A CPR Refresher Course

I just completed the course on Faithful Citizenship. Many students in the course struggle with issues related to abortion. Is it the only issue to consider when voting? Is it the most important issue to consider when voting? Is it one of many issues to consider when voting?

After several weeks of communicating with other students and our instructor on this issue, the following analogy came to me:

Late at night, a man is driving down a country road. The road is a great distance from any village, town or city. The man comes across an overturned car. About 20 feet from the car is woman who is unconscious. The man checks for a pulse. There is none. The woman is not breathing. He calls 911. Since the man just completed a CPR course, he knows that he needs to get the woman's heart going AND get her breathing. He also knows that it is most important to get her heart going. He administers the compressions to the woman's chest. After several rounds of compressions, he feels a pulse. Knowing that he needs to get her breathing, he beings mouth-to-mouth resusciation. After several breaths, she begins to breathe.

It was most important for the man to get the woman's heart to beat. She would have died very soon if he did not get her heart going. However, if all he did was get her heart going, she still would have died if he did not get her to breathe.

If a person votes on the single issue of abortion, they would be like the man in the analogy that gets the heart beating, but ignores the woman's need to breathe. She would still die. While abortion may be the moral issue that has the greatest need to be addressed, ignoring other critical issues will lead to the complete moral demise of our society. What good is having a nation where there are no abortions when we constantly face the threat of war, poverty, corporate greed, etc.?

When we vote, we need to think about CPR!

Separation of Church and State

I have finally had enough. One of the religious radio networks that I had been listening to is Relevent Radio. I really didn't go out of my way to listen to the local AM station. However, while driving to or from work, I would sometimes listen to their programs.

Over the past several weeks, whenever I would tune into the local Relevant Radio station, the program hosts would be "singing the praises" of one of our candidates for President and lambasting the other candidate (I'll let you guess which is which). Now, I really don't know whom I am going to vote for in the upcoming election. This is different than knowing whom I am not going to vote for. It really doesn't matter to me whom the Relevant Radio hosts praise or scorn. However, if I wanted to hear such partisan political banter, I would listen to Rush Limbaugh or tune into Air America. One would not expect to hear such banter on Relevant Radio. I really question how Relevant Radio can maintain their IRS 501(c)3 exemption given their clear efforts to encourage listeners to support a particular candidate.

I will no longer listen to Relevant Radio. Fortunately, through the miracle of satellite radio, I have the opportunity to listen to The Catholic Channel. This station on Sirius Satellite Radio is run by the Archdiocese of New York. One might think that the programming is very conservative. I have found the programming to be very "middle of the road" (with an occasional leaning toward the conservative side). Mostly, I find the programming to be pretty funny and entertaining. Some of the hosts are very intelligent and humorous. This is a wonderful combination - thinking and laughing. They even poke fun at the Pope (in a non-scandalous manner, of course).

Open Secrets

As regular readers know, I am taking an online course called Faithful Citizenship. The course is intended to assist participants in understanding the duty and role as Catholics in participating in the political arena and encouraging others to do the same. The course also includes significant discussion about what issues Catholics should consider in deciding how to vote.

There are 17 students in the course. After a few weeks of getting to know them online, I would guess that about 7 are very conservative, 7 are very liberal and 3 are somewhere in between.

During the past week, there was a significant amount of online discussion about whether or not any issues, such as abortion, trump other issues. A couple of the women from the liberal camp posted several thoughtful items for discussion. Later in the week, in an post to all of the students in the class, one of the women said that she had an abortion not too long ago and provided some details about why she felt she had to have an abortion. In the post, she mentioned that she thought some of the other students might not think much of her. To my slight surprise, nearly all of the students, including the conservatives, replied to her post with support for her and offered any assistance to help her with her struggle - she expressed that she feared for the salvation of her soul and feared talking to her priest because she has a leadership position in her parish and she was worried that the priest would think less of her because she had an abortion. Many of the students, including me, encouraged her to talk with her priest and that he would likely think even more highly of her for her willingness to share her struggle with him and seek his assistance. After the seeing the support she received from people she had never met, she has decided to talk with her priest.

Amazingly, a few hours after her post, the other woman that shared some very thoughtful insights posted a message that said she had had 2 abortions many years ago and still struggles with related issues to this day. She also received many replies from the other students that offered support and encouragement.

I mention that I was only slightly surprised that the pro-life students offered support to these woman. I really think that most pro-lifers are pro-life because it is a Republican issue rather than being Republican because the party supports pro-life causes. The political partisanship comes before morality. So, when the conservative students were faced with learning that someone to whom they have a personal connection had an abortion, their morality trumped their partisanship. When they ignored the partisan box that normally surrounds their thinking, they did the right thing and offered support to others that are struggling.

Blackberry Season

I fell victim to a cheap marketing ploy. My cellular phone service provider has the ongoing promotion where you can upgrade your phone at little or no cost every two years if you agree to sign a contract for another two years. I went over three years with my previous phone.

