UPDATE ELECTION 2010 : AS CHRISTIAN DISCIPLES OUR VOTES MUST REFLECT CATHOLIC SOCIAL TEACHING AND MORALITY..........

With less than two days left in what has been the nastiest and most contentious Election in several decades in the USA, we must pray for sanity, wisdom, courage, and fidelity, on the part of all American citizens who already, or will be voting on Tuesday.  As Catholic-Christians we cannot only got caught in the passionate politics of the moment, but must keep our moral compass in view, and choose candidates and our position remembering that as Disciples of Jesus, we must represent Gospel Values, and the common good of ALL our citizens and nation, not just a select remanant of people and special, inordinately unfair, interests.  The Catholic Social Justice Teachings clearly and consistently proclaimed by the Church since 1891, and Pope Leo XIII's Encyclial, "Rerum Novarum",  to the present must guide our actions, attitudes, and decisions, when voting in this and all elections.  Catholic Social Justice teachings are rooted in the Christian and Christian and Hebrew Scriptures, thus they are biblically based. They are also linked to the Sacred Tradition of the Church, and are a body of moral principles that teach us a Disciple's response to the economical, political, and social, order we interact with as citizens and Catholic-Christians.  Beginning with Pope Leo XII in 1891, Popes and the Universal Church have addressed secular issues affecting humanking and championed the dignity of the human person, the value of human labor and workers rights, and advocated for the protection of the weak, the poor, the marginalized.  Catholics, from lay persons, religious, deacons, priests, bishops, and Pontiffs, have illuminated the Church and the World with adherence to a moral theology that has led to reform and social progress for all citizens, such as the labor movement, identifying and supporting the case to be made for economic justice in society, and equal opportunity for the poor, as well as every other citizen in our country.  Our Catholic-Christian Discipleship requires that we be authentically Good Stewards of God's Creation, the environment, the sacredness of the earth, and the faithful witnesses we are to peace, justice, harmony, unity, and welcome, working to end divisions, prejudice, discrimination, and self serving motives, that benefit the few, but slam the many.  Therefore, at the very core of Catholic Social Teaching and Christian Gospel Values, places a priority focus on the following : a preferential option for the poor; devotion to the community and the common; global solidarity, and economic development; always affirming the dignity of every human person, regardless of their nationality, ethnicity, culture, creed, gender, or orientation.  And so as we vote tomorrow, let us see beyond the nastiness and contentiousness of a political season, most of us can't wait to have over, and cast our ballots, not just over the animosity of entrenched partisan politics, but rather on the sound principles of what is best for all Americans, as we face the issues and decisions facing the United States and the World, and the resilience and stability of our nations to go forward, as free, fair, just, and caring, citizens on the Earth and heirs to Citizenship in the Kingdom of Heaven..........Praying And Hoping For An Election That Meets These Standards of Catholic-Christian Justice And Values..........Fr.  Troy