My fellow California Catholics will face a big decision Tuesday: whether to affirm or deny the traditional definition of marriage. The state’s voters will consider Proposition 8, an initiative that would overturn the state Supreme Court’s May 15 ruling to legalize same-sex marriage. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the state’s Catholics will likely play a pivotal role in its outcome:
Catholics, who make up nearly a quarter of likely voters, also could make a difference, DiCamillo said. Catholics opposed Prop. 8 by a 48 to 44 percent margin, but that's down from 55 to 36 percent a month ago.
When the Proposition 22 same-sex marriage ban was on the ballot in 2000, Catholics were split almost evenly in the final pre-election poll, DiCamillo said. But exit polls showed Catholics actually voting for Prop. 22 by 15 points.
"The Sunday before the election could be important, since people may hear priests and ministers preaching against same-sex marriage," he said.
My family and many of my friends still live in the Bay Area, and I am familiar with the arguments against Prop. 8. The chief argument is that marriage should be defined by an individual’s desires and wishes. In its majority opinion, the California Supreme Court wrote,
These core substantive rights include, most fundamentally, the opportunity of an individual to establish – with the person with whom the individual has chosen to share his or her live – an officially recognized and protected family possessing mutual rights and responsibilities and entitled to the same respect and dignity accorded a union traditionally designated as marriage.
In the words of gay writer Andrew Sullivan, the terms of the court’s decision are a “watershed.” Previous marriage law had distinguished between gay and straight. The court’s ruling doesn’t. It posits that “the individual citizen … is defined as prior to his or her sexual orientation.”
Sullivan gets it half right. The court’s decision is a watershed, but not for the reason he described. The logic of the court’s decision, that of contractual law, is a common one in the legal world. Multiple parties discuss terms of a deal and sign a contract. Landlords and tenants operate on these terms, as do employers and employees. Whether the parties involved are gay or straight is irrelevant; the individual comes first.
What makes the court’s decision a watershed is not its logic, but rather its application.
Marriage had not been treated under the law as a purely private affair. It was understood to have private and public purposes. Marriage wasn’t just about the parties’ happiness; it was also about a common good – the begetting and proper raising of children. The gender of the parties, therefore, mattered. One party should be female, the other male. (Unsurprisingly, the California ruling severs the cord between marriage and children; as Sullivan notes, it establishes a definition of family “in which reproduction and children are not necessary.”)
Supporting this traditional understanding of marriage is reason enough to oppose gay marriage. As any Catholic knows, our private actions should be oriented toward the common good, especially as they the most vulnerable members of society. Just consider the consequences of no-fault divorce laws, which are governed by a contractual logic similar to that of gay marriage. These laws have harmed millions of children since their imposition 40 years ago. As Adam Thomas and Isabel Sawhill noted, if family structure had remained unchanged from 1970 to 1998, the child-poverty rate would have been 13.9 percent rather than 18.3 percent.
But there is also a specifically Catholic reason to oppose same-sex marriage. As Pope Benedict XVI points out, traditional marriage promotes authentic human freedom. It does this not as gay marriage does, by denying the real differences between men and women. Rather, it does this by affirming those differences and embracing them for their unitive and procreative ends. After all, what makes humans more free than becoming God-like, begetting children, and ensuring the future of humanity? As the California Catholic Bishops wrote in their statement in favor of Proposition 8,
we need to recall that marriage mirrors God's relationship with us-and that marriage completes, enriches and perpetuates humanity. When men and women consummate their marriage they offer themselves to God as co-creators of a new human being. Any other pairing-while possibly offering security and companionship to the individuals involved is not marriage. We must support traditional marriage as the source of our civilization, the foundation for a society that can be home to all human beings, and the reflection of our relationship with God.
The differences between the two types of marriage should be clear. Gay marriage represents, as Pope Benedict notes, “anarchic freedom.” Traditional marriage represents authentic freedom. This is in no way means that Catholics, or anyone, should disparage gay couples and their legitimate feelings. Yet California Catholics should understand the true nature of marriage, realize its implications, and vote accordingly.
