If a voter thought that, although Candidate A supports one intrinsic evil (abortion), the other supports a equivalent intrinsic evil (say, a nuclear target=city strategy that would kill millions), then there would be a proportionate reason to vote for "A" to limit the evil of "B."
(This is not factually true --- McCain was not threatening to nuke a bunch of cities together with their population --- but if you thought it was so, it would be a proportionate reason.)
If a voter thought that, although Candidate B has the verbally "right answers" about abortion ("It's wrong because life begins at conception"), Candidate A has a greater likelihood of actually, substantially reducing the number of abortion by some other, moral means (say, by promising every pregnant American woman $20,000 upon live birth), then there would be some justification in voting for "A".
(This also is not factually true, but it would provide justification for someone who thought it were true.)
Either of these two voters would be factually wrong, but subjectively not guilty of sin.
In any case, I think the priest is right in saying they should go to Confession. They should examine their consciences and discuss their vote and their motives with the priest: they need help sorting it all out before Judgment.
Nice try. I will side with the Pope and my conscience that tells me that more than 40 million murdered unborn babies is enough.
Incidentally, do you have any statistics to support your point that a Catholic voter who supported a pro-abortion candidate actually went through this pain-staking thought process in deciding whom to vote for? You sound like you are giving them an excuse.
You are very correct. There is no Church dogma or other canon law that says it is a sin to vote for a candidate that is in support of choice. (I won’t say supports abortion because I know plenty of people on both sides of this issue and not one is in favor of abortion.) The Vatican made it very clear in 2004 when Kerry was running that it was up to the individual voter to make their own moral judgement that they can live with. Additionally, the Church also made it clear, again, that you only commit a mortal sin if you directly assist someone in getting an abortion or if you yourself have an abortion.