Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Here are two views: This, by my colleague, Don Kommers, at Huffington Post, and this, by R.R. Reno, at First Things.
According to Kommers, "Catholics who take the social teachings of their church seriously will reject any candidate who would wish to dismantle social security, oppose universal health care, get rid of the income tax, weaken trade unions, disparage the need for environmental protection, or disdain the creative role of government in the face of acute poverty and rampant unemployment." Later, he contends that "state intervention in the economy is as essential today as yesterday when, for example, federal laws were necessary to abolish child labor, to eliminate industrial sweatshops, to prohibit unsafe places of work, to outlaw union busting, to force employers to pay a living wage, to ensure the safety of food and drug products, to prevent companies from discriminating on the basis of race or sex, and to clean our air and water. To cut back on any of these features of the regulatory state or to oppose the great social achievements of the New Deal and Great Society, as some politicians are advocating today, flies in the face of all that Catholic social thinking calls for."
Well, maybe. Prof. Kommers is an excellent scholar, and a friend, but . . . it is not the case -- at all -- that one who takes Catholic Social Thought seriously (as Don does, and as I do) is thereby estopped from thinking that, for example, today's public-employee unions undermine, rather than contribute to, the common good; that the health-insurance policies recently enacted into law will do more harm, at great cost, than good; that some measures that purport to be environmental-protection or social-welfare measures are actually, well, not; that government programs like Social Security and Medicare are in need of dramatic reform, etc. It is a mistake -- a common one, but a mistake nonetheless -- to (a) identify certain principles that matter in the Catholic Social Tradition; (b) describe those principles in a way that ties them too closely to particular attempts to translate those principles into policy; and then (c) say that those who think the attempts fail thereby demonstrate their lack of devotion to the principles.
It is just as easy (and at least as accurate) to say that "Catholics who take the social teachings of their church seriously will reject any candidate who" opposes school choice, wishes to impose intrusive regulations on the hiring of religious institutions, social-service agencies, and schools, supports public funding for abortion and the selection of judges who will invalidate reasonable regulations on abortion, and enmesh the government in embryo-destructive research as it is to say what Prof. Kommers said. I'm inclined to think we should not be over-confident about saying either. Such Catholics will probably want to vote for someone, and they should not be *too* comfortable with their choice. I think it's important, though, to not suggest or imagine that those who vote differently than we would like thereby demonstrate their lack of "seriousness" about the tradition.
I have not yet received this campaign postcard from the Minnesota DFL party, but thanks to Grant Gallicho over at Commonweal for bringing it to my attention. In case you can't quite read it, the priest is wearing a button that says "Ignore the Poor." I'm not sure that it will be obvious to all voters, but it seems to be a not-so-subtle swipe at the Archbishop's decision to focus on the marriage issue. Who could have thought that this postcard would be a good idea?
UPDATE: I still question the wisdom of this mailing, but the DFL has clarified that it aims at a specific GOP candidate who is also a (nondenominational) preacher and is not intended to be anti-Catholic.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Last week I posted about those who have left the Catholic Church and discussed some of the data about the reasons they leave. Now Cathy Kaveny here and Peter Steinfels here have two excellent textured essays about Catholic attrition in Commonweal. Kaveny’s essay places a lot of emphasis on the sexual abuse crisis, which somewhat surprisingly was not as much of a factor as I would have guessed it would be in the Pew Forum study (only 25% of those leaving the Church cited it as a factor). But the recent resurgence of the sex abuse crisis and the ham-handed approach to it by the Vatican took place after the Pew Forum study, and I think Kaveny is on the mark in giving it the emphasis that she does. (Steinfels also thinks the new developments will contribute to attrition in more serious ways than were present at the time of the Pew Forum study).
