Why Kmiec will not become the new Vatican Ambassador

Vatican
A Vatican official's case against Kmiec
Why Kmiec will not become the new Vatican Ambassador

Prof. Douglas Kmiec

Vatican City, Nov 25, 2008 / 03:22 pm (CNA).- An official from the Vatican's Secretary of State department has reacted to a recent article suggesting that Pepperdine professor Douglas Kmiec should become the U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican by saying, "it will never happen."

On November 23, America Magazine published an article from Michael Sean Winters describing Professor Douglas Kmiec, the former Republican pro-lifer who became Obama’s top Catholic apologist during the presidential campaign, as "the perfect candidate" to become U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See.

In his article, Winters argues that Kmiec is the perfect candidate because "He is a lifelong pro-life legal scholar who served as head of the Office of Legal Counsel in the Justice Departments of both Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. He was Dean of the Catholic University Law School and now teaches law at Pepperdine. His published works evidence a find (sic) legal mind and thorough familiarity with the natural law tradition that has been the dominant lens for Catholic social thought. Kmiec would be well known to prominent American churchmen in the Eternal City and a jewel in the crown of the intellectual milieu that surrounds the Holy See."

Winters also argues that "Kmiec’s pro-life credentials, despite some carping from the far right political fringe, are impeccable. Indeed, given that the American bishops have chosen opposition to FOCA as their greeting to the new president, Kmiec gives the bishops some satisfaction since he testified against the measure at its inception in the 1980s."

CNA presented the article to an official of the Secretary of State, who offered his reaction on a strict condition of anonymity. His answer at Kmiec’s chances of becoming an Ambassador: "It will never happen."

The official noted that prominent American Catholics at the Vatican -such as Cardinal James Francis Stafford or Archbishop Raymond Burke- look at Kmiec as a "traitor," and "their opinion will certainly count heavily."

But most importantly, the official said, is that the Holy See will not risk alienating vital U.S. Catholic organizations like the Knights of Columbus or the American branch of the Knights of the Holy Sepulcher, "whose role in the life of the universal Church is decisive, and who have already expressed publicly their disappointment with Kmiec's role in the recent elections."

The official also explained that the Vatican is "obviously interested in having a good relationship with the greatest power in the world," but such relationships usually flow "through different parallel channels and not only the Embassy."

"Despite the importance of a good relationship with the U.S.," the official explained to CNA, "the Secretary of State privileges the relationship with nations with which it has concordats," that is to say, international agreements that provide some recognition and support to the public presence of the Catholic Church, such as state support for religious education.

"If the office [the Vatican's Secretary of State] withholds the 'placet' –the official acceptance—from the appointees from Argentina and France, it could easily do the same [to Kmiec]" because "[we] would not risk alienating many U.S. Catholic organizations."

The Secretary of State official was referring to the recent Vatican decisions to deny the ‘placet’ to a French Ambassador to the Vatican because he was openly homosexual and to an Argentinean because he was divorced and remarried.

"Of course Mr. Kmiec is in neither of those situations, but for the Secretary of State it is far more important to maintain a good relationship with, say, Mr. Anderson (the Supreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus,) who is an active member of several Vatican dicasteries, than to please Mr. Kmiec and his friends in the new administration."

"Those who the article refers so disrespectfully as 'extremists on the right,' or 'the far right political fringe,' are the serious, loyal Catholics [the Vatican] precisely takes into account, because they are the ones who are there when the Church needs them," the official also explained.

Finally, regarding Winters’ claim that "Kmiec could do for the Democratic administration what (Mary Ann) Glendon has done for its predecessor," the official told CNA: "to be charitable, I will just say that I seriously doubt it."

A RESPONSE TO DOUG KMIEC BY FR RICHARD JOHN NEUHAUS

Doug Kmiec provides "cover" for so-called Catholics who think they can vote for and support pro-abortion political candidates and remain "good and faithful Catholics."

A RESPONSE TO DOUG KMIEC
BY FATHER RICHARD JOHN NEUHAUS

July 13-19, 2008 Issue | Posted 7/16/08 at 1:39 PM

Where to begin? Mr. Kmiec has a long history of faithful public service and has been unapologetic in his witness to the sanctity of human life. He has now become a voice for Catholics who wish to back for president a candidate who has a long history of unqualified support for the unlimited abortion license imposed by the Roe v. Wade decision of 1973.

