The advocacy for abortion has always relied heavily on Rationalization #64, “Yoo’s Rationalization” or “It isn’t what it is;” indeed abortion is one of the unethical tactic’s most prominent domains. For abortion isn’t a matter of “choice,” but rather a controversy over when and to what extent society should tolerate the killing of one human being (or millions) for the benefit of another. Calling the issue “a woman’s choice” is deliberate obfuscation.
Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut—and I will wrestle my hands to the floor to avoid typing some obvious and well-deserved characterizations of the woman—recently made the head-exploding argument that abortion was squarely supported by the moral teachings of the Catholic Church.
No, she really did. I’m not making this up! This was stated on social media by an elected official who is obligated to uphold the public trust. Here’s Rose:
“I am a Catholic—baptized, raised, and confirmed. The fundamental tenets of my faith compel me to defend a women’s right to access abortion. I am proudly part of the faithful large majority of US Catholics who support legal protections for abortion access…
As Catholic Democrats in Congress, we are proud to be part of the living Catholic tradition – a tradition that unfailingly promotes the common good, expresses a consistent moral framework for life, and highlights the need to provide a collective safety net to those individuals in society who are the most vulnerable. As legislators in the U.S. House of Representatives, we work every day to advance respect for life and the dignity of every human being. We believe that government has moral purpose.
We are committed to making real the basic principles that are at the heart of Catholic social teaching: helping the poor, disadvantaged, and the oppressed, protecting the least among us, and ensuring that all Americans of every faith are given meaningful opportunities to share in the blessings of this great country. That commitment is fulfilled in different ways by legislators but includes: reducing the rising rates of poverty, particularly child poverty; increasing access to education for all; pressing for access to universal health care; recognizing the dignity of all humans; and repairing long-standing racial and gender inequities in our society. Each of these issues challenges our obligations as Catholics to community and helping those in need.
We envision a world in which every child belongs to a loving family and agree with the Catholic Church about the value of human life….
…[W]e seek the Church’s guidance and assistance but believe also in the primacy of conscience….We also urge the Church to heed the words of Our Holy Father Pope Francis, who wrote in his Apostolic Exhortation, “The Joy of the Gospel that “the Eucharist although it is the fullness of sacramental life, is not a prize for the perfect but a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak.” Further, the Holy Father extolls that clergy must act as facilitators of grace, not arbiters, because “the Church is not a tollhouse; it is the house of the Father, where there is a place for everyone, with all their problems.” As legislators, we too are charged with being facilitators of the Constitution which guarantees religious freedom for all Americans. In doing so, we guarantee our right to live our own lives as Catholics but also foster an America with a rich diversity of faiths….The Sacrament of Holy Communion is central to the life of practicing Catholics, and the weaponization of the Eucharist to Democratic lawmakers for their support of a woman’s safe and legal access to abortion is contradictory. …We remind you that the Second Vatican Council renewed emphasis on the Eucharist as the central focus, especially in the Council’s Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy: “For the liturgy, ‘through which the work of our redemption is accomplished,’ most of all in the divine sacrifice of the Eucharist, is the outstanding means whereby the faithful may express in their lives, and manifest to others, the mystery of Christ and the real nature of the true Church.” …As Catholic Democrats who embrace the vocation and mission of the laity as expressed by the late Pope John Paul II in his Apostolic Exhortation, Christifideles Laici, we believe that the Church is the “people of God,” called to be a moral force in the broadest sense. We believe the Church as a community is called to be in the vanguard of creating a more just America and world. And as such, we have a claim on the Church’s bearing as it does on ours.
I have to take a quick break because Sidney Wang is banging on the door insisting that he be allowed to comment…
Thank-you, Sidney…
If Rose wants to say that she and other Catholic Democrats, notably Joe Biden, feel compelled to defy the teachings of their religion (which they claim they devoutly follow) in the matter of abortion, that’s fine. What she cannot say, and yet does, is that supporting abortion is consistent with Catholic teaching and principles. It is not. That’s not a matter of opinion, it’s fact.
The Congresswoman has the audacity to use the Catechism in support of her absurd contention, when the document expressly states that those who cooperate in an abortion should excommunicated and expelled from the church. Huh! That’s funny, since according to Rose, an abortion just embodies the “basic principles that are at the heart of Catholic social teaching.”
The Catechism states the following rather unequivocally :
- “Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception” (2270);
- “Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abortion, that is to say, abortion willed either as an end or a means, is gravely contrary to the moral law” (2271);
- “Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life” (2272);
- “The inalienable rights of the person must be recognized and respected by civil society and political authority. These human rights depend neither on single individuals nor on parents; nor do they represent a concession made by society and the state; they belong to human nature and are inherent in the person by virtue of the creative act from which the person took his origin” (2273); and
- “Since it must be treated from conception as a person, the embryo must be defended in its integrity, cared for, and healed, as far as possible, like any other human being” (2274).
