An Open Letter From Fellow Catholics To John Kerry On Faith & Reason

America is a place of hope and opportunity for many reasons. Chief among them we are a people of great faith and that is what keeps us strong.

But while Americans have always been a religious people, our faith is tied to reason. We choose goodness and truth not only because faith tells us to, but also because doing otherwise would be inherently wrong.

Disagreements will always exist in the civic arena. How high the minimum wage? How to best provide educational opportunity for all? The appropriate level of taxation? These are decisions that we work out in the political process and upon which the Church has no specialized knowledge. As Catholics and as Americans we are called to discern the truth in public policy and to determine which candidate best addresses our concerns.

There are core truths, however, around which we as Catholics must rally. Not just because it is the word of the Church, but also because of reason. This is where we stand on opposition to abortion.

Innocent human life must always be protected. Senator John Kerry, you have said that “life begins at conception,” but you have persistently supported abortion and oppose all sensible restrictions on the practice.

You have voted six times against banning the barbaric practice of partial birth abortion. You voted to spend taxpayers’ dollars to fund abortion at least 25 times.

You opposed Laci and Conner’s Law, which protects pregnant women and their unborn babies from violent crimes.

In the most recent debate Senator Kerry, you said, "everything you do in public life has to be guided by your faith” and that “everything is a gift from the Almighty.” But apparently, when it comes to the issue of the right to life, you follow neither your own faith nor your own reason.

As Americans and Catholics, both faith and reason lead us to President George W. Bush as the choice for life, compassion and justice for all. For that reason, we are urging fellow Catholics to join us in voting for the President on November 2.

* Group affiliation listed for identification purposes only and does not imply any endorsement.

Voter's Guide for Serious Catholics

THE FIVE NON-NEGOTIABLE ISSUES

These five current issues concern actions that are intrinsically evil and must never be promoted by the law. Intrinsically evil actions are those which fundamentally conflict with the moral law and can never be deliberately performed under any circumstances. It is a serious sin to deliberately endorse or promote any of these actions, and no candidate who really wants to advance the common good will support any action contrary to the non-negotiable principles involved in these issues.

1. Abortion

The Church teaches that, regarding a law permitting abortions, it is "never licit to obey it, or to take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or to vote for it" (EV 73). Abortion is the intentional and direct killing of an innocent human being, and therefore it is a form of homicide.

The unborn child is always an innocent party, and no law may permit the taking of his life. Even when a child is conceived through rape or incest, the fault is not the child's, who should not suffer death for others' sins.

2. Euthanasia

Often disguised by the name "mercy killing," euthanasia also is a form of homicide. No person has a right to take his own life, and no one has the right to take the life of any innocent person.

In euthanasia, the ill or elderly are killed, by action or omission, out of a misplaced sense of compassion, but true compassion cannot include intentionally doing something intrinsically evil to another person (cf. EV 73).

3. Embryonic Stem Cell Research

Human embryos are human beings. "Respect for the dignity of the human being excludes all experimental manipulation or exploitation of the human embryo" (CRF 4b).

Recent scientific advances show that often medical treatments that researchers hope to develop from experimentation on embryonic stem cells can be developed by using adult stem cells instead. Adult stem cells can be obtained without doing harm to the adults from whom they come. Thus there is no valid medical argument in favor of using embryonic stem cells. And even if there were benefits to be had from such experiments, they would not justify destroying innocent embryonic humans.

4. Human Cloning

"Attempts . . . for obtaining a human being without any connection with sexuality through 'twin fission,' cloning, or parthenogenesis are to be considered contrary to the moral law, since they are in opposition to the dignity both of human procreation and of the conjugal union" (RHL I:6).

Human cloning also involves abortion because the "rejected" or "unsuccessful" embryonic clones are destroyed, yet each clone is a human being.

5. Homosexual "Marriage"

True marriage is the union of one man and one woman. Legal recognition of any other union as "marriage" undermines true marriage, and legal recognition of homosexual unions actually does homosexual persons a disfavor by encouraging them to persist in what is an objectively immoral arrangement.

"When legislation in favor of the recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative assembly, the Catholic lawmaker has a moral duty to express his opposition clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favor of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral" (UHP 10).

ABBREVIATIONS

CCC Catechism of the Catholic Church

CPL Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, Doctrinal Notes on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life

CRF Pontifical Council for the Family, Charter of the Rights of the Family

EV John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life)

RHL Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction on Respect for Human Life in Its Origin and on the Dignity of Procreation

UHP Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Considerations regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions between Homosexual Persons

Voter's Guide for Serious Catholics

Catholic Ping - let me know if you want on/off this list

Repeatedly, over and over again, Kerry has said that he is prevented from being against abortion and embryonic stem cell research because that would be legislating an "article of faith." This is liberal sophistry and obscurantism at its worst. If Kerry were to be neutral on every matter about which the Catholic Church has made moral pronouncements he would have to legalize murder, rape, theft, child pornography, and genocide against Africans, and other groups.

Where Kerry errs is prccisely in claiming moral judgments on grave matters and on issues of fundamental human rights are merely based on an "article of faith." Reason, common sense, human decency, and the observation of evidence are involved in judgments of this kind. If the country followed Kerry's reasoning there could be no law against slavery. We would have to revoke child labor laws.

Prior to 1973's tragic Roe vs. Wade, the Vatican did not control U.S. laws against abortion. Does Kerry really contend that prior to 1973 U.S. laws were based on an "article of faith" of the Roman Catholic Church? That is absurd.

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Beautiful!