I am now the proud and tired owner of a Blackberry device. It is a wonderful piece of technology. Wherever I am, I have instant access to the Internet and to all four of my e-mail addresses. Most of my contacts are now in the Blackberry.

The term "Crackberry" didn't come out of nowhere. Rather than have to go to a computer to check one e-mail account and then another and then another, I can now check them all within a few seconds on the Blackberry. It is very tempting just to check the Blackberry screen every few minutes to see if any e-mails came in. If there are new e-mails, it is very tempting to just check them. Then it is tempting to send a quick reply to some of them. My cellular service provider loves these temptations since checking and replying to e-mails requires air time. I'll have to see what the damage is when I get the next cellular phone bill.

I tend to be pretty savvy at technical things. However, one issue has befuddled me - but I will figure it out. Whenever a new e-mail comes to any one of the four accounts I have on the Blackberry, the phone vibrates. Unfortunately, I get well over 200 e-mails total per day on the four e-mail accounts on the Blackberry. Not only is it somewhat annoying to have the Blackberry vibrating every couple of minutes, that vibrating requires a fair amount of energy from the battery. So, I'll figure out how to turn of the vibrating notification for new e-mails.

Sometimes, technology can be overwhelming. And no, I am not writing this post from the Blackberry - even though that is possible.

Back in the Saddle

After a hellacious week of work responsibilities, I am back to posting. I have plenty of issues to address in the next few days.

In a previous post, I mentioned that I was taking an online course through the University of Notre Dame on Faithful Citizenship, a document that is put out by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. This document provides guidelines about what Catholics should think about when deciding whom to vote for. The document is updated every four years - in the year of a Presidential election.

Here a a few of my initial thoughts after reading Faithful Citizenship:

• I am amazed by the quality of the most of the documents developed by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Faithful Citizenship is well-written. I wonder how the same group of elderly celibates can botch up the priest sexual assault issue AND put out such a thought provoking document;
• The document does NOT instruct people how to vote. The document provides some idea of what Catholics should consider when deciding how to vote.
• Although the document states that abortion is the big "non-negotiable issue", it does not state that it is a sin to vote for a candidate that is "pro-abortion". Although subtle, the document makes a distinction between voting for a candidate because of his/her support for abortion and voting for a candidate in spite of his/her support for abortion.

So, don't listen to people that claim this documents says it is a sin to vote one way or another. People on both sides of the party line and both sides of the abortion issue are using misinterpretations of the document to justify their positions. My advice would be to read the document for yourself. It can be found at: http://www.usccb.org/faithfulcitizenship/FCStatement.pdf

Family Responsibilities

I have known a fairly large number of priests over the years. Yesterday, I attended the funeral Mass of a woman. Her son presided at the Mass. This was the first time I have ever attended a funeral Mass at which the celebrant was an immediate family member of the deceased. I don't know how the priest, who is my friend, was able to preside at the Mass for his mother. In the various rites for a funeral, there are many instances where the celebrant mentions the deceased by name. Rather than use his mother's name, the priest simply used "Mom".

While driving back home from the funeral, I wonder whether priests think about what they might say during a funeral homily for a close family member - even if that homily won't likely be delivered for many years.

Citizenship 101

I am currently enrolled in my fifth STEP course from The University of Notre Dame. STEP stand for the Satellite Theological Education Program. STEP offers many courses, all of which are completed online.

The course I am taking is called Faithful Citizenship. It is very timely, given that the primary election is next week and the general election is on two months. While we haven't had our first online chat session yet, several of the course participants have posted background information about themselves. It should be an interesting course given the mix of backgrounds. Some are very liberal and some are very conservative. A couple are experts on immigration issues. One is a permanent deacon and another is studying for the permanent diaconate.

Hopefully, I will get some good post fodder from my course mates.

The document Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship can be downloaded from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops website at: http://www.usccb.org/faithfulcitizenship/FCStatement.pdf.

Youthful Indiscretions

I remember during the craziness of the Bill Clinton impeachment. One of the Congressmen leading the impeachment cause was Henry Hyde of Illinois. When it came to light that he might have not been completely faithful to his spouse many years ago, Hyde made reference to "youthful indiscretions".

A few minutes ago, I heard an early report that the teenage daughter of Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin is pregnant. She intends to have the baby and marry the father. While I doubt this will be the case, I hope that the press will leave her alone. It has to be difficult just dealing with the issues related to being a teenage mother-to-be, let alone deal with those issues in a public fishbowl. If there is anything to be publicly questioned, it is the vetting process that the McCain campaign went through prior to picking Governor Palin as a running mate.

Yes, Bristol Palin may have done something that she now regrets. Haven't we all? That doesn't mean that she is a bad person or that her life is now ruined. Hopefully, she and her family will have the chance to work through the situation with some level of privacy.