JFK’s Houston Speech and Cardinal O’Connor vs. NY Gov. Cuomo

[Pat]

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JFK’s Houston Speech and Cardinal O’Connor vs. NY Gov. Cuomo
(or What’s The Difference Between Enactment in the U.S. of Islamic Law, aka Sharia, and the Enactment in the U.S. of Roman Catholic Law???)


I must be asleep at the switch!!! But it is not too late to add the following issue to Wednesday evening’s agenda.

For a month, we’ve been focusing on abortion and, to a great extent, the position of the Roman Catholic Church in opposing it.

And I completely forgot an extra dimension to this imbroglio -- whether Catholic politicians should be elected if they will be compelled by the Catholic Church to support legislation enacting Catholic Doctrine.

After all, the American media and American politicians have been constantly railing against the establishment of Islamic Law (aka Sharia) in countries whose majorities are Muslim!!!

But when it comes to social issues in America, we often see the position of the Catholic Church embedded in American law at both the national and state level!!

But back to Catholic politicians.

Two vignettes.

First, JFK’s 9/12/1960 speech to the Convention of the Greater Houston Baptist Ministerial Association in which he promised that he would practice as President an “absolute separation” of church and state.

In other words, he would not take orders from the Roman Catholic Church in discharging his public duties.

That speech was generally credited with providing cover for the American media to attack as “politically incorrect” anyone questioning whether JFK should be elected President because of his Catholicism.

Second vignette???

The long-running threat by New York’s Roman Catholic Cardinal John O’Connor beginning in 1984 to excommunicate New York State Governor Mario Cuomo for supporting abortion rights.

After 6 years, the threat spilled over into media headlines. There follows below the NY Times article of 6/15/1990 reporting on Cardinal O’Connor’s threat to excommunicate Gov. Cuomo and the steps actually taken by other Catholic clergy against Catholic politicians for supporting abortion funding through Medicaid.

For the curious, Gov. Cuomo stood his ground and, so far as is known, he was not excommunicated.

Also for the curious, former NYS Gov. Mario Cuomo is the father of the current NYS Gov. Andrew Cuomo who is widely mentioned as a possible challenger opposing Hillary Clinton for the 2016 Democratic Presidential nomination.


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New York Times – 6/15/1990
By ARI L. GOLDMAN

John Cardinal O'Connor warned Roman Catholic politicians yesterday that they risked being excommunicated from the Catholic Church if they were persistent in supporting a woman's right to abortion.

''For the common good,'' the Cardinal said, ''such Catholics must be warned that they are at risk of excommunication.''

Those at risk, he said, are Catholics who ''are perceived not only as treating church teaching on abortion with contempt, but helping to mulitply abortions by advocating legislation supporting abortion or by making public funds available for abortion.''

''If such action persists,'' he said, ''bishops may consider excommunication the only option.''

At another point, the Cardinal made an impassioned plea to such Catholic officeholders that they change their positions, ''even to accept political defeat, should such be the result, rather than sacrifice human life.''

The threat by Cardinal O'Connor appeared in the weekly newspaper of the Archdiocese of New York and was stronger than any statement the Cardinal or any other major Catholic bishop in the United States has made in the recent abortion debate.

Excommunication is the most powerful punishment that the church can impose. It is a sanction that cuts the Catholic off from the sacraments of baptism, communion, confirmation, matrimony, last rites and ordination to the priesthood but not from the sacrament of penance. The sanction is rarely imposed. Among the actions that can result in excommunication are heresy, apostasy - or the abandoning of faith - and direct involvement in abortion.

VIRTUALLY SINCE HE BECAME THE ARCHBISHOP OF NEW YORK SIX YEARS AGO, CARDINAL O’CONNOR HAS BEEN ENGAGED IN A DEBATE WITH GOV. MARIO M. CUOMO, A CATHOLIC, OVER THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF CATHOCIC POLITICIANS TO FOLLOW THE DICTATES OF THE CHURCH ON ABORTION. (Emphasis added.)

The Governor, who says he is personally opposed to abortion, supports abortion rights, saying it is the law of the land, and has repeatedly approved the allocating of public money for poor women to have abortions. The decision to allocate such money, through Medicaid, was made by the Legislature and the Governor; many other states do not provide such funds.

Even though Cardinal O'Connor's statement deals specifically with those who ''make public funds available for abortion,'' a spokesman for the Cardinal said yesterday that the Cardinal did not have the Governor in mind.

''This was not written with anyone in mind,'' said the spokesman, Joseph Zwilling, director of communications for the archdiocese. ''The Cardinal was writing in general terms.''

But Mr. Cuomo appeared to take it personally. ''It is difficult to discuss it,'' he said when asked about the threat at an impromptu news conference in the rotunda of New York's City Hall. ''It is upsetting,'' he added. ''I don't like to hear it. How could you? This is something very fundamental to our family.''

