Posted on 11/19/2008 3:56:29 PM PST by wagglebee
WASHINGTON, November 19, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The possible signing of the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) by President-Elect Barack Obama would be "the equivalent of a war" an unnamed senior Vatican official recently told TIME magazine.
The startling comments make the second time this week that a Vatican official has forthrightly and in the strongest language condemned Obama's extreme policies on abortion. Speaking at the Catholic University of America a few days ago, Vatican Cardinal James Stafford labeled Obama's anti-life policies as "aggressive, disruptive, and apocalyptic," also noting that, "On November 4, 2008, America suffered a cultural earthquake" (see coverage: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/nov/08111703.html).
With Catholic, but outspokenly pro-abortion individuals occupying two prominent positions (Joseph Biden as vice president and Tom Daschle as Health and Human Services Secretary) the specter of public excommunication or denial of communion for prominent members of the Obama Administration has arisen.
The focus of the Vatican’s concern, FOCA, is a bill that would do away with state laws on abortion, including laws mandating parental involvement, or banning partial birth abortion. FOCA would also compel taxpayer funding of abortions, and, of greatest concern to Bishops, would force faith-based hospitals and healthcare facilities to perform abortions.
Obama has in the past said that he would make signing FOCA one of the highest priorities of his presidency.
Last week at the meeting of US Bishops in Baltimore, Cybercast News Service asked Chicago Cardinal Francis George, the current president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, if voting for FOCA would bring a penalty of automatic excommunication for Catholic politicians. The Cardinal did not rule it out.
"The excommunication is automatic if that act is in fact formal cooperation, and that is precisely what would have to be discussed once you would see the terms of the act itself," responded Cardinal George. When asked for more, he added: "The categories in moral theology about cooperating in evil, which make you complicit in the evil even though you don't do it yourself, are material cooperation, which is usually remote and therefore doesn't involve you in the moral action except in a very auxiliary and minor way, and formal cooperation, which would involve you even though you are not doing it, in the way that makes you culpable.
"So we would have to take a look at each case, and at each law, to determine whether or not the cooperation is material or formal. We've never done that."
Cardinal George has, however, personally analyzed FOCA and expressed his grave concerns about the legislation. In a message to the Obama Administration at the end of the USCCB meeting George wrote on FOCA, saying it would, "outlaw any ‘interference’ in providing abortion at will. It would deprive the American people in all fifty states of the freedom they now have to enact modest restraints and regulations on the abortion industry. FOCA would coerce all Americans into subsidizing and promoting abortion with their tax dollars. It would counteract any and all sincere efforts by government and others of good will to reduce the number of abortions in our country."
The Cardinal added: "FOCA would have an equally destructive effect on the freedom of conscience of doctors, nurses and health care workers whose personal convictions do not permit them to cooperate in the private killing of unborn children. It would threaten Catholic health care institutions and Catholic Charities." (see coverage: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/nov/08111209.html )
In light of this possible attempt to revoke conscience rights under the Obama administration, Catholic League president Bill Donohue has urged President Bush to enact regulations, already in draft for months, which would protect the rights of doctors, nurses and health workers from being discriminated against if they refuse to perform or assist in abortions, as well as other morally contentious procedures. "At stake are the religious rights of these professionals," said Donohue.
"To put it differently, were FOCA to become law (it needs to be reintroduced in the House), the culture war that the Vatican official was referring to would come to a boiling point," he warned. "In practical terms, this would mean the closure of every Catholic hospital in the nation: No bishop is going to stand by and allow the federal government to dictate what medical procedures must be performed in Catholic hospitals. Make no mistake about it, the bishops would shut down Catholic hospitals before acquiescing in the intentional killing of an innocent child. Were this to happen, it would not only cripple the poor, it would cripple the Obama administration."
Donohue concluded: "It is for reasons like these that the Catholic League urges President Bush to move with dispatch in instituting rules protecting the religious rights of all health care workers. If Obama wants to undo them, it will set up a confrontation he will surely regret."
See the TIME article:
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1859856,00.htm...
See the Cybercast News article:
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=14369
I sure don’t accept your judgment of that.
Your problem. Not mine.
When he publicly excommunicates Kennedy, Pelosi, Biden, et al, then I’ll take him seriously. Not before. Put up or shut up, Benedict. Won’t happen though.
Your ego, not mine.
“52%—in exit polling!—is the new “all.”
