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Anthony Stevens Arroyo is an American Catholic scholar and Professor of Puerto Rican and Latino Studies at Brooklyn College and Distinguished Scholar of the City University of New York.
In his article, Catholics and Planned Parenthood for On Faith (Washington Post), Arroyo addresses the recent cut in federal public funding to Planned Parenthood and shows how Catholic opposition to abortion could ultimately have a negative effect on the 67 percent of funding to Catholic Charities that comes from public sources.
The Republican-controlled Congress recently cut federal funding to Planned Parenthood and the vote has been projected as a great victory for Catholic opposition to abortion. However, the premise behind this proposed legislation threatens to send Catholicism back to the days of the Know Nothings in the 1840s.
At issue is whether a corporation like Planned Parenthood can receive government funding for some services and still spend privately raised money on others. Until now, the answer to that question has been, "Yes!" Just like food stamps are used to pay for milk while cigarettes must be paid for with a person's own cash, common sense has generally recognized that accepting government subsidies or grants does not strip a person or an agency of the freedom of how to spend their own money. The money is in two different piles. This Republican vote, however, stripped Planned Parenthood of federal funding for mammograms, pre-natal care, nutrition programs, etc. because 2% of private money funds abortions. The agency was denied the right to put money any longer into two separate piles.
How do we know that today's law that gives government the power to take away an agency's freedom to spend its own money will never be used against the Catholic Church? Some 67% of Catholic Charities funding comes from government sources. But Catholic teaching also supports efforts to serve immigrants, even if they have no longer have documents to work or reside here. Similarly, the Catholic bishops advocate a path to citizenship for the undocumented. What is to prevent the Republican foes of immigration reform from cutting off all funding for Catholic Charities by using the same logic that attacked Planned Parenthood? After all, the nature of law is that it applies to everyone. To argue that the Catholic Church will be treated differently under the law than Planned Parenthood is to suggest that religion is established in the United States - which is clearly unconstitutional.
I also reject the idea that Republican lawmakers could never pass legislation that repudiated Catholic teaching. In my district, the congressman is Lou Barletta, former mayor of Hazelton, PA and an implacable foe of Catholic social justice for Latino immigrants. At an October 2007 forum sponsored by the University of Notre Dame, Barletta demeaned not only the Church's social justice but also disparaged Cardinal Mahoney. Barletta boasted to me before a later public debate I had with him that he "set the Cardinal straight." Not exactly the obedience to the Ordinary Magisterium you expect from the pious laity!
How do we know that today's law that gives government the power to take away an agency's freedom to spend its own money will never be used against the Catholic Church? Some 67% of Catholic Charities funding comes from government sources. But Catholic teaching also supports efforts to serve immigrants, even if they have no longer have documents to work or reside here. Similarly, the Catholic bishops advocate a path to citizenship for the undocumented. What is to prevent the Republican foes of immigration reform from cutting off all funding for Catholic Charities by using the same logic that attacked Planned Parenthood? After all, the nature of law is that it applies to everyone. To argue that the Catholic Church will be treated differently under the law than Planned Parenthood is to suggest that religion is established in the United States - which is clearly unconstitutional.
I also reject the idea that Republican lawmakers could never pass legislation that repudiated Catholic teaching. In my district, the congressman is Lou Barletta, former mayor of Hazelton, PA and an implacable foe of Catholic social justice for Latino immigrants. At an October 2007 forum sponsored by the University of Notre Dame, Barletta demeaned not only the Church's social justice but also disparaged Cardinal Mahoney. Barletta boasted to me before a later public debate I had with him that he "set the Cardinal straight." Not exactly the obedience to the Ordinary Magisterium you expect from the pious laity!
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