The leaves have mostly fallen here in Ohio. The sky is usually cloudy.. It is my least favorite time of year, and this year the grey limbo of November seems appropriate for this time of waiting and anticipation.
I have never been so glad to see an election finally over. And what an election. As I noted before, during the time that the magazine Caelum et Terra was published two elections came and went without comment in our pages. This one, however consumed a lot of us and for the first time strained friendships. I was involved in an email discussion among friends, most of whom wrote for the magazine, all of whom were associated with it, and the conversation got heated. indeed.
But it is over. I am greatly relieved that John McCain will not be president and that the Bush/Cheney disaster is at an end.
But I am also apprehensive at the prospect of Obama’s presidency. I am praying for the man; Lord knows he’s going to need it. Has any president-elect walked into a worse situation? While he has tremendous capital going into the presidency- the outpouring of good will toward America from around the world being chief- he faces tremendous trials.
And just how he will rule is anyone’s guess. He is horrid on abortion, and his campaign gives little reason for hope: he emphasized his record, at least on radio ads for rock stations here in Ohio, and rather than reach out to prolifers he chose a prochoice Catholic as a running mate.
But we can hope that he will be prudent in his actions once in the White House. And we can take some comfort in the fact that presidential opinion apparently has little effect on abortion rates: abortion numbers declined under Clinton, for example. If numbers do indeed rise under Obama, it will likely reflect the economic woes of the nation rather than anything he might do.
But as the days have passed since November 4, I have increasingly become aware of one very good effect of Obama’s election: I have not seen African Americans this hopeful since the assassination of Martin Luther King..
Obama’s effect on the culture of black America may be far-reaching indeed. Think of young black men, who for too long have looked to thugs and athletes for role models. Now the most famous black man in the world is educated and articulate, a husband and a father. Obama did not emphasize racial questions in his campaign, but this is a little-remarked effect that may in the end be the most benign effect of his victory.
—Daniel Nichols
Very well put, Daniel. It was a very long, exhausting and passionately debated campaign season. I feel your relief that McCain was not elected and that Bush will not be able to damage the country any more than he already has. I too am a bit afraid of the big question marks that surround Obama, but I am hopeful, and praying as well. Thanks for putting my feelings into words so eloquently.
Barb
Dedication of the Lateran Basilica in Rome
9 November 2008
Dear Friends in Christ,
We the People have spoken, and the 44th President of the United States will be Barack Hussein Obama. This election ends a political process that started two years ago and which has revealed deep and bitter divisions within the United States and also within the Catholic Church in the United States. This division is sometimes called a “Culture War,” by which is meant a heated clash between two radically different and incompatible conceptions of how we should order our common life together, the public life that constitutes civil society. And the chief battleground in this culture war for the past 30 years has been abortion, which one side regards as a murderous abomination that cries out to Heaven for vengeance and the other side regards as a fundamental human right that must be protected in laws enforced by the authority of the state. Between these two visions of the use of lethal violence against the unborn there can be no negotiation or conciliation, and now our nation has chosen for its chief executive the most radical pro-abortion politician ever to serve in the United States Senate or to run for president. We must also take note of the fact that this election was effectively decided by the votes of self-described (but not practicing) Catholics, the majority of whom cast their ballots for President-elect Obama.
In response to this, I am obliged by my duty as your shepherd to make two observations:
1. Voting for a pro-abortion politician when a plausible pro-life alternative exits constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil, and those Catholics who do so place themselves outside of the full communion of Christ’s Church and under the judgment of divine law. Persons in this condition should not receive Holy Communion until and unless they are reconciled to God in the Sacrament of Penance, lest they eat and drink their own condemnation.
2. Barack Obama, although we must always and everywhere disagree with him over abortion, has been duly elected the next President of the United States, and after he takes the Oath of Office next January 20th, he will hold legitimate authority in this nation. For this reason, we are obliged by Scriptural precept to pray for him and to cooperate with him whenever conscience does not bind us otherwise. Let us hope and pray that the responsibilities of the presidency and the grace of God will awaken in the conscience of this extraordinarily gifted man an awareness that the unholy slaughter of children in this nation is the greatest threat to the peace and security of the United States and constitutes a clear and present danger to the common good. In the time of President Obama’s service to our country, let us pray for him in the words of a prayer found in the Roman Missal:
God our Father, all earthly powers must serve you. Help our President-elect, Barack Obama, to fulfill his responsibilities worthily and well. By honoring and striving to please you at all times, may he secure peace and freedom for the people entrusted to him. We ask this through Our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.
