The Catholic Conference of Ohio promotes the need for a new kind of politics - focused on moral principles not on the latest polls, on the needs of the poor and vulnerable not the contributions of the rich and powerful, and on the pursuit of the common good not the demands of special interests.
In the Catholic tradition, responsible citizenship is a virtue; participation in the political process is a moral obligation. All believers are called to faithful citizenship, to become informed, active, and responsible participants in the political process.
Death & Life Issues:
Assisted Suicide, Euthanasia
Concern for the dignity of each person - especially the most vulnerable members of society - is the foundation of our opposition to the legalization of euthanasia and/or assisted suicide.
There is a substantive moral difference between foregoing treatment (thereby allowing one to die naturally from an underlying pathology),and an action which of itself or by intention causes death, in order that suffering may in this way be eliminated.
The Catholic Conference of Ohio is committed to promote care and compassion in the face of pain and suffering, increased use of ethical principles including advance directives for health care decisions regarding medical treatment, and ongoing education and dialogue.
The Catholic Conference has developed a resource guide, Living With Hope, to aid those who face caring for people nearing the end of life.
Food is a basic human right. Food is essential for the maintenance of life and an indispensable requirement to maintain our God-given dignity. Food is not simply a commodity among commodities in the marketplace. A just agricultural system will promote food security and food safety. Justice also demands stewardship of the land and resources used in agricultural production and attention to the dignity and fair treatment of all who work in the system.
The Ohio Catholic Rural Life Conference pursues actions regarding the following questions:
• How can hunger in the human family be overcome?
• How can we ensure a safe, affordable, and sustainable food supply?
• How can we ensure that farmworkers and owners of small farms, in the United
States and around the world, live and work with dignity?
• How can land, water, and other elements of God’s creation be preserved,
protected, and used well in the service of the common good?
• How can rural communities in our country and around the world survive and
thrive?
Catholic Conference of Ohio Page on the Farm Bill
Catholic Conference of Ohio Page on Climate Change
Resources:
Sustaining Life on the Land - resource pages - A Resource Guide for Rural Ministry
At its core, global climate change is not about economic theory or political platforms, nor about partisan advantage or interest group pressures. It is about the future of God's creation and the one human family.
Because of the blessings God has bestowed on our nation and the power it possesses, the United States bears a special responsibility in its stewardship of God's creation to shape responses that serve the entire human family. As pastors, teachers, and citizens, we bishops seek to contribute to our national dialogue by examining the ethical implications of climate change.
We offer some themes from catholic social teachings that could help to shape this dialogue, and we suggest some directions for the debate and public policy decisions that face us. We do so with great respect for the work of the scientists, diplomats, business and union representatives, developers of new technologies, environmental leaders, and policy makers who have been struggling with the difficult questions of climate change for many years. (Adapted from the USCCB Statement on Global Climate Change, 2001)
The Catholic Conference of Ohio has taken a strong stand toward protecting the sanctity of all human life. Protecting human life begins with our opposition to abortion and euthanasia, which are pre-eminent threats to human life and dignity, and extends to our opposition to cloning, assisted suicide, the death penalty, and our efforts to pursue peace.
It is the teaching of the Catholic Church founded on the understanding of the Lord’s own witness to the sacredness of human life, that the killing of an unborn child is always intrinsically evil and can never be justified. Failing to protect the lives of innocent and defenseless members of the human race is to sin against justice. Those who formulate law have an obligation in conscience to work toward correcting morally defective laws, lest they be guilty of cooperating in evil and in sinning against the common good.
Abortion:
Catholic Conference Page on Abortion
Cloning/Stem Cell Research:
Concealed Weapons
While now permitted in Ohio, the Catholic Conference of Ohio remains wary that the law may lead to increased violence rather than less.
Bishops' Statements:
Regarding Concealed Weapon Legislation – October 11, 1995
Statement Regarding Concealed Weapon Legislation – May 25, 1999
Death Penalty / Capital
Punishment
The Catholic Conference of Ohio opposes Ohio's use of the death penalty as unneccessary and systemically flawed and advocates that other forms of correction to be used.
In 1987 and 1996 the Catholic Conference of Ohio issued teaching statements on the death penalty. These documents emphasized the conviction that capital punishment is not the most effective way for today’s society to punish criminals and protect society. It does not rehabilitate; it is no more effective as a deterrent to violence than other less dire penalties; and as a form of retribution, it adds to the confusion in our society about the sacredness of life.
A letter of concern is sent to the governor prior to each Ohio execution encouraging commutation.
