{"id":114,"date":"2019-11-21T00:06:05","date_gmt":"2019-11-21T00:06:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/?p=114"},"modified":"2025-09-30T01:11:31","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T01:11:31","slug":"jesuit-publication-america-column-agreeing-with-bishops-saying-abortion-should-be-top-catholic-voter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/?p=114","title":{"rendered":"Jesuit publication America: column agreeing with Bishops saying abortion should be top Catholic voter priority"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"asset-img-link\" href=\"https:\/\/hvcljournal.typepad.com\/.a\/6a00d8341cc5fb53ef0240a4ed5990200b-pi\" style=\"float: right;\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"40 days for life\" class=\"asset  asset-image at-xid-6a00d8341cc5fb53ef0240a4ed5990200b img-responsive\" src=\"https:\/\/hvcljournal.typepad.com\/.a\/6a00d8341cc5fb53ef0240a4ed5990200b-300wi\" style=\"width: 286px; margin: 0px 0px 5px 5px;\" title=\"40 days for life\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The article is 15 paragraphs and written by Alexandra DeSanctis &#8211; only takes a few minutes to read the whole article.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.americamagazine.org\/politics-society\/2019\/11\/20\/us-bishops-said-abortion-should-be-catholic-voters-top-priority-heres?utm_source=Newsletters&amp;utm_campaign=e6b29f9e59-DAILY_CAMPAIGN_2019_11_20&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_term=0_0fe8ed70be-e6b29f9e59-58468933\">U.S. bishops said abortion should be Catholic voters\u2019 top priority. Here\u2019s why they\u2019re right.<\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\">Bishop McElroy <a href=\"https:\/\/www.americamagazine.org\/faith\/2019\/11\/12\/us-bishops-threat-abortion-remains-our-preeminent-priority\">said<\/a> the inclusion of the word \u201cpreeminent\u201d before the letter\u2019s mention of abortion is at least discordant with and perhaps inconsistent with the pope\u2019s teaching. \u201cIt is not Catholic teaching that abortion is the preeminent issue that we face in the world of Catholic social teaching,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\">Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia pushed back against this claim, even as he agreed with Bishop McElroy that the pope\u2019s language could be added to the letter. \u201cI am against anyone stating that our stating [abortion] is \u2018preeminent\u2019 is contrary to the teaching of the pope. That isn\u2019t true,\u201d he said, noting that it \u201csets up an artificial battle\u201d between the U.S. bishops and Pope Francis.<\/p>\n<h6 style=\"padding-left: 40px;\">###############<\/h6>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\">Even though, as Archbishop Chaput said, the church holds that all human lives have equal dignity\u2014and that reality has various policy implications open to prudential disagreements among the faithful on issues like immigration and the climate\u2014Catholic teaching has long held that the right to life is paramount. In other words, Catholics must prioritize the fact that every innocent human being has a right not to be killed, a truth that abortion directly attacks.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\">Here is how Pope St. John Paul II put it in his apostolic exhortation \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.vatican.va\/content\/john-paul-ii\/en\/apost_exhortations\/documents\/hf_jp-ii_exh_30121988_christifideles-laici.html\">Christifideles Laici<\/a>\u201d in 1988: \u201cThe common outcry, which is justly made on behalf of human rights\u2014for example, the right to health, to home, to work, to family, to culture\u2014is false and illusory if the right to life, the most basic and fundamental right and the condition for all other personal rights, is not defended with maximum determination.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#0160;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The article is 15 paragraphs and written by Alexandra DeSanctis &#8211; only takes a few minutes to read the whole article. U.S. bishops said abortion should be Catholic voters\u2019 top priority. Here\u2019s why they\u2019re right. Bishop McElroy said the inclusion of the word \u201cpreeminent\u201d before the letter\u2019s mention of abortion is at least discordant with [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=114"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":658,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114\/revisions\/658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/life-net-bf3c43.ingress-alpha.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}