Amen.
Father Newman
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While I understand the sentiments of Fr. Newman, I find his reasoning confusing. He writes:
“Voting for a pro-abortion politician when a plausible pro-life alternative exits constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil, and those Catholics who do so place themselves outside of the full communion of Christ’s Church and under the judgment of divine law.”
Is his reasoning that Catholics place themselves outside of full communion with the Church because they materially cooperate with intrinsic evil or because they vote for a pro-abortion politician “when a plausible pro-life alternative exists”?
If it is the former, then Catholics would place themselves outside of full communion if they voted for a pro-abortion politician, even if no plausible prolife alternative exists — for in either case, they would be materially cooperating with evil.
If it is the former, it is not clear, from what Cardinal Ratzinger as head of the CDF said on the subject a few years back, that they would be placing themselves outside the communion of the Church. For, as Ratzinger noted, there may be proportionate reasons to vote for a pro-abortion politician that would justify a material cooperation with evil. And, he never said that such would be the case only where one has to choose between two pro-abortion politicians, or even that one’s vote in this case had to be based on abortion-related criteria.
Christopher,
I agree with your comments. Although I did not vote for Obama (but with little enthusiasm for Barr), I am puzzled by those who seem to ignore Cardinal Ratzinger’s statement which you refer to. For those who’ve forgotten what statement we’re talking about, it’s his 2004 letter to Cardinal McCarrick, and the relevant part runs thus:
“[N.B. A Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for Holy Communion, if he were to deliberately vote for a candidate precisely because of the candidate’s permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia. When a Catholic does not share a candidate’s stand in favour of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons.]”
Now, I saw some statements of bishops who denied that in this case any proportionate reason existed. OK, at least they are addressing the point, although it’s not clear to me that the CDF has left this up to the bishops to determine. Others have argued that whatever Cardinal Ratzinger meant by “proportionate reasons,” they cannot ever be a matter such as a war, since war is always a queston of prudential judgment, i.e., a war might be just, whereas an abortion is always wrong. But this argument just seems to miss the point. War in general is neither good nor bad, but this or that war might be unjust and clearly so. And in the case of the invasion of Iraq, we even had the Holy See condeming the war, something that rarely occurs.
So I would like to see supporters of Fr. Newman address Cardinal Ratzinger’s words that “it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons.”
I believe that when Fr. Newman speaks of a “plausible alternative”, he is asserting that proportionate reasons for the vote for the pro-abortion candidate do not exist. To vote for the pro-abortion candidate for proportionate reasons would necesitate ther being no “plausible alternative”.
Therefore, Obama voters who did not think that McCain, or anybody else was a “plausible alternative”, which would seem to include Dan, would be guilty of no more than “remote material cooperation.”
Ben and Tom,
Perhaps I should start by indicating that I, too, didn’t vote for Obama. I did not vote for McCain. I voted for Joe Schriner of Cleveland Ohio. But, as some Catholics are claming, any vote for anyone who was not McCain was a vote for Obama. So, perhaps I did vote for Obama…
Space indeed is curved.
But to my point. While abortion is always and everywhere wrong, and war isn’t, this is because abortion by definition is a deliberate killing of the innocent. War by definition is not. Put another way, abortion falls under the category of unjust killing — murder. But, while war as such does not fall in this category, an unjust war does. An unjust war is always and everywhere wrong, and no one can support an unjust war without committing grave sin. This being the case, judgement about a particular war is not merely prudential. I will grant that Catholics can perhaps disagree on the justice of a particular war, but once one has determined that a war is unjust, that determination has to enter into the calculus of his vote. It can not be ignored.
Whether proportionate reasons exist to vote for a pro-abortion candidate is a matter of prudence. Certainly, if the naure of the political choice is really between a clearly good and a clearly bad candidate, shepherds may, I think, warn their flock against voting for one of the candidates, and even tell them not to vote for a candidate. But did this election offer this choice? Or were there serious enough minuses on the side of McCain that a reasonble person might choose to vote for Obama? Or to vote third party? Or simply not vote at all?
