Posted on 09/12/2004 6:24:08 PM PDT by Land of the Irish
An article in the Post-Dispatch announced that Archbishop Raymond Burke is giving St. Louis Catholics a way to vote for politicians who support abortion rights without committing a grave sin or having to go to confession: “In his latest clarification of controversial comment he made earlier this summer, Burke said Thursday [September 2] he believes Catholics could vote for a politician who supports abortion rights as long as that's not the reason they are voting for the candidate, and they believe the politician's stance on other moral issues outweighs the abortion-rights stance.
“Previously, Burke had said Catholics who vote for a politician who supports abortion rights were committing a grave sin and must confess before receiving Communion…
“Burke now says there is one scenario in which a Catholic could vote for a politician who supports abortion rights without committing a grave sin. In that scenario, a Catholic who personally opposes abortion rights, votes for a candidate who supports abortion rights ‘for what are called proportionate reasons,’ he said.” (“Burke clarifies Voting Stance, September 2, 2004)
Burke makes a reversal on his firm stand.
This comes as a surprise as Archbishop Burke was one of my heroes when he said that a Catholic cannot vote for a politician who is pro-abortion, such as John Kerry. Was he bought off? Did billionaire John Kerry’s money play a part? I can think of no other explanation that makes even the slightest sense.
Archbishop Raymond Burke says he is trying to give St. Louis Catholics a way to vote for politicians who support abortion rights without committing a grave sin or having to go to confession.
In his latest clarification of controversial comments he made earlier this summer, Burke said on September 2 that he believes Catholics could vote for a politician who supports abortion rights as long as that’s not the reason they are voting for the candidate, and they believe the politician’s stance on other moral issues outweighs the abortion-rights stance.
How in the world is it possible that any other issue could outweigh the killing of 4,000 children every day – 1.4 million every year?
Does he mean issues like opening up another soup kitchen, or getting rid of the death penalty in which only a few guilty persons are killed every year and then only after they have had a trial, which innocent unborn children have not received?
Or, could it be the Iraq war, on the topic of which, by the way, Kerry said that he would again vote to go to that war.
I can think of no other reason and I don’t know how Burke can either to claim the garbage of "proportionate reasons."
Burke can now join Kerry as one of the country’s two greatest flip-floppers, and innocent children will suffer because of it.
Burke is dead wrong and I will prove it to you. Suppose instead of 4,000 unborn children who are being killed every day, it was 4,000 born children, or adults. Would he still say that you can vote for someone who is an enabler of these killings as long as that’s not the reason you are voting for the candidate – that it is okay so long as they believe the politician's stance on other moral issues outweighs their stance on murder. Of course not. Apparently, Archbishop Burke does not consider unborn children to be the equivalent of born children or adults.
May God have mercy on his soul.
I had nine Bishops on my list of good Bishops, now there are only eight. One thing I do know for sure – his flip-flop brings a smile to the face of Satan.
money talks
Ping
"Proportionate reasons" was a qualification mentioned by Cardinal Ratzinger. It simply means that, in theory, a Catholic could vote for a pro-abortion candidate if the candidate's opponent is even worse. It's hard to imagine an opponent who's worse except for perhaps an opposition candidate who's pro-abortion and pro-genocide.
Ratzinger, himself, has flip-flopped on voting for pro-death politicians, just as Burke has.
This is a man who's in "union" with Rome.
"This is a man who's in "union" with Rome."
What are proportionate reasons?
Our bishops are so disgusting. (if this report is accurate)
They are democrats first and Catholics later on.
I used to think they were heros. God help us.
LOTI - I assume you're not voting for Pres. Bush then? He's pro-abortion when the life of the mother is at stake. Apparently we're all stuck voting for the Constitution Party candidate and ceding the Supreme Court to a new batch of Kerry-appointed liberals? I don't think so.
So now according to one of our "hero" bishops as long as you can convince yourself that voting for a pro-death candidate is not only because he's pro-death, you're a good Catholic? This is insanity.
