CHRISTIAN CRITERIA FOR CORRECT VOTING

Here is Father Broom's Podcast on this important topic.

As followers of Christ we have a double citizenship: our earthly home (that is only temporal) and our Heavenly home where we will reside with God forever. Our effort should be to be good citizens of both kingdoms.

Therefore, when election time presents itself, we should have Christian-criteria for the correct casting of our vote.   It is both a privilege and a duty to vote. However, our voting should be cast not on subjective, worldly, ambiguous criteria but on the truth and the promotion of the common good, of the person, and the society as a whole.

This of course entails a properly formed conscience.  Every individual is born with a conscience in which he should reject all that is evil and pursue the good.  Due to secularism, materialism, hedonism, agnosticism and even atheism, the truth is not always clear.

There is objective and absolute TRUTH.   Jesus Himself said “I am the Way, the TRUTH, and the Life.”   Truth can be discovered in Jesus Christ, in His Mystical Body, the Church, through the teaching of the Magisterium of the Church presided over by the Vicar of Christ, the Holy Father, the Pope.   Therefore, our conscience and motivation for the voting of specific candidates must be made in the light of the Teachings of Jesus Christ and His Church.

A simple and easy-to-remember ACRONYM for the choice of political candidates is the simple 5-letter monosyllabic word C.E.A.S.E.    Each of the 5 individual letters expresses what are termed the “Non-negotiables”--- meaning that these actions in and of themselves are intrinsically evil, seriously sinful and offensive to God the Creator, damaging to the individual as well as the common good of the society as a whole.  Let us aim to “ CEASE” the reality and promotion of these 5 intrinsically evil practices!

CLONING.    The human person should not come into existence through biological engineering in a scientific laboratory uniting the procreative material of some anonymous woman and some anonymous man, hoping for the best results.  No!   The human person must come into existence through the loving and mutual embrace of man and woman, husband and wife, married sacramentally, from which results the conception of a human person with an immortal soul and an eternal destiny!   The end does not justify the means.

EUTHANASIA.   All human life is precious because human life comes from God as one of His most precious gifts.    God gives life and only God has the right to take life away.  Euthanasia, sometimes termed “Mercy-killing” proposes ending lives that seem to be no longer productive in the eyes of the world.   Advanced Alzheimer’s disease or Parkinson, prolonged dialysis--- these  degenerative, economically burdensome conditions--- according to the philosophy of Euthanasia merit termination and extinction.   Utilitarianism, a philosophy proposed by John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham in the mid- 19^th century, maintained that the value of human life was in direct proportion to economic wealth and prosperity.   Therefore infirm persons, aged and sick people, retarded individuals have no real intrinsic value.  How contrary to the Gospel is this false philosophical system.  Who were Jesus’ favorites?  The blind, sick, cripples, lepers, the paralytics and the deaf and mute.   By the way, Jesus was not a rich multi-millionaire.  Every person has intrinsic value by his mere existence being created by God in His image and likeness and destined for eternal glory.

ABORTION.   The primary criteria that should motivate all followers of Jesus in the casting of the vote should be the posture on human life from its inception.  Abortion is the taking of the life of an innocent baby. Murder, killing, infanticide, are other words for this atrocious reality.   The saddest moment in the history of the United States of America happened Jan 22, 1973 with the Supreme Court decision, Roe vs. Wade, in which abortion—the killing of innocent babies from the 1^st term up to 9 months-- was legalized.  Close to 52 million babies have been murdered since.  Stats are hard to calculate with perfection but more than a million a year, about 4000 a day and close to every 20 seconds a baby is killed.   None of us wants to go before Jesus the Judge on our day of judgment and have the blood of innocent babies on our hands, mind, hearts, consciences and souls.   For the love of God, your family, nation and eternal salvation, cast the vote to defend the unborn.   Remember the word of the Founding Fathers in the Constitution:  “Every individual is endowed with inalienable rights of LIFE , liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  God is the origin and source of life and only He has the right to end life.

SAME SEX MARRIAGE.   The future of the society depends on the primary fundamental and basic “mini-society” that we call family.  Blessed Pope John Paul II stated that the family is the basic cell of society and that the society depends on the solidity of the family.    An authentic family is composed of man and woman, husband and wife, married sacramentally with the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony for the purpose of procreating children and raising them as noble citizens for this world and the kingdom of heaven.  Two women living together, or two men living together cannot be called a family, much less if they were to adopt children.   In the beginning God created man and woman and for that reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and what God has united let no man rent asunder.  It was “Adam and Eve” and not “Adam and Steve!”

EMBRYONIC CELL EXPERIMENTATION.   Babies being created in the context of scientific laboratories, once again is against the Natural Law as well as the Divine Law.  We reiterate: the means by which human life comes into existence is through the mutual and loving embrace of the man and woman, husband and wife in the conjugal act, from which conception is achieved and at the same time Almighty God infuses an immortal soul.  Such unnatural concoctions such as egg and sperm donation, fusion and conception, then freezing in refrigerators and trying to determine which baby should be implanted and others discarded highly offends God the Creator as well as the dignity of the human person.

In conclusion, take as moral guide for voting this simple and clear acronym: C.E.A.S.E.--- meaning, we desire that all of these intrinsically immoral practices, “the non-negotiables” be eliminated from the face of the earth.  Cease fire; cease to exist these moral evils!

Let us pray to the Lord of Life  for the following, May…..

CLONING!  Cease to exist!

EUTHANASIA!  Cease to exist!

ABORTION! Cease to exist!

SAME-SEX-MARRIAGES!  Cease to exist!

EMBRYONIC STEM-CELL RESEARCH!  Cease to exist!

May your vote be a determining factor to foster the Gospel of life and end the Culture of death. May Our Lady who said “yes” to life intercede for us, our families, our country and the salvation of the world.  “Holy Mary Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.