November 12, 2010
Bishop D’Arcy: Catholic Church is pro-life because Jesus Christ is pro-life
Bishops Gerald A. Gettelfinger and John M. D’Arcy celebrate Mass at St. Benedict Cathedral, Nov. 4, part of the diocesan “Respect for Life Celebration.” (Message photo by Paul R. Leingang) Click for a larger version.
By PAUL R. LEINGANG (Message editor)
Bishop Emeritus John M. D’Arcy of Fort Wayne-South Bend said he counted former Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz among his friends. He was a pretty good coach and a pretty good Catholic, too. He went to daily Mass, “especially during football season.”
Bishop D’Arcy came to southwestern Indiana bringing humor and keen observation. “I didn’t know Evansville was in another country!” he said, after a long, long day driving on Indiana roads between Fort Wayne and Evansville.
And he came to deliver a pointed message on Catholic teaching about life — based on Sacred Scripture, natural law, philosophy, theology and papal teaching — in particular, Evangelium Vitae written by Pope John Paul II.
Following Mass at St. Benedict Cathedral in Evansville with Bishop Gerald A. Gettelfinger on Nov. 4, Bishop D’Arcy spoke to about 120 persons in the Woodward Hospitality Center at the parish.
His presentation was built on two questions: Why is the Catholic Church pro-life? and Why is not everyone pro-life?
The law of God is written in our hearts, he said, citing the Epistle of Paul to the Romans as the source of this teaching on natural law.
The fact of sin and the promise of redemption are found in the book of Genesis, he said. The original sin is pride, “a reaching to possess what belongs only to God,” in whom we live and have our being. “The ultimate arrogance, the ultimate pride, is to take away life.”
Bishop D’Arcy said the Church has to do more for women who have had an abortion, citing “the long loneliness” and the remorse described by Dorothy Day after she had an abortion.
Cain hid from God after killing Abel. “We all hide after sin,” Bishop D’Arcy said.
God asks Cain, “What have you done?” That is the same question asked today “at the beginning of life and the end of life and in so many other ways, the human life of one person is endangered by the envy of his brother,” Bishop D’Arcy said.
Cain asked God, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” “God has answered that question when he sent his son,” Bishop D’Arcy said.
The death of Jesus “for our salvation teaches us the ultimate lesson about the worthiness of the life of every person.”
Bishop D’Arcy said the idea of “freedom to choose” is misused. He quoted Pope John Paul II, speaking in North Carolina: “America, how can you speak of the ‘right to choose’ without speaking of the right to choose wisely?”
How can it be, Bishop D’Arcy asked, that “some-thing once considered a crime in all 50 states is now a right?”
Bishop D’Arcy also spoke about the death penalty, acknowledging that church teaching allows the state to impose capital punishment, but concluding with Pope John Paul II that the necessity for the death penalty is “very rare, if practically non-existent.”
Bishop D’Arcy said the U.S. bishops have determined four areas that are necessary in the Church pro-life stance. The church needs to provide catechesis so people know the teaching; the Church needs prayer; the Church needs to establish more pregnancy centers; and the Church needs to be active in the public arena.
The Church is pro-life “because Jesus Christ is pro-life,” Bishop D’Arcy said. Jesus answers the messengers of John the Baptist, who ask who he is. “The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have the good news preached to them.” (Luke 7:22)