The Big 5: Ethical Values in Elections

Intro­duc­tion

There remains great debate about who was most respon­si­ble for the death of Jesus. Chris­tians know that Jesus’ death was caused by the sin of each of us. But we also know that Christ died at one spe­cific moment in his­tory, and that those who lived at that time also had a part in it. They could have avoided it. We could have avoided it. We know Judas had a part in it, since he turned Jesus over to those who hated him. We know the reli­gious lead­ers at the time had a part in it, since they handed him over to the Romans for cru­ci­fix­ion. Nev­er­the­less, one thing is cer­tain: Jesus was cru­ci­fied because Pon­tius Pilate allowed it.  

Yet, Pon­tius Pilate per­son­ally opposed Jesus’ cru­ci­fix­ion; he said so sev­eral times dur­ing the course of Christ’s trial, and ulti­mately washed his hands of Christ’s blood before he turned him over for cru­ci­fix­ion.  So the ques­tion becomes: did his per­sonal oppo­si­tion to Christ’s being cru­ci­fied truly absolve him of his respon­si­bil­ity in the mat­ter?  Per­son­ally opposed or not, he still gave his per­mis­sion for it to happen.  

Now fast-​​forward two thou­sand years to our cur­rent polit­i­cal cli­mate, where our lead­ers must decide on many impor­tant issues-​​ includ­ing mat­ters of moral impor­tance.  Since some mat­ters are as seri­ous as life and death, the Church has recently been remind­ing politi­cians and vot­ers about five non-​​negotiable issues we must con­sider when choos­ing a can­di­date in the upcom­ing elec­tions.  In this les­son, we will exam­ine these non-​​negotiable issues, which we can call the “Big Five”: 

Abor­tion 

Euthana­sia 

Embry­onic stem cell research 

Human cloning 

Homo­sex­ual marriage  

Why so important?

Of course, Amer­i­cans face more than these five issues dur­ing this elec­tion.  There are eco­nomic issues, secu­rity and world peace issues, includ­ing the war on ter­ror­ism and Iraq.  With so many press­ing issues, why does the Church say these five issues are essen­tial and non-​​negotiable?  The rea­son is that the right to life is antecedent to all other rights.

The Church is not try­ing to impose its reli­gious creed on every­one. It is sim­ply remind­ing Catholics and soci­ety about basic truth. The Church reminds us that these are basic human rights issues. Giv­ing in on these issues will make our soci­ety crumble.

The first four non-​​negotiable, eth­i­cal issues are life-​​and-​​death issues, actions that always kill inno­cent human lives.  The fifth one deals with some­thing essen­tial for a healthy soci­ety: mar­riage and family.

The First Four: Life-​​and-​​Death Issues

Abor­tion and euthana­sia are delib­er­ate acts to ter­mi­nate life in its most vul­ner­a­ble stages: in the womb, and in sick­ness or old age.  Both are hot top­ics in cur­rent elections.  

Can­di­dates fiercely debate the legal­ity of abor­tion and partial-​​birth abor­tion-a pro­ce­dure in which the baby is par­tially removed from the womb, and then killed.  The state of Ore­gon has approved euthana­sia, but part of the fed­eral gov­ern­ment is chal­leng­ing this. Many courts of law are deal­ing with the issue of the killing of the sick or elderly.

Embry­onic stem cell research and a poten­tial appli­ca­tion of human cloning involve the manip­u­la­tion and killing of human life for sci­en­tific pur­poses. Sci­en­tists want to use stem cells from human embryos to cre­ate healthy cells for sick peo­ple. But a human embryo is a baby at the very begin­ning of its life. All sci­en­tific data points to this, even though this is not obvi­ous to the naked eye. Some sci­en­tists pro­mote human cloning as a way to repro­duce, or mass pro­duce, healthy organs and body parts for med­ical use. 

