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“They don’t vote as a block anymore.” These words were recently spoken by Monsignor Joseph Rebman about Catholic voters. Once a powerful demographic, Catholics today are bitterly divided over whether it is acceptable to vote for pro-choice politicians. Many Catholics are proudly progressive, but others insist that abortion is non-negotiable. What are the spiritual implications of a Catholic vote?
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quickening
Quickening and Other Issues
Discussions of quickening or ensouling addressed the issue of when the soul entered the unborn child. Saint Augustine, without the aid of sonograms or the advances in embryology we have today, calculated that boys received their souls at 40 days after conception, girls at 90 days (apparently Speaker Pelosi's analysis of Augustine missed this point).
However, the Church always viewed abortion as a great evil at any stage of pregnancy. Modern embryology now confirms what the Church knew all along --life begins at conception. That is a scientific fact, not a religious belief. At the moment of conception a human life has been created. That life may end before birth through miscarriage or abortion, but it was a human life.
With regard to war, adultery and other types of sin, abortion and euthanasia are on their own level in relation to other transgressions. The intentional taking of innocent lives can never be approved by the Church.
- BME
October 21, 2008 10:56AM
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life and other issues
"Modern embryology now confirms what the Church knew all along --life begins at conception"
This seems wrong on both counts. The Church did not know this all along, or they wouldn't have had the whole quickening thing. Second, sperm and eggs are living. The sperm is alive before conception so there is no "beginning" of life from non-life occurring. One could easily interpret the Bible in such away to believe that sperm and eggs have the same rights as fertilized eggs. After all, it's all based on the passage that God knew us before we were born.
"The intentional taking of innocent lives can never be approved by the Church."
So a Catholic couldn't vote for McCain either? He intentionally supported a war that the Pope has said is immoral, illegal, and a threat to humanity. Surely a threat to humanity is on the same level as a abortion.
btw, how does one determine which sins are greater than others?
- reckoner
October 21, 2008 12:04PM
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Quickening and Just War Theory
The quickening issue was discussed in the context of what penalty would be imposed on someone who caused a caused a woman to have a miscarriage, or in the case of an abortion. The penalty would be more severe if the quickening had taken place. However, there was never any doubt that the destruction of an unborn child at any stage was an act of evil.
I do not understand what you are getting at regarding the sperm and egg. Human life does not begin until the two come together.
I have searched the Vatican website and have found no statement by either Pope John Paul II or Pope Benedict XVI that the war in Iraq is "immoral, illegal, and a threat to humanity." That is not surprising in light of the fact that no such statement was ever made.
John Paul II stated as his own personal opinion, and expressly not as Church doctrine, that he did not believe the invasion of Iraq was justified. The Church itself long ago developed the Just War theory because it acknowledged that under certain circumstances wars might have to be fought. Reasonable people could disagree as to when those circumstances existed, and Catholics have disagreed about the Iraq War. However, the Church has never stated as a matter of doctrine that the War in Iraq was not a Just War.
The Church, through its teaching authority, talks about a hierarchy of sins. Since we are talking about abortion and war, lets look at some numbers. Since Roe v. Wade was decided 35 years ago, there have been approximately 50 million abortions in the United States alone. Are you aware of any war, anywhere in the world, where that many innocent lives were destroyed in the last 35 years?
- BME
October 21, 2008 1:05PM
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more questions
"Human life does not begin until the two come together."
In your opinion.
Regarding the war in Iraq.
http://www.cjd.org/paper/jp2war.html
http://www.americancatholic.org/news/JustWar/iraq/papalstatement.asp
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0 ,2933,80875,00.html
"Just War theory because it acknowledged that under certain circumstances wars might have to be fought."
Any honest reading of the Just War theory makes it clear that Iraq is an unjust war.
"John Paul II stated as his own personal opinion, and expressly not as Church doctrine, that he did not believe the invasion of Iraq was justified."
And you believe that your opinion of the war from a Catholic perspective is more relevant than the Pope's? How does one distinguish the Pope's personal opinions from those that are binding? What makes them substantially different?
Let's throw out another comparison. Can a Catholic vote for a politician that supports the death penalty? Does the Church have an official stance on the death penalty?
Lastly, I don't think your comparison of 35 years of abortion to the deaths of a single war is relevant. You'd have to account for 35 years of war and more than just the deaths of a war. What about all the people that are maimed by war, all that have suffered greatly due to the war, what about all the children that were burned over their entire bodies from napalm but did not die.
I'm trying to understand the value of life from a Catholic perspective. Can you explain the way the heirarchy of sin is determined?
"Reasonable people could disagree as to when those circumstances existed, and Catholics have disagreed about the Iraq War. "
Isn't it also possible that reasonable people can disagree about when a life is a human life? clearly your statement about quickening reveals that the Church saw life before quickening as less than life after quickening!
