The Five Non-Negotiables Concept Is Not Catholic Doctrine

 

For at least the last two election cycles, maybe more, a concept has popped up that has gained popularity amongst those of a conservative Catholic political bent. They call these the "five non-negotiables" (5NN). Several priests who are popular amongst some Catholics have promoted them, along with some similarly popular lay Web sites/orgs. That is the context for this post, and particularly because today two good friends of mine shared a priest's homily that leverages them. 

Where I Am Coming From

Let me start by making clear my own commitments, because too often people assume all sorts of things and are quick to be dismissive of those with whom they disagree. They want to label them, put them in a box, and tuck them neatly on a high shelf in their figurative closets, or they want to toss the box out in the trash. 

I am a Catholic convert from Protestantism. I came to the Church through a deep study of Christian history and, correspondingly, Christian thought from the Apostles on down to the present. I by no means claim to be an expert on all of Christian thought. That would be, quite frankly, impossible for any one human in this life. But I have studied a lot, and it was my study and ever growing love of the fullness of truth as expressed in Catholic doctrine that led me to the Church. (That and the Holy Spirit, I like to think!)

My study has not stopped. I joined the Dominican Order in 2007 as a lay Dominican and made life promises on 6 August 2011. Study is one of the four pillars of Dominican spirituality, and "veritas" (truth) is one of our mottos. (Hey, after 800 years, you pick up a few..) None of that gives me special authority or gives me any guarantee to be free from error, but I hope it at least illustrates my commitment to the Truth, not just intellectually but also spiritually. I live by a daily rule that includes the Divine Office and the rosary, among other things such as daily reading of Scripture and study that pertains to our Dominican vocation oriented towards the salvation of souls.

I was married in 1999, and as of writing, I have seven lovely children, ranging in age of two to nineteen. My wife and I (my wife mostly!) have almost exclusively homeschooled our children and made every effort to raise them in the Catholic faith. We also, for what it is worth, have attended an FSSP parish for a year when we lived in Tulsa, and (later) a parish in NJ with a flourishing Latin mass community for some years that we were an active part of. I personally have great fondness for the Extraordinary Form, particularly high solemn masses. 

Politically, I am an independent, although I have pretty consistently voted for GOP candidates, and that was informed not a little bit by my concern over abortion. My bias, such as it is, is center leaning right, if I had to put a label on it like that. It really depends on the issue in question though, because my actual political party affiliation is none. If anything, it would be closest to the American Solidarity Party because they, like I, at least try to take an orthodox Catholic stance on all the issues. In matters of society and politics, I try to follow the whole social doctrine of the Church, and I have read many encyclicals pertaining to this, the bishops' guides to faithful citizenship, and (perhaps most importantly) the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, cover to cover. I have the highlights to prove it.  😇

I hope this illustrates I am anything but the stereotypical "flaming liberal." And I hope it at least earns a thoughtful reading, in a cultural environment in which we are far too quick to dismiss anyone who even has the slightest disagreements with us. I am ever committed to seeking the Truth, and living in accord with it as best I am able. 

What is Wrong with the 5NN - #1 Political Motivation

And so, that gets us to the point at hand. While I do appreciate the intent behind the 5NN, I find it to be too much of a reduction of the full, beautiful teaching of the Church. More than that, I fear that its popularity has been, unconsciously I am willing to grant, driven more by political commitments than by an honest appreciation and presentation of the social doctrine of the Church. That every person who promotes it uses it either to directly criticize the Democratic Party and/or to directly promote voting for the GOP appears, to me, evidence of that. 

And I fear that far too many Americans who are members of both major parties are too uncritical of the problems with their own party platforms/candidates, while being overly critical of the other. This feeds nicely into our baser tribal instincts and also the very tempting but ultimately false binary thinking that is so prevalent. "If you are not for [my party], you must be for the [other party]." "A vote for a third party is a vote for the [other party]." These and many others like them are asserted against those of us who will not comply and fully throw our weight behind either major party. It is a cross we bear. (shrug)

But I do not want to get too focused on politics as such. My focus here is in no way to say we should or should not vote for this or that party. I believe everyone reading this is adult enough to form their own judgment on whom to vote for. It is not, I assure you, that I do not have significant criticisms of the major parties, and it is not, even, that I think they are both equally problematic. I simply do not see the good in adding to the "you should vote for my party" noise. 

And to be honest, this is a big reason I am not a fan of the 5NN. It is not because they are not part--even a "pre-eminent" part--of Catholic social teaching. It is that they are hijacked to uncritically support the GOP.

You may scoff at my suggestion that there is a lack of criticism, but in the circles that promote the 5NN, I have yet to see a single criticism of the GOP (or, rarely if at all, Trump). A good example of this is the video I mentioned of a homily from a certain FSSP priest in Maryland. In it, while disclaiming that he was telling anyone whom to vote for, he spoke at length about the many problems of Biden/Harris with nary a criticism of Trump or the GOP. And this is, as I say, par for the course. This good priest is, naturally, relying on the aforesaid binary mentality in our country that, if I clearly cannot choose Biden/Harris, my only choice is to vote Trump/Pence.

If you make this observation (as I have) to a Trump supporter/GOP party member, that person will inevitably fall back on the claim that all of the problems with the GOP are simply matters of prudential judgment (i.e., the "negotiables" in the 5NN concept). But as I hope to show, this is not at all the whole picture. (And I hope everyone will keep in mind that the point here is NOT to tell you not to vote GOP. I promise.)

What is Wrong with the 5NN - #2 Too Much Reduction

Unfortunately for us Catholics, the choice ain't so simple. We are called to learn, value, and uphold the whole of Catholic doctrine. Not only that, we are guided to weigh not only the underlying issue and principles at hand but also how those principles come to bear practically for any given action.

By action, I am including voting, but we should remember these are meant to guide our daily lives, not just how we vote! Judging by the amount of fervor that is expended on elections, particularly the quadrennial presidential election, one would not fault someone for thinking that many Christians only think that their duties with regards to the social doctrine of the Church extend so far as casting a ballot. But I digress..

The Compendium is hundreds of pages long. And it is a compendium, that is, it is meant to be a concise collection of our teachings. It isn't even, in a sense, the full teaching of the Church that is meant to be our guide. But it is most assuredly a good guide. It puts a lot of important meat on the bones, and it also teaches us, very clearly, that many of the political ideas we have been inculcated with from birth, even some cherished American sacred cows, are not as sacred as we might have been led to believe. As true children of the Church, we ought to be teachable and to amend our political opinions accordingly, rather than insist on our own way, clinging stubbornly to political ideals over the truths of the Faith.

Even the bishops' guide is 45 pages long, and you can think of it as a compendium of the Compendium, perhaps, with some extra guidance as applies for our situation in the US today. Given the complexities of life and, especially, how those are encountered at the national or international levels, there are no silver bullets, there are no "perfectly clear" choices. Even if the American Solidarity Party were one of the major parties--and it sets out to explicitly conform its platform to Catholic social doctrine--it is not a given that voting ASP would be a slam dunk for Catholics. 

No party, I repeat, no party has any kind of special guarantee from Christ that they best represent Catholic social doctrine. And so we must, as mature, adult Catholics, do our best to consider all the many important issues and how each party does more or less to promote the common good, as understood through the guidance of the Church's Magisterium--which does actually have the special guarantee from Christ not to lead us into error! This, I have to point out, very much includes the teaching of our Holy Father Francis, as I elaborate on in a recent article.

As Catholics, we should be mature enough to live with the ambiguity inherent in all this. Some principles are crystal clear, but how they are realized and applied in the complexities of life and through national and global systems are anything but simple. Saying this in no way denies the fundamental clarity of the principles themselves. By the way, has anyone looked at the length of the Summa Theologica? It is 3011 pages in the five volume set I have, and it is "only" dealing with faith and morals. It is supposed to have been an "introduction" to theology.

It seems to me that we have to accept that 1) we cannot fully comprehend the complexities of the systems at play in large scale politics and governance, 2) we cannot ever fully predict how a given policy will definitely play out and what repercussions it will have, and 3) few if any of us is able to balance the full social doctrine of the Church against all of these with anything approaching perfection. We need to accept and appreciate these with humility, and that humility ought to guide us and make us less certain and sure that our political choices (and parties) are right. 

That should, as well, give us all a sense of bonhomie with all our fellow citizens. We are all in this boat together! None of us gets it perfectly right, even when we have certain fundamental principles to start from. We all, yes even our political "enemies," are seeking some conception of the good, however imperfectly. We are all fallible humans in need of redemption. Political differences should not be held so strongly for these reasons. There is an almost certain likelihood that any policy, especially at higher levels of government, will not pan out as planned and have very many unintended consequences, many of which are not good. 

