So, this guy says an honest examination of the issues from a Catholic perspective should compel a Catholic to vote for Kerry. What do you think of that?
Weasel. A disgrace to my alma mater.
Well as a Catholic, a veteran, an American and a conservative I think he is an effin idiot, another in a long line of Pacifists for Genocide.
Guess he doesn't consider abortion on demand an issue?
A Catholic in name only. Excommunicate him, God already has.
Roche is about as "Catholic" as my cat! ROFLMAO
If one claims to be Catholic but their "conscience" deviates significantly from Roman Catholic Church tradition, they need to either reconsider the state of their conscience or the status of their membership in the Roman Catholic Church.
If one claims to be Catholic but their "conscience" deviates significantly from Roman Catholic Church tradition, they need to either reconsider the state of their conscience or the status of their membership in the Roman Catholic Church.
THE FIVE NON-NEGOTIABLE ISSUES
These five current issues concern actions that are intrinsically evil and must never be promoted by the law. Intrinsically evil actions are those which fundamentally conflict with the moral law and can never be deliberately performed under any circumstances. It is a serious sin to deliberately endorse or promote any of these actions, and no candidate who really wants to advance the common good will support any action contrary to the non-negotiable principles involved in these issues.
1. Abortion
The Church teaches that, regarding a law permitting abortions, it is "never licit to obey it, or to take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or to vote for it" (EV 73). Abortion is the intentional and direct killing of an innocent human being, and therefore it is a form of homicide.
The unborn child is always an innocent party, and no law may permit the taking of his life. Even when a child is conceived through rape or incest, the fault is not the child's, who should not suffer death for others' sins.
2. Euthanasia
Often disguised by the name "mercy killing," euthanasia also is a form of homicide. No person has a right to take his own life, and no one has the right to take the life of any innocent person.
In euthanasia, the ill or elderly are killed, by action or omission, out of a misplaced sense of compassion, but true compassion cannot include intentionally doing something intrinsically evil to another person (cf. EV 73).
3. Embryonic Stem Cell Research
Human embryos are human beings. "Respect for the dignity of the human being excludes all experimental manipulation or exploitation of the human embryo" (CRF 4b).
Recent scientific advances show that often medical treatments that researchers hope to develop from experimentation on embryonic stem cells can be developed by using adult stem cells instead. Adult stem cells can be obtained without doing harm to the adults from whom they come. Thus there is no valid medical argument in favor of using embryonic stem cells. And even if there were benefits to be had from such experiments, they would not justify destroying innocent embryonic humans.
4. Human Cloning
"Attempts . . . for obtaining a human being without any connection with sexuality through 'twin fission,' cloning, or parthenogenesis are to be considered contrary to the moral law, since they are in opposition to the dignity both of human procreation and of the conjugal union" (RHL I:6).
Human cloning also involves abortion because the "rejected" or "unsuccessful" embryonic clones are destroyed, yet each clone is a human being.
5. Homosexual "Marriage"
True marriage is the union of one man and one woman. Legal recognition of any other union as "marriage" undermines true marriage, and legal recognition of homosexual unions actually does homosexual persons a disfavor by encouraging them to persist in what is an objectively immoral arrangement.
"When legislation in favor of the recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative assembly, the Catholic lawmaker has a moral duty to express his opposition clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favor of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral" (UHP 10).
Catholic Ping - let me know if you want on/off this list
Didn't Cardinal Newman say that if one's conscience were to be at odds with the teaching of the Church, then the honest thing to do would be to leave the Church?
Any Catholic who would vote for Kerry is uniformed.
Kerry is a Catholic in Name Only (CINO) and does not deserve the Catholic vote!
But, I suspect that his answers would be: John Kerry has a plan! Kerry's tax plan (soak the "rich") is better. We should have allowed more time for the inspectors to do their jobs (like Kerry says!). Republicans want to poison our air and our water! Kyoto! More people below the (ever-rising) poverty line! Death penalty is murder!
At any rate, liberals at ND is nothing new. My only solace is that ND is less radically liberal than most other Universities, and therefore looks conservative in comparison.
By the the way, the Dean's e-mail address is:
Mark.W.Roche.5@nd.edu
If you want to correspond with him.
President Bush and John Kerry: On the Issues Important to Catholics
"Seismic" Catholic Shift to Bush [Insight ]
Analyst cites abortion stance as some Catholic voters shift to Bush
Poll: Catholics Trending Towards Bush
Kerry Losing Ground Among White Catholics
Voting Our Conscience, Not Our Religion [Catholic Prof Says "Vote Kerry"]
No big surprise here. The Jesuits will twist every which way to promote their "social justice" agenda - regardless of the Church's teachings on these issues. Twenty years ago, the Jesuit-run universities were not as liberal as public college campuses, but that is no longer true.
I believe that Notre Dame is a Jesuit school, so no wonder there are some rogue so-called 'intellectuals' there that think they know better than the pope or the teachings of the Magisterium.
No Catholic can vote for Kerry in good conscience without bringing upon himself grave sin in enabling the continuation of procurred abortion and the extension of the culture of death. He is unsupportable.
I don't care if he has a rock solid, foolproof, free plan to solve healthcare. HIS OPINIONS ARE VAPID, HOLLOW WORDS. He is WRONG ON LIFE and therefore his voice on EVERYTHING ELSE IS A NON-SEQUITUR. These other issues are irrelevant in Kerry's case because he's wrong on LIFE. It can't get much simpler than that.
The Vatican has already spoken. Who needs to listen to this twerp?
Whatever you're smokin, Mark, it has distorted your theology. By honestly examining the issues (please review the DNC platform), Catholics of good faith should be running in the opposite direction from the Dems as FAST as they can. Don't look back lest you become a pillar of salt. This party, called the Democratic party, is an anti-Christ institution. It is so taken by the forces of evil, it is not worth saving but consigning over to the devil. It is my advice to good Catholic pols who remain in this party to abandon it. There is no grace to be found there.
Deacon Francis