Trump Card

Last week’s election was, many say, a defining moment for America. It was for sure a significant development in American politics. A total outsider with no experience in mainstream politics is the President-elect.

Watching the election returns was surreal. I’m a product of the Reagan 80s and enjoyed seeing the Dukakis implosion, Clinton I’s rise to power, and Bush Part Two. But this was something different altogether. I was in a small town for the day watching the polls and small-town politics was quite a sight. And it was a privilege to see the record turnout from people of each party in voting for what they believed in.

Beyond the Abortion Wars (Charles Camosy)

It’s been more than a year since I read this book. Thinking of what to write was nearly as difficult as starting the book. At first it seemed to be a banal attempt by yet another Catholic moralist to justify certain allowances in the abortion arena. It read initially as a way to justify political horse-trading with pro-abortion politicians from a Catholic point of view. What Charles Camosy’s argument became, however, was an intelligent and thoughtful way to approach the abortion debate in the United States today. The end goal, as Camosy describes it, is to enact public policy that protects both mother and child in ways that people on both sides of the debate claim they want to see. Although I do not agree with all of Camosy’s arguments or conclusions, this is an important addition to the discussion surrounding abortion and, I think, can help move various factions to some agreement on a majority of the issues in the debate. It’s at least something that pro-life advocates should read and be aware of in the full panoply of the debate.

Camosy’s book offers a historical background, an evaluation of various arguments for and against recognition of the personhood of the unborn child (or “prenatal child,” in Camosy’s words), and a discussion of how those arguments may play out in legal and societal terms. He ends with an appeal for legislation he called the “Act,” a sweeping list of protections for mothers and their children–born and unborn.

Through the heart of Camosy’s argument run a theme that Catholics should pay particular attention to, and which they will disregard at their own peril. That is, we need to have a more complete approach to the abortion debate rather than the binary language to which Camosy points throughout the book. As he notes, churches and religious leaders must be completely pro-life, offering shelters for women in difficult situations so they have the support they need to bring their babies to term, increased access to affordable healthcare, support for women who need to work so that financial considerations do not motivate someone to obtain an abortion, and myriad other provisions that would recognize and support the gift that is motherhood and the important–the irreplaceable–role that women play in society. He notes:

We should be lining up to adopt babies of various races and health conditions; we should be using our free time to provide free child-care for needy women in our local communities and churches; every parish and church should offer shelter and assistance to pregnant women in difficult situations and offer programs of counseling and healing for women who have had abortions.

I totally agree. And I know so many people who are doing these very things. Some have devoted their lives to it. Yet the fact that some have devoted their lives to such a pursuit underscores how Carmosy’s compromises ultimately make his overall argument fail.

Where Camosy’s argument fails is in his allowance of abortion by another name. What he labels “Refusal to Aid,” which he also labels an “indirect” abortion, still is the killing of an unborn child. He admits that it would still be “perhaps morally wrong” but believes it to be justified because a woman may have, in his mind, “a proportionately serious reason for choosing not to aid the prenatal child.” And if she has such a reason, then the pregnancy is an “undue burden.” This is a euphemism to end all euphemisms. As two examples, Camosy offers “(1) a clear and unambiguous terminal diagnosis, confirmed by more than one OB-GYN, and agreed to by the attending neonatologist, and (2) a situation in which there is a significant chance the baby will die in utero, labor could be induced prematurely.” In both cases, it is hard to see how a premature induction of labor is not a direct act to kill the baby, no matter what the supposed diagnosis. In two lines, Camosy undermines the first part of the book extolling the dignity of human life and the need to protect it. Countless examples of misdiagnoses are documented every day, not to mention that allowing a baby to be born and die in the arms of its mother and father and family members carries a dignity of its own that is absent when a life is snuffed out in the womb.

Camosy’s argument, although beneficial to the debate–particularly the need for legislation helping both women and children–is inadequate and unconvincing as a solution. It still results in too many abortions and too subjective a standard for evaluating an “undue burden.”

My analysis of this book comes a year after I read it and with the perspective of a sad Supreme Court opinion that firmly entrenched the flimsy rationale of Casey into future of Supreme Court precedent. The political will to end abortion has been dealt a sharp blow so that even proposals like Camosy’s have little to no chance of success.

As noted before, Camosy’s book is an important addition to the abortion discussion and should be required reading for anyone who is going to be engaging in it. Ultimately, however, I find Camosy’s arguments unavailing and lacking in the firm conviction we need to address the problem head on and protect innocent life.

For a complimentary review copy of this book, I offered to write a fair review. You can find this book at http://www.eerdmans.com/Products/7128/beyond-the-abortion-wars.aspx.

 

 

 

 

 

Obergefell v. Hodges

The Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges–redefining “marriage” as a union between two people, regardless of gender–is one more step in the natural progression of our culture. We’ve been on the decline for a while now. But what was so unnerving about the Obergefell decision was the majority’s willingness to abandon any pretense of constitutional analysis in favor of reaching the end they desired and saw as inevitable. What is more, the majority does not even apologize  for their failure to provide a single, cogent reason for their decision. Perhaps they didn’t care. Or, perhaps, they have become so blinded to the Constitution as a result of the incessant call for “equality” and “justice.” As Chief Justice Roberts so accurately stated:

If you are among the many Americans—of whatever sexual orientation—who favor expanding same-sex marriage, by all means celebrate today’s decision. Celebrate the achievement of a desired goal. Celebrate the opportunity for a new expression of commitment to a partner. Celebrate the availability of new benefits. But do not celebrate the Constitution. It had nothing to do with it.

