DOUG KMIEC: Catholic Reasons for Hope in the General Election

By Douglas W. Kmiec
6/7/2008
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

"As a matter of Catholic teaching, who�s right? None of us. Who�s wrong? Also, none of us. Catholic teaching simply does not supply a single, definitive answer."

Both major political parties in the United States now have presumptive nominees for President. How a Catholic Voter should evaluate the policy positions of both of those candidates based upon the priniciples of Catholic social teaching,and inform their vote,is a subject of continuing debate.

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MALIBU, CA (Catholic Online) - Now that the two major parties have identified their nominees for President, Catholics must undertake the serious task of discerning whether there are faith-based reasons to support one candidate over another.

Deacon Keith Fournier has written that he cannot endorse either Senator Obama or Senator McCain at this point. I have endorsed Senator Obama. The distinguished Catholic politics scholar, Robert George of Princeton, has endorsed Senator McCain.

As a matter of Catholic teaching, who�s right? None of us. Who�s wrong? Also, none of us. Catholic teaching simply does not supply a single, definitive answer.

The Catholic Church does not presume to tell citizens how to vote, or endorse particular candidates, but it does outline important moral considerations, including the admonition that no Catholic can choose a candidate for the purpose of advancing a moral evil such as abortion or racism. A Catholic without that intent is free to support either Senator Obama or McCain or anyone.

Deacon Keith Fournier observes that even though Senator Obama �has regularly spoken of and demonstrated in his public interest work a concern for the poor,� he needs �to expand his message of hope to include giving the hope of birth to our littlest neighbors.� From a Catholic perspective, this is sound advice.

Likewise, Deacon Fournier notes in relation to the �support [of] deadly research and experimentation on human embryonic life[,] Senator McCain tries to justify this barbarism with reference to the fact that these human embryos will inevitably die in this unethical research, calling them �spare embryos�. We need to help him see the error of that position.� Amen to that as well.

However, in raising �other considerations,� Deacon Fournier comments that �the next occupant of the White House will choose at least one Supreme Court Justice. That choice will, at least in this Constitutional lawyers mind, determine whether the current �culture of death� hiding under the profane precedent of Roe v Wade will take another generation of our children before they are able to breathe our air and be welcomed into our family.�

Those are heart-felt words, but for the reasons discussed below, they assume � mistakenly � what the overturning of Roe would actually mean. Given that abortion is an intrinsic evil without justification, thinking the overturning of Roe �solves� the abortion problem, when it does not, can mislead Catholics into the erroneous conclusion that any candidate unwilling to pledge reversal of Roe is categorically unworthy of support. I suspect that this is why the Deacon �dreads� the beginning of the campaign since both of the major candidates fall short of the Catholic ideal on the issue of the protection of human life.

So let�s examine the nettlesome tragedy of abortion and the insufficient approaches of both candidates to date. Senator Obama�s position accepts the existing legal regime which leaves the abortion decision with the mother as a �constitutional right.� Senator McCain's position would leave the decision with the individual states. Neither position is fully pro-life, both are pro-choice, with the former focused on the individual and the latter focused on the right of the states. Senator McCain's position is sometimes described as pro-life, but in truth, it is merely pro-federalism (states being free under the McCain position to decide to permit or disallow abortion as they see fit).

Independent of my Catholic faith, as a constitutional law teacher, I respectfully disagree with both Senator Obama and Senator McCain since the Constitution was intended as a means to enforce and guarantee the unalienable right to life recited in the Declaration of Independence, where of course it is explicitly traced to our Creator. Since neither candidate presents a position fully compatible with Catholic teaching recognizing abortion for the intrinsic evil that it is, Catholic teaching asks us to work for the reduction of the incidence of abortion through the most prudent way possible.

There is no single answer on the most effective manner to reduce abortion either. My experience, and that of others whom I greatly respect for their tireless efforts in parish work and with Project Rachel and Catholic pregnancy centers, suggest that Senator Obama�s emphasis on personal responsibility (conveying especially to young people the need to understand the maturity and commitment needed for sexual intimacy) is the course most likely to make a difference.

I respect the views of my fellow Catholics who would place greater emphasis upon new legal prohibition or restriction, but my experience is that the more effective way to actually protect life is to work directly face to face with someone facing the awful thought of taking an innocent life. This is ...

