Launching the Catholic Alliance

March-April 1996

By Timothy R. Sherratt

BOSTON—The Catholic Alliance of the Christian Coalition was officially launched here on December 9 with nearly 600 persons attending the opening regional meeting. Participants heard strong pro-life, pro-family and anti-welfare messages from Congressman Henry Hyde (R-Ill), Ralph Reed, executive director of the Christian Coalition, Maureen Roselli, executive director of the Catholic Alliance, and Keith Fournier of the American Center for Law and justice, among others. In their appeals they made repeated references to the principles of Catholic social teaching, with John Paul II singled out for special praise. One had to be impressed with the confidence shown by the Catholic speakers in invoking their traditions. Indeed, the applause for Fournier following his reminder that American Catholics are Catholics first may mark a small but significant milestone in lay Catholic political action in the United States.

According to the Catholic Alliance's mission statement, "Catholic American lay people join with the Christian Coalition to promote, through action, a free and truly just society" The mission statement goes on to urge American Catholics to join with likeminded persons in practical cooperation aimed at promoting family-friendly public policy, restoring unalienable rights for all Americans, especially the unborn, and opposing religious bigotry. The statement reminds lay Catholics that they have a duty to participate in the legislative process to help bring about justice, but warns them to be realistic and to recognize the "real differences among Catholics of good will" about the best means to these ends.

Some of the principles announced in the mission statement translate into general stances while others lead to specific policy positions. For example, the recognition of human dignity manifests itself in a general commitment "to seek a society which never ceases, through law, custom and individual action to affirm the person for his or her own sake." By contrast, support for a "culture of life" produces specific calls for a halt to fetal experimentation and partial-birth abortions, legislation to end assisted suicides, a continued system of appeals to keep state-sanctioned executions to a minimum, and a constitutional amendment to protect human life from conception to natural death.

The main themes were woven skillfully into all the speeches. This writer was struck by Ralph Reed's skill in locating a rapprochement between Catholics and Protestants on issues like the sanctity of life, the family, and church-sponsored voluntarism. Clearly aware of their idiomatic differences, not to mention longstanding antipathies, Reed urged participants to focus on what unites Catholics and Protestants rather than on what divides them in order to secure a "tectonic plate shift" in American politics that will carry pro-family candidates and issues to victory. Unity is common sense, he insisted, voicing the prudential theme that pervaded the conference.

Striking, too, was Reed's confident use of the commendable life/liberty/family message to condemn the federal government in unrestrained terms—applauding the recent shutdown, for example—and earn applause from a Catholic audience whose church teachings historically have lent support for government-sponsored solidarity with the poor, legal recognition of labor unions, and positive public justice responsibilities of the state. Questioned on this apparent disparity, Roselli reminded this writer that the principles of Catholic social teaching are always to be applied prudentially. The relationship between prudence and principle cuts to the heart of Christian politics, but prudence can easily shade into expediency and become the enemy of a distinctively biblical approach.

Two concluding observations are in order. First, I rather suspect that if the Catholic Alliance is successful, it may help secure the independence of the Christian Coalition as a conservative political force. Should the hoped-for political unity come about, there is no guarantee that Coalition votes would automatically benefit Republican candidates if their commitments do not match those of the Coalition. In this context, December 9, 1995 maybe the date the Christian Coalition came of age.

Second, the most important demonstration of prudence may have been to set up Catholic Alliance as a division of Christian Coalition, including it but keeping it at a certain distance from the mainstream of the movement. For the child may eclipse its parent given half the chance. For many Protestants whose own denominations have left them with very thin offerings in the area of social and political thought and action, much learning might profitably take place. Of course, if Catholic social teachings were to make their way to the center of the Coalition's mission, one wonders what reception will be accorded them. It is too early to tell, but those of us evangelicals who affirm the potential for the saints to make the best citizens should welcome this effort by American Catholics to bring their well-developed social teachings into the public debate.

[Dr. Sherratt is Professor of Political Studies at Gordon College in Wenham, Massachusetts, and co-author of the Center's book Saints as Citizens.]