As Christians, though, we ought not to despair. We can live with the ambiguity and uncertainty and still make the best decisions we can based on what we know and understand at any given time. We can, and we should. But any time we start getting certain that our party or candidate absolutely 100% has it right or, especially, that any particular candidate is going to realize our principles with any meaningful degree of certainty, we need to step back. That kind of thinking is what leads to all of the sinful polarization and mutual demonization that is so common today. Let's let humility be the key principle we start from and cling to.

What is Wrong with the 5NN - #3 Confusing/Misleading Language

The Church does not really use the language of "negotiable" or "non-negotiable." The problem with using this language is that it is readily converted into, on the one hand, an overly restrictive understanding of the implications of the non-negotiables and, on the other hand, an overly permissive understanding of, well, pretty much any other issue! 

Let me be clear. If you say, "these five are non-negotiable," then you are saying that if a given party does not align with the Catholic teaching on them, then that party must not be supported--it is non negotiable. So let's take abortion for example. The Catholic teaching is that it is only permissible when the abortion is not the end or means in view, but that it may be allowed when the death of the child is a consequence (even a known consequence) of a procedure intended to protect the life of the mother.

Now, if we are truly saying that the Church's teaching on this is literally non-negotiable, then we may not vote for any party based on this alone. (Maybe the ASP, but that's it.) The GOP does not have such an "extreme" view against abortion. They as a rule allow it in cases of rape, incest, or to protect the life of the mother. So again, if we are to use the proposed language of "non-negotiable," then we cannot negotiate with the GOP and say "well, it's okay because you mostly support our view." No, we are not allowed to negotiate!

And while we are here, it is worth noting that the Holy Father has now made capital punishment into one of these "non-negotiables." The Catechism uses the language "inadmissible." So, again, if we were going to be literalists and absolute on such matters, we obviously could not vote for the GOP, which openly supports capital punishment, nor especially Trump, who has reinstated it with actual killings to date at the federal level. 

Clearly, then, we must either be consistent, and not vote for either major party, or we must allow ourselves room to "negotiate." And this "negotiation" is precisely what our bishops actually teach us we must do (#32):

Sometimes morally flawed laws already exist. In this situation, the process of framing legislation to protect life is subject to prudential judgment and "the art of the possible." At times this process may restore justice only partially or gradually. For example, St. John Paul II taught that when a government official who fully opposes abortion cannot succeed in completely overturning a pro-abortion law, he or she may work to improve protection for unborn human life, "limiting the harm done by such a law" and lessening its negative impact as much as possible (Evangelium Vitae, no. 73). Such incremental improvements in the law are acceptable as steps toward the full restoration of justice. However, Catholics must never abandon the moral requirement to seek full protection for all human life from the moment of conception until natural death.

We have an obligation to always oppose, but to wrongly translate that into "never negotiate" would, in effect, make achieving the goal impossible. Our bishops have a whole section on prudence and how to reason about applying these principles to our concrete realities. That is what we informed, faithful citizens must do.

So that is the problem with "non-negotiable." The problem with "negotiable" is, as I said, the inverse. It leads into a certain too-easy flexibility on the supposedly negotiable items, to the point of their not actually factoring in at all in our choice of how we vote. We feel free to effectively ignore them. This is contrary to what the Church teaches, as our bishops note (#34 of the same):

A Catholic cannot vote for a candidate who favors a policy promoting an intrinsically evil act, such as abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, deliberately subjecting workers or the poor to subhuman living conditions, redefining marriage in ways that violate its essential meaning, or racist behavior, if the voter's intent is to support that position. In such cases, a Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in grave evil. At the same time, a voter should not use a candidate's opposition to an intrinsic evil to justify indifference or inattentiveness to other important moral issues involving human life and dignity. (emphases mine)

This section clearly contradicts the whole concept of "negotiable" and "non-negotiable." Not only are "non-negotiables" paralyzing in the political sphere we live in, if we take them truly to be such, but the Church through the CDF and our bishops clearly teaches that it is possible to vote for a candidate who favors policy promoting an intrinsically evil act so long as we in no way intend to support that position. This strikes down any notion that, for example, a candidate's admittedly repugnant stance on abortion is completely non-negotiable. They continue, to be even more explicit (#35):

There may be times when a Catholic who rejects a candidate's unacceptable position even on policies promoting an intrinsically evil act may reasonably decide to vote for that candidate for other morally grave reasons. Voting in this way would be permissible only for truly grave moral reasons, not to advance narrow interests or partisan preferences or to ignore a fundamental moral evil.

And (#36):

When all candidates hold a position that promotes an intrinsically evil act, the conscientious voter faces a dilemma. The voter may decide to take the extraordinary step of not voting for any candidate or, after careful deliberation, may decide to vote for the candidate deemed less likely to advance such a morally flawed position and more likely to pursue other authentic human goods.

Speaking of intrinsically evil acts, "The Church has always taught the intrinsic evil of contraception, that is, of every marital act intentionally rendered unfruitful. This teaching is to be held as definitive and irreformable." (see here) What GOP candidate promotes this teaching? Do they not rather, as a rule, follow and promote the "standard" American view that contraception is just fine and normal? And, can we for a moment pretend that the GOP upholds what the Church teaches on the indissolubility of marriage? Or sex outside of marriage, even? Masturbation? And yet, these all involve intrinsically evil acts, and all parties and nearly all candidates fall short on this measure. Exactly zero of them are campaigning to bring back true "traditional marriage," stopping far, far short of the Church's teaching and implicitly or explicitly promoting such intrinsic evils. 

The purpose here, again, is not in any way to minimize the necessity of our opposition to intrinsically evil acts. Quite the contrary--the Church is very clear on that duty. It is simply to highlight that, contrary to the 5NN concept, when it comes to working for the common good, no single issue or issues always and everywhere invalidate voting for or working with a particular party or candidate to find what seems to us the best way to achieve the common good and to fight against all the very many grave injustices in the world today.

Again, if we were to take an absolute, non-negotiable stance on abortion, we could not even vote for most GOP candidates due to their support of abortion exceptions that are not allowed in Catholic teaching. And so, we may rightly determine to vote for them despite their support for that intrinsically grave evil. Indeed, not every Democrat supports fully unrestricted abortion. So while we can say that the GOP is certainly much preferable in their far more restrictive stance, they all still allow it to some degree.

I am not just being clever with words here nor trying to make some rarified academic point. They really, truly all have serious problems and to varying degrees support policies and law that promote intrinsic evils. We should never pretend that a vote for either of our major parties is free of such problems. We have to determine which has the greatest good that offsets those problems, and that applies when considering both major parties and any other party or candidate. 

Similarly, the admonition that "a voter should not use a candidate's opposition to an intrinsic evil to justify indifference or inattentiveness to other important moral issues involving human life and dignity" clearly rules out any possibility for single issue voting for a faithful Catholic (or five issue voting). 

What is Wrong with the 5NN - #4 Devaluing Other Gravely Important Matters

I touched on this above, but it needs to be highlighted further. As a rule, we Republican-leaning Catholics are far too quick to dismiss, wave hands, and claim "prudential judgment" on those things that are not in the 5NN. I can only imagine the ready defensiveness on this is for fear we be seen to lean towards positions more closely associated with the Democratic party. We see this in the massive overreactions to Fratelli Tutti, for example. Pope Francis criticizes unbridled capitalism (in lock step with Catholic social doctrine for over 120 years) and people lose their minds! He's a communist! (That is sarcasm.)

War is a grave evil. Pope Francis teaches compellingly and authoritatively in his role as supreme pastor (Fratelli Tutti, 258): 

We can no longer think of war as a solution, because its risks will probably always be greater than its supposed benefits. In view of this, it is very difficult nowadays to invoke the rational criteria elaborated in earlier centuries to speak of the possibility of a “just war”. Never again war!

Even admitting the possibility of just war, as Catholics we are called, as a rule and basic stance, to oppose it as invariably leading to grave evils. This is in stark contrast to the hawkish, nationalist stance that the GOP has taken, especially under Trump. He makes no beans about his readiness to use our military might to advance his America First policy. This should be a serious problem for Catholics.

The America First policy itself is hugely problematic from a Catholic principles point of view. It is fundamentally a selfish policy that prioritizes our collective national good over the good of every other nation in the world. We would not tolerate such selfishness on a personal level, nor should we tolerate it on a national level.

