In her op-ed, “Rambo Catholics and John Kerry,” posted previously on this blog, Professor Cathleen Kaveny argues that the election of John Kerry as President would force his most stalwart Catholic critics either to respond with violent resistance or, as apparently would be her preference, be “reduced to silence,” having been revealed as posers. (While saying she opposes “every inflammatory thing the Rambo Catholics write,” Professor Kaveny’s own response struck me as saturated with petroleum-laced rhetoric, most egregiously by constructing and then indicting the strawman of violent threats or tendencies.) More recently, in another statement posted on this blog, Professor Kaveny qualified her earlier statements to say that she meant only to chastise Rambo Catholics who “bully” others. An appeal to the consciences of faithful Catholics and the argument that voting for Kerry would be a serious sin is thus said to be the verbal equivalent of intimidation.
By highlighting the truly remarkable extremism of Kerry on the foundational question of life and his considered choice over his entire career to affiliate himself with the very people who brutally tear unborn children from their mothers’ wombs, I don’t know whether I too will now count as a nascent violent revolutionary or as an ecclesiastical bully by Professor Kaveny’s lights. If that’s what it takes to be placed alongside Gerard Bradley and Robert George (as well as Archbishop Burke, Bishop Sheridan, Archbishop Meyers, etc.), then I must regard these as terms of endearment and ask where I too can enroll in the Catholic Rambo brigades. But it’s all mere distraction in any event, that is, a distraction from taking a clear and unvarnished look at the prospect of a pro-abortion extremist, professing a Catholic communion, being elected to the nation’s highest office.
Those who say they will hold their nose and vote for Kerry too often seem ready to close their eyes as well. John Kerry is not some misguided reluctant “pro-choice” politician who sincerely (if ineffectually) mourns the ever-growing toll of abortion on humanity. Through his career, Senator Kerry has been a calculating, premeditated pro-abortion warrior who has eagerly and warmly endorsed the abortionists themselves in his legislative votes, in his campaigns, and in his circle of political friends and colleagues.
As I’ve written in an article, Abortion, Bishops, Eucharist, and Politicians: A Question of Communion, shortly to be published in the Catholic Lawyer and available by link on this blog, the case of the Catholic communicant who holds political power but refuses to protect the life of the unborn calls upon the sensitive pastoral role of the bishop. Counseling, dialogue, and gradual formation of conscience ought to follow, with ecclesial sanctions being a last resort. At the same time, the bishop has a continuing duty to instruct the flock and protect it from harm. In that article, we offer the example of the Catholic politician who sincerely opposes abortion but has not yet developed the wisdom or summoned the the courage to stand forcefully against the culture of death. With respect to eligibility for the sacrament of Eucharist, we allowed that, while ultimately unsatisfactory and thus acceptable only as a provisional sign of gradual conversion, profession of personal opposition to abortion by a Catholic politician who combines that easily-made assertion with at least some actions to limit or reduce abortions may satisfy the interim predicates for continued admission to the altar. (Some have accused us of being too “soft” in making such an allowance for human weakness, even if regarded as a preliminary step in the road to conversion.)
However, we also emphasized that such preliminary steps toward the culture of life by a politician must be accompanied by frequent and unequivocal public condemnation of abortion and a refusal to collaborate with those performing such evils. At a minimum, we would expect that any Catholic politician claiming respect for unborn human life would turn away as tainted any political money emanating from the abortion practitioner and would refuse with disgust any invitation to appear at a convocation designed to promote the interests of the abortion industry.
Sadly, even among so-called “pro-choice” politicians, Senator Kerry has been an extreme outlier, given his opposition to even the most modest of limitations on the abortion license, his insistence that public funds be devoted to procuring abortions, his vote to permit minor girls to be taken across state lines for abortions without knowledge of their parents, and his regular, easy, friendly and approving liasons with abortionists. It is not for naught that Kate Michelman, president of the NARAL Pro-Choice America, says that “[e]ven on the most difficult issues, we’ve never had to worry about John Kerry’s position.” John Kerry’s miserable record has earned him the abortionist’s praise.
Has John Kerry ever rebuked his abortionist friends, calling upon them to renounce their daily participation in an intrinsicly evil act? Has he ever refused a single dollar of blood-money from the abortion mills and abortion practitioners? Has he ever declined an opportunity to cheer on the abortion-providers and assure them of his unswerving loyalty? Has he ever refused to participate in a rally to provide moral encouragement to the abortionists and their assistants in plying their deadly craft? Has he ever voted for any minimal restriction on abortion, even when that restriction is supported by the substantial majority of the other legislators of his own party?
The plain fact is that John Kerry is not a “pro-choice” politician. Much worse, John Kerry is the candidate of the abortion industry itself.
It is for these reasons, principled reasons far beyond those flowing from ordinary partisan politics, that I and so many others genuinely tremble at the prospect of a President Kerry. It is difficult even to contemplate the appalling spectacle of a professing Catholic who knowingly and freely and energetically gives financial and legal aid and moral comfort to those who daily add to our national holocaust. Watching the most powerful man in the country throwing his arms in a warm embrace around those who kill unborn children, while banishing from government and judicial office those who would promote life, would be heart-rendingly painful. That this same man then could claim communion with the Church of Life is astounding. Such unavoidably would be an act of fundamental dishonesty and contempt for the Church’s witness to life. The scandal that would be caused to the faithful and the injury to the Church’s credibility and voice on issues of life might reverberate for years.
In words expressed by many other bishops as well, although not targeted at Kerry in particular, Archbishop John J. Myers of Newark has explained that “Catholics who publicly dissent from the Church’s teaching on the right to life of all unborn” have thereby chosen to separate themselves from the Church and “in a significant way from the Catholic community.” He asked that such people should “honestly admit in the public forum that they are not in full union with the Church,” and that any attempt by such a person to “express ‘communion’ with Christ and His Church by the reception of the Sacrament of the Eucharist is objectively dishonest.” To emphasize the fuller meaning and the powerful meaning of communion is not bullying; it is a matter of simple integrity.
Finally, contrary to Professor Kaveny’s indictment, the prospect of a Kerry Presidency does not evoke in me any thoughts of violence or plans for revolution. Instead, if this tragedy should come to pass, my heart will be broken. Still, I would not accede to any demand that I withdraw into silence or enter into “a life of monastic prayer” (however much I value those fellow-believers with a vocation to the latter). No, I would not be quiet in my expressions of grief. And when an appropriate term of bereavement had passed, a return to hopeful action would follow. At that time, I would hope to rejoin, both in communion and in concerted action for life, those who had played a role in bringing this debacle to pass by foolishly casting a vote for a manifestly unworthy candidate. We all make mistakes.
But the time for mourning has not yet come. We still may be spared the occasion of such grief. To that end, we must continue to speak, forcefully and faithfully, the truth of life, including calling upon our fellow Catholics to consult a conscience properly formed in the teaching of the Church when casting a vote upon which the lives of the next generation of the unborn well may rest. That some seek to distract us from revealing the frailty or cowardice of politicians who deliberately accommodate evil, while cynically professing communion, is all the more reason to bear witness.
Greg Sisk
