The following comes from an August 24 Angelus post written by Archbishop Gomez:
I am still trying to get my mind around this year’s election.
People have been asking me: What’s going on in America? I’m not sure I have the answers. But I’ve been praying, reading and thinking a lot about the question. These are some initial reflections.
What strikes me first is that many important issues are not being discussed — beginning with the ongoing daily injustice of abortion, the killing of innocent unborn children, which in recent years is being aggressively promoted as a fundamental “right” that trumps every other right and consideration in our society.
In no particular order, here are some other issues that are on my heart but don’t see being talked about by candidates in any meaningful way:
› Homelessness and joblessness, especially in minority communities; the crisis of affordable housing in our major cities;
› Continued evidence of racial injustice in our society;
› The injustice of the death penalty; the conditions in our prisons and inequities in the ways we define crimes and punish those convicted;
› The growing promotion of euthanasia and assisted suicide;
› The denial of rights to farmworkers and other low-income and undocumented workers.
And there are more.
Christians face genocidal persecution in the Middle East and Africa, and there is a dramatic undermining of religious freedom and the rights of conscience going on here in the United States. Where is the discussion in this year’s elections?
Developments in warfare in recent years — the use of drones, how we choose “targets” and define “enemy combatants” — all raise sharp moral issues. Yet no one is discussing these issues, either.
Democracy cannot stand without a proper understanding of the human person.
Government exists to serve the person and to ensure the conditions in which persons can grow and flourish. If we don’t know what a person “is” or what a person is “for,” we risk becoming a society in which men and women are turned into material instruments to be exploited.
It is clear that we need a new politics — a politics of the heart that emphasizes mercy, love and solidarity. The disturbing signs in our public life are all the “fruits” of radical secularism and radical individualism.
Pray for me this week and I will pray for you. And let us ask our Blessed Mother Mary to intercede for our country, and especially for the poor.
Catholic bishops cozying up to evil Democrat politicians is partially to blame for the mess this country is in, Excellency.
For the archbishop to use the word “injustice” in referring to both abortion and the death penalty is irresponsible and incorrect.
Abortion is an injustice, to put it mildly; it’s actually a grave horror and evil, but at least the bishop called attention to its evil.
The death penalty is not an injustice. The death penalty is just in itself because it can be a legitimate option in the administration of justice. A particular instance of applying capital punishment might be unjust, but the death penalty itself cannot be called unjust.
To equate abortion and the death penalty as both being unjust, as the…
Catholic teaching does not fall neatly into “Democrat” nor “Republican” categories, Sawyer. The Church teaches not according to party platform, but according to the dictates of the Gospel. The Church’s teaching on abortion for instance finds favor in the GOP; and her teaching on the death penalty with the Dems. One finds the Church’s position straddling and intersecting between the parties. And rightly so! Catholics in the US have to live with the fact that there is NO political home for them that houses in its platform all of the Church’s teaching. One party may have more of the top priority teachings of the Church in its platform than the others. But for you to say that the Church’s bishops “cozy up to” Democrats…
is patently false for there are bishops who also associate with Republicans. Therefore your accusation is false.
Now concerning the death penalty, good for Gomez to mention it! The issue may not have the same weight as abortion (as the CDF Letter clarifies), but its abolition is in harmony with the Church’s teaching on the sanctity of ALL LIFE. And because of that, the teaching against the death penalty MATTERS! Its use in our time is IMMORAL AND UNJUST which is why JP2, Benedict, Francis, and all the bishops of the universal Church are calling for its ABOLITION! Vote YES on 62, NO on 66!
Whereas it is not morally justifiable today for a Catholic to vote for Democrat candidates, it is morally justifiable to vote for Republican candidates.
Democrats in office are the reason for nearly all of America’s ills. Republicans are the best hope for fixing things and returning to a nation with more moral laws.
