Good for Cardinal O’Malley
Despite strong pressure to stay away, Cardinal Sean O’Malley opted to preside over Ted Kennedy’s funeral Mass, and gave the final commendation.
During his remarks, he made a point of thanking Obama (he also talked to him for a few minutes), and he talked about Ted Kennedy’s last days in the loving embrace of his family, noting how being surrounded by such love allows a person to die with great dignity. It was moving. In an earlier statement, he noted that “for nearly half a century, Senator Kennedy was often a champion for the poor, the less fortunate, and those seeking a better life….Across Massachusetts and the nation, his legacy will be carried on through the lives of those he served”.
Cardinal Sean’s pro-life credentials are second to none. He will undoubtedly be attacked by the extremist elements of the Church for presiding on Saturday. He already is. But the cardinal took a decision that was both brave and correct. As Fr. James Martin put it, it was “largehearted, compassionate, pastoral, sensitive and, above all, Christian”.
How does it serve the cause of the unborn to follow the advice of people like Judie Brown (who has been known to defend torture)? And yet when you look at the impressive litany of Kennedy’s record — civil rights, healthcare, education, economic justice opposition to war and the death penalty– you don’t have to be a foam-at-the-mouth right-winger to note the absence of protecting the unborn against violence. How do Catholics persuade those like Kennedy, those with otherwise impeccable social justice records, to become more consistent, to embrace a culture of life that is not selective? I’m not quite sure how to do it, but I’m very sure how not to do it — by dismissing Kennedy’s record as having no worth whatsoever, by engaging in bomb-throwing hyperbola and blaming him for the blood of millions, and by engaging in nasty and grotesque attacks on his personal life. These tactics might gain you accolades among your friends at the fringe, but they are actually harming the pro-life cause.
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The real test of his concern for the poor will be his will. Did he leave all to the poor? Errol Flynn made a point of getting rid of it. He didn’t want to go to heaven with money in his pocket. Andrew Carnegie wrote “the man who dies rich, dies disgraced”.
The Cardinal Archbishop of Boston seems to be merely one in a long line of Irish politician bishops. Nothing new there.
Nothing wrong with Card. O’Malley giving the final commendation. However, Catholic Vox Nova’s glorification of the senator, who was most definitely a pro-abortion voter among other things, would be laughable if it weren’t so pitiful.
I honestly think a PUBLIC funeral, following Kennedy’s voting record supporting immorality at every turn, was bordering on a sacrilege. If Pope Paul VI said the ‘smoke of satan’ had entered the Church in the 60′s, I think we witnessed a full out bonfire on Saturday. Having the most PRO ABORTION PRESIDENT IN HISTORY ENTER THE SANCTUARY, I believe, was an abomination.
It IS all about abortion in this generation. If you don’t believe that, look at a picture of an aborted baby.
“Having the most PRO ABORTION PRESIDENT IN HISTORY ENTER THE SANCTUARY, I believe, was an abomination.’
This hyperbolic rhetoric does nothing for the common good.
You think Nancy Reagan is living out her golden years pinched for cash because St. Ronnie left everything to the local soup kitchen? The Bush family aquired those fat Family Trusts by leaving their assets to the poor? But wait! These people should not be held to a higher standard (“The Real Test” as Gabriel pompously calls it). Unlike the Kennedys, their policies always made it clear that they cared nothing for the poor. To Whom Much is Given, Little is Expected (unless you’re Ted Kennedy)
Anne, I hope what you are writing is intended as satire. If not perhaps a head check would be in order.
Kennedy’s voting record supporting immorality at every turn,
This grossly misrepresents his record. Most of his votes and initiatives had nothing to do with abortion, and most of those votes and initiatives were concerned with helping the weak and powerless.
This hyperbolic rhetoric does nothing for the common good.
No, but it is immensely helpful to the success of the Democratic Party. Don’t hold back, Anne. Any comments you would like to make about the President’s citizenship?
Quite frankly, I agree with Anne and Gabriel. The time has passed or “playing nice” with persons who claim loudly and publicly to be faithful Catholics and then at every turn, prove by their actions that they are not. That goes for clergy as well.
