Time Immortal

Erf writes, in response to my last reply to him:

Great answers, Ken, thanks! Unfortunately I don’t have time to respond to everything in that kind of detail, but I do have a couple more things to say.

(Thanks for the clarification on the tags. I was curious.)

I won’t go into much more discussion on the ACORN business, except to clarify: you’re saying that Slacktivist is wrong (or lying?) when they say that ACORN actually flagged the questionable or unverifiable voter registrations before passing them on to the government, as they’re supposed to?

I didn’t realize Joe Biden is an abortion supporter. He’s also Catholic; has he been excommunicated?

What makes Obama’s “brand” of Christianity more egregious than McCain’s, when the latter supports torture, among other things, and as you say isn’t likely to do anything about the existing abortion laws in the states? Why doesn’t that (especially the torture issue, which he’s explicit about) automatically disqualify him from receiving our support also?

Out of curiousity, what is it about Palin that you find appealing, aside from the abortion issue? I can’t find anything in your tags about it.

Thanks, Ken. Your responses are always well thought out and researched. Keep up the good work.

Congrats to the three of you, and welcome to Ella! (Love the pictures of her and Grace you’ve posted.)

Thank you kindly, Erf; I’ll be sure to pass that along to Grace (although she reads this site daily, so I’m sure she already knows).

Now, as to Erf’s question, good Reader, about what assertions (if any) I am making about Slacktivist, I think it’s safest to say that I’m not making any assertions, but rather simply taking note of a few things that perhaps were missed. I’ll grant, for example, the point that ACORN has some process of identifying fraudulent votes — they’d have to have such a system, since there are thousands (tens of thousands, actually) of frauds being uncovered and reported on. Obviously, someone is discovering these things, in many cases.

This was kind of touched on in my previous observation about fraudulent votes. Obviously, many of the frauds have been uncovered, and that’s good…but the fact that ACORN supporters are nevertheless churning out thousands of fraudulent registrations, and encouraging yet more, is still very concerning, and certainly damages the overall legitimacy of the organization and its branches. The fact that the problem is not isolated to one or two districts, but has in fact cropped up in a wide variety of locales, suggests that the corruption is systemic, or very near to it.

Moreover, there’s also the matter of New Mexico, and the fraudulent votes which were linked to fraudulent ACORN voter registrations. Phony registrations are one thing, and not as bad, since they don’t influence an election’s outcome (necessarily — they have some value as a form of propaganda). But phony votes do influence that outcome, and phony registrations are a part of the process of getting phony votes on record. Obviously, not all of ACORN’s fake voters have been uncovered, since votes were case in the “name” of several of them, and I expect we’ll see more fake votes turned in because of it.

And there’s a real problem with that, and it’s what we must keep in mind when we consider the ACORN issue. In the 2000 and 2004 elections, key “swing” states were won or lost by fairly narrow margins. One recalls that in Florida, in 2000, the difference came down to around 500 votes. Five hundred votes isn’t that many, compared to the total number of people who cast votes…but then, with tens of thousands of fraudulent registrations already on the books, is it perhaps not possible that ACORN or some affiliated group might manage to get, say, 600 fake votes cast in a key county or state, thus swinging a close election toward the candidate who wasn’t actually winning? It’s not an absurd scenario to propose, given how small the numbers may in fact need to be (especially now that John McCain is gaining ground in the polls once again).

Slacktivist isn’t lying, I don’t think, but I note that his(?) source exhibits a curious…quirk. The Guardian article that Slacktivist links to uses many links to references, except (notably) when making reference to ACORN’s oversight procedures. Though obviously, many registration frauds have been caught, was there no linkable document which detailed the various anti-fraud schemes that ACORN employs? Are we to take a British columnist’s word for it that they have comprehensive oversight?

There’s a detail or two missing here, methinks.

But let’s move to the issue of Joe Biden. Yes, he’s a Catholic — or, rather, claims to be — and yes, he’s pro-choice. I’m not a Canon Law expert by any means, but in my understanding of things, there’s not much room for a Catholic to claim to be pro-choice, especially if he or she is a legislator. “Any Catholic who obstinately denies that abortion is always gravely immoral commits the sin of heresy. The sin of heresy also incurs a latae sententiae excommunication…This sentence of latae sententiae excommunication applies to any Catholic who denies that abortion is gravely immoral, regardless of whether they keep this denial hidden or publicly reveal it.”

Additionally, “Catholics who publicly announce their denial that abortion is always gravely immoral, or who publicly promote abortion, or who publicly argue in favor of legalized abortion, also commit a mortal sin and also incur a sentence of automatic excommunication. This sentence of excommunication applies to Catholics who are politicians, as well as to those Catholics who are political commentators, or public speakers, or who write or otherwise publicly communicate their erroneous view that abortion can be morally-acceptable or that abortion should be legal.”

And finally, “[a]ny Catholic politician who casts a vote with the intention of legalizing abortion, or of protecting laws allowing abortion, or of widening access to abortion, commits a mortal sin. When such a vote indicates that the Catholic politician believes that abortion is not always gravely immoral, such a politician incurs a sentence of automatic excommunication, under canons 751 and 1364, because of heresy.”

