Are the beliefs of religious Americans dependent upon who wins the presidency?
If you’re a Catholic, does your faith care what any guy in the Oval Office thinks?
You might, it seems, according to Catholics for Choice President Jamie Manson.
As stated by The Daily Wire, National Public Radio “found that liberal Catholics in America may have finally found their mascot in Joe Biden.”
NPR opines on opportunity:
“For those who would like to see the church take a more permissive stance on issues including abortion, Biden’s election is an opportunity.”
Are most members of the Holy Church pro-choice?
Survey says…
Polling suggests a majority of American Catholics support abortion rights in most or all cases and oppose overturning Roe v. Wade, the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion nationwide. According to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights, most Catholic women say they’ve used contraception at some point, which the church also opposes.
Do you consider those two — birth control and abortion — linked?
Either way, Jamie notes a growing divide between the rank-and-file and organizational leadership:
“There are many issues in which Catholics are dissenting from the bishops and seeing that these are complex moral issues, whether it’s same-sex marriage, whether it’s contraception, or whether it’s abortion.”
It sounds as if a traditional view is oppressive:
“What I hope one of the impacts on policy will be is to say, ‘Listen, that is not what religious freedom is about; religious freedom is about no one being oppressed or having their civil rights lost because of individual religious beliefs.’”
Back to Joe, he was purportedly denied communion in South Carolina last year due to his position toward abortion.
As I covered in December, Philadelphia Archibishop Charles Chaput on board.
His reason? “Grave moral evils”:
“To his credit, [Biden] has championed many causes and issues that do serve the common good. However, many of his actions and words have also supported or smoothed the way for grave moral evils in our public life that have resulted in the destruction of millions of innocent lives. Mr. Biden has said that he will continue to advance those same policies as president, and thus should not receive Holy Communion. His stated intention requires a strong and consistent response from Church leaders and faithful.”
But to Joe, he’s defending the innocent against attacks.
Consider his June 2020 statement on liberty “under any circumstance”:
“Women’s health care rights have been under attack as states across the country have passed extreme laws restricting women’s constitutional right to choice under any circumstance. Today the U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed that states cannot put in place laws that unduly burden a women’s right to make her own health care decision with her doctor.”
The politician’s certainly in line with his party’s trajectory.
In January of 2019 — now two years ago — both chambers of the New York legislature voted to allow abortion right up until birth.
We’re now farther along that path — consider the stances of every Democratic presidential Candidate that same year, as laid out here.
It’s not your grandfather’s Democratic Party.
With all that aside, part of the question raised by NPR, it seems to me, relates to a view of faith from some on the Far Left: The nature of religion is cultish; people of faith are lemmings; wherever their human authority (Trump, for example) leads, they will follow.
If such a perspective is proper, I suppose Joe Biden’s opinions on life in the womb will carry weight among Catholics — and Christians — the country over.
Personally, I don’t believe it will.
Do you?
-ALEX
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