{"id":66,"date":"2008-08-14T13:19:55","date_gmt":"2008-08-14T13:19:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/progressiverevival\/2008\/08\/inch-by-inch-moving-beyond-the.html"},"modified":"2008-08-14T13:19:55","modified_gmt":"2008-08-14T13:19:55","slug":"inch-by-inch-moving-beyond-the","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2008\/08\/inch-by-inch-moving-beyond-the.html","title":{"rendered":"The Casey Milestone: Moving Beyond the Abortion Quagmire?"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

News broke yesterday that Senator Robert Casey Jr. will <\/span>address the Democratic Convention<\/span><\/a><\/span> in Denver later this month. For many Catholics, this is an important symbol and step towards healing the bitter disappointment that so many of us experienced in 1992 when Casey’s father was denied a speaking role because of his pro-life commitment. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

This milestone came in the same week that many were abuzz about the revised abortion language of the Democratic platform, and whether it signals a new desire to seek common ground with pro-life voters. Several Catholic commentators, including Lisa Cahill of Boston College, weighed in during a recent <\/span>press briefing<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/b>.<\/span><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

The platform language still affirms a commitment to the legal status of abortion.  For the first time, however, it includes language that reflects the spirit and intent of Sen. Casey’s own  legislation, the Pregnant Women’s Support Act, which is modeled after a policy platform proposed by <\/span>Democrats for Life<\/span><\/a><\/span>, the “95-10 Initiative” (for reducing abortion 95% in 10 years.)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

Casey’s bill reflects his own stated adherence to Pope John Paul II’s call for “radical solidarity with women.” This understanding suggests that a pro-life commitment must be accompanied by a radical support and respect for pregnant women and their families.  The Casey bill and 95-10 both reflect the call by Pope John Paul II in <\/i><\/b><\/span>Evangelium Vitae<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/b>, <\/i>which called for “ensuring proper support for families and motherhood.”  Even further he suggested rethinking “labour, urban, residential and social service policies so as to harmonize working schedules with time available for the family, so that it becomes effectively possible to take care of children and the elderly. (90).”  <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

My problem with the abortion debate is that the solidarity to women and families articulated so powerfully by Pope John Paul is usually so severely lacking.  Too often, some commentators on these issues show minimal solidarity with women, and frankly they can display quite the opposite.   <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

While Sen. Casey will likely speak to a broad range of issues in Denver, including the dire straits of working and middle-class Americans, I hope he also shares his pro-life vision with the delegates.  For as much as the leaders of both political parties get stuck in “either-or” rhetoric on the abortion issues,  Casey’s comprehensive approach can offer a way out of this polarized quagmire.   The deep call within centuries of Catholic social teaching is for a culture that puts human life and dignity over materialism, community over excessive individualism, and principle over profit.  Now there’s an agenda we can all get behind.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/font> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

News broke yesterday that Senator Robert Casey Jr. will address the Democratic Convention in Denver later this month. For many Catholics, this is an important symbol and step towards healing the bitter disappointment that so many of us experienced in 1992 when Casey’s father was denied a speaking role because of his pro-life commitment.  …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":149,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,12,10,1,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-abortion","category-catholics","category-economy","category-election-08","category-religion-in-the-public-square"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Casey Milestone: Moving Beyond the Abortion Quagmire? - Progressive Revival<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2008\/08\/inch-by-inch-moving-beyond-the.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Casey Milestone: Moving Beyond the Abortion Quagmire? - Progressive Revival\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"News broke yesterday that Senator Robert Casey Jr. will address the Democratic Convention in Denver later this month. 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Kelley has served in diverse capacities in non-profit organizations committed to poverty reduction, social justice, and the environment. She worked for nearly a decade at the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, the Catholic Church's national anti-poverty program. Kelley is the co-editor of Living the Catholic Social Tradition: Cases and Commentary (Sheed and Ward 2004) with Dr. Kathleen Maas Weigert. The book examines how low-income led, anti-poverty organizations funded by the Catholic Campaign for Human Development put Catholic social justice teachings into action. She is co-author of a forthcoming book, A Nation For All: How the Catholic Vision of the Common Good Can Save America from the Politics of Division (Spring 2008) to be published by Jossey Bass. She is also the author of Call to Family, Community, and Participation, an education booklet in a Catholic social teaching series published by US Conference of Catholic Bishops. Kelley has a B.A. in Religion with honors from Haverford College and a Master of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School with a focus on Christianity and Culture. Kelley serves on the Board of Directors of the Providence Hospital Foundation and was a founding Board member of Language, Education and Technology Center, an adult literacy\/ESL program at Our Lady Queen of the Americas parish in Washington, DC. Kelley served as a delegate to the 2007 Vatican's Second World Congress of Ecclesial Organizations Working for Justice and Peace in Rome. She was one of more than 300 participants from 80 countries to the Congress that was convened and facilitated by Cardinal Renato Martino, president of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for Peace and Justice.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/author\/akelley"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/149"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}