"You don't work to limit the murder of innocent victims. You work to stop it," Judie Brown, the president of the American Life League adds. But couldn't they do both? Throwing their support behind more health care and opportunities for impoverished and campaigning to end abortion are not mutually exclusive things, as the more reasonable pro-lifers, like Douglas Kmiec, realize. "If one strategy has failed and failed over decades, and you have empirical information that tells how you can honor life and encourage women to make that choice by meeting real needs that are existing and tangible, why not do that?" Kmiec, a Catholic who voted for Obama tells the Post.

There's one Catholic who might not be as willing to compromise as Kmiec: the Pope According to Time, one of Obama's first moves in office may be to sign the Freedom of Choice Act, which would undo some restrictions to abortion, and "could force doctors in Catholic hospitals to perform abortions against their conscience." An insider at the Vatican tells Time, that if Obama signs the Freedom of Choice Act, "[I]t would be the equivalent of a war. It would be like saying: 'We've heard the Catholic Church and we have no interest in their concerns.'" The most unfortunate part of this potential is that the Obama administration and the Vatican have a lot of shared thoughts about foreign policy and the environment, and according to Time, "the possibility of an open clash over abortion could squander the potential for the Vatican to work side-by-side with Washington" on these issues."

Some Abortion Foes Shifting Focus From Ban To Reduction [Washington Post]
Will The Pope And Obama Clash Over Abortion? [Time]

The IHT writer interviews a bunch of Catholics in Scranton to highlight the back-and-forth about abortion and voting that happens among the Catholic faithful — if not their leaders — while showing at least some of them swinging toward McCain (and one being racist). Although the Church regards the practice of abortion as a sin, excommunication isn't exactly standard practice for the women of Catholic faith who have had them, since you can cross your legs and — as a friend of my mother's did in high school — wear a hat in the pew and never tell the priest about your abortion. For politicians, on the other hand, it's another story. In the last few years, players in the Church hierarchy have begun vociferously pushing the idea that not only are women who get abortions and the doctors who perform them going to hell, but that the politicians who support the right of non-Catholic women to believe that abortion is not wrong — and Catholic women who believe that the Pope is wrong — are also going to hell.

Joe Biden, for instance, was warned by a local bishop not to try to go to church in or around Scranton, Pennsylvania (his hometown) as he will be denied Communion. Conservative Catholic groups have called for all pro-choice Catholic politicians to be treated similarly in an effort to pressure them to choose their religious faith over their constitutional responsibilities. (Even Catholic writer and professor Douglas Kmiec was denied Communion (i.e., excommunicated) for having the audacity to support Barack Obama because he and Obama believe that Obama's pro-woman, pro-sex ed policies can actually reduce the incidence of abortion by reducing the economic hardships faced by pregnant women...and the number of pregnancies altogether. Shocking, I know.)

Amusingly, as I like to keep repeating, former McCain surrogate Carly Fiorina recently claimed that it is the Democrats who are trying to hold women hostage to the party on the issue of abortion. Well, I'll be damned if too many Democrats go around using their actual pulpits to actually damn people to actual hell (assuming there is a hell to which one can be damned, but Catholics believe there is). Actually, I guess I'll be damned anyway.

In addition to Biden, many politicians — Nancy Pelosi, Tim Kaine, John Kerry and Ted Kennedy, for instance — are practicing Catholics. As such, they are asked to believe that abortion as wrong. And as politicians sworn to uphold the Constitution of this country, they are asked to commit to this leetle thing we like to call the separation of church and state (and to represent the views of their constituents). When your religious values conflict with your responsibilities as a politician, that's a difficult thing to handle. Most do so in the same way that my mother does: they believe that abortion is wrong, but don't believe their religious views should be forced on people who don't share those beliefs. That's called being "pro-choice."

Abortion Issue Again Dividing Catholic Votes [International Herald Tribune]
Denied Communion For Backing Obama [Andrew Sullivan]
Abortion's Foes — On Both Sides Of The Aisle [Wall Street Journal]