Right on, Lynne. I don’t think anyone is claiming that Ted Kennedy never did anything good. But anything good he did do in NO way can make up for his very pro-abortion voting record. (And his wrongs don’t “just” stop at abortion.) How can the rest of you just dismiss it? If you were one of the millions targeted, told that you don’t have a right to live, maybe you would take it a little more seriously. As it is, I have a hard time taking your claims of being for the “weak and powerless” seriously.
“At every turn,” Lynne? While I would agree that Kennedy could have been better (to put it extremely mildly…) on abortion, on practically every other public policy matter I would argue he was closer to Catholic value than the Republicans are.
I really don’t get this. Ted Kennedy was an elected official who represented people from a lot of different moral persuasions.
He could have been personally opposed to abortion, but determined that making it illegal was going to cause more problems than help. I am of that opinion as well.
Criminalizing abortion is not going to stop abortions.
Caring for the living will do more to create a culture in which abortion is not necessary.
Shoofoolatte – representing people from different “moral persuasions” never removes the responsibility to do the morally correct thing. There is right, and there is wrong. Different “moral persuasions” don’t change that – some people see what is right, some people either don’t or don’t care. Kennedy did not fulfill his responsibility as a moral politician or a Catholic.
Convicting abortionists of first degree murder would certainly put a good dent of the number of children killed. Sure the well-heeled, as Justice Ginsberg recently articulated, would go abroad, but so what.
Society is not going to create a culture in which raising children does not involve sacrifice.
First, allow me to point out that the Cardinal O’Malley did *not* preside at the Mass. He attended in choir.
Secondly, it was a number of dissenting priests who convinced the Kennedys to renounce their pro-life stance.
CDNowak, GR Catholic Examiner
David – changing abortion laws right now as you describe (which would be a good deal more draconian than any abortion law that ever obtained in the United States since its founding) would lead to massive civil disobedience and probably civil unrest, and thus would be effectively unenforceable.
That aside, the point (my point anyway) is that to reduce Kennedy to his position on abortion is ridiculous. Should we only talk about George Washington with derision because he owned slaves? Or Thomas Jefferson?
Lynne Says:
August 31, 2009 at 3:11 pm
Quite frankly, I agree with Anne and Gabriel. The time has passed or “playing nice” with persons who claim loudly and publicly to be faithful Catholics and then at every turn, prove by their actions that they are not.
Pilgrim Says:
August 31, 2009 at 3:22 pm
Right on, Lynne. I don’t think anyone is claiming that Ted Kennedy never did anything good
Ummmm….I think Lynne just did.
Matt Talbot–I certainly would not reduce Sen. Kennedy to his abortion stance either. I was responding to an above comment.
I resent your use of the word draconian. Civil unrest besides, the crime of abortion should be duly punished. I am not calling for the Iron Maiden but certainly a severe penalty. Overstatements such as Anne’s are the result of compassion; compassion for the most innocent among us being tortured (saline anyone?) in the womb.
Overstatements such as Anne’s are the result of compassion;
I have no way of knowing Anne’s inner motivations. But the evidence is overwhelming that the result of statements like Anne’s is the cause for much of the political weakness of the pro-life movement. I think the actions of Anne and those who make like statements are responsible for far more abortions than Senator Kennedy (yet I would not try to deny her a Catholic funeral)
Kurt, your reason escapes me. Please do tell, how are the actions of Anne responsible for far more abortions than anyone? You say that you do not know her inner motivation but you know of her acts? Could not the great orator Ted Kennedy just once, in the last twenty years mention that abortion is the killing of a human being with full human dignity? Do you agree that the unborn are deserving of the same respect as anyone else?
We agree that abortion is terrible, David.
To my knowledge, it has never been the case in the US that abortionists were punished for first-degree murder.
But, OK, fine: suppose that, tomorrow, the United States Congress passed and, due to a sudden change of heart, President Obama signed a law establishing the same penalties for abortion that apply to murder; let’s say (since we’re in fantasy-land here) that the next day the Supreme Court upholds the law.
What do you imagine would happen next? Would the entire country wake up and say, “Gee, I guess the jig’s up; no more abortions for us?”
