<html><head><style type="text/css"><!-- DIV {margin:0px;} --></style></head><body><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:14pt;color:#000000;">I am so proud to say I know this priest and he is in my Diocese. - Dianne<br><br><h3 class="storytitle" id="post-4960"><a href="http://wdtprs.com/blog/2008/11/greenville-sc-fr-newmans-post-election-bulletin/" rel="bookmark"> Greenville, SC: Fr. Newman’s post-election bulletin </a></h3> <div class="meta"> CATEGORY: <a href="http://wdtprs.com/blog/category/sessiunculum/" title="View all posts in SESSIUNCULUM" rel="category tag">SESSIUNCULUM</a> — Fr. John Zuhlsdorf @ 4:17 pm </div> <p>At St. Mary’s in Greenville, SC, Fr. J. Scott Newman issued <a href="http://www.stmarysgvl.org/ourparish/2008-dedication-of-the-lateran-basilica-in-rome" target="_blank">the following</a>.<br>
<br>
My <strong>emphases</strong>.<br>
<br>
</p><blockquote>Dedication of the Lateran Basilica in Rome<br>
9 November 2008<br>
<br>
Dear Friends in Christ,<br>
<br>
We the People have spoken, and the 44th President of the United States
will be Barack Hussein Obama. This election ends a political process
that started two years ago and which has <strong>revealed deep and bitter divisions</strong> within the United States and also <strong>within the Catholic Church in the United States</strong>. This division is sometimes called a <strong>“Culture War,” </strong>by which is meant a heated <strong>clash between two radically different and incompatible conceptions</strong>
of how we should order our common life together, the public life that
constitutes civil society. And the chief battleground in this culture
war for the past 30 years has been <strong>abortion</strong>, which
one side regards as a murderous abomination that cries out to Heaven
for vengeance and the other side regards as a fundamental human right
that must be protected in laws enforced by the authority of the state. <strong>Between these two visions of the use of lethal violence against the unborn there can be no negotiation or conciliation</strong>,
and now our nation has chosen for its chief executive the most radical
pro-abortion politician ever to serve in the United States Senate or to
run for president. We must also take note of the fact that this
election was effectively decided by the votes of self-described (but
not practicing) Catholics, the majority of whom cast their ballots for
President-elect Obama.<br>
<br>
In response to this, I am obliged by <strong>my duty</strong> as your shepherd to make <strong>two observations</strong>:<br>
<br>
1. Voting for a pro-abortion politician when a <strong>plausible pro-life alternative</strong> exits constitutes <strong>material cooperation with intrinsic evil</strong>, and those Catholics who do so place themselves <strong>outside of the full communion</strong> of Christ’s Church and under the judgment of divine law. Persons in this condition <strong>should not receive Holy Communion until and unless </strong>they are reconciled to God in the Sacrament of Penance, lest they <strong>eat and drink their own condemnation</strong>. <br>
<br>
2. <strong>Barack Obama</strong>, although we must always and
everywhere disagree with him over abortion, has been duly elected the
next President of the United States, and after he takes the Oath of
Office next January 20th, he will hold legitimate authority in this
nation. For this reason, <strong>we are obliged by Scriptural precept to pray for him and to cooperate with him whenever conscience does not bind us otherwise</strong>.
Let us hope and pray that the responsibilities of the presidency and
the grace of God will awaken in the conscience of this extraordinarily
gifted man an awareness that the unholy slaughter of children in this
nation is <strong>the greatest threat to the peace and security of the United States and constitutes a clear and present danger to the common good</strong>. In the time of President Obama’s service to our country, let us pray for him in the words of <strong>a prayer found in the Roman Missal</strong>:<br>
<br>
God our Father, all earthly powers must serve you. Help our
President-elect, Barack Obama, to fulfill his responsibilities worthily
and well. By honoring and striving to please you at all times, may he
secure peace and freedom for the people entrusted to him. We ask this
through Our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you
and the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.<br>
<br>
Amen.<br>
<br>
Father Newman<br>
</blockquote><br><div> </div><div><div><div><font color="#0000bf"><em><font face="comic sans ms"><div><em><font color="#0000bf" face="Comic Sans MS">Like a deer that longs for running waters so my soul longs for you, O God.</font></em></div></font></em></font></div><div><font color="#0000bf"><em><font face="comic sans ms">Ps 42:1</font></em></font></div><div><em><font color="#0000bf" face="Comic Sans MS" size="1"></font></em> </div><div><em><font color="#0000bf" face="Comic Sans MS" size="1"></font></em> </div></div></div><div><br></div></div><br>
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