48 House Catholics send warning to Bishops

Forty-eight Roman Catholic members of Congress have warned in a letter to Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick of Washington that U.S. bishops will revive anti-Catholic bigotry and severely harm the church if they deny Communion to politicians who support abortion rights.The letter's signers, all Democrats, include at least three House members with strong antiabortion voting records.

"For many years Catholics were denied public office by voters who feared that they would take direction from the Pope," they wrote. ". . . While that type of paranoid anti-Catholicism seems to be a thing of the past, attempts by Church leaders today to influence votes by the threat of withholding a sacrament will revive latent anti-Catholic prejudice, which so many of us have worked so hard to overcome."

The three-page letter, dated May 10, was sent to McCarrick because he heads a task force of U.S. bishops that is considering whether, and how, the church should take action against Catholic politicians whose public positions are at odds with Catholic doctrine.

McCarrick's spokesman, Susan Gibbs, said he would not comment on the letter. She said the seven-member task force is "listening to many different voices" and will grant the 48 House members' request for a meeting. "They will be heard. It just hasn't been arranged yet," she said.

When your faith is based on the absolute truth of the Bible and on nothing else, then you have no room for the "humanism" that seems to be creeping in here.

If the Protestants have discerned "the absolute truth of the Bible and nothing else", why is it that they are not one church? Lutherans should be in complete agreement with Baptists, and they with Methodists and so on and so on through the 300 or so denominations.

There is an "absolute truth" common to the Protestant churches. They stand in "protest" against the Church to which they can all trace their origin.

Abortion is one of the few matters the Church considers "intrinsically evil". (Rutles4Ever, #214)
Please see #214. (B Knotts, #220)
Sure abortion is intrinsically evil. So is masturbation. (eastsider, #221)
masturbation is not intrinsically evil. The Church teaches that it is a grave disorder. (Rutles4Ever, #229)
Gravely disordered, intrinsically evil ... Is there really a difference? (eastsider, #234)
If the Church did not THINK there was a difference, they would not use differing terms, for crying out loud. (ninenot, #261)
FWIW, while researching the answer to my question ("How does it necessarily follow that to suffer murder under certain circumstances means to desire murder under those certain circumstances or to say that murder is a virtuous act?", #213 -- still researching, BTW), I stumbled across the following excerpt -- relevant to the collateral exchange quoted above, not to my question -- in JPII's Encyclical, Evangelium vitae, at #62 (emphasis added):

Therefore, by the authority which Christ conferred upon Peter and his Successors, in communion with the Bishops -- who on various occasions have condemned abortion and who in the aforementioned consultation, albeit dispersed throughout the world, have shown unanimous agreement concerning this doctrine -- I declare that direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, always constitutes a grave moral disorder, since it is the deliberate killing of an innocent human being.

I e-mailed your entire quote to Lynch, asking him whether it was true (and including my home address as his website insists, lest he waste time on anyone who can't vote for him). I haven't had an answer yet.

When I heard he had signed that infamous letter to the infamous McCarrick, I fired off another e-mail:

John Courtney Murray is a "great" theologian? Try Thomas Aquinas (whom I assume you've heard of, but given the obviously poor quality of catechesis you've received, this may be too generous).
For Aquinas (and this is the position of the Church), if your "conscience" (such as it is) does not allow you to accept the teachings of the Church, it is wrong for you to remain (or pretend to be) a Catholic. Of course, you also have a solemn responsibility to form your conscience in accordance with the truth, not with the rantings of the DNC.
As to that nonsense about the death penalty and the Iraq war, well, it is nonsense. The Church teaches and has always taught that the death penalty is a legitimate exercise of government power (assuming of course that it is reserved to criminals truly guilty of grievous crimes). And it may surprise you to learn that the Church has no position on the Iraq war, though some publicity-seeking bishops would have you think differently. The Church does endorse the Just War theory; whether it applies in a given case is left to those given responsibility in such matters to determine.
As to helping the poor, I fail to recall the Gospel passage (or any other of authoritative Catholic provenance) that says the gov't should take money from some to give to others; we should all, of course, empty our own pockets to those in need (an act apparently alien to many politicians -- see John Kerry's tax returns).
If you and such of your colleagues who signed that disgraceful letter cannot accept the teachings of the Church, you all should do the honest thing and make a clean break. If indeed you are "personally opposed" to abortion, but feel you must vote to support it, what other personal "principles" are you prepared to sacrifice for political success? Can anyone trust anything you say?

I also e-mailed my sister (to tell her about the info from you and about the McCarrick letter and my response), who knew Lynch only from his local anti-abortion days. She plans to e-mail him too (and encourage all her friends -- she has many more local friends than I do). In her answer to me she also said:

N said J told her that a lot of Lynch's constituency is disappointed in him for a variety of reasons. This may be the one that seals his fate for the next election.

"J" owns a local funeral home and has always been somewhat active in local politics; he, of course, knows everyone.

Should anything come of it all (answers, maybe?), I'll keep you posted.

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