lection day is upon us. But before you punch the ballot card, take a moment for recollection and discernment. The campaign road has been a long and arduous journey, and sadly, reaching the end of it feels not at all rewarding. Like many people, I find myself disappointed and uncertain about either candidate. Actually, I’m left with a bad taste in my mouth altogether.

What one candidate has is sorely lacking in the other, and vice-versa. I realize that no candidate is perfect. However, I also feel that no Catholic, in good conscience, can vote for Obama due to his extremist pro-abortion views (and they are extreme). Yet, McCain lacks any appreciable plan to address social justice concerns, which are central to the Church’s moral framework. Neither candidate has a consistent ethic on life. Sadly, neither party represents an ideology truly compatible with devout Catholicism.

So for whom do we vote? Is one candidate better than the other? Or is this a “damage-control” election?

To help us make these difficult decisions, I reference a few recent articles:

• My Personal “Faith Priorities” for This Election (Jim Wallis)
  

  In 2008, the kingdom of God is not on the ballot in any of the 50 states as far as I can see. So we can’t vote for that this year. But there are important choices in this year’s election — very important choices — which will dramatically impact what many in the religious community and outside of it call “the common good,” and the outcome could be very important, perhaps even more so than in many recent electoral contests. I am in no position to tell anyone what is “non-negotiable,” and neither is any bishop or megachurch pastor, but let me tell you the “faith priorities” and values I will be voting on this year.

• Be Not Afraid (Jim Wallis)
  

  In the final days of this election campaign, a new message has emerged. For the entire political year, the overriding theme has been change—with each candidate competing to be the real champion for a new direction. With 80 percent of Americans unhappy with our country’s current direction, it seemed that no other theme could break through. A new message has, and it is this: “Be Afraid— Be Very Afraid.”

• Christian Voters Need to Reorient, Not Disengage (Sondra Shepley)
  

  Ultimately, it is reorientation, not disengagement that we need. It is a call to conversion with the humble recognition that we engage powers and principalities of this world, both spiritual and physical, that will try to lure our deepest devotions. So, we stand at a new point in history clinging to our Savior’s promise: “I have said this to you, so that in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution. But take courage; I have overcome the world!” (John 16:33).

• Voting as Damage Control (Shane Clairborne)
  

  One way to look at voting is that it is damage control -– not so much voting for something as it is voting against something worse. We must do everything we can to reduce the destruction done by the principalities and powers, and voting may be one way to do that. Being an agent of God’s kingdom, transformation means calling out the best that the state can do, and not expecting it to be our savior.

• Vote Your Conscience, Revisited (Amanda Shaw)
  

  “Vote your conscience” said a recent election message aimed at Catholic voters, and I’ve heard more than one objection. The number of believing Americans without a proper understanding of ethics and civic duty is, I’d venture to guess, devastatingly large, and the last thing these individuals need is affirmation in their (and the media’s) confusion. Among those who do have a sense of morality in public life, most are wrenched in multiple directions, struggling to perform a moral calculus that avoids any scent of one-issue proclivities. Conscience is a murky land, not the sort of place to make a firm decision./BLOCKQUOTE>

• How the Bishops Found Their Voice (Austin Ruse)
  

  What a difference four years make. In 2004 a small number of bishops publicly criticized the pro-abortion position of the Democrat running for president. This election year, they have grown to a large and lusty choir taking strong public stands against the pro-abortion politics of the Democratic ticket and their loudest supporters. Why such a difference from 2004 to now?

• The Democrats: The Party of the “Common Good”? (George Marlin)
  

  Democratic Party insiders know that they must persuade practicing Catholics to return to the party of their forefathers if they are to win the presidential election this November. To achieve that goal, the Democrats are throwing rhetorical crumbs to Catholics voters.

• The Strains of the Political Season (Hadley Arkes)
  

  In times of trouble, we invoke Fr. Richard Neuhaus’s summoning line, “We can still turn this around.” The thing to be turned around is the election, after it has already been turned around.

• Bracing for the Election (Hadley Arkes)
  

  It was the best of times and the worst of times - oops: change that. It’s the worst of times, in this election, and some of us find ourselves shaking our heads in disbelief.

