Consistency, Please

I’d like to share with you a column I wrote about recent troubling developments at the state and national levels. Here’s an excerpt:

Recently, over an enjoyable meal, a rabbi friend and I discussed at length a litany of controversial issues, from immigration to the death penalty; from minimum wage to abortion; from prison reform to physician-assisted-suicide. We agreed on some, differed on others. At the end of our pleasant conversation, my colleague teased me, “The trouble with you is that you’re so damn consistent!”

I take that as a compliment! Our belief in the dignity of the human person, and the sanctity of human life — a conviction the rabbi and I share — leads to what we Catholics call a “consistent ethic of life,” what Pope St. John Paul II called a “culture of life,” what Pope Francis refers to as “an ecology of inclusion and protection for the most vulnerable.”

This leads us to affirm the civil rights of the innocent baby in the womb and to oppose the death penalty; to advocate for both the vulnerable refugee and for the struggling laborer. This consistency is hardly unique to us Catholics, but characterizes the values of people of many religions, or none at all. It’s a bedrock principle of this great Republic founded upon certain self-evident, inalienable rights.

Recently, we’ve been let down by our national and state executives.

Click here to read more at the New York Daily News.