ARTICLES

No Clear Guide

Local Catholic Voters Baffled More Than Ever

By Christopher Owen

In the face of an election described by the Massachusetts bishops as one where "the choices we make on November 7th will help shape the new millennium," pro-life Catholics throughout the diocese of San Diego were angered by the distribution of a four-page questionnaire titled "How Do I Decide? A Catholic Voter Education Aid from the Office for Social Ministry" prior to the general election.

The questionnaire, which claims to assist Catholics in their "exercise of the virtue of faithful citizenship," was unveiled by office for social ministry director Kent Peters at an August 28 pro-life coordinators meeting at the diocese pastoral center to replace the California Prolife Council and Christian Coalition voter guides.

Christian Coalition of San Diego strategist Alice Hayward said, "My understanding was that the Catholic bishops at the national level made the decision not to have voter guides distributed. We sent ours to Kent Peters early on, but he said it wasn't enough, and that he needed more documentation. A week before the election, the local diocese authority decided that if particular churches wanted to distribute them, then they could do so, but this came almost at the last minute."

A report on the meeting in the September 2000 issue of a local pro-life newsletter stated "Kent introduced a voter's aid for our review. There was controversy over the diocese not accepting Christian Coalition voter's guides this year.... Kent's voter aid is a workbook. Each parish would receive an initial mailing of 30 copies. If they wanted they could order 500 more, but if more than that were needed, the parish would have to get them printed. The voter's aid really forces people to think about whom they are voting (for) and is a valuable tool."

Printed on legal-size paper, the voter aid consists of one page of introductory remarks and usage instructions followed by three pages listing eight areas of Catholic social concern, with sample questions for voters to ask candidates. Theoretically, after querying each candidate and obtaining answers to the questions, Catholics would be able to make an informed voting decision.

The introduction on the first page of the voter aid states "It is apparent that the virtue of citizenship is dying -- evidenced by low voter turnout, by shrinking audiences for election debates, by voters obtaining information only from 30-second commercials, and by many citizens being unaware of who their elected officials are. As Catholics we can change that."

The remaining pages list eight social issues (with sample questions): Protecting Human Life, Protecting Immigrants and Refugees, Protecting Workers, Promoting Health Care, Safe and Affordable Housing, Protecting Working Poor Families, Protecting Families From the Harm of Pornography, and Promoting Global Solidarity. The voter aid does not address the issue of Catholic teaching on homosexuality.

According to a priest who requested anonymity, the decision to use the diocesan voter aid and exclude other organizations' election materials resulted from a presbyteral council meeting. "I saw Alexandra Kelly, the diocesan attorney, in the hallway on the Friday before the election. When I asked her if they made any change in the diocese's decision regarding the distribution of the ballot, she said, 'No.'"

One East County pro-life coordinator who requested anonymity said "The diocesan voter aid wasn't much help to the average person because it required them to do research on each issue, and most people aren't going to take the time to do that in a methodical way. People know who the candidates in the big races are, but they don't know who's running in the local races, like school boards and all the other little elections.

"On October 1, after all the Masses, I had a pro-life table with voter registration forms and other pro-life literature, and I also put the voter guides out that the diocese had given us. A few people picked them up, and some people said, 'These aren't like the ones we had other years; these don't have names on them.'"

Another Catholic expressed her disappointment: "If you think a candidate is going to give you 30 minutes, much less two hours, to thoroughly cover the questions on an issue, think again. Their attitudes are already formed or they wouldn't be in the party that they're in. They're not going to let you reform their stands on the life issues. Dream on."

Joel Anderson, president of the San Diego chapter of the California Pro-Life Council and a practicing Catholic, said the voter aid "includes questions that deal with increasing the minimum wage to help the poor, which equates abortion with the minimum wage. The questionnaire is a perfect example of how Catholics are being corrupted through the misuse of the 'seamless garment' theory from within the Church. Kent Peters and I tried to get a balanced slate approved for the local parishes, but we simply ran out of time. When you read 'How Do I Decide,' I think you will agree it de-emphasizes life issues and pushes Catholics toward Gore."

The seamless garment theory evolved from a 1984 talk given in St. Louis by the late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin entitled "A Consistent Ethic of Life: Continuing the Dialogue," where he stated that abortion and nuclear war must "be confronted as pieces of a larger pattern." Critics charge that the theory can be misused to place abortion on the same plane as other issues, thus diminishing its importance.

When asked about the legality of distributing his half-sheet guide listing candidate endorsements, Anderson said, "The churches are not being asked to distribute them. What I worked with Kent Peters to develop was a guide that listed only candidate positions and not endorsements. The Church has to say 'No' to distributing guides that endorse, but we as citizens have every right to hand them out. They get this church-state thing all mixed up. Nothing says that the Church has to remove them from windshields, or chase us down the street, or kick us off the sidewalk."

