Catholic churches around the country are rumbling with declarations of “enough” by top leaders who are taking the unusual step of assailing liberals and Democrats, namely the Clinton-Kaine ticket, for attacking core beliefs on marriage and abortion.
Moving swiftly, two top bishops this week condemned Catholic advocates for promoting abortion and same sex marriage.
On Wednesday, New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities, issued a blistering statement blasting a Catholic pro-abortion group that is promoting abortion candidates.
On Tuesday, Richmond’s Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo ripped those like Sen. Tim Kaine, the Democratic vice presidential nominee and former Richmond mayor, for predicting over the weekend that the church will cave in to same sex marriage proponents.
The effort is unusual and comes as some liberal Catholics are cheering Kaine and Hillary Rodham Clinton for their support for gay marriage and expanding abortion.
Dolan took specific aim at Catholics for Choice which kicked off a new campaign called Abortion In Good Faith that was promoted in ads and calls for taxpayer funding of abortion.
He wrote:
“The organization rejects and distorts Catholic social teaching – and actually attacks its foundation. As Pope Francis said this summer to leaders in Poland, ‘Life must always be welcomed and protected…from conception to natural death. All of us are called to respect life and care for it.’
“CFC’s extreme ads promote abortion as if it were a social good. But abortion kills the most defenseless among us, harms women, and tears at the heart of families. Pushing for public funding would force all taxpaying Americans to be complicit in the violence of abortion and an industry that puts profit above the well-being of women and children.”
Catholics for Choice reacted with a message to politicians: “The question that our campaign poses for politicians: Are you allowing an unrepresentative hierarchy to hold sway over the health care decisions in this country? Do you value the over 300 members of the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops, or the views and opinions of over 80 million Catholics in the U.S.?”
On Tuesday, DiLorenzo took on critics of its support for traditional marriage, including Kaine.
“More than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on marriage, and despite recent statements from the campaign trail, the Catholic Church’s 2,000-year-old teaching to the truth about what constitutes marriage remains unchanged and resolute,” he said.
“As Catholics, we believe, all humans warrant dignity and deserve love and respect, and unjust discrimination is always wrong. Our understanding of marriage, however, is a matter of justice and fidelity to our Creator’s original design,” he added.
Catholics have been under assault around the country, and the world, for their beliefs.
In his message, Dolan even took on polls showing that Catholics support abortion. He responded with a poll showing they reject taxpayer funding of abortion. He wrote, “According to a July 2016 poll conducted by the Marist Institute for Public Opinion, 62 percent of Americans oppose taxpayer funding of abortion, including 45 percent of those who say they are pro-choice.”
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected]