Climate change is another area where the GOP, as a rule, is way out of sync with Catholic social doctrine. Pope Francis has repeatedly highlighted for us (from his global vantage point that none of us has) the grave injustices done throughout the world to human beings as a result of our carelessness towards the environment. This is no matter of being a tree hugger or exalting some kind of mother-earth animism. It is about protecting and caring for the most vulnerable among us. 

The destructive effects of how we have been living are observable already even today. I am not talking about abstract concerns about rising temperatures, although those increases do endanger very, very many vulnerable poor people. The impacts on human beings and God's creatures are undeniable. And the GOP's denial, deregulation, pulling out of environmental accords, and the like promote an irresponsible laissez faire attitude, contrary to the careful stewardship we are called to, and the concern for the poor around the globe who suffer as a result of our lackadaisical attitude. 

Treatment of immigrants is another grave area for concern. We must not pretend that there is a dichotomy--completely closed borders or completely open. But not having followed current regulations for immigration does not strip a person of their human dignity. Being an "illegal immigrant" does not make a person subhuman and therefore beyond the scope of our care. 

As Catholics, we know better. The example of the good Samaritan that Pope Francis draws so heavily on in Fratelli Tutti applies, along with all the many corporal works of mercy that are the ancient and enduring tradition of the Church. A nation may have a right to protect its borders, but there are just and unjust ways to do that. The GOP under Trump have moved in the wrong direction and, in general, promote a careless and even hostile and fearful attitude towards those extremely vulnerable persons--the immigrants and refugees--who need our love and care.

Another area of grave concern is how we collectively care for the poorest among us in our own country. The free market does not give a damn about the poor. The increasing disparities in the world and our country between the very rich and the poor should be alarming to us. Policies that disproportionately favor corporations and the wealthy can only go so far towards the good. Again, this is not a binary thing. It is not communism or unbridled capitalism. It is not no taxes for social welfare or complete redistribution of wealth. Too often we reach for reactionary words and a mindset that resists reasonable compromises that would enable us to better serve the poor through our pooled resources.

Yes, prudential judgment does apply, but it applies to all of the concerns that bear on our action in the world and especially to politics and how we vote and the policies we craft. We are not any more free to deny our duty to help the poor than we are free to deny our duty to protect the unborn. Indeed, the two are not unrelated, given the poor disproportionately seek abortions. We are not free to turn a blind eye towards systems of injustice any more than we are free to turn a blind eye towards promoting chastity and the sanctity of marriage. How we achieve all these just and good goals is the matter of prudential judgment and working it out in our political sphere. 

Is There Anything Better Than the 5NN?

The reality and problem with the 5NN concept is that it is not, in point of fact, what the Church teaches us about our duties in the social and political spheres. It is too reductive, too selective, and serves more as a tool of the Republican party than of forming consciences according to the fullness of Catholic social doctrine. It reinforces the already prevalent misconception that as long as we vote pro life (or pro marriage), we're good, and it wrongly releases us from other very grave concerns and obligations. 

We need to realize we are not free at all to be cozy with and uncritically supportive of either major party. I have focused on the GOP here because criticisms of the Democratic party (in such circles as I often find myself in) are aplenty. I see this post as a necessary corrective to urge us all to start thinking more holistically with the Church. We can, despite protestations to the contrary, vote for either major party, given that both support intrinsic evils but both also promote the common good in their respective ways. I do not say that I think they are both equally good, all things considered, but it is by no means an easy choice, depending on what serious issue you consider at a given moment. If we are not struggling with this, we are not doing it right--we are not giving all the serious matters due consideration. Certainly if we think that the 5NN are sufficient to choose, I say we are just being lazy.

We Catholics have to accept our adult responsibility. This means no meme or handy five-point program is sufficient to form our consciences with regards to our social responsibilities, which are in fact the particulars of our duty to love our neighbors as ourselves. If there is any valid reduction of Catholic teaching, it is what Christ gave us in the two greatest commandments. But all of us need to expend more time and energy to form ourselves in the Faith. 

Our bishops' guide is only 45 pages. That is not too much to read and seriously ponder for such matters of import. I'll warrant most of us spend more time watching a Netflix show in one night than it would take to read that. Get started. Go read it, or read it again. I know I will.

And when you are done, consider carving out 10 minutes a day to read through the Compendium. That is, actually, how I managed it. One little bit at a time. You can do it, and you will be better formed for doing so, I guarantee it. Just sincerely pray for the Spirit to help you to keep an open mind and to allow yourself to be formed by the Church rather than our political parties and/or what we may have previously held. If we read it only looking for that things that confirm our thinking, we are wasting our time.

After (or even before) that, go read our Holy Father's Laudato Si and Fratelli Tutti. They both speak to important considerations to keep in mind, are part and parcel of the tradition of the social doctrine of the Church, and they are as pertinent for our times as Rerum Novarum was in its time.

Any and all of these are better than the 5NN to more effectively form our consciences in the Faith for action in the world. I urge us all to dive deep in them!

Peace, my brothers and sisters! Remember the key of humility!

Creation Matters

'All the trees of the field will clap their hands.' Is 55:12

St. Thomas Aquinas instructs us that religion is our duty in justice towards God. Part of that duty, which is also squarely in line with Scripture, is stewardship of God's creation.

How can it not be offensive to God when you treat His creation with flippancy and disrespect? We are part of His creation, and by the very fact of being His creation, creation implicitly has value and is, as He said, "good." That our value as rational beings endowed with eternal souls is greater does not in any way mean that the rest of creation Has little to no value.

How do we worship God? We worship Him in and with His creation. The bread and wine that we offer are fruits of creation. Our bodies and, yes, even our spiritual nature, are His creation. The church buildings we erect, the altars upon which the Supreme Sacrifice is made present to us, the liturgical vestments and sacred vessels, our icons, statues, and flowers, even the human bodily nature of Christ that we participate in, is all God's creation.

We also offer sacrifices of the things we produce, whether distilled in the form of money or not. These are good things that God has created and given to us that we offer back to Him. Sometimes our sacrifice is to abstain from partaking in what is otherwise a good part of His creation, and what makes it a sacrifice is precisely that we are freely offering that which is good to God, rather than partaking of it for our own good. These are all forms of worship, doing what little we are able to do in our duty towards God.

We can also worship God through acts of charity, and that charity can be towards non-rational nature or towards being endowed with rational nature--or both. Because we are in nature, because we are created beings and part of creation, we are not freely distinct from it. If you firebomb the countryside in which you live, you will not be able to live there long (to provide an extreme but simple example). And so when we care for nature, we are caring both for God's non-rational creation and for other human beings as well.

I have heard folks be dismissive of Church leaders--including our Holy Father--who are vocally concerned with the environment. Most of these, I'll wager, either haven't read Laudato Si, or only read it cursorily with much prejudice--looking for excuses to dismiss, downplay, and ignore it. But a faithful Catholic ought to be receptive to the teaching of the Holy Father. I'll say that again: a faithful Catholic ought to be receptive to the teaching of the Holy Father.

One of the things that Pope Francis illumines greatly is the connection between how our abuse of the environment directly and negatively impacts many human beings, particularly the most poor and vulnerable in the world. Few U.S. Americans are faced the the horrors of abject poverty that come about through how we have not been good stewards of creation. So it's easy for us to dismiss such concerns, but they are real. You can learn about them easily if you look.

This isn't about raising the temperature of the globe a degree or two. This is real, directly observable badness that you can see comes about from abusive consumption and disregard for both nature and human life in and around areas whence we source our raw materials. Only willful ignorance can make one blind to it.

When Christ speaks of separating the sheep from the goats, He doesn't talk of who has this or that theological point perfectly in their minds, or whether or not we use incense or Latin in mass or any such thing. He speaks, rather, of how persons have treated the poor and needy among them. This is hand in hand with His statement that the second-greatest command is like the first--to love your neighbor as yourself.

It is like the first in that our love of neighbor and of creation is an extension and expression of our love for God in Himself. Our willing the good of God's creation is precisely love for God. It is how we pay duty and honor and respect to Him, in justice. That is why St. James can say that your faith is dead if it has not such works. Our charity towards God's created nature and our neighbor are the manifest stuff of our love of God and, ergo, proof of our faith in Him.

A focus on contemporary environmental concern is nothing more than this--a faithful response to Christ's instruction that we care for the poor and needy and a proper and good response to God's entrusting his creation to us, to be good and wise stewards. It cannot be rightly separated from sharing the Gospel in the sense of bringing people to faith in Christ.

