Welcome to the penultimate Wednesday before the election! Let us pray for national wisdom as we wade through a week’s worth of news and views. These times beg us to lend an ear to trends, foments and politics. Some synod news is also in view, dashing hopes that Pope Francis will approve the ordination of women as deacons. (A change of pace at the last two items for Mormon underwear and a nun’s habit.)
Election Section – Your Conscience, Your Vote
The Catholic Vote
U.S.Catholic reports that “Younger Catholics’ response to the Harris candidacy reflects shifting values” – a shift away from single-issue voting. And Catholic News Agency cites a poll taken by EWTN News and finds Catholic voters favoring Vice-president Kamala Harris.
Seeking religious support
Religion News Service reports, “With Election Day looming, Harris ramps up engagement with Black church.” The Guardian reports “Trump courts Christian vote and says ‘God saved me for a purpose.’” The Republican nominee reflects on assassination attempt and says ‘my faith took on new meaning on July 13.
OPINION: That Al Smith Dinner
Writer Tulio Huggins is a college campus minister at Dartmouth College, where he graduated in 2023. On October 18, he wrote the following: “Today is the feast day of St. Luke. As a recent convert to Catholicism, I’ve enjoyed listening to the Gospels in homilies through a Eucharistic lens, hearing the good news in a way that feels new even after being a Christian all my life. But as I read the Gospel reading for this feast just hours after watching former President Donald Trump’s speech-turned-roast at the 2024 Al Smith Dinner in New York, I felt a sharp spiritual whiplash.
Campaign complications
Religion News Service and National Public Radio reported that “Catholic bishops are spending millions less to fight abortion this election.” A Russian-aligned propaganda network (Storm-1516) appears to be behind a coordinated effort to promote wild and baseless claims that candidate Tim Walz sexually assaulted one of his former students.
Extremism in politics: Justifying slavery
Nate Tinner-Williams in Black Catholic Messenger reports that a 33-year old Black Catholic, Royce White, appears to be ramping up his rhetoric to new extremes, including justifications for American chattel slavery. White is running in Minnesota, seeking to unseat three-term Democratic incumbent Amy Klobuchar, a notably bipartisan figure who currently holds a sizable eleven-point lead in the polls.
Cheney and Chittister find hope
Former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney and Benedictine Sr. Joan Chittister both believe that the soul of America will prevail despite the highly divisive 2024 U.S. presidential election. They say it will take hard work, collaboration between both sides of the political spectrum and the defeat of Donald Trump to return to a healthy state of affairs.
Another trend to watch: Christian nationalism
Christian nationalism is growing among US Hispanics, according to a report from Religion News Service. Baptist News Global reports that “Descendants of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and a number of Bonhoeffer scholars have signed letters denouncing Eric Metaxas and other Christian nationalists they say are twisting the German theologian’s writing to serve their cause.” They cite Project 2025 and violent political rhetoric.
Call and response
Rick Pidcock is a 2004 graduate of Bob Jones University, with a bachelor of arts degree in Bible. He’s a freelance writer based in South Carolina, and responds to what happened at “a Million Women” event. The call came October 12: “The Lord is summoning A Million Women, Esthers, young and old with their husbands and children to gather to the Washington, D.C., Mall October 12, the Day of Atonement, in a LAST STAND moment for America.” In a lengthy essay, Pidcock examines the endorsement of political violence in Scripture and in current politics.
The Synod: What’s happening and what’s not
The synod is entering the final stretch before officially concluding on Oct. 27. Here is a report from the National Catholic Register.
The head of the Vatican’s doctrinal department issued a letter on Monday (Oct. 21) dashing hopes that Pope Francis will approve the ordination of women as deacons. The statement, from Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernandez, who heads the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, comes after Francis’ efforts to build a more welcoming church had encouraged bishops and women’s advocates to make strong appeals to open the diaconate to female Catholics. It seemingly halted discussions about women deacons, who had already been relegated to a study group.
Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF), has reportedly apologized for what he called a “misunderstanding” regarding his absence from an Oct. 18 meeting of synod delegates about that Vatican study group on women’s roles in the Church.
