What will the US bishops do?

Jan 19, 2017

By Fr Thomas Reese SJ
The role of the US bishops in the coming years will be interesting to watch. The Catholic Church is one of the few national institutions that has an almost equal number of Republicans and Democrats. It also has Hispanics, whites and blacks, as well as members of every economic and educational class. It is, therefore, well-placed to help reconcile and heal the nation of its divides. When he visited the United States, Pope Francis encouraged the bishops to dialogue with society and to avoid harsh and divisive language. But many Democrats believe that the bishops have tilted in favour of the Republicans in recent years.

American Catholic bishops traditionally do not endorse candidates or political parties, although some have indirectly signalled their support for Republicans because of their opposition to abortion and gay marriage. Trump would not have been their preferred candidate any more than he was the preferred candidate of evangelical leaders. They distrusted his recent conversion away from being pro-choice. And they were appalled by his anti-immigrant rhetoric. The bishops recognise that the future of Catholicism in the United States is with Hispanics, since 54 percent of millennial Catholics (those born 1982 or later) are Hispanic or Latino.

But once Trump became the nominee, their antipathy toward Clinton’s positions on abortion and gay rights led a few bishops to issue statements that it was wrong for a Catholic to vote for someone who is pro-choice. They quoted from Paragraph 34 in their document Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship that reads:

A Catholic cannot vote for a candidate who favours a policy promoting an intrinsically evil act, such as abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, deliberately subjecting workers or the poor to subhuman living conditions, redefining marriage in ways that violate its essential meaning, or racist behaviour, if the voter’s intent is to support that position.

They denied that such statements were endorsements of Trump, but as often as not, they skipped Paragraph 35, which reads:

There may be times when a Catholic who rejects a candidate’s unacceptable position, even on policies promoting an intrinsically evil act, may reasonably decide to vote for that candidate for other morally grave reasons.

Clearly, these bishops did not think there were other morally grave reasons that outweighed Clinton’s support for abortion. Just over half (52 per cent) of Catholics voted for Trump, according to the media exit poll.

At the annual meeting of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops in Baltimore after the election, the bishops appeared to be as surprised and unprepared for the Trump victory as other Americans. Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, archbishop of Galveston-Houston, the newly elected president of the USCCB, thought the bishops would be happy with judicial appointments of the Trump presidency. The bishops thought the Republicans would be more receptive to their opposition to government programmes that force Catholic institutions to do things contrary to the conscience, especially in the area of bioethics.

But the bishops also issued a letter calling on the new president “to continue to protect the inherent dignity of refugees and migrants.” The bishops also elected Archbishop José Gomez of Los Angeles, a Mexican immigrant, as (the U.S. Catholic bishops’ conference) vice president. He will undoubtedly be elected (bishops’ conference) president in three years.

Since the two [bishops’ conference] leaders come from California and Texas, the two states with the most immigrants, immigration will not take a backseat with the US bishops.--NCR