There has been a guide developed by a Catholic organization making suggestions around voting: http://www.catholic.com/library/voters_guide.asp

Hailey, you have admitted before that you are not an RC; and further, some people around here who are have explained to you, with important links, that the North American church is by no means a monolith, and not all the bishops are likely to be much concerned with the sorts of tendentious links you've found there.

Presently, in Canada have a full range of contraceptive resources and the ability to say "yes" or "no" to any given sexual encounter. This gives them the ability to not experience an untimely pregnancy if they do not feel that they could welcome a new life easily.

I do not believe that John Kerry will be excommunicated by the end of the year. There are too many examples given where the Church failed to act to remove unworthy persons (according to RC standards, not my own)from participating in Mass. It is unlikely that he will be denied the Sacrament.

[ 29 August 2004: Message edited by: Hailey ]

The Church is not merely the hierarchy, though; in theory and often in practise, it is composed of those baptised into the faith, who have a wide range of political opinions.

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I'm nominally Catholic, as are most of the women in Québec who have been so militant in defence of the right to control our own bodies.

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Lagetta, does nominally mean non-practicing? loosely practicing?

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I have no idea whether the majority of pro-lifers are women - such alienation is not surprising; female genital mutilation is a case in point -

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The majority of prolifers are women. The most prochoice segment of society is males under 25. I don't have a url for those statistics but it gives you any credibility they were taught to me in women's studies and Susan Jackel (spelling?) was the author of the information.

I've not ever mutilated

anyone's genitals nor have I threatened to.

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What IS clear is that the Church hierarchy is a deliberately all-male, patriarchal, phallocratic body.

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Food for thought, if I may. Does it not depend on the way you define power and hierachy? Yes, Priests are men. That is not the only role. Is it not significant to you that during a time when the Church was under heavy criticism for different reasons that the person who ranked for over a decade as the most respected and admired in the entire world was a woman. It was never the Pope, it was never a Priest, it was never anyone from that path. The beautiful and wonderful Mother Teresa was regarded as among the most respected in the world. Despite all of the males within the church fold she stood out in her gifts and her ability to love. That is an accomplishment.

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There is no point in my debating in someone who thinks women are just things put on earth to breed with no choice in the matter. That is a question of war - by any means necessary

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I don't believe that. I have no disrespect whatsoever for women who choose to remain unmarried, women who choose to remain childless etc. Not every person is intended to be a mother in the same way as not everyone is intended to be a teacher or a doctor or a lawyer. Everyone has a different life path. I just would like to see it accomplished outside of abortion.

If I knew someone who was going to have an abortion I would attempt to disuade her and offer her support but if she proceeded to abort the baby I would have no legal recourse.

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Originally posted by Hailey:
I believe that it's the RCC that are making recommendations to their congregation that is compromised of both men and women around voting.

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I believe it's about defeating Kerry in the election.

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This week we witnessed the odd spectacle of an evangelical Protestant president from Texas seeking to goad the Catholic Church hierarchy into dictating positions to and punishing another Roman Catholic senator from Massachusetts because he doesn’t toe the line on issues such as abortion rights, gay marriage and stem-cell research.

When the president met with the pope last week, he also met with one of the pontiff’s chief advisers, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Vatican secretary of state. According to The National Catholic Reporter, he told Sodano that “not all the American bishops are with me” on cultural issues and further urged the Vatican to nudge the American bishops toward greater “activism” on these issues.

Now, out of context it’s not immediately clear what such “activism” might mean.

But perhaps the following will clarify matters.

The question of whether pro-choice politicians (particularly John Kerry) should be denied Communion has been roiling the country’s Catholic bishops of late. A majority of Catholic bishops appear to oppose such a move; an overwhelming majority of American Catholics oppose the idea, according to a recently released poll.
And even conservative cardinals at the Vatican are said to have recommended
caution.

This week, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is gathering in Englewood, Colo., and one key item on the agenda will be to arrive at some guidelines or uniform approach on this issue of denying Communion to Catholic politicians. Washington’s Archbishop Theodore E. McCarrick heads the task force on this question, and he has said publicly that he is “uncomfortable” with the idea of denying Communion to Catholic officeholders.

Now, a decision that leans toward placing a sanction on Kerry would certainly cause problems for his candidacy — if in no other way but as an embarrassment or nuisance that would keep him from pressing the issues central to his campaign. But others have noted that if every Catholic politician who publicly dissented from any aspect of Church teaching were denied Communion — death penalty, the Iraq war, contraception, etc. — there’s no telling where it would stop.

So one of Karl Rove’s chief conservative Catholic allies, the editor of a small-circulation publication called The Crisis, named Deal W. Hudson, has a solution.
“Once you open this door,” he recently told The Washington Post, “pretty soon no one would be taking Communion.” So what’s the answer? In the words of the Post: “Hudson said he believes the denial of Communion should begin, and end, with Kerry. Even better, he said, would be if priests would read letters from the pulpit denouncing the senator from Massachusetts ‘whenever and wherever he campaigns as a Catholic.’”

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Ultimately, I would like to see a time when abortion was not a legal option available to women

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In other words, you would vote to limit the freedom of other women.

I'm not sure how it is that I could be working for that man when, if I was American, I'm not even sure I'd vote for BUSH! I don't really like either candidate. And the war would factor into my decision in a b-i-g way.

I take no issue with the Church involving itself in encouraging their church family to consider different issues in their voting and re-familiarizing them with the church position.

