Religion & Law

Hello All,

A couple of quick comments occasioned by our recent posts on Ms. Pelosi and Mr. Brown. 

First, on Archbishop Neiderauer's response to Speaker Pelosi's mourning her difference of opinion with the American bishops, it's not clear to me that the Speaker is guilty of the conflation of which the Archbishop appears to accuse her.  It would indeed have been loose -- and indeed incoherent -- of her to confound (a) a moral or natural right to be legally free to make choices that might prove to be morally wrongful, with (b) a moral right to make morally wrongful choices.  (Were this identification sound, then it would be difficult indeed to make sense of the concept of moral wrongfulness.)  But no such conflation need follow, it seems to me, from what Speaker Pelosi is quoted here as saying.  Perhaps in her fuller set of comments (which I've not seen) she fell into some such blunder, but in the quoted language she can readily be interpreted as making the unobjectionable point that one has a natural right not to be civil-legally prevented from making at least some choices that might turn out to be morally wrongful.  That point seems to me to be logically impeccable.  Of course, it still leaves open the obvious truth that there also are many morally wrongful choices -- notably those that involve harm, including death, to others -- that one has no natural right to be civil-legally free to make.  (There are of course very firm natural law foundations for civil laws that protect lives from harm.)  And so it seems to me that it is there that Archbishop Neiderauer should fix his aim if he wishes to challenge Speaker Pelosi.  Let me also applaud, while I'm at it, the Archibishop's cite to Fyodor D, whose splendid Karamazov is worth reading in full at least once per year in this poster's humble opinion.

Next, on Scott Brown, I think it worth noting that, notwithstanding the ad run by some of Ms. Coakley's supporters aiming to tar him as a 'pro-life extremist,' Mr. Brown apparently identifies himself, as do sundry 'tea party' sorts, as a 'pro-choicer' well to the 'left' of the 'RINOs' whom they deplore.  See, e.g., this site, which I hope I may be forgiven for having read!: http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/usnews/politics/2767-coakley-brown-race-offers-poor-ideological-choice. 

All best,

Bob