Christopher,
Perhaps I should clarify. I think that Fr. Newman was indeed making a prudential judgement by asserting that there was a “plausible alternative” in this election. I happen to agree with him, but I do believe that people of good will could differ on this issue. I completely agree that a reasonable person could come to the conculsion that McCain is not a “plausible alternative.” It is just not the conclusion I reached. However, my anaysis had more to do with my incredulity towards Obama’s promises to pursue peace. The recent news that he may keep Gates at Defense and appoint Hilary Clinton to State, suggest that my suspicions may be borne o–I pray they are not.
I have absolutely no quibble with abstaining from voting for a politician who advocates any intrinsic evil, as both McCain and Obama do. I wish we could for once have a “plausible alternative” it did not require an application of double effect to vote for.
To clarify, I did not vote for Obama. I wrote in Wendell Berry and Bill Kauffman, and am sorely disappointed at their defeat.
However, Ben is right: I thought in this case that a vote for Obama could be justified by Cardinal Ratzinger’s “proportionate reasons”. I didn’t do it, because I found it distasteful, and in truth Obama had a pretty safe lead in Ohio, so the pressure was off.
What are these “proportionate reasons”? Well, in my estimation McCain, in both temperment and conviction put the world at risk for global nuclear war. He stated his belligerence over and over and his vicious temper is famous. Now, Fr Newman, and others of you who condemn a vote for Obama as sinful, how is global nuclear war not worse than the status quo re abortion? I hate quantitative morality, but world war could conceivably kill billions of people, . This dwarfs even the abortion holocaust.
You may think it nuts to think the election of John McCain endangered the lives of billions, but do not tell me that in my prudential judgement proportionate reasons did not exist.
Fr Newman is vastly overstepping his authority, violating the instructions of Cardinal Ratzinger in his role as prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, and violating individual conscience, which is the only place such a moral judgement can be made. The most he can say is that he personally does not think proportionate reasons existed. He cannot speak for anyone else.
Mightn’t another factor in proportional judgement be the consideration that, no matter what politician is elected, the status quo on abortion is not going to change — and this because it is now thoroughly part of our culture? A sexually promiscuous culture like ours thinks it needs abortion. Even the most anti-abortion leader is not going to change that. Even were Roe overturned, the best we could hope for would be some parental notification restrictions or the like in the states. Such would do little to lessen the abortion rate significantly, thus weakening the cogency of the numbers argument.
Precisely. The fallacy is that you are choosing 1 million abortions vs no abortions and in truth McCain would not exactly make it a priority to stop abortion. The most that could be hoped for is Supreme Court appointments that would eventually overthrow Roe v Wade, which would return the question to the states which would result in…most abortions still being legal in most places. And of course there is no assurance that McCain would indeed nominate prolife judges: most of the sitting SC justices were appointed by putatively prolife Republicans.
I held my nose and voted for Republicans a lot over the years based on this premise. Eventually I realized that I was being duped.
Damned if I would do it for a guy who makes Bush look moderate on foreign policy and who seemed unstable, to put it mildly.
But I think we need to question a lot of presumptions here. Really, are you obliged to vote for anyone who claims to be antiabortion over anyone who is not?
What if three of the Supreme Court justices were on their deathbeds and you have a candidate who is running with the promise that he will appoint prolife justices (as if anyone could do that and get elected). So there is a near certainty that R v W will be overturned. But let’s say his other promise is to round up illegal immigrants and execute them.
By the lights of some “prolifers” you are obliged to vote for the antiabortion candidate because numerical calculations say that “only” a million immigrants will be killed, while the status quo kills a million unborn children every year. Doesn’t this seem like madness to anyone else?
And Chris is right: abortion is not going away, not in the kind of nation we have become. Being a single issue voter is one thing; when the single issue is a lost cause it is quite another.
It is madness. I’ve heard and read so many times, “nothing could be proportionate to the 1.4 million abortions every year.” Good grief. And then they go on as if it would be the democrat personally carrying out those abortions.
I am not a philosopher, and ethicist, or a theologian, and so the difference between ‘remote material co-operation’ and ‘formal material co-operation’ etc. is fuzzy, but I’m plenty smart enough to know that a vote for Obama sure as hell isn’t the same thing as killing millions of babies.
