vulnerable infirm and elderly exposed to covert euthanasia, the victims of human trafficking, new forms of slavery, and every form of rejection."
Of the above, I would pair euthanasia with abortion.Of course every life is sacred, but with those two, the issue is the extermination of human life. and with abortion, the prevention of life coming into this world. Not so with the other ones. And with Mr. Biden and Ms Pelosi, it is not just abortion, but a whole host of enablements,promotions, and policies which violate Catholic teaching.
Under this administration, abortion pill restrictions have been relaxed, abortion funding bans have been done away,and billions of dollars authorized and approved for abortion. And there are other issues such as the implemention of LBGQT policies and programs throughout the Federal government.
What does it mean to be a Catholic true to the Faith? Are Pres. Biden and Ms. Pelosi ,who are the most prominent and public faces of the Catholic church in America, good Catholics or bad Catholics?
If one says they are good, then in what way can that be truly and faithfully argued? And if bad, then what is to be done?
I pray that our bishops make the right decision regarding these two and others.
Cardinal Ladria(on the possible formulation by the United States bishops of a national statement on worthiness for receiving communion):
“...it would be misleading if such a statement were to give the impression that abortion and euthanasia alone constitute the only grave matters of Catholic moral and social teaching that demand the fullest level of accountability on the part of Catholics.”
They do not constitute the only grave matters, but are preeminent and represent the gravest injustice. being that they involve the unjustified taking of human life, and fundamental in that they, in a most foundational way, violate above all Divine prerogative, but also unchanging and universal moral law, and so transcend the boundaries between divisions of man which constitute the different social and religious systems.
I pray that the bishops will do what God desires of them.
It is ironic that the Anonymous posting sarcastically at 9:18 a.m. who sounds very much like Anonymous TJM is called out as a hypocrite and a troll.
I don’t know whether you have addressed this article on the Blog (I was extremely busy with work during the relevant period—still am!) but I recently came across the following very thoughtful piece by Ross Douthat (has he ever written a piece that isn’t like that?):
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/02/opinion/pro-life-movement-14th-amendment.html
I don’t disagree with the thesis about the XIV Amendment and its underlying premise as explicated by my old tutor John Finnis (who is significantly responsible for my becoming a Catholic Deo Gratias), but Ross Douthat does make a very important point about realities that it behooves us all to acknowledge if we really do want to end abortions as opposed to just using it as a political cudgel, either sincerely (as I believe is usually the case among Catholics) or pretextually either consciously or unconsciously (as I suspect is the case for some, including perhaps some posting here). The real question is—just what are_we_personally prepared to sacrifice to help end abortion as opposed to just talking about it incessantly and attacking those who do not “toe the Party line” for good faith reasons? Here is a taste:
“But the anti-abortion cause is closely linked to a culturally bunkered Republican Party and a weakened religious right, it has few media megaphones and weak financial backing, and a lot of the country just seems not to want to think too much about abortion and to punish the party that forces it to do so. So it’s extremely easy to imagine the end of Roe leading to a little more state regulation over all (mostly limitations in the second trimester, along the lines of many European countries), but then for the few states that go further to find themselves boycotted and besieged, leaving the goal of ending abortion nationwide as far away as ever. . . .
“Especially because the plausibility of that goal depends on whether the pro-life movement can prove — through very literal policy demonstrations, not just rhetoric — that it can protect and support the pregnant women who would no longer get abortions in the world that it desires. The pro-choice side insists that these women’s independence and well-being and equality depends on a right to end a life that, were it wanted, would be called by name and celebrated with ultrasound photos on the fridge. Against that argument the anti-abortion movement needs more than just the ultrasound photo: It needs to prove the pro-choice premise wrong.
“The movement’s wiser leaders know this. Last year, for instance, The Atlantic’s Emma Green profiled Cheryl Bachelder, the former chief executive of Popeye’s and a rare pro-lifer in the C-suite world, who was working with other anti-abortion leaders “to brainstorm all the community support systems that would need to be stronger in a world where abortion is illegal: mental health services, addiction-recovery programs, affordable child care.” Green also reported that the Charlotte Lozier Institute, the research arm of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List, has been compiling a database of state resources for pregnant women in preparation for the hoped-for end of Roe.
“But, of course — as Green noted with dry understatement — actually getting a major expansion of social services in states that might conceivably ban abortion would require a different Republican Party than the one that exists today.”
In sum, get real!
-To my mind the Supreme Court seems to be moving in the direction of relinquishing the issue back to the states.
-Last time I checked, there is still no functioning abortion clinic in the state of Missouri and Mississippi has only one remaining. -So is the Court now or soon willing to allow the states to decide how they want to handle the issue?