Not a chance. NARAL, Emily’s List, the National Organization for Women and loads and loads of other organizations would just…have kittens. They’d immediately declare their intention to completely ignore the law. Besieged congresspeople would be barricading themselves in their offices, the criminal courts would all but grind to a halt due to an impossible caseload, there would be enormous protests in the streets, there would be some sort of immense underground network of abortion providers doing a brisk business, and on and on and on.
The only responses to that would be: give in and go back to the status quo ante, which would do irreparable harm to the anti-abortion cause; or make the punishment for abortion providers more severe.
A more severe punishment than the one for First Degree Murder is hard to imagine, so we’ll have to expand our thinking – perhaps use more explicitly coercive methods to accomplish the just cause of saving babies?
Let’s see, what could we do? Deploy the national guard to destroy abortion clinics where they are found? What if the clinics are on the bottom floor of a multi-story apartment building? Should it be razed and the upstairs residents compensated somehow? Or, maybe not: they should have known what was going on in their building, just like the residents of nearby cities should have known about the goings-on in the Nazi Death Camps. Besides, that will send a strong message to communities that they stand to lose everything if they have abortionists in their midst.
We’re up against pure evil, here, and so we should stop at virtually nothing to save the innocent: what are constitutional protections – mere legal abstractions – compared to the mission we have before us of saving innocent babies? Maybe we should suspend habeas corpus for a time, until the radical feminists can be convinced that we mean business? Make it a crime to advocate for permissive abortion laws?
I mean, think about it: Nazi Germany had to be virtually obliterated before they gave up their cause. Perhaps transforming America into a place like Germany in 1945 – people staggering shell-shocked around obliterated cities, surviving on stale bread and the occasional rat – is what it will take before abortion is finally banished from this land forever?
Perhaps the survivors can comfort themselves with the knowledge that they were willing to destroy the United States in order to save it?
“I am not calling for the Iron Maiden but certainly a severe penalty. ”
A severe penalty. . . such as execution, for the mothers and the doctors? Certainly we would seek the death penalty for anyone who killed a toddler, no?
At the very least life in prison for all involved, mother, father and doctor right?
Is this waht you had in mind?
Phosphorious, a truly pro-life person would not be in favor of seeking the death penalty even for truly horrible crimes like killing a toddler (or an unborn child). That would be a contradiction in terms.
I am a Missouri Synod Lutheran,The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod is very much pro-life. I guess in the Roman Catholic view of things, Ted Kennedy could support the pro-abortionist view up till the day he died and still be a good Catholic.
I guess in the Roman Catholic view of things, Ted Kennedy could support the pro-abortionist view up till the day he died and still be a good Catholic.
Well, if anyone had claimed that, you’d have a point.
“a truly pro-life person would not be in favor of seeking the death penalty even for truly horrible crimes like killing a toddler (or an unborn child). That would be a contradiction in terms.”
So life in prison, for all involved?
Kurt,…Do you agree that the unborn are deserving of the same respect as anyone else?
Yes.
Could not the great orator Ted Kennedy just once, in the last twenty years mention that abortion is the killing of a human being with full human dignity?
Could he? Yes. I wish he had. I wish President Bush had (he never did, though certainly was much better on the abortion issue than Kennedy).
your reason escapes me. Please do tell, how are the actions of Anne responsible for far more abortions than anyone? You say that you do not know her inner motivation but you know of her acts?
The act I am referring to is her post on this board — a public statement I’ve read with my own eyes. And I said the result of her acts and those who act like her. I firmly believe (and you can disagree with me but I don’t think you can say with integrity that my discernment is outside the bounds of liberty of judgment of a faithful Catholic) that Anne’s statement and those like it have alienated millions of citizens from supporting anti-abortion policy proposals. And the result of that alienation has been the lost opportunity to enact policies that might have saved many, many unborn lives.
Senator Kennedy was pro-choice. In that past few days we have been reviewing his legislative achievements. From the general interest press, it has been clear that he was a pro-choice vote but not much of a leader on that issue. It is difficult to measure what changes in law would have occurred if he had a different view.
But if Anne and others of her school would start showing the nation the personal kindnesses to her political opponents that Senator Kennedy was so known for, I think we would be in a very different situation regarding abortion policy.
That my opinion. But given it is based on the wits God has given me, it is what I must base my actions.
Um, pre-Roe abortion laws were directed at medical personnel, not mothers as such, and were not classed as first degree murder.