Catholic bishops who have cozied up to evil Democrat politicians by being chummy with them instead of chastising them for their advancement of intrinsic evils in law bear responsibility for America’s current mess. Catholic bishops and their “charity” organizations have a gravy train of government grants that they don’t want to jeopardize. Under CA’s “Catholic” governor, laws have become more immoral than ever…
Oh, so according to Sawyer, bishops “cozy” up to some politicians on behalf of Catholic charitable organizations, many of which I am sure do a lot of good. Is therefore the verb “cozy up” the right verb or shouldn’t it be “do business with” or even “lobby on behalf of Catholic charities’? Because if we’re talking “cozy up with”, there are MANY bishops who also “cozy up” to Republican politicians, and not necessarily for causes like Catholic charities.
Sawyer, you are very ignorant of how the grant procedure works. You don’t need to cozy up to politicians to get grants. Many Catholic diocese are no longer applying for government grants that require a violation of the Faith (and more will follow those brave leaders). The Bishops have been trying to educate both Catholic and non-Catholic politicians on moral issues for decades. I think your criticisms are unfair and uniformed.
AMEN!
OOPS…..continued……least my comment be misunderstood…..
AMEN! is for SAWYER above. Well said.
Political Scientist Gomez says he’s not sure he has the answers to what’s going on.
He sure convinced me of that.
H, I just read an article about the US Bishops accepting $650,000 from the top billionaire liberal of all time to help with expenses during the Pope’s visit last year? Guess who? George Soros! He offered it to buy influence in this election. Guess Soros is getting his moneys worth already from some diocese. You cannot make this stuff up. But it is still a very sad sign of the times. Pray God deliver us from all the enemies attacking Catholics, especially those compromised inside the church.
H, continued……another unholy donation by Soros…..reported by Life Site news @ http://www.lifenews.com/2016/08/25/george-soros-gave-planned-parenthood-1-5-million-to-cover-up-sales-of-aborted-baby-parts/
He gave PP $1.5 Million to help them COVER-up their sales of aborted baby parts. So evil and unholy an action it cries to heaven. Disgusting.
TEMPLES OF SEDITION
https://www.churchmilitant.com/video/episode/vortex-temples-of-sedition?mc_cid=7d9695683f&mc_eid=2379a41bd0
Hillary Clinton is evil. There is no other way to say the reality. She is evil.
That the United States will have an evil person such as her as the next leader is a heart-stopping notion. Obama was the warm-up act to this evil woman
Like goodness, there is a hierarchy to evil as well. Not all evil is equally malicious, just as all good is not equally sublime. And barring an act of God, she will be the next president of the United States This Luciferian candidate has the Luciferian media backing her nearly completely
And a nation which has given itself over to every Luciferian act imaginable sees no…
Well said MMcD…….HC = EVIL = (as the) fruit of her labors show.
God help us all in this country if Catholics don’t wake up to that fact. They need to VOTE them out and repent for the last bad voting for evil in the form of BO x 2.
God Bless America in His mercy!
M McD – Can’t remember his name, but an author wrote a book in 2008 in which he said on the back cover that HRC was “SOULLESS”! I thought that comment summed up her very well.
With all due respect, Your Excellency, such statements from you and your brother bishops are a big part of the problems we face today. For example, your seamless argument on abortion and the death penalty are a disgrace.
From 1976 to 2016, there has been a total of 1437 people executed in the United States. Executions involve those who commit heinous crimes.
From 1976 to 2015, there has been a total of 61,721,487 babies aborted in the United States. None of these babies committed any crime. BTW: The last 6 years, several states are not required to report abortions, so this almost 62 million number is actually higher.