As if to prove the importance of created, physical nature, God took that nature upon himself and divinized it. Further, he promises us a resurrection of the body and a New Jerusalem. We are not rarified spiritual beings or consciousnesses just loosely associated with our bodies, trapped by them and waiting to be freed. That is a gnostic error condemned since the earliest days of the Church. We are not beings of pure intellect either. We are, always have been, and always shall be beings intertwined with physical nature.

As Christians, we are not free to ignore or downplay the importance of stewardship and of loving God and our neighbors through it. The Gospel is not purely intellectual content, nor is living it purely a simple response of intellectual faith. We must live that faith out in the real world, and that includes caring for the rest of God's creation and our neighbor. This is by no means a "Modernist heresy," nor is it any less important than other aspects of the faith.

Where folks on both sides of the spectrum go wrong is when they create a false dichotomy between love of truth and love of creation and our neighbor. Language and human intellect are important and part of God's creation. So are our bodies, the things that our bodies need, and all of non-rational creation. We can give disproportional concern to both.

There's an old adage that every heresy is just taking some aspect of the faith to an extreme, and so far as I can tell, it seems to be true. It's an ancient tool of the Devil to trick us into becoming obsessed with one particular good to the exclusion of others and the balance of moderation.

Both areas of concern are areas calling out for attention. They always have been. We have always had spiritual darkness and error and heresy and a need for reformation and better instruction in the truths of the faith. And we have always had an insufficient care of the poor (and for most of us, our own bodies) and poor stewardship of God's creation.

To say that we ought to neglect one in favor of the other is an improper response to the challenges facing us. It may be true that, individually, we can't respond equally well to all areas of need, but as a group, we surely can do much, much better.

God gives different people different gifts, and our faithful response to use these in service of him would no doubt, if we all fulfilled our God-given potential, leave us in a starkly better place than we are in now. St. Paul cautions us against presuming that "our gift" is better or more important than the others. We would do well to keep that caution in mind.

Because God may be calling you or me, personally, to focus more on living the faith through communicating the intellectual content of the faith does not mean that others (even most others) ought not to focus on living the faith through care of God's creation and the corporal needs of other human beings. Nor does it mean we cannot do both to various degrees in our lives. It may be (and seems to be so) that the Holy Spirit is instructing us, as a Church, to do just that through the teaching of the current Vicar of Christ.

Why People Love False Christianity

Photo Courtesy of https://www.pinterest.com/pin/13792342584492054/

I awoke this morning to this headline: Why People Hate Religion. Oh boy. So in the spirit of the headline, though admittedly with far less clickbait power, I am writing about why people so love false Christianity.

You see, it’s because it doesn’t challenge them. It doesn’t make them feel uncomfortable. It doesn’t call them to repentance. It tells them that whatever they already believe and whatever they feel is good and to be embraced. It tells them that if something or someone challenges them, then that thing/person is to be shunned as evil.

The religion this guy suggests is precisely that flavor of “Christianity.” “I’m okay. You’re okay. As long as you’re not a Trump supporter, or even a social conservative.” “Jesus was just this nice guy, ya know?” It is a reductionism of Christianity to secular humanism—using religious terminology that is void of theological and soteriological content. Just “be nice and be nice to people” is all this version of Christianity demands, which is all that secular humanism calls for.

The NYT article author, Timothy Egan, says, ‘Archbishop Thompson says he tries to be “Christ-centered” in his decisions. If so, he should cite words from Christ condemning homosexuality, any words; there are none.’

Oh really. How about Matt 19:3ff:

And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.” (emphasis mine)

In Christ’s only explicit teaching about marriage, he very clearly says that it is a lifelong, sexually exclusive union of male and female. If Christ were the sexually-progressive person our contemporaries try to make him out to be, he surely would have been careful to avoid being clear that Divinely-instituted marriage is between a man and a woman. (And not only that, that "binary" sexuality is also of Divine origin.)

But let’s not stop there, because the suggestion to "cite words from Christ” for any Christian teaching is fabulously ignorant on its face. While on this planet, Jesus went to great lengths to make it clear that he considers himself to be the eternal Son of God, as Pope Benedict XVI so compellingly showed in his wonderful book, Jesus of Nazareth. And that has been unalterable Christian dogma since the beginning of our Faith. (It was precisely this claim that got him into such hot water with his Jewish contemporaries.)

Christ is, as the beginning of the Gospel of John makes evident, the eternal Word of God. Christian theologians have ruminated on this doctrine since the earliest times, and why that is particularly significant, in our context here, is that the entire canon of Christian Scripture is “The Word of God.” This means, through simple, syllogistic logic, that the entire canon of Scripture is "words from Christ." Christ, being the eternal and incarnate Word of God, therefore speaks directly through all of our Scriptures—not just the quotes attributed to Jesus in the Gospels. And there is plenty in the Word of God about sexual morals (including about homosexuality but by no means limited to it), all pointing toward what Christ was saying—that our sexuality is only rightly expressed within the bounds of that lifelong union of man and woman.

Simply put, if you do not believe that Christ is the eternally-begotten Son and Word of God, you are not a Christian. End of story. There can be no debate on this point. You can cite the words from Christ all you want, but you do not hold the Christian faith.

Furthermore, that same Word of God teaches that the Church is the pillar and ground of truth (1 Tim 3:15). That same Word of God teaches that Christ anointed his apostles with the power to forgive and retain sins (John 20:22-3). That same Word of God (in John 16:13), quotes Christ telling those same Apostles that when he did give them the Holy Spirit (by breathing on them as recorded in John 20), that the Spirit would lead them into all truth--even after Christ in his human person left the Earth. That same Word of God is where we find Christ anointing Peter as the rock upon which he would build his Church and conferring on him the power of loosing and binding (Matt 18:18-19).

And so, not only is the truth from Christ expressed in more than just the "words from Christ" attributed to him in the Gospels in Scripture, that truth is also to be found in the Church that Christ founded upon Peter. It is in that Church--when submitting ourselves to the authority granted by Christ to his apostles--that we are led into all truth through the charism given by Christ to the apostles and their successors. It is in the Church that we can rightly understand the Word of Christ, the Eternal Word of God.

And so we come to the teaching of the Church, which is supremely clear on these matters, not only on matters of morality (sexual or otherwise) but also on what the content of the Christian faith itself is. All of this is comprehensively but approachably explained in the Church's Catechism. Our bishops, with all their warts and flaws (some of which are direly serious), are our pastors, our shepherds. Under the headship of Peter's successor, they are the inheritors (not due to their own personal holiness but due to their office imparted by the laying on of hands) of the Apostolic charisms that Christ imparted, and it is in our union with those successors of the Apostles that we find the fullness of the Christian faith.

All of that is a somewhat long-winded way of saying that when judging what is or is not the Christian faith, and judging what is or is not part of the Christian approach to morality, one can't just consult the quoted words of Christ. Egan's version of Christianity is wholly insufficient and, in places, just plain wrong, especially in his following the notion of "be nice" as our primary guiding principle.

To be fair, he is right in some respects, as well. Part of Christian morality is to help the weak and the poor. (One can't help but wonder if he'd extend that principle of help of the weak to the not-yet-born.) He and the sister he quotes are right, in as much as our guiding light in the humanitarian work that we do is that we recognize the image of God in each person--no matter what condition they are in, no matter their developmental stage, no matter their mental or physical capabilities.

But in criticizing Christians for standing by the morals of the Faith that are not in line with popular secular culture, he is dead wrong. Perhaps the most fundamental principle of the Christian faith is the universal call to holiness. We are all called to be holy all throughout Scripture--it is the overarching theme. We are all called to repent from our sins and conform ourselves to the will of God (Romans 12:1-2). We know the will of God by his revealing it to us in creation, in His person, in Scripture, and within the guidance of His Church. Just being whomever we find ourselves to be is not a Christian way of life; it is the way of the world. No matter what our sins and inclinations are, we are called to take up our cross and follow Christ--and God gives us the grace to do that, especially through the Sacraments, especially through baptism, confession and reconciliation, and the Eucharist.

This personal, individual, on-going conversion is so often overlooked, particularly by those who want to change Christianity to fit our popular culture today. The Christian faith is completely opposed to the notion that whatever we feel, whatever we are inclined to do, is OK as long as it is not harmful to others. Furthermore, our Faith is wholly opposed to the notion that harm means challenging someone, that is, telling someone that, "no, 'you do you' is not OK," that there are in fact objective morals and objective truth, a standard of living to which all are called, no matter what our genetics and upbringing and social context, that we are all bound to respond to that universal call to holiness as best as we are able.

Sure, we Christians can and often do screw up, both in our responding to the call as well as in how we communicate it, but the call remains. And we are bound, as Christians, to share the whole Gospel--not just the parts that feel good and are acceptable to our contemporary cultures. We are bound to help the poor and weak and also correct the sinner, in addition to doing our best to conform our own selves to God.

