Why the Catholic Church gave $900K to fight Ohio's abortion rights amendment

The Catholic Church in Ohio is giving more than spiritual and moral support to the campaign to defeat Issue 1 in November.

It’s also giving money.

Campaign finance records show the Archdiocese of Cincinnati donated $500,000 in June to the group leading the charge against Issue 1, a proposed constitutional amendment that will guarantee access to abortion in Ohio if voters approve it.

The archdiocese’s donation is among the largest so far to the anti-Issue 1 campaign, records show, and is the largest from any Ohio-based organization or individual.

The next largest donations from Ohio sources also are from Catholic institutions: The Diocese of Cleveland and the Diocese of Columbus each gave $200,000 to the campaign.

The contributions from all three dioceses, which were made over a few weeks in June and July, are the latest and strongest signal that this election will be unlike any other for Catholics and their church. Rarely have faith and politics in Ohio intersected the way they will on Nov. 7.

While the Catholic Church always has regarded abortion as an “intrinsic evil,” this election is different because abortion is on the ballot. The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade last year threw the issue back to the states and made possible the fight that’s raging today over Issue 1.

After $900,000 in combined campaign contributions, the Catholic Church is now heavily invested in that fight, both financially and rhetorically.

“We cannot remain silent on a direct ballot question like the one in November,” Cincinnati Archbishop Dennis Schnurr wrote in an open letter to Catholics in August.

'Put your faith into action'

Schnurr’s fellow bishops in Cleveland and Columbus have echoed that sentiment in recent weeks, encouraging Catholics to view Issue 1 in the context of their faith.

“Now is the time to let our faith … influence the decisions we will make as citizens of this great state,” Cleveland Bishop Edward Malesic said in a recorded statement in late August. “Register to vote and put your faith into action.”

A spokeswoman for Schnurr would not say whether the archdiocese intends to make additional donations to the anti-Issue 1 campaign before Nov. 7, but the archdiocese is mounting its own campaign via Catholic publications and from the pulpits of its churches.

Ads produced by the archdiocese prominently display a “Vote NO” logo and encourage Catholics to “Protect Women. Protect Families. Protect Children.” Priests are expected to deliver a similar message to churchgoing Catholics between now and Election Day.

In addition to contributing directly to the campaign, the Catholic Church is involved in fundraising for Protect Women Ohio, the group leading the anti-Issue 1 effort. That’s the same group that received the combined $900,000 from the three Ohio dioceses in June and July.

In August, Bishop Malesic joined Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican and Catholic, at a Protect Women Ohio event that sought contributions as high as $50,000 per person. Campaign finance reports have not been filed yet for the event, so it’s not known how much money was raised.

As with the pro-Issue 1 campaign, most of the millions of dollars raised for the anti-Issue 1 campaign has come from out-of-state groups and political action committees, some of which are not required to disclose donors.

Among Ohio-based contributors, none come close to the amount of money given so far by the Catholic dioceses.

Issue 1 opponents say the bishops are right to lead the charge on such an important moral and theological issue. But supporters of Issue 1, including some Catholics, are wary of the bishops’ high-profile role and the implication that Catholics must vote a certain way to remain in good standing with their church.

They say it's one thing for the bishops to tell their flocks, as they have for decades, to consider Catholic teaching and follow their consciences when they vote. It's another to tell them a ballot issue promotes evil.

"Each person bears moral responsibility for his or her vote," said Jennifer Schack, spokeswoman for the Cincinnati archdiocese. She said the church teaches that people commit a "mortal sin" when they know the church's teaching on a grave matter but choose the evil anyway.

Does that mean voting for Issue 1 is a sin? The bishops don't frame the question that way, but their words and deeds in the run-up to Nov. 7 suggest more than public policy is at stake.

Some Catholics, though, bristle at the bishops' involvement in the campaign and their focus on abortion as a defining issue for the church.

