All moral values are not equal in eyes of church

All moral values are not equal in eyes of church
EDITOR:
This is in answer to last Sunday's letter claiming that the local Catholic leadership missed an opportunity to set the record straight. There is a hierarchy of moral values; all moral rights are not of equal value.
At the top of the list of moral values is the right to life. If a person is not acknowledged as a person in the womb with a right to life then all other political and social rights are meaningless. A living wage, health care, worker rights, etc. can only be to applied to a living person.
In point of fact the right to life is not a sectarian issue. Rather it is based on the natural law written in the heart of each human person and is known by the light of reason. Even an atheist would recognize that abortion on demand is a moral evil.
Cardinal Bernadine's consistent ethic of life can be misleading if this hierarchy of moral values is not acknowledged. Some moral values may be argued about as to their nature and application. However, the right to life in the womb is an absolute right. Abortion, the taking of a human life in the womb, is always morally wrong. There is no exception to the direct killing of an innocent victim.
Pope John Paul II's position on war is that every war is a defeat for justice and peace so he opposes any war. However, he never said the war in Iraq was unjust. Every war undertaken by a nation depends on the prudential judgment of its leader.
Bishop Tobin's statement of pleasure was that people voted their conscience instead of their self-interest in the past election. Abortion, the nature of marriage and stem cell research were more important than social issues for both Democrats and Republicans.
Even in Ohio where there have been significant job loss it seems people voted for moral principles rather than their own economic self-interest. It seems they recognized that some moral values are absolute and not negotiable.
This does not mean the Republican Party is the party of God. However, for the past 30 years the Democratic Party under a secular leadership has turned away from the values of the Catholic working man and his family. To be acknowledged by the Democratic leadership you have to be pro abortion.
The Democratic Party has conceded to the Republican Party the moral values of faith and family it once represented. Today the Democratic Party embraces every out-of-the-ordinary interest group in our society: Pro abortion, radical feminism, gay rights agenda, Hollywood immoral movie makers, the ACLU attack on God and religion in the public square.
The Democratic Party leadership (if it has one today) has rejected its moral standards and church going following that was its strength in the past and has given it away to the Republican Party.
JOSEPH B. GESING
Warren
Questioning God's party ties
EDITOR:
As I watch the pundits and the self-righteous letter to the editor contributors proclaim that God himself anointed President Bush a second term based on morality, I have to laugh and ask myself a few questions.
Would God be happy that we invaded Iraq based on false Bush administration intelligence, thereby causing the death of thousands of innocent Iraqis? Would the Almighty agree that it is moral to discriminate against gays, blacks, Hispanics, Protestants, Jews, atheists, and any other minority that doesn't believe exactly the way these religious zealots think? Would God have voted to allow the assault weapons ban to expire? Would he also agree that giving the wealthy a huge tax break while cutting education spending under the catch phrase & quot;no child left behind & quot; is good for a godly society? How about the environment? Maybe God agrees that allowing more mercury into the atmosphere, thereby causing more birth defects makes us more worthy of entrance to heaven? Maybe God knew the truth about the Vietnam service record of John Kerry and contributed money to the Swift Boat liars?
How come God allowed terrorists to level the World Trade Center while King George and the Republicans controlled the government? Maybe God is impressed that the abortion rate is increasing under President Bush while it declined in each of Bill Clintons eight years? Does God agree that the health care system in America is the best in the world, even though the truth is we aren't even in the top 10 and are one of the only industrialized countries that allows nearly 45 million to have little or no coverage? God had to be impressed that we passed a Medicare prescription bill based on a lie of its cost. I'll bet that God is really happy that we are the richest nation in the history of the world and yet we allow 20 percent of our children to live in poverty. The moral Republicans have also never proposed a minimum wage increase to help many single mothers and others who desperately need the few dollars that it provides.
If the Republicans are the party of morality, then I'm happy to be a Democrat.
BILL JOHNSON
Boardman
Letter rife with inaccuracies, and we're not sniveling
EDITOR:
Last Sunday, arriving home from church, I sat down with paper and coffee to see what words of wisdom the editorial page produced. Unfortunately, it was filled with extremely vitriolic nonsense attacking my bishop, the Catholic Church, and Father Witt, who for over 16 years has fought alongside my friends and I trying (vainly sometimes it seems), to educate people regarding the horrors taking place weekly at the Mahoning Women's Center. The Taliban reference would have been humorous if it wasn't so pitiful.
But sniveling is not what we do. It is called prayer and nonviolent witness. Denigrating the actions of Christians/Catholics trying to change the slaughter occurring daily in this nation against the weakest of our society -- the unborn child is fruitless, because God has promised good will always overcome evil.
To the writer of the second long letter, who is frustrated with Catholic leadership, let me reference an article by Francis X. Maier, Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Denver. Mr. Maier gave the example of Robert P. Casey, governor of Pennsylvania from 1987-1995, who was publicly humiliated at the 1992 Democratic Convention for arguing the rights of the unborn.
Maier states, "in his 1996 autobiography, Casey warned that: 'Many people discount the power of the so-called cultural issues -- and especially the abortion issue. I see it the other way around. These issues are central to the resurgence of the Republicans, central to the natural implosion of the Democrats, central to the question of whether there will be a third party. ... [The] Democrats national decline -- or, better, their national disntegration -- will continue relentlessly and inexorably until they come to grips with these values issues, primarily abortion."
Maier adds, "He died in 2000, loyal -- to the end -- to his party, his Catholic faith and his convictions about the dignity of all human life, born and unborn."
MARTI RUNYAN
Girard
Bishops meet, ignore women
EDITOR:
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops at its annual fall meeting in Washington D.C. is again going along the same route -- ignoring women.
Women are conspicuous by their absence. Not welcome, not invited, although they comprise a large portion of the church membership. Their work is accepted, their money contributions accepted, their opinions ignored.
Women's children have been abused yet their input into the church agenda counts for nothing.
This of itself is wrong but there is also the fact that the bishops are giving to everyone a bad and dangerous example of negligence.
MARGARET M. HAMROCK
Youngstown