When a candidate pledges to provide “comprehensive sex education” to school children and promises to promote – or to “sign immediately upon taking office” – the Freedom of Choice Act, Catholics and all people of good will have cause to question the sincerity of the candidate’s determination to reduce abortions, when these already existing limits have caused a decrease of more than 100,000 abortions each year. (cf. Michael New-Matthew Bowman, Combined Reductions in Abortions, with data supplied by NARAL Pro-Choice America)

As Archbishop Naumann and I stressed in our recent Pastoral Letter, “Our Moral Responsibility as Catholic Citizens,” we can never vote for a candidate because of his or permissive stand on abortion. At the same time, if we are inclined to vote for someone despite their pro-abortion stance, it seems we are morally obliged to establish a proportionate reason sufficient to justify the destruction of 45 million human persons through abortion. If we learn that our “candidate of choice” further pledges – through an instrument such as FOCA – to eliminate all existing limitations against abortion, it is that much more doubtful whether voting for him or her can ever be morally justified under any circumstance.

I urge you to learn more about the Freedom of Choice Act and its advocates so that you can make informed decisions in the voting booth.

Hat Tip Insight Scoop

Back in July Obama said “The first thing I’d do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act,” So we know where his real priorities are. No working towards reducing abortion, but working towards reducing people. The decline in abortion has been largely because of laws like parental notification and without those restrictions, once again abortion would be on the increase. Remember also that the Democratic platform eliminated references to making abortion rare, but in fact strengthened their support of it. But facts are no deterrent to Obama Catholics. I certainly believe there are valid reasons not to vote for Sen. McCain, but I can’t think of any to vote for Sen. Obama.

SALEM — Archbishop John Vlazny is criticizing Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski, a Catholic, for playing host to an abortion rights fundraiser Friday night in Portland.

Vlazny, head of the Archdiocese of Portland, said it’s an embarrassment and a scandal for Catholics that Kulongoski is hosting the event two days before the church conducts its annual “Respect Life” mass in Portland to show opposition to abortion.

“For a Catholic governor to host an event of this sort seems a deliberate dissent from the teachings of the church,” Vlazny said in a statement today.

Kulongoski is a longtime supporter of a woman’s right to choose an abortion.

“The archbishop is the governor’s pastor, and he has only respect and admiration for the archbishop,” Kulongoski spokeswoman Anna Richter Taylor said. “They obviously disagree on the issue of choice.”

Kulongoski and his wife, Mary Oberst, are the honorary hosts of Friday night’s fundraising dinner for NARAL Pro Choice Oregon. U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., is among those scheduled to speak. The event is to be held at a Portland hotel.

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Raymond Arroyo quipped about all of these bishop’s speaking out that we are having “bishop eruptions” in contrast to the “bimbo eruptions” of the Clinton years.

New Orleans, Sep 30, 2008 / 03:20 am (CNA).- Archbishop of New Orleans Alfred C. Hughes has criticized a Louisiana lawmaker’s proposal to pay poor women to sterilize themselves, calling it “seriously wrong,” “blatantly anti-life,” and a “form of eugenics.”

Louisiana’s Rep. John LaBruzzo, a Republican from Metairie, last week said he is studying a plan to pay poor women $1,000 to have their Fallopian tubes tied.

His proposal would also cover other forms of birth control, such as vasectomies for men, and could also encourage tax incentives for college-educated, higher-income people to have more children, the Times-Picayune reports.

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Kudos to Martin Sheen for his radio ad critical of the Washington state physician-assisted suicide initiative.