Whatever the majority’s motivation for issuing the “opinion” they did, it is now the settled law of our land that every state must recognize a same-sex union as a “marriage.” No more debate; no more votes. Maybe. We have no choice but to accept the decision for what it is, but we do not need to accept–indeed, cannot accept–the flawed underlying premises. Justice Kennedy’s attempt to make “liberty” a license to do anything collapses under the weight he asks it to bear. Justice Kennedy’s liberty knows no bounds, as he made clear decades ago in the “sweet mystery of life” passage in Casey:

At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.

Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 (1992). With this foundation, liberty can mean anything you want. And to the unthinking observer, arguing against such a lofty concept as liberty seems indefensible.

But as Justice Thomas noted in dissent, the original concept of “liberty” was a negative one: the freedom from government intervention. Once “liberty” becomes the basis for positive rights (or governmental benefits and privileges), it risks becoming a concept so broad that it is rendered meaningless. Justice Scalia had criticized Justice Kennedy’s inchoate use of “liberty” in the 2003 decision, Lawrence v. Texas:

 I have never heard of a law that attempted to restrict one’s “right to define” certain concepts; and if the passage calls into question the government’s power to regulate actions based onone’s self-defined “concept of existence, etc.,” it is the passage that ate the rule of law.

A mere twelve years later, Justice Kennedy is at it again, exalting liberty as one’s right “to define and express their identity.” From that unprincipled starting point, Kennedy goes on to overlook two millennia of precedent for traditional marriage and to find four new principles that, in the majority’s mind, justifies the expansion of “marriage” to same-sex unions.

I’ll spare you the details of Justice Kennedy’s explanation, which reads like a high-school sophomore’s extemporaneous essay. What I want to point you to is Chief Justice Roberts’ dissent. Although all four dissents highlight different errors in the majority’s reasoning (yes, it pains me to dignify it that way), Chief Justice Roberts offers a chilling prediction for the future of believers in America (emphasis mine):

Federal courts are blunt instruments when it comes to creating rights. They have constitutional power only to resolve concrete cases or controversies; they do not have the flexibility of legislatures to address concerns of parties not before the court or to anticipate problems that may arise from the exercise of a new right. Today’s decision, for example, creates serious questions about religious liberty. Many good and decent people oppose same-sex marriage as a tenet of faith, and their freedom to exercise religion is—unlike the right imagined by the majority—actually spelled out in the Constitution. Amdt. 1.

Respect for sincere religious conviction has led voters and legislators in every State that has adopted same-sex marriage democratically to include accommodations for religious practice. The majority’s decision imposing same-sex marriage cannot, of course, create any such accommodations. The majority graciously suggests that religious believers may continue to “advocate” and “teach” their views of marriage.  Ante, at 27. The First Amendment guarantees, however, the freedom to “exercise” religion. Ominously, that is not a word the majority uses.

Hard questions arise when people of faith exercise religion in ways that may be seen to conflict with the new right to same-sex marriage—when, for example, a religious college provides married student housing only to opposite-sex married couples, or a religious adoption agency declines to place children with same-sex married couples. Indeed, the Solicitor General candidly acknowledged that the tax exemptions of some religious institutions would be in question if they opposed same-sex marriage. See Tr. of Oral Arg. on Question 1, at 36–38. There is little doubt that these and similar questions will soon be before this Court. Unfortunately, people of faith can take no comfort in the treatment they receive from the majority today.

Perhaps the most discouraging aspect of today’s decision is the extent to which the majority feels compelled to sully those on the other side of the debate. The majority offers a cursory assurance that it does not intend to disparage people who, as a matter of conscience, cannot accept same-sex marriage.  Ante, at 19. That disclaimer is hard to square with the very next sentence, in which the majority explains that “the necessary consequence” of laws codifying the traditional definition of marriage is to “demea[n] or stigmatiz[e]” same-sex couples.  Ante, at 19.  The majority reiterates such characterizations over and over. By the majority’s account, Americans who did nothing more than follow the understanding of marriage that has existed for our entire history—in particular, the tens of millions of people who voted to reaffirm their States’ enduring definition of marriage—have acted to “lock . . . out,” “disparage,” “disrespect and subordinate,” and inflict “[d]ignitary wounds” upon their gay and lesbian neighbors.  Ante, at 17, 19, 22, 25. These apparent assaults on the character of fairminded people will have an effect, in society and in court. See post, at 6–7 (Alito, J., dissenting). Moreover, they are entirely gratuitous. It is one thing for the majority to conclude that the Constitution protects a right to same-sex marriage; it is something else to portray everyone who does not share the majority’s “better informed understanding” as bigoted.

Time will tell just how correct Chief Justice Roberts is in his prediction. But it is only a matter of time. The persecution of those who do not kowtow to the new social order can expect to face some consequences.

But that does not mean that we are to shut our doors and hide behind some protective barrier, assuming we could even find one. It is not time to be a huddled remnant. It is, however, time to come together as a community of believers, to deepen our commitment to the faith and its moral order, and to resolve here and now to be saints. This is the time we have been given and we should all be hearing the call to use the gifts God gave us to help transform the society in which we live.