“The hierarchy of the church does not speak for all Catholics,” said Steph Hanson-Quintana, deputy director of policy and organizing at Catholics for Choice, a Washington D.C.-based advocacy group. “We think that people can follow their conscience and make decisions about their reproductive rights.”

Mixing politics and religion

In some ways, the church’s participation in the campaign against Issue 1 is an extension of a movement that began more than 50 years ago. Right to Life was founded by Catholics in the late 1960s, and Right to Life representatives now sit on the board of Protect Women Ohio.

Issue 1 brought them together with Ohio's bishops. The proposed amendment would create a constitutional right to obtain an abortion until the fetus is viable, which generally occurs sometime after 20 weeks. State lawmakers could restrict abortion rights after viability, but only with exceptions to protect a woman’s life and health.

Supporters of Issue 1 say it’s the best way to protect reproductive rights in a state dominated by Republican politicians who are prepared to ban most or all abortions if the proposed amendment fails.

The bishops' opposition is rooted in the health exceptions, which they see as a loophole that could allow abortions through the ninth month of pregnancy. They also say the proposal is vague and opens the door for minors to get abortions without parental consent.

As a tax-exempt religious organization, the church’s participation in the campaign is permitted by state and federal election law because the bishops are advocating against a ballot issue, rather than a specific candidate in a partisan election.

But with greater involvement come greater challenges. One risk is that the church’s moral and spiritual argument against abortion could become entangled with the partisan politics that have defined the abortion debate in America for decades.

It may be a moral issue for the bishops, but it’s a red state vs. blue state issue for millions of Americans, including many Catholics.

“We’re more informed by our politics than by our religious faith,” said Ken Craycraft, a professor of moral theology at Mount St. Mary’s Seminary in Cincinnati who has written about the intersection of faith and politics. “I think that’s unfortunate, but that’s the unfortunate state of Catholic faith in the United States.”

Even so, Craycraft said, the church’s involvement and its financial contributions to the campaign are necessary. Abortion cuts to the heart of the Catholic faith, he said, and the bishops can't act as though Issue 1 is like any other ballot issue.

“It’s about abortion, yes,” Craycraft said. “But it’s also a symbol of how we think about the dignity of human life in general.”

Different views among Catholics

It’s not easy, however, to define how Catholics think about abortion. While the bishops are unbending, there is nuance among the faithful.

A Pew Research Center poll last year found Catholics tracked close to the American population overall in their views on abortion. Fifty-six percent of Catholics said abortion should be legal in all or most cases.

“The bishops’ opinions often diverge from the majority of Catholics,” said Hanson-Quintana, of Catholics for Choice.

While many Catholics hew to the line drawn by their bishops, Hanson-Quintana said, others don’t want their priests and bishops, through their role in the Issue 1 campaign, to impose their vision of Catholic theology on them or the rest of the nation.

Some Catholics have more practical concerns, arguing that the church could better spend its money and resources on parishes, schools and the myriad Catholic charities that support the sick and the poor.

According to the Cincinnati archdiocese’s 2022 financial statements, the $500,000 donated to the anti-Issue 1 campaign is roughly half what it cost the church to run Catholic Charities in 2022 and more than twice the cost of running its Hispanic ministry.

“That’s a lot of money,” said Lee Wilson, president of the parish council at St. Joseph Church in Cincinnati, which lost its school this year after church officials declared it unsafe and too costly to repair.

“I get it,” she said. “I don’t like abortion, either.” But Wilson said the bishops now appear to be pursuing their agenda on abortion at the expense of other things that matter to Catholics, like keeping their schools open.

“I’m more concerned about what happens after you’re born,” she said.

Schnurr seemed to anticipate the potential for criticism when he publicized his open letter to Catholics last month. He acknowledged that some might be squeamish about the church getting involved with an issue so caught up with the nation's fraught politics.

But in a debate where “choice” has been argued for decades, the archbishop concluded he had none when it came to the Nov. 7 election.

“The church,” he wrote, “must not remain on the sidelines.”

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Catholic church gives $900K to fight Ohio's abortion rights amendment