On October 31, Brian Johnston, western regional director of the National Right to Life Committee, e-mailed California Pro-Life Council supporters warning them they might encounter opposition from churches and reassured them of clergy support and the legalities of election literature distribution.

"First, be assured that you have the moral support of many church leaders for your efforts..." continued the message, which cited quotes by Bishop Timlin of Scranton, Pennsylvania and Archbishop Curtiss of Omaha, Nebraska about the overriding importance of abortion in this election.

Johnston's memo described the differences between voters' guides and endorsement slates. "...Voters' guides are designed for general distribution inside or outside churches. They do not endorse candidates. Rather they are a compilation of all we know about a candidate's position on life issues ... because they do not endorse a candidate or a party, [they] are perfectly legally suitable as bulletin inserts, or for any other distribution in churches, without jeopardizing the tax status of the church.

"Endorsement slates or other candidate endorsement literature is another matter. Our election piece literature drops are a very important element ... This literature is designed to be placed on car windshields or door handles outside of churches."

One former official from a California diocese suggested in a late October email to Johnston that he "urge pastors to take a neutral stand on partisan literature, but a pro-active stand on promoting voting for candidates whose views are in line with Catholic moral teaching, especially on life issues such as abortion and euthanasia, and family issues, such as traditional definitions of marriage. Neutral stand means they shouldn't disseminate partisan literature, but also that they mustn't chase people off the parking lots, denounce such literature from the pulpit, etc. Doing so can be interpreted as partisan in the other direction."

A pro-life veteran speaking from his office in Sacramento about the San Diego situation wanted to remind pastors that they were breaking the law by removing flyers from windshields, "Once the literature is placed on a car, it belongs to the car's owner."

News Notes reporter Allyson Smith distributed California Pro Life Council endorsement slates without incident during the 5:00 p.m. Mass at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart parish in City Heights after pastor Richard Perozich told her she could do so on the public sidewalk outside the main church entrance.

Other parishes, however, were not as tolerant. On Sunday morning, November 5, Smith went to Holy Trinity parish in El Cajon and began placing slates on car windshields in the back parking lot during the 9:00 a.m. Mass. An elderly gentleman patrolling the parking lot approached her and asked what she was doing.

"I'm putting voting guides on the cars," said Smith. "Did you get permission first?" asked the man. "You need to get permission."

"No, I didn't; I'm just putting flyers on cars." The man revealed that he had been "given orders" to pull any voting materials off cars in the lot. He also stated that he privately agreed with distributing the guides and added that it would be fine for Smith to place them on cars parked along the street. He indicated that people had already been to the parish to place flyers on cars and he had removed those, but didn't have time to remove the flyers that Smith had just placed.

Smith responded, "You do what you feel you have to do. I'll go to the public sidewalk in front of the church."

Relocating to the sidewalk outside the main entrance to Holy Trinity at approximately 9:45 a.m. while Mass was still in progress, Smith called out "Pro-life voting guides" to people going in and out of the church, handing them to interested Mass-goers.

When Mass ended at about 10:15 a.m., several people with nametags, apparently catechumens and their sponsors, exited the church, followed by Holy Trinity pastor Father Brian Corcoran.

After chatting with exiting Mass-goers for a few minutes, Corcoran approached Smith, told her to "Stop harassing people outside this church."

Smith replied she was only distributing pro-life voting guides and refused to leave. "You can't kick me off a public sidewalk. Besides, how are people supposed to know what I have [to hand out to them] unless I say something?"

"This is a celebration of faith and community," asserted Corcoran, "not a political gathering." When Smith again refused to leave, Corcoran said, "You may be a Christian and you may be pro-life, but you're certainly not polite."

Several of the Mass-goers who had accompanied Corcoran in the recessional procession witnessed the confrontation. After Corcoran left the scene, one woman said to Smith, "Keep your views to yourself." Smith replied, "I'm a Catholic too, and what you've just said is tyranny."

In a November 5 interview, laywoman Jane Collard, who had attended the 9:00 a.m. Mass at Holy Trinity, recalled, "At the end of Mass, Fr. Brian announced something like, 'I'm afraid when you go out, you may find some political literature on your windshields, and we do not approve of this, and we ask you just to ignore anything like that.'

"Two weeks ago, Father announced at Mass that the [office for] social ministry had prepared a voters' guide for everyone, and they were piled on the Communion rail, and they were totally worthless. They were asinine, totally a waste of paper. It's stupid. This whole thing is the most asinine thing I've ever seen in this diocese. The priests have to cooperate because they don't want to get sent to Imperial County.

"The problem," Collard concluded, "is that a pro-abort can come to a Protestant church and make a big speech and there's no problem with that, and that's not violating church and state, but a Catholic can't even get a signature for a local race."

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