Notice how the best teaching is always clear and unambiguous, and that which is not is often jargon-laden and emotional?

Consider these excerpts from Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap., "Rendering Unto Caesar: The Catholic Political Vocation," an address delivered at St. Basil's Collegiate Church at the University of Toronto (February 23, 2009):

I think Catholics -- and I mean here mainly American Catholics -- need to remember four simple things in the months ahead.

First, all political leaders draw their authority from God. We owe no leader any submission or cooperation in the pursuit of grave evil. In fact, we have the duty to change bad laws and resist grave evil in our public life, both by our words and our non-violent actions. The truest respect we can show to civil authority is the witness of our Catholic faith and our moral convictions, without excuses or apologies.

Second, in democracies, we elect public servants, not messiahs. It's worth recalling that despite two ugly wars, an unpopular Republican president, a fractured Republican party, the support of most of the American news media and massively out-spending his opponent, our new president actually trailed in the election polls the week before the economic meltdown. This subtracts nothing from the legitimacy of his office. It also takes nothing away from our obligation to respect the president's leadership.

But it does place some of today's talk about a "new American mandate" in perspective. Americans, including many Catholics, elected a gifted man to fix an economic crisis. That's the mandate. They gave nobody a mandate to retool American culture on the issues of marriage and the family, sexuality, bioethics, religion in public life and abortion. That retooling could easily happen, and it clearly will happen -- but only if Catholics and other religious believers allow it. It's instructive to note that the one lesson many activists on the American cultural left learned from their loss in the 2004 election -- and then applied in 2008 -- was how to use a religious vocabulary while ignoring some of the key beliefs and values that religious people actually hold dear.

Here's the third thing to remember. It doesn't matter what we claim to believe if we're unwilling to act on our beliefs. What we say about our Catholic faith is the easy part. What we do with it shapes who we really are. Many good Catholics voted for President Obama. Many voted for Senator McCain. Both parties have plenty of decent people in their ranks.

But when we hear that 54 percent of American Catholics voted for President Obama last November, and that this somehow shows a sea change in their social thinking, we can reasonably ask: How many of them practice their faith on a regular basis? And when we do that, we learn that most practicing Catholics actually voted for Senator McCain. Of course, that doesn't really tell us whether anyone voted for either candidate for the right reasons. Nobody can do a survey of the secret places of the human heart. But it does tell us that numbers can be used to prove just about anything. We won't be judged on our knowledge of poll data. We'll be judged on whether we proved it by our actions when we said "I am a Catholic, and Jesus Christ is Lord."

Here's the fourth and final thing to remember, and there's no easy way to say it. The Church in the United States has done a poor job of forming the faith and conscience of Catholics for more than 40 years. And now we're harvesting the results -- in the public square, in our families and in the confusion of our personal lives. I could name many good people and programs that seem to disprove what I just said. But I could name many more that do prove it, and some of them work in Washington.

The problem with mistakes in our past is that they compound themselves geometrically into the future unless we face them and fix them. The truth is, the American electorate is changing, both ethnically and in age. And unless Catholics have a conversion of heart that helps us see what we've become -- that we haven't just "assimilated" to American culture, but that we've also been absorbed and bleached and digested by it -- then we'll fail in our duties to a new generation and a new electorate. And a real Catholic presence in American life will continue to weaken and disappear.

From the website of the Diocese of Scranton:


--
Bishop Joseph F. Martino has issued a reflection on how the teaching of diversity and tolerance relates to the teaching of the Catholic Church. The reflection follows:


A substantial amount of media coverage and public commentary ensued after I asked Misericordia University to seriously consider discontinuing its Diversity Institute. Students and others in the community related how this Institute has furthered the advancement of tolerance, understanding and harmony between people of different races and cultures.

These are all worthy goals. All people of good will should work toward these ends.

Misericordia University, as a Catholic institution, has a responsibility for helping the community achieve these goals. However, precisely because it is a Catholic institution, it also has a responsibility to transmit Catholic teaching to its students in ways that are not ambiguous or confusing.

