A Catholic Speaker in the House

From Catholic Exchange:

In the run-up to last November's mid-term elections, San Francisco Democrat Nancy Pelosi frequently countered the charge that she was the embodiment of radical, West Coast liberalism by reminding the interlocutor that she was a "Catholic grandmother."

With her Party's victory locked up, the pro-abortion, pro-gay "rights" and pro-embryonic stem-cell research politico is now Madame Speaker. Pelosi made it clear that as House Speaker, one of her top priorities in the first 100 hours of Democrat Control would be the introduction of a bill that would ease federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research.

It was not too long ago that President Bush vetoed a bill passed by Congress that would have lifted the restrictions on such research, restrictions that he put in place back in 2001. In vetoing the bill, President Bush declared, "This bill would support the taking of innocent human life in the hope of finding medical benefits for others; it crosses a moral boundary that our decent society needs to respect. So I vetoed it." Buoyed by the latest election however, Pelosi and the Democrats have placed the issue near the top of their to-do list. So Nancy Pelosi, a practicing Catholic, will be the prime mover and public face of a bill that the Catholic Church clearly opposes. The issue of Catholic politicians placing themselves at odds with the Church's moral teaching is hardly a new one, but with Pelosi's high-profile ascent, it may soon be necessary for Church leadership in the United States to speak with greater moral clarity for the sake of the integrity of the Church's public witness to the defense of the human person.

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