Do I care if the church loses it's tax exempt status? No but that's because I don't believe any church should get it in the first place. As well, speaking the truth is more important than tax cuts.

Skdadl

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In other words, you would vote to limit the freedom of other women.

I consider that to be a deeply immoral position, obviously coercive, and deadly dangerous to all women in any kind of society, not to mention to democracy itself.

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I would absolutely take steps to limit abortion and protect the unborn children fifty percent of which are female. I absolutely realize that it, as you said, a "deadly dangerous" issue although who it is most deadly to is the children who are currently aborted. I am considered about the lives and freedom of those little people too.

I appreciate that I have a minority view on this subject in this particular setting and I do not exect you to applaud my view. It is my wish that men and women in Canada can use the resources available to them to ensure that they do not experience an untimely pregnancy but, thus far, that skill appears to be elusive. I would continue to promote access and information around that in hopes that that changes. It is disheartening to see this rate of abortion despite the supposed intelligence of people and the available means. I also believe in promoting a child-inclusive view that welcomes children on every level and supports women and families with difficult social situations when children are born at a less than ideal time.

As well, I don't consider myself a slave. I've never met a man that thinks of me that way either. I've only heard that term used towards me by activists in the women's movement. It's not a label I welcome.

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Everyone I've talked to that is a practicing Catholic absolutely denies that there is room in the Church for prochoicers.

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(Catholic Answers, by the way, was formed when a group of fundamentalist Christians handed out leaflets at a Catholic Church in San Diego telling the parishioners how wrong their faith was. This is par for the course for fundamentalists -- your people, Hailey -- who like you think that Catholics are not even Christian, that we should renounce our bapstism and be "born again" or we are bound for hell. Catholic Answers was formed to counter the annoying habit of fundamentalists -- like yourself, Hailey -- to tell Catholics what their faith is.)

Now, the "voting guide" lists five principles that are non-negotiable in elections. Amazingly, all of them deal with issues of sexuality. This is a self-serving document, to say the least.

There are other Catholics -- i venture to say, the vast majority of Catholics -- who are not going to vote based on these obsessions of a small number of people. They will vote based on their own conscience, hopefully considering issues of Catholic social teaching: support for the poor, opposition to unjust wars like Bush's Crusade, and the like.

The Catholic Answers guide, it's fairly obvious, is designed to use wedge issues like abortion to swing Catholic votes to the Republicans. That's because polls consistently show that Catholics favour John Kerry for President. This is important in swing states with high Catholic populations, like Missouri.

In fact, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops has specifically said the Catholic Answers voting guide is not the voice of the church, and prefers it not be distributed on church property. The USCCB has issued its own voting guide which does not focus on issues of sexuality to the exclusion of all other teachings of the church. Yes, it opposes abortion, but it says that in choosing which candidate to support, equal weight should be given to issues like debt relief and opposition to pre-emptive wars. Among the issues called for in the authorized USCCB version -- the one that Catholic Answers has rejected -- are:

- a preferential option for the global poor. "A fundamental measure of our society is how we care for and stand with the poor and vulnerable."
- the rights and dignity of working people. "The economy must serve people, not the other way around."
- peace and global solidarity. "At the core of the virtue of solidarity is the pursuit of justice and peace. Pope Paul VI taught that 'if you want peace, work for justice.' The Gospel calls us to be peacemakers."
- stewardship of the environment. "In our use of creation, we must be guided by a concern for generations to come. We show our respect for the Creator by our care for creation."
- a right to life that includes "conditions for living a decent life—faith and family life, food and shelter, education and employment, health care and housing." Note here also that the USCCB is teaching the "consistent life ethic" which opposes the death penalty and so on, rather than focussing solely on the early stages on life, as the Catholic Answers guide does.

Battle between Catholic voter guides

Shouldn't it also be the duty of the Church to excommunicate politicians who are pro-death penalty? How about politicians who start aggressive wars? How about politicians who slash benefits for the poor? Aren't they supposed to be practising mercy, turning the other cheek, not killing, and abiding by basic principles like charity? All this stuff seems *WAY* more fundamental than a very recent doctrine which was controversial even within the church when it was introduced. And yet, never a hint on any of that other stuff.

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Originally posted by skdadl:
It was the 7th or the 8th of August, weren't you telling us?

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What I can't understand for the life of me is why a person who thinks women should be the slaves of our biology is doing on a progressive board.

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Well, if someone who believes in the right to reproductive choice can flout the Vatican and call themself a Catholic anyway, why can't someone who doesn't believe in that right flout everyone else and call themself a progressive anyway?

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Shouldn't it also be the duty of the Church to excommunicate politicians who are pro-death penalty? How about politicians who start aggressive wars? How about politicians who slash benefits for the poor? Aren't they supposed to be practising mercy, turning the other cheek, not killing, and abiding by basic principles like charity? All this stuff seems *WAY* more fundamental than a very recent doctrine which was controversial even within the church when it was introduced. And yet, never a hint on any of that other stuff.

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Nailed it, Rufus. And, congrats, newlyweds.

[ 31 August 2004: Message edited by: steffie ]

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Originally posted by Mr. Magoo:
Well, if someone who believes in the right to reproductive choice can flout the Vatican and call themself a Catholic anyway, why can't someone who doesn't believe in that right flout everyone else and call themself a progressive anyway?

It would appear we can just (*poof*) be anything we wish to call ourselves.

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Hey, i'm more compliant with the official Catholic voters guide than Hailey is, and she's the one claiming to define what the Catholic viewpoint is. Well, she's one of them.