News

By John-Henry Westen

WASHINGTON, August 27, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The August 24 Meet the Press interview with Nancy Pelosi which has received condemnation from Catholic leaders around the nation is little more than a repeat of Biden’s own comments on Meet the Press last year.  The massive reaction from the Catholic hierarchy against Pelosi’s theologizing on abortion (see coverage: https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/aug/08082601.html ) should also be applied to Biden.

At issue is Pelosi’s assertion that the Catholic Church did not have a solid position against abortion. On when life begins, she said: “I would say that as an ardent, practicing Catholic, this is an issue that I have studied for a long time . . . And what I know is, over the centuries, the doctors of the church have not been able to make that definition.  And Senator – St. Augustine said at three months.  We don’t know.”

Just like Pelosi, in an April 27, 2007 interview, also with Meet the Press, Biden defended his support for abortion with references to ancient Church leadership, which he interpreted as questioning abortion.  “Even within our own church, there’s been debates about life, you know, from, from ‘Summa Theologica,’ Aquinas, and 40 days to quickening and right to, you know, you know, Pius IX, animated fetus doctrine and so on.”

Again like Pelosi, Biden was quick to point out his supposed Catholicism while advocating for abortion.  “I’m a practicing Catholic,” Biden told host Tim Russert while defending his support for Roe v. Wade.  “And the decision that I have come to is Roe v. Wade is as close to we’re going to be able to get as a society that incorporates the general lines of debate within Christendom, Judaism and other faiths, where it basically says there is a sliding scale relating to viability of a fetus,” he said.

Biden’s voting record on abortion for the past four years has been nearly perfect from the perspective of the National Abortion Rights Action League.  NARAL’s score card lists Biden as: 2004, 100%; 2005, 100%; 2006, 100%; 2007, 75%.

See the Biden Meet the Press interview here:
https://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18381961