Even though embry­onic stem cell research and human cloning are pro­posed as a way to help the sick, they also involve inhu­man pro­duc­tion of human lives (man­u­fac­tur­ing chil­dren), manip­u­la­tion of these new human beings, and their destruc­tion. Sim­i­larly, nei­ther embry­onic stem cell research nor human cloning is a proven method.  In fact, adult stem cell research has offered a pos­i­tive alter­na­tive.  Nev­er­the­less, the sci­en­tific com­mu­nity puts heavy pres­sure on elected offi­cials to grant gov­ern­ment money to these morally destruc­tive pur­suits.

The Fifth Issue: Pro­tec­tion of Marriage  

The last of the Big Five is homo­sex­ual “mar­riage.”  Some elected offi­cials want gov­ern­ment to allow and rec­og­nize the union of two peo­ple of the same sex as a mar­riage.  Some judges or politi­cians have declared homo­sex­ual mar­riages legal even though these deci­sions often dis­re­gard laws that have been enacted to pro­tect the def­i­n­i­tion of mar­riage. Even though most Amer­i­cans oppose legal­iz­ing same-​​sex mar­riages, a very vocal minor­ity is gain­ing the sym­pa­thy of many politi­cians and judges. 

The Church’s Role:  Remind­ing about Basic Human Rights

The Church is not inter­ested in polit­i­cal par­ties.  In this case it is inter­ested only in help­ing us dis­tin­guish between right and wrong.  That is why it offers guid­ance also dur­ing elec­tion years, when we face the respon­si­bil­ity of choos­ing leg­isla­tive lead­ers.  The Church has always con­firmed the impor­tance of cer­tain basic eth­i­cal val­ues, even when doing so has made it very unpop­u­lar, and has even lead to persecution.

 

Right to Life

Abor­tion, euthana­sia, embry­onic stem-​​cell research and human cloning all result in the delib­er­ate end­ing of human life. They go against the most basic human right: the right to life. 

Some argue that embryos are not human beings, but con­sider this: either the embryo is a human being or it is not.  If it is not, then it should not become a child and then an adult. To use a sim­ple exam­ple: a human embryo will def­i­nitely not grow into a cab­bage or a kit­ten. From the moment of con­cep­tion, a human embryo has all the ele­ments nec­es­sary for its full devel­op­ment. Say­ing that it only becomes a human life after a cer­tain amount of cell mul­ti­pli­ca­tion is arbi­trary, and con­tra­dicts the facts. The embryo becomes a human life because it already is a human life. 

As dis­cussed above, this is not just a faith issue. Even though as Chris­tians we know that these things directly vio­late the Fifth Com­mand­ment, “You shall not kill”, every human being is capa­ble of under­stand­ing that killing inno­cent human beings is gravely wrong, whether he believes in God or not. Only self­ish­ness and super­fi­cial­ness can make some­one deny this.  

That is why the Church is very clear when it speaks on these issues.  Abor­tion is a “moral evil” and this teach­ing is unchange­able (Cat­e­chism of the Catholic Church, 2271).  Euthana­sia is “morally unac­cept­able” and “con­sti­tutes a mur­der” (CCC, 2277).

Like­wise, human cloning and embry­onic stem cell research vio­late human dig­nity because they involve cre­at­ing, manip­u­lat­ing, and often­times the killing of human embryos solely for research.  “It is immoral to pro­duce human embryos intended for exploita­tion as dis­pos­able bio­log­i­cal mate­r­ial” (CCC, 2275).  The rea­son is that a newly formed embryo car­ries all the genetic mate­r­ial the per­son will ever need dur­ing his or her entire life.  A new human being is there-​​ just not in the form that is obvi­ous to the naked eye. There­fore, any attempt to manip­u­late the embryo or genetic mate­r­ial is the manip­u­la­tion or destruc­tion of a human being.

Respect for Marriage

In regards to homo­sex­ual “mar­riage,” the Church has always upheld and defended the sanc­tity of mar­riage as an inti­mate union between a man and a woman. In mar­riage, a lot is at stake: the psy­cho­log­i­cal and phys­i­cal health of the spouses, the psy­cho­log­i­cal and phys­i­cal health of chil­dren, and the virtues that spouses and chil­dren will live in soci­ety. The health of soci­ety depends tremen­dously on the health of mar­riage and the fam­ily.  

