It is nice to be able to overcome my technological deficiencies in order to be able to post again.  To show you how deficient, let me put it this way; when Al Gore invented the internet, he came to me for advice.

That being said, I see a lot of consternation over the House passage of its version of health care reform, and the role that the passage of Stupak played.  Kindly consider my reasons for believing that passing Stupak was the right thing to do:

1.  An unapologetic defense of life, REGARDLESS OF THE CONTEXT, is the right thing to do FOR MORAL REASONS.  Given our Judeo-Christian heritage is deeply rooted in codifying the Ten Commandments into law, defending the right to life as presented in the Stupak Amendment, AND being true to your constitutional oaths to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution, is clearly right;

2.  Historically, voting against your principles in order to achieve a desired result often leads to unintended consequences.  For all the things President George W. Bush did that were exactly consistent with the campaigns he ran, whatever you thought of them, I still believe his worst act as President was signing McCain-Feingold into law, given it clearly did not live up to the principles he stated would be necessary for him to sign it.  Even if he felt he would get John McCain on his side by signing it, and that the Supreme Court would declare it completely unconstitutional, which it did not, he was wrong, I believe, to break his promise on that;

3.  Voting pro-life is winning politically, as witness the impressive VA and NJ state house electoral victories of 6 days ago;

4.  In speaking about the rights that we are blessed to be endowed with, I believe we too often think about our own rights, and not enough about God’s rights.  Clearly, we have rights here in this country that others in other countries are literally dying for.  We deserve no credit for having those rights (except of course for the brave men and women who put their lives on the line every hour of every day to defend those rights) because we had nothing to do with being born in this great country.  Accordingly, these rights are gifts.  We can certainly agree that with great gifts come great responsibilities.  Isn’t our primary responsibility to defend the right to life that Almighty God endowed us with?  Can any of us imagine a reason why God would create a human being so that it could be aborted?

5.  For those who question God’s creation and hand in this country’s founding and existence, please consider that on the 50-year anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, two of the men most identified with the crafting of and signing of the Declaration, our 2nd and 3rd Presidents, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, died in separate locations and for different reasons.  Isn’t that an extremely persuasive argument for God’s having His hand in the creation and ongoing existence of our country?  Furthermore, isn’t it tactically smart for eternity reasons to be defending His rights?

In closing, let us take faith in knowing that, Biblically speaking, there are numerous instances of God leading those who fight for His rights to victory in their battles.  God be with each of us, my friends, in defending His rights in this battle for our nation’s soul!

In response to Warner and all those who have taken the time to stand up for life:

For what it is worth, and in the interest of full disclosure, I am a Roman Catholic and, like you, very upset and appalled by the decision to not just invite President Obama to be Notre Dame’s commencement speaker but to honor him with an honorary degree as well.  The reference to “putative Catholics” is not far removed from what many of my friends and I refer to as “cafeteria Catholics,” that is, Catholics who pick and choose what parts of Catholic doctrine they are interested in, and what part they choose to ignore.  I believe, as Catholics, we have an obligation to support with our words, thoughts, and actions, EVERY facet of Catholic Doctrine.

So why am I writing this?  I have two reasons.  First, to commend the thousands of Catholics and non-Catholics alike who took the time and expended the energy to vociferously defend the rights of the unborn through protests, leading alternative graduation exercises, writing pastoral columns, writing letters to editors, calling Fr. Jenkins’ office, signing petitions, etc. This group included many Catholic Bishops, Archbishops, and Cardinals, and also included, contrary to Time magazine’s saying that the Vatican was silent on this issue, Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura and Archbishop Raymond Burke.  This position in the Vatican is second only to the Pope himself as the highest judicial authority in the Vatican.  The group also included my own Bishop, who was extremely clear on his disappointment that Notre Dame decided to take this course of action, as well as Notre Dame’s own Bishop, Bishop D’Arcy, who stated that it appeared that Notre Dame had chosen prestige over principle.  God bless them for this.

The second reason I am writing this is, as I alluded to earlier, your reference to putative Catholics, and my correlating that with cafeteria Catholics.  As I also said, my faith informs me, that being a devout Catholic means accepting all of Catholic doctrine.  When it comes to defending life from conception to natural death, accepting Catholic doctrine includes, but is certainly not limited to, being pro-life and anti-euthanasia.  What is perhaps less-known, but is nonetheless vitally important, is the NECESSITY of avoiding artificial birth control methods, in order to fully proclaim oneself, by way of example, as being pro-life.  In the 1968 Encyclical “Humanae Vitae”, Pope Paul VI correctly predicted the extremely serious effects of all artificial contraceptives on the institution of marriage; that is why the Church promotes Natural Family Planning (NFP) as the only acceptable means for limiting the procreation act.  Certainly nobody can deny the impact the Pope predicted of a culture committed to artificial contraceptives, especially in regards to stripping children of the right to have a loving father and mother!  Would it not be a better world if we bypassed our own selfish desires in regards to the procreation act (and at the same time, men treating women as objects of their physical desires rather than the individuals worthy of dignity that they are) and thought of God’s rights and desires in creating children?  How I wish, for the sake of all children in this world, that every segment of society, Catholic and non-Catholic alike, would forgo artificial contraceptives!

Please consider this an open thread.