• A Last-Minute Assessment (Michael Uhlmann)
  

  A large segment of the public are clearly nervous about Obama, as well they should be. Four years ago, he was an obscure Illinois state legislator of undistinguished achievement. Before that, he was a community organizer in South Chicago, which is not exactly a familiar job description or one that … sends a tingle up the leg of most voters. His three-year record in the Senate is likewise devoid of accomplishment, which is perhaps understandable inasmuch as he spent most of that time running for president. So what, precisely, are his qualifications?

alloween (”All Hallows’ Eve”) marks the day before the All Saints’ Day, on November 1. The Feast of All Saints is a holy day of obligation and is when we honor all the saints of the Church — especially those who are unknown and who do not have feast days of their own. November 2 is the Commemoration of All Souls, when we honor the dead and pray for the souls in Purgatory. (According to the usus antiquior, if November 2 falls on a Sunday, then the Commemoration of All Souls is transferred to the following Monday; in the novus ordo, it is celebrated on the Sunday.) This ‘triduum’ of sorts (October 31 to November 2) is collectively celebrated in Mexican and many Latin-American cultures as the Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead.

These days serve as a good reminder to honor our obligation as faithful Catholics to pray for the dead. In New York City, many Catholics have a wonderful tradition for honoring these days: On the Feast of All Saints (a holy day of obligation), Latin Mass is held at the Church of Our Lady of Good Counsel (230 East 90th St., between 2nd & 3rd Ave.; 212-289-1742); the Commemoration of All Souls is celebrated by a Latin Mass at the Church of St. Vincent de Paul (123 West 23rd St., between Ave. of the Americas & 7th Ave.; 212-243-4727); and to cap it all off, the Annual Solemn Requiem of the New York Purgatorial Society is celebrated at Church of St. Agnes (143 East 43rd Street, between 3rd Avenue and Lexington; 212-682-5722).

O

Lord God omnipotent, I ask you by the Precious Blood, which your divine Son Jesus shed –

• In the Garden;
• In His cruel scourging;
• In His bitter crowning with thorns;
• In the streets of Jerusalem whilst He carried on His sacred shoulders the heavy burden of the Cross;
• Upon the tree of the Cross, especially from His sacred hands and feet;
• Which gushed forth from His sacred side, in the presence and to the great sorrow of His most holy Mother;
• and which He himself, on the night before His Passion, gave as meat and drink to His beloved Apostles and bequeathed to His holy Church to the perpetual Sacrifice and life-giving nourishment of his faithful people

deliver the souls in Purgatory, and especially that one which is the most forsaken of all, and bring it into your glory, where it may praise and bless you forever.

O God, Creator and Redeemer of all the faithful: Grant unto the souls of your servants and handmaids the remission of all their sins, that through our devout supplications, they may obtain the pardon they have always desired. Who lives and reigns, world without end; Amen.

Andrew Cusack recently shared the following inspirational story from a Louisiana newspaper:

Amy and Andrew J. DiMaggio Fr. of LaPlace don’t have to be told that their 1-year-old daughter Anna Maria is special. They get a glimpse of it every day when the toddler walks out to the front yard of her house and begins an animated conversation with the Blessed Mother.

“Whenever she is with us in the front yard, she will always stop playing at some point and walk up to our statue of Mary,” the DiMaggions said. “In this photo, she was holding her hands up and talking to Mary in her own babble language. We hope that this picture will inspire your readers to remember the words of Jesus who said that to enter the kingdom of heaven we must be as open as a child.”

n Catholic Answers’ Catholic Voters’ Guide, we are taught that there are five non-negotiable issues that guide our selection of political officials:

1. Abortion
2. Euthanasia / Assisted Suicide
3. Fetal (not adult-derived) Stem-Cell Research
4. Human Cloning
5. Homosexual ‘Marriage’

Of course, we would also hope that the candidate be Catholic, and espouse other values in accordance with the dogma and morals of the Faith. However, I must point out the following:

If you do ever happen to run into a good Catholic candidate, or at least a good candidate who satisfies the five criteria above, remember that there are other important issues to consider, such as a social support structure for the poor, medically indigent, handicapped, mentally ill, elderly and children. After all, our Lord did mandate that we should tend to them, even to the point of sacrifice (love your neighbor as yourself; when you did it for these, you did it for Me; etc.). And it is this sacrifice that makes Charity a virtue, rather than just being ‘nice’ or ‘caring’ or ‘kind’ or ‘helpful.’ Thus, this requires establishing a safety net of sorts.

