(6 of 12)
In January 1973, the bishops were shaken by a second event, the Supreme Court decision allowing abortion on demand in most circumstances. This legal challenge to the age-old Catholic teaching that abortion is equivalent to murder forced the bishops to adopt a style of political propaganda and maneuver that, until then, had been more characteristic of liberal Protestants. For Catholicism, the abortion decision was a bold attack on human life and dignity. The radical change produced reflection upon other "life" issues, especially the arms race. Says Bernardin: "If you take a strong stand against abortion as the unjust taking of human life, then you cannot remain indifferent to nuclear warfare."
The bellicose rhetoric of the Reagan campaign alarmed many bishops, who feared that the new Administration might blunder its way into nuclear war. Many bishops became more active in various antinuclear efforts. In November 1980, the bishops authorized the Bernardin committee to begin work on the pastoral letter. Pressed by mounting local demands to help the poor and the unemployed, key church leaders like Roach also assailed Reagan's $1.5 trillion defense buildup. The ensuing antinuclear wave in Western Europe and the U.S. has strengthened the bishops' commitment.
There may have been other subtle factors at work. Liberal Jesuit Sociologist John Coleman suggests that the bishops almost instinctively grasped the arms race as a moral issue because they needed to restore their "credibility" with the laity, which had eroded because the hierarchy had no choice but to support Pope Paul's unpopular (and widely ignored) ban on birth control.
The bishops' growing interest in political action was also increased by their involvement with the church in Latin America. There bishops, priests and nuns have embraced the social liberalism of Pope Paul and Vatican II, siding with the poor against the oligarchies. A tempering influence on Latin American clergy was Pope John Paul's admonition that they should not get directly involved in politics. But the general effect of the church's activism in Latin America was to encourage the U.S bishops not only to become more aggressive politically in the U.S., but to take strong policy stands on human rights in the hemisphere.
During the past year, the U.S. bishop and Protestant activists of like mind strongly opposed Reagan Administration policy in El Salvador. The bishops demanded that the Administration cut off military aid to El Salvador, arguing that it only escalated the violence, much of which has been engendered by the Government. Two weeks ago Archbishop Roach called for an end to U.S. military involvement in Guatemala because of that nation's human rights atrocities. Nonetheless, the gap between the bishops and the White House on policy in Central America has narrowed slightly. The Administration has seemingly