No big surprise, this is South Carolina...
Garry
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Priest: No communion for Obama sup****ters
Associated Press
Thursday, November 13, 2008
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- A South Carolina Roman Catholic priest has told
his pari****oners that they should refrain from receiving Holy
Communion if they voted for Barack Obama because the Democratic
president-elect sup****ts abortion, and sup****ting him "constitutes
material cooperation with intrinsic evil."
The Rev. Jay Scott Newman said in a letter distributed Sunday to
pari****oners at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Greenville that they are
putting their souls at risk if they take Holy Communion before doing
penance for their vote.
"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," Newman wrote, referring to Obama by his full name,
including his middle name of Hussein.
"Voting for a pro-abortion politician when a plausible pro-life
alternative exists constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic
evil, and those Catholics who do so place themselves outside of the
full communion of Christ's Church and under the judgment of divine
law. Persons in this condition should not receive Holy Communion until
and unless they are reconciled to God in the Sacrament of Penance,
lest they eat and drink their own condemnation."
During the 2008 presidential campaign, many bishops spoke out on
abortion more boldly than four years earlier, telling Catholic
politicians and voters that the issue should be the most im****tant
consideration in setting policy and deciding which candidate to back.
A few church leaders said pari****oners risked their immortal soul by
voting for candidates who sup****t abortion rights.
But bishops differ on whether Catholic lawmakers - and voters - should
refrain from receiving Communion if they diverge from church teaching
on abortion. Each bishop sets policy in his own diocese. In their
annual fall meeting, the nation's Catholic bishops vowed Tuesday to
forcefully confront the Obama administration over its sup****t for
abortion rights.
According to national exit polls, 54 percent of Catholics chose Obama,
who is Protestant. In South Carolina, which McCain carried, voters in
Greenville County - traditionally seen as among the state's most
conservative areas - went 61 percent for the Republican, and 37
percent for Obama.
"It was not an attempt to make a partisan point," Newman said in a
telephone interview Thursday. "In fact, in this election, for the sake
of argument, if the Republican candidate had been pro-abortion, and
the Democratic candidate had been pro-life, everything that I wrote
would have been exactly the same."
Conservative Catholics criticized Democratic presidential nominee John
Kerry in 2004 for sup****ting abortion rights, with a few Catholic
bishops saying Kerry should refrain from receiving Holy Communion
because his views were contrary to church teachings.
Sister Mary Ann Walsh, spokeswoman for the U.S. Conference of Catholic
Bishops, said she had not heard of other churches taking this position
in reaction to Obama's win. A Boston-based group that sup****ts
Catholic Democrats questioned the move, saying it was too extreme.
"Father Newman is off base," said Steve Krueger, national director of
Catholic Democrats. "He is acting beyond the authority of a parish
priest to say what he did. ... Unfortunately, he is doing so in a
manner that will be of great cost to those pari****oners who did vote
for Sens. Obama and Biden. There will be a spiritual cost to them for
his words."
A man who has attended St. Mary's for 18 years said he welcomed
Newman's message and anticipated it would inspire further discussion
at the church.
"I don't understand anyone who would call themselves a Christian, let
alone a Catholic, and could vote for someone who's a pro-abortion
candidate," said Ted Kelly, 64, who volunteers his time as lector for
the church. "You're talking about the murder of innocent beings."
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