I suppose we can vote for a Nazis too, as long as you're not voting for him solely because he's a anti-God murderer.
Our episcopal seems to have hopelessly lost their way. Traditional/Orthodox/Conservative Catholics sadly have no moral leadership whatsoever, we're literally on our own.
Please answer gbcdoj's question. Do we all vote for the Contitution Party's candidate because he is the only one who is totally pro-life? President Bush is for abortion in cases of rape and incest,so if you believe that Burke and Chaput and Ratzinger are wrong then you evidently are advocating either sitting this election our or voting for Perouskis.I hope Ultima has something to say about this.
Yes. I only vote for strictly pro-life candidates. I'm afraid one of those cute little babies that had its head and arms ripped off while it bled to death will meet me at the Pearly Gates and ask me "Why?".
Don't tell me I'm wasting my vote. I don't vote to win. I vote to do the right thing.
It would seem to me that to push us back to the top of the slippery slope and anchor us to the pinnacle we need to elect candidates that either oppose abortion under any circumstances or oppose it in all but very defined circumstances.
In the upcoming election we have a third candidate on many ballots and it is conceivable that a vote for the pro-life candidate of the third party might take away votes from a candidate that is far more pro-life than the other.
Maybe rather than being afraid of meeting a cute little baby with it's arms cut off,one should think about meeting one million cute,tiny creatures who have been violated at various points along the way or a few humdred.
This is a subject that must be talked about and I hope we all will think about it and add our thoughts. It is very important.
Are there any Catholic Bishops left in the U. S.?
What a satan-inspired cleric!
(Some) clerics who are in good stead with God, know that this amounts to Cafeteria Catholicism. You just take from the Church what you want and ignore the vegetables.
A pro-abortionist is one voters should steer clear of at elelction time, but this bishop, along with scores of others, has decided to help Kerry and his ilk all he can by removing the key issue by which Catholics must vote against such candidates.
What a ride on which liberal clerics have taken the laity. Most of the laity are slap happy and nothing shocks or suprises any longer. Clown masses, washing peoples hands instead of feet on Maundy Thursday, a jug band mass, a folk mass, a childrens' mass, a polka mass....they just keep trying and trying and trying.
Many churches have a confessional station that is so disguised you can't find it and furthermore it is never used. Many just to go "services" to be entertained for 45 minutes.
And has an iron-clad pack with satan....as does most of the vatican.
"LOTI - I assume you're not voting for Pres. Bush then? He's pro-abortion when the life of the mother is at stake."
This is precisely the point I make in this thread here:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1214452/posts
President Bush is a pro-abortion candidate who Catholics could vote for on the grounds of proportionate reasons.
I am certain that this is the implication of Ratzinger's footnote. The possibility of voting for someone like Kerry never enters into it.
Already hashed out and discredited on the news/activism forum.
Try to pay attention.
What does that mean? I read this article several days ago on Zenit. How is it discredited?
Instead of realising this, even after much discussion on this forum, some folks puke up the knee jerk response: "Burke is the Spawn of Satan!!!" Stuff and nonsense!
THEN A VOTE FOR KERRY WOULD BE A MORTAL SIN.
That would be my read on it also. Even with his not so perfect record of abortion reform, President Bush would seem to be preferable, as means of starting the ball rolling toward a more permanent solution.
Re: "Archbishop Raymond Burke says he is trying to give St. Louis Catholics a way to vote for politicians who support abortion rights without committing a grave sin or having to go to confession."
Sorry Archbishop but a sin is a sin and all a priest or bishop can do is teach the truth or get caught up in sin himself. Pick a side.
From the St. Louis article, Burke is quoted as saying:
"The sticking point is this - and this is the hard part," said Burke. "What is a proportionate reason to justify favoring the taking of an innocent, defenseless human life? And I just leave that to you as a question. That's the question that has to be answered in your conscience. What is the proportionate reason?"
