I believe that this may have been said before in other threads, but I’ll risk repeating it again. The question about abortion is about human rights. Every human being has the right to be born unless his or her life is take by God through natural means.
The pro-life position is not an imposition of a religious belief on the voter or the legislator. It is a defense of human rights, which this nation along with the civilized nations of the world has promised to protect.
This is not to say that one cannot vote for a pro abortion candidate for because one is conscious of a good that can be achieved, without comprimising one’s commitment to human rights. But this is a very difficult choice to make given what it happening in modern politics.
There are apologists who believe that it is impossible to vote for a pro-abortion candidate without sacricing orcompromising one’s belief in human rights. Then there are apologists and theologians like Archbishop Charles Chaput, OFM Cap. who have explained this well. The right to life is the fundamental issue of all time. Every other issue trumps this one, even capital punishment. The reason for this is that the human being who is still in the mother’s womb is innocent and defenseless. Civilized society owes it to defend the right to live of every human being who cannot defend himself.
Render Unto Caesar by Archibishop Chaput, OFM Cap should be required reading for everyone before voting, Catholics and non Catholics. Chaput puts this into the conext of human rights and takes the question out of the context of religious belief. He uses pure reason and history to show that the State does not have all of the rights that it claims to havae, even in its attempt to protect and represent the rights of all its citizens.
The idea of a State that protects the rights and freedoms of its citizens is a moral good that must be promoted. But the means by which the State does so are often a violation of the State’s own rights. The State does not have the right to rewrite natural law, because it is not its orignal author. Therefore, it cannot edit it to meet the needs of its constituents.
Here is where the Church’s teaching of Religious Freedom enters into the picture. When the State rewrites natural law, it violates religioius freedom. Religious freedom is based on natural law. Citizens have the right to defend the rights of the unborn. It is their moral right. If the State says that the unborn has no rights, then the citizens’ right to defend it is curtailed abrogated.
Fraternally,
JR