His effort to justify his position as a faithful Catholic is, I believe, deeply confused.

Mr. Kmiec argues that we can’t rank abortion as greater evil or a more pressing social and legal concern than racism because they are both intrinsic evils. But Mr. Kmiec has misunderstood the meaning of the term intrinsic evil, and the nature of our political moment.

That two actions are both intrinsically evil tells us nothing about the relative gravity of each action. Telling a lie is intrinsically evil. So is rape. They are not equally grave. Except for instances such as perjury or libel, lying is not a crime.

Racism is an attitude that may lead to acts we call racist. But nobody pertinent to our political life today advocates racism or racist acts. The intentional killing of a member of the human family — which is what happens in every abortion — is the most pressing social justice question of our time. Mr. Kmiec’s candidate advocates an unlimited right to abortion.

The question is that of justice for unborn children. When one candidate supports the unlimited abortion license and another wants the abortion question returned to the states, it is disingenuous to suggest that they are equally pro-choice. And to say that the first candidate’s position is closer to a Catholic understanding of subsidiarity is, I am sorry to say, risible. Catholic teaching and the mandate of justice is that all members of the human family, born and unborn, be protected in law. To deny that protection is a grave injustice.

The candidate who would return the abortion question to the states so that citizens working through their elected representatives can enact laws protecting the unborn is, in taking that position, pro-life. The candidate who, by supporting Roe v. Wade, would deny to citizens that opportunity is pro-choice. It is a great disservice to try to obfuscate such an obvious distinction.

As I am sure Mr. Kmiec knows, the law also has a pedagogical function. As does the “bully pulpit” of the presidency. Many people believe, wrongly, that if something is legal it is morally acceptable. That is among the reasons why the Supreme Court is so important in this discussion.

And that is among the reasons why it makes a very big difference whether a president takes the position that abortion is grave injustice or takes the position that abortion — including partial birth abortion and the denial of care to a baby who survives the abortion procedure — is a constitutional right.

As for the Court, Mr. Kmiec claims that no justice believes that everyone has a right to life from the moment of conception.

I have no reason to think that the Catholic members of the Supreme Court dissent from the Church’s teaching on that point. Does Mr. Kmiec? That the justices think there is a moral right to life need not entail the conclusion that there is a constitutional right to life. It seems that Justice Thomas does think there is such a constitutional right. So Mr. Kmiec is simply wrong as a matter of fact.

Justice Scalia’s oft-stated position is that the Constitution does not settle the abortion question one way or the other. It therefore falls to the citizens, acting through the means provided by this constitutional democracy, to decide what the law should be. Again, the overturning or effective nullification of Roe v. Wade is a major step toward achieving legal protection of the unborn and other endangered members of the human family. (The lethal logic of Roe v. Wade is extended, for example, to euthanasia.)

It is deeply regrettable that Mr. Kmiec cites Archbishop Chaput’s 1976 support of President Carter, who endorsed Roe v. Wade, as evidence that one can rightly support his preferred candidate today. Archbishop Chaput can speak for himself, and he has, both on the First Things website (May 20) and in his new book Render Unto Caesar. He makes it unequivocally clear that he regrets that 1976 decision, which he rationalized at the time along lines very similar to those now employed by Mr. Kmiec.

The archbishop says that he does not believe there is a proportionate reason — a reason he will one day have to give to the aborted babies — to justify support for a pro-choice candidate. Nor has Mr. Kmiec indicated such a proportionate reason. Mr. Kmiec claims his candidate wants to reduce the number of abortions by reducing the incidence of unwanted pregnancy, and he will do that by encouraging “responsible sexual behavior.” One may be permitted to point out that four decades of sex education, including the massive promotion of contraception, has not been a great success in reducing unwanted pregnancies or abortions.

I do not know what has prompted Mr. Kmiec’s current advocacy, and I take him at his word that he has convinced himself that his position is consonant with being a faithful Catholic.

The fact is, however, that, after all the tortured reasoning and misrepresentation of the positions of others, Doug Kmiec has put himself into the position of supporting for president a candidate whose track record and publicly stated views represent the extreme position of pro-abortion advocacy against the Church’s repeatedly stated teaching, at the highest level of magisterial authority, respecting the moral and political imperative to protect innocent human lives.

Father Richard John Neuhaus is editor in chief of the journal First Things.