Duty & manner of voting, conditions for voting for unworthy candidates

[Graham]

I had a whole reply, picking this post apart piece by piece.

Jayne is right, it's funny to imagine your slurried brain arduously concocting what it takes to be an incisive takedown, and then the camera slowly pans over the computer screen and it's just some ridiculous shitpost.

[Jayne]

There was an article by Bishop Conley (one of the better NO bishops) last election year that presents the Catholic understanding of voting: https://www.lincolndiocese.org/op-ed/bishop-s-column/6841-voting-and-living-as-good-citizens

This November, American Catholics have the opportunity to shape the direction of our nation, our states, and our local communities in the voting booth. Good citizenship is a moral obligation for all Catholics, and voting is an important part of that obligation. In the United States, the responsibility for our government’s direction lies with us, as citizens, and we can’t take that responsibility lightly. We cannot, because of apathy, or discouragement, or perfectionism, abandon our obligation to vote.

In the past few months, many Catholics have asked me how to make good choices in the voting booth. Many Catholics have especially expressed to me being uncertain about how to make choices when faced with two presidential candidates they find intolerable or unacceptable. While a bishop should never tell Catholics who they should vote for, I would like to offer four points of guidance, drawn from wisdom of the Church, as we discern our choices as voters.

The first is that government has an important purpose, and our votes help to achieve that purpose.

The Catholic Church teaches that the purpose and obligation of our government is to support the common good. The Second Vatican Council said that the common good is “the sum of those conditions of social life which allow social groups and their individual members relatively thorough and ready access to their own fulfillment.” Our common good has three elements: respect for the dignity, rights, obligations, and freedom of the human person; respect for the well-being, development, and flourishing of the entire community; and peace, in the stability and security of a well-ordered community, governed by the rule of law.

When we vote, we do so in order to promote the common good, to express it, advance it, and protect it. There are some issues in which the common good is clear and some issues which require careful discernment and prudent judgment. This discernment can, therefore, lead to different conclusions and ideas among people of good will. In fact, often the best solutions to difficult political issues can come from robust discussion among people with the same goals in mind, and different ideas about the best ways to achieve those goals.

My second point is that on some issues the moral obligations of Catholics, and the demands of the common good, are abundantly clear. For example, no Catholic can vote in good conscience to expand legal protection for abortion, or to support the killing of unborn children.

Mother Teresa of Kolkata, who was canonized a saint earlier this month, said it best in a 1994 letter she wrote to the United States Supreme Court. She said that “Roe v. Wade has deformed a great nation. The so-called right to abortion has pitted mothers against their children and women against men. It has shown violence and discord at the heart of the most intimate human relationships. It has aggravated the derogation of the father’s role in an increasingly fatherless society. It has portrayed the greatest of gifts --a child-- as a competitor, an intrusion, and an inconvenience.... Human rights are not a privilege conferred by government. They are every human being’s entitlement by virtue of his humanity. The right to life does not depend, and must not be declared to be contingent, on the pleasure of anyone else, not even a parent or a sovereign.” 

Abortion is a grave, unconscionable, and intolerable evil, and we cannot support it in the voting booth.

My third point is that when we vote, we need to carefully consider the specifics of each race. Blind partisanship can be dangerous, and we have to look past political rhetoric and media alarmism to make prudent discernments.

In each race, we need to discern whether there is a candidate who can advance human dignity, the right to life, and the common good. When there is, we should feel free to vote for that candidate—whether they are a member of a major party or not. In extraordinary circumstances, some Catholics may decide, in good conscience, there is not a suitable candidate for some particular office and abstain from voting in that particular race.

We also need to remember that we are not responsible for the votes of other people.  Choosing not to vote for “Candidate A” is not the same as actively voting for “Candidate B.” No Catholic should feel obliged to vote for one candidate just to prevent the election of another.

In good conscience, some Catholics might choose to vote for a candidate who, with some degree of probability, would be most likely to do some good, and the least amount of harm, on the foundational issues: life, family, conscience rights and religious liberty. Or, in good conscience, some might choose the candidate who best represents a Christian vision of society, regardless of the probability of winning. Or, in good conscience, some might choose not to vote for any candidate at all in a particular office.

