Posted on 08/13/2016 8:43:50 PM PDT by Arthur McGowan
My column this week is a collection of personal comments. Read it as thoughts from a brother in the faith, not as teachings from an archbishop.
Presidential campaigns typically hit full stride after Labor Day in an election year. But 2016 is a year in which two prominent Catholics – a sitting vice president, and the next vice presidential nominee of his party — both seem to publicly ignore or invent the content of their Catholic faith as they go along. And meanwhile, both candidates for the nation’s top residence, the White House, have astonishing flaws.
This is depressing and liberating at the same time. Depressing, because it’s proof of how polarized the nation has become. Liberating, because for the honest voter, it’s much easier this year to ignore the routine tribal loyalty chants of both the Democratic and Republican camps. I’ve been a registered independent for a long time and never more happily so than in this election season. Both major candidates are – what’s the right word? so problematic – that NEITHER IS CLEARLY BETTER THAN THE OTHER. [Emphasis added.]
As Forbes magazine pointed out some months ago, the Republican candidate is worth roughly $4.5 billion. The Democratic candidate is worth roughly $45 million. Compare that with the average American household, which is worth about $144,000. The median U.S. income is about $56,000. Neither major candidate lives anywhere near the solar system where most Americans live, work and raise families. Nonetheless, we’re asked to trust them.
That’s a big ask. One candidate — in the view of a lot of people — is an eccentric businessman of defective ethics whose bombast and buffoonery make him inconceivable as president. And the other – in the view of a lot of people – should be under criminal indictment. The fact that she’s not – again, in the view of a lot of people — proves Orwell’s Animal Farm principle that “all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others.”
So what are we to do this election cycle as Catholic voters? Note that by “Catholic,” I mean people who take their faith seriously; people who actually believe what the Catholic faith holds to be true; people who place it first in their loyalty, thoughts and actions; people who submit their lives to Jesus Christ, to Scripture and to the guidance of the community of belief we know as the Church.
Anyone else who claims the Catholic label is simply fooling himself or herself — and even more importantly, misleading others.
The American bishops offer valuable counsel in their document Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship (available from the USCCB), and this year especially, they ask us to pray before we vote. This is hardly new “news.” Prayer is always important. In a year when each Catholic voter must choose between deeply flawed options, prayer is essential. And prayer involves more than mumbling a Hail Mary before we pull the voting booth lever for someone we see as the lesser of two evils. Prayer is a conversation, an engagement of the soul with God. It involves listening for God’s voice and educating our consciences.
It’s absurd – in fact, it’s blasphemous – to assume that God prefers any political party in any election year. But God, by his nature, is always concerned with good and evil and the choices we make between the two. For Catholics, no political or social issue stands in isolation. But neither are all pressing issues equal in foundational importance or gravity. The right to life undergirds all other rights and all genuine social progress. It cannot be set aside or contextualized in the name of other “rights” or priorities without prostituting the whole idea of human dignity.
God created us with good brains. It follows that he will hold us accountable to think deeply and clearly, rightly ordering the factors that guide us, before we act politically. And yet modern American life, from its pervasive social media that too often resemble a mobocracy, to the relentless catechesis of consumption on our TVs, seems designed to do the opposite. It seems bent on turning us into opinionated and distracted cattle unable to gain mastery over our own appetites and thoughts. Thinking and praying require silence, and the only way we can get silence is by deciding to step back and unplug.
This year, a lot of good people will skip voting for president but vote for the “down ticket” names on their party’s ballot; or vote for a third party presidential candidate; or not vote at all; or find some mysterious calculus that will allow them to vote for one or the other of the major candidates. I don’t yet know which course I’ll personally choose. It’s a matter properly reserved for every citizen’s informed conscience.
