Catholics Can Be Pro-Choice?

[Agnes_Ainsworth]

A few direct questions for SoCalRC!

1. If there is no law allowing torture how do we fight against it?
2. As you claim to agree with ALL the Churches teachings, including the evil of aborting ectopic pregnancies, do you believe it is your duty as a faithful Catholic to strive to abolish the law that legalised termination of pregnancy?
3. Before abortion was legalised some illegal abortions were performed, some were prosecuted for performing them and occasionally women died as a result of an illegal abortion. Do you believe, as many Catholics do, that it is preferable to allow legal and safer abortions ( for the women)
4. Do you believe that those of us who do campaign to change the law and attempt to demonstate that abortions are against the common good and actually damage the woman as well as kill the child, are inconsistent if we do not agree with your views on moral relativity and therefore wrong?
5. Do you think it is possible that when the Church condemned the interference of ectopic pregnancies that the judgements were faulty due to lack of knowledge? At that time I would imagine that most women who had ectopic pregnancy died anyway before the days of safe surgery.
6. To recap, does the Catechism of the Catholic Church or any twentieth century Papal document, reiterate the nineteenth century teaching on ectopic pregnancy?
7. What do you think faithful Catholics should be doing about the millions of abortions which are damaging all Western Nations?
8. Do you agree with Pope John Paul lI that we live in a culture of death and the cause is mainly the sheer number of abortions?

Forgive me if I misunderstand your arguments in these posts but I get the distinct impression that you are attempting to justify the law as it stands by nit picking with those who believe in attempting to repeal it. Whilst acknowledging your rhetorical skills and knowledge, I just cannot see the point of your discussion and challenge.

 

[BamaRider]

First SoCal posted this Church Doctrine as a rebuttal to what Ender said-

In effect the acknowledgment of the personal dignity of every human being demands the respect, the defence and the promotion of therights of the human person. It is a question of inherent, universal and inviolable rights. No one, no individual, no group, no authority, no State, can change-let alone eliminate-them because such rights find their source in God himself.

The inviolability of the person which is a reflection of the absolute inviolability of God, fínds its primary and fundamental expression in the inviolability of human life. Above all, the common outcry, which is justly made on behalf of human rights-for example, the right to health, to home, to work, to family, to culture- is false and illusory if the right to life, the most basic and fundamental right and the condition for all other personal rights, is not defended with maximum determination.

The Church has never yielded in the face of all the violations that the right to life of every human being has received, and continues to receive, both from individuals and from those in authority. The human being is entitled to such rights, in every phase of development, from conception until natural death; and in every condition, whether healthy or sick, whole or handicapped, rich or poor. The Second Vatican Council openly proclaimed: “All offences against life itself, such as every kind of murder, genocide, abortion, euthanasia and willful suicide; all violations of the integrity of the human person, such as mutilation, physical and mental torture, undue psychological pressures; all offences against human dignity, such as subhuman living conditions, arbitrary imprisonment, deportation, slavery, prostitution, the selling of women and children, degrading working conditions where men are treated as mere tools for profit rather than free and responsible persons; all these and the like are certainly criminal: they poison human society; and they do more harm to those who practice them than those who suffer from the injury. Moreover, they are a supreme dishonour to the Creator” - CHRISTIFIDELES LAICI, #38, quoting GAUDIUM ET SPES

So I read it, and noticed THIS when talking about the importance of right to life, which abortion is certainly under-

Above all, the common outcry, which is justly made on behalf of human rights-for example, the right to health, to home, to work, to family, to culture- is false and illusory if the right to life, the most basic and fundamental right and the condition for all other personal rights, is not defended with maximum determination.

Now that means what it means to me. A Catholic places the right to life above all else. Certainly above the social agaenda of American politicians looking to buy votes with minimum wage hikes, free healthcare, welfare checks etc. None of that matters if that politician faild to defend right to life with “maximum determination.”

But when I pointed that out SoCal said I was picking and choosing-

That’s called Cafateria Catholicism. You are picking a portion and both elevating it’s status and compressing its meaning. Notice it does not say ‘abortion’, but “right to life”. You have to look to the paragraph that proceeds it and the one that follows it to get the full definition of what that term means.

Now the SoCal likes to tell folks they don’t understand what they just read. But pretty clear to me, and nothing in the afore or latter paragraph does much to distract the meat of the statement. It is a pretty clear cut message to me.

