I hate to pick on old Clean Cut Kid as he had some nice things to say about my Lance Armstrong post, but today I think he makes an error with comments about John Roberts' Catholicism.
The impetus behind this story is this article by Jonathon Turley who claims that "unnamed sources" tell him that Sen. Dick Durbin asked Roberts what would Roberts do if the law required a ruling that his church held to be immoral. According to Turley's sources, Roberts was caught off guard and said he would probably have to recuse himself, which even I would admit is a bad answer. By bad I mean wrong and imprudent.
Subsequently, it has turned out that the facts may not be as Turley reports them. Durbin's office is denying the story. Turley now says he got the story straight from Durbin. Who knows? But let's proceed as if the story were true. Chad uses this story to launch an age old attack against Catholics in public life: they take orders from the Pope and can't be trusted with power. Not only is that false, but, it must be said, betrays a profound misunderstanding of the authoritative structure of the Church. The Pope doesn't write the Catechism, the basic deposit of Church teaching, and just this side of never does the Pope "issue orders" on anything political in nature. The Pope might remind the faithful of what the Church teaches, but the Pope is not just expressing his own views. This tactic of questioning the objectivity of religious men and women, used by Chuck Schumer and others to keep devout Catholics like Bill Pryor off the federal bench, amounts to a religious test for office. What it means is that by default the only acceptable religious points of view are secularism or extreme latitudinarianism. Or maybe it's just those goofy devout Catholics who worship a foreign prince who should be barred from the bench.
Here is more reporting on this issue via the New York Times:
Mr. Cornyn called Professor Turley’s account of the discussion "troubling, if true." In his own meeting with Judge Roberts on Monday, Mr. Cornyn recounted, "I said, ’I hate to see somebody going down this road because it really smacks of a religious test for public service.’ "
He added, "I said, ’I hate bringing this up, but since someone else already has and I know it is going to come up, is there anything about your faith or religious views that would prevent you from deciding issues like the death penalty of abortion or the like?’ "
"Absolutely not," Mr. Cornyn recalled Judge Roberts replying.
Mr. Durbin declined to discuss the issue on Monday. A spokesman, Joe Shoemaker, said, "What Judge Roberts did say clearly and repeatedly was that he would follow the rule of law, and beyond that we are going to leave it to Judge Roberts to offer his views."
Let us not forget that Roberts said in his confirmation hearing for the appellate court that he would have no problem upholding Roe v. Wade, which is a funny point of view for a puppet of the man in the funny hat.
I think judges should keep their personal opinions to themselves and just rule on the law. While I hope Roberts seeks the help of divine wisdom as he issues rulings, I wouldn't want him to substitute his religious beliefs for the law of the land, even though I suspect that his and my beliefs are quite similar. But I also don't believe we should sanitize the walls of power of those who have strong religious convictions.
I suspect many of those who get all bent out of shape about theocracy and the influence of those cursed religious conservatives aren't really concerned with the influence of religion in politics, they are just worried about conservative religion in politics. Take these words for example:
My faith affects everything that I do, in truth. There's a great passage of the Bible that says, "What does it mean, my brother, to say you have faith if there are no deeds? Faith without works is dead. "
And I think that everything you do in public life has to be guided by your faith, affected by your faith, but without transferring it in any official way to other people.
That's why I fight against poverty. That's why I fight to clean up the environment and protect this earth.
That's why I fight for equality and justice. All of those things come out of that fundamental teaching and belief of faith.
But I know this, that President Kennedy in his inaugural address told all of us that here on Earth, God's work must truly be our own. And that's what we have to -- I think that's the test of public service.
That's John Kerry during the October 13, 2004 presidential debate. Yet in the same debate when the subject of abortion came up, Kerry said this:
I believe that I can't legislate or transfer to another American citizen my article of faith. What is an article of faith for me is not something that I can legislate on somebody who doesn't share that article of faith.
Wait. It's ok for Kerry to legislate his religious views on poverty, the environment, and claim "everything you do in public life has to be guided by your faith" but when it comes to this one particular question, he demurs and says he can't impose his views on those who don't share his faith? I happen to like what Kerry says in the first passage I quoted. And I bet many on the left do, including perhaps Chad and Seth over at CCK and Epp over at SD Watch. But you add "abortion" to the list of poverty, environment, equality, etc. and folks squeal about theocracy and imposing your beliefs on other people. That's why I like Democrats for Life. They seem entirely consistent to me, if still wrong on some practical matters (e.g, I happen to think statism is bad for the poor). Some people on the right take their faith into economic matters and foreign policy matters, but not nearly enough.
For more on the Roberts/Catholic matter, see Joe Knippenberg and he links to Win Meyers. You can tell I stole from both of them. For then-Cardinal Ratzinger's letter about abortion and communion, it's posted at Priests for Life. I would point out that it leaves much room for judgment on the part of individuals and their priests. I have no desire to pick a fight with Chad, Seth or Todd E. and would appreciate thoughtful responses.
Update: Because this post wasn't long enough, here's more. Who is lying? Durbin or Turley?
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