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1 - 10 of 61 Comments

springspring
4 years ago
Hello, im new here. i just wanna say hello to all.
gengoparm
4 years ago
Funny Things coming later !!!
Clara
4 years ago
Dear Servicemember in Iraq,

Your letter to Professor Kmiec brought tears to my eyes. I lost a childhood friend in Afghanistan in October 2006. He is a hero. You are a hero too. Thank you for serving our country. We love you and appreciate your work securing our freedoms. Your words about respecting life give me chills. You are the man Professor Kmiec was at one time, and, hopefully, will be again some day. No other freedoms make sense if our innocent are denied the fundamental right to life. Obama's morality is foundationless. Kmiec has taken a detour (I hope only temporarily), but in the past he spoke plainly and truthfuly, like you speak. Let's pray that Professor Kmiec has the humility and honesty to return to the cause, as Christians we will welcome him back with open arms. Let's also pray that you return home safely.

Again, thank you for your service and your witness to the truth.

With Appreciation and Love,
Clara
elm
4 years ago
On June 27, there will be a funeral in MI for the children found in a dumpster behind a mill. Would Prof. Kmiec be willing to attend this service which will acknowledge that these victims have souls and are entitled to a burial? This is the one-on-one he mentions as being the way to go to overturn abortion in this country. Perhaps if we were to line up the tiny bodies for display in front of the abortion mills, minds might take a turn towards the culture of life. What we can't see doesn't exist. If John McCain saves even one child from the slaughter house, that would be worth any effort in electing him as President.

Would Obama meet with Father Pavone as John McCain has?
In Iraq
4 years ago
Professor Kmiec, and editors of Catholic Online,

I'm not sure who will see this comment, or whether Professor Kmiec or the Catholic Online editors will see it, but I'll try to be brief, and to the point.

Sirs, Catholic teaching is very relevant even to those of us, like myself, who are NON-Catholics. But, even if I were not, anyone who can type "Google" and "Barack Obama" and "Abortion" can find a few things, if he or she is of a mind to.

For one thing, he'd find that Sen. Obama stated before NARAL, in a public speech, that he would support, nay, would sign, the Orwellian "Freedom of Choice Act." They'd find, if they decided that wilfull ignorance would not rule them, that he blocked (yes, ACTIVELY blocked, not just passively) a ban on late-term abortions in the late 1990s when a member of the Illinois state legislature.

Now, how Professor Kmiec can make a comparison, in any way, shape or form, with Sen. McCain, or anything remotely resembling respect for natural rights, is to deviate (and, I use the term in the old-fashioned way), unequivocally, from clear thinking on natural rights theory, protection of the unborn, and Catholic doctrine in the most profound way.

May I write this as to the Baby Boomers: who decided that you could have an unilateral "choice" to abort us, your babies?

I'm of Generation "X", the first generation to be told, under American law (however hijacked it was by the Roe Court, according to separation of powers, as well as by the texts of the Constitution and the Declaration themselves), "You shall be the first generation that will not have the right to live!"

There's only one word for that: evil.

I say this as a NON-Catholic.
I also say it as a soldier currently IN Iraq serving.

Good Lord, sir. Are you SO against this war that I'm in (and, by-the-way, we liberated 25 million people here, and things are FAR, FAR better here than your avowed candidate says, daily, about conditions here. Of course, if he'd travel here, he'd find that out).

Oh, sir. Maybe Mitt Romney, who you used to work for - and very recently - HAD the same views as Sen. Obama, but he DID change them, did he not?

All of this because of opposition to war against a horrible, horrible man: Saddam Hussein.

Think I'm being too tough here, my fellow Catholic brothers-in-Christ?

I'm not Martin Luther, but I think that the greatest sin of modern life, now that we have the internet, is the wilfull ignorance of so many in modern life.

Prof. Kmiec, you are a brilliant man. You HAVE the internet, sir. You know (I know you do) about Roe (and Doe) both wanting their cases overturned.

You KNOW about Roe being the biggest judicial power grab since Dred Scott (I know you do; I know who your colleagues were, and I know you must read them occasionally still; I CERTAINLY know that you read them in the past, and their positions haven't changed, and you haven't CHALLENGED those positions, past or present).

To say that you "disagree" with Sen. Obama and make a false comparision with John McCain is to embrace wilfull ignorance in the hope that that wilfull ignorance of Sen. Obama's positions - on Iraq as well as on abortion - will, somehow, allow you to feel good about participating in them.

For shame, sir.

I love you as a fellow Christian, Prof. Kmiec, but, as one who's in Iraq, and as one who was saddled with the unkindest, and, yes, evil (reread President Reagan's "Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation") policies out of Roe V. Wade and Doe V. Bolton, all I can say is: for shame.

