Governor’s Race: Disappointing Revelations

For any pro-lifer, Wendy Davis is a non-starter as a candidate.  Her extreme position supporting abortion just excludes her from the get-go.  That just goes without saying.

Our hope was in Greg Abbott who has always (to my knowledge) been described as pro-life.  Without having done much research into this, I took it at face value.  That said, I am always aware that pro-life is a continuum and self-proclaiming one as pro-life does not really mean much.

Today I was watching the gubernatorial debate from last night.  I was struck by what Abbott said when the question turned to abortion.  I pulled the transcript to be sure I heard correctly and it was worse than what I first thought.  Here are his comments in full:

I AM PRO-LIFE AND I'M CATHOLIC. LIKE MOST TEXANS, I BELIEVE ALL LIFE IS SACRED. AS GOVERNOR, I WILL DEVELOP A CULTURE OF LIFE IN THE STATE SO WE CAN DO EVEN MORE TO PROTECT WOMEN AND CHILDREN. TO DIRECTLY ANSWER YOUR QUESTION, TEXAS IS ENSURING THAT WE PROTECT MORE LIFE AND DO A BETTER JOB OF PROTECTING THE HEALTH CARE OF WOMEN BY PROVIDING THAT WOMEN STILL HAVE FIVE MONTHS TO MAKE A VERY DIFFICULT DECISION. AFTER THAT TIME, THE STATE HAS AN INTEREST IN PROTECTING INNOCENT LIFE.

Closed-Captioning Transcript at 7:11 from C-SPAN.  (Bold emphasis mine.)

There are too many mistakes in this for it to be a mere misstatement.  It was smoothly delivered, as if rehearsed.  Let’s analyze the mistakes from a Catholic, pro-life perspective.

FIRST, if all life is sacred – and it is – then we protect all life without exceptions.  Those that legislate should work to do so, incrementally if necessary, but working without ceasing to add more and more protections to all life – from conception to natural death.  That is the Catholic ethic on life.

SECOND, it is NOT pro-life to “do a better job of protecting the health care of women by providing that women still have five months to make a very difficult decision.”  Our respect for life and protection of it does not begin at 20 weeks.  Our job as pro-lifers is NOT to ensure that abortion remains available until 20 weeks.  That is simply not a pro-life position.

THIRD, abortion is not healthcare.  I have written before about how you have to be so careful about adopting the language of the other side.  It is truly unfortunate to have “the pro-life” candidate make this statement. 

So what’s a pro-lifer to do in this situation?  Follow your own well-formed conscience.  Objectively, an argument can be made that Abbott is marginally better than Davis.  As such, of course, it is not a sin to cast a vote for him and he is not advocating for abortion in the same extreme way as Davis.

But I think it’s also moral to decide to sit this one out.  He has just said, as a Catholic, that pro-lifers work to ensure the availability of abortion – as health care – for the first five months. That will have ramifications for what can be done legislatively while he is governor. 

Also, I am sick and tired of having poor candidates from which to choose and rewarding those that throw us a bone now and again (although this was not such a bone) who then do not do much while in office, having arrived there because of our vote, which they received in part because we were afraid of the worse alternative. 

What about the argument that not voting for Abbott is a vote for Davis?  You will likely hear this.  I already have.  While I understand the sentiment and what they are trying to do, that is just simply not true. I do not believe not voting for one candidate is a vote for the other.  It is a non-vote.  It adds no vote to anyone.  This is a matter upon which people can disagree – whether to vote for Abbott or not given his non-pro-life statements – but it is not fair to say that those who do not vote for him have voted for Wendy.  The votes will be cast and those cast will be counted. Non-votes do not somehow add to the tally of the other candidate.  Neither candidate gets a vote.  It's a neutral act in terms of the numbers.

