Obama re-election is a wake up call to Catholics but also Evangelicals.

Here's a sobering article on the impact of the Obama Administration on the Catholic Church. George Weigel, author of authoritative biography on Pope John Paul II, points out the direct attacks posed by Obamacare and gay "marriage".

The immediate threat, of course, is the HHS (Health and Human Services) mandate requiring Catholic institutions and Catholic employers to include coverage of contraceptives, sterilizations, and abortifacient drugs in the health insurance offered to their employees. The legal challenges mounted against this obvious violation of the first freedom, religious freedom, may well be vindicated. But with Obamacare now seemingly set in concrete, the Church will face a host of such implementing “mandates” and it will be imperative to contest those that are morally unacceptable, time and time again. Authentically Catholic health care in America is now in mortal danger, and it is going to take a concerted effort to save it for future generations.

A further threat comes from the gay insurgency, which will press the administration to find some way to federalize the marriage issue and to compel acceptance of the chimera of “gay marriage.” Thus it seems important to accelerate a serious debate within American Catholicism on whether the Church ought not pre-emptively withdraw from the civil marriage business, its clergy declining to act as agents of government in witnessing marriages for purposes of state law.

If the Church were to take this dramatic step now, it would be acting prophetically: it would be challenging the state (and the culture) by underscoring that what the state means by “marriage” and what Catholics mean by “marriage” are radically different, and that what the state means by “marriage” is wrong. If, however, the Church is forced to take this step after “gay marriage” is the law of the land, Catholics will be pilloried as bad losers who’ve picked up their marbles and fled the game—and any witness-value to the Church’s withdrawal from the civil marriage business will be lost. Many thoughtful young priests are discussing this dramatic option among themselves; it’s time for the rest of the Church to join the conversation.

I would add his concerns confront not just Catholics but Evangelical Protestants and Orthodox believers as well.

He does point out one of the consequences of this looming crisis. It will force people who identify with the Gospel of Christ and the Scriptures, to get serious about their faith. That's what persecution always does and I suspect why it is often allowed to come.

As for the opportunity embedded in this crisis, it is nothing less than to be the Church of the New Evangelization, full-throttle. Shallow, tribal, institutional-maintenance Catholicism is utterly incapable of meeting the challenges that will now come at the Catholic Church from the most aggressively secular administration in American history. Only a robustly, unapologetically evangelical Catholicism, winsomely proposing and nobly living the truths about the human condition the Church teaches, will see us through the next four years. Radically converted Christian disciples, not one-hour-a-week Catholics whipsawed by an ever more toxic culture, are what this hour of crisis, in both senses of the term, demands.

DFL Chair Melendez support and defense of anti-catholic political ad only digs him a deeper hole and doesn't pass straight face test.

The political offensive ad used against Republican senatorial candidate Dan Hall by the state DFL party and its subsequent endorsement by DFL party chair Brian Melendez only deepens the controversy and outrage over a blatantly, bigoted political attack ad on Catholics specifically and Christians in general.

In the DFL ad attacking Hall, they show a picture of a man in a clerical collar wearing a button saying, "Ignore the Poor". Melendez supports the ad and says the depicted collar is worn "by just about every major christian denomination." I'd like to know where he's seen the depicted collar worn outside the Catholic Church. It shows his ignorance of Christian practices in Minnesota.

The other pictures used, an altar and stain glass window, are also very strong Catholic imagery. As for Hall, who's a nondenominational pastor, those scenes are not found in nondenominational churches.

In the ad, the DFL accuses Hall of ignoring the poor, because he didn't oppose Governor Pawlenty's reductions in health care expenditure increases. Such an assertion is ridiculous.

To suggest that one doesn't care about the poor, because one thinks the government should live within its means and doesn't have a responsibility to everybody with health care is a sham and a distortion of Christian beliefs. (The demand that government must provide health care for everyone is called socialism. And socialism is in fact inconsistent with Christian principles.) And to say Hall doesn't care about the poor and vulnerable is outrageous. He's been a chaplain for years helping those in great need; I suspect far more than the perpetrators of the vicious attack ad.

Nancy Pelosi's failed attempt at Catholic Church Theologian

US House Speaker, Catholic Church attendee and ardent pro-abortion advocate Nancy Pelosi attempted to play Catholic Church theologian and was immediate rebuffed by Catholic Archbishops' Chaput and Wuerl and other Catholic leaders.

Appearing on Meet the Press, Pelosi was asked by Tom Brokaw how she'd help out Barack Obama after his Saddleback Presidential forum comment that it was "above his pay grade" to answer the question when a baby should be granted human rights. She said:I would say that as an ardent, practicing Catholic, this is an issue that I have studied for a long time. And what I know is, over the centuries, the doctrines of the church have not been able to make that definition. . . . St. Augustine said at three months. We don’t know. The point is, is that it shouldn’t have an impact on a woman’s right to choose. . . . I don’t think anybody can tell you when life begins, human life begins.”
In response, according to Fox News,

Archbishop Donald Wuerl said people need to reflect more before they start talking about church doctrine. He also issued a statement calling Pelosi’s explanation of the church’s abortion stance “incorrect.”

“The current teaching of the Catholic Church on human life and abortion is the same teaching as it was 2,000 years ago,” Wuerl noted. “From the beginning, the Catholic Church has respected the dignity of all human life from the moment of conception to natural death.”

Wuerl cited a passage from the church’s catechism that condemns abortion as “gravely contrary to moral law.”

“Since the first century the church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion,” the catechism states. “This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable.”

Chaput described Pelosi as “a gifted public servant of strong convictions and many professional skills. Regrettably, knowledge of Catholic history and teaching does not seem to be one of them.”

It's exciting to see Catholic leaders forceful in their statements about moral issues like abortion and the responsibility of Catholic politicians to uphold and protect the sanctity of life if they wish to remain a member in good standing with the Catholic Church.

I think church leaders across denominational lines are increasingly speaking out on the moral issues of the day. Ultimately, these moral issues are spiritual in nature and pastors, as spiritual leaders, need to address them. As they do they will change the culture. That was true with the abolitionist and civil rights movements.

I recall the significant role clergy played during the founding of our nation. The British called the American clergy "the black regiment", because of their black robes and the impact they played in shaping American public opinion.