-Mr Douthat ignores for whatever reason that many on the Pro-Life side have for years now been moving in the direction he advocates by providing assistance, both financial and material, to unwed mothers who choose to keep their child.
- He fails to mention abortifacients, which have come into increasing use and reduce the necessity of visiting an abortion clinic. With any overturning of Roe, these will have to be outlawed, but of course the illegality of the possession of certain things has not stopped their availability.
Beyond all this, the issue at hand for the Catholic church is what to do (if anything) about the President and Speaker of the the House, both Catholics who have reversed the Pro-Life policies of our previous President, and whose actions contradict Church teaching on a host of other issues.
“But, of course — as Green noted with dry understatement — actually getting a major expansion of social services in states that might conceivably ban abortion would require a different Republican Party than the one that exists today.”
My comment:
First, we have a lot more social service programs today than when Roe was decided and Republicans helped make that happen.
Second, I don't know what would require a different Republican party than we have today, but the one we have today is a heckuva lot better than the Democrat party we have today.
But are the measures, private and public, sufficient to achieve the desired goal? The following article offers much food for thought and a challenge:
https://www.businessinsider.com/republican-baby-bust-panic-wont-support-pro-family-policies-2021-4
A taste:
“Both Republicans and Democrats insist they're "pro-family," but American public policy is notoriously unfriendly to most families and children. Unlike other major economies, the US doesn't have subsidized child-care, paid parental leave, universal healthcare, or other key programs that help lift kids and families out of poverty and boost the middle class.”
In nations like Canada, Australia and NZ there are a LOT more social services and government benefits etc - than the USA - for any woman who has an “unplanned” or unwanted pregnancy yet for the size of each nation’s population there are still enormous numbers of legal abortions.
What this is largely about in our modern, pagan, Western nations is the right to have if, one chooses (and millions do choose) a lot of casual, recreational sex without any - or with the absolute minimum - annoying and or inconvenient consequences.
If it wasn’t for this key factor; probably a lot more people would find the snuffing out of early human life a lot more abhorrent.
Monica A.
Pregnancy as an “annoying and inconvenient” consequence of promiscuous, recreational sex.
Got it!
This is for Father K:
“I speak not only to the communicant, but also I say to the priest who ministers the Sacrament: Distribute this gift with much care. There is no small punishment for you, if being conscious of any wickedness in any man, you allow him to partake of the banquet of the table: ‘Shall I not now require his blood at your hand?’ (2 Sam. 4:11). If some public figure, or some wealthy person who is unworthy, presents himself to receive Holy Communion, forbid him. The authority that you have is greater than his. Consider if your task were to guard a clean spring of water for a flock, and you saw a sheep approach with mire on its mouth–you would not allow it to stoop down and pollute the stream. You are now entrusted with a spring, not of water, but of blood and of spirit. If you see someone having sin in his heart (which is far more grievous than earth and mire), coming to receive the Eucharist, are you not concerned? Do you try to prevent him? What excuse can you have, if you do not?
St. John Chrysostom who truly spoke "truth to power!"
Anonymous 2 keeps citing leftwing sources like The Atlantic. The Democratic Party is morally bankrupt and akin to a crime organization masquerading as a political party.
Here's a commentary on The Atlantic:
"Donald Trump broke The Atlantic. One of the last remaining sophisticated, left-wing outlets—indeed, one of the last physical magazines to which I and other conservatives I know still subscribe—has decayed into a monthly mélange of shallow leftist tripe. While the ideological crescendo has built over many months, today’s firing of conservative columnist Kevin Williamson seals the outlet’s fate: The Atlantic has become irredeemably partisan."
When you chase away the sentient, you are in trouble
Oh, and Father K, please do not lecture me on my town population density somehow causing a massive spike compared to the county numbers.
The town lacks entirely in large apartment complexes, almost exclusively single family homes with yards and fences, and even with the mask mandate and 1/3 the county population, accounted for 3/4 of county infections when the county had no mask mandate. The difference is not the density, but time of exposure to others, where town folk stayed in/worked in stores, restaurants, offices, etc, and we ended up OFFICIALLY 1:4 infected, and judging by plunging numbers, more like 1:2, and CLEARLY the masks helped not at all and may have made things far worse.
Anon 9:22 - St. John Chrysostom is not the source of our practice and policy today. And that is a very good thing.
