Cafeteria Catholics: A Longish Response to Rick Garnett

Cafeteria Catholics: A Longish Response to Rick Garnett by MSW

The difference Cuomo should have highlighted, aside from echoing JFK on the fact that Christendom has no place in American politics (with Christendom being defined as the bishops using discipline to get Catholic politicians to vote right), is the fact that not a lot can be done about abortion rights, save going through the complex task of getting Congress to grant personhood to the unborn (something states cannot constitutionally do). Quite a bit can, and is, done on the other issues - from war and peace to funding more effective adult education and family income support programs - which take money and alliances with faith based institutions to do well. Conservatives focus on what they and liberal Catholics cannot do precisely because it allows them to not do anything on those issues where progress is possible. The bishops abet them in this task, and they should not.

The theology of the empty tomb on these issues is complex, as the empty tomb is the claim that the Lord was justified in his actions on the cross. What we believe about the crucifixion has a lot to do with what be believe about morality. If Jesus was on a vision quest to experience human suffering, then the magic moment of salvation was when he cried out to God in agony in the voice of the suffering servant. If the magic moment was his death in order to satisfy divine blood lust, than morality must take take a more conservative voice - favoring orthodoxy and justification over charity and individual responsibility and punishment over community solutions to abortion. It is the key question, but I don't think this is what MSW meant.