Let's do a hypothetical. A building is on fire and you rush in to save anyone inside. At one end is an 8 year old girl and at the other end are 10 fertilized eggs (it's a fertility clinic). You only have time to save one or the other, do you save the girl or the 10 fertilized eggs?
In my mind it's clear that the eggs are not equivalent to the 8 year old girl
- reckoner
October 21, 2008 1:53PM
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Can Catholics Vote for a Pro-Choice Candidate
The purpose of this argument is to discuss whether a Catholic can vote for a pro-choice candidate. You apparently are not Catholic and do not agree with the Church's position on various issues. That is fine and your right, but we are straying far afield from the purpose of this discussion. My purpose here is to argue that Catholics cannot vote for Senator Obama with a clear conscience.
In any event, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has just released a statement at their website usccb.org that basically obliterates all of the justifications for the "Yes" position on this argument. I will be interested in seeing how the experts on that side explain the statement away.
I also think the statement by the bishops will answer some of your questions raised in your reply to me.
- BME
October 21, 2008 2:12PM
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understanding
it's true that I am not a Catholic (or Christian), but I'm making a sincere effort to understand your point of view. I apologize if my questions are difficult, but my intention is to understand The Catholic position. I'm a logician and I like to test the consistency of things.
Do Catholics really believe that 4 cells the size of a period at the end of this sentence are of equal stature to a living breathing 8 year old girl? Would they save 10 fertilized eggs over 1 girl if forced to choose?
Are Catholics consistently pro-life? If they can't vote for a pro-choice candidate then why can they vote for a pro death penalty candidate?
Maybe someone else can help me understand these questions if you find them too difficult or misunderstand my intentions.
- reckoner
October 21, 2008 3:15PM
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Understanding
I appreciate your desire to want to know more about Catholicism, but the point of this argument is to discuss whether Catholics can vote for a pro choice candidate. This is an important issue for Catholics and with the election only two weeks away, it should really be the focus of this discussion.
I would suggest you look at the statement I directed you to, and also look at the Bishops' Statement on Catholics and voting issued last November, which you can also find on the usccb.org website. If you really want to look into these various issues, catholicity.com has a summary of the Catholic Cathechism, which states the Church's teaching on these issues and can be searched by topic. If you are really ambitious, you can go to the Vatican website, vatican.va, and can search for the papal statements on these issues.
Finally, to answer your questions, the Church believes a person is a person from conception to natural death.
That being said, I would save the little girl and I think virtually every Catholic would as well. Your question is really a red herring in the abortion context because there we are not dealing with a situation like a fire that kills indiscriminately. We are talking about the intentional taking of the life of an innocent human being.
That leads to your final question on the death penalty. The Church opposes the death penalty except in cases where society cannot be protected in any other fashion. However, the death penalty does not rise to the level of abortion because in an abortion an innocent life is being taken. With the death penalty you are dealing with someone who took an innocent life.
- BME
October 21, 2008 3:49PM
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What about...
One thing that rarely comes up in the abortion debate is the high number of spontaneous abortions. It seems that God is the biggest inducer of abortions. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/MEDLINEPLUS/ency/article/001488.htm . An estimate of between 25 to 50% of fertilized eggs are spontaneously aborted.The figures on that are a guess because they happen before most women even know they are pregnant and don't usually get pregnancy tests done. Of the known pregnancies, about 10% are naturally aborted.
How does that figure into the wonders of religion?
- mangueken
November 23, 2008 11:56AM
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What about...
I disagree with your basic premise that God causes spontaneous abortions, but will accept it for the purpose of responding to your comment.
The problem with your line of reasoning is demonstrated by applying it to other "Acts of God." People are killed all the time by natural disasters. That does not make it okay for human beings to kill other innocent human beings.
- BME
November 24, 2008 8:27AM
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I brought it up...
to make a point of logical consistency.
We all would be better off helping make sure that we educate people about sex and pregnancy so that we could reduce the numbers of unplanned pregnancies. But that would require us to teach our children about sex and contraceptives. It sometimes seems that people would like a particular result without being active in the solution.
I also admit I was taking a dig at the religious belief that god considers every life special. It can hardly be true if god created a body which naturally aborts more often than others induce them.
I agree taking other "innocent " human lives is wrong and that natural disasters are a terrible experience for all those involved. I try not to resort to worse case scenarios. I happen to think a woman or young girl is higher on the list of people who need support than a few cells starting to become a life and have a hard time understanding the religious point of view on abortion .
It always appears to me that people know god's mind and I wonder how they know it. Did they ever think that god had a different plan for that woman of young girl other than raising a child? It seems to me if you are going to use the argument god works in mysterious ways you would have to conclude that among one of the mysterious ways he chose, abortion would be among those ways.
If one proceeds along those lines, even as a Christian, you have to say that yes, a Christian could vote for a pro choice candidate because technically speaking no one knows the ways of god and god may not be that opinionated on the subject.
- mangueken
November 26, 2008 9:15PM
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