The most-viewed article at Newsweek.com this week was Opinion: Can Catholics back pro-choice Obama? The article discusses the controversy within the Church between Catholic leaders like Douglas Kmiec, who was denied communion for backing Obama, and Francis Cardinal George, who in September addressed the archdiocese of Chicago in no uncertain terms: "One cannot favor the legal status quo on abortion and also be working for the common good."
At last night's debate, Barack Obama spoke about finding "common ground" between pro-life and pro-choice adherents. John McCain gave us his "that one" moment for this debate--"health"--as well as his ugly, just plain wrong characterization of "pro-choice" as "pro-abortion."
To this Catholic, "pro-choice" is not "pro-abortion." In fact, I believe it is possible for Catholics to be both pro-choice and pro-life. Follow me below.
First, I need to provide some background. My wife and I are devout Catholics. We go to church every Sunday and occasionally during the week. We are both active in the community outreach programs of our parish. Our kids go to a Catholic school with a diverse group of students. In many ways, I have become my parents, because these same things were true for them when I was growing up.
I was not always this way. In college, I rejected my faith--and organized religion, generally--and became agnostic. Part of the reason was the rampancy of fundamentalism at my university, which was a major turn-off to Christianity. The other was a complete overinflation of my ego. I meandered through my 20s and 30s, a relatively decent and fairly successul person who was spiritually rudderless. Hedonism, not intimacy or connectedness, governed me.
What eventually brought me back to the Church was the realization that I did not, and could not, have all the answers, no matter how much I read or experienced. My personal intellectual arrogance gave way to humility--perhaps the result of being kicked around a few times by factors completely outside my control. But with that humility came the return of a core belief inculcated in my youth--that we are all redeemable. (I may have to make an exception for Dick Cheney.) The Resurrection became more than miracle or myth--it was a metaphor for my life and our humanity. And so I began going back to church, eventually becoming a regular at a progressive Catholic parish in Chicago.
It was not ritual or dogma that led me to re-embrace Catholicism. Like almost all Catholics, I disagree with the bishops on a number of issues and am disgusted with the abuse scandals. But two things overrode even this. The first thing, of course, is the teachings of the Master: peace, tolerance, justice, solidarity and forgiveness. The second, which stems from the first, is the bedrock of Catholic Social Teaching, which I find to be perhaps the most progressive, humanistic and well-considered expression of values in any religion. These principles define what it means to be a Catholic. If only we were better at adhering to them.
One other thing I need to mention is my experience with pregnancy. My wife and I became parents after two completely routine pregnancies that resulted in the births of two wonderful children. Every subsequent pregnancy--and there have been several--has resulted in miscarriage. Each time before we were witness to that crushing first sonogram, we knew the increased risks (because of our ages); each time, we decided together that we would go through with the pregnancy no matter what. My wife, who continues to grieve the due dates that never were, knows what it is like to mourn when the potential for human life is extinguished. As a man, I cannot possibly know the full depth of her pain; I can empathize, but cannot sympathize.
My visceral, personal experience with my faith and family brings me to the choice question for Catholics: can there ever be common ground between pro-life and pro-choice; even more, can one be both at the same time? To many, the choice is binary and the results are mutually exclusive. Obama, I believe, sees it differently: it's a question of how you frame the issue.
To most pro-life people--including, apparently, John McCain--pro-life equals pro-abortion. Which is ridiculous. No one likes abortion. The decision to terminate a pregnancy is almost always surrounded by difficult factors: medical risks, economic hardship, social disgrace. Its emotional consequences--regret, guilt--are often felt years later. But many of the comments to the Newsweek article exemplify a meme by pro-lifers that everyone who chooses to have an abortion is a callous, irresponsible, selfish person. Example:
As a real "Catholic" I believe abortion is murder. I also think the woman who has an abortion and doctors who practice abortions on these women should be considered "MURDERERS".
This comment obviates the converse perspective, which is much closer to the truth: "pro-life" really means "anti-choice." "Pro-life" to someone like the author of this comment has nothing to do with creating a culture of life. It has everything to do with secular law mandating that every pregnant woman carry a child to term, based on religious ideology. From a Catholic perspective, despite what Cardinal George and Benedict XVI state, there are two fundamental problems with this worldview.
The first problem is that one cannot create an affirmative culture of life by outlawing its opposite. One cannot choose life if the option to choose otherwise is not available. Choice that is mandated is not a true choice. Embracing a true, affirmative culture of life can only result from exercise of the awful grace of free will, not fear of punishment. Historical examples abound. We did not embrace racial tolerance because slavery was outlawed, although outlawing slavery was necessary. To the contrary, racial intolerance was exacerbated for decades, if not centuries. The conversion of hearts and minds rarely occurs by pushing, although ephemeral results can be realized quickly. Instead, true transformation is that which pulls us into it--and conversion becomes permanent as a result. But "pull"-type transformation takes much, much longer. A true, enduring culture of life requires a common, widely-shared and sustainable respect for life at all stages, in all peoples. Anything short of that is a quick fix.
The second problem with the "anti-choice" mandate stems from Benedict XVI's and Cardinal George's own teachings. Both are brilliant, scholarly men who share Aquinas's perspective on the harmony between reason and faith, dimensions of the human spirit that are "fully realized when they meet and dialogue."
Yet this embrace of reason is belied by sloppiness in defining the choice issue. Perhaps the most disappointing example of this is the constant use of the phrase "unborn baby" or "unborn child" in Cardinal George's letter. I understand the social justice perspective behind this and am moved by his appeal to defense of the most vulnerable. But implied in this missive is the unstated directive that human life begins at conception. And I know from personal experience that this isn't necessarily so.
I do believe, as does Joe Biden, that "life" begins at conception. I also believe that "the potential for human life" begins at conception. But the point at which this actually becomes "human life" is above my pay grade. After all, ontongeny recapitulates phylogeny. Each of our miscarriages occurred just shy of the end of the first trimester--at the 10 or 11 week mark. Each time my wife was devastated; she wondered things like whether the two glasses of wine she had before she knew she was pregnant could have been the cause. I gave her the medical facts: the vast majority of miscarriages are the result of a mismatch of the mother's and father's chromosomes such that human life cannot be sustained. That did not make her pregnancies any less real, or discount the potential for human life that was there. Science indicates that the conversion of that potential to actual human life occurs sometime during the second trimester. To say otherwise denies science for the sake of ideology.
These are the reasons why I believe in a culture of life, and also believe that we must uphold Roe v. Wade. I think this Catholic role model (Joe Biden) said it best:
Outlawing abortion will not prevent it. Creating a culture that respects the dignity of life at all stages, and for all people--even though it may take generations to do so--will. I am hopeful.