The NCR attack on Deal Hudson

Yesterday (Aug. 19, 2004) the left-wing National Catholic Reporter (NCR) published an article by the appropriately named Joe Feuerherd (Ger.="fire stove") digging up a combustable cocktail of facts about an embarrassing incident from the pre-conversion personal life of Catholic convert Deal Hudson (pictured left). The article, entitled "The Real Deal," is clearly animated by animosity against Hudson, who has become one of the most influential Catholic laymen in Washington, DC, and served on the Republican Natinal Committee promoting the re-election of President George W. Bush. What has been particularly offensive to the left-leaning NRC has been Hudson's incisive public criticism and expose of the hypocrisy of Senator John Kerry's claim to be "the Catholic candidate" in this election while openly defying the Catholic Church in his support for abortion, among other things. The Vatican has issued directives against allowing public figures to receive Communion if they do not publicly renounce their support for abortion and other positions condemned by the Church as immoral. NCR represents the dissinting wing of Catholics in the United States who renounce various moral teachings of the Church and would like very much to see a fellow-dissident like Kerry elected president. Meanwhile, Hudson, anticipating NCR's attack on him issued a pre-emptive response in National Review Online on August 18, 2004, entitled "The Price of Politics: Getting ahead of a potential distraction."

Deal Hudson admits his past misdeeds in his article, as he does in his autobiography, An American Conversion. Like John Kerry, Deal Hudson is a sinner and admits it. But unlike John Kerry, Hudson has renounced what the Church condemns as sinful and embraced the good which his Church enjoins upon us. Meanwhile John Kerry wants to be able to step into the Communion line without renouncing his public support for abortion rights, gay rights, etc. As Peter Kreeft once said, in the final analysis there are only two kinds of people in the world: saints who know they are sinners, and sinners who think they are saints.