PASTORAL LETTER
“THE CHURCH’S TEACHING
REGARDING CONSCIENCE AND THE RIGHT
AND DUTY TO VOTE”
June
13, 1981
On 10
June 1981 the major dailies of Metro Manila featured on their
front pages certain references to the teaching of Pope Pius XII and of the
Catholic hierarchy of the Philippines regarding the moral obligation of citizens to vote.
The office of the Secretary General of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of
the Philippines subsequently issued some clarifications which were duly
cited in some newspapers.
With the approach of the elections,
I believe it my responsibility as pastor of the Catholic people
in the Archdiocese of Manila to obviate any standing misconceptions
or misinterpretations of the teaching of the Catholic Church regarding
this matter. For this reason I would like to issue (from the Cardinal Santos Hospital where I am presently confined) these further clarifications,
in brief question and answer form. I limit myself here to the
very concrete questions raised by the above-mentioned news reports,
prescending from the larger issues regarding the forthcoming
elections which could also be discussed.
Q.1.
What precisely did Pope Pius XII teach about the obligation to vote,
and under what circumstances did he propose this teaching?
ANSWER: The clarification has already been correctly given by
the Secretary-General of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines. In brief: Pope Pius XII sought to avert the probable
and imminent takeover of the Italian government by the Communist Party if
it carried the Italian elections of 1948. Such were the circumstances under
which he issued the statement that for Italian Catholics not to vote “particularly
through indolence or from cowardice,” the Pope affirmed, would be to “commit
thereby a grave sin, a mortal offense.” It is clear that we cannot make unwarranted
generalizations from this statement of the late Holy Father, as it was an
historically-situated declaration, regarding the 1948 Italian elections.
Q.2.
What is the common teaching of the Church regarding the obligation
to vote?
ANSWER: It is the teaching of the Church that, as a general rule
and under normal circumstances, citizens have a moral obligation to vote.
The second Vatican Council speaks of “the right and duty to vote freely in
the interest of advancing the common good” (Gaudium
et Spes, no. 75).
This was also the intent and
teaching of the Philippine Catholic Bishops’ pastoral letter of 12
September 1953 (Boletin Eclesiastico, 27/1953, pp. 609 ff.). “The vote,” they
said, “is not merely a right to be protected -it is a duty to be fulfilled.
Every qualified citizen of a democratic republic has a duty to vote, and to
vote for those candidates who would in his honest opinion best discharge the
duties of the office to which he is elected” (art. cit., p. 611).
Catholic teaching would affirm
this norm “as a general rule and under normal circumstances,” because situations
can arise when the Christian does not believe, in conscience, that he should
or must exercise his right to vote -for example, when the very act of voting
is seen by him to be a violation of moral truth itself because he is convinced
that the election process is manipulated to produce pre-determined results,
or when there is physical impossibility or grave inconvenience for him in
exercising his right to vote.
Q.3.
What is the moral condition of the conscience that believes it has
the imperative to boycott the elections?
ANSWER: If, for a proportionately serious reason (as the reason
given above), a citizen believes himself bound in conscience to abstain from
exercising his right to vote, that conscience must be respected.
Similarly, the citizen who
believes in conscience that he must vote, must have
his conscience respected also.
Needless to say, with regard
to the citizen who, after due deliberation and in all sincerity of conscience,
believes he should abstain from voting, all talk of mortal sin of omission
is out of place. On the contrary, the State is bound to respect this honest
decision of conscience and not impede its free exercise.
Q.4.
Suppose a citizen does not believe, in conscience, that he should boycott
the election: Does he then have an obligation to vote?
ANSWER: He would have an obligation in civil law to vote, and
there remains the general moral duty for qualified citizens to vote in
legitimate elections. However one cannot rightly speak in every election
of a duty binding under pain of mortal sin.
The 1953 pastoral letter of
the Philippine Catholic Bishops says: “This duty can be a grave duty, that
is, one which must be performed under pain of mortal sin when there is danger
of evil men obtaining control of the government unless they are decisively
voted down” (art. cit., p. 612).
Q.5.
What is the origin of the right to vote?
ANSWER: The right of the human person to participate in decisions
affecting his life in civil society comes from God and not from the State.
Following on this, the right
of suffrage which enables “every qualified citizen of a democratic society”
to exercise this participation must be said to be his or her natural moral
right. The State recognizes this right; it does not grant it.
Ethics and the social teaching
of the Church have consistently affirmed that there are basic moral claims
which are prior to and superior to the State These
are called human rights. Pope John Paul II teaches: “Human values, moral values,
are the basis of everything. Law cannot set them
aside, neither in its objectives nor in its means” (Address to the participants
at the 9th World Conference on Law, 40).
Our citizens have to form freely
their own consciences, and decide freely for themselves how they should act
in the coming national election of 16 June, whether they choose in conscience
to vote or not to vote. I have laid down these brief guidelines simply to
help them to decide for themselves. It is my hope and prayer that they may
be of some service to our people at this crucial and difficult time.
Given at Cardinal Santos Memorial
Hospital Green Hills, San Juan, Metro Manila.
(SGD.) + JAIME L. CARDINAL SIN, D.D.
Archbishop of Manila
June 11, 1981
