The murder of a physician in Wichita, Kansas, who provided late-term abortions, comes just as political factions are lining up for the debate over progressive Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor.<\/p>\n
Accusations of racism and reverse-racism are flying fast.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, protests were also held in California over the weekend, supporting and opposing same-sex marriage.<\/p>\n
In a speech a couple of weeks ago at Notre Dame, President Barack Obama appealed to both sides of the culture war.<\/p>\n
He urged activists to listen respectfully to one-another and engage in a real dialogue about thorny issues such as same-sex marriage and abortion.<\/p>\n
But I fear that the rift in America between traditionalists and social conservatives (on the one hand) and more progressive, modernist-leaning groups (on the other) is wider than ever.<\/p>\n
If, for example, the Roman Catholic church were advocating a simple ban on abortion, the conversation would be confined to a fairly understandable ethical and moral debate.<\/p>\n
When does life begin? Where do a woman’s rights end and her unborn fetus’s begin?<\/p>\n
But the Church — and a wide variety of other traditionalist organizations — also oppose contraception, sex-education, divorce, and (of course) homosexuality.<\/p>\n
Many conservative groups are also uncomfortable with the idea of women holding equal authority within society, especially within their religious organizations.<\/p>\n
Modernist groups, meanwhile — many, though not all, secular — see these matters entirely differently. <\/p>\n
They focus on a completely different set of ethical concerns: climate change, poverty, social injustice, etc.<\/p>\n
And they see the activism of conservatives as a direct threat to their personal, moral freedom.<\/p>\n
How do you begin to have a reasonable dialogue when worldviews differ so fundamentally?<\/p>\n
The simplest answer in America is that we try to decide these things peacefully, at the ballot box. But it doesn’t always work that way.<\/p>\n
Sometimes our passions, and our zealots, push their way to the fore. <\/p>\n
Which is why mainstream activists on both sides have a moral duty to moderate their language, and to help constrain the more destructive elements that exist on the fringe of any movement.<\/p>\n
That said, I have a feeling we’ll be negotiating this long, troubled path for years to come.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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