Michael Centore – always our go-to guy for context, says “The fourth and final week of the Synod began on a bit of a contentious note on Monday, as questions about the organization and working methods of one of the 10 synodal ‘study groups’ continue to be raised.”
The new dynamic – lay people among cardinals and bishops — has led to any number of colorful anecdotes, from synod parents finding each other and swapping stories at the opening retreat, to a mother introducing herself to the cardinals and bishops at her small group table by passing around a smart phone with photos of her kids.
Care for Creation
North Carolina pastor, the Rev. Richard Joyner first became a farmer, then a climate activist. He says, “God is not flooding the land. Our behavior is destroying the environment.” The amazing story of the pastor’s crazy ideas and how the congregation responded is told by Religion News Service.
A larger voice for religion in conservation efforts. Two years after reaching a global agreement to halt and reverse rapid biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse, countries are convening in Colombia this week to continue mapping out how exactly they’ll do it. Among 23,000 delegates attending the latest United Nations biodiversity summit, known as COP16, is a coalition of faith groups who say they aim to bring moral clarity and pastoral pressure to the proceedings and to parcel out a larger space, and voice, for religion in conservation efforts at a critical juncture for the planet.
The head of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), along with leaders of Mennonite Church USA, and Lipan Native American Church, filed a friend of the court brief in the US Supreme Court case of Apache Stronghold v. United States et al on October 15. Other faith leaders filed a similar brief, all in support of the Apache Stronghold working to preserve from corporate destruction by mining Oak Flat, a site about an hour east of Phoenix in the Tonto National Forest known to the Apache as Chi’Chil Bildagoteel. They fesr “the complete physical destruction of an indigenous sacred site, ending forever the ability to engage in religious rituals.”
Where are you from?
Writer Dilshad Ali is quoted in a PBS series on the history of Muslims in America. “Wherever we trace our beginnings, Muslim Americans are still seen as people who come from elsewhere. More than 20 years after 9/11, American Muslims are often still asked where we are from or sometimes told to go back to where you came from.”
Prophets and Martyrs
Activist murdered: Catholic priest Marcelo Pérez, an activist for Indigenous peoples and farm laborers in southern Mexico, was killed on Sunday. The prosecutors’ office in the city of San Cristóbal de las Casas, in the state of Chiapas, said the religious leader was shot dead by two gunmen when he was in his van after Mass.
Tribute to Civil Rights preacher: Writer Jim Wallis describes “The gospel according to Bill Pannell” — A preacher who was an antidote to the spirit of fear and hate in our world and politics today. Pannell would never leave race out of the gospel message — as white evangelicals around him almost all did. White evangelicals, as he recounts, “slept through the Civil Rights Movement,” the most important Christian movement in our time. White evangelicals chose to ignore racism, as it is easy to do when you are the race in charge of a society.
See Judge Act
Catholic Action representatives renewed their “Pact of the Catacombs” in Rome, marking solidarity with the poor. Nate Tinner-Williams reports on the 4-day conference on the lay apostolate animated by synodality and the “See, Judge, Act” method of Servant of God Joseph Cardijn.
Preservation of sacred places
The National Fund for Sacred Places has awarded $4 million for preservation of 24 historic houses of worship, according the fund’s director. Rachel Hildebrandt said nearly 500 applications had been received, up 31 percent from the previous year.
Sleeveless Mormon temple garments?
Many members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, especially women, have been asking for a sleeveless temple garment for years. (Temple garments are”sacred underclothing.”) An observer wonders, Will the change make young adults more likely to wear garments?
Sister’s Habit: ‘It’s Not What You Wear’
Sister Laurena has a good story to tell in a video available on Facebook. It’s well worth the 12 minutes to hear her faith witness of humor and habits, presented by The Moth, a not-for-profit storytelling organization. Long-life Catholics will gasp at the beginning and marvel at the Vatican II message.
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We hope you have enjoyed this roundup of recent news about faith, politics, and culture. We will return next week with another edition of Wisdom Wednesday.
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