Abortion, Moral Obligation, Religious Obligation

A few weeks ago, I met a young couple who were in Washington for the summer, working as interns working for a pro-life organization. At some point in the dinnertime conversation election politics came up, and the young woman maintained that as a Catholic, she had a moral obligation not to support candidates who support abortion rights.

This seems to me to be a mistake.

The issue isn't who's right about the abortion question. Reasonable people can differ about that. But partly for that reason, the idea that as a Catholic, she had a moral obligation to guide her political behavior according to Church teaching is disturbing. Although there are individual Catholics who disagree with it, the Catholic Church's position on abortion is clear and consistent. The thought that someone might find the Church's analysis persuasive and see it as a basis for political action doesn't trouble me. What troubles me is the thought that whether or not someone had thought through what the Church has to say, he or she would see it as a reason for political action.

I have a suggestion about how the ideal citizen would think about her vote: she would vote as though her ballot was the one that tipped the scales; the one that decided which way the overall vote would go. If we follow that standard, and if what's at stake is something that would have real and significant consequences for real people, that imposes a considerable duty of care. In particular, it imposes a duty not just to take someone else's opinion on a consequential moral question -- even if that someone (or those somebodies) happen to be the ones who speak for one's religious tradition.

No one should take offense at the suggestion that the Catholic Church has been wrong before in matters of consequence. After all, this would hardly make the Church unique. But we can go a little further. There are weighty reasons to think that the Church is wrong even now about important things. Most Catholics don't accept Church teaching on birth control, and it would be a mistake to put this down to intellectual or spiritual sloth. What the Church has to say about birth control rests on premises that many thoughtful religious people, including many thoughtful Catholics, don't find convincing. The same goes for what the Church has to say about homosexuality. The point isn't that doubts about official teaching on these issues undermines what the Church says about abortion. The point is simply that since it's possible in good conscience for Catholics to have reservations about Church moral teachings on some issues, it would take argument to show that abortion couldn't be an exception. And it would take even more argument to show that the moral duty of a good Catholic is to vote with the Church's urging, private doubts notwithstanding.

I said it before and I'll say it again: the point isn't that the Church is wrong about abortion. The point, rather, is that the issues here aren't simple, even though both sides often try to present them as though they were. When I teach the topic of abortion to philosophy students, I always begin with an admonition: whichever side of this question you're on, if you think it's simple, you need to think again. Whenever we're confronted with an issue of that sort, I'd suggest that our duty is not to turn the settling of our duties over to others. Our duty is to think things through.