Christianity Today reports that Sojourners' David Batstone is calling for the Catholic bishops to excommunicate any Roman Catholic who supports the Iraqi war. In a letter to the Catholic bishops Batstone writes:
Sorry to speak so boldly, but you have no basis for so selectively narrowing your rich moral tradition. .. We recently have witnessed in the United States a decision and act by our political leaders to pre-emptively invade a sovereign nation-state. The social teaching of the Church explicitly prohibits and condemns such aggressive behavior. Pope John Paul II certainly understands this fact, as he made clear in an audience with President George W. Bush last month.
I have not heard one U.S. Bishop even suggest that Holy Communion might be withheld for any politician who enacted, or voted for, the immoral pre-emptive invasion of Iraq. Yet the consequent loss of human lives-both Iraqi and American-and the devastation of Iraqi society have been nothing short of tragic. Furthermore, this act of spiritual arrogance-invoking God's guidance while invading-has deepened historical animosities that surely will lead to more senseless bloodshed in the Middle East and across the globe.
Why is it that the bishops of the U.S. Catholic Church are unable to see this serious breach of morality? Over 250 of you are gathered in Colorado this week, and you only see fit to make public pronouncements about a sole moral issue.
Friends and brothers, I fear that your narrow-mindedness is turning the voice of the Church into something far worse than irrelevant. You risk stumbling into hypocrisy. I urge you to reclaim the full gospel of life, and announce it prophetically to those who would trample on the rights of the defenseless-those who have already been born as much as those yet unborn.
CT notes, however, that:
Most politicians who supported the Iraq war believed they were doing the work of justice and charity. A politician who supports abortion, however, would have a hard time saying he was protecting the unborn - the church radically differs on its teachings of abortion and war. "The killing of an unborn child is always intrinsically evil and can never be justified," the American bishops said in their most recent statement. The Roman Catholic Church has always held that war can be justified. The debate was whether invading Iraq met the qualifications of a just war, and it's worth noting that folks in the Bush camp tended to reference traditionally Catholic doctrine on this issue while folks in the Sojourners camp tended to take a more pacifist view.
CT does a good job of responding to Batstone's argument, and the entire article will be of special interest to Catholics as well as readers of Sojourners.