But I do know a few of the things I’ll be reading between now and November. The list is not exclusive or comprehensive. But this year these particular titles seem especially urgent:
Living the Gospel of Life. This 1998 pastoral letter of the U.S. bishops remains the best brief guide to American Catholic political reflection yet produced. Resurrecting the Idea of a Christian Society by R.R. Reno (Regnery) and It’s Dangerous to Believe: Religious Freedom and Its Enemies by Mary Eberstadt (HarperCollins). Both of these books are new, important, a key to understanding the current moment in our national life, and deeply engaging. They need to be discussed and shared widely.
And finally two essays by the late, great Czech writer, Václav Havel, “Politics and Conscience” and “The Power of the Powerless.” Both are collected in Open Letters: Selected Writings, 1965-1990 (Vintage Books). Havel was not (to my knowledge) a religious believer, and he wrote as a dissident during an era of Soviet Bloc repression. But his commitment to what he called “living in the truth,” and his understanding and critique of the weaknesses in Western societies like our own – not just Marxist ones – were remarkable. They remain relevant right now, today.
The next few months will determine the next decade and more of our nation’s life. We need to be awake, we need to clear our heads of media noise, and we need to think quietly and carefully before we vote. None of us can afford to live the coming weeks on autopilot.
As a Catholic, I just don’t understand why someone with such a high position in the church, and all his influence, just fails to see the corruption from the Clintons and the democrat party. This is very disappointing.Catholic might as well be spelled D-E-M-O-C-R-A-T
Archbishop Caput{sic} is trying to create a distraction from your Pope. Would Catholics vote for your Pope to be President?...Hillary? The Pope? How could we tell the difference.
Who ever said God is going to INTERFERE in the election???????
And that’s not what you said in the first place. You said God does not PREFER one party over another.
I pointed out that that is absurd—that it’s like saying the God is equally pleased by gassing Jews and saving Jews.
Then you CHANGED THE VERB from “prefer” to “interfere.”
Of course nobody expects God to “interfere” in the election.
But Chaput said that God does not PREFER the pro-life party to the pro-abortion party. THAT is a blasphemous statement.
Anyway, you have demonstrated that you are not interested in discussing a question honestly, but will substitute one verb for another, when your statements are exposed as absurd.
Whatever..LOL
Most bishops are like that. Than God for the Church he founded so no one bishop can do much harm.
“Whatever.”
Thank you for conceding that your assertions were indefensible.
“Whatever.”
Thank you for conceding that your assertions were indefensible.
Padre if that is what you are, which I seriously doubt, you clearly did not receive a Jesuit education.
My assertion was and is that God does not prefer OR interfere with mankind’s political squabbles.
You remind me of a certain black woman army military imposer around here who has never been close to the military. I doubt you have been near the church since the nuns made you stand in the hall in second grade.
Really pal, don’t waste anymore of my time, you are as they say in Latin an idiota...
Wow. Your powers of discernment/deduction are, simply, pathetic.
I not only went to a Jesuit college, and was a philosophy major, I was a Jesuit novice for a time. And then got another degree in philosophy, at Fordham.
You have just asserted the same preposterous notion: that God has no preference in “political squabbles.”
If you consider the ripping up of babies’ bodies to be a “political squabble,” about which God yawns, completely indifferent, then you are not in the land of the civilized or rational, and certainly not the Catholic.
Thank you for repeating your repulsive, irrational view that God is indifferent to the murder of babies, the gassing of Jews, the beheading of Christians, and other “political squabbles” so succinctly.
Do not be surprised that once Pope Francis turns 80, he will look into stepping down. The hint he gave was at the end of the WYD gathering in Poland a few weeks back that he said the next one he will not be there, that is in 3 years time, in Panama.
There is something to having the clergy free to speak on politics. I am free to criticize their social and economic policies.
What about: “World events are under His control?”
Revelation 9:15
Daniel 4:34
Daniel 2:21
Psalms 29:3-10
1 Corinthians: 15:27
that NEITHER IS CLEARLY BETTER THAN THE OTHER. [Emphasis added.]
As Forbes magazine pointed out some months ago, the Republican candidate is worth roughly $4.5 billion. The Democratic candidate is worth roughly $45 million.