There may be only one member of the SCOTUS who would be willing to read a right to life for the unborn into the federal constitution; otherwise, the other anti-Roe Catholic justices are legal positivists who believe in some form of textualism in constitutional interpretation, meaning they simply believe it should be a matter for state legislatures to decide.
Given that a pro-life state like South Dakota would not pass a very restrictive abortion law by popular referendum, chances are that an overturning of Roe/Casey would mean that a handful of Bible Belt states might adopt anti-abortion laws in the wake of that.
Matt Talbot wrote “most of those votes and initiatives were concerned with helping the weak and powerless”. Yes, Matt, but then there were all those votes that helped end the lives of “the weak and the powerless”. So it couldn’t have been the state of being “weak and powerless” that caught Senator Kennedy’s attention and aroused his protctive instincts.
By the way, in his letter to Pope Benedict, didn’t Senator Kennedy write that he accepted and respected fundamental Church teaching? Was he acknowledging that he accepted and respected Church teaching on life issues? And therefore acknowledging deeply worrying transgression on those issues?
Was his letter obscurely confessional or an attempt at self-justification before the earthly Father?
So it couldn’t have been the state of being “weak and powerless” that caught Senator Kennedy’s attention and aroused his protective instincts.
I say it was: he had an egregious blind spot (like many of his generation and large numbers of our fellow citizens generally) for the yet-to-be-born: he did act to protect folks that were already born and suffering.
“Was he acknowledging that he accepted and respected Church teaching on life issues? And therefore acknowledging deeply worrying transgression on those issues?”
Mab, you confuse two very separate questions. One has to do with Church teaching and the other has to do with what can be done about those teachings in the practical order.
If you think the strategies of the pro-life movement have been successful in the practical order, think again. They have not, nor can they be. The entire pro-life movement is in shambles. What has any pro-life member of congress actually done to improve the integrity of the unborn? Precious little.
On the other hand, no one in Congress has done more to further social justice than Kennedy. Absolutely no one.
Some of the challenges facing Catholic politicians are addressed here:
http://vox-nova.com/2009/08/30/ted-kennedys-letter-to-the-pope/#comment-62909
Nothing has enabled the abortion rights movment more than the promotion of the viewpoint that government can never be trusted.
Don’t you see that many of you are missing an important point – As long as Ted Kennedy was pro-abortion, no matter what other good he might have done, he ought not to be set up as a model or ideal politician. Period.
Would you say the same about Thomas Jefferson and slavery, Pilgrim?
“As long as Ted Kennedy was pro-abortion …”
There is a distinction between being pro-choice and being pro-abortion. Being Catholic and a pro-choice politician means that, given the political circumstances, the greater good can be achieved when decisions about the integrity of the unborn are left to the mother, her family, her doctor, and her religious advisor. This is an area where the State should not intrude.
Even though political and moral pluralism prevails in the U.S., it is probably true that the majority of pro-choice politicians are also opposed to abortion. Most would support efforts to reduce the incidence of that practice. But they would not favor using the power of the state to create a moral police order.
Gerald C.
The state uses it’s power for the common moral good all the time–and rightfully so. I understand that the ideal (in my mind) of abortion being called what it is, namely premeditated murder, is pie in the sky idealism, but golly it’s a little baby.
Matt Talbot, was it “an egregious blind spot” or was the defense of the unborn “weak and powerless” likely to turn off the mighty spigots of lobbyist money his party wanted to advance protections for the born “weak and powerless”?
Both, Mab.
david,
The pro-life MOVEMENT has tried to use State power to serve its ends. It has failed. Why?
Frank writesAugust 31, 2009 at 2:30 pm
“You think Nancy Reagan is living out her golden years pinched for cash because St. Ronnie left everything to the local soup kitchen? The Bush family aquired those fat Family Trusts by leaving their assets to the poor? But wait! These people should not be held to a higher standard (”The Real Test” as Gabriel pompously calls it). Unlike the Kennedys, their policies always made it clear that they cared nothing for the poor. To Whom Much is Given, Little is Expected (unless you’re Ted Kennedy)”.
