The Nuns on the Bus are opposed to the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett. I'm holding my breath until some Republican jackass calls the nuns anti-Catholic.
Sister Simone Campbell of Nuns on the Bus talked to Alex Witt on Saturday. (Campbell is also a lawyer and executive director of The Network Lobby for Catholic Social Justice.) She gave the best pro-choice argument I have ever heard.
SISTER SIMONE CAMPBELL: She is a strong Catholic. That's lovely. I'm a lawyer and I'm worried about her decisions. The fact is Judge Barrett has livered in an ivory tower bubble most of her career. She doesn't know the reality of struggling people, and her approach to the Constitution is to say, "we have to go back to 1789 and how they thought then" without acknowledging the changes that have occurred, the growth in civil rights, the growth in the fact that women have the vote. The growth in the fact that we as a nation have discovered a deeper sense of the common good. And so I worry about what's going to happen to voting rights. I worry about what's going to happen to the Affordable Care Act. I worry about how she sees the critical social issues of our time.
WITT: You mention the Affordable Care Act and by supporting Joe Biden and the Democrats, the hope is the Affordable Care Act will stay in place. You have abortion rights that will remain in place. Is there any difficulty for you in that trade off?
CAMPBELL: No, because one of the issues that's really ripe right now in our conversation is about religious liberty. For me, religious liberty is for each up with of us to exercise our faith and our faith values. Right now the way the law stands, everybody can exercise their faith when it comes to the issue of abortion. Now i'm a Catholic sister, I'm not going get pregnant. That's not an issue for me. What I know is that women, Catholic women have the capacity to make their own choice. I don't think it's right in our diverse nation for me to force my choice, my faith, onto others. I think we're in a strong position. Let's support the formation of conscience and the choices made by women, but let's make sure pregnant women have the supports they need. We know in Democratic administrations that the abortion rate goes down faster than Republican administrations because Democrats support pregnant women. That's how I care for the unborn. Let's ensure women have access to health care, nutrition, housing. All the basics they need to carry a baby to term. That matters.