So I told the SoCal this-

Originally Posted by BamaRider
So looks like SoCal is gonna be voting with ME come this fall LOL

But when confronted with that option he jumped and down and said this-

That is illogical. You publicly reject portions of Catholic pro-life teaching. According to the Church:

vatican.va/roman_curia/co…litica_en.html

That means I cannot, in good concience, vote for you because doing so would be an attack on “the essence of moral law”.

Don’t feel bad, this happens a lot. Folks get so convinced that they already ‘know’ what the Church teaches that they look at a quote without reading it closely. Much like Vern howing when I brought up the distinction between “human life” and “human person” in our teaching. He kept quoting the Catechism without noticing that it, in fact, used the term “human life”, as I had stated, and that the distinction was explained in Doctrinal Notes from the Church.

You’re so used to collapsing “right to life” to “abortion” (and collapsing ‘abortion’ to political voting), that you already have a perceived notion of what the quote means. But if you read all of #38 in CHRISTIFIDELES LAICI and EVANGELUM VITAE, you will see that our concept of “right to life” is expansive - look at the small section I quoted: “every phase”, “every condition”.

If this means right to life can be other things than abortion I can go along with that. But given this statement, and applied to U.S. politics, a candidate who is not pro life (whether hs is conservative or liberal) is to be avoided. And thats all I’m saying.

BUT liberals are liberals first, and will vote pro choice candidates if it means furthering their social agenda even if they are Catholic. I dunno if SoCal falls into this catergory or not, he’s certainly not gonna vote conservative (not hard to discern his dislike for it) even if they are staunch anti abortion, but that doesn’t mean he’ll vote for a lib. If the latter is true, and he sits this one out, then ok, thats one vote less for the liberal agenda, and that’s a good thing.

 

[janechantal]

Look, I think that we all agree that abortion is wrong. If you read the text of the original quote at the top, the poster is not suggesting that the church is for abortion. I read this quote as the church having a stated goal of no one having abortions in a society that allows them.
Would it be terrible if we lived in a society that legally allowed abortions, but through teaching, counseling, and other options, all pregnant women exercised their free will to keeping the baby?

‘Pro Choice’ doesn’t mean ‘Anti-Life.’

Do you think that teaching and all that you mentioned is not in forced today? Of course, it is. Many choose to ignore that, especially when it hits close to home. And, many women are using abortion as a convenient birth control method. Unfortunately we don’t live in that kind of society. If you recall, God set up commandments in order that parameters could be set for his little children to help them to live holy and healthy together on earth. When the children disobeyed, what happened to them? Only through Moses’ intercession for the people were they saved from being “poofed” off the earth forever. God expects us to have knowledge and wisdom now that we have the Holy Spirit living within us and guiding us. Many do not listen to His voice and do not use the gifts He gives us. Life is sacred. We must readjust our society to the right mindset over this and so we continue to pray for a reversal of Roe vs Wade, etc. and the hopefulness of life respect to return to the earth. We are the witnesses and the disciples on the earth today. We must continue to say what is right NO matter what!!!

 

[SoCalRC]

A few direct questions for SoCalRC!

1. If there is no law allowing torture how do we fight against it?

Actually, there are two issues. First, we have to call upon our elected officials to enforce and honor the laws against torture (both US law and US treaty obligations) and hold politicians who conspire to violate these laws accountable.

Second, it is not quite true that there is no law. Congress passed retroactive immunity for US war crimes prosecution in two military authorization bills. Since war crimes are an attack on “human life”, I believe that we Catholics are morallly obliged to vote against such laws and any politicians who support them.

1. As you claim to agree with ALL the Churches teachings, including the evil of aborting ectopic pregnancies, do you believe it is your duty as a faithful Catholic to strive to abolish the law that legalised termination of pregnancy?

Yes, it is my duty. Intellectually, I doubt the viability of this particular prong in the fight against abortion, particularly given the broad views of our society, but the Pope, as his predecessor, has spoken clearly on the matter. Since it does not clash with the absolute certainty of my moral concience, I obey.

1. Before abortion was legalised some illegal abortions were performed, some were prosecuted for performing them and occasionally women died as a result of an illegal abortion. Do you believe, as many Catholics do, that it is preferable to allow legal and safer abortions ( for the women)

The year before Roe, about 200 women died from abortions. After Roe, it dropped to about 20. I know that many here think that 180 is nothing compared to millions of unborn deaths, but they weight heavily on my conscience when I vote against choice.

