The Country Can Benefit from Catholic Social Teaching

In an interview published this weekend on National Review Online, Carl Anderson, head of the Knights of Columbus, calls on Catholics to participate more fully in our national civic life and to answer Pope John Paul II's challenge to build a "civilization of love."

At one point in the interview, the interviewer, Kathryn Jean Lopez, brings up a question that has been a point of contention in the current political season: doesn't an insistence upon using Catholic social teaching as a guide for Catholic voters put the Church in the position of dictating who should get our vote? Anderson makes clear that the Church's position transcends mere partisanship.

LOPEZ: You make clear that Catholics should be “following Catholic social teaching in their own lives . . . withholding our votes from candidates and propositions that oppose Church teaching on matters of intrinsic evil.” You go on to say that this “should be done in every case, in every race for political office, regardless of the party of the candidate.” You continue, “It is impossible to say what party might benefit most in the long run,” but “if Catholics take such a stand, we could literally change the face of our country’s political debates.” But in the short term, doesn’t that mean not voting for Barack Obama? Is there a danger that Catholics will become too aligned with one party?

ANDERSON: There are candidates in both parties, seeking local, state, and federal offices. Some in each party are pro-life, some in each party are not. My point should not be taken simply in the context of one race, but in the context of all of them. We should apply an objective principle, and we should do so consistently. If we make exceptions based on party, it nullifies the effectiveness of the entire proposition. We need to get back to looking at our political choices from the perspective of the bible and our Judeo-Christian values. We shouldn’t conform our values to our political preferences.

 Anderson goes on to point out that religious liberty has long been at the service of the common good in the United States, giving the example of the Civil Rights movement.

LOPEZ: What can defenders of religious liberty learn from the civil-rights movement?

ANDERSON: The civil-rights movement was successful because it was in the right, and it was based on the Judeo-Christian principles that informed the history of this country and the lives of most Americans. The Judeo-Christian arguments so powerful then — for instance that all are created equal by their creator — are equally powerful in defense of religious liberty. We are no less American because we are people of faith. If anything, we are far closer to the great values that have shaped this country than secularists are. Americans are both a religious people and a people committed to the First Amendment. We should remember that. And we should, like those in the civil-rights movement, never be afraid to stand up for the truth, and to declare that faithful Americans are entitled to rights and protections guaranteed us not only by our Constitution, but, even more important, by God.

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