04/14/2004: "Kerry, Catholicism, and abortion"

The Religion News Service's "Quote of the Day" is from Frances Kissling, president of the oxymoronic Catholics for a Free Choice, who declares:

"There is something profoundly disturbing about the current media attention focused on Sen. John Kerry's religious practice. For reporters to follow whether or not the senator receives Communion is an inappropriate invasion of private and sacred space."

Actually, what's far more disturbing is Kissling seeking to dissolve the bond between Catholics and their Church by claiming that one can be pro-abortion and Catholic, but that's another story. On Kerry, she's all wet, but she's consistent. The way she justifies being a pro-abortion Catholic is by claiming that religion and public policy have nothing to do with one another. What she's saying here is that Kerry's radically pro-abortion politics (he was among the few senators to vote against the partial-birth ban) have nothing to do with his claim, which he has promoted in his presidential campaign, to be a faithful son of the Church. I suspect that it will be the Church's leadership, rather than a Vatican-basher like Kissling, that will ultimately decide whether being a pro-abortion legislator and a Catholic are incompatible. In the meantime, as long as Kerry continues to trumpet his religious bona fides on the campaign trail, his willingness to lay aside one of his church's most important ethical teachings for the sake of his political ambitions is unquestionably newsworthy.