Details, details. Rose is “proud to be part of the living Catholic tradition – a tradition that unfailingly promotes the common good, expresses a consistent moral framework for life, and highlights the need to provide a collective safety net to those individuals in society who are the most vulnerable.” Allowing women to end the lives of the nascent human beings they have created expresses a “moral framework for life”! Allowing the continued existence of the most vulnerable and innocent of human beings to depend on another human being’s whims, convenience and life priorities “provides a collective safety net to those individuals in society who are the most vulnerable”!
And I, as Dorothy Parker would say, am Marie of Rumania.
DeLauro’s spectacular “it isn’t what it is” exercise, distorting her own alleged faith to support and justify for what it explicitly and emphatically condemns, is beyond the usual political mendacity. It is gaslighting, and reveals such a dearth of integrity that no competent voter should ever place power in her slimy hands. Her ethical ignorance is revealed right at the start, as she seems to think that ethical principles are subject to majority rule. That’s the most hoary rationalization of them all: “Everybody does it,” or in this case, “Everybody thinks it.”
But, I suppose, what matters is that she supports the option of killing unborn children and for women who view this as worth empowering ethics black holes like Rosa DeLauro, it’s good enough.
Ethics Alarms 
Thank you, Jack!
Former Greek Orthodox quotes Catechism of the Catholic Church to a Catholic. ‘Nuff said. Mike drop.
Some major names from the USCCB (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops) including Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio, president of the USCCB, Bishop Michael F. Burbidge of Arlington, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Pro-Life Activities, and Bishop Daniel E. Flores of Brownsville, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Doctrine, issued a joint corrective statement in response to this. I can’t find the whole thing, but several quotes from it are shown below.
“Members of Congress who recently invoked teachings of the Catholic faith itself as justifying abortion or supporting a supposed right to abortion grievously distort the faith. It is wrong and incoherent to claim that the taking of innocent human life at its most vulnerable stage can ever be consistent with the values of supporting the dignity and wellbeing of those in need… [The CCC states] Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception.”
The fact that the USCCB jumped on this so quickly and comparatively harshly states that they agree with you, Jack. This is disgusting.
I’ve never understood why people like Rosa don’t simply leave the church. It’s not hard. Anyone can do it. I did it as a sixteen-year-old. If they had any respect for the church at all, they’d leave instead of militating for change or making stuff up. The church is not a participatory democracy. There are tons of other Christian denominations that will provide them all the latitude they require.
The real question is whether we can convince Other Bill to come back to the Catholic Church…
I think there is a great deal of weight the Catholic Church bears in the world, even with all the scandals it has had (not just most recently with the priestly sex abuse scandal; let’s not even discuss the Medici Popes!), and people thirst for the Catholic Church to cave on particular issues. So we have two motives to stay. First, they can try to undermine Church teaching from within, though I’m sure they would call it advocating for the Church to update its teachings to reflect the modern world, and they stand a better chance of clamoring for change if they are within the Church. Second, by remaining Catholic, they can lay some claim to that weight the Catholic Church bears, and thus get traction with things like, “I’m Catholic, and I’m fine with abortion.”
Ryan, you and all the faithful are better people than I am. My problems with the church began when brothers at my all boys, Marist run and owned high school were propositioning classmates. And almost sixty years later, this video piece I saw just a few days ago pushed me decidedly over the edge, or kept me firmly there: https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2023/06/20/baltimore-catholic-church-priest-abuse-contd-orig-aw.cnn
I have to say, I thought it was just gay priests that were running amok. For the most part, I thought the straight priests simply married soon to be erstwhile nuns (as did a cousin of my mother who had taught at Notre Dame, come to think of it). Not that abusing girls from a position of authority is unique to Catholic priests. The above video was really helpful to my understanding a woman acquaintance (to put it mildly) I knew who was raped by a professor nearly fifty years ago. I’ve concluded she’s never recovered, based on the women in the video. Until I saw them, I did not understand what victims of rape by persons of authority go through. So, I’m thankful to the Diocese of Baltimore for straightening me out on that. Hah.
By the way, a law school classmate’s uncle was Archbishop of Baltimore in the late ‘seventies, early ’80s. One of the classmate’s funny lines was, “The family’s waiting for word from the Vatican any day now that he’s been made Oriole.”
Where I came from the sexual abuse went on behind the scenes, although I never saw it. I did see one or two brothers suddenly disappear without any explanation as to where they had gone or why. It took a back seat to the physical abuse, though. One of the brothers who taught at my high school was jailed for beating showering kids with a belt, and that was just the tip of the iceberg. I’ve never had a personal issue with a priest, all the priests I’ve known have been generally good people. My concern is these religious orders that frequently get used as a dumping ground for otherwise unwanted men who might do something crazy in the outside world. I can see why this behavior would make others turn their backs on the church. It disgusts me that those in charge of shepherding the flock would instead prey upon its most vulnerable members.
