Rep Thaddeus McCotter (R-Livonia) was the author of a Congressional resolution on April 9 welcoming Pope Benedict to the United States. In his comments on the House floor related to the resolution, he took special pains to emphasize that the Pope's message was essentially the same as the Republican mantra of personal freedom:

"It was not passion alone that allowed for the founding of our free republic; [the founding fathers] also used their reason to find their way to express how those rights could be guaranteed against government, and how individual citizens could live together with their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This is no different than the message that the Holy Father brings today. The Holy Father has said that faith and reason are concomitant blessings from God which allow us to find him not only in ourselves but in each other."

The Congressman's voting record in support of the Iraq War and in opposition to any non-punitive solutions to the immigration problem in the US seemed directly at odds with the wording of his Papal welcoming resolution. The document praised the Pope because he "has made repeated calls for peaceful resolution to international conflicts" and because he "has affirmed the dignity of the human person with respect to refugees, exiles, evacuees and other migrant persons."

Rep McCotter does have some redeeming qualities, having played a leading role in trying to hold the Chinese government to account for its brutal human rights record.

But his own record on domestic issues borders on the inhumane. He has publicly labeled the S-CHIP expansion bill as an effort that was "unscrupulously using children as props in a soulless script replete with ironic appeals to an apparently socialist Almighty," despite studies that have shown that lack of health insurance results in child deaths from asthma and disability from other chronic conditions that go untreated. He has advocated cutting off all services to undocumented immigrants, in direct opposition to the stance of the US Bishops Conference. He has unwaveringly supported the Bush war in Iraq, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and the displacement of nearly 20% of their population.

In short, Rep McCotter has a very narrow view of what Catholicism is about, characterized by the use of violence in international affairs, the absence of a collective responsibility for the wellbeing of more vulnerable members of society, and the villanization of immigrants.

It would be one thing if Rep McCotter's views were those of an outlying ideologue, but he is the Chairman of the Republican House Policy Committee. It is a harbinger of the Republican approach to the 2008 elections that they are willing to praise the Church and be photographed with its leaders, while having little interest in public policy that would advance the cardinal Catholic virtues of mercy and generosity of heart.

Patrick Whelan
Exec Director
Catholic Democrats