Yes, I know you think President Trump is obnoxious, immoral, creepy, vulgar and an embarrassment. Worse than that, you fear he is corrupt, venal, conniving and crooked. You don’t like his playboy history, his ownership of casinos and strip clubs, his shady family history and worst of all his bragging, strutting, foul mouthed public persona.
I get that. I share your concerns.
Personality and character are certainly qualities to consider when voting, but they are not the main criteria. An election should not be, first and foremost, a popularity contest. We’re not voting for Mr Congeniality.
We need to stop and look at the issues, and for Catholics abortion is the number one issue, and let me explain why.
The Democrat Party publishes a platform that proposes to make the world a better place through programs to get rid of evils. Low, unfair wages are evil. Let’s bring in a universal income.
Child abuse is evil. Let’s bring in more social workers.
Being cruel to immigrants is evil. Let’s open the borders.
Unemployment is bad. Human trafficking is bad. Child labor is bad. Pollution is bad. Being mean to gay teens is bad. Denying human rights is bad. The list could go on and on of bad things idealistic politicians want to get rid of.
But in the abortion issue people are not trying to get rid of something bad. They’re promoting something bad. Abortion is an intrinsic evil. Everybody knows that. If it was an intrinsic good then we would celebrate it, but we don’t. Even abortionists and supporters of abortion rights use euphemisms. It is a “termination of pregnancy.” The murdered child is “the product of conception”. It’s a “woman’s clinic” and “Planned Parenthood” not “Abortion Clinic” or “Child Extermination Center.”
Everyone knows deep down that abortion is a shameful, horrible thing that goes against the laws of nature. Mothers of all species love and nurture their offspring. They don’t kill them.
Everyone must accept that abortion is an intrinsic evil. An intrinsic evil is an action that is in and of itself evil.
However, those who are in “pro-choice”, say this evil is permissible in order to help women in crisis pregnancies, to give women reproductive “rights” and to help poor women who can’t afford another baby. But notice that no one is saying abortion is a Good Thing. They are allowing what they know to be evil in order that another supposed good may come about.
In all the other so called pro-life issues we are attempting to make the world a better place by getting rid of something evil.
With abortion we are attempting to make the world a better place by promoting something evil.
Supporting abortion therefore subverts the whole idea of morality. Morality consists of two things: getting rid of evil and doing what is good.
Abortion advocates are not getting rid of evil and doing good. They are promoting or at least permitting something they know is evil to bring about what they think is good.
Joe Biden and all the other pro-choice people call what is evil good and what is good evil, and this reversal of morality is a lie is from the textbook of the Father of Lies.
Does it matter? Look around at the country over this tumultuous year of 2020. Why did crowds riot in the streets, burn buildings, break windows, loot and beat people and even commit murder?
Because they thought doing something they knew was evil was permissible if it was for a higher cause or what they thought was a greater good.
This is the deeper and more insidious lie beneath the abortion choice: it is a lie that subverts the very idea of morality and condones any kind of evil to bring about some supposed good.
The fact that Joe Biden–a very public Catholic–and his party, support tax funded abortion up to birth is not only a horror but a blasphemy.
What is blasphemy? It is a sacrilegious act or words against God or sacred things. Being a Catholic and being pro-choice is a blasphemy against our church’s continuous teaching from the first century onward on the offense of abortion. It is a blasphemy because it publicly and formally reverses the moral order and promotes a lie and death rather than life.
So we are faced with the prospect of a life long Catholic –who may become the most prominent Catholic in the world after the pope– supporting this horror–this lie, this reversal of the whole moral order AND because he is the one of the most famous Catholics in the world millions will conclude not only that abortion is okay, but that the whole idea of morality is meaningless.
Can you be a Catholic and vote for Joe Biden?
You decide.
“But in the abortion issue people are not trying to get rid of something bad. They’re promoting something bad.”
Excellent way to express the problem. I’ll be using it.
Very compelling argument that the abortion issue is not the same as the other issues of poverty, immigration, racism, etc. Mother Teresa once said the a nation that chooses abortion chooses violence to solve its problems. We certainly have seen this played out this year. Thank you Father
Is it really plausible that voting for Trump is a vote to stop abortion from happening? I am grateful for the post. This is not a serious issue but THE Issue. I have met enough people that say many beautiful things and espouse great ideas and just can’t deliver. I am fearful that Biden will deliver on expanding abortion if elected. However, I think that boots on the ground, folks doing the business of living are the real game changers here and we are spending too much energy on the vote. YES, it is important. But disassociated from a whole person ethic it becomes unsettling. Unsettling because neither candidate espouses a whole persona that one would want to emulate and I think that many personal experiences cannot be discounted when looking at them and voting. It is a great thing being able to vote. But to make it a matter of spiritual life and death means we have not done enough in other places in our lives. (sorry to be so quick and maybe not too cohesive)
I didn’t say anything about Trump or voting Republican. The issue is actually quite complex. I don’t think anyone is going to outlaw abortion, however the Supreme Court may move in the direction of upholding state legislation that further restricts abortion or even makes the restrictions so severe as to make abortion, in effect, outlawed. What pro lifers need to do in addition, is get busy promoting legislation that provides funding for adoptive families, eliminates expensive lawyer fees for adoption and frees adoption agencies from all the stupid politically correct regulations that too often restrict and limit their operations.