Judge Barrett has been described as a devout conservative Catholic. Well, I'm a liberal and I hope she is. I hope she will let her Catholic faith influence the decisions she makes as she attempts to interpret the constitution as a member of the Supreme Court.
I hope that the theology which will guide her in her application of the constitution is built upon the wisdom, righteousness, and goodness of those great conservative Catholics who go with and have gone before her and the scripture that shaped their lives and ministries. I hope she will take them with her as she enters her chambers to contemplate the law and her interpretation of it.
I hope she will enter those chambers wearing not just her judicial robes but also the same cloak of humility of St. Francis of Assisi who said: “Here is one of the best means to acquire humility; fix well in mind this maxim: One is as much as he is in the sight of God, and no more.”
I hope she will take with her the passion of St. Joan of Arc so that her passion for the “helpless pre-born” will be matched by a passion for the hopeless post born, the poor, the dispossessed, the oppressed, the down trodden, the homeless, the sick, and the imprisoned.
I hope she will take with her the compassion of Mother Theresa and fix in her mind the words of that great lady: “At the end of life, we are going to be judged on the basis of our love for one another.” And I hope that she will take heed of that kind and gentle woman’s reminder that when we must account to God for our lives “God won’t ask us for the number of degrees we had, the balance of our bank accounts, or the highest position we attained in our careers but how did we live out the love that we’ve been blessed with?”
I pray that she will enter her deliberations with what Cardinal Joseph Bernadin called a “consistent ethic of life,” one that knows that “Those who defend the right to life of the weakest among us must be equally visable in support of the quality of life of the powerless among us: the old and the young, the hungry and the homeless, the undocumented immigrant and the unemployed worker.”
I sincerely wish that she will remember the words of St. John of the Cross that, “In the twilight of life, God will not judge us on our earthly possessions and human success, but rather on how much we have loved.”
May her search for guidance in her decisions making send her not just to her law books and her People of Praise spiritual director but to scripture as well:
To Micah 6:8 “He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”
To Deuteronomy 27:19 which warns us that "cursed be anyone who deprives the alien, the orphan, and the widow of justice."
To Jeremiah 21:12 which warns us to, “Execute justice in the morning, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor anyone who has been robbed, or else my wrath will go forth like fire, and burn, with no one to quench it…”
And to Amos 5:15 which admonishes judges to “Hate evil, love good; maintain justice in the courts.”
I earnestly pray that she will, like all truly devout Catholics, take seriously the words of Pope Francis, perhaps the modern king of the papal theological and ethical axiom: "A little bit of mercy makes the world less cold and more just." "Right now, we don't have a very good relation with creation." "You cannot be in a position of power and destroy the life of another person." "We must not reduce the bosom of the universal church to a nest protecting our mediocrity." “It seems clear to me also that climate change is a problem which can no longer be left to our future generation.”
I hope she’ll give at least a moment’s thought to his words about prayer: “You pray for the hungry. Then you feed them. That's how prayer works.” His words about leadership: “You can't govern without loving the people and without humility!” His words about the environment “Isn't humanity committing suicide with this indiscriminate and tyrannical use of nature?"
And, finally, I hope, as a good and devout Catholic, she will write on her heart his words about governance: “Every man, every woman who has to take up the service of government, must ask themselves two questions: ‘Do I love my people in order to serve them better? Am I humble and do I listen to everybody, to diverse opinions in order to choose the best path?’ If you don’t ask those questions, your governance will not be good.”
Then I would pray that she is, indeed, as devout a Catholic as she has been described as being.
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