TEN PRINCIPLES THAT ARE CORE TO HOW I VIEW POLITICAL AND LAY CISTERCIAN CHOICE.

In trying to decide which ideology best suits my way of viewing reality, Democratic, Republican, or Independent parties, the notion of my Catholicism comes wafting through the murky party platforms offered to me by existing political parties.

For example, I take the bulk of my views about what is accurate from the not-so-perfect heritage of the Catholic Church, more specifically, the Roman Rite. I find Catholicism unique as an individual, and I use the Christ Principle as the template to determine what is true. I have assumed into my worldview not the totality of what I think it means to be a Catholic practitioner, but rather, like a cafeteria of mini-beliefs that I have accepted and continue to reaffirm our core TO MY CENTER. The deliciousness of free choice is core to all I do because, like a tiny leaf on the tree of life, I can choose whatever I want as my center of reality. In this sense, every Catholic, like every citizen, believes selectively while viewing some principles with my nose as ridiculous. I am a Catholic, based on those principles, which I have assumed in my decision-making as making sense. Some I find revolting, yet not to the extent that I abandon the whole and, like my Anglican fratres state,” Throw the baby out with the bathwater.” I am always in the process of knowing more and more, loving more and more, and trying to adapt what I know of Catholicism to what I experience in my daily living outside of reality as I encounter it. My Lay Cistercian Way is my attempt to make sense of the competing ideologies and the contradictions of moral values held by politics and religion.

That precious choice is evident in my selection of a President of the United States. I am free to vote my conscience, and so are you. That I choose to be Independent, Republican, or Democrat is consistent with my humanity’s desire to belong to a group that best suits the majority of my concerns. Like Catholicism, I don’t hold all doctrines equally, some being more central to the bulls-eye than others. St. Thomas Aquinas states, “I believe, help my unbelief.” I am a Democrat or Republican like no one else because I choose to take the political party platform (which no one trots out except in pre-election rhetorical mumbo jumbo).

Faced with a cocktail of seemingly contradictory political statements, here are ten principles that guide me to be an independent Republican, Democrat, or Independent, and most significantly, a Catholic Universalist. These principles are peculiar to me and serve as filters for making judgments. I am not you, and you are not me. We both make choices based on those life experiences of good or evil that we choose to take into our unique wheelhouse. These are my choices.

TEN PRINCIPLES THAT GUIDE MY MORAL COMPASS IN MATTERS RELIGIOUS AND POLITICAL

1. Avoid placing false gods at my center. I don’t offer incense to the Emperor and do not allow any ideology to hold my free choice hostage, and that goes for religion or politics. The saying, “If you think you are god, you have a fool for a believer,” rings true. I must act my nature, being neither an animal nor divine in my conception. I must respect the laws of nature and the laws of science.
2. Avoid being seduced by the false god of trying to assassinate the individual rather than discuss the policies and why they are essential to you. When politics or religion becomes enamored by character assassination or vile and demeaning words, I stay clear of that ideology. “From the fullness of the heart, the mouth speaks,” cautions Scripture. Based on the vitriolic personal attacks from all sides, I must admit to not being fully enamored of any political party, and it is getting that way in the Catholic Church.
3. Those who are iconoclasts concerning others’ statues and memorials, defacing them when they are out of fashion, or they become into power, do well to heed the words of John 21 (USCCB.com):  “Amen, amen, I say to you,^j when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” Demanding respect because you tower over others is not worthy of political or religious belief.
4. Respect the integrity of work, but recognize that the dignity of the American worker is at the heart of the Constitution.
5. Factions indicate that a political party is corrupting itself with false principles. As with the Catholic Church or other entities, those who cultivate the cults of racial, religious, gender, or political factions to garner power at the expense of others will ultimately fail into obscurity because they are irrelevant. This is a slow but inevitable death.
6. Revenge is always a sure way for factions to fester. I first realized that politics had changed from debating policies to character assassination when I watched Robert Bork’s hearing on being nominated for the Supreme Count. After that, it seems to be the politics of retribution and retaliation. The Catholic Church is no stranger to this intrigue. Hatred will bring down the United States, not military conquest. We are dangerously well on the road of no return. When that happens, violence is the only way to solve the problem, according to those on both sides who hate.
7. Sexual habits and observances are the realm of the individual and not the State. The introduction of changing genders by wishing it to be so has become a viable option for those who do not want to admit its unintended consequences. What is happening to morality is called casuistry.
   • “Casuistic methods of reasoning in medical ethics have been criticized by a number of authors. At least five main objections to casuistry have been put forward: (1) it requires a uniformity of views that is not present in contemporary pluralistic society; (2) it cannot achieve consensus on controversial issues; (3) it is unable to examine critically intuitions about cases; (4) it yields different conclusions about cases when alternative paradigms are chosen; and (5) it cannot articulate the grounds of its conclusions.” https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10616318/
   • This partly explains why we cannot reach a consensus on political or religious issues critical to our survival as a nation. No one faces each other but shows their other side when asked to discuss the issues. Arguments rarely, if at all, lead to meaningful discussions.
8. The truth is what happened, not what individuals think happened. Spinning truth only leads to dizziness. The truth will make us accessible because what happens to the mind is infused by what happens to the heart. Those who lie, opt for death rather than embrace life, cheat, prevaricate, envy others, are jealous of others, and lust towards others yet portray a chaste falseface are not free.
9. Ex fructibus cognocetis. Listen to the intent, not just the words spoken. Wrong thinkers use words that don’t respect the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Wrong answers are given to those who have wrong questions.
10. Original sin is the default position of all humans. To do what is easy is always the path most taken rather than the way of the cross and what is right. If your morality comes from the minds of thieves, hold onto your wallet, even if you are a thief.

In my frame of reference, morality comes from outside human nature, which always tends to protect itself and justify its existence, whether in the Church or politics. Single-issue politics or religious beliefs tend to favor ideology and one issue that cascades all other principles to the side.

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