Right Wing Bishops Vote To Deny Communion To Biden
The Republican Party and its conservative allies in the Catholic Church (and evangelical churches) have long used religion as a wedge issue to demonize Democrats and falsely portray them as anti-Christian. This disingenuous campaign hit its zenith when Barack Obama was president. The pharisees of the radical right alleged that Obama was both a phony Christian and a Muslim — at the same time. You can’t make this stuff up.
Now these same phony Christians are back now that we have a Democratic president. The Roman Catholic bishops of the United States- while rejecting a warning from the Vatican- have begun to take steps to deny President Biden communion because of his support for women’s health care rights.
This hyper-partisan measure was approved by a vote of 73% in support and only 24% opposed. The bishops are expected to make a final decision in November, on the eve of the midterm election cycle. This will give Republicans a weapon to criticize Democratic politicians throughout the 2022 campaign cycle. The U.S. Catholic Bishops are in the process of transforming themselves into just another arm of the Trump campaign and the RNC.
The decision made on June 18, is aimed at the nation’s first Catholic president since John Kennedy. Biden is only the second Catholic president in U.S. history. What’s more, Biden is the the most pious president since Jimmy Carter. The 46th president attends Mass on at least a weekly basis and frequently mentions how his faith has influenced his life and his policies.
The right wing Bishops are foolish to get embroiled in a dispute with Biden since Catholics are the ultimate swing vote and split down the middle between the two parties. Obama carried the Catholic vote by a comfortable margin in both of his victories. Four years later, Catholics favored Trump by a 52% to 45% margin over Clinton. In 2020, Trump carried the Catholic vote by a razor thin margin of 50% to 49%.
Biden and his supporters’ views are focused on the priorities of Pope Francis: poverty, racial inequality and climate change. In contrast, right wing Catholics are obsessed with the GOP’s partisan big government abortion bans and denying equal rights to the LGBTQ community.
This decision by the Catholic Bishops further exposes them as partisan gunslingers and contemptible hypocrites. The U.S. Catholic hierarchy have supported Trump and his GOP allies even though the former TV reality star was the least religious president in U.S. history. He has had five kids from three different wives. The disgraced former, one term president has had numerous affairs and he even paid hush money to porn stars and Playboy models to buy their silence during the 2016 election cycle.
At George H.W. Bush’s funeral, Trump (and his third wife) didn’t even bother to recite the Apostles’ Creed or sing any hymns. This was in sharp contrast to the former presidents and first ladies seated around them.
How can the Bishops continue to support Trump? He is a loathsome human being whose bad behavior flies in the face of everything they claim to believe in. What part of Donald Trump reminds anybody of Jesus Christ? Really? Trump’s right wing Christian supporters owe Bill Clinton an apology.
The right wing Bishops will further expose themselves to charges of partisanship and hypocrisy if they don’t deny Communion to politicians who support the death penalty, which Jesus actually opposed. Will the Bishops call out Pete Ricketts who funded a campaign to restore the death penalty and illegally obtained drugs to carry out an execution? I wouldn’t hold my breath.
The reality is that the Democratic Party is the truly faith driven party. In 2019, New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand made some comments on the disconnect between GOP economic policies and the teachings of Christ. “I don’t think the Republican Party is a faith-driven party. I really don’t,” Gillibrand said in an interview with NPR. “I think when they don’t feed the poor and don’t vote for food stamps, when they don’t care about families struggling and living in poverty, when they continue to invest in for-profit prisons, they aren’t doing what the Gospel tells them to do: feed the poor, help the sick.”
We Democrats are the party of religious diversity and tolerance. We welcome people of all faiths into our ranks. Moreover, we welcome and respect those who choose not to believe. The Democratic Party is welcoming converts and the GOP is purging heretics. The Democratic Party is truly the big tent party. Nonetheless, we need to fight back hard against misleading attacks from the radical right. Never let a phony attack go unchallenged.
The 2022 election cycle will be here before you know it. The 2022 elections for the U.S. Senate and U.S. House are now about the continuation of democracy itself. Senator Brian Schatz tweet. If the GOP regains control of the Congress, they will vote to steal the presidential election in 2024 from Joe Biden.
We have our work cut for us in 2022. Let’s get it done! Let’s leave it all out on the field! We can do this!