To mourn is simply to grieve or lament for the dead. I’m saddened that Senator Kennedy held an intellectually flawed view and that he had not the opportunity to resolve it — because of the gravity of it — in this life. I am saddened that it is even amongst the list of sins he must account for. I have hope in his reception of the last Rites and in the mercy of God — for there is where his salvation lies.

There is no honor nor anything won, justice or otherwise, in listing alitany of a man’s sins after he has died. One might judge the legacy or lack thereof left behind, but that should not render any ultimate judgment on the person.

A true, pious Catholic would mourn his death in my view. Otherwise, we are presupposing he is incapable of salvation and being saved — and that is a judgment.

Kissling mourns Kennedy as a champion for “reproductive rights.” Her mourning is misplaced. Her ideological committment is unjust as it opposes the absolute right to life of the unborn. Nothing justifies what she and Kennedy in his life advocated.

But I do extend the benefit of the doubt, perhaps too kindly. I have not always been pro-life in the Catholic sense. And when I believed things contrary to what is asked of us by the Magisterium, I did not actually — as some would say — really know the Truth explicitly and just reject it anyway. On the contrary, I literally believed what I thought reflected reality and I didn’t advocate just “opinions.” Every relativist is an absolutist trying to undermine their opponent’s argument by taking away the absolute while not applying the standard to their own position.

I think the tragedy of the pro-choice position is that one literally convinces one’s self to not believe the most obvious reality — the humanity of the unborn. I have once denied this reality. Even when I first became Catholic, it took a while for me to come around. But it was patience — real patience — not relativism that persuaded me.

I feel sometimes this does not happen because of the abrasive way — though I understand the frustration — we go after those who fool themselves on this issue.

If anything, if Kennedy has not won union with God — and I sincerely with every fiber of my being pray that he has — then I think it is a sadness worth mourning. For a creature, a beautiful creature — as is all humanity — who has been offered a gift, the Lord Himself and union with Him, to be adopted as His Sons, and offered the Eucharist, a gift not even endowed unto angels — ultimately would be found guilty of rejecting that gift and will suffer the unmentionable reality that such fallen creatures will endure for eternity.

That’s my two cents. Pray for him.

The issue facing Kennedy and Co. at the time was whether to fight it or go along with it, and they of course chose the latter for reasons of political expediency. However, to say they “plotted the slaughter” implies that legalized abortion didn’t exist at the time and it was all their idea.

I suspect their main concern was how to provide some kind of Catholic faith-based justification for going along with what appeared to be an inevitable change in society (the spread of the sexual revolution and abortion on demand) rather than risk their political and academic futures by appearing to be “reactionary.” Certainly nothing to be proud of, by any means.