The election for the United States president is a few days away. If you or any of your family members or friends find themselves confused about who to vote for morally, or why we should vote based on moral issues as our first priorities, allow me to offer you the following bullet point principles:
• It is a grave moral evil to vote for a pro-abortion candidate when there is a fundamentally pro-life candidate available, unless there is grave proportionate reason.
What would grave proportionate reason be? Say one man is pushed up against a wall and another man is pointing a gun at his head threatening to pull the trigger and kill him. Moreover, it is well known that this man with the gun has killed many men in like manner and plans to continue to do so.
Next to them is another man. He is also being threatened by a man. What is he being threatened with? Taking his money? Having him participate in a questionable war? Taking away his standard of living? Lowering his retirement benefits? Hurting his relationship with people of different countries? None of this is morally proportionate to the first case—the direct killing of an innocent human being, and, when done so knowingly, the act of murder.
One candidate wants to sign into legislation immediately as his very first presidential act a law that allows murder of millions of unborn people (Freedom of Choice Act), which includes the removing of any or all national restrictions, whether at federal or state level, particularly giving partial birth to a baby and then having the baby's brain literally sucked out of his or her head. That's the frightening and macabre process of partial-birth abortion. That's gravely and grossly evil. No Christian or person of good will can in good conscience support that evil or the horrific evil of abortion in any form, and there is absolutely no proportionate reason to do so. Morally, it's pretty simple.
• Numerous U.S. bishops have also made it clear, that in the particular case, of this presidential election, there is no proportionate reason that can justify voting for the pro-abortion presidential candidate (cf. Bishops Farrell and Vann of Dallas-Fort Worth; Archbishop Naumann, Kansas City; Bishop Martino, Scranton; Bishop Arthur Serratelli, Patterson, etc.)
• One candidate is a fundamentally pro-life candidate. This is confirmed by National Right to Life. The other candidate is a passionately pro-abortion candidate. This is confirmed by Planned Parenthood. We cannot morally vote for the pro-abortion candidate when there is an option of a fundamentally pro-life candidate.
• All human rights depend on the right to life. If you're not alive, you're not too concerned about the Dow Jones, foreign policy or health care. That's why voting pro-life is not "single issue" voting, but rather morally appropriate priority issue voting, based on a properly formed Christian or moral conscience. All Christians and all people of good will are morally obliged to exercise priority issue voting.
• Not being in favor of the war does not justify voting for a pro-abortion candidate. The direct killing of innocent human beings in the womb is an intrinsic evil that outweighs in its direct formal and moral proximity the evil of a potentially unjust war. In the particular case of the Iraq war, this is true, both qualitatively concerning the immediate material and formal evil of the abortion act, and quantitatively, by the numbers of lives lost. 50 million unborn children have been killed through abortion in the U.S., and that doesn't include the millions upon millions of unborn children killed through contraceptive abortificacients.
• Frustration that one political party didn't do more when they were in office, however justified, is not an appropriate moral reason for failing to support the fundamentally pro-life candidate and for not opposing a political candidate and consequent party who is vehemently pro-abortion. Supporting a pro-life and pro-family candidate at the very least prevents the fearful advancement of an anti-life national agenda, while also providing the possibility of further pro-life and pro-family legislation, which includes the appointment of pro-life Supreme Court justices.
• When there is a candidate who is fundamentally pro-life with a chance of victory and effecting authentic pro-life legislation (and/or preventing an onslaught on pro-abortion legislation through defeating the pro-abortion candidate), and another candidate who is entirely pro-life but with no chance of victory, you are not morally obliged to vote for the entirely pro-life candidate, since the Church allows for the voting for a fundamentally pro-life candidate with the goal and practical outcome of saving lives and moral values through the candidate with the possibility of victory.
• Claiming that one party is alone and entirely responsible for the present economic crisis (as dubious as this position might be) does not morally justify supporting a pro-abortion candidate from the other party. This would be to place money over morals, and economic concerns over human life and its protection.
• Saying that a pro-abortion presidential candidate has nothing really to do with abortion (since he's not actually committing the abortion) is philosophically parallel to saying that Adolf Hitler had nothing really to do with killing the Jews because he never himself pulled a trigger or released the poisoned gas. A presidential candidate who voluntarily wills to sign into law the FOCA abortion legislation has immediate moral and formal participation in the advancement of abortion and is directly morally responsible.
• To claim that one candidate is not "pro-abortion" but only "pro-choice" is to equivocate the truth that supporting the legitimacy of the direct killing of an innocent human being as a legitimate option is in itself an intrinsic evil and in act a pro-abortion policy.
• Support of limited embryonic stem cell research, as immoral as it is, cannot be morally or proportionally paralleled to abolishing 35 years of pro-life legislation as your first presidential act (FOCA legislation) and making abortion "rights" the litmus test for appointing pro-abortion supreme court justices.
How do we think Blessed Mother Teresa would vote if she were alive now and a U.S. citizen? What about Servant of God, John Paul II? Whom do we really think our present Holy Father wants us to vote for, based on the authentic moral principles of the Catholic Church?
Ultimately, I believe, it comes down to a question not of politics, nor of party, but of faith. Any disciple of Jesus could never in good conscience prioritize issues of economy or party allegiance over allegiance to God and His moral issues of life and family, which He has ordained to constitute the foundation of the all societies.
Let us pray and fast in these few final days before the election. Let us pray and fast that we all vote in a manner pleasing to Almighty God first. Let us pray and fast that Catholics and Christians of the United States, who make up well over a quarter of our national population, will vote morals first, pro-life first, pro-family first—pro-Christ first.
Yes, ultimately it comes down to a question which has not only grave national and international contemporary ramifications, but also authentic eternal ramifications: Who and for what policies would Jesus want us to vote for? We will be personally and eternally responsible, for whom and for what principles we vote for in these final critical days.
When in doubt, err towards life. Jesus will be eternally grateful. You will be eternally grateful.
Personally, on Tuesday, Nov. 4, I will be voting for Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin.
Immaculate Mother, Mother of the Unborn, Co-redemptrix with Jesus, Mediatrix of Mercy, Our Lady of America,
Pray for the United States of America,
your children who need you in the midst of great crisis and confusion.
We entrust our country to your Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart.
We place our trust not in ourselves, but in the infinite mercy of your Divine Son.
We beg to be spared from what we perhaps deserve as a nation, but plead instead for the mercy of the Father, which comes to us through the pierced Heart of His Son.
May the Holy Spirit, through your most Immaculate Heart, illumine the hearts of our citizens, especially those who are disciples of your Son, to vote for life, for family, for policies consistent with our Christian faith above all other considerations.
Our Lady of America, O Immaculate Conception, pray for us,
your children of the United States of America.
Dr. Mark Miravalle
Professor of Theology and Mariology
Franciscan University of Steubenville
http://www.motherofallpeoples.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1531
