OK, so we can’t ignore any of the 9 issues, which is what the CA guide does. Do the 9 all get the same weight? I have been generally giving weight to the abortion issue for a number of years. With 50 million since '73, I felt it got some weight over some of those 9. I know we have to be careful not to name names on this forum, but there is also the issue this time around regarding “post birth abortion”.
The Church has made it crystal clear that no issue or combination of issues trumps abotion.
From the USCCB Consciences for Faithful Citizenship:
Section 34:
“A Catholic cannot vote for a canidate who takes a postion in favor in an intrinsic evil such as abortion”
Then Cardinal Ratzinger:
“In the case of an intrinsically unjust law, such as a law permitting abortion or euthanasia, it is therefore never licit to obey it, or to 'take part in a propaganda campaign in favour of such a law or vote for it’” (no. 73). Christians have a "grave obligation of conscience not to cooperate formally in practices which, even if permitted by civil legislation, are contrary to God’s law. :
and
"Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment.
There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia."
Archbishop Chaput:
Catholics have a duty to work tirelessly for human dignity at every stage of life, and to demand the same of their lawmakers. But some issues are jugular.** Some issues take priority**. Abortion, immigration law, international trade policy, the death penalty and housing for the poor are all vitally important issues.
But no amount of calculating can make them equal in gravity.
The right to life comes first. It precedes and undergirds every other social issue or group of issues. This is why Blessed John XXIII listed it as the first human right in his great encyclical on world peace, Pacem in Terris. And as the U.S. bishops stressed in their 1998 pastoral letter Living the Gospel of Life, the right to life is the foundation of every other right.
Bishop Wenski:
Today, some self-identified Catholic politicians prefer to emulate Pontius Pilate’s “personally opposed but unwilling to impose” stance. Perhaps, they are baiting the Church, daring an “official sanction” making them “bad Catholics”, so as to gain favor among up their secularist, “blue state” constituencies. Such a sanction might turn their lack of coherent Catholic convictions into a badge of courage for people who hold such convictions in contempt.
Rev John Meyers:
Catholics who publicly dissent from the Church’s teaching on the right to life of all unborn children should recognize that they have freely chosen by their own actions to separate themselves from what the Church believes and teaches. They have also separated themselves in a significant way from the Catholic community.
Bishop Carlson:
Opposition to abortion binds every Catholic under pain of mortal sin and admits of no exceptions.
**It was for this reason that I stated in October **
of 2000 that you cannot vote for a politician who is pro-abortion when you have a choice and remain a Catholic in good standing. For some Catholics this is a hard teaching, but I am simply repeating church teaching: “Human life is sacred because from the beginning it involves the creative action of God (Gospel of Life, par. 53)…the direct and voluntary killing of an innocent human being (abortion and euthanasia) is always gravely immoral (Gospel of Life, par. 57, 65)…protecting the mother’s health does not justify the deliberate killing of an innocent human being (Gospel of Life, par. 58).”
Bishop Burke:
22**. Within the considerations for the protection of human life, the protection of the life of the innocent and defenseless, and of the weak and the burdened must have primacy of place**. There can never be justification for directly and deliberately taking the life of those who indeed are “the least” (Matthew 25:45). Such an act is always evil in itself, intrinsically evil. Society, rather, is called to treasure its members who are weakest, in the eyes of the world.
- For that reason, our Holy Father reminds us that “[a]mong all the crimes which can be committed against life, procured abortion has characteristics making it particularly serious and deplorable” (Evangelium vitae, No. 58a). In treating the evil of procured abortion, our Holy Father concludes:
**
You will not find similar blanket condemnation of politicians or Catholics who support the Iraq war, support the Death penalty or disagree with the Church’s position on immigration. fighting poverty or disagree on any other social issue or issues that some claim are equally as important or more important than abortion.
**