I’m also plenty smart enough to know that there’s a lot missing from the arguments I hear from the adamantly pro-Republican pro-lifers. I’m not even talking about the social justice stuff that so many right-wingers loathe. I’m talking about things like: there has to be a difference between saying “I want abortion to be legal” and “I think the way the law stands now is what the electorate wants and I will not oppose the electorate.” Or things like “what an office holder has direct control over must be weighted more heavily than what the office holder has very little influence on.” Or things like “any argument that effectively says ‘ignore almost everything except this one thing I want you to think about’ is probably a wolf in sheep’s clothing”. Or things like “why is that 1.4 million does not justify bombing abortion clinics, systematic assassination of every staff and board member of NARAL, or large scale war?” (just to be absolutely clear – I do not advocate such violence)
I’m not claiming that properly adressing those kinds of questions would tip the scale in favor of Obama. I am claiming though, that not adressing those questions makes the argument completely untrustworthy.
I’d bet that Thomas, or Daniel, or Christopher could do a good job of adressing those rarely discussed matters.
It is madness. I’ve heard and read so many times, “nothing could be proportionate to the 1.4 million abortions every year.” Good grief. And then they go on as if it would be the democrat personally carrying out those abortions.
I am not a philosopher, and ethicist, or a theologian, and so the difference between ‘remote material co-operation’ and ‘formal material co-operation’ etc. is fuzzy, but I’m plenty smart enough to know that a vote for Obama sure as hell isn’t the same thing as killing millions of babies.
I’m also plenty smart enough to know that there’s a lot missing from the arguments I hear from the adamantly pro-Republican pro-lifers. I’m not even talking about the social justice stuff that so many right-wingers loathe. I’m talking about things like: there has to be a difference between saying “I want abortion to be legal” and “I think the way the law stands now is what the electorate wants and I will not oppose the electorate.” Or things like “what an office holder has direct control over must be weighted more heavily than what the office holder has very little influence on.” Or things like “any argument that effectively says ‘ignore almost everything except this one thing I want you to think about’ is probably a wolf in sheep’s clothing”. Or things like “why is that 1.4 million does not justify bombing abortion clinics, systematic assassination of every staff and board member of NARAL, or large scale war?” (just to be absolutely clear – I do not advocate such violence)
I’m not claiming that properly adressing those kinds of questions would tip the scale in favor of Obama. I am claiming though, that not adressing those questions makes the argument completely untrustworthy.
I’d bet that Thomas, or Daniel, or Christopher could do a good job of adressing those rarely discussed matters.
I am becoming increasingly interested in becoming a part of a Catholic agrarian community. I have a wife and two children and live in Naperville, Illinois. But I don’t want to up and leave without first finding a somewhat stable community to move near to. Do you have any suggestions?
Hmm… I am quite tardy in posting a comment here, since the article is a week old. Perhaps no one will read this but Dan.
So anyway, Dan, thanks for the blog. Whenever I read headlines and articles online, I conclude by sensing an almost desperate thirst for some good news. That is why my last stop is Caelum et Terra. To me, although it is small, the fact that it is here is good news.
Thanks, Brother Paul. Did you know that I was in the first group of postulants when your community was formed? I have great memories of my time in the South Bronx, back when it looked like Germany after WWII, if Germany were populated by Puerto Ricans and blacks. And had used syringes littering the sidewalk. Anyway, great community, though I’m sure it has changed with the great growth you have experienced.
And Adam: Depends on what you mean by “community”. If you mean like-minded Catholics living in the country and hanging out, there are quite a few scattered west of Steubenville, and there are a number up near Madonna House in Ontario. There are no doubt others elsewhere. If you mean more of an intentional community, I am not aware of many. There is Little Portion in Arkansas, if you don’t mind John Michael Talbot pretty much running the show. I used to know of some converted Mennonites in Tennessee who became Third Order Franciscans, but haven’t heard anything about them in years. I believe the Third Order Dominicans in New Hope Kentucky are still around, but I haven’t heard anything about them in a long time either.
