CINO Biden brings to the fore the dispute between clerics who oppose abortion and the clerics who give aid and comfort to pro-abortion politicians. Sandro Magister gives us the details:
All peace and harmony, then, between the Catholic Church and the new American president, in the noble wake of Murray and “Dignitatis humanae”?
Not at all. Because with Biden it has become clear once again that the problem is not just religious freedom, but what to do with this freedom.
That the dispute is real and far from being resolved can also be seen in the different inflection of the two highest ecclesiastical messages that greeted Biden’s entry into the White House: that of Pope Francis and that of the president of the episcopal conference of the United States, Los Angeles archbishop José Horacio Gómez.
Pope Francis limited himself to briefly calling upon the new president for the construction of “a society marked by authentic justice and freedom, together with unfailing respect for the rights and dignity of every person, especially the poor, the vulnerable and those who have no voice.”
Archbishop Gómez, on the other hand, in a much broader and more detailed message released in English and Spanish, after recognizing the sincere Catholic faith of the new president and his constant commitment “to the Gospel’s priority for the poor,” continued as follows:
“As pastors, the nation’s bishops are given the duty of proclaiming the Gospel in all its truth and power, in season and out of season, even when that teaching is inconvenient or when the Gospel’s truths run contrary to the directions of the wider society and cultures. So, I must point out that our new President has pledged to pursue certain policies that would advance moral evils and threaten human life and dignity, most seriously in the areas of abortion, contraception, marriage, and gender. Of deep concern is the liberty of the Church and the freedom of believers to live according to their consciences.”
And he went on:
“For the nation’s bishops, the continued injustice of abortion remains the ‘preeminent priority.’ Preeminent does not mean ‘only.’ We have deep concerns about many threats to human life and dignity in our society. But as Pope Francis teaches, we cannot stay silent when nearly a million unborn lives are being cast aside in our country year after year through abortion.”
In conclusion, Gómez said he hoped that “the new President and his administration will work with the Church and others of good will,” in order to “address the complicated cultural and economic factors that are driving abortion” and to “put in place a coherent family policy,” in “full respect for the Church’s religious freedom.”
But shortly after the publication of this message voices were immediately raised in spirited opposition, on the part of two cardinals from the circle – still a minority among the American bishops – closest to Pope Francis and the Democratic Party, Chicago archbishop Blase J. Cupich and Newark archbishop Joseph W. Tobin, utterly opposed to committing the episcopal conference to a systematic “pro-life” contestation of Biden’s policies.
It is a split that has been in place for years, especially after the promotion of Cupich to Chicago in 2014, and among other matters has manifested itself in the dispute over whether or not to give Eucharistic communion to a Catholic politician who supports abortion policies, like none other than the new president, a dispute that Settimo Cielo covered in the previous post.
Pope Francis is also, visibly, on the side of those who prefer silence over strife, just the opposite of his predecessor Benedict XVI, who on February 18 2009, after receiving at the Vatican the Catholic Nancy Pelosi, of the Democratic Party, then as now “speaker” of the United States House of Representatives and also pro-abortion, had this severe statement released:
“His Holiness took the opportunity to explain that the natural moral law and the constant teaching of the Church on the dignity of human life from conception to natural death require all Catholics, especially legislators, judges, and those responsible for the common good of society, to work together with all men and women of good will in order to promote a just legal system, aimed at protecting human life in each of its stages.”
Last January 21 Nancy Pelosi reiterated her positions, arguing that those who voted for Donald Trump on account of his opposition to abortion were in reality “willing to sell the whole democracy down the river for that one issue.”
Which promptly brought this the reply from Salvatore Cordileone, archbishop of San Francisco, Pelosi’s own diocese: “No Catholic in good conscience can favor abortion. Our land is soaked with the blood of the innocent, and it must stop.”
The next day, another clash occurred between Biden himself and the head of the “pro-life” commission of the episcopal conference, Kansas City archbishop Joseph Naumann, following a statement from the new president and his vice-president Kamala Harris in support of legal abortion, on the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision.
Not a word, on “L’Osservatore Romano,” of the statements from Gómez and Naumann.
In short, the dispute continues. Religious freedom yes, but to do what?
Go here to read the rest. Liberty can be a blessing or a curse. Edmund Burke summed it up long ago:
No one should fear a dog that doesn’t bite. Fear of God is the beginning of wisdom.
Pro-abortion Catholic politicians must excommunicated from the Catholic Church. There is no other solution at this stage of the game. Not to excommunicate them destroys the Church’s credibility and the mission of salvation.