Post-election reflection

This article is from today's New York Times. Steinfels articulates one of my post-election concerns when he asks, "By appearing to tie their moral stance on abortion so closely to a particular political choice, have (the bishops) in fact undermined their moral persuasiveness on that issue as well as their pastoral effectiveness generally?"

Catholics and Choice (in the Voting Booth)
By Peter Steinfels

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After a presidential campaign in which it was widely perceived that the dominant message from Roman Catholic bishops was that Catholics were morally obliged not to vote for a candidate supporting abortion rights, exit polls show that Catholics voted 52 percent to 45 percent for Senator Barack Obama. That was seven percentage points more than the Catholic vote in 2004 for Senator John Kerry, a fellow Catholic.
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If the bishops sweat a little over these figures next week, the reason won’t be worry about their political prowess but about their pastoral and moral effectiveness. By appearing to tie their moral stance on abortion so closely to a particular political choice, have they in fact undermined their moral persuasiveness on that issue as well as their pastoral effectiveness generally?

In 2004, a distinct minority of bishops established the public posture of the church by excoriating the abortion rights advocacy of Senator Kerry and in some cases urging that he or even Catholics who voted for him should be barred from Communion.

The result was disarray among the bishops and a backlash among a considerable number of Catholics. To keep that from reoccurring in 2008, the bishops painstakingly reframed the brochure they issue every four years to guide Catholics in contemplating how to vote.

Responding to complaints that previous statements insufficiently highlighted abortion among the church’s many concerns, the new version emphasized that issues involving “intrinsically evil” actions could not be equated morally with others. Abortion was the prime example, but euthanasia, torture, genocide, unjust war and racism were similarly labeled.

Catholics, the bishops taught, could never vote for a candidate because he or she supported any of these evils but only despite such support—and only for proportionately grave reasons.

There were further nuanced reflections on the complexity of political choices and the place of prudential judgments in applying general moral principles to particular circumstances or to particular candidates. The bishops repeated longstanding disavowals of single-issue politics and of telling Catholics how to vote.

In November 2007, the bishops voted overwhelmingly for the document, titled “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship.” During the election season, most of them publicized it in their parishes and stuck with it in their own statements.

But faced with the prospect of a victory by Senator Obama and particularly disturbed by the support he was getting from Catholics whose anti-abortion credentials were undeniable, many other bishops began to insist on giving their own interpretation. Some estimates place 50 to 60 bishops within this group, almost certainly a larger minority than four years ago. And they were the ones responsible for the public’s perception of the bishops’ role in the election.

Sometimes their declarations were dramatic. Archbishop Raymond L. Burke, recently transferred to Rome from the Archdiocese of St. Louis, declared the Democrats “the party of death.” Bishop Robert J. Hermann, the church’s interim leader in St. Louis until a successor to Archbishop Burke is named, invoked “Judgment Day” a half-dozen times in a column leaving no doubt that Catholics should decide their vote on the basis of abortion alone.

Bishop Joseph F. Martino of Scranton, Pa., required all pastors to read a letter from the pulpit stating that abortion superseded all other issues for Catholic voters, and he effectively suggested that Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic vice-presidential nominee, should not receive Communion because of his support for abortion rights.

“To the extent it was perceived that abortion was the only issue that should determine a Catholic’s vote,” Bishop Howard J. Hubbard of Albany said this week, “I don’t think it was true to ‘Faithful Citizenship’ itself, and I don’t think it resonated with the Catholic people.”

The danger may go beyond not resonating.

Many Catholics may understandably feel that the bishops are talking out of both sides of their mouths: Catholics are not supposed to be single-issue voters, but, by the way, abortion is the only issue that counts. The bishops do not intend to tell Catholics how to vote; but, by the way, a vote for Senator Obama puts your salvation at risk. Catholics are to form their consciences and make prudential judgments about complex matters of good and evil — just so long as they come to the same conclusions as the bishops.

There is obviously a gap between the prudential leeway that “Faithful Citizenship” affirmed for Catholics and the political urgency that some bishops feel about abortion — and already some of the latter are suggesting that the document should be recast again, presumably to make conformity to one’s bishop’s judgment a litmus test for being a faithful Catholic.

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Complete NYT article