Kentucky Bishop Unjustly Condemns Covington Catholic Kids

Two days ago, Bishop John Stowe of the Diocese of Lexington, Ky., condemned the Covington Catholic schoolkids who went to the March for Life, mostly because some of them wore MAGA hats. I think it is a bad and even a disgraceful op-ed.

There is a defensible argument against wearing the hats to the march, which would basically have been the same as the argument against wearing a Bush-Cheney T-shirt to the march in 2005. The marchers go to Washington to stand in solidarity with the unborn victims of abortion, to register their dissent from the Supreme Court’s determination that they are unpersons, and to plead for laws that will offer protection against the deliberate killing of human beings at any stage of development. That is quite enough for one march without getting into the implications that arguably follow from these pro-life premises. Add in the facts that particular pro-life politicians may have non-abortion aspects of their records that are objectionable; that a significant number of people who are open to the basic pro-life case object to particular pro-life politicians because of their stances on other issues; and that several measures of the popularity of the pro-life cause show it to be higher than the popularity of this president: All of these are reasons not to wear the hats to the march, and a bishop could very reasonably suggest as much to students on their way to it. Or to put it another way: There’s a case for a border wall and a case against it, but there’s no reason to bring that debate to the march.

Two days ago, Bishop John Stowe of the Diocese of Lexington, Ky., condemned the Covington Catholic schoolkids who went to the March for Life, mostly because some of them wore MAGA hats. I think it is a bad and even a disgraceful op-ed.

There is a defensible argument against wearing the hats to the march, which would basically have been the same as the argument against wearing a Bush-Cheney T-shirt to the march in 2005. The marchers go to Washington to stand in solidarity with the unborn victims of abortion, to register their dissent from the Supreme Court’s determination that they are unpersons, and to plead for laws that will offer protection against the deliberate killing of human beings at any stage of development. That is quite enough for one march without getting into the implications that arguably follow from these pro-life premises. Add in the facts that particular pro-life politicians may have non-abortion aspects of their records that are objectionable; that a significant number of people who are open to the basic pro-life case object to particular pro-life politicians because of their stances on other issues; and that several measures of the popularity of the pro-life cause show it to be higher than the popularity of this president: All of these are reasons not to wear the hats to the march, and a bishop could very reasonably suggest as much to students on their way to it. Or to put it another way: There’s a case for a border wall and a case against it, but there’s no reason to bring that debate to the march.