Putting mercy before judgment

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2016

Last Friday, the day the massive “March for Life” rally barely beat the blizzard to Washington DC, I heard a homily during Mass at Boston College that both surprised and encouraged me.

Jesuit priest Peter Folan told a story about a couple seeking counsel from a priest, any priest, whoever happened to be in the rectory when they stopped by on an awful day three years ago.

The unborn child the mother carried had been diagnosed with significant genetic abnormalities. The stunned parents needed to talk.

At Mass last week, Folan said that until that day, abortion had been an abstraction to him, theoretical, an issue we argue about. The Church teaches that abortion is an “intrinsic evil,” he said, a grave sin. To many Catholics, that’s the end of the discussion.

But on that day, abortion became to him not abstract, but particular. In this case, the particulars were a shell-shocked mother and father detailing a horrific medical prognosis, expressing fear for their older child, their unborn child, themselves.

And Folan did not see evil in his office that day, but a loving couple confused and devastated.

I left Mass Friday surprised, even stunned, to hear a priest on the altar talk with such compassion about a mother and father considering abortion. I left wishing women I’ve known who’ve agonized about abortion, too, and felt so judged and rejected by their Church, could have heard him.

Then I realized: Folan is part of a new and different Church, the Pope Francis Church. Last fall, Francis himself said women can be forgiven for abortions.

Last month, beginning his “Year of Mercy,” he said we wrong God and his grace “when we speak of sins being punished by his judgment before we speak of their being forgiven by his mercy. We have to put mercy before judgment.” Continue reading