One more comment, indulgent though it may be. Daniel is right. It means a lot that, perhaps with Obama, young black Americans will aspire to greater heights. I am proud to be from a country that has a president who is a member of a thirteen-percent minority. I am proud to be from a country that has a president who is the son of a man from Kenya.
Furthermore, many black Americans may now wake up to politics and even begin demanding that officials take their concerns to heart, e.g. marriage untwisted and the protection of life, accountability from public schools and from police departments.
And to Adam: there is a community of Catholics around Ann Arbor, Michigan that is exhilarating. Christ the King Parish there currently has just six or seven hundred families, and sixteen of its sons in seminary. There is actual Catholic intellectual life and evangelization, engagement with the world and intentional living.
And I second what Dan says about west-of-Steubenville and Combermere. Lakefield, Ontario is another such place. And even better, half the people in Lakefield play the fiddle.
Speaking of Campaign 2012… There is a presidential candidate who has developed an entire platform based on Catholic Social Teaching. He has run in the past three election cycles and has already declared for 2012. The time to support his bid would be NOW — so he looks viable come the year 2012. Incidentally, that candidate is, well: me. http://www.voteforjoe.com Note: If we want to end abortion, pro-life people need to take to the street en masse, day in and day out, to create a climate of “social unrest” similar to what was created in the South to end Segregation. The onus is on us. That simple. Yet that hard.
Hi Joe; I’ve heard a lot about you, and you sound like a good guy.
The difference between now and the civil rights era is that we lack a) the numbers and b) a sympathetic media.
During the heyday of the rescue movement we did get some interest from the media, especially in the wake of clinic bombings, but the evangelicals who took over that movement caused its self-destruction, along with the feds coming down heavy with enforcing RICO laws. So I think your idea is about as quixotic as your quest to be president.
Hello, Joe. Please send my regards to Liz and the children.
I think Daniel is right about the possiblity of mass demonstrations making any difference about abortion. Anti-abortion folks not only lack the numbers but a common cultural language with the larger society. The western world, while showing a regard for human rights, roots those in rights in a utilitarianism of the conscious individual. In other words, for the modern West, rights are sacred because the individual requires them to achieve happiness. They are not sacred because of the intrinsic nature of the human person. Thus, when one radically loses consciousness (as those in a persistent “vegetative” state) or has not yet achieved consciousness (as the fetus), he does not possess rights, at least to the same degree a conscious human being does. The objection to abortion, because it represents maternal betrayal — a mother killing her children — just would not register at all with our society.
Perhaps the best way to battle abortion is not to battle it — politically, at least. Instead of pouring money into initiative campaigns or even public demonstrations, invest it in crisis pregnancy centers, halfway houses for pregnant, unmarried women, sidewalk counseling. We’ve gone beyond the point, I think, where public discussion is possible; our witness has to be one of radical charity. In some ways, abortion is to our society what chattel slavery was to the ancient world. The early Christians could have had public demonstrations against slavery, I suppose if such an idea would even have occured to them. But such demonstrations would have been meaningless to a society that accepted slavery as natural. It was the Christian witness to the radical equality of all men, slave or free, Jew or Greek, that ultimately dissolved slavery.
By the way, I do not mean to say that slavery and abortion are equivalent. I don’t think they are. I merely use slavery as a example, though an inexact one for purposes of comparison.
Daniel,
I met Joe Schriner and his family after he addressed a small parish in the Mojave Desert — in the town of Mojave, California, in fact. At first I was certain he was off his rocker; but then I met his wife, Liz, and after a discussion about farm worker issues, that, even if what they were doing seemed insane, they weren’t. I maintained that opinion even after speaking to Joe. Following that meeting, they came up to our place in Tehachapi and hooked their van conversion to our electrical outlet and shared supper.
What Joe is doing certainly is quixotic, as I think he would admit. But, even should he never be elected president (and I wouldn’t wish that on him; he is too good a man), his campaign is not in vain. He acts as an emissary for good things, among them practical ideas on how we might live a fuller, more sustainable life, in harmony with one another and in a manner pleasing to God. As I found, he reminds of things we ought not forget, but which day-to-day living, dulling our sensibilities, drives from our minds. And, really, anything we try to do politically today will be quixotic. Ron Paul was quixotic. Judging purely from natural causes, Paul had about as much a chance of winning the Republican nomination as Joe Schriner has of winning the White House.
