March 27: The Creole Sister

Welcome to the American Catholic Daily Reader podcast. Today is March 26th, and our story is The Great Catholic What If? Daniel Patrick Moynihan has been called the great Catholic what if of American public life, a brilliant thinker who brought the church's insight to Washington, D.C. politics, but who remained mostly silent when it came to protecting the right to life.

Born in Oklahoma, Moynihan grew up in a poor New York City neighborhood. With the help of a naval officer's training program scholarship, he earned his B.A. at Tufts University and served in World War II, before going back to Tufts for his M.A. and Ph.D. in sociology. He finished his education as a Fulbright Scholar at the London School of Economics.

After that, Moynihan entered public service, first working in New York state politics, then in four successive presidential administrations, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, and finally as New York's four-term Democratic senator. In the beginning, Moynihan's politics had a decidedly Catholic bent. During the Kennedy administration, he angered liberals by arguing that the U.S. national welfare policy destroyed African American families by defining deviancy down, enshrining through law behaviors once considered immoral. Later, as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations in India, he opposed communism more stridently than the Republican administrations he served.

Once Moynihan moved into the Senate, however, his reputation as a champion of Catholic social teaching waned. Although he continued to stress the importance of culture to a healthy democracy and wielded his razor-sharp wit on behalf of the poor, on the foundational issue of the sanctity of unborn human life, he parted ways from his church.

Moynihan was no abortion champion. He once told a group of feminists, you women are ruining the Democratic Party with your insistence on abortion. Nevertheless, with the exception of a vote against partial birth abortion in 1996, he refused to defy the pro-abortion lobby, leaving many wondering how abortion politics might have changed had the prolific author lent his wit to the cause of life.

The great Catholic what-if retired from the U.S. Senate in 2001, and died two years later, on March 26, 2003. Moynihan's life illustrates that intellect and influence must be paired with moral courage. Without action on fundamental ethical issues, even brilliant contributions can leave critical questions unresolved.

Identify one area in your life where moral courage is needed. Make a plan to act consistently with your convictions. Thank you for listening to the American Catholic Daily Reader podcast. Join us tomorrow, March 27th, for another story of faith and courage in America.