Washington D.C., May 5, 2008 / 16:19 pm
Archbishop of Washington Donald W. Wuerl has expanded his previous comments about politicians who support permissive abortion laws but also present themselves to receive Holy Communion. Though he insisted that support for abortion is wrong, he said that convincing and persuading national Catholic pro-abortion political figures is best done in their respective home dioceses, rather than in the Archdiocese of Washington.
Writing in his archdiocesan newspaper The Catholic Standard, Archbishop Wuerl said that both Catholic citizens and Catholic politicians must follow Catholic moral convictions.
“Just as Catholic voters are not asked to leave aside the most deeply held moral convictions of our faith when they enter a voting booth, so Catholic elected officials are not asked to deposit the moral and ethical convictions of the Church at the door of Congress or at the State Assembly where they serve,” he wrote.
The archbishop reiterated Catholic teaching on abortion, saying, “The teaching is clear. Abortion and support for abortion are wrong. No informed Catholic can claim that either action is free of moral implications, and certainly no one should be led to believe, because of someone else's voting record, that this teaching about abortion is uncertain.”