Posted on 10/31/2004 5:53:56 AM PST by Diago
Subj: Kerry Scolds Vatican Over Gay Marriage
Date: 10/31/2004 8:37:02 AM Eastern Daylight Time
From: "Fr. Peter West"
To:
Kerry Scolds Vatican Over Gay Marriage
Associated Press
BOSTON - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry scolded the Vatican Friday for saying Catholic politicians like himself have a "moral duty" to oppose laws granting legal rights to gay couples.
"I believe in the church and I care about it enormously," said the Massachusetts senator. "But I think that it's important to not have the church instructing politicians. That is an inappropriate crossing of the line in America."
The Vatican had urged Catholics and non-Catholics Thursday to unite in campaigning against gay marriages and gay adoptions. The 12-page document, issued by the church, presents a battle plan for politicians confronted with legislation legalizing same-sex unions and rails against gay adoption.
The document calls on Catholic politicians to vote against laws granting legal recognition to homosexual unions and to work to repeal those already on the books.
"To vote in favor of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral," it said, although it didn't specify penalties for Catholics who do.
Kerry opposes gay marriage, saying it is a right reserved in America for men and women, but he has said gay couples should have the same legal rights as husbands and wives.
When it returns from its August recess, the Senate will begin hearings to determine whether new laws are necessary to strengthen the federal definition of marriage as a man and a woman, a Republican senator said Friday.
In 1996, President Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act, which denied federal recognition of same-sex marriages and allowed states to ignore same-sex unions licensed elsewhere.
President Bush said at a White House news conference Wednesday that he believes "a marriage is between a man and a woman, and I think we ought to codify that one way or the other."
Bush spokesman Scott McClellan said the next day that the White House was studying possible responses if pending lawsuits in Massachusetts and New Jersey result in legalization of gay marriage.
Some Republicans in Congress also are pushing for a constitutional amendment that would ban gay marriages.
Ashcroft I don't think has the heaviosity, although he's been a prosecutor. One usually has to nominate either a judge to SCOTUS, or an ex-President. Which brings me to the wild-card possibility, that Dubya might nominate his daddy to the High Court. After all, President Taft wound up on the Supreme Court.
And Bush Senior is the original, wild-and-woolly RiNO. He was a RiNO before the acronym RiNO was invented -- a Rockefeller Republican, Skull and Bones, you name it. The liberals would love him, he'd be confirmed by acclamation. Remember, you heard it hear first. "In the dark!"
I'd pay to be a fly on that wall, you know. LOL!
Luttig is with the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals. He has reinstated Virginia's ban on partial-birth abortion, and has issued other decisions that warm the hearts of the pro-life lobby.
Regarding Ashcroft, the nomination of a prosecutor with no experience on the bench is not without precedent. Antonin Scalia and William Rehnquist had no previous judicial experience, both having served as assistant US attorney general -- Scalia for three years and Rehnquist for two.
I am skeptical about the nomination of George H.W. Bush as a Supreme Court justice. At this point, the ideological conservatives in the party are adamant about putting pro-life judges on the Court who will be there, issuing pro-life decisions, for the next 30 years. He fails on two counts: he's too old, and he's not sufficiently pro-life.
Of course it is his duty, but it is his duty to apologize to his fellow soldiers, officers for what he did in VietNam, and when he returned from VietNam. I don't see that happening either.
"Whatever"----sinkspur.
He gave me that response too.
Cut le crappe. I can't take this. I really can't.
The Taft precedent and the "spirit of civility" thing might move X41's name into the limelight, if a particularly nasty confirmation fight loomed -- d/o outcomes tomorrow in the Senate.
And it isn't beyond the realm of possibility either, that if Kerry squeaked in (or stole it) but didn't get a majority in the Senate, that he might put up X41 as a fellow Yankee patrician, fellow Yalie and Bonesman, who could be counted on to roll left ("moderate" in Mediaspeak) when it mattered. Particularly if the Bush nomination for an Associate Justice slot helped him get Ginzburg or Souter into the CJ job, and opened the door for his likely nomination of Mario Cuomo or someone equally capable of rolling votes, Billy Brennan style, later on. Although if Kerry got the job, and the Senate, I think he might be inclined to nominate either Mr. Peanut or a young liberal from the Ninth Circuit fruits-and-nuts squad.
I agree Bush's nominating X41 wouldn't be palatable to conservatives, but he might just do it anyway. Wait and see.
"I respect those that have more charity and virtue than I have, who pray for this Kerry character. I think I'd prefer that he receive the left foot of fellowship out the church-house door first. Not that he'd care, but it might stop the endless scandal he causes to not just faithful Catholic Christians, but faithful non-Catholic Christians as well."
As Catholics and according to the Spiritual Works of Mercy, we are obliged to warn the sinner and counsel the doubtful. I admire the courage of the converts to Catholicism...you are an example, (and the kick in the shorts we need), to practicing Catholics worldwide.
We already know what happens when good people remain silent...thank you for speaking up.
I agree with you.
Perhaps; priests are probably wasting their time instructing politicians.
Statesmen, on the other hand, would probably pay attention to what thier church elders had to say, considering themselves accountable to the church they claim to "believe in."
People like Kerry give Catholicism a bad name (if that were possible).
He cares that he was an altarboy. Likes having that on his resumé.
Kerry is as much of a faithful Catholic as he is a loyal American.
Let him scold! This is God's doing, to show the Catholic electorate all over the nation what "Sin"ator Kerry is all about!
Obviously not enough to get in the wheelbarrow.
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