I don't have any insights into Hillary's finances, but I'll guarantee you she's worth more than $45 million. It probably depends on which set of books she shows you.
The author of this article fails to realize that if Hillary is elected, there may not BE a Catholic Church, at least that we recognize, within a decade.
“If you consider the ripping up of babies’ bodies to be a “political squabble,” about which God yawns, completely indifferent, then you are not in the land of the civilized or rational, and certainly not the Catholic”
As a questioning Calvinist I would have to agree with you Arthur.
Spot on.
The only time a Catholic bishop should speak or write is when what he is saying MUST BE BELIEVED by all Catholics.
I have to disagree there. There's a place for helpful guidance that might work well for one person and not another. Say, an article on how to order your day to improve your spiritual life, or what the bish believes is an important new novel of interest to Catholics. Those would be necessarily matters of taste.
In my opinion, the problem is that Abp. Chaput has always been a hopeless "wet" on immigration and his disastrously poor judgment on that clouds his thinking. And then he packages this foolishness into "just my opinion." As you say, he has an office, and he's abusing its importance. Abp. Sheen never made that mistake.
Only ONE candidate is problematic, and that is Hillary Clinton. It is a no brainer!
Everything Hillary has ever touched has failed, been engulfed in scandal, resulted in massive investigations, litigation, financial ruin, prison or death. The final stage of any Hillary enterprise is a grand announcement that Hillary did not technically break the law. Or no one can prove she did. Or, even if she did, no one ever gets prosecuted for it. What are her accomplishments?
Hillary is a leader in the culture of death and the dismantling of the family, increased taxes, open borders, more government regulation, same sex marriage, and chaos.
Trump is for economic prosperity via reduced taxes, replacing Obamacare, etc.
Trump will strengthen our military, secure our borders, protect the unborn, remove regulatory barriers and eliminate dependence on countries that do not like us.
Trump will reintroduce common sense in place of Political correctness.
Once in a while, the good Archbishop says something dopey, and this is one of those times. Really dopey. Chaput, tho he has a reputation as friendly to traditional Catholicism, sometimes exhibits a disconnect that is off-putting. Trump, for all his wealth, seems to actually understand the dynamics of working. And he has a long paper trail to review that supports that assertion - the values his children model, his search for excellence in his TV show, The Apprentice, etc. Clinton is merely an old, has-been career criminal.
Ultimately, of course God is in control, he is after all the final judge of all of our lives.
As I noted in an earlier post if we weren't given the gift of free will then there would be no evil in this world. People choose to be evil, it exists because we have been blessed with free will.
God does not prefer a particular course of political action nor does he interfere with our political squabbles. It's up to each individual exercising their free will to make those choices. Human history is littered with governments and tyrants making evil decisions and the misery and devastation left in their wake.
Because God allows us to choose evil it does not mean he is indifferent to the consequences. I believe all whose lives are snuffed out because of the evil pervasive in the world enjoy a special place in the Kingdom of the Lord, remember God's promise is eternal life and it is how we lead our lives, being given the power of free will that we well be judged on.
Knowing most of us are to weak to handle free will he gave us his only son so that our sins may be forgiven. It's up to each individual to choose the right path, on his/her journey through this short life. God has given all of us who believe in him the choice to follow his word, he is not going to make us do it nor is he going to make the world safe, that's the job for all of us...
Idiots doing their best to let Satan in because they recognize trump as a sinner and cannot fathom that they too are flawed - as they preach that no flawed person is worthy of the job of President....
Satan's claws reach deep....
The Catholic church leaders need to STFU about our election
The article is crap. The author shoots a big giant hole in his “informed Catholic” case when he blithly conflates the MSM Trump caricature with the actual man. Anyone who has actually looked into Trumps past will find out that he has done more for people around himself in dire need and for society in general than the grasping, greedy Clintons will ever do in ten more lifetimes. This is a low info know nothing.
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