There are real con­se­quences for every­one when mar­riage is called some­thing it is not. It pro­motes a cul­ture of decep­tion and moral con­fu­sion.  The very things that give soci­ety sta­bil­ity will be con­sid­ered optional, and even­tu­ally will be despised. Call­ing homo­sex­ual unions mar­riage will pro­mote a lack of respect for the essen­tial things in real marriage. 

These essen­tial things in mar­riage, such as the sex­ual com­ple­men­tar­ity of the man and woman and the open­ness to the proper con­cep­tion and edu­ca­tion of chil­dren, work for the good of soci­ety and he good of chil­dren. They are an indis­pens­able help for deeper hap­pi­ness, matu­rity, and ful­fill­ment of the hus­band and wife, and espe­cially for the healthy for­ma­tion of chil­dren. Every child has a right to a true father and mother, and a real family.

While the Church acknowl­edges some per­sons may have an attrac­tion to other per­sons of the same sex, it is firm in its teach­ing: “Homo­sex­ual acts are intrin­si­cally disordered…contrary to nat­ural law” (CCC, 2357).  Homo­sex­ual per­sons are called to abstain­ing from sex­ual acts that go against the cor­rect use of their sex­ual fac­ul­ties, as every Chris­t­ian per­son is.

The Church never tells peo­ple who to vote for, but it con­tin­ues to edu­cate and inform vot­ers on mat­ters of moral importance.

Elec­tion 2004

While the Church does not endorse either can­di­date in the cur­rent pres­i­den­tial elec­tion, its guid­ance helps us com­pare and con­trast their views on the Big Five issues.  

	Pres­i­dent Bush	Sen­a­tor Kerry
Abor­tion	Signed into law a ban on partial-​​birth abor­tion ban and signed the Unborn Vic­tims of Vio­lence Act  Appointed sev­eral fed­eral pro-​​life judges  Has repeat­edly stated he wants to pro­mote a cul­ture of life. Stated many times that a com­pas­sion­ate coun­try should have room for all human beings, includ­ing the unborn.	Voted six times against the ban on par­tial birth abortions  Voted in favor of using tax dol­lars to fund abortions Voted against Unborn Vic­tims of Vio­lence Act Voted against the appoint­ment of pro-​​life judges Promised to appoint only pro-​​abortion judges
Euthana­sia	The Bush Admin­is­tra­tion chal­lenged Oregon’s assisted-​​suicide law in court	Claims he is per­son­ally opposed to assisted-​​suicide, but would not chal­lenge any state’s law regard­ing it
Embry­onic  Stem-​​Cell Research	Blocked fed­eral fund­ing on new embry­onic stem-​​cell research	Promises to end the President’s block on fund­ing for embry­onic stem-​​cell research
Human cloning	Regards human cloning as “morally wrong” and called for a ban on it	Voted against a ban on human cloning and even intro­duced his own bill to make it legal
Homo­sex­ual “Marriage”	Sup­ports a con­sti­tu­tional amend­ment defin­ing mar­riage as between a man and a woman	Voted against the Defense of Mar­riage Act in 1996 and then against allow­ing even a debate on the pro­posed mar­riage amendment

A fun­da­men­tal dif­fer­ence in the can­di­dates is the role they give their faith when mak­ing deci­sions.  Pres­i­dent Bush, a born-​​again Chris­t­ian, believes strongly that his faith should influ­ence his deci­sions.  Sen­a­tor Kerry, though a pro­fessed Roman Catholic, believes his faith should not influ­ence the way he votes as a politi­cian.  He has said many times that he is per­son­ally opposed to cer­tain issues, but would not impose his per­sonal beliefs on others. 

