How are Catholics reconciling Pope's disagreement with govt policies?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A large number of American Catholics reject papal authority when they don’t like what the Pope says. Pope Francis has been clear that communion should not be denied based on political belief- as politicized bishops tried to deny it to prominent Catholic democrats. Notably, Catholic democrats did not attempt to support policies with doctrine. They governed secularly. They did not contradict the Pope or Catholic teaching.

Vance twists scripture and contradicts the teaching of the church. For example:


Vice President JD Vance is getting schooled by theologians over his inverted theology expressed in a Jan. 29 interview on Fox News.

What Vance said: “There’s this old school — and I think it’s a very Christian concept, by the way — that you love your family and then you love your neighbor and then you love your community and then you love your fellow citizens and your own country, and then after that you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.

“A lot of the far left has completely inverted that. They seem to hate the citizens of their own country and care more about people outside their own borders. That is no way to run a society. And I think the profound difference that Donald Trump brings to the leadership of this country is the simple concept of America First. It doesn’t mean you hate anybody else, it means that you have leadership. And President Trump has been very clear about this — that puts the interests of American citizens first. In the same way that the British prime minister should care about Brits and the French should care about the French, we have an American president who cares primarily about Americans, and that’s a very welcome change.”

Politics aside, numerous Christian theologians took to social media to point out the vice president — who is a conservative Catholic — misrepresented the teachings of Jesus and the Gospels.

“Actually no. This misses the point of Jesus’ Parable of the Good Samaritan.”
“Actually no,” wrote Jesuit priest and author James Martin. “This misses the point of Jesus’ Parable of the Good Samaritan (Lk 10: 25-37). After Jesus tells a lawyer that you should ‘love your neighbor as yourself,’ the lawyer asks him, ‘And who is my neighbor?

“In response, Jesus tells the story of a Jewish man who has been beaten by robbers and is lying by the side of the road. The man is helped not by those closest to him (a ‘priest’ and a ‘Levite’), but rather by a Samaritan. At the time, Jews and Samaritans would have considered one another enemies.

“So Jesus’ fundamental message is that everyone is your neighbor, and that it is not about helping just your family or those closest to you. It’s specifically about helping those who seem different, foreign, other. They are all our ‘neighbors.’

“But Jesus’ deeper point can only be understood from the point of view of the beaten man: Our ultimate salvation depends, as it did for that man, upon those whom we often consider to be the ‘stranger.’

Vance is strictly a politician. He doesn't give one crap about doctrine.
Here's what it is: Vance intertwining politics and Christian faith because it's the Christian/evangelical base the republicans feel obligated to pander to. They all have to reference their faith and God now. I don't know why he chose to convert to Catholicism; but he's just using the facade and manipulating terms and concepts to form Christian rationale to fit the politics and the administration's policies. He's banking on nobody knowing what the fancy Latin phrases and doctrinal concepts actually mean (and the few who do not having sufficient bully pulpit to correct him with the greater public). By spouting the terms, he comes off as knowledgeable and therefore credible. He's a hypocrite. He probably actually knows what the concept really means, but since it doesn't genuinely matter to him spiritually or faithfully, he is just manipulating it to fit the political narrative he needs.

Maybe he chose Catholicism so he could join Opus Dei and be a big shot

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm curious about how Catholics are thinking about the current position of the Pope, which is decidedly against the Trump administration's immigration policies.

If you're Catholic and opposed legal abortion because the Catholic church was against it (although the government obviously supported it), are you now opposing these immigration policies for the same reason? And if not, how can you reconcile that with being Catholic?

We're not required to agree with the Pope's political opinions. I'm a Democrat but don't believe we need to let the entire third world flood our country to the detriment of our citizens.

Besides, it would be hypocritical to tell everyone not to impose religious beliefs about abortion on the country and then turn around and say we need to open the border because the Bible.

Except the Bible is silent on abortion and says to welcome the poor.

If we're going to ignore the whole "do not kill" thing, then I'd point out that Catholics are not a Sola Scriptura church and that abortion was condemned explicitly as far back as the Didache. Only recently have most of the mainline Protestant churches changed their teachings on abortion. It wasn't always a major political talking point but abortion being evil was universal across the board in Christianity until fairly recently.

It's either ignorant or disingenuous to claim that "welcome the poor" means the government should let in every single impoverished person until our social safety net collapses but at the same time, the Church's constant teaching against the evils of abortion should just be tossed aside. Either Catholic teaching should influence our votes or it shouldn't.

Also, the instructions given to welcome the poor, to give to the poor, etc, were always given to either individuals (sell all you have and give to the poor) or to theocratic governments (remember you were strangers in the land of Egypt). It's hardly the same situation. We're called to give to charity, not to vote for specific social programs. In fact, letting in waves of poor migrants impacts our ability to serve the poor who already live here.

Except that we aren't talking about not letting in waves of migrants. We are talking about pushing mothers and babies back into the water at Rio Grande, putting small children into detention camps with deplorable conditions and no parents, about rhetoric that embraces hate and disgust for others. Moreover, the same government is pushing policies that hurt the poor here, slashing medicaid and nutritional programs for children, cutting out school lunch programs, and eliminating whole agencies that are dedicated to providing services to the poor, all in order to fund tax cuts for the weathy.

If you support this administration, then you are Catholic in name only. There is absolutely no sound defense to support following any of the teachings of Christ or the Catholic church while supporting Trump and his appointees.