It appears that politicians who declare that they are devout Catholics, in order to gain votes, but publicly go against Church teaching are not just an American phenomena. Apparently it is common in Australia too. And Cardinal Pell has had enough!

“In a Jan.4 interview with the Sunday Herald Sun, Cardinal Pell gave a sharp rebuke to Australian members of parliament who “fly under the Christian or Captain Catholic flag” but “blithely disregard Christian perspectives” in their actions.“If a person says, ‘Look, I’m not a Christian, I’ve a different set of perspectives,’ I disagree but I understand,” he said. “If a person says to me, ‘Look, I’m nominally a Christian but it sits lightly with me,’ I understand that.”

“But it’s incongruous for somebody to be a Captain Catholic one minute, saying they’re as good a Catholic as the Pope, then regularly voting against the established Christian traditions.”

Cardinal Pell called out politicians who endorse secular stances on issues while insisting that they’re Catholics, saying, “if you’re espousing something that’s not a Christian position, don’t claim Christian backing for that.”

The Catholic Church “doesn’t teach the primacy of conscience,” he said, explaining that a person’s conscience doesn’t trump Church teaching. “You know if somebody said apartheid was all right, nobody would say, ‘Yes you can say that because of the primacy of conscience.'”

“To the extent that on a significant number of issues you depart from Christian teachings you know it’s incongruous to be billing yourself as a champion of Christian rights,” he said.

“I’m not telling people how to vote,” he underscored during the interview. “I’m telling people how I think they should vote. I’m an Australian citizen and I have as much right to do that as any other citizen.” Source: CAN

Amen!

I really do believe that the Bishops are beginning to realize that diplomatic approaches to the problem of people in the public square who claim to be Catholic but are not faithful is, well, not working.   It has done little to change minds and hearts.

The Bishops have no choice. They are shepherds and they cannot let their flocks be led astray.  And the politicians have no one to blame but themselves.

As the good Cardinal said they cannot continue to “”fly under the Christian or Captain Catholic flag but blithely disregard Christian perspectives” in their actions.