Mark Stricherz
In 2004, a grassroots organization in Ohio called “Catholics for Kerry” asked the campaign to send a surrogate to one of their events. They were told, “We don’t do white churches.” Turns out, if you “don’t do white churches” you also don’t get to do the White House.
This year, you don’t have to ask twice if you are a religiously motivated voter and you want some attention from the Democrats. Several groups have sprung up to articulate and amplify those parts of Catholic social teaching that correspond with more progressive policies and they are taking to the airwaves to promote their message.
Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good has been busy all election season, hosting conference calls with reporters, preparing voter guides and now running a campaign that includes billboards, print ads and most importantly an extensive radio campaign. For samples, click here. http://www.catholicsinalliance.org/ad-campaign. As you can guess from the group’s name, the ads focus on the need to replace the social Darwinism that has reigned in America lo these many years since Reaganomics first began its idolatry of the free market with social policies that bring people together. Solidarity, not competition, is the theme and it could scarcely be more resonant as the nation comes to grips with the greatest economic challenge since the Great Depression. The ad campaign is running in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Missouri.
The group Faith in Public Life is mounting a ten-state ad campaign on Christian radio stations. The ad states: “We need to ask ourselves what it really means to be pro-life and help move the conversation beyond bumper sticker slogans…It's time for Democrats and Republicans to come together around solutions based on results, not rhetoric. Please learn more by visiting http://www.realabortionsolutions.org/.” The website includes statements from a host of religious leaders about the need to find some common ground on abortion.
Matthew25.org has been busy on the airwaves also. This group is the brainchild of Mara Vanderslice, who won the hearts of many religiously motivated Democrats in 2004 when she cheerfully served in the often thankless job of religious outreach director for the Kerry campaign. They are more explicitly partisan – they have endorsed Obama - and they have been running ads for a couple of months on Christian radio, highlighting Obama’s faith as much as his policy positions, making him familiar to a largely evangelical audience.
Voices from the right have been busy as well. “Catholic Answers” is distributing voter guides again this year. Randall Terry, the pro-life activist, has issued a document called “Faithful Catholic Citizenship” that reflects what he calls “the authentic magisterium,” a not so subtle jab at the U.S. Bishops’ document “Faithful Citizenship.” He also has issued “An appeal to Catholic priests” – but viewer discretion is advised. In the video Terry stands before an altar and displays an aborted fetus, which struck this viewer as tasteless, turning a tragedy into a prop.
I am no believer in averting our gaze from the horror of abortion, but the issue between Catholics in Alliance and Randall Terry is not whether abortion is good or bad but how we can best approach the issue. Some were moved when they watched “Silent Scream” and others were repulsed, but in a democracy the key is to convince and to do so in a way that respects the views of those with whom we disagree. My friends on the Left and my friends on the Right disagree about how to advance the pro-life cause but both groups should enjoy the presumption of good faith in their earnestness to prevent abortion.
Michael Sean Winters
The problem, of course, is that many things have been tried, and the unsuccessful ones are being dusted off and re-gifted to the American public; if we don’t know precisely what does work, we certainly do know what doesn’t.
One problem with Malanga’s and Shaw’s argument is its premise that “the federal government lost its War on Poverty.” This is highly misleading. Poverty rates actually fell in the 1960s. In 1960, more than a fifth of Americans were poor; in 1969, one in eight were. See the accompanying chart below.
Another problem with their argument is the claim that the Republican-led policies of the 1990s succeeded. Welfare reform took millions off the dole; new police tactics and strategies cut the crime rate. For all of the good that these policies achieved, they did not reduce the poverty rate significantly.
Yet if Malanga and Shaw are to be believed, the policies that reduced poverty failed, while those that have not succeeded. This is the logic of Orwell's Ministry of Truth.
It is largely true that Barack Obama’s anti-poverty proposals (and John McCain’s for that matter) would not help the poor much. Community Development block grants rarely bring jobs to a neighborhood; at best, they shore up the local housing stock. Extra spending on urban education, such as to build gold-plated schools, won’t raise student achievement much. Such programs are aimed more at middle-class political constituencies than the marginalized.
