{"id":25782,"date":"2013-09-21T14:37:53","date_gmt":"2013-09-21T19:37:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/voxnova\/?p=25782"},"modified":"2017-05-03T19:01:50","modified_gmt":"2017-05-04T00:01:50","slug":"naral-thanks-pope-francis-in-translation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/voxnova\/2013\/09\/21\/naral-thanks-pope-francis-in-translation\/","title":{"rendered":"NARAL Thanks Pope Francis: In Translation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Well, Pope Francis has confounded the media again<\/a>.\u00a0 One day after he was reported to have told Catholics not to talk about abortion, the Pope himself talked about abortion in what Lifesitenews rather ridiculously called his \u201cstrongest pro-life comments to date<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0 But, as Mark Shea clearly sees<\/a>, the only reason groups like Lifesite are forced into making such statements is because they themselves buy the New York Times party line about what the Pope had actually said the day before.<\/p>\n

The simple fact is that, in his landmark interview<\/a>, Francis did not say not to talk about abortion, but he told us how<\/em> to talk about abortion so that our message may be heard.\u00a0 In particular, he highlighted the essential nature of discussing abortion in context, which, as Charlie Camosy has pointed out<\/a>, is more or less the angle taken by Benedict in Caritas in Veritate.\u00a0 <\/em>The day after the interview was released, Francis followed his own prescription to the letter by speaking about abortion within a larger context, particularly that of a \u201cthrowaway culture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of course, Lifesitenews sees this as a kind of rescue mission and the debate in the comboxes is whether Francis managed to avert disaster or not, and the secular press has to presuppose that Francis was bowing to some kind of pressure from conservatives in the Curia.\u00a0 But does anyone actually think that the man who has been governing the Church since March is someone who bows to curial pressure?<\/p>\n

In this rather bizarre situation one of the more troubling misunderstandings of what Francis is about comes from those who think he has somehow appeased the abortion lobby.\u00a0 They point to this NARAL meme:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

As one LSN commenter put it, in defending LSN\u2019s earlier negative coverage of Francis\u2019s interview,<\/a> \u201cWhen the devil\u2019s henchmen cheer you on, you know we\u2019re all in trouble!\u201d\u00a0 But is NARAL really cheering Francis on?\u00a0 I doubt it.\u00a0 Here\u2019s my translation of the NARAL meme:<\/p>\n

Dear Pope Francis, = Dear Gullible Catholics Everywhere,<\/p>\n

Thank You. = Some of you have serious questions about your Church\u2019s teaching about abortion.\u00a0 Do we ever have good news for you!\u00a0 You no longer have to struggle with that teaching and its implications.\u00a0 Your conscience can rest easy now, knowing that you have permission from the highest spiritual authority on earth to ignore everything the Church has said about abortion in the last 2000 years.\u00a0 The Church is finally catching up with the times.<\/p>\n

Some of you oppose abortion but have very serious concerns about voting for the political party in this country that says it opposes abortion and you struggle very deeply every time you need to cast a vote in our political system.\u00a0 Worry no more!\u00a0 You have permission to vote for NARAL-endorsed candidates from the Pope himself.<\/p>\n

Some of you believe abortion is the greatest human rights violation of our era and that it must be fought tooth and nail.\u00a0 To you we say, \u201cDespair!\u201d\u00a0 You are on your own.\u00a0 You have been forsaken by the very Chair of Peter, the last great opposition to our agenda in the world.\u00a0 This is game over people.\u00a0 If you insist on continuing this fight, you do it alone and you will dwindle to insignificance.\u00a0 Even the Pope is on our side.<\/p>\n

Signed, Pro-Choice women everywhere = Please try to forget that there are pro-choice men and pro-life women.\u00a0 Otherwise you will see right through the phony pretense that abortion is a male vs. female question with men as oppressors and women as victims.\u00a0 To oppose abortion is to use and victimize women and has nothing whatsoever to do with the taking of an innocent human life.\u00a0 Anyone who suggests as much is merely a misogynist trying to cover his<\/strong> misogyny.\u00a0 And it gets awkward if we acknowledge that a very significant number of such mysogynists are women.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

NARAL may just be bad at reading<\/a>.\u00a0 But I doubt it (while agreeing with the Bad Catholic\u2019s more basic point).\u00a0 They know exactly what they\u2019re doing here.\u00a0 This is a divide and conquer move.\u00a0 Pro-life Catholics, I beg you:\u00a0 don\u2019t take the bait!<\/p>\n

\n

Brett Salkeld<\/a> is Archdiocesan Theologian for the Catholic Archdiocese of Regina, Saskatchewan. He is a father of four (so far) and husband of one.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, Pope Francis has confounded the media again.\u00a0 One day after he was reported to have told Catholics not to talk about abortion, the Pope himself talked about abortion in what Lifesitenews rather ridiculously called his \u201cstrongest pro-life comments to date.\u201d\u00a0 But, as Mark Shea clearly sees, the only reason groups like Lifesite are forced […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2991,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,350],"tags":[1708,1709,5],"class_list":["post-25782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-abortion","category-brett-salkeld","tag-lifesitenews-2","tag-mainstream-media","tag-pope-francis"],"yoast_head":"\nNARAL Thanks Pope Francis: In Translation<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Well, Pope Francis has confounded the media again.\u00a0 One day after he was reported to have told 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