I am easily confused. I do not see what the actions of the Reagans have to do with the Kennedys. I know many millionaires who have lived off fat trusts [the Kennedy family largely among them]. But it seems that if one raises a question about a sainted Democrat the answer must be to point to a Republican. Why not the millionaire Clintons? Why not the Chancellor of Germany? Why not Mrs. Thatcher? What has the one thing got to do with the other?
Andrew Carnegie again: “The worst thing a man can do to his children is to leave money to them”.
Matt Talbot writes September 1, 2009 at 1:36 pm
“Would you say the same about Thomas Jefferson and slavery, Pilgrim?”
Pilgrim would not have to; Jefferson said it himself: “When I think that God is just, I tremble for my country. His justice cannot sleep forever”.
There is an all too obvious similarity between enslaving a human being and the murder of a helpless human being. That’s what the civil war was about. There even were Catholic bishops [but not popes] denouncing the abolitionists. What is so shocking about the idea of civil unrest in the streets? Sometimes it is the only way to bring about fundamental change.
Gabriel – if I thought civil unrest would end abortion, I’d be willing to make allowances for it.
The way politics in the US is right now, I can easily imagine it degenerating into chaotic violence; maybe even civil war. The last civil war was bad enough; a new civil war in a country armed with thousands of nuclear weapons is too horrifying a thing to risk.
In additon to Senator Kennedy’s generous personal contributions, he has left the on-going legacy of the annual fundraising dinner he co-founded for the Catholic schools of the Archdiocese of Washington. The 2009 Dinner, later this month, will be a tribute to Senator Kennedy and co-hosted by Leader Boehner and former DC Mayor Williams. Vox-Nova readers who contribute by buying a dinner ticket are invited for cocktails at my home prior to the event, which is next door to the hotel the dinner will be held at.
To make any Republicans feel at home, I do have a bottle of Chivas.
Hey – Democrats drink scotch too, Kurt :)
A question to those who are pro-life: How do you convince a woman that she has a value that far surpasses anything she has learned about herself so far in this environment she was born into? How do you let her know that she is the source of life and love in this world when she is told from the beginning that her safety and worth are dependent upon the males who have created the systems of power that are so opposed to the creation that she is?
If she must adapt to this world of males and in essence protect her vulnerable self from harm, then how can she see that we value and love her if we protest against her with the same look of anger and opposition that had driven her into hiding in the beginning of her life?
How do you convince someone that you are willing to give up everything to help them when you actually are not willing to give up everything? How do you convince yourself that you are pro-life when you are not willing to give up everything to save one life? I include myself in this entry.
I have not sacrificed enough and therefore, I am responsible for every abortion. I may talk love but I am still living the life of the rich young man in my middle class wealth.
I am a hypocrite!
Ronald,
I’m afraid I don’t follow your argument.
Besides, I think I’ve read statistics that indicate middle class women – many married – utilize abortion as “family planning” as often as “women driven into hiding at the beginning of their lives”, whatever that means.
If you feel like a “hypocrite”, maybe you could support a local shelter, at least financially.
Mab – I notice you seem to be running from Ron’s questions with both feet. Do they make you uncomfortable?
Mab, I do not feel like a hypocrite, I am a hypocrite.
Abortion is the result of fear. Unless you understand that fear you will continue to be part of the “culture of death” and not of the “culture of life”.
Right now I am part of the “culture of death” even though I know what the “culture of life” is. Because I do not give up everything I remain a shameful, weak and freely chosen passive member of the culture of death.
The term “pro-choice” is bosh. If a politician claims to be “pro-choice,” he is for the so-called right for a woman to choose whether or not to kill a child. Being for the “right” of a woman to murder?
Gerald: “This is an area where the State should not intrude.” Would you say the same about the Jews in the concentration camps? People are people, whether in the womb or out. Injustices of this gravity should never be tolerated on any level, state or personal. (Not to mention the fact that abortion has tragic effects on nations, not “just” women, babies or families.)
Matt Talbot – you asked if I would say the same of Thomas Jefferson. Honestly, I don’t give him much thought. But now that you ask, while I may recognize that he did some good (as did Kennedy), I certainly don’t hold him up on any pedestal or see him as a role model. Do you? You certainly seem to see Kennedy so.
And to be clear, “pro-choice” is pro-abortion, and Ted Kennedy, God rest his soul, was that.
