Should religion and politics mix? Should priests speak on politics? Let's be clear. Priests are not permitted to run for public office, and clergy are not permitted to endorse a particular candidate or seek to influence people's votes for particular parties.
However, it is part of the duty of the clergy to inform the faithful on the moral issues the populace are facing. It is the duty of the clergy to warn the faithful not to support immoral causes. It seems strange to me when I hear people tell me to shut up and not speak out on politics. The church should stay out of politics period.
When the Nazis came to take away the Jews and gypsies and homosexuals was it okay then for the Catholic clergy to speak out or would it have been better for the church to 'stay out of politics'? When the Catholic people, with the encouragement of their clergy rose up to overthrow the corrupt Marcos regime in the Philippines should the clergy have stayed out of politics? When the Catholic clergy along with the people rose up to overthrow the Communist regime in Poland should the clergy have stayed out of politics? No. All Catholics, including clergy are to be involved in the fight for justice, peace and life.
What we are not to do is to get involved in the ways of this world. We stand outside the political process. We stand outside the ways of force, revolution and military struggle. We stand outside the political system, but we must speak up and stay involved.
What are my own politics? It doesn't matter. As a Catholic priest I stand up first of all for life. I defend human life from womb to tomb. I stand up for love and marriage and children and I defend the family and the home. I insist on a preferential option for the poor. I am against greed and injustice and servitude. I believe the rich have a responsibility to help the poor and that all men and women have a responsibility (due to their own innate dignity) to help themselves and to help one another. I am against killing. I am against war. I am against the rape and pillage of our beautiful natural resources.
This is simply the Catholic faith, and it means that I am disappointed with all the politicians and all their parties. Too often those on the right support an economic system that encourages greed and irresponsibility and neglect of the poor. Too often they are bellicose, warlike and frighteningly nationalistic. Too often those on the left support an economic system that encourages complacency, envy, greed and a sense of entitlement. Too often the left, in the name of freedom encourages license, immorality and depravity.
Republican or Democrat? A plague on both your houses. I'm not for politics. I'm for morality. I'm don't think government has the answer. I think individuals have the answer. I don't think the solutions are in power and politics and prosperity, but in prayer and sacrifice and personal virtue.
I agree with most of what you've said Father. Much of what we call politics is simply the life we live in our nation. Abortion is not politics. The death penalty and war are not politics. Health care is not politics. They are all part of our way of life, for good or for ill. And if we know any of them to be against God's will then it is our obligation to oppose them.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you- but I still vote
ReplyDeleteA very wise decision, Father, to separate the concerns of the Church from those of "the system" and worldly politics.
ReplyDeletePut not thy trust in princes, as the Psalmist says - or to quote CS Lewis, "Most political sermons teach the congregation nothing except what newspapers are taken at the Rectory".
Most items on a political agenda are contingent matters in which religious principles are not at stake (should the school bond issue be $x mill or $y mill.?). Still, sometimes public policy issues and politicians (our fellow citizens, after all) deal with issues that are squarely in the proper realm of our religion and our individual faith life. It would be silly to pretend otherwise. Whenever and to the degree that these issues go off the rails morally, the specific people and issues MUST be opposed to exactly that extent.
ReplyDeleteIn my personal opinion, the moral chaos and internal strife within the Catholic Church in the U.S. over the last few decades has led to a defensive crouch. A sort of policy of hapless silence by Catholics took hold as the state made larger and larger claims to be the pre-eminent moral authority in society. That encroachment process is coming to a climax as the state is now staking the final, and logical, claim against the Church and natural law morality. The Church is to be "finally" defeated, overruled, and (crucially) humiliated.
Now if the Church operated according to the metaphysical world view of Islam, we could react as militant Islam does. But, of course, the Church cannot use violence while remaining true to Christ and to her teaching - and her enemies in the current struggle know it. The enemy, and those who serve him, are counting on the pain of earthly sanction to be so unthinkable to the hopelessly divided, lax, and comfortable Catholics of the contemporary U.S. that the risks of provocation are quite low. So they are anxious to push, and push to the limit - now.
Only if Catholics are willing to be impoverished, jailed, slandered, sanctioned in every way possible can this challenge be defeated. The enemy doesn't, fundamentally does not, believe that U.S. Catholics of today will stir themselves to do much of anything in the face of this challenge. They have utter contempt for the level of faith they estimate is present in the contemporary Church.
Again, in my view, a few Catholics today are shocked, genuinely shocked, that they are being forced to choose between Christ's Church and secular politics. To them it seems safer to object, and argue against the Church stirring herself out of a long, long trance of moral torpor. They apparently feel that a few scolding, hectoring comments to the clergy, perhaps along with their threat to bolt, will pressure the clergy back into the old stance - quiet and quietist.
Unfortunately, there is no going back. This is a showdown. There is no future for the Church as a lapdog of the state and morally comprised culture that has deformed it. As culturally uncomfortable as it makes a number of people, the Church has no choice. We must oppose what is being forced on us, we must oppose the people who are doing the forcing, and we must suffer the consequence that are surely to follow. Tragically, that will include a number of the weak falling away, probably to their eternal regret.
Father,
ReplyDeleteI am gravely concerned more now than ever before, that how I vote and what I do in this political system will hae serious impacts on my sins of omission. Father, I am fearful Evil is using politics to influence the faithful with deception. I am doing my best not participate in sins of commission but I'm terrified about the sins of omission. I need your prayers and guidance on how I should interpret these concerns I have. I am praying more now than I ever before. While not a deeply faithful servant, I am now hearing the call of God and in my heart and soul, He is telling me to prepare for battle.
Please father, address my concerns on sins of omission! How do we stop the evil without committing sins of omission and sins of comission?