"The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modern times with communism or socialism. She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of capitalism, individualism and the absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor. Regulating the economy solely by centralized planning perverts the basis of social bonds; regulating it solely by the law of the marketplace fails social justice, for there are many human needs which cannot be satified by the market. Reasonable regulation of the marketplace and economic initiatives, in keeping with a just hierarchy of values and a view to the common good, is to be commended." (Catechism of the Catholic Church, #2425).
Reading Resources:
The Good Company: Catholic Social Thought and Corporate Social Responsibility in Dialogue ( Sixth International Symposium on Catholic Thought and Management Education, Rome, Italy, October 2006). CLICK HERE
Payday Lending:
Catholic Social Justice teachings call us to support efforts that help to assure fair and responsible business practices. Practices that take advantage of the ignorance or hardship of another is a form of stealing.
We believe that Ohio laws should serve the common good by encouraging responsible lending practices. We support regulations on payday lending institutions that help ensure and/or maintain consumer protection and fair and equitable practices.
Payday Lending Information Page
Tax Reform:
Taxation is both an economic and moral issue. We believe there are important questions to be answered.
Does Ohio’s tax structure adequately protect the poor, vulnerable children, seniors and the disabled?
Are Ohio’s tax policies sufficiently progressive, intentionally designed to collect more from those with a greater ability to pay?
Is Ohio’s tax code fair to all taxpayers?
Do our tax policies serve the common good of Ohioans?
The Ohio Bishops support tax reform that is fair, raises adequate revenues, is progressive, and mitigates the impact on persons with fixed and low incomes.
Bishops' Statements:
Fair and Adequate Tax Reform - May 21, 2004
Minimum Wage
Work has a special place in Catholic social thought: work is more than just a job; it is a reflection of our human dignity, and a way to contribute to the common good. Most importantly, it is the ordinary way people meet their material needs and community obligations.
In Catholic teaching, the principle of a living wage is integral to our understanding of human work. Wages must be adequate for workers to provide for themselves and their families in dignity. Although the minimum wage is not a living wage, the Catholic bishops have supported increasing the minimum wage over the decades. The minimum wage needs to be raised to help restore its purchasing power, not just for the goods and services one can buy but for the self-esteem and self-worth it affords the worker.
In the last school year Ohio chartered nonpublic schools educated more than 271,000 pupils. Ohio allocates about 3 % of their total education budget towards the education of students attending chartered non-public schools.
The Ohio General Assembly has been very responsive in the past to providing assistance for pupils attending chartered non-public schools. Funding, totalling around $ 200 M each year, has been provided in such areas as school transportation, administrative support, textbooks, computers, post secondary opportunities and teacher training.
Ohio's EdChoice voucher program and the Cleveland Scholarship Program also provide opportunities for parents with students in under-performing public schools to attend charter nonpublic schools.
The Catholic Conference advocates that Ohio funding for auxiliary and administrative reimbursement be increased by the same percentage as the basic foundation funding for public schools.
Legislative News
Catholic Conference testimony in support of vouchers and Ohio Choice Scholarship program
Catholic Schools: Heritage and Legacy – 1990
Public School Funding: on Issues One & Two, – April 6, 1998
Resources:
Ohio Catholic Schools Accreditating
Association
What's Happening in Ohio (2007). DVD explaining Ohio tax-supported assistance to students in Catholic schools. Features Ohio Catholic school students and adults.
North version. Features persons from the Dioceses of Toledo, Cleveland and Youngstown.
South version. Features persons from the Dioceses of Cincinnati, Columbus, and Steubenville
Legislative version. Shortened version targeted at Legislative leaders.
Games and schemes of chance are not in themselves inherently wrong. The Church recognizes, however, that a variety of social ills can become associated with any form of gambling. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church “they become morally unacceptable when they deprive someone of what is necessary to provide for his needs and those of others."
Experience indicates that a variety of social ills are associated with casino gambling. These include a tendency to promote addictive gambling, familial irresponsibility, alcohol and/or substance abuse, and organized crime.
While there are a variety of social ills which can also become associated with charitable bingo, bingo should be viewed as distinct from casino gambling. Bingo games in Ohio use 100% of the net proceeds for charitable purposes. These charities are churches, schools, fraternal groups, youth athletic programs, volunteer fire departments, senior citizen clubs, neighborhood organizations, and various service programs. Thousands of volunteers donate their time to staff such games. Communities have been generally supportive of this form of “lower stakes” charitable fundraising.
Catholic Social Doctrine teaches that everyone has the right to affordable and accessible health care.
The issue of affordable prescription drugs and medical inflation remain ongoing concerns.
Ohio provides health care coverage through Medicaid for PASSPORT, nursing home residents and persons in need of long term care. Working families (up to 90% of the poverty level), as well as the children of families up to 200% of poverty are also covered under this state and federal partnership program. Current budget proposals seek increases in these programs. We support such increases.