There is also a "Voter Guide" on the Archdiocesan website. Quotes from that:
"But voting cannot be arbitrary. "A well-formed Christian conscience does not permit one to vote for a political program or an individual law that contradicts the fundamental contents of faith and morals" (CPL 4). A citizen’s vote most often means voting for a candidate who will be the one directly voting on laws or programs. But being one step removed from law-making doesn’t let citizens off the hook, since morality requires that we avoid doing evil to the greatest extent possible, even indirectly.
Some things always are wrong, and no one may deliberately vote in favor of them. Legislators, who have a direct vote, may not support these evils in legislation or programs. Citizens support these evils indirectly if they vote in favor of candidates who propose to advance them. Thus, to the greatest extent possible, Catholics must avoid voting for any candidate who intends to support programs or laws that are intrinsically evil. When all of the candidates endorse morally harmful policies, citizens must vote in a way that will limit the harm likely to be done."
It goes on to list the 5 "Non-negotiable Issues":
THE FIVE NON-NEGOTIABLE ISSUES
These five current issues concern actions that are intrinsically evil and must never be promoted by the law. Intrinsically evil actions are those which fundamentally conflict with the moral law and can never be deliberately performed under any circumstances. It is a serious sin to deliberately endorse or promote any of these actions, and no candidate who really wants to advance the common good will support any action contrary to the non-negotiable principles involved in these issues.
1. Abortion The Church teaches that, regarding a law permitting abortions, it is "never licit to obey it, or to take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or to vote for it" (EV 73). Abortion is the intentional and direct killing of an innocent human being, and therefore it is a form of homicide.
The unborn child is always an innocent party, and no law may permit the taking of his life. Even when a child is conceived through rape or incest, the fault is not the child's, who should not suffer death for others' sins.
2. Euthanasia
Often disguised by the name "mercy killing," euthanasia also is a form of homicide. No person has a right to take his own life, and no one has the right to take the life of any innocent person. <[>In euthanasia, the ill or elderly are killed, by action or omission, out of a misplaced sense of compassion, but true compassion cannot include intentionally doing something intrinsically evil to another person (cf. EV 73).
3. Embryonic Stem Cell Research
Human embryos are human beings. "Respect for the dignity of the human being excludes all experimental manipulation or exploitation of the human embryo" (CRF 4b).
Recent scientific advances show that often medical treatments that researchers hope to develop from experimentation on embryonic stem cells can be developed by using adult stem cells instead. Adult stem cells can be obtained without doing harm to the adults from whom they come. Thus there is no valid medical argument in favor of using embryonic stem cells. And even if there were benefits to be had from such experiments, they would not justify destroying innocent embryonic humans.
4. Human Cloning
"Attempts . . . for obtaining a human being without any connection with sexuality through 'twin fission,' cloning, or parthenogenesis are to be considered contrary to the moral law, since they are in opposition to the dignity both of human procreation and of the conjugal union" (RHL I:6).
Human cloning also involves abortion because the "rejected" or "unsuccessful" embryonic clones are destroyed, yet each clone is a human being.
5. Homosexual "Marriage"
True marriage is the union of one man and one woman. Legal recognition of any other union as "marriage" undermines true marriage, and legal recognition of homosexual unions actually does homosexual persons a disfavor by encouraging them to persist in what is an objectively immoral arrangement.
"When legislation in favor of the recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative assembly, the Catholic lawmaker has a moral duty to express his opposition clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favor of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral" (UHP 10).
I think it is fairly clear that the author of the St. Louis Dispatch article is the one who supports voting for pro-aborts, not Burke. I'm not claiming he is some sort of super-bishop, but I'm pretty sure he is not one of the Bishops that are in the pockets of the leftist baby killers.
I'd like to read what Burke actually said. I can think of no good reason why any commentator or journalist would use paraphrasing in a context such as this, other than to enlarge what the person actually said. Combined with relying on initial reports from the media, enlargement may result in stating something directly contrary to the truth.