So while Joe Biden claims to be Catholic, his public pro-choice stance would, I think, seem to mean that he has in fact brought upon himself an automatic excommunication from the Church, which cannot be rescinded until such time as he repents of his erroneous views and offers a full confession for the mortal sin of defending or promoting abortion.

The problem with automatic excommunications is that they require enforcement. Not only does the individual have to humbly accept that he or she has contravened the faith and, in heresy, removed herself from the fold of the Catholic faithful — the local bishop and priests must likewise stand firm and enforce Canon Law, and its consequences, during Mass and from the altar. The principal outward sign of excommunication is, of course, denial of the Eucharist to the excommunicated person; it takes real guts for a priest to actually state, to any person, that he or she is unfit to receive the Body of Christ.

There have been priests who have stood up for Canon Law. There have been priests who haven’t. I don’t know enough about Joe Biden’s church life, or the priest(s) at the parish(es) he attends to say whether or not the Canons have been enforced in his case. But from my understanding of Canon Law, it would seem that Joe Biden has incurred a penalty of automatic excommunication, whether he acknowledges this to be the case or not.

Now, I didn’t really discuss the respective denominations of the candidates, apart from Joe Biden, all that much, so I admit that Erf’s question about what makes one candidate’s denomination more egregious than another’s catches me a bit off guard. I didn’t really make that assertion, did I?

Be that as it may, I don’t actually think that one candidate’s faith is more egregious than that of any of the others, although certainly I will say that I regard the faith of each candidate to be in error to the same degree that it does not reflect full communion with Rome. Of the two presidential candidates and the two VP picks, the only candidate whose faith is, I think, left more or less un-compromised is that of Sarah Palin.

I don’t know much about John McCain’s churchgoing ways, if in fact he is a regular churchgoer. I know even less about his faith overall. It hasn’t really even been an issue in the campaign. We’ve already discussed Biden, of course; the best word for him might be “hypocrite.” Palin is an evangelical, and some have attempted to lambaste her as a Young Earther. I don’t actually know if she holds that view or not, though I’m not inclined to think so; she has said that she favours some teaching of the idea that life was created, although from what I know of her statements in this regard, she wasn’t explicitly referring to a literal, six-day creation, but to the general idea that God is the author of life. Perhaps the strangest aspect of Palin’s church is its emphasis on speaking “in tongues.” Take that with an appropriate quantity of salt grains, good Reader, but do remember that among the various evangelical churches, especially those with a Pentecostal basis, such “gifts of the Spirit” are a common focal point for worship gatherings. Palin’s church is hardly unique in this regard.

The issue of Obama’s faith — and now I think I know from where Erf’s question stems, given my citation of Binky’s observations about the volume of hagiography being directed at Obama — isn’t a question of whether or not his church and its teachings are “more” egregious than the church which McCain attends (if he has a church he attends on a regular basis, mind — this I do not know). The issue is that Obama’s supporters have invested a boatload of effort in casting Barack Hussein Obama in divine terms, prompting some to quip that he is the Obamessiah.

What’s egregious, then, isn’t Obama’s denominational stance, but the fact that whatever he believes about Christ, he seems to not have a problem with the sheer volume of hagiography being directed his way. “As…noted before, no Christian would permit music, accolades and statements to be made about them that infringe on the turf of divinity. The One? Halo-pictures? If that was me being divinized, I’d rightly fear the flames of eternal punishment for presumption. But so far as I’ve heard, Obama hasn’t called it off, whatever he’s heard of thusfar. Indeed, he seems to have deliberately wrapped himself in Religion: healing the planet, change, hope, transformation!”

Remember: “It’s evil to claim God’s proper praise for oneself.”

Obama’s denominational stance concerns me very little; the fact that he has wrapped himself in the mantle of divinity concerns me greatly. Secular messianism can only have a messy end, if history is to be taken as any kind of guide.

Now, I want to end by answering Erf’s question about why McCain’s support for — or, at least, his probable inaction on the issue of — torture does not also disqualify him from our (Catholic) support. I kind of addressed that in the previous post, and will do so again, but let me get the rest of what Erf has said out of the way first.

Concerning Sarah Palin, I think the thing about her that I like is that she’s…real. She’s not an establishment hack, for the most part; she doesn’t come across as a politician as much as she does as normal folk. Since I began dating — and then subsequently got married to — a small-town girl, I’ve come to appreciate the open honesty in the way that people who live in smaller communities see and talk about the world, and I get that same sense of sensibility and graciousness from Palin. Unlike the other three people she shares the spotlight with, she seems to be the one that is the most normal, the most human.

She’s also, apparently, as sharp as a tack. Moreover, she doesn’t play the victim card because of her gender; her career in politics has been marked by taking on — and defeating — one “good ol’ boys” club after another, whether it was the local law enforcement agency, an oil company, or her own political party in the years prior to her election as governor. The fact that she walks the walk, rather than just talk the talk, on the pro-life issue is icing on the cake.

