Senator Barack Obama won the presidency. Not a few bishops spoke out and informed Catholics that they may not vote for an Pro-Abortion Candidate. One bishop, His Grace Archbishop Chaput of Denver, CO spoke the loudest during this campaign.
I have read that Catholics who went to Mass weekly voted for Senator McCain over President-Elect Obama 54% to 45%. I wonder how many are placing their immortal souls in danger for voting this way when our bishops have been clear that one may not vote for such a candidate with out proportionate reasons. And, to paraphrase Archbishop Chaput, what campaign promise is proportionally greater than the horrid slaughter of 4000 babies per day?
Doing some research I found the states which have the highest proportion of Catholics in their population. Here they are from the USCCB website:
http://www.nccbuscc.org/comm/archives/2008/08-160.shtml
1. Rhode Island- 59.5%
2. Massachusetts- 42%
3. New Jersey- 41%
4. New York- 37.1%
5. Connecticut- 36.6%
6. Nevada- 32.3%
7. Illinois- 30.1%
8. Delaware- 29.7%
9. Wisconsin- 29.5%
10. California- 28.6%
Guess who these states elected to the Presidency?
(Why did I choose percentage over total population? Because to win a state, one has to have the majority of votes, one has to have a higher percentage over the other candidate to win the electoral votes of the state.)
The Black Cordelias 
As a citizen of the second state on your list (and a non-Catholic McCain voter) this is dis-heartening, to say the least…
Amen to everything you’ve observed here, however, we must remember that, 1) God is sovereign, 2) everything will work out, in the end, to His purposes, and 3) His will MUST be done. We must pray for the president elect because it feels distasteful. God put him there for a reason, even if that reason will play out in bitter and terrible ways.
OK, I got curious and ran a statistical correlation between the final vote tally as reported by CNN and the 2008 data you linked to from the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (which unfortunately excludes the District of Columbia).
The result?
A positive correlation coefficient of 0.612 between the percentage Catholic population in each state and the Obama vote in that state<, and a negative correlation of the same magnitude with the the McCain vote.
In other words, your observation is a good one — and it plays out across the whole country. Calling oneself Catholic seems to correlate strongly with one’s affinity to vote for a pro-infanticide candidate.
Are those horses I hear? Four of them, perhaps?
[…] Population Predicts Obama Vote This post over at The Black Cordelias got me curious and so I ran a quick statistical correlation in Excel between the most recent vote […]
Dear Simple Sinner,
I have been mulling over this election for a few days.
I have a few thoughts.
1. Using the word Socialist is no longer taboo.
2. The US Bishops have made a huge strides in defending life since the last presidential election when only a few brave souls ventured to stick their neck out.
3. This is a culture war, not a political war.
4. The new Catholic media is an effective tool in Catholic persuasion.
5. The Catholic left stuck its neck out for Barack, we tend to know who they are now.
6. The “Communion wars” have only just begun.
7. This years war against the “Vag.na Monologues” is a ground game in the cultural political war taking place in Catholic Universities.
8. Their needs to be a definable Roman Catholic “Pro-Life” Republican organization.
9.”Pro-life”Catholics have to get involved politically.
10. Nose rings and back tattoos are the marks of a lost culture war.
11. Catholics have to take charge of their children’s education.
12. “Pro-life” and theologically conservative Catholics have to take a more active part in parish life.
13. The “Pro-life” Protestants have taken notice of the Catholic Bishop’s new conservative agenda. It’s seems to be an effective evagelization tool.
14. There is no “Newt” in the House of Representatives.
15. Sarah Palin was the closest thing to a Catholic to vote for.
Re: #15: Alan Keyes was on the ballot in many states.
Re: #2: Last general election, only one bishop spoke up and President Bush was re-elected and he put Justices Roberts and Alito on the Supreme Court. This election many bishops spoke up and President-Elect Obama was elected and he has promised to sign FOCA.
Re: #6: Agreed, and it’s about time.
Re: #12: Agreed.
P.S. I wrote the post.
#10 What does that even mean?