It is true that some of the War on Poverty’s policies failed. As Nicholas Lemann in The Promised Land pointed out, its maximum feasible participation clause posited a link between political and economic empowerment that does not exist. It might have given state and local officials the impression that they should make it easier to get and stay on welfare.
And it is true that some of Malanga’s proposals could reduce the poverty rate. More federal funds should go for prisoner re-entry programs and charter schools; tighter standards should be applied to federal public housing.
Yet Malanga is silent on why those policies work: acculturation. Their aim is to instill middle-class mores and habits into the down and out. For all of the talk about the poor’s economic needs, their cultural and spiritual needs are neglected. As this is an era of family breakdown, as Ross Douthat and Reihan Salam have noted, such policies are doubly necessary. (These policies are also surely consistent with one of the goals of subsidiarity, the Catholic principle in which a “community of a higher order” (i.e. the federal government) supports but does not supplant a community of a lower order” (i.e. local government or agencies.)
Although the 1960s War on Poverty failed politically, one of its guiding principles did not. Unlike its 1990s counterpart, it conceived of the poor in their totality (or near totality). The elderly poor, the white rural poor, the black urban poor – all were included in its purview.
What the country surely needs now is a program with the best of the old and new: the scope of LBJ’s policies with an acculturation strategy aimed at bolstering the poor’s families and institutions.
Mark Stricherz
Last Friday, I argued that Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput’s criticisms of Barack Obama have been misunderstood as partisan. In response, reader Joseph J. Cleary II wrote:
When the church leadership takes the jump from enunciating clear moral policy to “implying” political votes for a party or candidate, they inevitably miss the mark.
I take Cleary’s point: church leaders should not imply votes for or against any candidate. To do so would be to violate the spirit of church consensus. As Michael Sean Winters noted accurately, The bishops’ document "Faithful Citizenship" says, "In fulfilling these responsibilities, the Church’s leaders are to avoid endorsing or opposing candidates or telling people how to vote.”
Yet contra Michael, Chaput has not urged Catholics to vote against Obama. Instead, the archbishop has criticized the Democratic candidate’s position on abortion, as well as his supporters. Opposing a candidate and criticizing his policies one are not the same. Criticism means disapproval; it doesn’t mean opposition. Most of us criticize candidates regularly; this doesn’t mean we won’t vote for them.
Naturally, this raises the question: Why hasn’t Archbishop Chaput criticized John McCain for his support of another evil -- federal funding of embryonic stem-cell research. Last month, Fran Maier, the chancellor of the Denver archdiocese, explained the archbishop’s decision this way:
In fact, the archbishop has voiced his criticism of embryonic stem cell research directly to Sen. McCain. He’s had no similar invitation or opportunity to meet with Sen. Obama. Moreover, the Republican Party platform rejects embryonic stem cell research. In fact, anyone interested in the contrasts between the two party platforms on this and related life issues simply needs to compare them.
Fran’s words invite questions. Would Chaput not have criticized Obama publicly if he had agreed to meet with the archbishop? Did Obama reject Chaput’s offer to meet with the archbishop?
In my reading of the evidence, Chaput is not a partisan. But surely he could explain his position about public criticism of candidates and their positions on various evils more fully.
Mark Stricherz
Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput is getting no love, to use the parlance of the day, from progressive Catholics. Doug Kmiec implies that Chaput is biased against Democrats, saying that he "singles out" their policies for criticism. Michael Sean Winters writes that Chaput is “the second most vocal supporter of the GOP.” Journalist David Gibson suspects that "the bottom of [Chaput's] argument is that a Catholic cannot vote for Obama." All three statements are mischaracterizations. And it reflects, I think, a larger misunderstanding that progressive Catholics have about their co-religionist opponents.
