Catholic Bishops Overreaching With Demands to Obama Over Abortion

U.S. Roman Catholic bishops, at their fall conference in Baltimore, warned President-elect Barack Obama against enacting an "evil law" that would deregulate the "abortion industry," saying it would alienate millions of Americans and sow disunity. But it is the bishops who are the ones sowing disunity: With its all-male hierarchy, the Roman Catholic Church clearly does not respect the constitutionally-protected right of American women to freedom of reproductive choice -- and when church doctrine clashes with the Constitution, the Constitution, with its separation of church and state, must take precedence. (Photo: Mandel Ngan/Agence France-Presse)
(Posted 5:00 a.m. EST Thursday, November 13, 2008)
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A 'SKEETER BITES REPORT EDITORIAL
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Dear Readers,
It's been barely 10 days since President-elect Barack Obama's history-making victory and he won't be sworn in until January. But already, he's facing a direct challenge to his authority by the Roman Catholic Church on the volatile issue of abortion.
The nation's Roman Catholic bishops vowed Tuesday to forcefully confront the new Obama administration over its support for abortion rights, denouncing as "evil" a proposed executive order lifting restrictions on family-planning programs imposed eight years ago by the outgoing Bush administration.
At their fall conference in Baltimore, several bishops declared they would take an uncompromising hard line on abortion, condemning Catholic voters for voting to elect Obama and other pro-choice candidates. Other bishops pushed for the excommunication of Catholic politicians, such as Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) and Vice President-elect Joseph Biden, unless they followed church doctrine that condems abortion as murder.
Bishop Joseph Martino of Scranton, Pennsylvania, specifically singled out Biden, a Scranton native. "I cannot have a vice president-elect coming to Scranton to say he's learned his values there when those values are utterly against the teachings of the Catholic Church," Martino said.
Archbishop Joseph Naumann of the Diocese of Kansas City, Kansas said politicians "can't check your principles at the door of the legislature." Naumann has said repeatedly that Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius, a Catholic Democrat who also supports abortion rights, should stop taking Holy Communion until she changes her stance.
"They cannot call themselves Catholic when they violate such a core belief as the dignity of the unborn," Naumann said Tuesday.
Excuse me, Bishop Martino and Bishop Naumann, but since you've decided to take an uncompromising hard line on abortion, I'm going to do likewise -- to protect women's constitutionally-protected right to freedom of reproductive choice.
When did anyone put you in charge of running the government of this country? America is a democracy, not a theocracy. As such, the first duty of all elected officials, Catholic or otherwise, is to the citizens who elected them, not to the church (and do I really need to remind you that a 2-1 majority of Americans are Protestants?).
Our elected officials are also bound by their oath of office to uphold not the doctrine of the Catholic Church, but the Constitution of the United States -- which, I must remind you, is the supreme law of this country.
It is, therefore, unrealistic for you to expect government officials who happen to be Catholic to always adhere to Catholic doctrine in the performance of their duties -- especially when Catholic doctrine, in the case of abortion, directly clashes with the constitutionally-protected right of women to freedom of reproductive choice.
The decision on whether to terminate a pregnancy (unless the pregnancy is in its final three months) is not a decision for the bishops to make. It is not a decision for elected officials to make. It is not even a decision for the expectant father to make. It is a decision for the woman -- and only the woman -- to make. Neither the church nor the state can interfere with her decision.
For the bishops to expect elected officeholders who are Catholic to violate the Constitution they are sworn to uphold in order to adhere to the teachings of the church on abortion is unrealistic. To expect them to make Catholic doctrine on abortion the law of the state in direct conflict with the Constitution is unacceptable.
There is a reason our Founding Fathers inserted into the Constitution a strict separation of church and state. They did not want to live under a theocracy. Many were Freemasons who faced bitter persecution under the British monarch (which many Americans don't realize was -- and still is -- the head of the Church of England as well as head of state of the United Kingdom).
This separation of religion and government is also essential to the flourishing of religious freedom in this country. Without it, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and many other non-Christian people of faith would face persecution.
This blogger was raised a Catholic, but I renounced Catholicism in 1976 because I could not stomach the church's shameful treatment of women which continues to this day. Nor could I stomach the church's position on homosexuality (a position that, quite frankly, I find to be downright paranoid -- but that's a subject for another editorial).
Many bishops condemned American Catholics who had argued it was morally acceptable to back President-elect Obama because he pledged to reduce abortion rates. Let me make one thing clear: Every American, Catholic or otherwise, has a right to vote for whatever candidate he or she chooses to support. That, too, is guaranteed by our Constitution.
What are the bishops going to do, excommunicate the millions of Catholics who voted for Obama? That would lead to a legal hornet's nest over individual freedom and the separation of church and state. And that, in turn, could jeopardize the Catholic Church's continued exemption from paying taxes.
I strongly suggest that the bishops think very carefully about the unintended consequences if they proceed with cracking down on Catholics who don't adhere to the church's doctrine on abortion.
Sincerely,
Skeeter Sanders
Editor & Publisher
The 'Skeeter Bites Report
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Volume III, Number 74
Copyright 2008, Skeeter Sanders. All rights reserved.
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