Now let’s come back to the issue of supporting McCain, as Catholic voters. In an article I linked to previously, John Zmirak made an apt comparison: Catholic voters are in the same ugly position as were the guards at the Tsar’s palace on the eve of the Russian Revolution. The mob is approaching, the Tsar is safe behind his walls, and the order to fire has been given. What do we do?

The choice facing American Catholic voters next Tuesday seems to be between a vote that will result in an increase of evil, and a vote will maintain the present level thereof. This is not a good choice, especially if one votes with a Catholic conscience. As such, nobody should be under the delusion that good will come of it; the argument can be made that a vote for either major candidate will be a vote for some manner of evil, and we know that we cannot promote the use of evil in the hope of achieving a good, nor should we be deluded into thinking that good will result from the doing of evil.

Obama’s platform is certainly “transformational,” and what it desires to see America transformed into is a very concerning thing indeed. We’ve discussed the ramifications of an Obama victory before, and many of them center on the issue of abortion. By signing FOCA into law, something Obama has pledged to do, not only would abortion law become substantially less restrictive in the United States (in fact, abortion would become a de facto “fundamental right” of women, legally on par with any Constitutional right), but almost all freedom of conscience protection for doctors and nurses opposed to abortion would vanish. As Zmirak notes, this would essentially result in one of two ugly possibilities: either Catholic hospitals would have to provide abortion services, or they would have to close. This sort of result is just a slightly more convoluted way of doing the equivalent of hanging a “No Blacks” sign in a restaurant window. The effect of FOCA would be the same: people opposed to abortion, including most Christians, would essentially be barred from working in medicine.

There’s other concerns as well. Obama would probably repeal BAIPA, and might even bring back some form of the Fairness Doctrine, which would have the effect of stifling political commentary critical of his administration. Toss in a tax scheme that reflects his desire to see “redistribution of wealth” become a reality in America, and the result is, at the very least, highly concerning. That it would probably also be economically ruinous, and steeped in Censorship, adds an additional measure of evil to a platform that has already failed — utterly and completely — on life issues. And to put a cherry on top of it all, there’s one other tidbit of information that has just come to light: even with his proposed tax increases and other changes, Obama’s numbers don’t add up…his government wouldn’t be able to afford e.g. universal health care, his proposed reforms to education, and all the rest. “If he closes every loophole as promised, saves every dime from Iraq, raises taxes on the rich and trims the federal budget as he’s promised to do ‘line by line,’ he still doesn’t pay for his list.” So if he can’t do what he’s promised, he’ll do something else. But what?”

So, at best, a vote for McCain will maintain evil at its current levels. A vote for Obama, or for a doomed quixotic candidate, risks the possibility of an Obama victory, which will increase evil. Now, there’s obviously a certain logical peril inherent in looking at moral ramifications by means of a mathematical/quantitative framework, but I think the point stands: though Catholics cannot support evil, the option does not exist in the American presidential election to functionally, effectively, reduce the perpetration of evil in America.

To that end, the only — and then sinful, but this is a sinful world — choice remaining is to vote against that which will increase evil. And that means voting to keep Obama out of the White House.

Let’s come back to the soldiers for a moment. They have three choices: fire on the mob, fire in the air, or join the rush and help the mob overthrow the Tsar. In this example, the Tsar is the extant establishment, represented by McCain. If the soldiers fire on the mob, all the evils of the Tsar will continue, as surely as they would have had the soldiers of Russia managed to put down the revolutionaries way back in 1917. If the soldiers do not fire on the mob, either by shooting in the air (an analog to voting for a third party, spoiling a ballot, or prematurely deciding that Obama has won and simply abstaining from the vote entirely) or joining the mob (an analog to voting for Obama), the the evils of the Tsar will perish…only to be replaced by the evils of Lenin and Stalin, as happened in history.

Now, keep in mind: I’m not suggesting that Obama would turn the U.S. into a totalitarian dictatorship. This is a metaphor, not a prophecy. But at a moral level, American Catholic voters face the same quandry as those Russian soldiers would have faced. There’s no avoiding evil in the imperfect scenario of the upcoming election. The choice is between the evil that is, and the evil that could be. And one is worse than the other.

I don’t know how history would have turned out had the Tsar somehow retained power, had Lenin’s little uprising been defeated. I suspect, however, that we would not have seen, in Tsarist Russia, the sheer volume of slaughter and human suffering that we saw in the Soviet Union, even given the corruption and excess of the Tsarist regime. In like manner, I don’t think things will improve under McCain…nor will they get any worse. But under Obama, I think things will get much worse, and then at a moral level.

And when facing a doomed choice to begin with, it behooves Catholic voters to choose that which will not make things measurably worse.

Update: Welcome, Steynians!

As the Reader may recall from last time, what had begun as a conversation about dinosaurs and whether or not they were mentioned in the Bible took a very wrong turn; the Young Earth Creationist with whom I was debating the point shifted gears and began to attack me on the basis of my Catholicism. I wish I could say that I was successful in returning us to the topic at hand, but as the following exchange demonstrates, I was anything but successful.