ugh.

[khedron]

Ugh. A Roman Catholic bishop in Colorado Springs has issued a "pastoral letter" saying that good Catholics who still want to receive communion won't vote for any politician in favor of abortion rights, gay marriage, or stem cell research.

I'm not going to quote any of the bits from the PDF file you can find at the above link, although I did download it and read it. Mr. Slacktivist does a fine job of ranting about this, although he goes off on irrelevant (to me) tangents. I just want to say that when John Kerry started running and some suggested that his being Catholic could get him in trouble, I didn't buy it. After all, doesn't the Church get as much out of the separation of Church and State as the State does? But apparently the Vatican believes differently. The Colorado Springs guy is only going farther by including voters in this directly.

Ugh.

Comments

[kcatalyst.livejournal.com]

Am I the only one (besides the bishop in question) who doesn't see anything to get one's knickers in a twist over here?

While I sympathize with the plight of pro-choice Catholics, we all knew perfectly well that the church hierarchy believes that abortion is a sin. A really really really bad sin. Why is it inconsistent for them to say that explicitly supporting ongoing murder (in their eyes) is also a sin that, if not confessed and repented (and stopped) disqualifies one from communion?

I kinda like this guy, actually (well, I bet I wouldn't as a person :-). I'm tired of everyone pretending that strictly regulated beliefs and hierarchy and personal conscience decisions *on the same topic* can peacefully coexist within the same system. Someone needs to give here, eventually.

[reesei.livejournal.com]

Well, what makes it especially silly for me -

He's not talking about denying communion to those who have abortions.

He's not even talking about denying communion to politicians who publicly support choice, or activists who support choice, or anything else (whether or not they personally have an abortion); one level of abstraction.

He's talking about denying communion to those who vote for a politician who, among all their other views, does not condemn abortion (or stem cell research or same-sex marriage or euthanasia) to all people absolutely.

Now, if he were talking about denying communion to those who vote for politicians who are known adulterers, I might be impressed. Heck, in that case the politician has even actually committed the sin! But that'd be bipartisan.

[keyne.livejournal.com]

What she said.

(Also note that what has the Colorado bishop's knickers all wound up isn't abortion, it's the idea that somebody, somewhere, might actually vote for marriage rights for those damn perverts. <sigh>)

[kcatalyst.livejournal.com]

Oh, *silly* I grant you freely. But then, I find the entire Church silly.

The church has already moved to deny pro-choice politicians communion. Likewise, an individual who has one would have committed a sin, and would not qualify for communion without confession repentance, etc. (If then - it would only be venial right?)

I'm not sure how the adultery figures into it, since the link between being elected and committing adultery is pretty tenuous, so it's difficult to see how electing them would constitute facilitating adultery.

[desdenova.livejournal.com]

Don't religious institutions which claim tax-exempt status have to steer clear of partisan political activity?

And like, wow, way to revive centuries-old fear and prejudice against RCC governing figures!

[crouchback.livejournal.com]

The problem I have is that there are other things that the Church finds as repellent as abortion (the death penalty, for instance) where they don't heap this opprobrium on politicians.

And they don't seem to be hitting Republicans who favor abortion the way they've been hitting Democrats.