Ronald – I hope you’re not implying that all pro-lifers fall under the category in which you have placed yourself.
I do agree that “pro-choice” and “pro-abortion” are not fully equivalent terms. Not all “pro-choice” people are in favor of abortion. But I also agree that we should never forget what “pro-choice” really means: “pro-choice-to-kill-your-child-should-you-decide-to.”
“And to be clear, “pro-choice” is pro-abortion, and Ted Kennedy, God rest his soul, was that.”
This is not at all clear. Is there no moral distinction between causing something to happen, and allowing something to happen? Is it always the case that when something must be done, the government must do it?
Is it simply the case, no argument allowed, that honest people can’t disagree over the moral status of an embryo?
The pro-life movement requires a basic dishonesty of its members. They can’t accurately describe their opponents, or else the jig would be up.
Pilgrim, I am stating that if everyone who is pro-life would take an in-depth look at how much they have sacrificed to make it safe for women to bring children into this life they would find how attached they are to the materialism that gives them comfort and yet is linked to the culture of death and how unwilling they are to give up this comfort for the benefit of life.
Pilgrim,
“‘This is an area where the State should not intrude.’ Would you say the same about the Jews in the concentration camps?”
Are you saying that the Nazi State should have intruded to save the Jews confined to the concentration camps? What is this all about? The analogy you are drawing here makes absolutely no sense.
“And to be clear, “pro-choice” is pro-abortion, and Ted Kennedy, God rest his soul, was that.”
The conflating of pro-choice and pro-abortion has no basis in logic.
Michael I,
” … we should never forget what “pro-choice” really means: “pro-choice-to-kill-your-child-should-you-decide-to.”
Absolutely. This is why every effort must be made to do what is practical to mitigate this grave moral failing.
This does not mean, however, that in the practical order one should continue doing what has not worked for three decades. That would be ridiculous. The prevailing strategy needs to be changed.
The pro-life MOVEMENT has relied on a strategy that has been the political equivalent of the Maginot Line. Pass restrictive legislation and the intended results will flow from there. Such a defensive strategy never works. It didn’t work in 1939 and it won’t work in 2009.
The U.S. is a pluralist society. Choice is sacrosanct. It is a logical requirement of pluralism. Rather than trying to stop people from choosing altogether, it is necessary to influence how people choose. The best way to do this is to build an ethos of love around the mother to alleviate her fears about the future.
Such moral persuasion is very Catholic, I would say.
It certainly is interesting that when I post a quote from a liberation theologian which argues that changing social structures is an essential part of changing the hearts of persons, right-leaning commenters argue that it’s an anti-human position to take. When it comes to abortion, though, the mere suggestion that maybe we should focus on changing hearts first instead of legislating everything is met with fury as well.
Add that to the infinitely long list of republicatho — er, republican Catholic (!) contradictions and inconsistencies.
Michael,
I often reflect that many of these right-leaners must be wearing heavy duty corsets or Playtex girdles to keep their contradictions and inconsistencies from showing! Some days while on here I feel like I’m attending a burlesque show.
Matt,
Running, no.
Q.How to convince a woman she has value, etc.? A.Teach her the Catholic Faith; her value comes from the Creator of the universe. Sounds ridiculous? It’s gotten millions, billions, through lives that were quiet triumphs over the tawdry materialism of the world.
Q.How to teach her she is the source of life & love? A.She isn’t; God is. All life and love is from God.
Q. Adapting to the world of males?
A.That’s materialistic. Adapt herself to Mary’s example and to “Christ who lives in me”.
It isn’t that it isn’t “safe” to carry a baby to term; it isn’t “convenient”.
But before the inconvenience of pregnancy comes selfish immorality. Pope Paul VI is proven more prophetic every day.
Mab, I am talking about women who see Catholicism as rigid and against them. Your answers are not solutions. Your answers indicate that you do not understand their human experience. The answers you provide are easy to speak. They may even be harmful to those you want to convert. Love is not easy. It is easier to love God than to love His human creation. It is not words that change a person’s heart, it is the action of love through the Grace of God’s Love that will change hearts.
What is the action that answers the questions I posed?
Catholicism “harmful”?
I thought I was at a Catholic blog.
All of my answers involved actions.