Pope Francis: In this Election, Picking the “Lesser of Two Evils”

Recent interventions in politics by America’s Catholic bishops can lately be summed up in two words: Clerical error.  Voters in state after state — including heavily Catholic constituencies — have rejected admonitions from church hierarchy and voted to sustain or restore abortion rights.

As voting in a critical election begins, the conservative-dominated U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has taken a hit from above. Pope Francis has extended the bishops’ agenda for “faithful citizenship” to embrace social justice. He has endorsed obeying conscience rather than instructions from the pulpit.

Last November, conservative bishops prevailed  to make “the threat of abortion” the “preeminent priority” to guide Catholic voters in the upcoming presidential election. They rated abortion over and above “other grave threats to life.” 

Earlier this month, however, Pope Francis called for different and deeper engagements. Speaking to reporters on a flight back from Slovakia to Rome, the Pope when asked about candidates for the American presidency, he replied: “Both are against life, the one that throws out migrants and the one that kills children. Both are against life.”  What should a citizen do? “Vote, and one has to choose the lesser evil.” The pope refused to name a preeminent or lesser evil, saying: “Each person must think and decide according to their own conscience.” 

 Pope Francis was asked if President Biden, a Catholic, should be denied communion because he supports a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy. “I never denied communion to anyone,” he replied. “Communion is not a prize for the perfect; . . . Communion is a gift, the presence of Jesus and his church.”

The Pope is directly contradicting conservatives in the American hierarchy. Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone in San Francisco has denied holy communion to former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi because of her support for abortion rights. Joe Biden was refused the eucharist at a South Carolina parish while campaigning for president in 2020.

Pope Francis has received Pelosi at the Vatican. He warmly welcomed Biden’s inauguration, in contrast to a snarky statement from Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles, head of the USCCB. He also embraced a far wider agenda than Cardileone’s and America’s hardline hierarchy.

 The Pope has made clear his defense of the unborn is “clear, firm, and passionate,” and that “at stake is the dignity of a human life which is always sacred.” He has, however, added: “Equally sacred, however, are the lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute, the abandoned, and the underprivileged, the vulnerable infirm, and elderly exposed to covert euthanasia, the victims of human trafficking, new forms of slavery and every form of rejection.”

Those were welcome words to progressive Catholics. In a Sunday letter to his parish, St. James Cathedral pastor Fr. Michael Ryan embraced that message: “Despite impressions given — sometimes intentionally, sometimes not — the Catholic Church does not endorse candidates for public office. It must not. The Church respects the right and duty of each of its members to study the issues and make an informed, conscience-driven decision about which candidate to vote for.”

Ex-President Trump would have it differently, taking a transactional view toward voting by the faithful. In a 2020 campaign call with cardinals and bishops, Trump proclaimed himself “the best president in the history of the Catholic Church.” Stressing his naming of conservative Supreme Court justices who overturned the precedent of Roe, Trump said his support for the pro-life cause “has been at a level that no other president has seen before, according to everybody.”

Trump has taken multiple abortion positions since. He’s also been married three times, paid hush money, told thousands of lies, and carries 34 criminal convictions. Nevertheless, he garners support from Catholic cultural warriors.

CatholicVotes is running an anti-Kamala Harris campaign keyed to the Democratic nominee’s stand favoring transgender rights. A group called Catholics for Catholics is hoping to stage 2,024 Masses for Trump in advance of November 5.  The conservative Napa Institute, at its pricey summer conference, has brought together Francis critics within the church with such Republican politicians as ex-Vice President Mike Pence, Veep nominee J.D. Vance, and former Attorney General William Barr.

America magazine, the Jesuit review of faith and culture, has come down in the opposite camp, recoiling at Trump’s demagoguery and his demeaning of political dialogue. The magazine spoke of “our overriding concern about Mr. Trump’s refusal to acknowledge constraints on his own power.” The magazine in its current issue wrote: “While Americans may disagree in good conscience about the proper levels of immigration and how to regulate it, no just or moral policy can be built on racist, nativist fear mongering.”

Father Ryan has raised similar concerns, of “gravely compromised” values of common purpose and common decency. “Along with civility, dialogue, and a willingness to meet halfway, respect has all but disappeared from the public square and from public discourse,” he wrote. “As a nation, we seem to have forgotten the very meaning of the word ‘respect.'”

The “blue wall” rust belt states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin will likely pick America’s next president. Arizona, too, is a battleground state, with a tight presidential contest as well as an abortion referendum.

 All four states have substantial Catholic populations. Polls have shown a pretty even nationwide split among the voting faithful, with Trump a bit ahead in the northern battleground states. The culture wars, however, have witnessed Catholics consulting conscience rather than heeding hierarchy.

Locally, Catholics and others in the faith community will mark a “crossroads of conscience” on the eve of election day. St. James Cathedral, St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral, Temple De Hirsch Sinai, First African Methodist Episcopal Church, and Seattle U’s Center for Ecumenical and Interreligious Engagement — all are cosponsoring a “interfaith service of hope” on November 4, 7 pm at St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral.

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