Philadelphia, Pa., Oct 21, 2004 / 22:00 pm
In a homily during the Closing Mass of the Catholic Leadership Conference held in Philadelphia yesterday, Bishop Thomas Wenski of Orlando said that Catholics, either as voters or elected officials must be uncompromising in their defense of the dignity of the human person.
“One could rightly argue that our American revolution succeeded precisely because it reflected the truth about the human person, while other revolutionary ideologies such as in France, Russia or Cuba, just to name a few, failed because they did not,” said the Bishop at the Chapel of Philadelphia Cathedral.
“Yet, today,” he warned, “many in America are confused about the truth of the human person. The tendency to moral relativism in our culture is the greatest threat to authentic democracy today.”
Recalling that Catholic social teachings recognize that God is the source of those rights deemed inalienable and since they were not granted by men or by the states, Bishop Wenski said that “they cannot be abrogated either by men or by the states.”