I have a few friends in my parish who are staunch Democrats, will vote for Obama no matter what. They know what the church teaches, they are only nominally pro-life and they believe in every one of the arguments mentioned in this article.
When one of them, who hates Pres. Bush, and with whom I had several heated discussions during the last election, made the argument that my dear Bush never did anything about abortion, I reminded him that the partial-birth abortion ban was passed, signed and upheld by a SC led by Bush appointee, Chief Justice John Roberts. There was no acknowledgment of my assertion, he just went on to say that the Republicans were the party of wealthy business owners, corporations and BIG OIL.
I have another friend there. A woman, the Regent of our Catholic Daughters court, who angrily accused me of being a hypocrite because I didn’t equate abortion with the War on Terror or the death penalty. Our organization is a pro-life one, but she refused to allow me to host any pro-life activities under the sponsorship of our court. I am doing so anyway as a private citizen and member of the parish.
Today, in Mass, there was a call for unity. One mind, one body. We attend mass together, we say the same prayers, sing the same songs, hear the same Word of God, and yet we couldn’t be further apart in how to accept and follow the teachings of the church. There is much dissension within, and until that is resolved, the Catholic vote won’t be the force it could and should be.
The tragedy is that Catholics could have really made a difference in this country. I work for a Catholic Church in New York and the only ones voting for John McCain are me and the Pastor — everyone else is an Obama kool-aide drinker. When you bring up the abortion issue, they counter it with the Iraq war and poverty in America, as though that’s suppose to neutralize the argument. God help us — NOTHING TRUMPS ABORTION!! — but they don’t understand this or they don’t want too.