Wherein Fr. Martin Does Actually Go Too Far

I usually find myself needing to explain/defend Fr. Martin from his many rash and ungenerous detractors. But there are times where I do think he crosses the line of letting his good intentions lead him astray. And I do firmly believe he has the best intentions, including a desire for the salvation of souls. I have little doubt that God has, does, and will use him to draw people to himself who might not otherwise be able to hear His calling.

But as all of us do, sometimes we make missteps, and for someone who lives as publicly as Fr. Martin, those may be more noticeable and noticed than your average person. I think Fr. Martin's recent interview with Brandon Ambrosino is one of those cases.

Brandon, a professional journalist, is a public gay Catholic (as in, he writes about it as a journalist) who is engaged to be married to another gay man. I say this to ward of the usual accusations that I am making his private bedroom business my own. No, he makes it our own by making himself a public figure with regards to this aspect of his life. So, fair game..

In discussing his public gayness with Fr. Martin, he relates how he wants to kiss his partner in Church during the kiss of peace but doesn't feel he can/should. Fr. Martin reacts, saying, "You have internalized rejection already. You don’t even need to be told that you’re rejected in the Church, you’ve internalized it and that’s very sad. A lot of the people that Jesus came into contact with did the same thing." Such a sense of rejection is sad, to be sure, but Fr. Martin goes on to say, "So I hope in ten years you will be able to kiss your partner or soon to be your husband. Why not? What’s the terrible thing?"

I understand this is part of Fr. Martin's larger impetus (which he rehashes in the interview) to call out Christians for singling out this sin, and calling us to "build a bridge" to persons who identify as LGTBQ. But, instead of saying that the Church should equally call out these other sins that Father mentions, he seems to say that we should rather be as laissez faire about homosexual behavior as we are about other sins.

What's "terrible" in all of this is the sin itself. It's terrible not because anyone has a personal revulsion/fear of it but because sin, in principle and reality, damages one's relationship with God and others. What's terrible is the suggestion that the Church should turn a blind eye to sin. Fr. Martin is right that we have often unfairly singled out homosexual sin in the Church, especially in recent years since it's been a hot topic in our society, but he seems to have the wrong solution--to not only acknowledge that we are all sinful but also to further normalize that sinfulness, in a public way. To say, it seems, that "it's okay," that we ought not to care or feel a need to repent.

Brandon and Fr. Martin offer a few other examples, like ignoring a homeless person or abusing power. Should people who do that not be allowed to kiss in Church? This to me seems to miss a key distinction, which is that--by his own admission--part of Brandon's motivation is to normalize homosexual relationships in Church, in the context of the mass. Brandon openly argues that homosexual unions should be blessed and be considered to be sacramental and indicates that his kiss is not simply one of, say, Christian brotherly love, but is meant to be a public display of affection within the context of his sexual relationship with his partner.

There are two things wrong with that.

1) It misunderstands the whole purpose of the "kiss of peace." This is not an opportunity for us to share our personal affection towards our brothers and sisters in Christ. It is an opportunity for us to share Christ's peace with each other. The purpose is for us to share the love of Christ, his peace, and be reconciled to one another, which unites us all in Christian community. It's not at all necessary (or even relevant) that we have any sense of personal affection. In Brandon's defense, this is a common misconception about the Peace in the Church.

2) A kiss between two people that is meant to be a public display of affection of an immoral sexual relationship (such as two gay men in a sexual relationship, two lesbian women in a sexual relationship, an unmarried, cohabiting sexually active straight couple, a man and his mistress, and so on) is at least sinful in itself, and it is compounded by its being public and in the context of mass and in the context of the kiss of peace (which again is not supposed to be PDA but an expression of Christ's peace). All of that adds up to it being completely wrongheaded and (I don't use this term lightly or often) scandalous, not in some prudish sense but in the formal Christian meaning of the term.

A Christian who is trying to live a converted life to Christ should feel that such a display is inappropriate, and our response should not be "let's hope people are cool with it in 10 years." It is scandalous because the intent behind it is to convince others that such relationships are not sinful, which not only confirms the ones doing it in their sin but also contributes to the decay of the Christian community's moral sense in these matters--leading to a deadening of conscience and the likelihood that others, too, will fall into similar sins. That is the scandal.

This situation is decidedly different for those who have sinned in other ways that do not pertain to the expression of the kiss. So it is apples and oranges and incorrect to suggest that we are unfairly discriminating between those in immoral sexual relationships and those who, for instance, have stolen from the poor. Both are sinful, but in the one case, the kiss is a public expression of the sin, while in the other it is entirely unrelated.

And I am serious that this is not just about homosexual relationships--it applies to any immoral sexual relationship. We should feel the same lack of comfort with a straight couple who are living in an immoral sexual relationship. That feeling is appropriate to a properly formed Christian conscience.

Now, what we do with that feeling is important, too. We don't tackle them and pull them apart. We don't "tsk tsk" at them audibly or wait until they look in our direction and glare. We don't withhold the Peace from them. We don't otherwise make a scene. At a very minimum, we ought to say a prayer for them. Each situation is different, but I'd say it'd be potentially appropriate to counsel the couple privately about it, if you have an existing relationship with them that allows for that to happen in a way that they might actually listen. To be clear, I am not advocating for public shaming or anything like that; I am only saying that our reaction, as a community, should not be that "there's nothing wrong with it," which seems to be what Fr. Martin is hoping for.

Fr. Martin also hems and haws about not being a theologian and how that some other teachings--he names Humanae Vitae--have not been accepted, much like the purported majority of Catholics approve of gay marriage. He suggests--if I understood right--that for a teaching to be authentic Christian teaching, it must be accepted by the Christian faithful. I can only assume he is alluding to the sensus fidelium.

I have to be honest and say that this, more than anything I've seen from him, gives me pause, because it seems to suggest that he does actually believe that these teachings are wrong and that we should (and eventually will) change them. Up to now, my take has been that he's just overly focused on being tactful and welcoming, but this makes me question if that's the case...

I also am not any kind of official theologian, but my understanding is that this inverts the function of the sensus fidelium. It is primarily meant to be an expression, to quote the famous phrase by Vincent of Lerins, "that which has been believed everywhere always by all" [of the faithful]. So if we are to apply this here, it would be clear that the traditional belief of the Catholic faithful is that such things are immoral, not the other way around. Further, the idea that the laity can be right in opposition to the hierarchy is officially excluded as a valid interpretation.

The Catholic Church's teachings that are most notably at odds with current Western/American culture tend to be those having to do with sexuality and related issues (such as abortion). The fact that they are resisted and not accepted by all of us has no bearing on their veracity or standing as part of true Catholic doctrine. It is, rather, more of a reflection on our current cultural separation from our Christian roots.

It is not at all surprising that, especially, cradle Catholics--who have typically not been well-catechized and who are inescapably immersed in a culture that is on some points at odds with Catholic doctrine--should not be accepting of those points of doctrine, especially when there are equally influential aspects of our culture, such as self-determination/actualization, unfettered "freedom," democratic governance, and relativism, that incline us to believe that we, as individual persons, are the ultimate arbiter of truth as it applies to us. All of this is a kind of perfect storm to create a condition where large swaths of baptized Catholics reject teachings, often based on cultural and political affiliations, but also based on a lack of personal fortitude--some teaching are just hard. I should know!

So contrary to what Fr. Martin seems to be suggesting here, the laity do not--in contradiction to the hierarchy--determine what is true Catholic doctrine. On these points--artificial contraception and other various forms of sexual behavior--our collective inability to accept them is no indicator that they are wrong or false or subject to revision. It is simply that we are flawed human beings who face an immense challenge to overcome both our carnal passions as well as our cultural predispositions.

Believe me, I am sympathetic. Catholicism, indeed pretty much any form of traditional Christianity, is not an easy way of life. It requires sacrifice. It requires a life-long endeavor (and even after this life if need be) to conform ourselves to God. The way of the Cross is hard, but the grace of God is there to help us if only we will avail ourselves of it. And with it comes immeasurable peace and joy in this life and the next.

Tenders of Signs

When I first read of Bp. Paprocki's decree on those in homosexual unions, I thought it was unfortunate in terms of timing and narrow focus on this particular area of morals, because people are so sensitive about this right now in our society. Harping on it seems to set the wrong tone in calling people to repentance. As an approach, it seems to more lend towards hardening people's hearts and resistance to the Gospel than helping.