Chaput’s basic opposition is to political candidates who support Roe v. Wade. As he wrote in August,
Obviously, we have other important issues facing us this fall: the economy, the war in Iraq, immigration justice. But we can’t build a healthy society while ignoring the routine and very profitable legalized homicide that goes on every day against America’s unborn children. The right to life is foundational. Every other right depends on it. Efforts to reduce abortions, or to create alternatives to abortion, or to foster an environment where more women will choose to keep their unborn child, can have great merit—but not if they serve to cover over or distract from the brutality and fundamental injustice of abortion itself … Yet for thirty-five years I’ve watched prominent “pro-choice” Catholics justify themselves with the kind of moral and verbal gymnastics that should qualify as an Olympic event. All they’ve really done is capitulate to Roe v. Wade.
This position is not, strictly speaking, Republican or Democratic. It was also the late-career position of Robert P. Casey, Sr., the late Democratic governor of Pennsylvania. On the third day of the 1992 Democratic convention, Casey organized a full-page ad in The New York Times which called Roe “the most momentous act of exclusion in our history.” Casey also opposed the re-election of Mark Singel because Singel, in a reversal of his previous position, came out for Roe.
In addition, Chaput’s position echoes that found in the Catechism:
The inalienable right to life of every innocent human individual is a constitutive element of a civil society and its legislation:
… The moment a positive law deprives a category of human beings of the protection which civil legislation ought to accord them, the state is denying the equality of all before the law. When the state does not place its power at the service of the rights of each citizen, and in particular of the more vulnerable, the very foundations of a state based on law are undermined. . . . As a consequence of the respect and protection which must be ensured for the unborn child from the moment of conception, the law must provide appropriate penal sanctions for every deliberate violation of the child's rights."81
Now, our two parties have official positions about Roe. The Republican’s platform calls for the passage of a human life amendment, which if enacted would reverse Roe; the Democrats’ platform calls for preserving Roe. Naturally, the archbishop has made a descriptive statement about the GOP: that on cultural issues the GOP is “the natural ally” of the church.
It is true that Chaput has criticized pro-choice Democrats, such as Barack Obama. But that's because they favor abortion rights, not because they are Democrats.
Yet Chaput has made no prescriptive statements about the Republican Party; he has not endorsed, or even praised, one of their candidates for office. In fact, he said in an interview that “we are not with the Republican Party. They are with us.” That’s hardly the statement of a GOP booster.
If Chaput were a GOP supporter, he would say nice things about a Republican pro-life candidate instead of a pro-life Democratic one. Chaput said no such thing. For example, he didn’t imply support in 2006 for Bob Beauprez, the Republican opponent of Bill Ritter, the pro-life Democratic gubernatorial candidate (and now the state’s governor).
If Chaput were a GOP supporter, he would have said nice things about Rudy Giuliani, who was a leading Republican presidential candidate this year. Chaput said no such thing. Instead, he told Newsweek that Catholics would have to discuss their options:
"What if a candidate were right on all the issues except racial discrimination?" asked Denver's archbishop, the Most Rev. Charles Chaput. "Why isn't [abortion] as important as that?" If Giuliani is the nominee, Chaput says, Catholics will have to choose between the lesser of two evils or stay home from the polls in protest.
For what it is worth, I suspect that the archbishop is a Democrat. He invited me to give the annual Bob Casey lecture at the archdiocese. In talking with him, I learned that he is as much of a strong pro-life Democrat as Casey himself. As a young seminarian, he worked as an “active volunteer” for Bobby Kennedy’s presidential campaign in 1968. He supported Jimmy Carter’s presidential bids in 1976. He opposed the Iraq war and some of the GOP’s attempts at cracking down on illegal immigration.
Chaput has offered encouragement to Catholics who oppose abortion but don’t seek to criminalize the procedure. But his position, as well as that of Casey, is that overturning Roe is foundational.
This makes sense to me. Consider the issue of slavery. In 1857, the Supreme Court’s decision in Dred Scott declared that black Americans were the property of their masters. Was it really possible to oppose slavery but favor Dred Scott?
This is a question that I think that progressive pro-lifers need to ask.
UPDATE: I forgot to mention that the pro-life committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops released a statement Tuesday that criticized the notion that seeking to reduce the abortion rate was a sufficient pro-life strategy.
Mark Stricherz
