The Pope's Real Message for Obama By JOHN L. ALLEN Jr.

December 19, 2008
Op-Ed Contributor
The Pope's Real Message for Obama By JOHN L. ALLEN Jr.

THE roughly 67 million Catholics in the United States make up nearly one-quarter of the American population, but just 6 percent of the global Catholic total of 1.1 billion. Ninety-four percent of the Catholics in the world, in other words, are not Americans, which may help explain why the pope and his lieutenants are not always thinking American thoughts when they get out of bed in the morning.

That's a useful bit of context to bear in mind in light of a tough new Vatican document on bioethics, released one week ago, that ratchets up the church's condemnations of embryonic stem cell research, in vitro fertilization, the "morning-after pill" and a host of other techniques it regards as violations of human dignity.

In the United States, the tendency may be to see the document, titled "Dignitas Personae," or "Dignity of the Person," as a battle plan for resistance to the incoming Obama administration. In reality, that amounts to trying to shove a square peg into the round hole of American politics.

For one thing, the document has been in the works for years, so it is hardly a rapid response to the American elections. Moreover, the Vatican doesn't want to be at loggerheads with Barack Obama, because it sees a range of matters where it's more in sync with him than it has been with President Bush. On Dec. 3, for example, the Vatican simultaneously signed and ratified a new international treaty banning cluster bombs, a measure President Bush opposed — a reminder that Catholic social teaching and Republican politics are not always a match made in heaven.

What the Vatican may not fully appreciate, however, is that putting out a hard-nosed pro-life document right now, at least in the United States, may be the political equivalent of shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater.

In the '08 elections, pro-life Catholics emerged as the dominant voice of the religious right. To be sure, Mr. Obama won a majority among Catholics. Yet the sharpest anti-Obama rhetoric from religious leaders came not from old culture warriors like Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson but rather from some Catholic clergymen.

Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City, Mo., for example, warned voters that their eternal salvation might be at stake if they supported Mr. Obama. A couple of pro-life priests even suggested that Catholics who voted for Mr. Obama should go to confession. (Their bishops, it should be said, quickly rejected that idea.)

Cardinal Francis Stafford, a former archbishop of Denver who today heads a Vatican court, described Mr. Obama's rhetoric on abortion as "aggressive, disruptive and apocalyptic," and compared the election results to the Garden of Gethsemane — the spot where, according to the Bible, Jesus agonized before his crucifixion.

In that context, "Dignitas Personae" risks being read as encouragement for the most ardent pro-life forces in America to let slip the dogs of war.

Of course, many Catholic bishops and many ordinary Catholics in America believe that while Mr. Obama's positions on abortion and stem cell research are troubling, there are also important areas of common ground.

That seems to be the balance the Vatican is trying to strike. Pope Benedict XVI sent a telegram of congratulations to Mr. Obama calling his election a "historic occasion," and the two men later spoke by telephone. A papal spokesman said the Vatican hopes to work with him on Iraq, the Holy Land, Christian minorities in the Middle East and Asia, and the fight against poverty and social inequality.

To be clear, the Vatican yields to no one in its pro-life commitments. In effect, "Dignitas Personae" is a reminder that there will be no "truce," no strategic silence, about the defense of human life from the moment of conception. The question now is whether the Vatican will find an equally effective way to mobilize those Catholics who hope to build bridges.

This is one case in which the pope would do well to think a few American thoughts.

John L. Allen Jr. is the senior correspondent for The National Catholic Reporter and the author of "The Rise of Benedict XVI."

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/19/opinion/19allen.html?sq=Pope&st=cse&scp=1&%2339;s%20Real%20Message=&pagewanted=print

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