The White House St. Patrick's Day celebration was certainly cringeworthy. As Spencer covered yesterday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) read an Irish poem bu U2's Bono, which, oddly enough, equated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to St. Patrick. The speaker herself told reporters at a press conference "you might find [it] interesting," and that's certainly one way of looking at it. But, other than reading a poem idolizing Zelenskyy as a popular saint, faith and the Catholic Church came up in another way, that of President Joe Biden.
Pelosi says that Biden "understands the dignity and worth of all people because his Irish heritage, in his case, was accompanied by a deep Catholic faith." pic.twitter.com/7pgdu9xeXg
— Kevin McMahon (@Kevin__McMahon) March 17, 2022
Here's one way in which Pelosi discussed President Biden:
My wish for all of you is that you could have been there last night. And – well many of you were – to hear the President take pride in his Irish American heritage. He made us cry – almost – he made us laugh in our hearts and he made us think, he made us think about what America is and what American – what the Irish community means to our great country.
And we could see how this great President came to be, as a person who understands the beautiful diversity of our country – as I've said, because he respects his own heritage. He understands how we accept – we respect our own heritage as well. And he understands the dignity and worth of all people, because his Irish heritage in his case was accompanied by deep Catholic faith.
To say Biden is "great" is certainly a relative term, and subjective at best. The polls don't suggest that at all, and they haven't for a long time. There was hardly any so-called bump in his polls, and, as Guy highlighted, whatever bump there was, it's gone now.
Pelosi also spoke of America being "blessed by her Irish children," quoting President Ronald Reagan, who was a particularly pro-life president, going on to say "and one of those Irish children is now the President of the United States," referring to Biden.
As she got closer to introducing the president, Pelosi referred to Biden as "one of America's children that God has blessed us with."
Both Pelosi and Biden are Catholics, arguably some of the most well-known Catholic figures in the country, perhaps even in the world. Their status as Catholics, though, has certainly not been without controversy.
The Catholic Church is pro-life. Pelosi and Biden surely know that, yet they disregard the key tenant of their faith as a matter of politics. Both have been clear about the pro-abortion policies.
The Biden-Harris administration has been keen to get rid of the Hyde Amendment, which has passed every year since 1976 with bipartisan support and which protects taxpayers from having to fund elective abortions. While it did ultimately pass this year, that wasn't before the White House and most of the Democratic Party, save for Sen. Joe Manchin, a moderate who represents one of the reddest states there is, West Virginia, tried to get rid of it.
In June 2019, while running for president in what was still a crowded Democratic primary, Biden's campaign claimed that he still supported the Hyde Amendment, as he had done for all of his political career spanning decades. There's even fundraising letters Biden sent out touting his support for Hyde, not just as it stands today with its excepts for rape, incest, and life of the mother, but when it was even more restrictive. He caved the very next day, though, and came out against. A particularly strong critic of his stance was fellow candidate and now Vice President Kamala Harris.
It's not merely Biden's pro-life stance that seems to have declined, but his understanding of his Catholic faith as well. Last September, as I covered at the time, Biden told a reporter who was asking about the Texas abortion ban that had just gone into effect "I respect them — they — those who believe life begins at the moment of conception and all. I respect that. Don't agree, but I respect that. I'm not going to impose that on people."
One could certainly argue that making taxpayers fund abortions despite sincerely held beliefs against it doesn't mean Biden "respect[s] them." Such remarks also proved Biden was at greater odd with his faith, and also with science, which tells us that a unique individual with its own DNA is formed at the moment of conception.
Landon also highlighted how Biden had even acknowledged in 2015 that he believed life begins at conception.
Speaker Pelosi has also been particularly vocal about her support for getting rid of Hyde, bizarrely bringing in her Catholic faith and her role as a mother of five children in doing so.
"As a devout Catholic and mother of five and six years, I feel that God blessed my husband and me with our beautiful family, five children, six years almost to the day, but it’s not up to me to dictate that that’s what other people should do. And it’s an issue of fairness and justice for poor women and in our country," Pelosi snapped at a reporter last July.
The House, under Pelosi, has voted several times to get rid of the Hyde Amendment, even after the Catholic Church continued to speak out about the issue. Build Back Better, a key Biden agenda item which ultimately failed last December thanks to Manchin's opposition, passed the House in November. Pelosi was clear that it would not include Hyde protections.
How to deal with pro-abortion Catholics is tricky, especially ones who are such public figures with well-known views, as Pelosi and Biden are. Denying them Holy Communion has been discussed, and even took place for Biden in South Carolina when he was running for president.
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, which is Pelosi's home diocese, has been particularly outspoken about the importance of the pro-life position as well as the sacredness of Holy Communion, and made it clear that pro-abortion politicians should not present themselves for Communion.
Last March, in an interview with The Atlantic, Archbishop Joseph Naumann, the Chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities, had also emphasized this position. Critics tried to get him punished for it.
On the other hand, Cardinal Wilton Gregory of Washington, D.C. and Bishop William Koenig of Wiilmington, Delaware, Biden's home diocese, have not been as vocal.
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) made plenty of headlines last year for their June and November meetings in which they voted to consider a document clarifying the worthiness to receive Communion, which did not refer to or single out politicians such as Pelosi and Biden by name.
As part of "understand[ing] the dignity and worth of all people," which Pelosi is correct is part of the Catholic faith, the unborn are included in that category, especially with how marginalized they are in society. And it's because of Pelosi and Biden that they are.
Biden is indeed a child of God and a blessing, as all people are. That includes the unborn too, though.