As a matter of conscience, faithful Catholics have to weigh all those pertinent issues, and make the choice that seems most in accord with the common good of our nation: with respect for human dignity, social well-being, and peace. Catholics will make different judgments about those questions, and come to different conclusions—this reflects the fact the Lord has given us free intellects and free wills.

I think he did a good job of explaining how the principles of moral theology apply to the current situation (although, as I have indicated, it would be better without the reference the Vatican II). There are several options that are consistent with Catholic teaching.

[Geremia]

voting […] a bullshit Golden Calf.

If that's true, then idolatry is enshrined in canon law; cf. 1917 canons 160ff. on ecclesiastical elections.

[Greg]

Even if I thought Trump would waste another 4 years tweeting bullshit, I would still vote just to see the libtards lose it on November 4th, assuming I was a yank.  Was great last time.  I was drunk on their childish misery.  I have enjoyed the reruns since then.  Never gets old.

The alternative is Biden/Harris so Trump could take a shit on my driver's seat and I would still vote for the fabulous troll.  I absolutely love him.  He is funny as hell and so random and having no filter that he makes life exciting again.  I have hope he might succeed just by dumb luck and bravado.

[Daniel]

Voting is a Golden Calf.

But seriously, voting and "democracry" are a [. . .] Golden Calf.

I think I get what you're saying, but I really think this needs qualification. Voting and democracy can be a golden calf... but it seems kind of absurd to say that it's always a golden calf. There is such a thing as "secondary" causation, after all.

[Jayne]

Even if I thought Trump would waste another 4 years tweeting bullshit, I would still vote just to see the libtards lose it on November 4th, assuming I was a yank.  Was great last time.  I was drunk on their childish misery.  I have enjoyed the reruns since then.  Never gets old.

This one is my favourite.  I've lost count of how many times I've watched it.   Enjoy, Greg.

[Greg]

Trump's victory proved to me once and for all that there is far more cock up than conspiracy and the so called experts are just self promoting asshats who know very little.

If people with common sense and decency just pushed back a little they would see all these cockroches run and hide.  They truly are clueless, arrogant scum.

[AveCrux]

What about the situation, which is not uncommon in other places in the world, of an unworthy candidate who uses the number of votes/voters as a way to legitimize their corrupt/unjust rule (i.e. South American/African "democratic" dictator who has elections with only one candidate and wins 97% of the vote)?  Would it be morally acceptable/preferable to abstain from voting?

Do the moralists you quote deal with the very recent (relative to their writing) advice/command of Bl. Pope Pius IX for Italians to not vote in the parliamentary elections in Italy because of their illegitimacy after having stolen the Papal States which was I believe upheld by Leo XIII and St. Pius X (I believe it was lifted by Benedict XV).

Thanks be to God always

[FamilyRosary]

The Norse had a myth that at the end of the world there would be an epic battle, called Ragnarok, between the good gods and the evil ones. The evil gods, led by Loki, would ride into battle in a ship made of the finger and toenails of the dead.

There was no way to prevent the end of the world but the living could delay it by meticulously destroying the finger and toenails of their departed before burying them. They knew that there would always be some people somewhere who would die with their nails intact and little by little the ship would eventually get built, but they did their best to put off that moment for as long as possible.

That's why, for the first time in my life, I'm voting for POTUS and placing my ballot for President Trump. I voted in the primary elections of 1988 and did not vote again until the mid-terms of 2018. But I'm voting next month, just hoping I can eliminate a few fingernails before the gods of evil get them.

[dellery]

No, I’m not voting for trump. Thought that was obvious. Lol

So Trump is presumably getting you to vote for a candidate that supports murdering children in their mother's womb and probably outright infanticide?
Yep, you're sure gonna show him...

The Anti-Trump tormentors will definitely right the wrongs of Trump. 

[Bernadette]

I never said who I was voting for, just that it won't be Trump.

[The Theosist]

I never said who I was voting for, just that it won't be Trump.

Not voting for Trump or Biden has the same effect as not voting.

[dellery]

I never said who I was voting for, just that it won't be Trump.

Not voting for Trump or Biden has the same effect as not voting.

I have typically voted by abstaining from voting. Seems like writing in "vote of abstinence" would be more productive though.