Not all but enough; we do have a left-wing President Elect. The only chance for changing Roe/Wade would be one more non-liberal Supreme; that will not happen now. There is no other effective way to change the Supremes’ Roe/Wade rulling. It is almost certain that two additional pro-abortion Supremes will be added in the next four years.
The Truth of Christ is not ego. It is the absence there of.
Ego is believing one’s own personal magisterical interpretation of Holy Scripture is ordained in Heaven.
Later.
There are likely to be two NEW pro-abortion justices to replace CURRENT pro-abortion justices, there WILL NOT be two additional pro-abortion justices, there is a difference.
For what it's worth, I have always believed that Justice Kennedy will vote to overturn Roe if presented with the "right" case and Obama's pro-death crowd could easily put such a case before the Court.
A favorite quote from our foerbears that you must have forgotten: 2Samual 23:3 " He that ruleth over men must be just. Ruling in the fear of God" That particular quote was used time and again by Sam Adams and the Sons of Liberty to justify NOT PAYING TAXES TO AN UNJUST EVIL GOVERNMENT.
I am afraid that a man with your views in 1770 would have had a new suit of clothes of feathers and tar !
I stand corrected: I agree with your first paragraph.
ONE NATION UNDER GOD
Pro-Life PING
Please FreepMail me if you want on or off my Pro-Life Ping List.
Well, I hope so. I guess we will be living in 'interesting times' at any rate.
So many people basically accept what the press, especially television, portrays as being the truth, and the Obama family will certainly get the extra-special 'Kennedy' treatment.
I run into many mediocre thinkers who accept what big media says completely without thinking and obviously believe that what they are spouting are their own opinions, but they even use the television-style characterizations, word for word. They don't even know they have been brainwashed (or perhaps they don't care, but I would guess it's the former). So, I don't know that many are skeptical about Obama. We have let our education system decline so badly that many of our citizens are cosmically ignorant (and they actually think they know a lot, which is SO dangerous for our country). These are the Obamabots, and they are huge in number, IMHO.
I believe the Catholic Church feels the Democrat Party is the party of “social justice”, defenders of the downtrodden.
The surprising fact not taken into account by so many non-Catholics is that the Church is a Theocracy, not a Democracy. Even among the practicing members of the Church dogma is not established by consensus or vote. The Church is the extreme example of a deliberative body and was structured to NOT be responsive to the changing winds of popular opinion or politics.
Rest assured that the Church is moving in the right direction on this issue. I do find it a little disconcerting that the godless left has more faith in the Church fomenting change than so many people of faith do. Ask yourself why the left and the MSM protested so loudly when Benedict XVI was selected as the new Pope.
A better view would be Matthew's account of this transaction (MT 22:15-22). Jesus did not say that we had to pay our taxes. He recognized the trap set up between two fundamental enemies --the Pharisees and the Herodians. His answer, "...repay to Caesar...." was merely His divine wisdom exercised to placate the question. Neither side was allowed any grievance with which to arrest Jesus. In today's world, we would call it 'walking the fine line'.
“The Pope spoke out very forcefully against abortion when he was here this spring. Dozens of bishops spoke out during campaign.
There could have been a great deal of public backlash if a foreign head of state had appeared to publicly take sides in the election.”
Sorry - his silence regarding disciplining those Catholics, especially politicians, that defy Church teaching and the Scriptures speaks volumes. He remains quiet because it would have ramifications on attendance and income. He has spoken forcefully against other U.S. political issues such as the war. Why not now?
Short list of Pope Pius XII’s public anti-Nazi proclamations
Papal Encyclical “Summi Pontificatus” October 1939
New York Times 10/28/1939
Fall 1939- Allied aircraft dropped 88K copies of Summi Pontificatus over parts of Germany
1/19/1940 - Worldwide broadcast Vatican Radio and L’Osservatore Romano
January 1940 Jewish Advocate
January 1940 New York Times
January 1940 Manchester Guardian
March 14, 1940 New York Times
1940 Easter Homily
May 11, 1940 Public Speech
June 1942
10/1/1942 Lonton Times
Homily Christmas 1941
Homily Christmas 1942
This is a very very short list and does not include anything Pacelli did before he became Pope Pius XII.
It has been noted that when Pius made public statements the Nazis stepped up executions of Jews and Priests.
No, he never said anything. Same old crap.
Our little church is expecting it.
I wonder if anyone has an idea of how many Catholics just didn’t vote?
It seems unreal that a higher percentage of Catholics total voted for Obama than for Bush.
We already do. You don’t wanna know.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.