Word of warning
Diocesan newspaper editor cautions faithful over "Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good"
News from the Trenches
(Editor's Note: We reprint the item below at the request of Jack Smith, editor of The Catholic Key, official newspaper of the Diocese of Kansas City. In his blog entry below, Mr. Smith points out that a group calling itself "Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good" is really a front organization sponsored by the Democratic National Committee. "This group has been treated as legitimate by CNS and other Catholic news sources," noted Mr. Smith in an email to California Catholic Daily.)
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 2008
Cardinal George Slams 'Common Good' Fraud
Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good is an organization whose purpose is convincing Catholics to vote for pro-choice Democrats. The sleight of hand they employ in this task is to claim that such candidates align so well across the board with Catholic teaching on the common good, that their support for legalized abortion can be fairly overlooked. In fact, the group does not even call for the repeal of the Roe regime and is constantly critical of those who do, preferring to praise those pro-choice politicians who claim to reduce abortions by adjustments in social policy.
Cardinal George attacks that notion today in a letter posted to the Archdiocese of Chicago website (excerpt):
"The unborn child, who is alive and is a member of the human family, cannot defend himself or herself. Good law defends the defenseless. Our present laws permit unborn children to be privately killed. Laws that place unborn children outside the protection of law destroy both the children killed and the common good, which is the controlling principle of Catholic social teaching. One cannot favor the legal status quo on abortion and also be working for the common good."
Cardinal George does not call out Catholics in Alliance by name, but he has previously banned their deceptive material from parishes in his diocese.
The tactics employed by Catholics in Alliance are not surprising given their birth from within the Democratic Party and strong ties to pro-choice Catholic politicians.
Executive Director and Co-founder of Catholics in Alliance, Alexia Kelley, served as religious outreach coordinator for John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign.
James Salt, who helped start Catholics in Alliance and is now Director of Organizing for a nearly identical group called Catholics United, had previously worked on the campaign of the pro-choice Catholic Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius.
While the group was forming, David Wilhem, the non-Catholic former chair of the Democratic National Committee, was helping to form the group's board of directors.
Former Boston Mayor and President Clinton's Ambassador to the Vatican Ray Flynn told The Catholic Key that Wilhelm attempted to recruit him for the board. Flynn though is a truly pro-life Democrat and when the organization made clear to him that they would not support efforts to legally curtail abortion, he declined.
The Chair of the Board of Directors for Catholics in Alliance is Ambassador Elizabeth Frawley Bagley. She served in a number of capacities in the Clinton State Department and is the wife of former Democratic National Committee finance chair, Smith Bagley. Ambassador Bagley has herself given hundreds of thousands of dollars to the DNC, as well as to numerous stridently pro-choice Democratic candidates including, Barack Obama, Al Franken, Barbara Boxer, Claire McCaskill, Charles Schumer and The Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund.
There is a pressing need and a noble task involved in faithful Catholics who are Democrats working to change their party's attachment to abortion on demand. Unfortunately, Catholics in Alliance and Catholics United are simply trying to spin their fellow Catholics into thinking the Democrats' position on abortion is no big deal.
