But even as he tried to avoid making news Sunday, Kerry broke new ground in an interview that ran in the Dubuque, Iowa, daily, the Telegraph Herald. A Catholic who supports abortion rights and has taken heat recently from some in the church hierarchy for his stance, Kerry told the paper, "I oppose abortion, personally. I don't like abortion. I believe life does begin at conception."
"I can't take my Catholic belief, my article of faith, and legislate it on a Protestant or a Jew or an atheist," he continued in the interview. "We have separation of church and state in the United States of America." The comments came on the final day of a three-state Midwest swing, during which Kerry has repeatedly sought to dispel stereotypes that could play negatively among voters in the Heartland.
When life begins isn't strictly a religious question. You can have an opinion based on science or philosophy. It doesn't matter how or why you formed an opinion, the question is whether you have the guts to stand up for your convictions. What Kerry is saying here is that he doesn't have the ability to fight for what he believes in. Yes, says Kerry, it is a human being, and though I pain when it dies in the womb, I am but a helpless Senator shackled by the rigors of the constitution.
Put another way, the Catholic Church believes in feeding the poor and offering charity. Is that a religious question? By Kerry's reasoning he cannot support welfare, public housing, food stamps or any government aid the Catholic Church supports, because it would conflict with his views of church and state.
Any opinion can be derived from any number of ways and many opinions are based or supported by more than one set of values. For some people it may take the scientific fact and a religious belief to change a behavior or form an opinion. You might not smoke because it's a sin and science says it might kill you. In the case of abortion a person could philosophically believe that abortion cheapens life which leads to more murder. Scientifically, abortion causes harm to the mother. Economically, the loss of these future humans will be a hardship on the economy. However your opinions are derived is unimportant compared to whether you are willing to fight for the ones you have. When Kerry casts a vote, the Supreme Court isn't going to disallow it because it coincides with the belief of his church.
Some leaders are driven by their beliefs and other leaders nod at the beliefs of voters to get elected. Does anyone think the latter is more honorable than the former? Is it better to lulled into sleep by a panderer or led by a believer?
I would much rather hear a candidate say that the abortion debate at the national level is really just emotionalism. What with the court and filibusters of judges, abortion is here to stay. So can we talk about something realistic that can improve America?
But if Kerry wants to tell us that life begins at conception then his voting record would remind one of the Nazis who ran the trains to Poland. They didn't gas one single Jew themselves in a concentration camp. They were just doing their job according to German law set forth by de Fuhrer, regardless of any personal beliefs. They were personally against this genocide, but it would have been wrong of them to get mixed up in their religious beliefs when they had a job to do. Thank goodness professionals can look past their own view of morality and keep the engines of government running as the law dictates.
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