Am I a liberal or a conservative? No. I reject those labels. Today, “conservatives” are too often stuck in the past. And “liberals” are frequently unhinged, cut off from traditional values. 

Many years ago, when we first moved to Kentucky, Sharon and I registered as Independents. In those days (the mid-1980s), all of the important positions were decided in primaries that we couldn’t vote in. We considered changing to one of the main political parties, but a careful look at the two party platforms convinced us that the most honest course was to remain independent and judge each candidate and/or issue on the merits rather than party affiliation. 

My position is much the same when it comes to Church politics. The Catholic Church’s teaching and practice are broad and inclusive at the same time that they are narrowly focused on “the way” Jesus lived and “the truth” he taught. These have been handed-on faithfully by the apostles and we have the testimony of witnesses—the saints and martyrs—who for the past 2000 years have shown us by their words and example how we are called to live. 

The Christian way is not set in concrete, but it is also not set in quicksand. Set on a rock (Peter and his successors up to and including Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis), the Church is also neither liberal nor conservative. It is both traditional and progressive—always journeying forward in living continuity with the past. 

Here is the way Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI) explains this in his book Church, Ecumenism and Politics:

Anyone who wants to cling exclusively to the wording of Scripture or to the formulas and structures of the patristic Church, banishes Christ to yesterday. The result is, then, either a completely sterile faith that has nothing to say to today or else an arbitrariness that skips over two thousand years of history, tosses it onto the scrap heap of failed enterprises, and now decides to figure out what Christianity should really look like according to the Scriptures or according to Jesus. But that can only amount to an artificial product of our own making that has no inherent stability. There is real identity with the origin only when there is at the same time a living continuity that unfolds it and thereby preserves it. (Joseph Ratzinger)

I have no desire to “banish Christ to yesterday.” Nor do I want the Church to be “an artificial product of our own making.” What I want is both creativity and continuity, tradition and progress,  a vision for the future that is faithful to the best of the past.

 I believe that this is authentic Catholicism. I also believe that this stance represents the American way at its finest. God knows that neither Church nor country is perfect. Our sinful humanity prevents that. But God calls his imperfect people to move forward in faith, hope and charity to a future that is better far than this—God’s kingdom which begins to be built here on earth and is completed in our heavenly homeland. 

Veni, Creator Spiritus,
Mentes tuorum visita:
Imple superna gratia,
Quae tu creasti pectora.

Come, Holy Spirit, Creator blest, and in our hearts take up your rest. Come with your grace and heavenly aid to fill the hearts which you have made..