This surprises me.
Excellent post.
Any Catholic who lobbies for either of the Two Parties lobbies for pro-aborts.
I don't think many realize how critical certain CAtholic hierarchy have been for the cause of population control and eugenics from the get-go as Spellman carried water for Roosevelt and signaled the selling out of the Puerto Ricans preparatory to US experiments in birth control on their "control" Catholic population.
Any Catholic who thinks Burke supports voting for a pro-abortion politician is a certified lunatic.
Think about it. Burke would deny communion to Kerry, yet somehow twist himself into knots saying that a Catholic could vote for him?
Continuing to financially support anything novus ordo also qualifies in the "certified lunatic" category.
Here's yet more evidence of where the donations end up (when they're not being used to fund wreckovations - or paying legal bills for predatory sodomite perverts)...
http://www.nbc5.com/news/3724403/detail.html?z=dp&dpswid=2265994&dppid=65195
Where do you suppose that guy got the money to pay restitution?
Good question.
Here's how traditio.com sums up the situation...
There is a worse crisis in the Church of the New Order than the sex scandals, and the Novus Ordinarians better recognize it before they are reduced to poverty: Newchurch bishops and presbyters are stealing right and left from the contributions of the Novus Ordinarians. If the sex scandals hadn't got more press, these thefts would have been front-page news.
There have been so many thefts from the collection basket that it hard now to remember them all, but they include:
Ex-archbishop Weakland's theft of some $500,000 to pay off a catamite's blackmail.
The New York presbyter who conned a sick old woman out of several hundred thousand dollars to pay for his beach-front property.
The ex-Santa Rosa bishop who was stealing from the Church for years until finally exposed.
The Illinois presbyter who stole some $200,000 from the collection plate to support his gambling habit.
The latest, as reported by Associated Press, is a presbyter who has admitted to stealing more than $1,000,000 from his Chicago parish, St. Bede the Venerable, between Janaury 1999 and July 2004. The same presbyter had resigned in July after police caught him drunk and having an assignation with a prostitute.
You can just imagine what the draft Novus Ordinarian parishioners are going to say about this incident. Let me tell you. We must "forgive and forget." The presbyter had "psychological problems." If he stole a million dollars, "he must have needed it." "We all worship the same god." You know the drill. No statement about crimes that need to be paid for. No statement about justice that must be served. No statement about a presbyter having to be an example to others.
And what is the pope's reaction to this thievery on the part of his own bishops and presbyters? Nothing. What is the U.S. Conference of Catholic [sic] bishops' reaction? Nothing. What is the Novus Ordinarian parishioners' reaction? Why, they gave more money last year than the year before!
Where do they think these collections are going? To buying prophylactics for Africans? To funding abortions in India? To supporting the Kerry campaign? Well, maybe those things too, but primarily these monies are going to support the venality of Newchurch bishops and presbyters and to support a structure of sexual corruption not seen in the Church since the Renaissance.
Every penny the Novus Ordinarians put into the collection plate is likely to be directed toward legal funds to pay off sex lawsuits. To supporting expensive pagan cathedrals. To paying the diocesan lawyers who are hired to close down the parishioners' churches. It's really quite sick what these Novus Ordinarians are doing to themselves. The people that walked in darkness have apparently not yet seen the blinding light.
Who died and made him God?
Expect some clarification from Archbishop Burke before too long. In the meanwhile, at least give the benefit of the doubt to this bishop who has taken such a clear stance in the past.
Archbishop Burke Now Approves Voting for Those Who Promote Baby Killing
======
Father, don't foirgive them, for they know what they do !!!
The position of the Catholic Church remains unchanged,certain conditions,as always,remain subject to clarification.
See Tantumergo's post *16 on this thread for more information. It is extremely important that all who call themselves Catholic do understand what the Church's postition is and make no mistakes about it. Unfortunately,it is a little more complicated than it appears at first glance.
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