In the wake of Catholic fundamentalist Tom Monaghan's plan to build a Catholic town based on a theocratic form of government, <
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-mon28.html>, we should all take this opportunity to remind ourselves why the Constitution protects the freedom from a state religion.
More than any other group, we Catholics should be thankful for the separation of church and state enshrined in the First Amendment. Unfortunately, many Anti-Choice Catholics have not learned their history in this regard.
Except in Rhode Island, most early European settlement in New England was predominantly Puritan. These Puritans were notoriously intolerant of other religious views, and they had expelled both Catholics and Quakers. Rhode Island was founded as a refuge for those who could not endure the religious intolerance of Massachusetts. Pennsylvania and Delaware were founded as sanctuaries for Quakers.
Colonial Virginia (and, to a lesser degree, Maryland and Georgia) had laws establishing the Church of England as the state religion, and it had banned Puritans, Catholics, Quakers, Baptists, and Presbyterians from preaching their faiths. While Georgia had laws establishing the Church of England as the state religion, it was somewhat more tolerant that Virgina and there was even a sizable Jewish community in colonial Savannah, but even Georgia expelled Catholics. Maryland was founded as an early haven for Catholics until the Church of England was established as the state religion, and Catholics were not even welcome in Maryland.
New York and New Jersey were religiously tolerant and diverse, and laws nominally establishing the Anglican Church as the state religion (a vestigial artifact from their religious-haven origins) were not generally enforced. Among the Anglicans, Protestants, Quakers, and Jews lived in relative harmony.
Carolina was founded on the principles of religious toleration, but ultimately even colonial North and South Carolina abandoned these principles and established the Church of England as the state religion.
Anti-Catholicism was flagrant in pre-Revolutionary America.
How, you may ask, could these various states join into a union as one nation? All you have to do is read the very first words of the Bill of Rights: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion."
To the extent that the desire to outlaw women's sovereignty over their own wombs is based on religion, it is a desire we Catholics must oppose under the First Amendment. Catholics, above all other, must understand this because of our history. Remember, it is not just the state that wishes to be free of the church; the church also wants to be free from the state. It was Jesus who said "render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's." (Matthew, 22:19-21).
To the extent that the desire to outlaw women's sovereignty over their own wombs is based on public health policy, we must understand that outlawing abortion is an ineffective means of lowering the abortion rate.
In countries with liberal abortions laws (most European countries, for example), the abortion rates are generally very low; and countries where abortion is completely illegal (most South American countries, for example), the abortion rates are very high. In America, Pro-Choice Clinton presided over a falling abortion rate while Anti-Choice Bush presides over a plateauing or slightly rising rate.
In short, the means to effectively reduce the abortion rate is by reducing the economic pressure on pregnant women and not by outlawing abortion. Anyone like me who wants to lower the number of abortions in America should also stand with me in the fight to eliminate the root causes of poverty for pregnant women.
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