Among his other comments:
"The Jews sacrifice their children to Satan… They are worse than wild beasts. The synagogue is a brothel, a den of scoundrels, the temple of demons devoted to idolatrous cults, a criminal assembly of Jews, a place of meeting for the assassins of Christ, a house of ill fame, a dwelling of iniquity, a gulf and abyss of perdition…
The synagogue is a curse. Obstinate in her error, she refuses to see or hear; she has deliberately perverted her judgment; she has extinguished within herself the light of the Holy Spirit…
[The Jews] have fallen into a condition lower than the vilest animals. Debauchery and drunkenness have brought them to the level of the lusty goat and the pig. They know only one thing: to satisfy their stomachs, to get drunk, to kill and beat each other up like stage villains and coachmen…
I hate the Jews because they violate the Law. I hate the Synagogue because it hates the Law and the Prophets. It is the duty of all Christians to hate the Jews.”
It is good that our understanding of the Jews and our relationship to our elder brothers and sisters in faith does not hold sway today.
Fr K,
Are you willing to be consistent?
Would you be equally willing to condemn the foulest, antisemitic ravings of large numbers of Muslim religious and political leaders in the 21st century as you are willing to condemn certain Christian religious and political leaders of more than 1,500 years ago?
I doubt it.
Since the 1970s and 1980s, with many progressive Catholic theologians etc praising the merits of Luther (and claiming, for example, that for centuries, most traditional Catholic theologians have been too stupid to grasp that what Luther meant by faith, Aquinas meant by hope...and so on...) have you ever felt inclined to publicly point out Luther’s extreme antisemitic sermons and his hatred of Judaism and Jews?
Would you be willing to point out and object to the crudest antisemitic ravings of many secular, leftists in print TODAY and on the streets in recent days in Western cities, at protests about the Israeli defence forces attempting to protect Jewish and Arab Israelis from rocket attacks launched by Hamas terrorists?
Again, I doubt it.
As it has rightly been said of most “progressive” people on the Left, if they didn’t have any double standards, they wouldn’t have any standards at all.
As a Catholic, with maternal Jewish ancestry, I despise such double standards.
Anonymous at 6.11pm,
I think you are a little naive to consider the possibility that any "progressive" modernist Catholic and any Catholic ecumaniac would ever condemn or slightly criticise or would ever even honestly acknowledge the antisemitism of thousands of muslim politicians and community leaders or the antisemitism of the founder of Lutheranism...it wouldn't happen.
Anon 6:11 - Your doubt is unfounded.
Anti-Semitism is wrong yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Whether it comes from John Chrysostom or Louis Farrakhan, Martin Luther in 1543 or Dr. Nasser al-Yafawi in 2020, is is vile and destructive.
My response above was to a particular comment in which the poster attempted to use a quote from St. John Chrysostom to condemn me. That attempt was ill-conceived for a variety of reasons.
First, we already have policies and practices in place - there is no absence of advice and direction to priests.
Second, we do not, today, form our practices and policies based on one particular quote from one ancient Christian writer. This is one of the beauties of our Church, that we can synthesize the wisdom of the centuries. Matthew 13:52 "He said to them, 'Therefore every teacher of the law who has become a disciple in the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old.'"
Regarding the tragedy we are seeing continually unfolding in Palestine, I hope and pray that BOTH Israelis and Palestinians will find a way to turn from violence and destruction and to seek a path toward mutual respect and justice. I hope and pray that BOTH sides will reject hatred and demonization of the "Other."
But Fr Kavanaugh,
Would you on a blog or website followed by many devout Muslims write/post about how wrong is the worst sort of antisemitism preached by many Muslim imams?
Or:
When mixing socially with Protestant pastors would you ever remind them of Luther's terribly antisemitic sermons and writings?
I think: No.
Because you'd always show more respect to Muslims and Protestants - the sort of respect you often don't show to traditional Catholics on this blog.
Anon 9:48. Again, your assumption is wrong.
You confuse disagreement with disrespect. It is quite common today to see this, and it is often manifested as "You hate (fill in the blank)!" when, in fact, there has simply been an expression of disagreement. I can and do disagree with some people, all the while maintaining respect for them.
I have stated plainly that anti-semitism is wrong. You can manufacture whatever scenarios you like about what I might or might not do in this or that set of circumstances.
Would I, in a social setting, approach a Protestant pastor and say, "Let me remind you of Luther's antisemitism" No, I would not. Why not? Because I am not a jerk, and that is how a jerk would behave.
Like any other sin, especially serious sin, hate of another person is wrong and self-destructive no matter who practices it. While we may seek to understand the reasons for it, and may forgive the person who hates, we should not fail to condemn the hate itself.
Anti-Semitism is truly vile, but criticism of specific Israeli governmental policies is not to be equated with anti-Semitism; otherwise, many Jews themselves would be guilty of it. By the same token, criticism of specific policies of the U.S. government is not to be equated with anti-Americanism—a distinction that we seem to be in danger of forgetting because it seems many can (no longer) think straight but allow themselves to be manipulated.
Post a Comment