By Kathleen Gilbert and John-Henry Westen
October 31, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The priests of CallforherSOS.org have delivered what may be the most blunt directive yet to Catholic voters in the upcoming presidential election.
In three short videos, Fr. Tom Celso and Fr. Don Eder embellish little upon a simple, strict manifesto of Catholic moral teaching.
“It is the mission of the Catholic Church to pass moral judgements in matters related to politics, whenever the fundamental rights of man require it,” say the priests.
“The Democratic party and Barack Obama have brought shame and horror to this nation. Mr. Obama has promised to legalize partial-birth abortion, the savage murder of babies during birth. We are outraged.
“Catholics must uphold human rights, avoid sin, and cannot vote for abortion candidates. They cannot vote for Obama.”
The videos were created by the Catholic coalition CALL FOR HER – SOS, i.e. “Catholics Activated Leading Laity For Openly Recognizing Human Elementary Rights – Salvation Of Souls.”
The website explains the coalition’s mission to “activate Catholics and other Christians, especially laity, to lead other persons to recognize … the most basic human rights and the importance of saving souls in the context of the current election.”
The only other known Catholic leader to openly condemn voting for Obama by name is retired Texas Bishop Rene Gracida. In a letter to Catholic World News, the Bishop explained why most Bishops will not endorse candidates by name. “In the United States the danger of losing the tax-exempt status of the Church may perhaps be seen as justification for caution on the part of Ordinaries (Bishops in charge of particular dioceses)),” said Gracida.
The bishop added however, “It would be wrong for an Ordinary to jeopardize the tax exempt status of his Diocese for any reason short of the most important, the defense of innocent human life. Therefore, I do believe that abortion is a great enough threat to our society to justify an Ordinary taking a strong stand against the candidacy of such a pro-abortion candidate as Barack Hussein Obama. An Ordinary need not name the candidate by name, as I have done, but surely the Ordinary possesses the literary skills to condemn the candidacy on moral grounds in such a way as to leave absolutely no doubt in the reader’s mind as to the identity of the candidate whose candidacy is being condemned.”
To see the videos, go to: https://www.callforhersos.org/
See the letter to Catholic World News:
https://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/blog.cfm?id=300