Obama's 'September surprise' for American Catholics
By Phil Lawler (
bio -
articles -
send a comment) | July 11, 2012 3:20 PM
If Barack Obama is a clever politician, he will soon offer the US Catholic bishops another “compromise” on the HHS contraceptive mandate. Such a gesture could boost the President’s chances for re-election, and obviously Obama would welcome that result. The proffered compromise could also cause deep divisions within the Catholic Church in America, and the President would welcome that development, too.
Here’s the scenario, as I imagine it unfolding:
- In a few weeks, perhaps just after Labor Day, the White House will announce with great fanfare that President Obama has made an extra effort to accommodate the concerns of Catholics. The exact nature of this new “compromise” is immaterial. It will involve only a trivial change, on some irrelevant point. President Obama is locked into his position, determined to provide universal contraceptive coverage. He has no desire to address the bishops’ real concerns. Nevertheless the White House will tout the new policy as a huge concession, insisting that the President has gone out of his way—twice, now!—to accommodate Catholic concerns.
- The US bishops’ conference will greet the White House announcement politely at first, welcoming the President’s willingness to re-open the discussion, and promising to study the new plan carefully. But after reading the fine print, the bishops will realize that nothing of substance has changed, and announce that the revised plan is still unacceptable.
- However, before the US bishops’ conference has time to issue that measured response, Obama’s Catholic allies will leap into the game with their own prepared public statements, extolling the President for his vision. Op-ed columnists, notified in advance by White House operatives, will be ready with supportive essays, announcing that all reasonable objections to the HHS mandate have now been answered. The Catholic Health Association will wax enthusiastic about the new plan. Professors at Jesuit universities will appear on talk shows, delivering their confident opinion that the bishops have no choice but to accept the new plan. Prominent Catholic clerics will thank the President for his consideration. Perhaps even a bishop or two will join in the chorus of praise.
- Only a few perceptive analysts will notice the voices that are not heard in this debate. Feminists, abortion advocates, and family planning crusaders will not protest against the new White House proposal. A genuine compromise would have required them to yield some ground, and provoked at least a bit of grumbling. But the “compromise” offered by Obama will cost them nothing.
- When the bishops pronounce the plan unacceptable, then, these liberal Catholics will react with well-rehearsed disbelief. How could the bishops possibly hold out, they will ask, when Obama has answered all their objections? (In fact Obama will have answered none of the serious objections, but we’re talking about political perceptions here, not rigorous legislative analysis.) How could the hierarchy be so intransigent? As the presidential race heats up, the liberal criticism of the bishops will become more aggressive. The hierarchy is out of touch, Obama’s friends will say; the bishops’ conference does not speak for ordinary Catholics. The President himself will not enter the fray, but his campaign surrogates will encourage lay Catholics to dismiss the bishops’ opinions, characterizing them as purely partisan. The nastier critics will persistently remind us (as if we needed any reminder) that the bishops were not nearly so energetic in punishing clerical abusers.
- Meanwhile the Obama campaign will announce a series of initiatives designed to appeal to liberal Catholics: increasing funding for Catholic Charities, eased immigration policies, a hike in the minimum wage. Taking their cues from Democratic campaign workers, Catholic activist groups like Network will denounce the Republican candidate, Mitt Romney, as an enemy of the poor and downtrodden. If the bishops continue to hammer away on religious freedom, their liberal critics will insist that this is only one among many important issues. Now the party line will be that for all reasonable Catholics (as opposed to the unreasonable bishops), Obama is obviously the better choice: the champion of social justice.
The resat of the article can be found here:
http://www.catholicculture.org/comme...undoff_confirm