Well, apparently, it will be up to OUR generation, and those of my younger brothers and sisters (Generations Y, Z, Millenials), and ANYONE non-Boomer, to speak the truth and protect our future generations from this evil.

Oh, and, by-the-way, I honor your past service, sir, but you, as well as millions of Catholics (indeed, Americans) have lost your moral way vis-a-vis this false moral equivalence.

You may even know it already, which is why you'll probably not respond to this letter.

Too tough, but too truthful.

Sincerely,
A servicemember in Iraq

PS - Sorry if I'm too tough, but Jesus was pretty tough, too, on the money-changers in the Temple.

With love,
Generation X in Iraq
Patrick
4 years ago
Your dismissal of the importance of the individual appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court is disingenuous and intellectually dishonest. You are certainly too intelligent and educated to believe your drivel that Obama will be "more open . . . to work for greater recognition and respect for the culture of life" than McCain.

Your reasoning, besides being factually fictitious, is pathetic. Please, Mr. Kmiec, give us one example where Obama has exhibited his "dedication toward reducing the partisanship of the past." Just one. Please.

I'm sorry that you can't be honest with yourself about why you like Obama, but please spare us any more of your pitiful apologies.
A. Smith
4 years ago
Great post, Franklin. You're right, Kmiec has softened his moral stance. Obama has power over idealistic types, like Kmiec. The emotional entrallment is the yearning for perfection (Heaven on Earth). God help us if this Obama is elected with the help of Catholics like Kmiec!
Franklin
4 years ago
For a mesmerizing, charismatic cult figure, it's easy gathering followers - even those smart Christians who would naturally oppose Obama will talk themselves out of their own beliefs and into those of their new Leader....

If the follower is emotionally enthralled first, and when his rational faculties sense this he must try to explain his enthrallment in rational terms. But since enthrallment came before, rather than as a result of agreement on the issues, etc., something has to give.

And the anointed one just turns up the power of his smile on you; notice that he doesn't even try to persuade you. You think to yourself, "that shows how fair-minded he is, and how confident of his own positions."

But actually, he just knows he doesn't need to bother to win you over with argument, that it is you, Doug, who will slowly do all the work of coming around to his way of thinking. You have to, so you can get your condition of enthrallment in sync somehow with the belief that you make decisions rationally (out of your God-given free will)

He is smiling upon you, Doug, because it's working: you've already begun triangulating and triaging and softening your past moral stances on those who "give themselves up to uncleanness" and "changed the truth of God into a lie" and you're looking for the philosophy (libertarianism?) that will take the burden of responsibility for the murder of the innocents off of the government, and hence out of Obama's domain of influence.

And that warm chuckle is ofr you, too, because you've already begun to deepen your passion for the issues that Obamessiah holds high.

And now you have heeded his call, and been personally impressed with (enthralled by) his magnetic presence.

Bow! It is your time to embrace CHANGE, to worship and serve the creature more than the Creator.
catholiclawstudent
4 years ago
Prof. Kmiec, re: being denied communion:
The priest had every right to do what he did. As celebrant of the Mass, it his prerogative whether or not to give a person the Body of Christ. If the priest feels that a person is living in mortal sin, he cannot give that person the Eucharist, because in doing so he would commit an even greater sin. Receiving the Eucharist while in a state of mortal sin is a mortal sin itself.

Publicly supporting abortion is a sin. The law prof stated his public support for electing a candidate who supports abortion. The priest did the right thing in denying the Eucharist to the law professor, since the priest avoided committing a mortal sin himself by knowingly giving the Eucharist and avoiding having the law professor commit a mortal sin by knowingly take it while in state of mortal sin.

And finally, contrary to the professor�s comment at the end of the article, communion does not mean community. Communion, or more properly, the Eucharist, is the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, transubstantiated from bread and wine at the altar at the moment of consecration.
catholiclawstudent
4 years ago
If only there was a pro-life, anti-war candidate running whom Catholics could vote for... oh, turns out there still is: Ron Paul, who is still running for the Republican nomination, even though it looks very unlikely he'll get it... but miracles happen.

As for supporting Obama, I don't think Catholics in good conscience can publicly support a politician who sees nothing morally wrong with abortion (indeed, he hopes his daughters aren't "punished" with children).

A vote for Obama is a vote for a pro-choice justice on the Supreme Court.

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