Bishops trying to help the president navigate the minefields
Cardinal Francis George, president of the USCCB, issued a letter to Barack Obama asking him to consider deeply some of the social moral issues of our time.
I recently wrote to assure you of the prayers of the Catholic bishops of the United States for your service to our nation, and to outline issues of special concern to us as we seek to work with your Administration and the new Congress to serve the common good.
I am writing today on a matter that could introduce significant negative and divisive factors into our national life, at a time when we need to come together to address the serious challenges facing our people. I expect that some want you to take executive action soon to reverse current policies against government-sponsored destruction of unborn human life. I urge you to consider that this could be a terrible mistake — morally, politically, and in terms of advancing the solidarity and well-being of our nation’s people.
This comes from what the bishops hope is their shared belief in the common good.
Obama speaks of reducing the number of abortions, the bishops respond that’s their goal as well as making abortion “unthinkable as an answer to unintended pregnancy.” It’s an exercise in reason, this letter.
On one occasion, when asked at what point a baby has human rights, you answered in effect that you do not have a definite answer…Uncertainty as to when human rights begin provides no basis for compelling others to violate their conviction that these rights exist from the beginning. After all, those people may be right. And if the goal is to reduce abortions, that will not be achieved by involving the government in expanding and promoting abortions.
Which addresses the Mexico City policy that, under the Reagan and Bush administrations, prevented federal funds for abortion outside US borders. That policy, Cardinal George states
has ensured that family planning funds are not diverted to organizations dedicated to performing and promoting abortions instead of reducing them. Once the clear line between family planning and abortion is erased, the idea of using family planning to reduce abortions becomes meaningless, and abortion tends to replace contraception as the means for reducing family size. A shift toward promoting abortion in developing nations would also increase distrust of the United States in these nations, whose values and culture often reject abortion, at a time when we need their trust and respect.
Then there’s the stem cell controversy. That debate needs the clarity, first of all, of naming which kinds of stem cells are being used or sought for cures. The media usually just reports that some group or politician ‘opposes stem cell research’, when it’s embryonic stem cells in particular. George argues that government ought
to ensure that Americans are not forced to use their tax dollars to encourage expanded destruction of embryonic human beings for their stem cells. Such destruction is especially pointless at the present time, for several reasons. First, basic research in the capabilities of embryonic stem cells can be and is being pursued using the currently eligible cell lines as well as the hundreds of lines produced with nonfederal funds since 2001. Second, recent startling advances in reprogramming adult cells into embryonic-like stem cells – hailed by the journal Science as the scientific breakthrough of the year – are said by many scientists to be making embryonic stem cells irrelevant to medical progress. Third, adult and cord blood stem cells are now known to have great versatility, and are increasingly being used to reverse serious illnesses and even help rebuild damaged organs. To divert scarce funds away from these promising avenues for research and treatment toward the avenue that is most morally controversial as well as most medically speculative would be a sad victory of politics over science.
Obama has been saying lately that we must appeal to our ‘better angels’, to that spirit of shared humanity we innately have and stop partisan bickering and political posturing. On behalf of the nation’s bishops, Cardinal George makes that appeal to President Obama.
I hope you will consider these comments in the spirit in which they are intended, as an invitation to set aside political pressures and ideologies and focus on the priorities and challenges that will unite us as a nation. Again I want to express our hopes for your Administration, and our offer to cooperate in advancing the common good and protecting the poor and vulnerable in these challenging times.
May they work together, for peace, social justice and human rights…..for all.
