Silver Lining

The Huffington Post, Camille Paglia and Lifesite News are all in agreement: Barack Obama might choose Governor Sebelius as his vice presidential candidate.

While the successful election of an Obama/Sebelius ticket would be an absolute disaster for the United States, such an election would hold out real potential to force the Catholic Church in the United States to become faithful again.

If nothing else, such a win would have ENORMOUS potential to embarrass Archbishop Donald Wuerl of Washington DC.

The good Archbishop has said that any decision to deny the Eucharist belongs to the bishops of the dioceses from which a pro-abortion politician hails, not to him. Given that a bishop has the duty to teach to the Church universal, with a particular stress on safeguarding the reception of sacraments within his own diocese, this has been a very convenient, if not entirely truthful, way to pass the buck. None of the local bishops with such publicly heretical Catholics have had the guts to do their job in this regard.

But what if Obama won with Sebelius at his side?
The very possibility would give Archbishop Wuerl nightmares.

After all, Arcbhishop Naumann of Kansas City has already publicly told Governor Sebelius that she is not to approach for reception of the Eucharist.

If Obama/Sebelius win the election, Archbishop Wuerl would be in the peculiar situation of denying the Vice President of the United States the Eucharist, while giving Jesus to Ted Kennedy, who is incidentally dying from a brain tumor in no small part because of his insistence on receiving the Eucharist during a papal Mass.


Archbishop Wuerl would be hoist by his own petard into highlighting the absolute rank stupidity of the current USCCB policy on Eucharistic reception and the de facto schism it has already wreaked upon the Catholic Church in the United States.

The USCCB policy could not long endure such a public spectacle.

Either all pro-abortion politicians would begin to be denied, or the entire hierarchy of the United States bishops who espouse giving the Eucharist to men like Kennedy and women like Pelosi would have to make plain their schism from the Church.

And we know which way that will go.

Men who don't have the guts to stare down Kennedy and Pelosi certainly don't have the guts to stare down Pope Benedict XVI. They would toe the line, even if they didn't believe it. And, as Pascal's Wager made plain, if you live the Faith for a year, you start to understand in your bones how to believe the Faith and accept it in your life. Such a public spectacle could force our bishops back to orthodoxy.

So, there is a possible silver lining even to the Obama cloud.

But, sadly, this is why Sebelius probably won't be chosen as the VP candidate. If she is, the USCCB will have an extremely vested interest in making sure Obama is NOT elected. Not because Obama is pro-abort, but because Sebelius is sanctioned, and it could get publicly messy for the bishops if she got in, therefore Obama has to be kept out.