Opinion: Doug Kmiec on McCain v. Obama at Saddleback

"As Catholics we need to undertake to address abortion in its full social justice context and in as great a spirit of charity and friendship as remains possible in American politics."

MALIBU, CA (Catholic Online) - Deacon Keith Fournier gave an excellent recounting of the recent "civil forum" conducted by Pastor Rick Warren of the Saddleback Church ministry in California. The Deacon was awarding Olympic-like prizes and gave both Senator McCain and the Pastor a "gold medal." The pastor's was well deserved.

The impressive "civil forum" in which the pastor separately put similar questions to Senators Obama and McCain was illuminating - indeed, more so than any of the presidential debates to date. The pastor's questions were for the most part fairly and clearly stated and they did not avoid difficult topics like abortion. In addition, since the candidates were not on stage together, there was an attitude of conversation rather than one-up-man-ship. In keeping with its name, it was the best of civil discussion -- that is, the sharing of ideas with civility and respect.

The Obama campaign had thoughtfully arranged for my wife and myself to attend the forum, and we did - well, sort of. When we arrived with plenty of time, the church grounds were "locked down" and we never did make it inside. The Sheriff's Department was confronted at the entrance with loud and sometimes unruly protest. Many protesting were carrying large pictures of unborn or aborted babies.

As a pro-life Catholic, I understand that one way to instruct about evil is to unmask its ugliness. Abortion is ugly. And so for the next two hours we were subjected to one bloody photo or another being thrust into our face as one epithet or another was hurled at Senator Obama. There was also a contingent of yellow-tee-shirted protestors proclaiming marriage to be between one man and one woman, to which as Catholics we also concur.

Again, though, there was something about watching otherwise normal looking people rip into one another - in several cases literally - to fully grasp that what the First Amendment rightly protects as a means of expression, might as a matter of decency be disqualified as a tenable method of persuasion.

God finds His own way to teach. That afternoon, He thought it best for this middle-age couple in suit & tie and Sunday dress to stand at the curb of a church property and witness and hear and feel what our nation has become: a nation that chooses up sides readily and considers opposing sides almost never. Rather than seeking "a more perfect union" we look for reasons to dislike one another.

In some cases, we have been angry so long and with such intensity, the idea of finding common ground or pursuing a common good is unthinkable. And matters only get worse when faith is mixed into the hatred. In that circumstance, all hope of "love of neighbor" or "doing for the least of one's brothers and sisters" is not only foregone, but foregone righteously. Of course, in our sober moments uninflamed with partisanship, we admit - if only to ourselves - that using faith as a means of hate is an agency with the wrong side.

Later that evening, when my wife and I saw a rebroadcast of the forum on television, we were startled by the profoundly different answers given by Senators McCain and Obama to Pastor Warren's question as to whether there is evil in the world, and if so, what should be done about it? While the good Deacon generously awarded Senator McCain an overall gold medal, let me respectfully suggest that his answers were not of that high standing.

McCain's answer, for example, on the question of evil: confrontation writ large; he will get the radical Islamists; he will deploy troops wherever and whenever necessary to prevail over "the enemy" however we may describe that enemy from time to time. Years ago, it was "the communists;" then, the soviets; then the Viet Cong; then the Iraqis or al Qaeda or radical Islam (the qualifying adjective being necessary only for cover since our comparative understanding of the nuances of most religions beyond our own is often too paper thin to justify expressing an opinion, let alone sufficient grievance to send an army).

Senator McCain got robust applause for his commitment to pursue Osama bin Laden "to the gates of hell." Bin Laden is a big, if elusive, target of course and the world's justice should be brought to bear upon his crimes against humanity, but let us remember, an intemperate use of force deploys not the aged men behind the lines, but our sons and daughters at ages just months beyond the receipt of a driver's permit.

The nation's security must be safeguarded, but as the Holy Father has instructed more than once, if the first line of defense is war, it is already a defeat for mankind.

How did Senator Obama respond? By acknowledging the existence of evil and the importance of confronting it, but by first grasping, in humility, its cause. All Americans detest the horrific killing in the Republic of Georgia, but events of that nature do not manifest themselves spontaneously, and part of the art of diplomacy is undertaking the balance of relations that bring security by agreement and deterrence, not reactive force.

Pastor Warren did a fine job of maintaining evenhandedness while also praising that worthy of it. One could sense Pastor Warren's understanding nod to Senator Obama's observation that we need to be wary about the pursuit of evil in the name of the good. Sometimes, one hears a concern about Senator Obama's relative youthfulness or past experience, but in that single answer, there was the manifest wisdom of the virtue of prudence illustrating that judgment does not depend upon the number of days crossed off the calendar.

In the context of the later questions dealing with war, Senator Obama acknowledged the extraordinary service of the American military in responding to the attack at Pearl Harbor by referencing his grandfather's service and a recent visit to the Arizona war Memorial. Responsible and proportionate force is sometimes unavoidable, not in accordance with the teaching of the Catholic Church, there is a presumption against the use of force - as a matter, by the way, of honoring the culture of life.

The McCain and Obama answers on abortion followed a similar pattern. McCain said all the right Catholic things: life begins at conception and he intends to be a pro-life president. McCain's support for embryonic stem cell research as Deacon Keith acknowledges is inconsistent with what our faith teaches, but by virtue of Senator Obama's statement that he does not support reversing Roe, McCain's inconsistency passed as a footnote.

What's more, here uncharacteristically, Pastor Warren let Senator McCain off the hook. In Warren's own words, after McCain's self proclamation as pro-life, the pastor stated "don't have to go longer on that one." Yet, there was much more to be explored. Does being a pro-life president involve anything more than hoping the Supreme Court will express its approval that states can be either pro-abortion or pro-life which is McCain's wholly unsatisfactory position.

Pastor Warren can be forgiven for not immediately seeing the need to inquire. The Catholic perspective has been likewise oblivious to the fullness of the faith here as well. After declaring abortion to be intrinsically wrongful, the Catholic mind too often closes itself to all but one means - the reversal of Roe -- of addressing it. Like McCain's un-nuanced understanding of evil this incomplete thought plays into, if not stokes, the "us v. them" mentality.

In this, there is no effort to address underlying cause and certainly no extension of empathy with the poverty or the ignorance or the cruelty that may lie behind the morally tragic contemplation of a woman to take the life of her own child. And with the Catholic mind so totally closed to alternative means to reduce abortion, it then often remains closed to every aspect of the social justice teaching of the Catholic tradition - whether it be providing a living wage, decent shelter, adequate prenatal care or the preservation of the created environment.

If we are to follow the model of Pastor Warren's "civil forum," as Catholics we need to undertake to address abortion in its full social justice context and in as great a spirit of charity and friendship as remains possible in American politics. John McCain told us what we wanted to hear. It is less clear he told us what we needed to know to open the Catholic mind - not to the acceptance of evil, but to its amelioration by means other than condemnation.

Doug Kmiec is the Chair & Professor of Constitutional Law, Pepperdine University; and the former Dean of The Catholic University School of Law

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