Others I know think the timing is exactly right because of the mass cultural delusion of acceptance of immoral sexual behavior (and I don't just mean homosexual behavior). They are of the mind that we must repeatedly and simply restate that such behavior is immoral because they believe that without doing this, people will remain and/or become more confused about sexual morals.

They seem to believe that the call to repentance, that is, evangelization, consists in simply telling people what is sinful. Or at least this seems to be the main feature of such an approach to sharing the Gospel. They often excoriate those, especially our pastors, who do not follow this approach, while lauding those who do. "Finally, someone is speaking the truth clearly!" they exclaim.

Bp. Paprocki is both well within his rights and duties as bishop to issue his decree. He is right that he is simply and objectively applying long-standing Church teaching to a new societal situation. Within the context of an internal memo to his priests, there would be little to criticize because it's not intended as an exposition of Catholic sexual ethics but merely clarifying his diocese's treatment of a new social situation.

He explains the timing of his decree has to do with the recent acceptance of civil homosexual marriage, and our society's shifting attitudes with regards to homosexual behavior (as being a morally acceptable alternative to heterosexual sex within marriage). That is understandable.

Of course it would be naive to think that such a decree would not become public when concerning such a controversial matter, and I am sure the bishop is not that naive. I imagine he is of the persuasion I outline above, that is that more or less simply restating Catholic doctrine as applied to this new situation is our most appropriate response to the new situation. His video here seems to support this inference.

For my part, I am inclined to think that it takes all types. Some people are at the place in their journey that benefits from simple statement of truth, kind of like a shock to the system, a jostling out of one's comfort zone. Others more likely need a gentler approach. They need time and more indirect means of warming to the necessity of turning away from this or that sin that is dear to them. They need a kind hand on the shoulder, an assurance they can do it.

I think that God works through all kinds of different approaches in drawing people to himself, and the Holy Spirit can use even our human blunders to reach people's hearts.
For my part, however, I tend to think at the social, public level, it's time to err on the side of gentility. It's too easy for people to harden their hearts and simply tune out of the truth. On this matter, especially, our zeitgeist sends a reinforcing message that this tuning out is exactly the right response. "These people are just homophobic bigots," it whispers. "They're just hateful. You don't need to listen."

And so they will become or remain lost--precisely because we have reinforced this notion, that being a faithful Christian means you have to be a bigot. Who would be attracted to that? Who would want to leave behind something that they feel brings them some amount of happiness in order to become like that? No one. That's who.

Jesus almost always erred on the side of gentleness and compassion with sinners. He saved the majority of his anger and direct confrontation for the religious leaders of his day, particularly those who were very good at articulating every detail of the Law, following it to the letter, and all-too-ready to condemn those who didn't. He wasn't ever unclear about the need to repent, but his approach tended to be more indirect and aspirational--stirring desire towards God rather than scaring people away from sin. That's the approach I would rather try to emulate.

It's just not enough to simply tell people what sin is and that they are sinning. That's not even the message of the Gospel. The Gospel is the grace of God acting in our lives, ever renewing us and strengthening us. The Gospel is that God's mercy is greater than our many sins--sexual or otherwise--and that no matter how many times we screw up and fall back into them, God is always there, ready and waiting to pull us up out of the ditch, tend to our wounds, and strengthen us to continue our journey towards eternal life with Him.

Yes, we need signs telling us which road to follow, we need warnings about the dangers and drop offs, but those are just means to our One, True End. I think we need to be less worried about sign maintenance and more worried about being the helping hand that God uses to pull people out of ditches and being the person God sends to accompany them on the way. Having someone who knows the way travel with you is immeasurably more valuable, appreciated, and effective than any number of signs.

Responses to Cardinal Burke et al's Dubia

I figured I'd take a whack at responding to doubts proposed by Cardinal Burke and his three cardinal colleagues. This is how I imagine Pope Francis might answer, though I would not presume to actually speak for him or anyone but myself. My intent is to balance objective moral truth against the messy reality that is life, and I think that's really what Pope Francis is urging that pastors do. I think he's said as much on numerous occasions.

I will grant that I am no theologian or canon lawyer, and that my understanding of Catholic moral tradition is less than others'. Despite that, I think my answers are orthodox, even if not a wholly traditional Catholic approach. It's good to keep in mind that the discipline and application of definitive truth can change without necessarily doing damage to the truth. It tends to be a matter of personal judgment on whether a specific change incurs actual damage to the truth. They are not independent of each other, but they are not so bound up that it is impossible to change practice/discipline/law (as is manifestly evident from Church history).

Traditionalists/conservatives tend to err on the avoid changing things to be safe side of things; progressives/liberals tend to err on the side of being more concerned with contemporary adaptation in the hope of addressing new challenges (perceived or real). Where one falls on this tends to be a spectrum and not a binary, and I am certainly somewhere in between.

The proposers of these doubts suggest that they can be answered in a simple yes or no; however, they take pains to preface and then elaborate on each of them. While theoretically such questions can be answered yes or no, I do not think it is reasonable to expect a simple yes or no, nor have I bound myself to that stricture. In fact, I would say that simply answering yes or no, especially given the way the questions are asked, can easily lead to faulty interpretations and actions, based on such a simple answer. I suggest that expecting a simple yes or no puts the power in the hands of the question framers, and so it would not really be appropriate for the CDF or Pope Francis to answer with a simple yes or no.

If I had to guess why no answer has been given so far, it is because the Holy Father well knows that no matter what answer he gives, even with clarifications, it will only engender more debate, debate which I'm sure he feels has been given due space in the synods leading up to Amoris Laetitia. The contemporary Church is not given to expressions of anathema sit, and even/until an actual ecumenical council were called (and warranted) to address these concerns, no matter what the Pope teaches, there will be dissenters and differing interpretations and applications of laws. When Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI were in office, we had plenty of "confusion" and dissent in the Church; those who pretend that Pope Francis is new in this way, only think so because it is now their positions which are challenged.  The Church always has had and will always have its share of dissenters and divergences of opinions and interpretations.

And as we have seen with even ecumenical councils, there remain dissenters even after those definitive gatherings. So the fantasy that a clarification by Pope Francis on these items would end differing opinions, create unified pastoral guidance, etc. is just that--a fantasy. Suggesting that his not doing so is somehow indicative of his intention to signal approval of heresy is simply outrageous and is bitterly ungenerous, presumptuous, and potentially sinful in itself.

I welcome thoughtful dialogue on the answers below. But if you start out by telling me I'm a heretic, or if you simply assert that my answers are heretical or unorthodox or not Catholic or anything along those lines, be prepared to be ignored. If, however, you want to argue for alternative positions or point me to some definitive teachings that seem to call my answers into question, I will gladly consider those. My desire is always to remain faithful to God and his Church.

Know that I do not consider canons or prior legislative texts or this or that Vatican congregation or this or that bishop, cardinal, or pope weighing in on something as de facto infallible or irreformable (again, in keeping with Catholic Tradition). Not even everything in our current Catechism is infallible or irreformable or not subject to further discussion and development. That is to say, if you use a text to support your position, be prepared to surround it with argumentation as to why you think it is authoritative in the context and how it supports your view. Proof texting, even from Scripture, is an impoverished practice in such dialogue.

Now onto the dubia...

DOUBT 1) It is asked whether, following the affirmations of Amoris Laetitia (300-305), it has now become possible to grant absolution in the sacrament of penance and thus to admit to holy Communion a person who, while bound by a valid marital bond, lives together with a different person more uxorio without fulfilling the conditions provided for by Familiaris Consortio, 84, and subsequently reaffirmed by Reconciliatio et Paenitentia, 34, and Sacramentum Caritatis, 29. Can the expression “in certain cases” found in Note 351 (305) of the exhortation Amoris Laetitia be applied to divorced persons who are in a new union and who continue to live more uxorio?

I ANSWER THAT given sure knowledge of the specific conditions enumerated here, particularly definite knowledge of the validity of a prior union and no intention of living in continence in the new union that is acknowledged to be adulterous, it would not be appropriate to absolve such a penitent. It is a given that Divine law requires a repentant heart for forgiveness.

It is possible to absolve, however, if the validity of prior unions is uncertain (or even doubtful). This is particularly true if the new union appears more likely to be valid than prior unions, even if if has yet to be adjudicated as such.

It may also be possible to absolve if the penitent clearly expresses a firm intention to amend his life, even if it seems unlikely he will be able to do so (and even if he has a history of not being able to do so), particularly in situations where, as Pope St. John Paul II wrote in Familiaris Consortio, 84, taking the objective actions necessary to prevent future sin would involve committing new injustices or would otherwise be impracticable. The pastor should be generous and supportive of the intention, whatever doubts he may have.

