UPDATE 28 August 2020:
Msgr. Paul Garrity apologized Thursday for the “confusion and upset” caused by his statements on #abortion and politics, and said he is “totally against legalized abortion” “committed to upholding Church teaching regarding the sanctity of life.” https://t.co/mg6tWmsJV4
— Catholic News Agency (@cnalive) August 28, 2020
From CNA:
On Thursday, Garrity clarified that he is “totally against legalized abortion.”
“I am committed to upholding Church teaching regarding the sanctity of life from the moment of conception until natural death,” he said in his most recent Facebook post. Garrity added that he was “not prepared for the uncharitable responses” to his earlier post, and that “the last thing that I would ever want to do is hurt anyone with my words.”
A priest writes that he is with the Dems abortion platform and he says he received “uncharitable” responses?!?
Hang on. Telling him he is WRONG is, in fact, charity… at least when done in a measured way.
On Thursday, Cardinal O’Malley, Archbishop of Boston, issued a statement saying that Catholics have “the right to expect the priests of the Archdiocese and those entrusted with handing on the faith to be clear and unequivocal on the Church’s teaching concerning respect and protection for life from the first moment of conception to natural death.”
“This teaching is of the highest priority for the Church,” he added.
Originally posted Aug 27, 2020 at 14:02
I say… suspend the jackass now.
If nothing else this priest in Boston is committing the sin of scandal, by leading people to think that support of abortion – which is the sacramental plank of the Party of Death’s platform – is anywhere near acceptable for a Catholic.
Garrity’s Facebook post: pic.twitter.com/XsxzkfYXFT
— JD Flynn (@jdflynn) August 26, 2020
Scandal is any action or its omission, not necessarily sinful in itself, that is likely to induce another to do something morally wrong. Direct scandal, also called diabolical, has the deliberate intention to induce another to sin. In indirect scandal a person does something that he or she foresees will at least likely lead another to commit sin, but this is rather tolerated than positively desired.
From CNA
Boston priest claims Catholics can support ‘right to choose,’ archdiocese declines comment
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Aug 26, 2020 / 03:00 pm MT (CNA).- A Boston priest has said he believes in “a woman’s right to choose” on the issue of abortion, and will continue his advocacy for Joe Biden’s presidential campaign, despite Catholic teaching on abortion and a Church prohibition on clerical advocacy for political candidates.
Msgr. Paul Garrity of the Archdiocese of Boston spoke to CNA Tuesday, after attracting criticism for a Facebook post endorsing former vice president Joe Biden for president.
In an Aug. 23 Facebook post titled “I AM PRO-LIFE AND SUPPORT JOE BIDEN,” Msgr. Garrity wrote: “I am pro-life and I believe in a woman’s right to choose. I will vote for Joe Biden for President because I believe that Joe Biden is pro-life like me.”
[…]
He’s pro-life, like Joe!
B as in B. S as in S.
Pro!
He keeps using that word. I don’t think that word means what he thinks it means.
[…]
Biden is running for president on a platform that would codify the full extent of Roe vs. Wade into federal law, effectively preventing any state limitations on the practice. Biden also supports the expanded use of taxpayer funds for abortion.
Garrity added that he believes “any woman who becomes pregnant should have the right to choose to give birth to her baby.”
[…]
In effect, he says that women… in fact anyone, now that I think of it… has the right to kill the unborn if they don’t feel, at the moment, properly disposed to allow the baby to be born.
That priest thinks that the child doesn’t not have a RIGHT to be born. Or, if he can be induced to accept that this unborn human does have a right to be born, he is saying that other human beings’ rights cancel out the rights of the unborn. There are human beings who have more rights than others.
So, why not slavery and sex trafficking? The priest’s argument comes down to one of convenience and who has more power. The powerful win.
Moreover, if the unborn child doesn’t have rights, then some person other than the mother can choose to abort the child as well, à la the One Child Policy.
This priest’s public statement is a scandal that must be dealt with.
[…]
While the archdiocese did not offer any official comment on the matter, one archdiocesan leader did say the priest’s view was contrary to Catholic teaching.
In a since-deleted tweet, Thomas Carroll, Secretary of Education & Superintendent of Schools for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, expressed criticism of Garrity’s post. He followed it up with an explanation saying that he believed Garrity’s view is “100% not” in line with Church teaching, and that he did not “want the 30,000 students in our schools to be led astray by false teachings spread by someone wearing a collar.”
Carroll deleted the tweet on Tuesday afternoon. He referred questions from CNA to the Archdiocese of Boston.
[…]
Wow. This gives “cancelled” new meaning.
[…]
In the past, Pope Francis has called abortion akin to “hiring a hitman.”
At least those who are killed in the open air by hitmen were born.
This is where Fr. Jackass’ argument comes off the rail, along with all the Dems on that engine hauling those box cars toward the camp. All the other issues, such as poverty, trafficking etc. are equally sacred, they say. Seamless garment! But those poor people were born. More fundamental even than the rights of those in poverty is the right to be born.
A Catholic cannot support the Dem platform or a candidate who has resolutely, for decades, supported the extermination of the unborn for what – in the final analysis – beyond all the anxiety and pain and pressure and doubt that precedes the decision to abort – the convenience of those who are breathing air in this world.
The fact is that people who are walking around have power and those who are not yet born do not.
This priest – and the Archdiocese of Boston? – should a least be as honest as, say, Camille Paglia. As Paglia puts it – with honesty instead of smarmy weasel words draped in pious crepe –
“I have always frankly admitted that abortion is murder, the extermination of the powerless by the powerful. Liberals for the most part have shrunk from facing the ethical consequences of their embrace of abortion, which results in the annihilation of concrete individuals and not just clumps of insensate tissue.”
Paglia: Of course abortion is murder! It’s just that we don’t care. We have power and we do what we want.
Liberals will refer you to the sophistication of “nuance” regarding balancing factors.
No. This is not a position that a Catholic priest can hold in good conscience.
This is not a position that any Catholic politician can hold in good conscience.
And for those out there who think that woman have the right to control their bodies, as if their bodies were things they possess, I’ve got new for you. If our bodies are our possessions, then they aren’t truly part of who we are. If you can possess, as in own your body, so can someone else. They can do whatever the hell they want to your body, and if they have more power than you, you can’t stop them. But don’t worry! You are different from your body. Your body belongs to you so you can do anything you want to to it. It’s just something you ride around in.
Or… as John Paul underscored… we are our bodies. We people are both body and soul. Our bodies are not our personal possessions, as if they are some separate from our interior self. They are destined to be together for eternity… and they will be. Not even death can stop that.
That priest in Boston needs publicly to retract his scandalous public statement.