As a parent of two daughters, it is easy for me to imagine even a wonderful child making a terrible mistake. The idea of that child dying from that mistake, missing the chance for reconcilliation and redemption, bothers me terribly. My son, who is disabled, was born in spite of a recommendation for a medical abortion. He is one of the lights of my life and my wife and I have never regretted our decision. But when my oldest daughter was diagnosed with an ectopic pregnancy, I was one of the people most strenously trying to convince her to change her mind about ‘wait and see’ (although she had some medical problems as a result, the pregnancy ended naturally and she experienced no permanent injury).

I am explaining this because those 180 deaths are on my mind when I refuse to vote for a pro-choice candidate. This may seem like moral hypocrisy, and it may well be, but I respond to my conscience by contributing to support mechanisms, education programs, and abortion alternatives for all those women who find themselves in the unfortunate situation of a pregnancy they are considering terminating.

Cont.

 

[SoCalRC]

1. Do you believe that those of us who do campaign to change the law and attempt to demonstate that abortions are against the common good and actually damage the woman as well as kill the child, are inconsistent if we do not agree with your views on moral relativity and therefore wrong?

I see nothing wrong with compaigning to change the law, though I think that it is more productive and more in keeping with our Christian calling to “demonstrate that abortions are against the common good” and provide support and alternatives to women seeking abortions.

However, if, as part of your efforts, you compromise on teachings that the Church has deemed non-negotiable, I believe that the Church is right, you are potentially undermining your own efforts.

1. Do you think it is possible that when the Church condemned the interference of ectopic pregnancies that the judgements were faulty due to lack of knowledge? At that time I would imagine that most women who had ectopic pregnancy died anyway before the days of safe surgery.

No, although the ruling predates plasma and antibiotics, surgical intervention dramatically improved survival rate at the time the Church was asked.

However, I think that the Church has been very wise in not stressing the full implications of the teaching.

First, the teaching is difficult. It is one thing to agree to the principle of being a Martyr for Christ, another to have a loved one (or oneself) become one.

Second, like all abortion, the problem is difficult to address in isolation. Ectopic pregnancies are substantially on the rise, with the most probable culprit being infectious disease. It is not completely established scientifically, but it appears that our sexually promiscuous culture leads to more tubal scaring which, in turn, leads to more ectopic pregnancies.

Just as fewer unwanted pregnancies is a big step towards fewer abortions, a move towards the Catholic idea of proper human sexuality could potentially mean fewer ectopic pregnancies.

1. To recap, does the Catechism of the Catholic Church or any twentieth century Papal document, reiterate the nineteenth century teaching on ectopic pregnancy?

Yes, the prohibition on abortion is listed in the current Directives for Caregivers. The Church also made reference to the decrees in both its Decree on Procurred Abortion (1973?) and its Doctrinal Note on the Rights of the Human Embryo (1989?).

1. What do you think faithful Catholics should be doing about the millions of abortions which are damaging all Western Nations?

Confront poverty and lowering standards of living, as well as other attacks on the Family, like modern laws concerning divorce. Most importantly, be a living reflection of our belief of the inalienable rights of the human person. This would be a good example of why I find our being at odds with the Pope on Iraq, the death penalty, and our involvement with torture troubling. How can we, the US, be a moral leader on abortion when we find ourselves on the wrong side of aspects of Catholic Pro-Life teaching that much of the modern world already accepts?

1. Do you agree with Pope John Paul lI that we live in a culture of death and the cause is mainly the sheer number of abortions?

I agree that we live in a culture of death, however, having read all of JP II’s writings on the subject I think that you are simplifying his causal assertion. John Paul II was, arguably, the most pro life Pope we have ever had. Although he did use abortion as an example in his writings, he consistantly condemed all attacks on human life, as a reflection of our “every stage” and “every condition” belief, throughout his papacy. Remember, abortion, euthanasia, murder, and even the death penalty were all condemned in EVANGELIUM VITAE (though only the first three infallibly).

Forgive me if I misunderstand your arguments in these posts but I get the distinct impression that you are attempting to justify the law as it stands by nit picking with those who believe in attempting to repeal it.

No forgivness required. I believe my position is simple - first, that the best way to be pro life is to fully honor our full life teachings, because compromising on life in any form undermines life in all forms, including fetal.

Second, Catholicism and Christianity are hard, and our belief in life is no exception. It is easy to feel emotion for an innocent helpless child, but following our shepard John Paul II as he led us from that belief to a hardened criminal on death row in EVANGALIUM VITAE is much harder. Likewise, ‘two deaths is better than one murder’ is much easier to grasp theologically than emotionally.

