A New Discourse

Below is a letter I sent to the Supreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus regarding abortion and gay marraige.

Mr. Carl Anderson
Supreme Knight
Knights of Columbus
One Columbus Plaza
New Haven, CT 06510

Worthy Supreme Knight:

I am a Past Grand Knight and former District Deputy from Illinois and I have wanted to write you for a long time in regard to the issues of abortion, gay marriage and the recent presidential elections.

Please understand that I am not advocating any nuance in our stand on the issues of abortion and gay marriage. What I think that the Knights of Columbus should be doing is helping transform the discourse on these issues.

First of all, I would like to address the evil of abortion. I believe in the church’s teaching that life begins at conception and ends with natural death but I have become convinced that the road to ending abortion does not go through the direct political process. The Knights of Columbus need to be at the forefront of championing both attitudes and policies that make it more desirable for a woman to keep her child rather than to abort it. That means that the knights need to be advocating things like accessible day care, education reform and health care reform. If women have the right support network they will be less likely to chose abortion. The problem as I see it is that the advocacy that the knights have engaged in so far seems to stop with ending abortion. I have not seen any other issue command so much rhetoric both at the local council and Supreme Council level as abortion does. We as knights need to really understand what it means to be “pro life”. I further believe that without a true change of heart and priorities in public spending, any legal protections given to the unborn will not guarantee an end to abortion. Affluent women will still be able to travel to foreign countries for abortions as they did before Roe v. Wade and there will arise a network of doctors will continue to perform clandestine abortions.

I have no illusions that the changes in day care, health care and education will be expensive but if we want women not to abort their babies we are going to have find a way to pay for it. Too often, people outside of the pro life movement have the perception, whether rightly or wrongly, that once a child is born, the woman is on their own. We knights need to change that perception. That change won’t happen with the rhetoric that you engaged in with your open letter to Senator Joseph Biden. I feel that while it was doctrinally correct, it was a tactical misstep because it hardened opposition to the pro life movement and your own background, having worked in Ronald Regan’s administration, blunted the efficacy of the message because you have been perceived as just another Republican voice. My point is that if you were to use the resources of the Knights of Columbus to advocate for broader changes in the priorities in terms of government spending, our stand on life issues would have a great deal more credibility.

Now, I would like to address myself to issue of gay marriage. I think what the knights need to do is expand what we advocate in terms of marriage. More and more, Catholic marriages are ending up in divorce. My first marriage ended that way and I was fortunate to get an annulment. We need to spend more time extolling and helping to develop the sacramental theology around marriage than trying to decide who can and cannot get a marriage license. In my professional life, I have come into contact with a number of gay couples who have been able to build a life together without a marriage license. Deciding who can and who cannot get a marriage license will not change that.

I have often heard the statement that gay marriage is a danger to the institution of marriage. I would submit to you that there are dangers to marriage that are more close at hand. I look at my own experience in that my wife and I experienced prolonged periods of unemployment while trying to take care of my wife’s mother in our home while her dementia continued to rob her of mental faculties. These things were far more dangerous in terms of putting our marriage at risk than whether or not two gay individuals can get a marriage license. Again, the knights need to be strong advocates for those priorities in government spending that will demonstrate our true commitment to family life. Without those policies in place, it won’t make a difference who can get a marriage license

I truly believe that we first must evangelize the Catholic community as to what marriage truly means and that is a union of a man and woman that makes manifest in the world Christ’s love for the church. Frankly, if it were up to me, I would tell all Roman Catholic priests and deacons that they were to no longer sign marriage certificates issues by a civil authority. I think we would be better off moving to more of a European model and process like my parents went through when they got married in England in 1954. They had a full nuptial mass and then had to go to the marriage registry office to have their marriage recognized by the civil authority. If we had a model like this in the United States, we could advocate for marriage as we as Catholics understand it regardless of what the civil authorities say.

The essence of what I want to convey to you is that many of us are tired of the same old culture wars and think that a new approach is needed. This approach does not require us to nuance or water down what church doctrine is but does require us to look at it from the larger perspective of bringing about a greater good for more people while staying true to the Gospel of Life.

Sincerely yours,
Eugene Michael Giudice