In certain cases, it may be that the penitent cannot honestly apprehend that his new situation is sinful, perhaps due to serious personal doubts of the validity of the prior union (even having tried to adjudicate nullity without success) or failure to apprehend the true nature of marriage even now (which should cast doubt on validity of either union). These could be a defect of knowledge and, consequently, of full consent. Pastors should endeavor to determine if such is willful ignorance or a defect in intellect or some other mitigating factor, always with a preference for generosity if the penitent displays honest intention to live a holy life and grow in sanctification, accompanying and guiding the penitent toward that life.

In all cases, the pastor should counsel according to the teaching of the Church to help the penitent correctly discern his situation, encourage and help the penitent to seek a decree of nullity if possible, and offer practical advice to help the penitent avoid sin.

DOUBT 2) After the publication of the post-synodal exhortation Amoris Laetitia (304), does one still need to regard as valid the teaching of St. John Paul II’s encyclical Veritatis Splendor, 79, based on sacred Scripture and on the Tradition of the Church, on the existence of absolute moral norms that prohibit intrinsically evil acts and that are binding without exceptions?

I ANSWER THAT, yes, there are indeed absolute moral norms that prohibit intrinsically evil acts (and as such objectively, intrinsically evil acts do definitely exist). Murder. Adultery. Blasphemy. Idolatry. And so on.

It is not, however, an objective fact that someone who has been married was definitely validly, sacramentally married. The fact of an ecclesiastical legal system and tribunals that adjudicate the validity (or nullity) of marriages is sufficient evidence of this, as is Church teaching on what is necessary for a valid marriage to occur in the first place.

Given this, it is possible for someone to objectively be in a second union without, by virtue of that objective fact, committing adultery. And given the known terrible state of catechesis today coupled with secular cultural norms that directly contradict a Catholic understanding of marriage and sexuality, not to mention a growing understanding of human physiology and psychology, it is reasonable to be more uncertain in contemporary times that all, or even most, marriages--even those celebrated in Catholic churches--are valid. In short, it is not a safe assumption that someone who is remarried is, by the simple fact of being remarried, committing adultery, and more than that, it is arguable that this is more doubtful today than at any point in Christian history.

On the other hand, there are still objective actions that can be assumed to be adultery, such as sleeping with someone who is married without being in any form of marriage with that person. The distinction here is between a married couple where one of the individuals is divorced and remarried, versus two people having sex outside of marriage, with one or both being in a marriage (confirmed to be valid or not). It is beyond a doubt in the latter case that such is extramarital sexual relations, without regard to determining the validity of the prior or current marriage. So cohabiting unmarried people who engage in sex, those having sexual affairs, keeping a mistress, etc. would fall under the objective adultery category.

DOUBT 3) After Amoris Laetitia (301) is it still possible to affirm that a person who habitually lives in contradiction to a commandment of God’s law, as for instance the one that prohibits adultery (Matthew 19:3-9), finds him or herself in an objective situation of grave habitual sin (Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, “Declaration,” June 24, 2000)?

I ANSWER THAT it is still possible to affirm this when the sin in question is public and indisputable, for example, in the case of a politician repeatedly, obstinately pursuing governmental policies that promote an intrinsic evil. However, in the case of adultery (and sex in general), which is by nature private, we cannot assume, even by the nature of a public commitment such as marriage, that adultery is habitually occurring by the simple fact of persons living together (married or not). This is as true for a minister of Communion discerning the application of Canon 915 as it is for any lay person observing another.

However, if adultery is determined publicly and an individual publicly manifests an intent to continue in that sin, a minister of Communion could infer an objective situation of grave habitual sin and act accordingly by applying Canon 915. This seems like it would be rare. Most people do not affirm adultery publicly. It is arguable that if a person, say, prominently were to keep a mistress, then Canon 915 could apply, even if the person did not explicitly affirm that adultery because the nature of keeping a mistress is that it is an actively sexual relationship, as would typically be an affair. In such cases, there are no other reasons for two unmarried people to be together.

On the other hand, a remarried (or even cohabiting) couple may have other practical reasons to to remain together, and assuming the relationship is adulterous is less of a reliable assumption than in these others. This is not to say that it is not reasonable to think that such a relationship is sexual, only that it should not be assumed that it is with regards to the application of Canon 915 or a general perception of an objectively adulterous situation. In short, unless they express in private to a minister or in public that they are living as man and wife, one should be willing to extend the benefit of the doubt.

What should be obvious is that pastoral discernment is still required even when one may suspect grave sin and that in general both clergy and laity should not presume sexual sin simply based on external circumstances alone. And the public act of refusing Communion should be based in a commensurately public grave sin. It is better, in most cases, to counsel such persons privately to discern whether or not to approach the sacrament, as is the clear intent of St. Paul in 1 Cor 11.

DOUBT 4) After the affirmations of Amoris Laetitia (302) on “circumstances which mitigate moral responsibility,” does one still need to regard as valid the teaching of St. John Paul II’s encyclical Veritatis Splendor, 81, based on sacred Scripture and on the Tradition of the Church, according to which “circumstances or intentions can never transform an act intrinsically evil by virtue of its object into an act ‘subjectively’ good or defensible as a choice”?

I ANSWER THAT yes, one ought to regard that teaching as still valid. No matter the mitigations of personal circumstance that diminish culpability, an objectively evil act can never be transformed into a morally acceptable choice much less a good, considered in itself. It's worth noting that this does not mean that other goods cannot accidentally accompany or follow as a result of objectively immoral actions, but such goods do not change the nature of the evil act in itself.

Amoris Laetitia 302 does not seek to countermand this teaching. Rather, it calls to mind the well-established distinction in Church teaching between objective grave sin and subjective mortal sin.

DOUBT 5) After Amoris Laetitia (303) does one still need to regard as valid the teaching of St. John Paul II’s encyclical Veritatis Splendor, 56, based on sacred Scripture and on the Tradition of the Church, that excludes a creative interpretation of the role of conscience and that emphasizes that conscience can never be authorized to legitimate exceptions to absolute moral norms that prohibit intrinsically evil acts by virtue of their object?

I ANSWER THAT it is not the role of conscience to make an act moral or immoral. It is the role of the conscience to discern the path of good from the path of evil. Amoris Laetitia 303 suggests that it further can discern the best that a specific person can do in a specific situation. This is no commentary on the objective nature of the acts in question. It is, rather, a recognition of the limitations of the person in question to choose the good, i.e., to maximize the good and avoid the evil in as much as a person can. It, in itself, does not determine whether or not such an action is actually good or evil; it can only determine what is in its best judgment the best path.

We're Not Anti Choice and They're Not Pro Abortion

I know it is preposterously optimistic to hope that people on the different sides of the abortion debate can ever work together to end abortion (or at least make it rare).  But hey, at least some of us want to try, still. I think that starts with reducing polemical rhetoric, increasing mutual understanding, and searching for common ground to build from.

I grew up in the staunchly pro life Bible belt. I was raised pro life. I was surrounded by pro life people, i.e., evangelical Christian Republicans mostly, and I converted to Catholicism at twenty-two. I consider myself absolutely pro life, in the most "extreme" (i.e., consistent) way possible--from conception until natural death. I make no exceptions for rape or incest (why impose the death penalty on a child for the sin of a parent?). I am even for the abolition of the death penalty.  I am opposed to euthanasia. I am for welcoming and being open to children and large families (and practice that--we now have six).

I think these positions are demanded by a consistent pro life ethic, and defensible without relying on religious rationale, although they are certainly strengthened by Christian, Catholic faith. We also need to structure society as much as we can to minimize cases where people feel that taking life is a good choice. I do not see these as an either-or proposition--we can make the right to life inalienable and compassionately help people in need. We must.

I published my first pro life article in 2004. I wrote in 2008 on how I prioritize life and related issues in deciding whom to vote for. I've written my Congressman. And written here and here and here. I have had innumerable conversations on social media, email, and in person defending and advancing the pro life position. I teach my children to be pro life. I have voted for many pro life candidates, with that issue playing a big part in my choice. I contribute bi-weekly to the Blessed Margaret Home for Crisis Pregnancies. (I note that to advertise the good work they do and suggest others consider supporting them or similar homes. As one of my pro choice friends said recently--that should be something even pro choice people can get behind.)

There should be no question that I am staunchly pro life. I live it. I speak it openly and publicly.

