Some of our Catholic politicians who are preparing to vote in favour of abortion are trying to square their consciences by pulling what amounts to the ‘John F Kennedy defence’. That is, they are trying to separate their consciences from their faith because they think this is what Kennedy did, even though it’s not, in fact, what he did.

Kennedy’s Catholic faith was a major stumbling block for many US Protestants when he was running for the presidency in 1960. Fed on generations of anti-Catholic prejudice, they believed that Kennedy would be little more than the Pope’s stooge in the White House. (Senator John Crown seemed to be suggesting something similar in this column in last weekend’s Sunday Independent).

Therefore, in September 1960, Kennedy used a speech to the Protestant ‘Greater Houston Ministerial Association’, to convince people that would not be the case.

He said “I believe in an America where the separation of Church and State is absolute – where no Catholic prelates would tell the president how to act.”

However, contrary to what many believe, Kennedy did not actually say he would leave his conscience, much less his religious conscience, at the door when governing.  

On this score here is what he said: “I do not speak for my church on public matters; and the church does not speak for me. Whatever issue may come before me as President, if I should be elected, on birth control, divorce, censorship, gambling or any other subject, I will make my decision in accordance with these views — in accordance with what my conscience tells me to be in the national interest, and without regard to outside religious pressure or dictates. And no power or threat of punishment could cause me to decide otherwise.

“But if the time should ever come — and I do not concede any conflict to be remotely possible [our italics]– when my office would require me to either violate my conscience or violate the national interest, then I would resign the office; and I hope any conscientious public servant would do likewise.

“But I do not intend to apologize for these views to my critics of either Catholic or Protestant faith; nor do I intend to disavow either my views or my church in order to win this election. “

Note what he did not say in the above passage. He did not say that his conscience could not be informed by his faith.

Therefore it is absolutely open to a Catholic politician, based on what John F Kennedy said, to vote against abortion on the basis that such a vote would be in keeping both with his conscience and with the national interest.  

That’s a very different thing to saying that a faith-based conscience and politics don’t mix.

What Kennedy said is that no bishop or pope could tell him how to vote or not to vote. He did not say his conscience shouldn’t tell him how to vote. That would clearly be ridiculous.

And he certainly didn’t say his conscience as a politician couldn’t be informed by his Catholic faith.

Therefore the ‘Kennedy defence’ isn’t as effective as some of our home-grown Catholic politicians might imagine.