I’m going to go out on a limb and admit that I am anti-abortion. Nor do I mind using the term anti-abortion instead of pro-life. Pro-life means nothing to me. Everyone likes life, just as we are all pro-money and pro-sunshine. Call me anti-abortion as you like, but in return I demand reciprocity – the opposing view is pro-abortion. Pro-choice is a camouflage. Everyone likes choice, just as they like life. It’s what you choose that matters.

But this is no anti-abortion tirade. In fact, I intend the opposite – to present my grievance with the anti-abortion crowd.

I am a Catholic, and spend a fair amount of time cruising Catholic websites. These days, with the election coming up, the push is on in almost all conservative Catholic quarters. A vote for Obama is a vote for abortion. A vote for abortion is a serious sin. Oh, but otherwise, feel free to vote however you want. Here is a representative comment, courtesy of Deal Hudson, writing for Inside Catholic:

What should we make of Catholics who vote for the persecution of their Church and the ongoing killing of millions of unborn children? That's between them and God. I'll just offer this little catechetical reminder: Holy Communion received in a state of mortal sin is itself a still graver sin -- one of blasphemy.

 Janet Porter of Faith2Action puts it even more bluntly:

Then obey Him in the voting booth and out of it. If not, do us all a favor and quit calling yourself a Christian.

Numerous Catholics have been threatened with the withholding of Communion for supporting abortion rights. Now the rage is withholding sacraments for simply voting for a pro-choice candidate, never mind the voter’s personal beliefs. One prominent Catholic, Douglas Kmiec, a law professor at Pepperdine University and prominent Roe v. Wade critic, was denied communion at a Mass in April. Denied not for being pro-abortion, but simply for being pro-Obama.

This is a new twist in Catholicism, to my knowledge. It is a sin now not only to perform an act or to enable an act, but simply to vote for someone who supports a legal decision that might allow a woman to choose to have an abortion. Third degree guilt.

Further, this sticky notion of abortion, the idea that the guilt of abortion rubs off on every person who comes in contact with it, stands in contrast with what I know about Christian theology. Christianity teaches that we are all free to choose to go good or evil, and that the responsibility for our decisions lies with us, to the degree that we are free to make them. As such, the guilt of abortion, however great it may be, stains the people who choose to have them. If stealing were legal, would that make me a thief? A thief bears the guilt of theft, regardless of what the law says. As a citizen I may have the responsibility to try to reduce theft, but if theft happens, that does not make me guilty of it.

I want to make clear what I am saying and what I am not saying. In no way do I condone abortion. I support legal abortion when it is necessary for the health of the mother, and though I am not comfortable with it in cases of incest, I don’t think that is a battle the anti-abortionists are going to win and so would possibly concede it for the greater good. Nonetheless, while I agree with the pro-lifers in principle, something about their methods is deeply disconcerting.

It took a while for me to figure out what the problem is. But as I thought about it, I finally identified my distaste: the intellectual coercion. Presenting a follower with a list of beliefs and calling it doctrine is one thing, but telling people to vote one way or literally burn in hell is quite another. There is something insulting about carefully cultivating conscience in my mind through doctrinal teaching, and then refusing to allow me to vote my conscience.

From experience, I know that many Catholics are hazy on fine points of doctrine, such as the Virgin Birth, the Immaculate Conception (not the same thing!), the Assumption, and the meaning of purgatory. I have never seen a Catholic denied Communion over any of these issues in my lifetime. In such cases, the Church takes the understandable and pragmatic position that it is better to tread softly, re-educating believers and bringing them gently back into the fold. Only people who want to vote for Obama are being shown the door.

Critics of religion often complain about the rigidity of organized faith, how churches brainwash adherents into doing their bidding. As someone on the inside, I have never thought that way.  I have always felt that sharing beliefs with others is what makes believing so beautiful. Believing alone can be very isolating. Believing alone can also tempt a person to feel alarmingly self-righteous.This is the grave danger I see in driving more liberal voters away from the Church. The remaining members will be less diverse, more calcified in their political conservatism, and intolerably self-righteous. Jesus ate with the sinners and tax collectors and the Church has never taught that their sin rubbed off on Him. In fact, Jesus had his own opinion about living with sinners.

Jesus said, 'It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: "I desire mercy, not sacrifice." For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners'" (Matthew 9:10-13).

This does not mean Christians should hold the hands of women as they have abortions. It means that sinners are out there in the world, and we are called to live with them, not to condemn them as enemies.

I don’t know what the solution to the abortion issue is. But I do know  it is not demonization. Demonization has brought us to the place we are now. Two groups, diametrically opposed, bent on crushing the other. For left-leaning Catholics like me, that leaves a ridiculous choice – I can either vote conservative all the time, which goes against my conscience on most issues except one very important one; or I can vote liberal all the time, which puts me at ease with most major issues except one.

What kind of a choice is that, and why, as a moderate, do I have to submit to such a swindle?

If pro-lifers would loosen their death grip on conservative politics, maybe a few moderate anti-abortion candidates would emerge that I would feel comfortable with. I would be delighted to support a slightly left-of-center Democrat who was serious about reducing abortions. Where is that candidate?

He or she doesn’t exist because pro-lifers swing so hard to the right. To be moderate and pro-life these days is political suicide. Both the left and the right will abandon you.

If Church conservatives want me to start voting pro-life, they need to give me candidates I can support. This means pro-lifers need to start doing what they are asking me to do – support a candidate that does not strictly conform to their point of view if that candidate will help in the abortion fight. In short, they need to be flexible.

Let’s say I bend to their wishes and vote for McCain. If I do, and he wins, will the religious right moderate a little bit and give me some of the things I want, like an end to the Iraq War, and universal health care? The answer to that is no, and hell no.

So if I submit to them, and vote straight pro-life, I can kiss all my other political beliefs good-bye. You will excuse me, then, for my hesitation.