Other Elected Officials  

In this elec­tion many other polit­i­cal posi­tions are also being filled. One third of U.S. sen­a­tors face elec­tion. All the mem­bers of the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives will be cho­sen. Many state and local offi­cials will be elected. All these posi­tions are impor­tant in defend­ing these five non-​​negotiable issues. A respon­si­ble cit­i­zen will pro­mote can­di­dates in all these posi­tions who defend human life and the fam­ily, since our soci­ety is affected by the laws that are pro­posed, enforced, and inter­preted by all lev­els of the gov­ern­ment. Of course national posi­tions have more uni­ver­sal effect, but state and local lev­els are also essen­tial in pro­mot­ing and pro­tect­ing a cul­ture of life and a cul­ture of respect for mar­riage and fam­ily. In addi­tion, most national politi­cians and judges start first at a local level.

Vices and Virtues in the Polit­i­cal Process

In a per­fect world, the sound moral judg­ments of vot­ers would put moral lead­ers in office.  Unfor­tu­nately, cer­tain neg­a­tive fac­tors can affect the out­come of an elec­tion.  One is the deceit and con­fu­sion that occurs when politi­cians give false infor­ma­tion about issues or are not clear with us about where they really stand.  News media can some­times add to this prob­lem. Vot­ers must show dis­cern­ment when choos­ing a can­di­date.  Dis­cern­ment is fig­ur­ing out which issues are the most impor­tant, based on what is right and wrong, then pri­or­i­tiz­ing them accord­ingly. 

Another neg­a­tive fac­tor is moral cow­ardice on part of politi­cians.  Even if politi­cians are con­vinced of the right thing, it is dif­fi­cult for them to stand up for it.  This leaves vot­ers with imper­fect or poor options when going to the polls.  It takes moral courage to stand up for what is right, both as a politi­cian and as a sup­porter.  When a can­di­date shows strong moral val­ues, we should do all we can to sup­port him or her.  Some­times this takes a spirit of ini­tia­tive and net­work­ing for essen­tial causes.  An exam­ple of this is a cam­paign by Catholic Answers, an apolo­get­ics orga­ni­za­tion, for national dis­tri­b­u­tion of a voter’s guide out­lin­ing the Big Five issues.  They adver­tised the guide in full-​​page ads in a national news­pa­per and on radio sta­tions in order to reach the most people.

Vot­ers may also hin­der the polit­i­cal process by way of their lazi­ness and indif­fer­ence.  Either they do not make the effort to inform them­selves prop­erly on the can­di­dates’ true posi­tions or they do not vote because they think their effort will not amount to any­thing.  In fact, lit­tle more than half of all eli­gi­ble vot­ers actu­ally vote.  Vic­tory, how­ever, results from tenac­ity and action.  The beauty of democ­racy is that it rests in our hands.  It is our respon­si­bil­ity to make our gov­ern­ment a reflec­tion of truth.

 

Get Involved 

Some say the Church has no place in pol­i­tics, but there is more than pol­i­tics involved in an elec­tion.  The Church has a duty to edu­cate con­sciences on moral mat­ters, just as lay peo­ple have a respon­si­bil­ity to spread Gospel val­ues in the sec­u­lar world.  Many times dur­ing his pon­tif­i­cate, Pope John Paul II has reaf­firmed this voca­tion to evan­ge­lize by remind­ing us, “Be not afraid.”  

While we do not have the right to impose our beliefs on oth­ers, we have a right and a duty to pro­pose the truth to them.  Truth has a spe­cial power because it makes sense, like the dif­fer­ence between life and death.  It also car­ries a spe­cial grace, as God uses it to con­vert hearts and minds.  

The good news is that young peo­ple today are more pro-​​life and pro-​​family than in the very recent past. And we don’t have to be over 18 to have an impact.   Often “cam­paign­ing” done by young peo­ple such as dis­cussing these issues with friends and fam­ily, can make a huge impact. Igno­rance is the great­est enemy to truth.  We can make a dif­fer­ence by edu­cat­ing oth­ers on the impor­tance of the Big Five issues and the stance that can­di­dates take on them.  Begin by under­stand­ing the­ses issues our­selves, and then we can find effec­tive ways to help oth­ers under­stand them. 

