Puzzling Over Why Catholics Back Democrats

The Human Life Foundation's Defender of Life annual award dinner this month was an eye opener. The award recipient was Rep. Chris Smith of New Jersey, and in the brochure noting his accomplishments I learned that the congressman is co-chairman of the bipartisan pro-life caucus. Bipartisan? In amazement, I asked him if there really are pro-life Democrats in Congress. "Oh yes," he assured me, "about 30." He went on to name one, but I'm not going to repeat the name because he and the others probably get enough grief from other congressional Democrats.

A senior editor for National Review, Ramesh Ponnuru, introduced Mr. Smith. In his book, "The Party of Death" Mr. Ponnuru makes no bones about which political party deserves that description. I'm not sure whether it's wise to use such hyperbolic language about the nation's majority political group, and yet maybe strong words are overdue in describing the culture that's being promoted today. Abortion on demand, embryonic destruction, euthanasia, and animal rights now displace human rights. It wasn't the GOP pulling the plug on the disabled Terry Schiavo.

My sisters are Democrats, and one refuses to vote for any Republican. They are also Catholics, and Catholics have traditionally voted Democrat. I'm still amazed by how loyal Catholics are to a political machine that champions causes directly opposed to church teaching. Although I have never been a registered Democrat, I've voted for and campaigned for that party because it once fought for basic human rights. That is no longer the case. Senator Miller, who formerly represented Georgia in the upper chamber, had it exactly right when he wrote his book, "A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat." He frequently says that he did not leave the Democratic Party. It left him.

The Human Life Foundation, based in Manhattan, publishes a review of essays and reprints of articles exploring all aspects of respecting life. A self-described Jewish atheist, Nat Hentoff, was honored by the foundation a few years ago, and he declared that respect for life is not a religious issue: It is a fundamental human rights issue that has been clouded and deliberately distorted for a left-wing political agenda. The real horror of the Terry Schiavo case, Mr. Hentoff insists, is the danger it unleashed to the rights of the disabled.

Soon after President Bush signed the ban on partial birth abortion, the Staten Island Advance ran on the front page a confession by a woman dubbed Rita who admitted to having this procedure after learning she was giving birth to a child with Down syndrome. Her real identity was kept anonymous and with good reason: Her explanation that the decision to kill a Down syndrome baby was the best thing for her family enraged many parents of such children who regard their children as blessings.

One of the altar girls at Our Lady of Good Counsel church has Down syndrome and she is also a Eucharistic minister, which means she could distribute along with priest the sacred host to communicants. Her relative youth meant that her mother had access to prenatal testing that would have disclosed her syndrome, but she either chose not to have the test or refused to abort her. She also clearly adores her daughter.

The annual fund-raiser at Blessed Sacrament Church in Staten Island is a performance of a famous Broadway play and under the brilliant direction of Edward Callahan; amateur parishioners perform like professional actors. In every show, extra parts are given to children with this syndrome who carry out their acting chores perfectly. Poor Rita doesn't understand what she's lost, but she's certainly not the only one to be pitied. After Arthur Miller's death, it was recently reported that he had a Down syndrome child, Daniel, whom Miller committed to a Connecticut institution and never acknowledged while he was alive.

What was emphasized throughout the evening and in Mr. Smith's speech is that the elemental right to life supersedes all other rights. George Mckenna wrote an article for Human Life Review that delineates the Democrat / Catholic symbiosis and why the abortion issue now makes that connection invalid. In his essay, "Criss-Cross: Democrats, Republican, and Abortion," Mr. Mckenna writes, "the Democratic Party and the Catholic Church have always been on the same wave length as regards social and economic rights, particularly the rights of the poor, weak, and vulnerable members of society."

When Democrats decided in 1980 to ignore the rights of the most vulnerable humans — those still in the womb — and endorsed a license to abortion, the Reagan Democrat was born. If Catholics ever wake up to which party is really on their wave length, a new type of Democrat may emerge next year.

acolon@nysun.com