Catholic Conference of Ohio's Dept. on Health Affairs Site
Catholic Conference of Ohio's page on Health Care Reform
Ohio Smoking Ban:
Compliance Information on Ohio's Smoking Ban
Affordable Rx Programs:
PASSPORT Program:
Ohio PASSPORT program: Home Health Support for Medicaid eligible Older Ohioans.
Medicaid:
Ohio Department on Jobs and Family Services, Office of Medicaid
Catholic Social Teaching insists that shelter is one of the basic rights of the human person. There must be available to all everything necessary for leading a life truly human such as food, clothing and shelter.
The lack of safe, affordable housing is a national crisis. The Catholic Church supports a recommitment to the national pledge of "safe and affordable housing" for all and effective policies that will increase the supply of quality housing and preserve, maintain, and improve existing housing.
The Catholic Church promotes public/private partnerships, especially those that involve religious communities. We continue to oppose unjust discrimination or unjust exclusion in housing and support measures to help ensure that financial institutions meet the credit needs of local communities.
Bishops' Statements:
The Ohio Housing Amendments: in Support of Issues 1 & 2 – September 17, 1990
Catholic Conference testimony in Support of SB 185, the Home buyers Protection Act.
Advocacy Efforts
Ohio has a growing immigrant population in need of welcome and support. Most of these immigrants have left their homelands due to overwhelming poverty, civil strife and natural disasters. Many of them are undocumented. The majority come from Mexico and Central America. They have been recruited to labor year round in places such as food processing plants, plastic factories and landscape nurseries throughout Ohio. Most are here to support their families back home.
The Catholic Conference of Ohio encourages increased pastoral outreach and public solidarity for immigrant workers in Ohio; federal revisions of our nation's immigration laws and policies; parish, community and individual support for initiatives such as English as a Second Language classes, job mentoring, crisis intervention, cultural exchanges, family visitations, faith based celebrations, public dialogues, coalition building, fundraising and social justice advocacy.
Poverty affects more than one million Ohioans. Children are the poorest Ohioans. More than one in seven children live in poverty. A child is born into poverty in Ohio every 18 minutes. Throughout the eight years of economic expansion in the 1990’s, Ohio’s poor actually got poorer.
In the USCCB pastoral statement, Economic Justice for All, it states: “the obligation to provide justice for all means that the poor have the single most urgent economic claim on the conscience of the nation.”
In the USCCB statement entitled A Place at the Table, it states: “Concern for the poor is advanced by individual and common action, works of charity, efforts to achieve a more just social order, the practice of virtue, and the pursuit of justice in our lives. It requires action to confront structures of injustice that leave people poor."
Each diocese has a coordinator for prison ministry. Many persons- priests, deacons, women religious and lay volunteers- provide services to inmates in Ohio state institutions. Many of their family members also receive outreach.
God established the family as the basic cell of human society. Marriage ought to be protected as a lifelong commitment between a man and a woman and our laws should reflect this principle. Policies related to the definition of marriage, taxes, the workplace, divorce, and welfare should be designed to help families stay together and to reward responsibility and sacrifice for children.
Bishops' Statements
U.S. Bishops Statement in Support of Federal Marriage Protection Amendment, May 2006
National Pastoral Initiative on Marriage
Catholic Conference Statement of Support, Issue 1, the Marriage Protection Amendment
Resources
Talking Points in favor of a ban on same-sex marriages
Catholic Conference of Ohio Page on Child Protection
The Catholic Church has many teachings related to peace and the avoidance of war. Section 497 of the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church states that the Magisterium condemns the savagery of war. "It is hardly possible to imagine that in an atomic era, war could be used as an instrument of justice."
The Church also offers principles related to a just defensive war.
The Church strongly objected to going to war with Iraq. It now calls for Responsible Transition in Iraq.
The situation in Darfur remains dire and in need of more public attention and response.
Catholic Social Services Issues
Adoption
Adoption Guide: Ohio Dept. Jobs and Family Services
Adopt Ohio website: Ohio Dept. Jobs and Family Services
Faith-based Partnerships
Governor's Office of Faithbased and Community Initiatives
Senior Care
Direct Deposit for Social Security and SSI Checks. GoDirect
Special Needs
McGivney Special Needs Trust Background Materials. A K of C sponsored program in partnership with Ohio Catholic Charities Agencies
Ohio Catholic Social Services Agencies
Catholic Charities, Archdiocese of Cincinnati
Southwest
Miami Valley
Springfield
Catholic Charities, Diocese of Cleveland
Catholic Charities, Diocese of Columbus
Catholic Charities, Diocese of Steubenville
Catholic Charities, Diocese of Toledo
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