Recently, Jim Wallis echoed my own sentiments:

In 2004, several conservative Catholic Bishops and a few megachurch pastors like Rick Warren issued their list of “non-negotiables,” which were intended to be a voter guide for their followers. All of them were relatively the same list of issues: abortion, gay marriage, stem cell research, etc. None of them even included the word “poverty,” only one example of the missing issues which are found quite clearly in the Bible.

I understand the arguments of those who say that charity can be accomplished in the private arena (individually and by churches and private charitable organizations); but such efforts, while laudable, are inconsistent and vary in coverage from region to region, population to population and season to season. I would argue that it is vital to have something more dependable and constant. Put in all the checks-and-balances that are required to ensure that the system is not abused or taken for granted, but ensure that the system exists. In an ideal world, where everyone lived truly according to the Faith, this system would not be necessary; but in the Real World, it is sorely needed.

Thus, I would kindly propose that a sixth non-negotiable issue be added to the list:

6. Concern for the Poor, Medically Indigent, Infirm, Disabled, Mentally Ill, Elderly and Children — and Support of Social Support Structures Thereof

What to do when there are candidates who don’t meet these six criteria perfectly? The Voters’ Guide says,

In such a case you may vote for the candidate who takes the fewest such positions or who seems least likely to be able to advance immoral legislation, or you may choose to vote for no one.

A difficult decision, I think. But one well worth pondering.

Addendum: ‘Normative’ is not equivalent to ‘optional’…

es, unlike the other five non-negotiables, which are essentially Boolean parameters (i.e., yes/no, with no middle-ground), or at least a limited set of ordinal variables (stance 1 > 2 > 3), social concern requires normative assessment, having complex quantitative and qualitative dimensions.

I feel that people who say it cannot be a non-negotiable just cringe at the admitted difficulty involved in its analysis… It’s harder to weigh Candidate A’s stance against Candidate B’s platform. Be that as it may, all things worth doing are difficult! Most people would agree that this is a moral issue that warrants our attention and analysis, and I would offer that our Faith obligates us to do so. Moreover, the fact that it is far more vague and complex and interwoven with other issues makes it that much more deserving of our attention precisely because most people will gloss over the issue in preference of the other, more easily classified non-negotiables.

Wallis says it this way:

After the last election [of 2004], I wrote a book titled God’s Politics…, [in which] I was trying to explore what issues might be closest to the heart of God and how they may be quite different from what many strident religious voices were then saying. I was also saying that “God’s Politics” will often turn our partisan politics upside down, transcend our ideological categories of Left and Right, and challenge the core values and priorities of our political culture. I was also trying to say that there is certainly no easy jump from God’s politics to either the Republicans or Democrats. God is neither.

In any election, we face imperfect choices, but our choices should reflect the things we believe God cares about if we are people of faith, and our own moral sensibilities if we are not people of faith. Therefore, people of faith, and all of us, should be “values voters” but vote all our values, not just a few that can be easily manipulated for the benefit of one party or another.

In 2008, the kingdom of God is not on the ballot in any of the 50 states as far as I can see. So we can’t vote for that this year. But there are important choices in this year’s election — very important choices — which will dramatically impact what many in the religious community and outside of it call “the common good,” and the outcome could be very important, perhaps even more so than in many recent electoral contests.

Just as no candidate in the Real World will espouse, perfectly, the Church’s views on all five of the non-negotiables, no candidate will have the perfect plan for systematized social support structures (e.g., welfare, medical insurance and ensured access, home health assistants, etc.). If we are able to weigh, say, satisfactory conformation in three of the five non-negotiable items for Candidate A against conformation in two of the five for Candidate B, then my argument is that we must also include in this mix an assessment of my Criterion #6. There may not be a clear, objective method to decide if a candidate has a ‘baseline, satisfactory’ position… Assessment here is more akin to subjective discernment, and as such, it may be easier to compare the positions of each candidate. In so doing, I would find the candidate who is better devoted to the Church’s requirement for Charity, at a system-wide level, and award him or her one gold star for this. Add that to the tally of the other five non-negotiables and see who comes ahead.

The sad truth of the matter is that we will likely be disappointed with the candidates, regardless, even after this is thrown into the mix. It just makes us realize that there is a great paucity of true heroes in the world today.