That said, this type of abuse of trust in the name of gaining sexual favors is not unique to the church nor even to just the Catholic Church. Knowing what I know now about what’s going on at the purely secular schools and an organizations such as the boy scouts, I wonder that any family is willing to trust their children to anyone. Then again, can you even trust your own family? How many kids have been victims of abuse by relatives?
All of that said, the fact is that the churches teachings with regard to procured abortion are pretty clear and they haven’t changed in centuries. However, like rules anywhere else, the rich and the powerful think they don’t apply to them. They are also willing to advocate against them for the sake of staying rich and powerful. Biden’s case is a particularly egregious one because he was pro-life or at least generally against abortion until it was no longer convenient to be so. He was also in favor of the death penalty until suddenly he wasn’t because it would score him more points with liberal voters. This woman is simply a clown and a liar seeking votes from young suburban women and their weenie partners by making it easy to carry on like the Fokken twins on a busy weekend at the height of their careers.
At first I thought that was a photoshop of Jimmy Durante with a wig and glasses, but that would have been more appropriate for a “Jumbo”.
This is classic standard issue liberal, well to do, white woman abortion advocacy: abortion needs to be legal so black women can murder their children, so they won’t have too many of the nappy headed little things underfoot keeping them from having a successful working career. It’s essentially eugenics even though these women purport to have black peoples’ best interests at heart. I can’t believe they don’t see the irony. And the condescension entailed in the presumption that black women simply are not able to figure out how to not get pregnant.
Or perhaps worse yet, these women operate under the assumption that black guys are going to run around impregnating black women non-stop, so we need abortion on demand to deal with that problem. These people are simply racist bigots.
She should be happy the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith no longer burns heretics.
She’s either an idiot or a liar.
If you think the church’s teaching is wrong, make that argument, but don’t pretend like Catholicism teaches something it doesn’t. Maybe there are some principles that could support abortion (if you ignore other principles), but she, again, just need to be straight up. Just say “I think the church’s teaching in this area is wrong.”
History clearly shows orthodox Christianity did not support abortion and has not ever really done so. These politicians that keep playing this game have become so trite that I can’t even laugh at how wrong they are anymore.
You don’t even have to be a Catholic to see it. You could be pro-choice and still see she cares nothing for logic, history, or philosophy.
What would be the effect on abortion rates if the KKK et al. we’re to explicitly champion abortion for getting rid of races that are unwanted, even offering to financially provide transportation and funding for the procedures if necessary? Cognitive dissonance scale?
My point exactly.
What does she think of Leviticus 20:13?
I wish Rep. Rosa DeLauro‘s mother had aborted her.
Wait. What?
jvb
I believe presenting oneself in that fashion as a sitting member of Congress is no less disrespectful of revered American institutions that baring one’s breasts while a guest at the White House.
DeLauro is hiding behind legalese. She is very carefully not saying the church supports abortion, but that her commitment to Catholic moral teaching compels her to support its legality. It is deception.
Catholic ethics has some precedent for this position. No moral teaching, for instance, would compell a Catholic judge to make a bad faith legal argument again abort if the law clearly says otherwise. A Catholic jurist is expected to uphold the law as written, not exceed his authority to change it.
This applies strictly to judges. Legislators do, in fact, have the authority to change laws, and Catholic legislators are morally compelled to work to restrict grace moral evils such as abortion.
DeLauro is walking a fine artificial line. As a legislator, the duty to uphold the law as written does apply to her. Thus, she could, as a faithful Catholic, state that the constitution does not allow her to seek total prohibition, for instance. Her ethical duty to craft laws within the constitutional framework is also a sacred duty.
Thus, she could legitimately advocate against unconstitutional prohibitions while remaining a faithful Catholic. However, morally she must only advocate for bare legal status if in good faith she believes legal prohibition is impossible.
DeLauro is abusing this narrow window of duty to uphold the law. Catholic social teaching compels justice to be upheld. However, it includes justice for the most vulnerable, and few are more vulnerable than the unborn child of a woman seeking to abort it.
DeLauro is waiving her Catholicism as a political tool. She is claiming her duty to uphold the law regarding abortion (which currently allows abortion, and it’s ability to restrict it is an open question). She is also spouting off about irrelevant social teachings to make herself sound saintly.
She is carefully not directly connecting the two, which would require her to lie and state the church supports abortion. But she is definitely hoping you connect the two “unrelated” statements and come to that conclusion.
This is misleading, and thus unethical, but that is the nature of the retorhical trick Catholics like DeLauro and Biden use to skirt around the church’s clear and present teaching that abortion is evil, and that legislators and executive leaders have a moral duty to oppose it using all lawful means.