In that light, we should all be mindful of our own compromises in Catholic teaching. Just as we call to mind our unworthiness each Mass, we should be mindful of our own proper place in God’s eyes as we attempt to act out our faith in the political arena. If we get too caught up in the ‘moral inferiority’ of other’s compromises, we can all too easily become the Pharisee or the Dutiful Son, which Jesus specifically warned us against.

I know that I certainly have no trouble being mindful of my own unworthiness each week at Mass. And I’d like to believe that I am sincere when I join the rest of the Church in praying for unity and peace.

Those simple messages can easily get lost, particularly when one is answering a zillion side points from a zillion directions.

And also, obviously, I do not always maintain an optimum Christian composure in some of my responses. I hope that I have answered your questions clearly.

Peace

 

[SoCalRC]

And, many women are using abortion as a convenient birth control method.

Do you have any evidence to support that? It does not make the sin less grievous, but all the secular evidence suggests that use of abortion as birth control is essentially non existant.

The vast majority of the women procurring abortions in the US live at or near the poverty line. Roughly half are already mothers. The vast majority report finding the decision extremely difficult and having post abortion doubts. This should not be surprising, 27% of them report being Catholic - we are disproportionately represented.

I know it is easier to think of them as lazy sluts instead of say, terrified young girls, but are we not instructed to love them every bit as much as the unborn children they chose to abort?

 

[SoCalRC]

What does this have to do with anything?

To be honest, that is my initial response to the vast majority of what you direct at me. I have strived to respond sincerely, but I find myself increasingly questioning everything from your native intelligence to your Christian charity.

Even now I cannot help but think of Kiki’s Law. Since I am both struggling to find the saliency of your latest posts and the proper Christian charity within myself to suitably reply, I will leave you with the last word(s).

 

[Ender]

{Re the estate tax} you commented that scope does not alter morality, an injustice is an injustice.

Well I certainly admire your memory, if not your logic. I absolutely said that … and nothing I have said in this thread contradicts it.

Is that a principle that you only apply to money and property?

I ignore your cheap shot and turn the other cheek. :getholy:

For most, ten vs. a million, would mean little comfort if they were one of the ten.

Abortion is an evil and (let us assume) torture is an evil. If the former kills one million and the latter ten, then the former is the greater evil and if I had to compromise on the latter to secure the former (as opposed to securing neither) I would. Similarly, while I find the death tax to be an injustice, if I could not eliminate it I would compromise and secure the highest deduction I could achieve. In both cases it is morally preferable to achieve some good rather than no good at all.

The Pope has identified climate change as a “right to life” issue.

No he hasn’t.

Well, the Catechism denounces it {torture} by name.

The writers of the catechism may have intended this but it is not what they achieved. The UN clearly denounced it; the catechism is not as emphatically phrased. They left the door open whether or not that was their intention.

It also prohibits it, without exception, in the case of war (CCC 2313).

Not exactly. It prohibits actions contrary to the law of nations but there is no US law or international law (which we have ratified) that prohibits the torture of terrorists.

And, of course, Pope John Paul II quotes the Pastoral Constitution of the Second Vatican Council here

Gaudium et spes seems pretty clearly to exclude torture. I will have to study it in context and with other documents to conclude that it is as implacably opposed as you assume. At the very least this document says what you have (I believe incorrectly) claimed for the others.

Ender

 

[SoCalRC]

If the former kills one million and the latter ten, then the former is the greater evil and if I had to compromise on the latter to secure the former (as opposed to securing neither) I would.

So you have said. You are willing to accept grave evil to fight what you have decided is the greater evil. Using your logic, those who perceive other evils that threaten human lives (like it or not, things like global poverty do prematurely end lives) should feel just compromising on abortion.

One common response to this is that abortion is special, it is infallibly held to always be gravely immoral. However, murder and euthanasia are also held to be be infallibly grave moral disorders. So the torture murders, however many, are also, infallibly, immoral.

A relative application of morality with respect to what we hold to be absolutely immoral is what the Pope refers to as “moral relativism”.

No he hasn’t.

Perhaps you better look into April 2007 and a Vatican Council on Climate Change. The Pope specifically said it is a “right to life” issue. He has since indicated that it is a question of science, not a political football. FWIW, we have sworn testimony that the Bush adminisration actively suppressed and substantially altered the results of Federally funded climate change research.

