Catholics and the 2008 Presidential Election

There have been several posts here at MOJ on the 2008 presidential election, some concluding that the only reasonable choice for a faithful Catholic to make is to vote Republican.  But many faithful Catholics disagree with that conclusion.

Consider, for example, this editorial from The Tablet, 9/6/08:

Pro-Life Is Not A Single Issue

It may not decide who is to become the next President of the United States, but abortion is once again a hot issue as the 2008 election campaign is launched at the conclusion of the two party conventions. As during the campaign between John Kerry and George W. Bush four years ago, so attention has again focused on the Catholic vote - approximately a quarter of the whole - and how it will be affected by the strongly expressed opinions of some leading members of the Catholic hierarchy. Joe Biden, the man chosen to be vice-presidential running mate for the Democratic candidate, Barack Obama, is, like Mr Kerry, an Irish-American Catholic who supports - in a qualified way - the pro-choice position.

The stance taken by socially conservative prelates such as Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver is that Senator Biden should not present himself for Holy Communion when he attends Mass, as he does every week. Indeed, he should be refused Communion if he insists on doing so. The fact that Senator Biden has opposed the legalisation of partial-birth abortion and is also against government funds being made available for abortion has not won him a reprieve from Archbishop Chaput's censure. But it may help him with Catholic voters in general, who by no means always do what their bishops tell them to. A significant number of them were persuaded to swing towards Mr Bush in 2004, but many have since noticed that America's pro-abortion laws are no nearer repeal as a result.

No doubt one of the reasons why the Republican candidate, John McCain, has chosen Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska is because she is strongly anti-abortion and therefore thought to be a magnet for conservative Catholic and Evangelical voters. But this is an area where the Catholic position itself is more nuanced. Whether or not a particular Catholic politician does or does not receive Communion is an issue that can cause hurt and embarrassment. But it does not stop Catholics from voting for him or her, even on a strict interpretation of moral theology and canon law. As Cardinal Ratzinger, Pope Benedict gave a ruling in 2004 that generally supported the case for adamantly pro-abortion Catholic politicians being denied Communion, but he added: "When a Catholic does not share a candidate's stand in favour of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons." This deserves to be more widely known, and is equivalent to the repeatedly stated view of the English and Welsh bishops that "a general election is not a single-issue referendum". Senator Biden has certainly been pro-life in urging outside intervention to stop genocide in Bosnia and Darfur, issues on which conservatives tended to be more restrained. He supports such pro-life causes - although not usually seen as such - as universal health care and measures to improve the lot of the American poor, among whom infant mortality runs at rates more usually seen in the developing world.

The demand that the Church should stay out of politics is transparently unreasonable. But if Catholic bishops are to exert political influence they must do so with a sophisticated appreciation of complex issues. If they are not careful, church leaders can find themselves being cynically manipulated by those whose real interest is not morality but power.

And consider this editorial from the National Catholic Reporter, 9/5/08:

Ways past the culture wars        

The choice of Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware as the Democratic vice presidential candidate brought an immediate and predictable reaction from those intent on using this election cycle to revive the Catholic culture wars.

Suddenly pundits knew “what kind of Catholic” Biden is and they were eager to frame his deepest motivations on the basis of a vote here and there on “life issues,” which in the world of the culture warrior translates as only one issue -- abortion. And they picked up immediate encouragement from on high when Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput issued the pastoral wisdom that Biden should refrain from receiving Communion.

To take that last matter first, Chaput’s pronouncement momentarily grabbed a portion of the national news cycle, but Catholics shouldn’t overreact. They would do better to read his book, Render Unto Caesar: Serving the Nation by Living Our Catholic Beliefs in Political Life, a far more nuanced and challenging presentation of his view of Catholic responsibilities.

They’d do better, too, by reading the U.S. bishops’ valuable and thorough reflection on political responsibility, “Faithful Citizenship,” which, while placing the protection of innocent life as the central consideration in pursuing the common good, also acknowledges the complexities of political life and the ambiguities that can sometimes confound even the most purposeful legislator.

Mr. Biden is, we suspect, closer to the people most priests face in the pews every week than the culture warriors would have us believe: devout, faithful, prayerful and questioning. The problem for him, of course, is that he plays out his life in public. Most Catholics don’t have to contend with a chorus demanding absolutes where sometimes only compromise and negotiation can serve the common good.

According to a recent Associated Press story, Biden has said in the past that he is “prepared to accept” church teaching on when life begins, but at the same time he believes that Roe v. Wade “is as close as we’re going to be able to get as a society” to a consensus among differing religious and other views on the subject. We suspect that view is held by a lot of ordinary Catholics and more than a few bishops, albeit privately. So the dispute becomes more over political strategy than church teaching. How to attack the abortion problem from the political stump in the political arena -- where compromise is the coin of the realm -- is far different from pronouncing from the pulpit.

The reality, as shown in poll after poll, is that Catholics, like most others in the culture, are looking for a politics on the abortion issue that is far removed from either extreme, a politics that can begin to effectively reduce the number of abortions. Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good released a study Aug. 27 that shows a strikingly direct correlation between the availability of social services and a drop in the number of abortions.

There is more involved in creating a culture of life than simply seeking the elusive ban on abortion. The culture wars have cost the church dearly in terms of political capital and credibility, and in the election of legislators who promise lots on abortion, deliver little and frequently ignore most of the rest of the bishops’ social agenda. No political party holds the complete Catholic vision of society.

Seeking a significant reduction in abortion will require more from us than protest and vilifying politicians. It will require an approach to the common good that places high value on programs supporting women and children, on assuring access to jobs and education and on dealing with the causes and effects of poverty.