Let’s keep in mind that our efforts to edu­cate oth­ers on these issues can­not end with these elec­tions. The Holy Father has called young peo­ple to be active pro­tag­o­nists in pro­mot­ing a cul­ture of life and in spread­ing the Good News about mar­riage and fam­ily. He believes deeply in young peo­ple. We need to remem­ber, how­ever, that peo­ple are won over by char­ity in propos­ing the truth and by respect for their free will.  

Vocab­u­lary

Human Embryo- A human life in the ear­li­est stage of human development.  

Dis­cern­ment-Wis­dom and judg­ment in deter­min­ing the moral impor­tance of issues or prob­lems and pri­or­i­tize them accordingly. 

Moral Courage-Fac­ing and deal­ing with what is impor­tant with­out with­draw­ing when it is dan­ger­ous or dif­fi­cult. The virtue that helps us put into action and defend essen­tial val­ues, espe­cially when they are con­trary to pop­u­lar opinion

Ini­tia­tive-Per­sonal capac­ity for think­ing up and car­ry­ing out a pos­i­tive action. Abil­ity to think and act with­out being urged or obligated

Net­work­ing- Mak­ing the most of one’s per­sonal rela­tion­ships to spread infor­ma­tion and inspire action

Apolo­get­ics- The art of using rea­son and knowl­edge to defend one’s faith. Explain­ing the specif­i­cally Chris­t­ian faith to non-​​Christians and explain­ing the Catholic faith to non-​​Catholics 

Tenac­ity- Endurance, strength, per­sis­tence. Hold­ing fast to ideals and actions. Oppo­site of laziness. 

Arbi­trary- depend­ing on indi­vid­ual dis­cre­tion (as of a judge) and not fixed by stan­dards, rules, or law

Antecedent- some­thing that precedes-​​ or comes before-​​ some­thing else

Com­ple­men­tar­ity- the state of fill­ing up or com­plet­ing; sup­ply­ing mutual needs or off­set­ting mutual lacks   

Bible Blurbs

“I have set two things before you: life and death, bless­ing and curse; there­fore choose life.  (Deuteron­omy 30:19)

 “What you did you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me.”  Mt. 25: 45

“No one who lights a lamp con­ceals it with a ves­sel or sets it under a bed; rather, he places it on a lamp stand so that those who enter may see the light. (Luke 8:16)

“…for if these things are done when the wood is green what will hap­pen when it is dry?” (Luke 23:31)

For the chil­dren of this world are more astute in deal­ing with their own kind than are the chil­dren of light.’ (Luke 16:8)

Saints and Heroes

White Rose Mar­tyrs (1942)

As Hitler’s Nazi party con­sumed Ger­many and threat­ened the rest of the free world, a group of uni­ver­sity stu­dents in Munich decided to edu­cate the Ger­man pub­lic about what was tak­ing place.

Hans Scholl, a med­ical stu­dent, was a nat­ural leader with a charis­matic per­son­al­ity.  His sis­ter, Sophie, was intel­li­gent and gutsy, never back­ing down from the truth.  With fel­low stu­dents Christoph Probst, Willi Graf, and Alexan­der Schmorell, they formed the White Rose, an under­ground resis­tance move­ment against the Nazis.

Though from dif­fer­ent reli­gious back­grounds - Ortho­dox, Protes­tant, Catholic - the stu­dents rec­og­nized and wrote about the fun­da­men­tal evils in Hitler’s plan.  They printed and dis­trib­uted thou­sands of anti-​​Hitler leaflets to lead­ers through­out Ger­many.  Three of the White Rose, the Scholls and Probst, were caught pass­ing out leaflets at the uni­ver­sity.  At trial, when asked why she par­tic­i­pated, Sophie pro­claimed, “Some­body had to make a start!”  Hours later all three were beheaded.  Today, over 200 schools in Ger­many are named after the stu­dents who gave their lives to pro­mote truth.  