Not exactly. It prohibits actions contrary to the law of nations but there is no US law or international law (which we have ratified) that prohibits the torture of terrorists.

As you say, “not exactly”, torture is prohibited by US law and multiple treaties. The President has acknowledged that the highest levels of his adminstration met on the issue and agreed to adopt prohibited tactics. Mr. Yoo, at the Justice Department, then wrote a legal justification. Yoo’s argument was essentially that the president is not constrained by the rule of law in a time of war. That is, no constitutional checks and balances apply, no constitutional rights of US citizens supercede. In his brief, Mr. Yoo conveniently ommitted the cases which he, himself, as a Berkley Law Professor, has previously described as the most relevant and salient to both seperation of powers and the constraints of presidential war time authority.

You may accept a presidency that has absolute dictorial powers, but I believe that the legal question is not yet decided.

At the very least this document says what you have (I believe incorrectly) claimed for the others.

I have offered to walk through the other documents a sentence at a time to see where your understanding so substantially diverges, but have so far seemed uninterested in such a discussion. Case in point, you accused me of ‘ommitting a paragraph’ in another thread. I subequently went through the entire section, quoting, then summarizing each paragraph, then reiterated the interpretted points in brief. You did not respond with a similiar analysis of your own.

I do frequently quote the documents and provide links for the complete text, something I notice that you never seem to do with your blanket assertions.

 

[BamaRider]

SoCal sez-

You may accept a presidency that has absolute dictorial powers, but I believe that the legal question is not yet decided.

This Presidency has assumed “absolute dictorial powers?” You only hurt your case with the regular folks when you make statements like this, because it will detract from your credibility. Normal people know the President does not have “dictorial powers,” and when the folks in flyover country hear statements like this from the radical left, they just scratch their heads, get back on their tractors, or punch their time clocks, and go to work, all the while thinking, “what did he just say?” LOL

Heck, a few of them might get out their guns, and go shoot tin cans, and cling to their Faith, as it was told to a bunch of left wing elitist out in San Francisco the other day. LOL. They really hate it out there when the folks in Kansas do that. Gotta lotta small towns in Pa, where the citizenary are subject to do it too.

Nobody with half a brain believes President Bush is a dictator, governing at will, and tearing up the constitution. Seriously brother, you need to take a breath.

I can promise ya, an election is gonna take place in 6 months, and President Bush is gonna leave office, that hardly constitutes at man with “absoulte dictorial powers.”

You might owe an apology to all those poor people that DO live under regimes, where the man in charge does HAVE “absolute dictorial powers.” You’ll find them in such pleasant places as Cuba, and led by nice people like Castro or Chavez. Didn’t the latter just ban a bunch of TV shows, just because he didn’t like them?

Your dislike of the President is blinding you to any normal kind of discourse.

 

[paladinan]

Hi everyone. Please look at the quote below and tell me what, if anything, is wrong with it. Thanks!

Hi, Holly,

In a nutshell: there’s a difference between being “physically free” and being “morally free”. I am physically free to run over a group of people walking on the sidewalk (since I have the physical ability, and nothing physically impedes me from doing so), but I am not morally free to do so (since murder is gravely evil, and God forbids us to sin).

As for the quote you mention:

Based on St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica, and explained in Article 6 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (usccb.org/catechism/text/…chpt1art6.htm), an individual’s conscience is one’s highest moral authority. The role of the Church is not to compel obedience, but rather to “form” one’s conscience in alignment with God’s will.

The paraphrase is mistaken; a well formed conscience is the guide by which one should make one’s decisions–and it isn’t the highest moral authority, in any case… since the highest moral authority is always God.

By exercising one’s conscience, i.e., CHOOSING right over wrong, one utilizes God-given FREE WILL. Therefore, the Catholic Church is officially PRO CHOICE

This is a “bait-and-switch” with terminology. The Church certainly upholds the freedom of every person to act in accord with a rightly-formed conscience (i.e. that every person should be physically free to follow the voice of conscience), but that’s not at all what the modern misnomer-slogan “pro-choice” means. The corrupted modern version of “pro-choice” insists that all people are morally free to kill children in the womb–that it isn’t even “wrong” in any absolute sense… which is utter nonsense.

and its PRO LIFE position is what the Church teaches should be the choice.

This is true, in a limited sense… but the quote portrays the Church’s condemnation of abortion as a mere opinion–as a “recommendation”, rather than a moral imperative.

