To the Editor,
Recently, there was a Letter to the Editor entitled, ‘Voting for Obama goes against Jesuit ideals,’ (week of Nov. 20, 2008) by Thomas Sheen, ‘A Concerned Alumnus.’ Mr. Sheen is correct in stating that Fr. Michael Doody, Fr.’ Jeffrey von Arx and Professor Paul Lakeland distorted the Church’s official position on abortion. The Church does indeed say that one should never vote for a pro-choice candidate if there is a pro-life alternative.
Unfortunately, that is about as much as Sheen and I can agree on. The problem with Sheen and the Christian Right movement is that they obsess over these controversial social issues and never see the big picture. It is fair to say that abortion was hardly even on the radar of most voters in this election. The issue of this election was the economy, the economy and the ECONOMY. People are losing their homes and their jobs.
Frankly, most citizens just don’t have time to debate the endless minutia of the abortion issue right now.
Sheen is basically saying that he wants every Catholic voter to become a robot and strictly vote according to the teachings of the Catholic Church. If every Catholic voter followed Sheen’s advice, Catholics would almost always vote only Republican, which is probably what he wants anyway.
The thing that Sheen does not realize is that many Catholic voters just do not care what the Catholic Church says. If they did really care, Sheen would not have had to write his letter.
The point I’m trying to make here is that it is a miracle many voters do not blindly vote according to Church teaching. That would be the end of the political process because religious beliefs would be exploited for political gain. People need to think on their own and they need to make decisions that are best for them. That is where von Arx, Lakeland and Doody got it right.
These men understand that Fairfield University’s purpose is to educate, not indoctrinate.
‘ ‘ ‘ Sincerely,
‘ ‘ ‘ Patrick Connolly ’09
Leave a Reply