As Americans participated in the historic election of Barack Obama and Joseph Biden as the next president and vice president of the United States, Catholic voters also made a significant statement about their willingness to ignore their bishops when considering how to cast their ballot. Once again, Catholic voters showed that as goes the Catholic vote, so goes the election. According to exit polls, Catholics voted 54 percent for President-Elect Barack Obama and 45 percent for Senator John McCain. As the bishops meet this week in Baltimore at their annual fall assembly, we hope they will spend some time reflecting on the will of Catholic voters and where those few bishops who huffed and puffed their way through the election and pushed a hard-line approach went wrong.
As shown in our poll, "The Catholic Voter in Summer 2008," Catholic voters, like all voters around the country, are most concerned with the bread-and-butter issues that effect all Americans. Catholics showed once again that the most important factors in their decision about who should be the next president and the issues they want him to focus on were improving the economy, affordable health care, ending the war in Iraq and keeping the country safe from terrorism. Catholics represented the largest swing in religious voters in this presidential election, with seven percent more Catholics voting for the Democratic candidate as compared to 2004.
Catholics voted their conscience over the objections of their bishops who issued statements and lobbied against the candidacy of Barack Obama because of his prochoice stance. This wasn't always easy; on the eve of the election, Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City-St, Joseph, appearing on a radio show, said to Catholics considering a vote for the Democratic candidate: "Give consideration to your eternal salvation."
While it was a small minority of the bishops across the country, there were several who pushed the message that the issue of abortion should trump all others for Catholic voters on Election Day. A letter from Fort Worth Bishop Kevin Vann and Dallas Bishop Kevin Farrell called abortion "intrinsically evil" and said that it is "morally impermissible" for Catholics to vote for prochoice candidates over pro-life candidates. Bishop Arthur J. Serratelli from Patterson, NJ criticized President-Elect Obama's support of the Freedom of Choice Act writing that, "We choose our leaders who make our laws. Every vote counts. Today, either we choose to respect and protect life, especially the life of the child in the womb of the mother or we sanction the loss of our most basic freedoms. At this point, we are still free to choose!"
Many Catholics were rightly turned off by this overt electioneering. In our poll of likely Catholic voters, 70 percent said that the views of Catholic bishops are unimportant to them in deciding for whom to vote and 73 percent said they believe they are under no religious obligation to vote on issues the way the bishops recommend. On Election Day, Catholic voters held firm to those views and showed just how misguided those few bishops and conservative Catholics are who claimed the issue of abortion must trump all others.
Despite the hierarchy's claims that abortion needed to be the one issue that Catholics voted on, and in direct contradiction to alarmist claims made by a few reporters and headline writers, Catholics overwhelmingly disagreed with the idea that abortion should be the deciding factor this election. Those bishops who didn't interfere in this election cycle are to be commended for not going the old route of communion wars and threats of excommunications. There is change in the air and more and more public officials recognize that the views of the hierarchy do not reflect the views or votes of their constituents.
Those few bishops who sought to make the election about abortion, and abortion alone, showed how out of touch they are with most Catholics. We hope that, as the bishops come together this week, they do not bend to those ultra-conservative bishops but instead temper the dialogue, seeking to bring their flocks with them and not push them away. The bishops should not spend this week attempting to spin doctor their way out of a crushing defeat. Instead they should focus on a pastoral approach to the common good that speaks to the majority of Catholics who voted in favor of a president who shares their values on sexual and reproductive health-as well as many other issues.
As prochoice Catholics, we celebrate the election of a prochoice president who has been a strong supporter of abortion rights, comprehensive sexuality education and access to reproductive health care. The next administration will have to work hard to repair the damage done to reproductive right during the last eight years: the Global Gag Rule, abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, subordinating science to personal belief, and a pervasive program against family-planning efforts. Undoubtedly, concerns about America's economic security and military engagements overseas will garner a great deal of attention. However, we urge the next administration and Congress to also work for advances in reproductive health care in the US and abroad.
Catholic voters overwhelmingly endorsed an agenda that includes access to family planning, comprehensive age-appropriate sex education and caring adoption programs in order to reduce the need for abortion. We will continue to stand with this majority of Catholics worldwide who disagree with the dictates of the Vatican on matters related to sexuality, contraception and parenthood. We are excited about the prospect of working with the new administration and Congress to effect change for the better on issues of sexual and reproductive health and rights, both domestically and internationally.
Read the Catholics for Choice statement on the bishops' gathering in Baltimore here.
