A Texas bishop publicly endorsed a video over the weekend that told Catholics to reject the Democratic Party because of its radical pro-abortion stance.
In a comment Saturday on Twitter, Bishop Joseph Strickland of Tyler, Texas, urged Catholics to “heed this message” in the video by Wisconsin priest Father James Altman.
“As the Bishop of Tyler I endorse Fr Altman’s statement in this video,” Strickland wrote. “My shame is that it has taken me so long. Thank you Fr Altman for your COURAGE. If you love Jesus & His Church & this nation … please HEED THIS MESSAGE.”
Altman’s video, which has more than 350,000 views on YouTube, included some strong and controversial statements about Catholics’ role in politics in America.
Altman insisted that Catholics cannot vote Democrat because of the party’s radical pro-abortion stance. He faulted “gutless cowards in the clergy” for failing to teach Catholics the truth about God and the value of every human life.
“When politics and politicians act in an immoral way, we most certainly do have the duty and obligation to speak up about it,” Altman said. “You can not be Catholic and be a Democrat. Period! Their party platform absolutely is against everything the Catholic Church teaches. So just quit pretending that you’re Catholic [if you] vote Democrat.”
When people accuse him of being too political, Altman said he responds, “Baloney!” He said politics fundamentally should be a moral enterprise, and Catholics have a “duty and obligation to speak up” when politicians act immorally.
SIGN THE PLEDGE: We Can’t Vote for Pro-Abortion Joe Biden
On the matter of abortion, for example, he said there should be no confusion for Catholic voters. The Democratic Party supports abortions without restriction and wants to force taxpayers to pay for them. Altman noted how Democrat President Barack Obama even asked God to “bless” Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion chain in the U.S. and one founded on racist, eugenic ideas.
“There will be 60 million and counting aborted babies standing at the gates of heaven barring your Democrat entrance, and nothing you can say will ever excuse you for your direct or indirect support of that diabolical agenda here in the end,” Altman said.
The National Catholic Reporter pointed out that a number of priests and bishops have been speaking out publicly about politics and abortion ahead of the November presidential election.
Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence, Rhode Island, stirred up controversy in August when he denied that Democrat presidential candidate Joe Biden is Catholic.
“Biden-Harris. First time in awhile [sic] that the Democratic ticket hasn’t had a Catholic on it. Sad,” Tobin wrote on Twitter.
Biden claims to be Catholic, but his positions on a number of issues conflict with the teachings of his faith. He supports the killing of unborn babies in abortions without restriction and wants to force taxpayers to fund them. In June, he said he supports abortions “under any circumstances” and wants to codify Roe v. Wade into federal law.
Last week, Bishop Richard Stika of Knoxville, Tennessee, also criticized Biden for supporting “the ultimate child abuse,” abortion, according to the report.
In a series of tweets on Sept. 1, he wrote, “It really confuses me that both Joe Biden and [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi time and time again state that they are faithful Catholics and yet promote unlimited abortion as well as deny so many of the teachings of our faith.”
Stika continued: “How can a person say they are a faithful Catholic and yet support those who support the ultimate child abuse and human rights violation of those yet born? Slavery was legal at one time and yet now we look at it with horror. A child yet born is not the property of another.”
Biden and his vice presidential running mate Kamala Harris have been described as the most pro-abortion presidential ticket in U.S. history. If they win, tens of thousands more babies could be killed unnecessarily in abortions every year, many of them directly funded by Americans’ tax dollars.
Last year, Biden announced that he no longer supports the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits taxpayer-funded elective abortions in Medicaid and other programs. Popular among Americans, the amendment has saved more than 2.4 million unborn babies from abortions, according to research by Charlotte Lozier Institute. If ended, about 60,000 more unborn babies could be aborted every year in the U.S. alone.
In March, Biden said one of his first acts as president would be to restore funding to Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion chain in America.
Biden also said he is committed to “the constitutional right to an abortion” and to reversing “the Trump administration and states’ all-out assault on women’s right to choose.”
In April, he even has called abortions an “essential medical service” – as if slaughtering a unique, irreplaceable human child inside his/her mother’s womb is something good.
His and Harris’s position on religious freedom also are deeply troubling. Biden claims to be a “very devout Catholic and a person of deep faith,” but he opposes a religious exemption from the Obamacare contraception mandate for the Little Sisters of the Poor, a nuns’ charity that serves the poor and elderly.