In other words, the Church says, “CHOOSE LIFE” … which one cannot do unless one HAS the choice.

The quote’s author is confused, here. In the United States, where a de facto “separation of Church and State” exists, the Church is politically powerless to change the laws of the land, and She can only exhort… but the Church’s condemnation has moral authority which far surpasses any political concern; it isn’t simply a “plea”. Those who ignore that “plea” place their eternal salvation in grave jeopardy.

Our society has not arrived at a civil consensus that can be reflected in secular law to declare the unborn, from the moment of conception, to be citizens with rights.

This is the logical fallacy of “question-begging” (among other things): it assumes that all morality is (and should be) decided by consensus, rather than by God Himself. That, I argue, is flatly and obviously contrary to the teachings of Christ’s Church.

In short: the quote’s author is using a political argument, while trying to make it sound like a “Catholic argument” by smuggling some Catholic terms into it, by stealth.

In Christ,
Brian

 

[SoCalRC]

This Presidency has assumed “absolute dictorial powers?”

No, the justification for illegal torture proposed by the White House, is presidential power unconstrained by US law or any other branch of government.

cnn.com/2008/US/04/01/torture.memo.ap/

This is what the administration (you know, the guys you support) are claiming. I’m claiming they are wrong. The rule of law was good enough for my forefathers, it is good enough for me.

Perhaps chronic ‘missunderstandings’ like these are connected to the lukewarm reception your recent attempts at ‘playing dumb’ as a form of humor received.

 

[Ender]

You are willing to accept grave evil to fight what you have decided is the greater evil.

There is no willingness to accept grave evil on my part. My argument is not so subtle that you should have this much trouble understanding what it is. Voters will have three options this fall: vote for a candidate who opposes a great evil but supports a lesser one, vote for a candidate who supports the greater evil but opposes the lesser one, vote for neither. One of the two candidates will be elected - you have provided no rationale as to why I should not prefer the candidate who opposes the greater evil.

A relative application of morality with respect to what we hold to be absolutely immoral is what the Pope refers to as “moral relativism”.

It has already been made clear that a politician may vote for a law permitting abortion if it is the most restrictive that can be achieved; that is, he may support a bad law that permits something absolutely immoral if it is better than the alternative. This is not a relative application of morality and has nothing whatever to do with moral relativism. If the Church feels that voting for an imperfect candidate is immoral they have done a singularly poor job of articulating that position.

Perhaps you better look into April 2007 and a Vatican Council on Climate Change. The Pope specifically said it is a “right to life” issue. He has since indicated that it is a question of science, not a political football. FWIW, we have sworn testimony that the Bush adminisration actively suppressed and substantially altered the results of Federally funded climate change research.

Provide a link to the documents you cite and I’ll read them.

You may accept a presidency that has absolute dictorial powers, but I believe that the legal question is not yet decided.

If you are speaking about the legal question of what constitutes torture and what the president may legally authorize then I would agree with you: the legal question is not yet decided.

Ender

 

[SoCalRC]

Your dislike of the President is blinding you to any normal kind of discourse.

You keep professing to know my heart and mind, but the largest obstacles to discourse so far seem to be reading and comprehension on your part. We never get to discourse, because I keep having to explain that you are falsely assigning things to me that I have not said.

You, in turn, keep sneering that my answers need to be shorter. It is an insurmountable obstacle. Your pesistant misrepresentation of my statements calls for even more detailed explainations, while the longer my responses the more likely you are to simply substitute them with random thoughts from your head.

And of course, long ago you boasted that you did not need to even read my comments to have a meaningful opinion of them. So even the illusion of “discourse” is silly.

Now, having let myself be drawn into yet another wasted correction of yet another silly red herring, I will in fact, leave the floor to you and focus my energies on reminding myself of the “any condition” aspect of our teaching.

 

[SoCalRC]

One of the two candidates will be elected - you have provided no rationale as to why I should not prefer the candidate who opposes the greater evil.

I have provided a Doctrinal Note from the Church, stating that, with regards to voting on non negotiables, our responsibility is clear.

If the Church feels that voting for an imperfect candidate is immoral they have done a singularly poor job of articulating that position.

Actually, both the Church and the Princes of the Church have expressed this in detail. I have provided you with a link to various documents multiple times. You profess that the documents mean something else, but seem disinclined to demonstrate how.