Blessed Alberto Mar­velli (1918-​​1946)

Alberto Mar­velli grew up in Rim­ini, Italy.  A boy of great energy and deter­mi­na­tion, Alberto excelled at sports, espe­cially cycling.  After serv­ing in the army, Alberto became an engi­neer and worked for Fiat, a famous sports car man­u­fac­turer.  When the Ger­man army destroyed his home­town, he returned to help the peo­ple left injured, home­less, and hun­gry.  He trav­eled all over by bicy­cle deliv­er­ing food, cloth­ing, and med­i­cine.  Once, he sent the win­dow­panes of his own house to a sick priest whose house was with­out windows.

His tire­less works of char­ity earned him such a rep­u­ta­tion that local author­i­ties asked him to lead the com­mit­tee for rebuild­ing the area.  He over­saw build­ing projects and man­aged large sums of money for those in need.  He made the most of his respon­si­bil­i­ties by found­ing a uni­ver­sity, soup kitchens, and an asso­ci­a­tion for con­struc­tion workers. 

Alberto enjoyed serv­ing peo­ple through polit­i­cal action.  He became a can­di­date for polit­i­cal office in the new gov­ern­ment.  Unfor­tu­nately, Alberto was struck by a mil­i­tary truck and killed on Elec­tion Day while rid­ing his bicy­cle to the polling sta­tion.  Even his polit­i­cal ene­mies mourned the loss of this sin­cere, coura­geous young man.  

Dis­cus­sion Questions

A. Using the Big Five guide­lines, which pres­i­den­tial can­di­date, which sen­a­to­r­ial can­di­dates, and which can­di­dates for the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives most sup­port a cul­ture of life and family?    

B. What is the dif­fer­ence between the Big Five and other life-​​and-​​death issues such as war and cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment?  (Note: Help stu­dents dis­tin­guish between sit­u­a­tions that are “intrin­si­cally evil” and those that pru­den­tial deci­sions made with cer­tain cri­te­ria and which the Church has never said they are always intrin­si­cally evil (Cri­te­ria for defense of soci­ety com­bined with respect for human life. Final deci­sion left to the pru­dent judg­ment of “those who have respon­si­bil­ity for the com­mon good”, etc.) See resources: 

Abor­tion: CCC 2771; Euthana­sia CCC 2277; Embry­onic Stem-​​Cell Research: CCC2275; Human Cloning: CCC2275;  Homo­sex­ual “Mar­riage”: CCC2357; 

Cap­i­tal Pun­ish­ment: CCC2266; War:  CCC2307-​​2317 

C. Is it pos­si­ble to believe one thing but to do the oppo­site?  Give exam­ples of how some politi­cians act this out in their polit­i­cal offices.  Why would a politi­cian do this?  Is this a good char­ac­ter­is­tic to have in a leader?  

D. Some peo­ple staunchly iden­tify them­selves with a cer­tain polit­i­cal party to the point of dis­re­gard­ing these five non-​​negotiable issues.  Is this a good ratio­nale to have if one wants to be a seri­ous Catholic voter?  

Writ­ing Activities

A. In your jour­nal, make a list of some things you really believe in.  Next, write what you would do if these beliefs were chal­lenged.  Which beliefs are objec­tive truths?  Can you prove them?  Which beliefs are your own per­sonal opin­ions? Can you sup­port them?

B.  Write down the process of dis­cern­ing a polit­i­cal candidate’s views.

Res­o­lu­tion Ideas:  

1. Gather infor­ma­tion on your local and state polit­i­cal can­di­dates.  Make a bul­letin board for your class­room or school delin­eat­ing the can­di­dates’ posi­tions accord­ing to the Big Five cri­te­ria.  Make hand­outs avail­able with the same infor­ma­tion and offer them to your fel­low stu­dents so they may dis­sem­i­nate the information.  