As I said in my previous statement, students should learn respect for all races and cultures, but viewpoints that are in direct opposition to Catholic teaching should not be presented under the guise of “diversity.” Doing so within a formal structure sanctioned by the institution gives the impression that these viewpoints are acceptable, or that all morality is relative.

As Catholics, we must distinguish between authentic tolerance and an “anything goes” mindset. For example, would the Diversity Institute be justified in hosting a speaker who believes the Holocaust is a myth? Or one who believes slavery is okay because certain people are inferior? Or one who believes women can be exploited because they are the “weaker sex”? There are people out there who actually believe this nonsense, and they would be perfectly willing to come to the campus to tell you why.

Their views are certainly “diverse,” but does that qualify them to be given a platform in the name of tolerance? Or should they be allowed to make a presentation without any retort from the Catholic perspective?

As Catholics, we believe there is an objective, moral Truth – given to us by Jesus Christ. This Truth is timeless, and it cannot be altered by the shifting tides of popular culture. If our faith and our actions are not rooted in this Truth, we risk contributing to the “dictatorship of relativism” cited by then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger in a homily given just prior to his election as Pope Benedict XVI. He said:

“To have a clear faith, according to the creed of the Church, is often labeled as fundamentalism. While relativism, that is, allowing oneself to be carried about with every wind of ‘doctrine,’ seems to be the attitude that is fashionable. A dictatorship of relativism is being constituted that recognizes nothing as absolute and which only leaves the ‘I’ and its whims as the ultimate measure.”

As the Bishop, it is not only my right, but my obligation to ensure that authentic Catholic teaching is being provided in all Catholic institutions in this Diocese, and that viewpoints in opposition to this teaching are not being presented as acceptable alternatives.

I voiced my “absolute disapproval” of Misericordia’s hosting of Keith Boykin not because of his sexual orientation, but because he is a well known proponent of morality that is disturbingly opposed to Catholic teaching, such as homosexual relations and same sex marriage. Furthermore, no presentation was made to balance Mr. Boykin’s viewpoints with the teaching of the Catholic Church.

That is why I asked Misericordia, which asserted that it “is committed deeply to its Catholic mission,” to convey how it teaches Catholic morality regarding sexuality and homosexuality, and to produce concrete evidence. It is regrettable that the University chose to respond with a brief statement without any such evidence.

Nevertheless, I continue to urge Misericordia University to fulfill the four essential characteristics of a Catholic institution of higher learning. As I pointed out in briefer form in my initial statement on this matter, these are:



1. A Christian inspiration not only of individuals but of the university community
as such;

2. A continuing reflection in the light of the Catholic faith upon the growing
treasury of human knowledge, to which it seeks to contribute by its own
research;

3. Fidelity to the Christian message as it comes to us through the Church;

4. An institutional commitment to the service of the people of God and of the
human family in their pilgrimage to the transcendent goal which gives
meaning to life.

(Pope John Paul II, Apostolic Constitution on Catholic
Universities)



I also offer this postscript to those who criticize me for taking public stances that may not be popular or “politically correct,” or may not agree with their own personal notions of what “progressive” Catholic doctrine should be. My job as a Bishop is to promulgate the authentic teaching of the Catholic Church to all the faithful. I will continue to do so.

My Comment:

It's wonderful to see a bishop, who possesses the fullness of His priesthood and is the teacher of The True Faith in a diocese, plainly spelling out the TRUTH, to remove any doubt, misconceptions and 'situational' ethics or spin, misstatements or weasel positions taken by anyone in public life who 1) professes to be Catholic and 2) tries to have it both ways to pander to popular sentiment or curry favor.

Senator Casey is an embarrassment. Not to Catholicism. We've been here since the Church was founded by Our Lord, and the gates of Hell will not prevail against it. However, the senator does not speak with authority grounded in truth, but, like the coward he is, has denied the gift he's was given at his baptism and speaks with the words of someone whose focus is on this world, not the next.