'Profoundly Disconcerting'

''I am not suggesting to you that we are religious and good,'' he said. I'm suggesting that we are vulnerable, that we are frail, and for that reason we cling to our Roman Catholicism as a consolation and as a source of strength and when someone suggests that they might try to divide that connection, it is profoundly disconcerting, but it is not going to change anything.''

Conceivably, the threat could apply to any number of public officials in addition to the Governor. Among Catholics who support abortion rights are Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, Gov. Jim Florio of New Jersey, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York and Representatives Jose E. Serrano and Charles B. Rangel of New York.

An invitation to Congressman Rangel to speak at a New York high school was recently withdrawn because of his abortion stand. Asked about the Cardinal's threat, Mr. Rangel said yesterday that he found it ''mean spirited.''

''The Cardinal obviously has a closer working relationship with God than I do, so therefore I would not risk challenging his authority,'' he said.

'Focusing on One Issue'

Mr. Serrano said, ''I'm saddened at the fact that my church is focusing on one issue and one issue alone.''

He added that he did not think excommunications would follow. ''I think that the church will understand that we have a very difficult job to do as elected officials,'' he said.

The Cardinal's threat was included in a 19,000-word article that covers 12 pages of this week's Catholic New York, the newspaper of the archdiocese. The article, he explains, was written to answer the questions raised by many ''well-meaning'' people over the years and generally takes a conciliatory, if didactic, tone.

He begins, for example, by expressing compassion and understanding for those who feel that abortion is their only option. ''But sadly nothing changes the objective reality: abortion kills babies in their mother's womb.''

Quoting Scripture, Vatican statements and scientific journals, the Cardinal also calls for a new effort to teach that sexual relations outside of marriage are wrong; expresses frustration with the ''pro-choice media'' and argues that abortion enslaves rather than liberates women.

'Most Important Issue'

Abortion, the Cardinal writes ''is the most important issue of our day.''

The article is appearing at a time when the anti-abortion forces have suffered many setbacks, like an increase in state legislation favoring abortion rights in the wake of last year's Supreme Court decision in a Missouri case that gave states the right to set abortion policy.

Numerous politicial figures have switched from being against abortion to being in favor. One major blow was the decision last month by the New York State Republican Party to split with the national party by endorsing ''reproductive rights'' for women.

The statement comes only days before a closed meeting of the nation's 300 Roman Catholic bishops in Santa Clara, Calif. While Cardinal O'Connor says in his article that he is speaking only for the Archdiocese of New York and not for the bishops' conference or its Pro-Life Committee, which he heads, his statement is expected to have a strong impact on the agenda.

At the last meeting of the bishops, held in November in Baltimore, the bishops criticized politicians who supported abortion rights but declined to suggest any church sanctions against them.

BUT SINCE THEN, SEVERAL BISHOPS HAVE TAKEN ACTION ON THEIR OWN. (Emphasis added.)

Just a few days after the meeting, Bishop Leo T. Maher of San Diego barred Assemblywoman Lucy Killea, then a candidate for the California State Senate, from receiving communion, a step short of excommunication.

She went on to win the election handily.

In January, Bishop Austin Vaughan of Newburgh, N.Y., an auxiliary bishop to Cardinal O'Connor, said Governor Cuomo was ''in serious risk of going to hell'' because of his abortion stand.

Stand by Brooklyn Bishop

In February, the newly appointed head of the Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn, Bishop Thomas V. Daily, said he would not permit Mr. Cuomo to speak on abortion in a Catholic church in the diocese because of his abortion stand. Besides Brooklyn, the diocese includes Queens, the borough where Mr. Cuomo has lived most of his life. The New York Archdiocese is made up of New York City's other three boroughs and seven counties north of the city.

Earlier this month, Governor Florio resigned from the Knights of Columbus after Bishop James T. McHugh of Camden, N.J., said those favoring abortion could not speak about any subject in a diocesan church or school. The bishop welcomed the resignation.

In his article, Cardinal O'Connor writes that he ''can not find anything in church teaching that can support a 'personally opposed to, but' position.''

''The 'personally opposed' phrase says, in effect: 'In public life I will act indistinguishable from someone who sees abortion as a positive social good, but please know that I will do so with personal regret.' This regret is hardly effective, since it serves the agenda of those who actively favor abortion.''

At the end of a section about the obligations of Catholic public officials, the Cardinal takes a thinly veiled slap at Mr. Cuomo by citing the Governor's favorite philosopher, St. Thomas More.

''While he remained committed to his king, his first obligation was to Almighty God,'' the Cardinal wrote of the 16th-century martyr. ''Catholics in public office must also have this commitment to serve the state; but service to God must always come first.''