Voting Our Conscience, Not Our Religion [Catholic Prof Says "Vote Kerry"]

The New York Times ^ | 10/11/04 | Mark W. Roche, Notre Dame University

[BlessedBeGod]

The Vatican has already spoken. Who needs to listen to this twerp?

[CFW]

a just welfare state and more equitable taxes.

there is nothing just or equitable in taking from those who have just because they have and giving to those who want just because they want.

[bowzer313]

What's noteworthy about your list of Five Non-negotiable Issues for Catholics is the lack of any reference to conducting a war or support of the death penalty. Both of these issues are debatable in accordance with Catholic doctrine. The issues on your list should trump any other political consideration. Yet I can't tell you how many Bishops and Priests rationalize their support for the Democrats based on these two issues alone, irrespective of the Democrats positions on abortion, euthanasia, cloning, homosexual marriage, et.al. And their infidelity pollutes the thinking of the rest of the Catholic community.

Clerics such as these rate a special place in hell.

[John Robertson]

I want to report two things: My daughter is a current sophomore at ND, and the student body is trending ever-more conservative...in large part because many of them arrived that way. You've got your obligatory lib issues and groups that every big campus has, but this current student body is majority-conservative. This guy's vote, and any he might pull in, won't do a thing in the election, at least in Indiana.

Number two: Bought and enjoyed a "Cheney burger" from the "Fighting Republicans of Notre Dame" at the Stanford game on Saturday. Go Irish Republicans!

[nickcarraway]

Notre Dame is NOT a Jesuit university.

[Pharlap]

Vote your conscience not your religion. Does this mean that in Roche's mind his religion is unconscionable. Once that happens, how can any person of faith continue to profess that religion? It seems that Roche has a far deeper problem than merely who to vote for. He has confessed a fundamental disconnect with Catholicism. How can he remain a Catholic or even remain at Notre Dame under these circumstances? Or, to put it another way, how can Notre Dame keep him?

[ThomasMore]

the University of Notre Dame.

This school hasn't been Catholic for some time now.

[Earl B.]

To set the record straight, Notre Dame is most certainly NOT a Jesuit institution. It was founded and is run by priests who are members of the Congregation of the Holy Cross (CSC).

Web site here

FYI.

[MKM1960]

That is very good news to me. I hope that this continues. My brother refused to even consider sending his kids there, but that is a long story.

[dukeman]

Putting the party before God. Certainly not the order I'd go

Amen. I guess the ease of a person's ability to do this is a measure of how seriously he takes his faith.

[ThomasMore]

But if Catholic voters honestly examine the issues of consequence in this election, they may find themselves returning to their Democratic roots in 2004.

Whatever you're smokin, Mark, it has distorted your theology. By honestly examining the issues (please review the DNC platform), Catholics of good faith should be running in the opposite direction from the Dems as FAST as they can. Don't look back lest you become a pillar of salt. This party, called the Democratic party, is an anti-Christ institution. It is so taken by the forces of evil, it is not worth saving but consigning over to the devil. It is my advice to good Catholic pols who remain in this party to abandon it. There is no grace to be found there.

Deacon Francis

[ApplegateRanch]

"Let your conscience be your guide" = "Do what thou wilt is the whole of the law" = Aleister Crawley's Satanism.

Since when is that Christianity, Catholic, or otherwise?

[dukeman]

either reconsider the state of their conscience or the status of their membership in the Roman Catholic Church

Agreed, Tamar1973. But as you know, every faith-- Christian (Catholic & Protestant), Judaism, Islam, etc.-- has individuals who are "members" for cultural/traditional reasons only. Some know they are, some don't. Those who don't "get it" would never think of examining the bona fides of their membership (it just wouldn't occur to them). Examining why you do what you do, or why you believe what you believe, is hard for many people to do. It requires looking in the mirror.

[TheCrusader]

I read the whole article and I didn't see where it said that professor Roche at Notre Dame was Catholic. It is widely known (or at least it should be by now) that a great many profs, including theologians, at Catholic Universities are not Catholics. If Roche isn't Catholic then the article is just another red herring by the NTY. And if he is Catholic, it's a great reminder of why the Pope wrote a directive two years ago to all Catholic Universties in America asking them to return to traditional Catholic teachings.

[Knitting A Conundrum]

my conscience(formed by the teaching of the church, which I take seriously) says that if I voted for Kerry and the way he supports abortion rights, and didn't get to a priest with sincere repentance, I would go to hell. Because it would be a willful intentional doing of something my bible, my belief system and 2000 years of church teaching tells me is a mortal sin.

Therefore, I will vote my conscience and vote for Bush.

[keats5]

If your religion doesn't guide your conscience, why is it your religion?

[RabidBartender]

Wow. You didn't last long, did you?

[dukeman]

Exactly!