2. Dis­trib­ute the Catholic Answers Voter’s Guide for Seri­ous Catholics ( HYPERLINK “http://www.catholic.com” www.catholic.com) to neigh­bors, rel­a­tives, friends, and other Catholics.  

3. Orga­nize a debate to encour­age stu­dents to fur­ther research the moral aspects of cam­paign issues, and to express their own opin­ions to rest of the class, or to the whole school.  Explore the issues of just war and cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in addi­tion to the Big Five.

Fur­ther Formation 

From Doc­tri­nal Note on Some Ques­tions Regard­ing the Par­tic­i­pa­tion of Catholics in Polit­i­cal Life

About the Five Non-​​Negotiable Issues:

“When polit­i­cal activ­ity comes up against moral prin­ci­ples that do not admit of excep­tion, com­pro­mise or dero­ga­tion, the Catholic com­mit­ment becomes more evi­dent and laden with responsibility. In the face of fun­da­men­tal and inalien­able eth­i­cal demands, Chris­tians must rec­og­nize that what is at stake is the essence of the moral law, which con­cerns the inte­gral good of the human person. This is the case with laws con­cern­ing abor­tion and euthana­sia (not to be con­fused with the deci­sion to forgo extra­or­di­nary treat­ments, which is morally legitimate). Such laws must defend the basic right to life from con­cep­tion to nat­ural death. In the same way, it is nec­es­sary to recall the duty to respect and pro­tect the rights of the human embryo. Anal­o­gously, the fam­ily needs to be safe­guarded and pro­moted, based on monog­a­mous mar­riage between a man and a woman, and pro­tected in its unity and sta­bil­ity in the face of mod­ern laws on divorce: in no way can other forms of cohab­i­ta­tion be placed on the same level as mar­riage, nor can they receive legal recog­ni­tion as such.” (Con­gre­ga­tion for the Doc­trine of the Faith, , Novem­ber 24, 2002, num­ber 4)

From The Cat­e­chism of the Catholic Church 

About dis­cern­ment, pru­dence, jus­tice, and fortitude:

1835 Pru­dence dis­poses the prac­ti­cal rea­son to dis­cern, in every cir­cum­stance, our true good and to choose the right means for achiev­ing it. 

1806 …With the help of this virtue (pru­dence) we apply moral prin­ci­ples to par­tic­u­lar cases with­out error and over­come doubts about the good to achieve and the evil to avoid.  

1836 Jus­tice con­sists in the firm and con­stant will to give God and neigh­bor their due. 1837 For­ti­tude ensures firm­ness in dif­fi­cul­ties and con­stancy in the pur­suit of the good.

  “All sin­ners were the authors of Christ’s Pas­sion … the Church does not hes­i­tate to impute to Chris­tians the gravest respon­si­bil­ity for the tor­ments inflicted upon Jesus.  (Cat­e­chism of the Catholic Church num­ber 598)

 ”…This Bib­li­cal lan­guage does not mean that those who handed him over were merely pas­sive play­ers in a sce­nario writ­ten in advance by God.” (Cat­e­chism of the Catholic Church num­ber 599)

 “No ide­ol­ogy can erase from the human spirit the cer­tainty that mar­riage exists solely between a man and a woman…”( Con­gre­ga­tion for the Doc­trine of the Faith, Note on Legal Recog­ni­tion to Unions of Homo­sex­ual Per­sons, Novem­ber 24, 2002, num­ber  2)

 “Soci­ety owes its con­tin­ued sur­vival to the fam­ily, founded on mar­riage.”  (Note on Legal Recog­ni­tion to Unions of Homo­sex­ual Per­sons, num­ber

 “Legal recog­ni­tion of homo­sex­ual unions or plac­ing them on the same level as mar­riage would mean… mak­ing it a model in present-​​day society..(and) would also obscure basic val­ues which belong to the com­mon inher­i­tance of human­ity.”(Note on Legal Recog­ni­tion to Unions of Homo­sex­ual Per­sons, num­ber 11)