Christopher- I wasn’t using “quixotic” in a negative sense at all. Most of my life has been pretty quixotic and I make no apologies.
I agree with everything you said above, with the exception of your contention that the unborn child does not possess consciousness. I once heard John Cavanaugh O’Keefe speak pretty eloquently on how even delaying abortion a few days may give the child in the womb unspeakable delights, of which we can know nothing. I would imagine primal consciousness to be dreamlike and impressionistic, and very slow-moving (you know how time moves more slowly for the very young).
Daniel,
I don’t know if I would deny consciousness to an unborn child, though it seems it is not consciouness that depends on a conceptualization of the self. I meant rather to outline what I think society thinks about the unborn child.
I’m sorry if I misunderstood; you did say the fetus “has not yet achieved consciousness”. Perhaps you meant self awareness…
Regarding the comparison of the pro-life movement to the civil rights movement: the comparison is more than apt from the moral point of view, but from the political point of view the two situations are almost night-and-day different. I don’t think the success of the civil rights movement provides a useful guide for the pro-life movement.
The civil rights movement didn’t succeed because people took to the street. There weren’t really that many who did, and the local governments easily shut them down. But that wasn’t the last word, because the appeal of the movement was not to those weak local governments but to the effectively all-powerful central government.
Like the anti-slavery movement, though with rather less bloodshed, the civil rights movement succeeded because the federal government forced its opponents to surrender. Had the state governments been the highest authority to which the movement could appeal, segregation would have lasted for decades more at least. Contributing to the willingness of the federal government to act was the support of the press, the intelligentsia, and most of the rest of the country.
I think a take-to-the-streets social unrest strategy by the pro-life movement would simply result in the movement being crushed as soon as it became anything more than a minor nuisance, unless maybe you want to postulate millions and millions of people taking to the streets. Not only does the pro-life movement not have the sympathy of the press and the intelligentsia, it has their active opposition, often crossing over into real hatred. The federal government is, broadly speaking, indifferent. The movement has some friends and some enemies there, but few who are willing to risk loss of power and prestige on its behalf.
The only way to change that is to convert enough people to have a very decisive edge in votes, so that politicians aren’t able to defy us. It would have to be *really* decisive, too, because as we know the courts are quite willing to defy the electorate when they think they’re right. We’re a long way from that. A majority (according to a lot of polls) do support significant restrictions, but when the choice is between the status quo and an absolute prohibition, a majority choose the status quo.
Maclin wrote, “The only way to change that is to convert enough people to have a very decisive edge in votes, so that politicians aren’t able to defy us. It would have to be *really* decisive, too, because as we know the courts are quite willing to defy the electorate when they think they’re right. We’re a long way from that. A majority (according to a lot of polls) do support significant restrictions, but when the choice is between the status quo and an absolute prohibition, a majority choose the status quo.”
Quite true, I think, Maclin. But I would go further. I’ve thought for some time that the best and probably only way to fight abortion is to preach the Gospel and attempt to convert our fellow countrymen and indeed the entire world. Slavery was ended only after the Roman Empire was more or less Catholic. And of course, that is the commandment Jesus Christ gave his Church, Go out and preach the Gospel, not, Go out and oppose all existing social evils and sins.
And of course we cannot see preaching the Gospel as merely an instrumental good for the sake of ending abortion. Rather, the propagation of the Faith is what we should be working for, not the ending of abortion or any other particular sin. Those will necessarily follow if God converts men’s hearts. I think it’s probably “natural” that a non-Christian society will tolerate abortion.
I agree completely. And regarding your last sentence, “I think it’s probably “natural” that a non-Christian society will tolerate abortion”–I’ve concluded that it’s impossible to make a really decisive argument about abortion, euthanasia, etc. to anyone who doesn’t believe in a transcendent divine morality, some reason to say “it’s wrong because it’s wrong.”
Because without that, such questions are ultimately pragmatic, judged on this-world outcomes, and by that standard it’s difficult and maybe impossible to convince someone that, for instance, a person in the late stages of Alzheimer’s shouldn’t be euthanized, or the teenaged girl have an abortion. It becomes a question of balancing competing worldly goods, and the presumption against taking innocent life is by no means always going to be the winner.
In other words, yes, it is perfectly “natural.”