Pride goes before the fall. The root of personal sin is pride: the consuming thought that WE are the penultimate creation and OUR will is supreme. While no one can judge the state of another's soul, we can protest and correct aonther's actions which indicate a lack of conformance to Christ's will.

Bravo to Bishop Martino. May he serve Our Church for many years to come!

The letter below was sent to Senator Casey as well as publicly distributed. Is there any doubt NOW about the clarity of the Church's teaching? Can the senator now say that there is any ambiguity or room for discussion? I think not.

From the diocesean website:

--
Bishop Again Voices Concern Regarding Sen. Casey’s
Mexico City Policy Vote

The following letter has been sent to Sen. Bob Casey:

Dear Senator Casey,

It is a matter of deep concern that your recent vote against the Mexico City Policy is continually misrepresented by your staff as a pro-life vote intended to promote “contraception and other family planning that avoid unintended pregnancies” (Times-Tribune, February 6, 2009).

The Mexico City Policy is, first and foremost, about abortion, not about family planning. First put in place in 1984, the policy required all non-governmental organizations that receive federal funding to refrain from performing or promoting abortion services abroad. The policy required such organizations to agree as a condition for receiving U.S. foreign aid dollars that they would “neither perform nor actively promote abortion as a method of family planning in other nations.” The policy included exceptions for abortions done in cases of rape, incest or life-threatening conditions.

Furthermore, the Mexico City Policy did not take funds away from family planning; its effect is quite the opposite. Tom McCluskey of the Family Research Council reported the following: “. . .The Mexico City policy halts U.S. family planning funds from going to foreign . . . [NGOs] that perform abortions or ‘actively promote’ abortion as a method of family planning in other countries. . . The effect of President Obama rescinding the Mexico City Policy is that now millions ($461 million in the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2008) of dollars are taken away from family planning groups that do not promote abortions, and delivered into the hands of organizations that are the most militant in promoting abortion as a population-control method—especially in countries that find abortion objectionable on moral grounds” (my emphasis). Contrary to the claims of your staff, the absence of “Mexico City” regulations insures (1) that money is taken away from family planning, (2) that abortion is promoted as a method of family planning, and (3) that countries that have moral and cultural objections to abortion are encouraged to abandon their policies against it.

Finally, it is never permissible to use immoral means such as artificial contraception to achieve a good end, namely, the reduction of unplanned pregnancies. In fact, the mistaken view that artificial contraception may be used to regulate population growth and the size of families has led to countless evils in America and abroad, including the attitude that having and raising children is a burden to be avoided. This attitude has contributed mightily to the acceptability of abortion as a means of contraception both at home and abroad.

My letter of January 30 urging you to rescind your vote on the Mexico City Policy was in no way mistaken regarding the nature and the effect of President Obama’s order to rescind America’s long-standing policy to avoid using U.S. tax dollars to support organizations that promote abortion abroad. It is imperative that this fact be made known to the public.

It is also imperative that there be utter clarity when it comes to the teaching of the Church on matters that pertain to the taking of innocent life and the special responsibilities that fall to you, Senator, as a lawmaker to oppose abortion and other clear evils.

In closing, I refer you to the words of Cardinal Francis George, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, to President Obama urging him to retain the Mexico City Policy.

The Mexico City Policy . . . has wrongly been attacked as a restriction on foreign aid for family planning. In fact, it has not reduced such aid at all, but has ensured that family planning funds are not diverted to organizations dedicated to performing and promoting abortions instead of reducing them. Once the clear line between family planning and abortion is erased, the idea of using family planning to reduce abortions becomes meaningless, and abortion tends to replace contraception as the means for reducing family size. A shift toward promoting abortion in developing nations would also increase distrust of the United States in these nations, whose values and culture often reject abortion, at a time when we need their trust and respect (January 23, 2009).

Sincerely,

Most Reverend Joseph F. Martino, D.D., Hist. E.D.
Bishop of Scranton