Priest offers ideas to Catholic voters

By PAT PASTERNAK- | Comments: 0 | Leave a comment

"There is no Catholic vote!" exclaimed Rev. Michael Baxter, CSC, Oct. 30 at the Hubbard Interfaith Center at The College of Saint Rose in Albany.

In a presentation on "The Politics of Holy Indifference," the priest tried to stem the confusion many voters are experiencing over the elections next week.

The priest, a native of the Albany area, is an associate professor of theology at Notre Dame University in Indiana.

Voting patterns

Father Baxter noted that Americans find themselves being pulled in two different directions, to the political "left" or "right," towards liberalism or conservatism. This cross-pressure has resulted in a major change in voting patterns among Catholics.

Many dioceses in the U.S. are now urging Catholics not to vote for a candidate because of how he or she stands on only one issue (such as abortion or the death penalty), he said. Rather, they should look at the complete candidate and make choices based on what that candidate's actions are.

"We need to know who the candidate is," he said, "who we are dealing with."

Divisions

Father Baxter believes that there are broad divisions among Catholic voters as well as among Protestants.

"Liberal Catholics will find more in common with liberal Lutherans, Episcopalians or Methodists than they will with conservative Catholics," he said. "This pattern contributes to the breakdown of our religious identity and also makes it difficult to hold on to the notion of a 'Catholic vote.'"

Further, Father Baxter believes that the candidates are skirting the real issues that need to be addressed, issues that change lives over a long period of time.

"What about the disappearance of the family farm," he asked the group, "or the plight of the homeless in our cities? Was the Gulf War really a just war? Can we condone it? How will we go about caring for our elderly in the future?"

TV and politics

Referring to political ads on television, Father Baxter opined that Vice President Al Gore and Gov. George W. Bush are nothing more than fictional productions, figures that they think people want to see, rather than the genuine people that they really are.

"The gap is wide between the image of the person we see on the TV ads," he noted, "and the reality of that person and his views."

Father Baxter suggested that what voters need to question the values that society has embraced. He spoke of "the culture of death" and suggested that Catholics need to embrace the teachings of Jesus Christ in their decisions on voting for certain candidates. He believes that it is very difficult for Catholics to maintain a perspective on each candidate.

"Priests need to speak out from the pulpit, bishops need to preach more on Christian values, Catholics need to dialogue with each other" he said. "The politics of holy indifference is the lack of concern for the world around us. It is a myth that can be broken, but only if we redefine what politics means to us. The new definition would be voting for someone in terms of that candidate achieving good for society. But in the U.S., the notion of 'good' has always been translated to meaning 'interests.'"

Solutions

"What is needed," he continued, "is a 'politics of change.' Perhaps we could vote with concern for changing the issues (maybe we should seriously think about how we handle the issues that confront us). Perhaps we should vote with concern for not cooperating with evil," he said.

"We have to learn to vote for what we believe in, not necessarily for a candidate that tells us what he believes in. We should be voting our conscience. We need to be thinking on a larger scale, on the level of the needs of the entire society, not just what we believe in as individuals.

"If Jesus Christ were a politician today, He would finish last in the polls," Father Baxter said, "but His life and teachings gave us the opportunity to devote ourselves to working, and voting, for the betterment of our society. The choice is ours."

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