Just a quick correction. I’m pretty sure Obama isn’t pro abortion. I’m pretty sure what he actually favors is giving people a choice instead of forcing a woman against her will to go through a dangerous medical procedure (childbirth), that still kills a great many of them.
That’s different from being in favor of abortions. Just saying. :)
Chris, finish the sentence. Obama prefers to give people a choice to _____.
Everybody says “choice” without clarifying what they are choosing to do.
They are choosing to MURDER THEIR OWN CHILDREN!!!!!
That’s only true if you believe life begins at conception, which I’m sure on this site, most people do. :) Under that logic, it’s worth noting that most lives end in the first few weeks simply through miscarriage, or the embryo not embedding in the uterine wall, or other such things.
It does raise one other interesting question. If life begins at conception, do these embryos that are miscarried have souls? If so, do they end up in Heaven? How can they, if they haven’t been baptized? Do they end up in Limbo instead? Surely they wouldn’t end up in Hell and I wouldn’t imagine God would just delete them, cause certainly that would be worse than abortion, right?
Chris,
While Dr. Eric’s point is obviously assuming his own position, you must realize that one can make the same critique in a way which doesn’t need to assume abortion is murder. Indeed, the point of Dr. Eric’s critique of the “pro-choice” terminology is not primarily (1) that abortion is murder but rather (2) that pro-choice is a euphemism and that it obfuscates the political debate.
And point (2), regardless of one’s position on abortion, is quite defensible. “Pro-choice” terminology is simply a euphemism, and a rather poor one at that.
I gave my reasons for this in detail here:
https://theblackcordelias.wordpress.com/2008/06/18/on-political-euphemisms-pro-choice/
I will summarize some of my post very succinctly here: to say “pro-choice” is to avoid saying “pro-choice” *on what.* If that’s the case, I’ll tell you that I’m quite pro-choice– especially on freedom of speech and freedom to bear arms. But I’m certainly not pro-choice on feticide (the killing of a fetus). So let’s get rid of this ridiculous terminology and call a spade a spade– a person who supports the legalization of free speech is pro- free speech, and a person who supports the legalization of gun ownership is pro-gun, and a person who supports the legalization of (and I will use the term “abortion” here, although I too think this is vague) abortion is “pro-abortion.” It does not imply that he likes abortion any more than being pro-free speech means that he likes what person or newspaper X prints, it merely means that he is in favor of the legalization of said issue.
So yes, indeed, Obama is quite “pro-abortion.”
“That’s only true if you believe life begins at conception, which I’m sure on this site, most people do. :) Under that logic, it’s worth noting that most lives end in the first few weeks simply through miscarriage, or the embryo not embedding in the uterine wall, or other such things.”
I’m still not quite sure why its “worth noting” this. Do you think this is a counter-example or refutation of sorts to the Catholic view on the beginning and sanctity of life? If so, could you please draw our your implicit argument explicitly? Thank you.
As to “under that logic”– Catholics don’t hold either that morality is something which is only privately knowable and inscrutable to reason. Rather, Catholics hold that moral truths are publicly accessible and knowable by reason. So it’s not as if its a question which must permanently end in a stand still.
Indeed, I don’t know if pro-abortion proponents have really adequately addressed several central and important issues. I would think that the first would be an adequate distinction between “human being” and “human person” which is used to justify the killing of the fetus (which most certainly is a human being) by claiming that it isn’t a person. I suspect this distinction is merely fanciful and unsupported. The more important problem for any pro-abortion proponent is to make an adequate justification for abortion of the unborn which does not us criteria which would also justify infanticide. I will take infanticide as being quite obviously a moral evil; any criteria which equally allow infanticide with abortion must be quite obviously absurd.
If that is the case, then I think arguments like this stand fairly well. (1) Killing an innocent human being is always wrong. (2) The fetus is an innocent human being. (3) Killing the fetus is always wrong. (The being/person distinction would have to be make to refute this, I think– but it might be some serious philosophical heavy lifting to get it in.)
And, (4) Infanticide is immoral. (5) There is no relevant moral difference between infanticide and abortion. (6) Therefore abortion is immoral.
