Wednesday, August 15, 2007

National Catholic Register: "Hope and the Politics of Abortion"

Jennifer Roback Morse writes in the August 19-25, 2007 issue of the National Catholic Register:
Anne Hendershott’s The Politics of Abortion offers hope and encouragement to the pro-life movement. She starts by asking simply: How did the party of the New Deal, of the underdog and the weak, become identified with abortion on demand, more than any other single topic?

Part of that story is that pro-abortion activists systematically schemed to neutralize Catholic opposition to abortion.

Hendershott, professor of sociology at the University of San Diego, describes the Democratic Party’s transformation as the “political equivalent of a sex-change operation.” Abortion advocates worked on persuading the Kennedys, the most visible and influential Catholic family in America.

In the summer of 1964, leading Catholic theologians visited the Kennedys in Hyannisport, she reports. They convinced the Kennedys that they could “tolerate legislation that would permit abortion under certain circumstances if political efforts to repress this moral error led to greater perils to social peace and order.” The theologians included Father Robert Drinan, Father Richard McCormick, Father Charles Curran and Father Giles Milhaven, men now known as dissenting Catholics, but who at the time were considered mainstream Catholic theologians.

These men’s views effectively neutralized Catholic opposition to abortion for the crucial period in the late 1960s and 1970s. By then, Roe v. Wade had changed both the law of the land and the political landscape.

In spite of the counter-cultural roots of the pro-abortion movement, in spite of the abortion lobby’s posturing as “progressives,” Catholics today are fighting an uphill battle against a firmly entrenched, well-funded foe that is for all practical purposes, The Establishment.

***
Most importantly, Anne Hendershott’s book shows signs of hope in the abortion wars.


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My Comments:
I question part of the Kennedy timeline in the above story. Which of "the Kennedys" were "convinced" back in 1964 to support abortion rights? Bobby Kennedy certainly fudged the issue in his 1968 presidential campaign, but he hardly came out in support of legalized abortion. And his brother The Swimmer was claiming to oppose abortion well into the 1970s. Sargent and Eunice Shriver to this day have always maintained a pro-life stance (notwithstanding their son-in-law's cynical use of Sargent's Alzheimer's Disease as a ploy to push embryonic stem-cell research).

That being said, there is little doubt that the Catholic theologians mentioned, especially Father/Congressman Robert J. Drinan, S.J., provided political cover for those Catholic politicians and voters who threw in their lot with the pro-abortion forces.

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1 Comments:

At 8/15/2007 11:53 AM, Blogger Dad29 said...

There's a BIG difference between a politician's public statements and his actions (or lack thereof) on a given issue.

While stating "I oppose," many politicians have winked at legislation--allowing it out of Committee, or failing to modify, or whatever.

 

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