No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. (Mt 6:24; cf. Lk 16:1-14)

All the more evidence that we are engaged in a grand Culture War. Let us continue to be the Church Militant and tirelessly defend God and our Faith from secular threats and sabotage from within.

n Indulgence is the remission before God of the temporal punishment due to be suffered for sins that have already been forgiven. In granting Indulgences, the Church — as minister of the Redemption — authoritatively dispenses and applies the treasury of the satisfaction won by Christ and the Saints (Indulgentiarum Doctrina, Norm 1). The temporal punishment due for forgiven sins must be suffered either on earth or in Purgatory. Fr. Rutler explains,

Indulgences respond to the reality that there are two consequences of sin. “Grave sin deprives us of communion with God and therefore makes us incapable of eternal life, the privation of which is called the ‘eternal punishment’ of sin. On the other hand, every sin, even venial, entails an unhealthy attachment to creatures, which must be purified either here on earth or after death in the state called Purgatory. This purification frees one from what is called the ‘temporal punishment’ of sin. These two punishments must not be conceived of as a kind of vengeance inflicted by God from without, but as following from the very nature of sin. A conversion which proceeds from a fervent charity can attain the complete purification of the sinner in such a way that no punishment would remain” (Catechism, n. 1472).

A Partial Indulgence remits part of the temporal punishment due, whereas a Plenary Indulgence remits all the temporal punishment due. Indulgences can always be offered for the Poor Souls in Purgatory, rather than for ourselves — this could be considered to be one of the spiritual works of mercy. However, Indulgences for the Poor Souls are efficacious by way of suffrage, that is, depending on God’s decision, since the Church on earth does not have jurisdiction over the souls in Purgatory.

Four Ways to Gain a Plenary Indulgence

a Catholic, being in the state of grace, can gain a Plenary Indulgence by many different prayers and works of piety, but these four are worthy of special mention:

• Making a visit to the Blessed Sacrament to adore It for at least one-half hour.
• Lectio divina, or reading and meditating upon Sacred Scripture with the veneration due to the Word of God.
• Making the Way of the Cross. This includes walking from station to station. No specific prayers are required, but devout meditation on the Passion and Death of our Lord is required.
• Recitation of the Rosary of at least five decades, with devout meditation on the Mysteries, in addition to the vocal recitation.

Additional Requirements

In addition to performing the specified work, the following conditions are required:

• Confession
• Holy Communion
• Prayer for the Holy Father’s intentions (one Pater Noster and one Ave Maria may suffice).
• A person’s mind and heart must be free from all attachment to sin, even venial sin.

These conditions may be fulfilled several days before or after the performance of the prescribed work. It is fitting, however, that Communion be received and the prayer for the intention of the Holy Father be recited on the same day the work is performed.

If one tries to gain a Plenary Indulgence but fails to fulfill all the requirements, the indulgence will be only partial.

If we generously offer Indulgences for the Holy Souls in Purgatory, we may hope to obtain relief or release for many of them, in accord with God’s holy will. In gratitude, they may well obtain for us many great favors.

These norms are from the official Enchiridion of Indulgences (1968) and the Apostolic Constitution, The Doctrine of Indulgences (1967), as summarized by TAN Books and Publishers on their “How To Gain a Plenary Indulgence” card.

esus called us to conversion, reconciliation and solidarity. To continue to live that call, we might take the spiritual and corporal works of mercy as a penitential model. These 14 practices demand great sacrifice and generosity, and they draw us more deeply into conformity with the Lord. Focusing on one of these works each week may be a practical way of integrating them into our personal, family and parish lives.

Corporal Works of Mercy

• Feeding the hungry
• Sheltering the homeless
• Clothing the naked
• Visiting the sick
• Visiting the imprisoned
• Giving drink to the thirsty
• Burying the dead

Spiritual Works of Mercy

• Converting sinners
• Instructing the ignorant
• Advising the doubtful
• Comforting the sorrowful
• Bearing wrongs patiently
• Forgiving injuries
• Praying for the living and the dead

Penitential practices express in visible signs and deeds the interior conversion of heart. Because we are called by Jesus to give our whole selves to the Father, conversion means a radical reorientation of our whole lives toward God’s kingdom. We turn away from evil, resolve not to sin and trust in God’s amazing grace. There will be sadness for past wrongs but deep joy in the working of grace.

In the end, our life in Christ is about loving God with our whole heart, mind and soul, and about sharing God’s love with others. Penitential practices are essential if we are to turn away from sin, believe in the Gospel and share God’s love with one another.

Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, editor of First Things, shares his views on the final presidential debate and on the issue of abortion in this poignant essay.