I’m still looking for a transcript of Fr. Curran’s Thursday address at Southern Methodist University, but Tom Roberts over at the National Catholic Reporter has done an excellent recap of Curran’s talk. Here are excerpts below:

The approach currently taken by the U.S. bishops to changing the law on abortion — giving it a preeminence above all other issues that Catholic voters might consider — is flawed on four counts.  … Curran did not dispute church teaching about abortion in his talk. Instead he argued that various approaches to the law are acceptable under Catholic teaching.

“In my judgment, the U.S. bishops claim too great a certitude for their position on abortion law and fail to recognize that their own position logically entails prudential judgment so that they cannot logically distinguish it from most of the other issues such as the death penalty, health care, nuclear deterrence, housing,” Curran said.

[Curran] traced the narrowing of the bishops’ approach to abortion since the mid-1970s when, in the wake of Roe vs Wade, the Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion, the bishops resisted a single issue approach to political involvement. A document on political responsibility before the 1976 election, wrote Curran, “insisted the bishops did not want to form a voting bloc or tell Catholics how to vote. Voters should examine the candidates on a full range of issues, and with a consideration for the candidates’ integrity, philosophy and performance. The document lists eight issues in alphabetical order, beginning with abortion, but does not give priority to any of these issues.”

In contrast, today the bishops “now clearly state abortion is the primary issue.” Their rationale for doing so, he said, rests on their conviction that other issues of public policy and law “involve prudential judgments,” but that abortion laws “deal with something that is intrinsically evil and does not involve prudential judgments. Catholics have certitude on the abortion law issue.” However, Curran states, the bishops’ thesis is wrong for four reasons:

* “The speculative doubt about when human life begins;
* “the fact that possibility and feasibility are necessary aspects involved in discussions about abortion law;
* “the understanding and role of civil law;
* “and the weakness of the intrinsic evil argument.”
(more…)

Keep an eye out for Catholic theologian Fr. Charles Curran’s public lecture on Thursday at Southern Methodist University titled “The U.S. Catholic Bishops and Abortion Legislation: A Critique from Within the Church.”

The promo material describes it thusly:

The U.S. Roman Catholic bishops have now made legal opposition to abortion their primary social issue. This lecture will document the change that has occurred in their position about abortion laws over the years. In addition, the lecture criticizes the bishops from the perspective of Catholic theology, for having claimed too much certitude for their position. There should be room in the Catholic Church for different positions on this issue.

Dallas Catholic Bishop Kevin Farrell has denounced the lecture already, expressing his regrets that “Father Curran has chosen to criticize the position of the bishops of the United States on this matter.” Farrell’s statement has been posted on the SMU Catholic Ministry website and inserted into bulletins at Catholic Masses on campus Sunday.

Curran responded, “This paper is not about the Catholic moral teaching on abortion. In fact, the paper accepts the Catholic moral teaching that direct abortion is always wrong. The paper deals solely with abortion law and argues that one who holds the Catholic moral teaching can come to different conclusions about what the law should be.”

If anyone attends this lecture in Dallas, I’d like to hear your report. Otherwise, I will try to get a transcript and post it here. While the Catholic hierarchy has stated that Catholics cannot discuss issues such as abortion, ordination of women, or same-sex relationships and marriage on Catholic property, we certainly can and should discuss these issues — along with war and peace, nuclear weapons, the climate crisis, death penalty, health-care reform, workers rights, etc — everywhere else.

They are rioting in Paris to prevent the government from resolving its debt crisis on the backs of the middle class. In England, Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne detailed their deepest budget cuts ever, “eliminating almost 500,000 public-sector jobs,” according to Bloomberg News.

In the midst of it all, Alison Tomlin, president of the Methodist Conference UK, preached at Central Methodist Hall this week in London, giving the perspective from Christian ministries on-the-ground. “Just in the last week,” she said, “I have been told about an emergency housing project in Birmingham at threat; a project in Newcastle working with women seeking sanctuary anxious about its future; a young offender rehabilitation project in Liverpool wondering if it must close.” All examples of governments “scrooging” the poor.

Tomlin stands in a long line of Methodist women who have taught (Susannah Wesley), funded (Lady Huntingdon) , and organized (Barbara Rucke Heck) for the Methodist revolution that believed it “inconceivable to follow Christ and not have the welfare of the poor and the vulnerable close to your heart.” Here’s a excerpt from Tomlin’s speech at Central Methodist Hall this week:

You may not have noticed but this but you are sitting in a Methodist Church, where a vibrant multi-cultural congregation meet each Sunday. When you came in on the first floor, on your left there was a life size statue of John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church. You may have missed it – he was a very short man.

In his journals Wesley wrote about a press that stigmatized the poor, he wrote of politicians who did not wish to look at the concerns of the poor, and who continually blamed the poor for their own fate. He wrote of people using that stigma and blame to continually treat the poorest and most vulnerable badly. Thank, goodness that was 250 years ago and could never happen now!

The past ten to fifteen years of boom benefited some sections of society but not the poorest. Relatively their income went down. Justice or, to use that popular word, ‘fairness’, demand that they do not suffer now during the bust. Earlier [ in October 2010] Eric Pickles [Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government] asked us to judge the government on how they treated the most vulnerable. That we will do.

For the past ten years Christians worldwide have been working with governments to promote policies that will end poverty. As has been repeated ad nauseam, “We have the ability, but lack the political will.” Now, as the gamblers’ deck of financial tomfoolery slides wildly out of control, Christians will need to place ourselves alongside the poor and aid in their mutual defense — against government policies, banking regulations, trade agreements, budget restructuring, etc, that will inevitably kill them.

Tomlin continued with a fine example of what makes a strong financial community:

This building was built a hundred years ago using money donated by ordinary Methodists. To ensure this was a building of ordinary people, initially no-one was allowed to donate more than one guinea. Rich and poor alike. In the historic roll, which you can see on the left as you leave the building, the names of all the people who gave one guinea, including my grandparents, are recorded.

This hall was built because Methodists believed that ordinary people, people who could afford no more than one guinea, should have a voice in the heart of Westminster. Hearing today’s contributions, the stories of ordinary people, the concern for ordinary people, I am confident my grandparents would have felt that theirs was a guinea well spent. Methodists support a wide range of views about deficit reduction. It is possible to be a Christian and a member of almost any political party. But John Wesley, and the Methodist Church he founded, believe it is inconceivable to follow Christ and not have the welfare of the poor and the vulnerable close to your heart, and we are proud to stand beside others who share those concerns today.

Rich and poor alike, if we follow Christ, then we will find ourselves deepening our relationships with the newly homeless, battered women without a refuge, and teen offenders at a loss without the re-hab programs previously available. We must be as passionate as the Parisians (without the random violence) and as courageous as the Methodist women if we are to step boldly in this new era.

Rose Marie Berger, an associate editor at Sojourners, is the author of Who Killed Donte Manning? The Story of an American Neighborhood available at store.sojo.net. This post first appeared on Sojourners God’s Politics blog.

Solitude has its own special work: a deepening of awareness that the world needs. A struggle against alienation. True solitude is deeply aware of the world’s needs. It does not hold the world at arm’s length.–Thomas Merton

Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander by Thomas Merton (Image, p. 19)