I hope that Abbott rethinks this position. It was a very disappointing revelation, but also a very telling one that we needed to hear before determining for whom – or whether – to vote.   Voting for a candidate or choosing not to vote (in protest, which is not apathy, so don’t buy into those arguments either) is not to be determined cavalierly.  Continue to follow the campaign, continue to evaluate as new information becomes available, pray about it, pray for the candidates, then act on your well-formed conscience.  That’s the best any of us can do.

            Thanks for reading!

Another Inconvenient Truth: Oral Contraceptives Are Dangerous

This post is going to be uncharacteristically short, but serves as an important update and additional source for prior blog posts on the topic of contraception.

A month ago, on the Feast of St. Edith Stein, I wrote about contraception and covered a number of bases: how Texas pays for it for low income women and the immorality of that; how that is awfully close to eugenics; how we must be morally consistent in our pro-life ethic; how contraceptives (not just “emergency” contraceptives) are abortifacient; and the serious health risks of hormonal contraception, especially “the Pill.” 

Today I saw an article, entitled “Link Between Breast Cancer and Contraceptives Now Too Big to Ignore,” that discusses how yet another study establishes (again) how dangerous oral hormonal contraception is. (And, I submit, probably all similar hormonal contraceptives whether taken orally or by some other means, carry this risk; e.g., injections, implants, patches. I suspect that the danger with the medications is not the means by which one gets them into one’s body, but the chemicals ingested and how they affect one’s body. They seem to all work on a similar principle.) 

The article discusses this new study, its methodology, and the unmistakable findings about the increased breast cancer risk. It also discusses how political pressure and a certain feminist ideology is keeping medical professionals from telling women the truth.  It brought to mind this simple, but profound and all-too-often applicable verse from the Bible:  “Pilate said to him, ‘What is truth?’” John 19:38 (RSV, CE)

The conclusion of the article discussing the research is spot on:

There is a great deal of political pressure to avoid condemning oral contraceptives. The lobbying to make hormonal contraceptives a mandated benefit of the Affordable Care Act and the reticence to allow religious exemptions to this mandate are evidence of the power of contraception advocates.

Many women erroneously believe they cannot be successful unless they render themselves sterile. It is the purveyors of this myth who are waging the real war on women. The lives of young women are being sacrificed because of this radical feminist ideology. It is time for medical professionals to speak clearly and without apology about the dangers of hormonal contraception.

(Emphasis added.)

As I have written before, in Texas, thanks to the Women’s Healthcare Program, we have had government funded contraception for low income women for years now – loooooong before Obamacare.  Think about that.  Pray about that.  

Medical professionals need to be honest about what this kind of contraception does: that it can be abortifacient and that it has serious health risks, including but not limited to cancer. Pro-lifers need to re-evaluate any support for contraception (especially that which is abortifacient and/or carcinogenic) as well and realize, as we’ve discussed before, that support for contraception is a moral impediment to the overall success of the pro-life movement (such as any efforts to have a Personhood or Human Life Amendment).  

Politicians need to think about what they are doing to women's health - and this is a women's health issue even though contraception is not health care, it is quite the opposite. We need to apply pressure to politicians at all levels of government to stop taxpayer funded contraception programs. Government needs to exempt those individuals, corporations, and religious organizations who object from being forced to pay for these toxins.

I encourage our clergy to boldly speak and write about what the Church teaches about contraception and counsel individuals on the matter as well. And, I encourage both clergy and the laity (the latter having an ongoing moral responsibility to learn about your Faith and then put it into action) to really read, absorb, and pray over Humanae Vitae so that you realize how prophetic it was (and is) and what a gift it continues to be to the Church and the world. I encourage the laity to look into Natural Family Planning (and to learn and understand when it is morally licit to use.)

I have long believed that in many things science and history – when accurate – will end up supporting morality even if what is moral is ignored, rejected, and treated with hostility by the majority. Always remember that one cannot escape consequences by simply choosing not to believe truth or asking "What is truth?" to avoid the issue.  Right is right even if only 1% believe it or live it, after all.  

         Thanks for reading!