As Kaveny observes, many Catholics who have left the Church have been concerned about their perceived complicity with evil. I assume it is not coincidental that Kaveny this week also has a column in America magazine here on the subject of cooperation with evil. The issue of liberal Catholics’ views that they might be cooperating with evil, however, is not the point of the column. The column starts with the question whether Catholics can support pro-choice candidates and moves to broader principles of Catholic thought on this general problem. On the principles she develops, in my view, liberal Catholics (who see evil in many facets of the Church) are not by any means required to leave the Church, but are permitted to leave (assuming they do not believe the Catholic Church is the one true Church – then leaving would not be an option). If that is an easy case for discretion, there are much harder cases and quite insightful discussion of circumstances in which one might through one’s action permissibly provide support for evil in one context (though regretting this effect of the action), but be required to combat it in some other way. The essay has a rich discussion of areas in which moral theology’s discussion of the issues involved in cooperation with evil are underdeveloped. I very much like her contrast between the prophets’ and the pilgrims’ approaches to the issue. Kaveny’s column in America and the two essays in Commonweal are well worth reading.
cross-posted at religiousleftlaw.com
I recommend that all MOJ-ers take a few minutes to read Bishop William Lori's (Bridgeport) new pastoral letter, "Let Freedom Ring: A Pastoral Letter on Religious Freedom." I had the pleasure and privilege of spending some time with Bishop Lori last week, in connection with the Red Mass in his Diocese, and to talk with him about religious-freedom and constitutional-law questions. Connecticut is (as the letter describes) something like "ground zero" when it comes to the Freedom of the Church. I hope, though, that this letter will have a positive, educative effect. A taste:
The Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Liberty, issued on December 7, 1965, affirmed one’s right to worship in accord with one’s conscience and also implied the advisability of separating Church and State, that is to say, that advisability of distinguishing between the political power of the State and the religious authority of the Church, and protecting the latter from the former. This Declaration went on to teach that "the right to religious freedom has its foundation in the very dignity of the human person," not "in the subjective disposition of the person but in his very nature" (Dignitas Humanae, no. 2). Nothing in the Vatican II Declaration endorses the notion that society should be free from religion or that religion should be marginalized as something irrational or dangerous. On the contrary, the Declaration on Religious Liberty affirms the natural right of individuals to be free from State coercion with regard to privately held religious convictions as well as the natural right to express those beliefs publicly. This public expression of faith takes the form of worship but includes more than worship: it includes education, and various forms of community service. Here we think of our parishes, our Catholic schools, after-school programs, religious education programs, as well as the array of services offered by Catholic Charities and Catholic hospitals. But we should also lay claim to our natural right to bring our religious convictions into the public square, to engage the culture in which we live, and to participate in debates and discussions which help to shape our character as a civic society. As George Washington said of religion, "Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these pillars of human happiness."
Sunday, October 24, 2010
This past Friday, Villanova Law hosted its ninth-annual Symposium on Catholic Social Thought and Law, now named for Joseph T. McCullen. Past symposia went directly to topics in CST, but this year we decided to approach such topics by focusing on Jean Porter's brand new book, Ministers of the Law: A Natural Law Theory of Legal Authority. The very first copies of the book arrived via overnight delivery in time to be unveiled on Friday. Readers of MoJ will want to order this volume right away: as its title indicates, it concerns both the natural law and legal authority, and its constructive account of their interrelatedness is both novel and important. I would make my own the words of Russ Hittinger's blurb on the book's cover: "Jean Porter accomplishes a most unusual thing. She illuminates and at the same time renders subtle in every hue and shade a most difficult set of questions on natural law. I could not stop reading, and in some places disagreeing with, this splendid work. I think it is her best yet." It's got everything from Gratian to HLA Hart, and all of it a subtle but constructive balance.
All of the papers from the conference will be published in the Journal of Catholic Social Thought. In addition to the papers by Porter and by me, we can look forward to papers by Kevin Flannery, SJ (Gregorian University), Brad Lewis (CUA), Francis Mootz III (UNLV), Maris Tinture (Oxford), and Nick Wolterstorff (Yale).
Whatever else is wrong with the world, it's wonderful to be in dialogue with such serious-minded folks about such important, pressing issues. As I said, buy Porter's book! Brien Tierney says this about it: "A major contribution to modern debates on the grounding of law." And my friend Ken Pennington: "This book should be required reading for every American constitutional scholar and, in particular, every American Supreme Court justice." I say amen to that.
