PELOSI AND BIDEN: BELONGING TO CLUB CATHOLIC

 

CLUB CATHOLIC AND CATHOLIC POLITICIANS

You know things have reached a breaking point when usually quiet and mild Catholic Bishops and Archbishops take to the air waves and print media to castigate and soundly pound the living sin out of Catholic politicians who twist and and pervert the faith. 

Such has been the case with Senator Biden and Congresswoman Pelosi.  Heavyweights like Cardinal Egan, Archbishops Chaput and Wuerl among others along with the entire Bishop's Conference have roundly condemned both for the spin they have put on Catholic teaching concerning abortion.  Biden is more public now because of his run for vice-president, but his pro-abortion views have long been known.   Pelosi has come in for the most criticism because of her breathtakingly ignorant statement that our teaching on the matter is only fifty years old.  Her response to the criticism is equally shallow--as if she ran to Wikipedia's "Great Catholic Quotes on Abortion" and printed the first one that seemed--erroneously so--to favor her position.  But that's okay for these two, because membership in Club Catholic is different than belonging to the Catholic Church.  Check the Catholic Response here:    chaput , wuerl, egan.  

Club Catholic is all about appearances; the Catholic Church has those "rules" expected to be followed.  The Club allows one to do anything he or she wants because membership is due more to ethnicity or growing up in a certain neighborhood rather than a choice for the truth.  The Church, on the other hand, is so stuffy (so thinks the Club) about actually living out what it professes.  The Club is cool to belong to; the Church requires commitment. 

When one starts seeing the Church like just another version of the Elks, Moose, or Rotary Clubs, then a person gets to start defining for him or herself what being Catholic means.  That's just what Pelosi and Biden have done.  How pathetic.  Trying to use their Catholicity to gin up votes for their concerns, they will only succeed in awakening those voices who speak for those who have no voice--the unborn--many of whom will never have a choice to belong either to the Club or the Church.  All because Pelosi and Biden cling to the myth that their faith is whatever they choose to make it, rather than a truth handed down to them through the centuries by Christ, his Apostles, and their Successors.  The Cross is not some lodge badge, or strange hat with antlers, or a secret handshake or banner--it is the Sign of our Faith, of what is in our hearts.

Thank them, those Bishops who ought to be roundly praised for their quick, decisive and eloquent defense of life and clarification of Catholic teaching.  Club Catholic--pretty shallow.  The Catholic Church of Jesus Christ--just the place to be at this time, in this hour.

Here's an update based on Sen. Biden's Meet the Press interview on 9/7. Archbishop Chaput Slams Biden Again.   Sen. Biden needs a crash course on what constitutes a human right that obliges persons regardless of faith profession and what is a belief peculiar to a particular religion.

Comments

[AnPiobaire]

Biden is a real-life practicing Cathlic who cannot truly said to be "pro-abortion". His views mirror those of many of other practicing Catholics who long ago came to the realization that abortion isn't necessarily a legal or political issue and how we approach it politically cannot rightly be used as a litmus test for our status as faithful Catholics.

*****from Msgr. Barr: You must know a different Joe Biden. Reasonable people on both sides of the issue, looking at his record, would easily conclude that he is a friend of those who believe in abortion. I agree that he is one of those "practicing Catholics" who think that they can dispense with essential Church teaching and still be faithful. He's just wrong about that, as the bishops have been trying to tell him. Abortion is a litmus test for faithful Catholics not because of legal or political reasons but because it deals with a human right--the right to life, which outweighs any right to choice.

[AnPiobaire]

Thanks for the response, Monsignor.

Please note that I did not say that "abortion" is not a litmus test for Catholics, but that how we approach it politically should not be.

It is perfectly legitimate for practicing Catholics like Joe and myself to hold the opinion that political and legal efforts have produced no substantial results over the course of nearly four decades.

I can't speak for Joe, but in opinion clinging to these failed political and legal positions puts us (the Church as a whole) in danger of being cynically used by one partisan side or the other, to our detriment, while at the same time dissipating needed energy away from actions which might actually turn people's hearts away from abortion.

[Pat]

Look at the big picture! It seems to me that by completely dismissing Joe Biden as a less favorable candidate than Sarah Palin is hypocracy on the part of the church. It is evident that McCain and Palin abuse there power, lie, cheat and show no evidence of behaving or thinking in a Christian manor.
Roe V: Wade has not been overturned in the evil Bush Administration, why would you think it would in a McCain one?

This is the narrow minded thinking that makes me want to leave the Catholic Religion.

Don't you think that Jesus would rather support the poor, and middle class than the ultra rich and powerful?

****Thanks for the comment, Pat, but I think you are making the same mistake many liberal Catholics make. Namely, that just because a candidate may be pro-choice or rabidly pro-abortion, if he or she embraces other good social justice concerns, that somehow absolves them. Last time I checked, you have to be alive to experience the rest of social justice. The Right to Life trumps other rights. That being said, I appreciate you strugging with the issue. What a world we live in, though, where the fate of the innocent rests with politicians.

[Kelli]

Thanks for writing this.