How many bishops and priests vote for Democrats? A non-vote for Trump or a write-in candidate is a vote for Clinton…
AMEN Peggy. Let’s pray & hope the USCCB & our bishops & fellow Catholics VOTE them out! Stop supporting intrinsic evil as it has a way of spreading. Aren’t the gates of hell gapping wide enough in this country already? Tragic & cries to heaven that so many (so called) Catholics freely voted for BO, twice. Look where we are now as a country after almost 8 years of his shoving Sodom & Gomorrah on our infrastructure….meaning- schools, hospitals, businesses, local governments? The war attacking religious freedom is on folks. Don’t lose it by voting for the enemy! God help us in His mercy!
The sad facts…..The ‘death penalty’ issue was offered by progressive Bishops to muddy up support for the top, worst intrinsic evil of all time = ABORTION = 40M+ dead babies & counting. IF YOU VOTE them in (again), you put your immortal soul at risk as you cannot support that type of evil & be ‘Catholic’. NO OTHER ISSUE today trumps the evil of killing babies in the womb. NONE. Of course other evils exist. But to a MUCH lesser degree. May God enlighten all those lead astray by the ways of the world. May God bless America with pro-life,pro-Christian & pro-American leaders. It is our duty to support them. Pray.
Continued…….SPEAKING of pro-AMERICA. NEWS of HC’s plan to irreversible damage our country by allowing 1 million muslims in her first term! Read this & weep for our land: http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/08/26/immigration-expert-u-s-resettle-nearly-one-million-muslim-migrants-one-term-clinton-presidency/ As we know, assimilation to these folks is: us infidels converting to their religion & sharia law ruling over our country’s constitution which they do not recognize. Vote her out or say goodbye to our current way of life for us & our offspring forever………..God protect us from the unholy global designs of our leaders forever.
All comments above are right-on —- except those of Jon.
Jon, educate yourself by reading these comments and learn. In addition to voting correctly, you will be a better Catholic and it will help in your salvation.
Peggy – Methinks you may be jousting with a (Paid?) Troll, who could care less about the Catholic Faith and is (like other ‘anonymous homosex trolls) just here for disruption.
I recommend – just scroll past the troll, and look for worthy exchanges.
America turn back from the clutches of the culture of death. The slaughter of the unborn at close to one million killed each year in America is the number one issue in this election that nobody seems to be talking about. The persecution and genocide of Christian communities in the Middle East and Africa is another very important issue that is not being talked about during this election campaign. The protection of the traditional family is another major issue that should be talked about. If America does not change its course it will be under the judgement of Almighty God. Pray America Pray before it’s too late!
Restoring the Political-Moral Center
by Shimon Cowen and Arthur Goldberg
https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2016/08/17530/
Politicians should return to the common-denominator universal ethical values –
Until the second half of the twentieth century, the major parties of the left and the right in the United States and in other advanced Western democracies operated within a framework of shared basic moral values –
Until recent years, it was unthinkable that the major parties of the right and the left would operate outside the periphery of these traditional, universal ethics that have prevailed for centuries –
These advocates of the new “politically correct” ideology seek to prohibit all religious teaching in schools and…
Its Official Huma Abedins’ MOTHER Does Not Support Hillary Clinton for President
https://www.capoliticalreview.com/capoliticalnewsandviews/its-official-huma-abedins-mother-does-not-support-hillary-clinton-for-president/?utm_source=CAPoliticalReview.com
The top advisor and closest BFF to the openly corrupt Hillary Clinton is Huma Abedin—she is married to the perverted former Congressman Winer, who likes to show off his “stuff” on the Internet to young ladies.
Huma is the former EDITOR of a radical Muslim magazine that calls for child marriage, women being submissive, lashing and stoning’s. But, her mother edited a book that spoke to women in the workplace.
“In 1999, Saleha translated and edited a book titled “Women in Islam: A…
Community Organizer Gomez doesn’t like the country, its system, its founders, its people, its culture. So why does he stay?
I got it. Must be the food. Not the cuisine, just its ready availability.
Over 50 % of the “Catholics” who voted in the 2008 election voted for pro-abortion candidates. Those candidates are the ones with a (D) after their name. “If you lie down with dogs, you come up with fleas”.