Times Editorial

The op-ed to which Susan referred was written by Mark Roche, dean of the College of Arts and Letters here at Notre Dame. You can link to the full text of the piece here. Given our discussions of the very real problems confronting American Catholic voters, it's particularly timely. I recently had a discussion with a colleague who is deeply involved in the Catholic worker movement. She argued that voting is no substitute for the Christian action and engagement required of us as believers in a lived Catholic faith. Better not to vote for president at all and to focus on living out our faith in a way that makes our values real. What, for instance, is more likely to limit abortions in this country--voting for George Bush, or active involvement in the activities and institutions that witness the Catholic respect for life to those people most likely to feel the hopelessness or alienation that tends to lead to the choice of abortion? How many Catholics are really care about why abortions are so much more common in the United States than in most other wealthy industrialized nations?

Vince