Dear Parish Family, 
     The Holy Father Pope Francis is fond of saying, “The Church is here to help form our conscience, not to replace it.” It stands to reason, then, that if the Church tells people how they should vote, then we haven’t done our job to form consciences, we have just replaced them with our own personal point of view.
     In a document entitled Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship, the Catholic Bishops of the United States remind us that, “the responsibility to make choices in political life rests with each individual in light of a properly formed conscience.” To put it another way, how you vote and for whom you vote is a matter between you and God.  Again, this is made clear in the same document, which states, “Conscience is the voice of God resounding in the human heart, revealing the truth to us to do what is good while shunning what is evil.” This tremendous respect for the conscience of each individual voter is further reflected in a statement by the Bishops, which offers the following guidelines to priests and parishes:
 
· Do not endorse or oppose candidates, political parties, or groups of candidates, or take any action that reasonably could be construed as endorsement or opposition.
· Do not make available the use of church facilities, assets, or members for partisan political purposes. 
· Do not authorize the distribution of partisan political materials or biased voter education materials on church property, in church publications, or church activities.
· Address the moral and human dimensions of public issues.
· Share Church teaching on human life, human rights, justice and peace.
· Apply Catholic values to legislation and public issues.
· Encourage all Catholics to vote. 
 
     The Catholic Bishops of the United States underscore that every Catholic should take into consideration the following:
 
† Defending the sanctity of human life from the moment of conception until natural death
† Rejecting the excessive consumption of material goods
† Being good stewards of the Earth and the environment
† Love for the poor
† Respect for immigrants and refugees
 
     In all honesty, being a priest does not disqualify me from having strong, political opinions. Nor does it exempt me from having political leanings. Nevertheless, my deep respect for your own personal liberty keeps me from telling you how to exercise your own conscience. But what I can encourage you to do, is exercise your God-given right, indeed the rights given us by the Constitution of the United States, to study the issues, to apply Catholic values in light of the issues, and to vote.
                                                                   Sincerely in Christ, Fr. David