Not Anti Choice
All that said, I am not "anti choice." Putting restrictions on abortion and, ultimately, making it illegal, does not remove a person's free will to choose. We have all kinds of laws, and people still choose to break them, with varying degrees of knowledge and consent. We have oodles of legal groundwork for what it looks like for abortion to be illegal--the women are not punished by those laws, and they certainly still made the choice to abort, even when it was illegal.

A person who is pro life is no more "anti choice" than is a person is who thinks that pedophilia, rape, or murder should be illegal. On important issues, society has to draw the line and say "this behavior is not okay." And come on, riding a bike without a helmet and speeding is also illegal--talk about being anti choice... Abortion takes the life of a human being. It should not be legal. It should not be an inconsequential "choice." By wanting to make it illegal, pro life people are saying that this is a line that should not be crossed--even knowing that some people will still choose to do it.

Not Pro Abortion
Similarly, I'd like to address my pro life friends who tend to like to use the term "pro abortion" to apply to anyone who is pro choice. (I admit to doing that myself--to make a point.) "Pro abortion" is a polemical choice of language. It does not accurately reflect the view of most of the people to whom it is applied.

Some claim that "pro choice" means a choice for abortion.  But the CDC says that in 2012 (the most recent data we have), "the abortion ratio was 210 abortions per 1,000 live births." That means that roughly 2 in 10 women chose to abort. So factually, the claim is false. Women currently have the legal choice to choose abortion, and 80% choose life (as of 2012). I don't know what the ratio was prior to Roe vs. Wade, but I suspect it wasn't a lot different. People in desperate situations often still choose to break the law if they feel they need to.

Even if you're not direly poor, carrying a baby to term, giving birth, and being responsible for it for life is a big deal. I don't care how wealthy you are, that's a big life change--real pain, potential impact to your livelihood/ability to work, and years of responsibility. For the vast majority, it's not a flippant choice to make at all. Even choosing to give a child up for adoption is not an easy choice, even though it may be the best choice. I feel like in all the emotional fervor of the pro life movement, we often lose sight that abortion is by no means a choice that most women freely want to make.

According to this Pew 2016 data, only 15% think abortion is morally acceptable, while 56% think it should be legal. That means that by far, most do not think abortion is good--they are not for (pro) abortion, but they think it should be a legal option. Again, the data contradict the claim that being pro choice is being pro abortion. We know that such truly pro abortion people exist, but they are a small minority of pro choice people.

Also, it is noteworthy to see that while 56% think abortion should be legal, a full 80% actually act pro life and choose life. That's a good thing. Can you imagine if everyone who thought abortion should be legal actually chose abortion? That'd be almost 3x as many abortions per year. Thank God that people act more pro life than they vote.

The Impasse
Now, the Catholic bishops in the U.S. have made it abundantly clear (in line with the universal Catechism of the Church and unbroken prior teaching going back to apostolic tradition as seen in the Didache) that formal cooperation in abortion is objectively, intrinsically, gravely evil. On that, someone who is faithful to Catholic teaching and practice cannot disagree. We will never be able to turn a blind eye to abortion. We will never be able to see it as a morally acceptable choice, so the case is very strong to make it illegal in our view.

Data for abortion mortality show that legalizing abortion led to less danger for those women who will choose to do it whether or not it is legal. It is difficult to reconcile that with criminalizing it again--nobody wants women to be endangered. But I admit that I find it more difficult to reconcile keeping something legal that is the (often brutal) murder of an innocent child. That people will choose (even under duress) something that endangers them does not mean, in itself, that it should be legal--especially when the chosen action results in the murder of another human being.

On the flip side, pro choice advocates have shown little, if any, willingness to budge. And it seems even in recent years that this conflict has only increased antipathy towards the pro life cause while at the same time galvanizing the pro choice folks and even making their positions more extreme. What are we to think when the "and rare" qualifier is abandoned from "safe, legal, and rare"? Clearly, this culture war has only resulted in greater polarization and impasse. And I can't deny I think it's largely due to the posturing and pandering of politicians.

Reconsidering the Focus of Pro Life Action
Pro life advocates often use rhetoric that makes it sound like that by making abortion legal, we essentially created the problem of abortion. "By not criminalizing it, we are killing N number of babies every year/minute." I have even thought and argued that in the past. But as I learned more, I discovered that not only has this evil always been with us (which of course I knew) but also that the numbers have always been high. Indeed, data show that restrictive laws do not correlate with low numbers of abortions.

While I do not agree with the fallacy that essentially says we should make murder legal because people will do it anyways, the numbers do indicate that our efforts to criminalize abortion would not have a significant effect on the actual number of abortions. And it's certainly not as if criminalizing it will reduce that number to zero, as is implied by the rhetoric. So this argument that often pushes people into prioritizing voting for pro life politicians based on these numbers doesn't hold up. People even use this argument to justify voting for Trump, which is unfortunate to say the least, considering everything he has going against him from a moral/common good point of view and that he appears to be only nominally pro life.

Again, that doesn't mean we should keep something that is intrinsically evil legal. It just means we need to put the practical impact of the laws in perspective. It seems that the terrible numbers of abortions will not be greatly impacted by criminalization. Proportionally, then, the common pro life argument that this issue is far more urgent than others does not appear valid. And in the last twenty or so years, even while legal, the numbers have been dropping. Each side has their rationale for that drop. I suspect it is a combination of many factors, not the least of which are pro life awareness efforts and efforts to help women in crisis pregnancies.

Another observation is that in the pro life movement, there is a lot of focus on overturning Roe vs. Wade. But even if Roe vs. Wade were overturned, that doesn't guarantee each state would criminalize it (indeed some states had decriminalized it before then), and even after 40+ years of trying, we still haven't managed to reverse it. We still today have a majority of people who think it should be legal. Something isn't working, and not for lack of trying!

I am anything but a pro abortion apologist (as I doubtless will be called by some for posting these thoughts), but I think we pro life people have to consider these data. So, so, so much energy and passion is invested in this war to reverse Roe vs. Wade and re-criminalize abortion. We do this for good reason--abortion is intrinsically evil; it is at least as evil as any murder and even more repulsive given the circumstances of it being a defenseless baby in its mother's womb. But given the considerations above, is focusing so much on criminalization still the best way we can fight this evil?

Without giving an inch that it is intrinsically evil, could we shift more of our energies to 1) something that has a greater chance of actually happening and 2) has a more immediate, significant impact on making abortion rare? Like fighting the things that cause women to feel they need an abortion? Like enabling women to feel they have a real option to choose life? Like evangelizing our culture so that even more women will choose life? At this point, are we maybe working against ourselves to focus so much on criminalization? It seems to be the epicenter of polemical divisions that prevent us from working with others to truly make abortion rare.

For the record, I do not want to downplay the immense efforts that many pro life persons make in concretely helping women and educating the populace on abortion-related issues. I literally support them. But I am thinking particularly of our political efforts, which are front and center right now. Is it possible that, in politics specifically, we've let ourselves be manipulated into letting criminalization shape our thinking so much that we are spending too much of our energies there when they could be better spent in other areas? Is it possible that it is suboptimal to think of being pro life as primarily voting for people who will work to criminalize abortion? Have those we voted for to that end delivered on that promise? Have they and we neglected other considerations that could more effectively, actually reduce abortion, not to mention other issues of grave importance? What more should we look for in a pro life platform and political action?

This is not a call to surrender. It is a call to reprioritization and a call for honest reflection on what our current strategy has done and not done and probably will or won't do in the future. It's a call to think more about how--if we really do care about all these babies and all those women--we can really, actually save and help them.

Some Questions for Pro Choice Folks
For those who are pro choice, given that so few believe it is an acceptable moral choice, how do you true that up with thinking it should be legal? Isn't something off in our society when it is illegal to drive a car without a seatbelt, but it is legal to kill an unborn baby? What restrictions on abortion might be acceptable restrictions? What can you do--assuming you think it should remain legal--to help society not become numb to the horror that it is? What can you do to educate people about the terrible realities, including the emotional pain that haunts most women for life? Would making it illegal help people to understand the severity of the evil? What can you--we--do to help enable women to choose life?

I also know there are those who really see nothing wrong with abortion, who don't think it is killing a human person. Even for those, surely we can agree that even just considering the often negative impact on the women who have them, it's not a good thing. And can you be absolutely certain that it is not a human person deserving of equal protection? Is it worth taking the risk given that it might be a human person? Seems to me that it's still safer and better to work to reduce abortions.

Can We Work Together?
To all, the common ground seems to be fighting the causes that lead to the perceived need for abortion, educating people on the realities of abortion, and ensuring that we have social structures and services to help women who find themselves in crisis pregnancies--to help them choose life. It's a tall order, but it touches on so much that could be better in our society. I think it's worth the effort.