Here, again is a Doctrinal Note, addressed to the Lay Faithful, regarding voting:

vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20021124_politica_en.html

This is Catholic doctrine. It is approved by our last Pope and was prepared, as Prefect, by our current one. In section 4, we will first find the following statement:

John Paul II, continuing the constant teaching of the Church, has reiterated many times that those who are directly involved in lawmaking bodies have a «grave and clear obligation to oppose» any law that attacks human life. For them, as for every Catholic, it is impossible to promote such laws or to vote for them.

That sounds absolute, you can’t vote for for anything that violates our concept of “right to life” (which is broader than just abortion). But, the document then continues with an explanation of a narrow exception called “limiting the harm”, introduced by John Paul II in EVANGELIUM VITAE.

As John Paul II has taught in his Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae regarding the situation in which it is not possible to overturn or completely repeal a law allowing abortion which is already in force or coming up for a vote, «an elected official, whose absolute personal opposition to procured abortion was well known, could licitly support proposals aimed at limiting the harm done by such a law and at lessening its negative consequences at the level of general opinion and public morality».

The example is an elected official, with impecable credentials attempting to lessen harm. So the obvious question is, how broadly can this concept be taken? Is it just elected officials, or can we compromise in voting to limit the harm ourselves?

The next paragraph reads:

In this context “limiting the harm”, italicized in the previous paragraph in the original], it must be noted also that a well-formed Christian conscience does not permit one to vote for a political program or an individual law which contradicts the fundamental contents of faith and morals. The Christian faith is an integral unity, and thus it is incoherent to isolate some particular element to the detriment of the whole of Catholic doctrine. A political commitment to a single isolated aspect of the Church’s social doctrine does not exhaust one’s responsibility towards the common good. Nor can a Catholic think of delegating his Christian responsibility to others; rather, the Gospel of Jesus Christ gives him this task, so that the truth about man and the world might be proclaimed and put into action.

This appears to state that you cannot use the concept of “limiting the harm” to justify compromising on other important Catholic teachings. The faith is an “integral unity” so compromising it is potentially harmful to the whole. Further, it warns that political committment to something is not a substitute for one’s comprehensive Christian obligations.

This leads to the question, what is “fundamental”, that is, what sorts of things cannot be compromised in limiting the harm?

The document continues:

When political activity comes up against moral principles that do not admit of exception, compromise or derogation, the Catholic commitment becomes more evident and laden with responsibility. In the face of fundamental and inalienable ethical demands, Christians must recognize that what is at stake is the essence of the moral law, which concerns the integral good of the human person. This is the case with laws concerning…

So, the section, read in order to this point, appears to say:

• You can’t vote in violation of right to life (notice, not just abortion, but Catholic right to life).
• If you are a lawmaker, there is a narrow exception to allow you to help “limit the harm”.
• It must be remembered that “limiting the harm” cannot be used to rationalize compromise or abridgement of other fundamental tenants of the faith or basic Christian morality, since doing so can potentially undermine the entire Faith.
• And, when it comes to really important things, things we absolutely cannot compromise on, our Catholic reponsibility “becomes more evident and laden with responsibility”, that includes the principles of…

There are then nine broad examples listed in the document. I believe that the Church is saying that they are non negotiable (“moral principles that do not admit of exception, compromise or derogation”). You appear to be arguing that they can be compromised under the concept of “limiting the harm”.

Since explanation of “limiting the harm” is followed with the warning “in this context”, and the warning itself is followed with words like “more evident and laden with responsibility” and “essence of the moral law”, it is hard for me to understand how “moral principles that do not admit of exception, compromise or derogation” could be interpretted as anything other than ‘non negotiable’.

But please provide your own, alternative, interpretation of the same section. Then we can move on to other documents to see which interpretation most closely matches other information from the Church.

 

[BamaRider]

1st the SoCal said this, see post #408

You may accept a presidency that has absolute dictorial powers, but I believe that the legal question is not yet decided.

In the context of that conversation with the Ender to mean to accept this adminstration is to accept a president with “absoulte dictorial powers.”

Now you said it, I just took ya at your word, and called it out. So now we get the “clarification.” with this-

No, the justification for illegal torture proposed by the White House, is presidential power unconstrained by US law or any other branch of government.

Spin tends to happens, when crazy coments are hurled. I thought the adminstration WAS torturing people, now it is just a proposal? Which is it?

