Election Confusion

[Contarini]

I personally could not bring myself to vote 3rd party. I understand why people do, as neither candidate is in line with all that we believe as Catholics. However, in my opinion, a vote for a 3rd party candidate is a vote for Obama.

That doesn’t make any sense. I hear this all the time–the assumption behind the statement seems to be that of course all decent and reasonable people would pick Romney if they had to choose. But lots of folks think differently. I can’t vote (I’m a resident alien), but on the whole Obama seems to me to be the lesser of two evils. And I know a lot of folks who agree with me. So for such folks, not voting is actually voting for Romney, because if they voted (other than 3rd party) they’d vote for Obama.

This is what angers me about the conservative Catholic rhetoric surrounding this election. First people pound home the message that you can’t, absolutely can’t, vote for Obama, even though they have to twist official Catholic teaching in order to make this point. And indeed there are grave reasons not to vote for Obama. Let’s say someone is convinced that Obama is on the whole the better candidate, but abortion is a deal-breaker. To then try to convince such a person that they have to vote for the person they consider the poorer candidate so that Obama won’t win is simply partisan manipulation. At that point we aren’t talking Catholic teaching, just politics. People who make this argument have no respect for the consciences of their fellow Catholics, who are deeply convinced that Romney will be destructive for the nation but can’t vote for Obama because of abortion and similar issues.

Edwin

 

[Matilda_Bennett]

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