Of course, I’m not particularly trained in this area of argumentation, but reasonable arguments can quite definitely be offered and accepted.
God bless,
Rob
Dear Dr. Eric,
Re: #15: Alan Keyes was on the ballot in many states.
Alan Keyes was on the ballot in my state. 10 years ago Alan Keyes was a part of the political mainstream. His run against Obama for Senate was a valiant one, but his voice is no longer heard in the Republican party.
2. The US Bishops have made a huge strides in defending life since the last presidential election when only a few brave souls ventured to stick their neck out.
Re: #2: Last general election, only one bishop spoke up and President Bush was re-elected and he put Justices Roberts and Alito on the Supreme Court. This election many bishops spoke up and President-Elect Obama was elected and he has promised to sign FOCA.
The USCCB as a whole moved the ball forward, The big three Bishop’s sent clear messages, that has the Catholic left a little rattled (Fr. Reese, S.J. latest op ed piece). FOCA will galvanize the Catholic left and right. (Communion war’s will become an inter clerical battlefield)
#10 What does that even mean?
When you see a woman with a nose ring or/and back tattoo, she is lost, no longer able to defend her dignity. She has been morally abducted by MTV and Paris Hilton. Pagan society is making inroads into a Christian nation.
Just think of the possibilities if our Church could run an evangelizing campaign as large and as sophisticated as the Obama / McCain Campaigns.
JMJ
Joe
Dear Chris,
In regards to your statement.
“Just a quick correction. I’m pretty sure Obama isn’t pro abortion. I’m pretty sure what he actually favors is giving people a choice instead of forcing a woman against her will to go through a dangerous medical procedure (childbirth), that still kills a great many of them.”
Obama has clearly stated that he would not want his children “punished” if his own children became pregnant, you can’t get much more pro-abortion than that. In reality, he speaks as though he has had to deal with subject first hand and is still dealing with it.
JMJ
Joe
Oh, good grief. Tatoo’s and piercings? This site is filled with wonderful intellectual spirit filled information and discussion. I can’t even believe that statement was made. I know hundreds of wonderful Godly young adults and adults who love the Lord and hate “Hollywood” (and MTV!). Spend their time in worship and devotion. Go on mission trips. Sacrifice their time to help others. Spend time in Christian volunteering, study and service. Spend time fighting for the rights of the unborn. All of whom have a tatoo or piercing. To lump these people in with Paris Hilton and say that they are lost is absurd. If that were true 75% of my prayer group are lost!? This is a group of mixed religion, including Catholic.
Back to important issues.
Anonymous,
Calm down. First, that statement came from a commenter and not from “this site” as you suggest.
Second, he said “tattoos and nose rings are marks of a lost culture war.”
He did not condemn every individual, but saw in this trend a sign of a negative cultural shift. I tend to agree with him. I know seminarians who have tatts. That does not make them bad people. It is a sign, though, that the sacredness of the body as God’s creation and not an individual’s possession is a lost concept. Along with this loss of sacredness of the human body, we have a worsening trend among the young to be anti-life. This is a reversal of the trend of the young in the 90’s which was toward the pro-life movement.
I think you ought to think through your comments before you post them next time. Lord knows I have commented rashly all too often, but calming down before posting does help.
Oh, I thought he said: “when you see a woman with a nose ring or/and tatoo,she is lost. She has been morally abducted by MTV and Paris Hilton”.
Apparently, I read that wrong. Sorry for commenting so rashly.
Anon, I see what you are commenting on there, now. I myself commented to rashly, then. Still, he is a commenter on “this site” and not an author. I will not defend his latter comment as applying generalizations to particular individuals is bound to faith the truth test.
Still, I do stand by my assertions that good people can have a tatt, and that tatts in general represent a diminution of the sacred nature of the human body.
I would be interested if you had something to say about these two points.
Not really, like I said before, on to important issues.
My Grandma can tell of the day when the sacred nature of the human body was in jeopardy because of ear piercing and nail polish (oh, and Elvis).
My point , all the big issues, seems absurd for him to make those generalizations.
I do understand he is not an author on this site, still, an interesting site.