Later on I made this comment-

Originally Posted by BamaRider
Your dislike of the President is blinding you to any normal kind of discourse

So that prompted you to say this-

You keep professing to know my heart and mind, but the largest obstacles to discourse so far seem to be reading and comprehension on your part. We never get to discourse, because I keep having to explain that you are falsely assigning things to me that I have not said.

I tend to disagree, you have posted a vast volume of work on this tread, it would take hours and hours to read it all. Thankfully I’m retired, and I have the time. To be fair I went back and read again the posts where I fell asleep (sorry) becaue of the length. Now unless you’ve not been truthful in those posts, it is obvious you don’t care for the President or his policies, many of which you think are anti Catholic.

Now, if none of that is true, you have to bandwith to set the record straight.

Lets remove the President as a person, we don’t need to go there, because all people are people, lets say it is your amout of dislike for the President’s *policies *that has caused you to make comments like this-

“You may accept a presidency that has absolute dictorial powers, but I believe that the legal question is not yet decided” - The SoCal post #408

 

[SoCalRC]

Now, if none of that is true, you have to bandwith to set the record straight.

No, I don’t. How can I know when you fall asleep?

Did you not even read the part where I stated that I am not going to respond to your red herrings and misdirection anymore?

This whole ‘gotcha’ psuedo debate thing you are doing would be more sensible if you at least could put up the illusion of intellectual honesty.

You’ve already confessed that you form your opinions without reading. Changing your story now just makes you appear dishonest. Similarly, you’ve already confessed that pretending not to understand something to annoy others is your idea of ‘fun’. So your obstuseness is now suspect by default.

If you actually think your attacks are coherent, good for you. If you are more interested in attack than coherence, at least I am praying for you.

 

[Ender]

I have provided a Doctrinal Note from the Church, stating that, with regards to voting on non negotiables, our responsibility is clear.

Actually, both the Church and the Princes of the Church have expressed this in detail.

Ah, the Princes of the Church. Let’s look at what the American Princes said back in November.

“A Catholic cannot vote for a candidate who takes a position in favor of an intrinsic evil, such as abortion or racism, if the voters intent is to support that position.” (Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship - 2007 #34)

“There may be times when a Catholic who rejects a candidate’s unacceptable position may decide to vote for that candidate for other morally grave reasons.” (#35)

This explains that a Catholic can vote for a candidate who supports something that is intrinsically evil, such as abortion.
*
"When all candidates hold a position in favor of an intrinsic evil, the conscientious voter faces a dilemma. The voter may decide to take the extraordinary step of not voting for any candidate or, after careful deliberation, may decide to vote for the candidate deemed less likely to advance such a morally flawed position and more likely to pursue other authentic human goods.* (#36)

usccb.org/faithfulcitizenship/FCStatement.pdf

This says that the position you take (not voting for either) is the extraordinary one … which means that the ordinary position is to make the best of an imperfect situation … as I have maintained.

Either the US bishops are unaware that they flatly contradict Church teaching, or your interpretation of the documents you cited is wrong.

Ender

 

[BamaRider]

No, I don’t. How can I know when you fall asleep?

Well ya gotta point, but if ya keep it short I’ll promise to stay awake (just kidding!)

Then ya said-

This whole ‘gotcha’ psuedo debate thing you are doing would be more sensible if you at least could put up the illusion of intellectual honesty.

And I haven’t quoted anything on here ya didn’t say, and anyone can see that, so I’m thinkin my intellectual honesty is intact. You say these things, I just point them out.

And for the record I DID go back and read the ones where I fell asleep. But ya gotta salient point on gotcha. I have the advantage of time, I can go back and disect as many posts as I wish, all day if I’m so inclined (depends on what I have on tivo, or if I might take one of my motorcycles out for the day)

Now go back over to the other thread so we can tawk about my pay pal account and investment.

 

[vern_humphrey]

How odd, aren’t you the one arguing that the 100,000+ abortions of ectopic pregnancies each year in the US is licit?

How odd, aren’t you the one trying to put words in other people’s mouths?

You, yourself, have said such abortions are unnecessary.

Another odd comment, the encyclopedia entry is a collection of quotes from the Tribunal of the Holy Office - ie, the Church. The entry itself was approved by a Cardinal. If you like, we can go through all the Church documents in detail, but the synopsis will remain fundementally accurate.

Whereas the Catechism was introduced by an Apostolic Letter from the Holy Father as “a full, complete exposition of Catholic doctrine.”

Do you accept that the Catechism is “as a full, complete exposition of Catholic doctrine?”