Bush asked Vatican for a political boost, according to report

By David D. Kirkpatrick and Jason Horowitz
The New York Times

VINCENZO PINTO / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS President Bush meets with Pope John Paul II during his June 4 visit to the Vatican.

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In an online column posted Friday night, John Allen Jr., the newspaper's correspondent in Rome and the dean of Vatican journalists, wrote that Bush had made the request in a June 4 meeting with Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Vatican secretary of state. Allen, citing an unnamed Vatican official, wrote: "Bush said, 'Not all the American bishops are with me' on the cultural issues. The implication was that he hoped the Vatican would nudge them toward more explicit activism."

Allen wrote that others in the meeting confirmed that Bush had pledged aggressive efforts "on the cultural front, especially the battle against gay marriage, and asked for the Vatican's help in encouraging the U.S. bishops to be more outspoken." Sodano did not respond, Allen reported, citing the same unnamed sources.

A Vatican spokesman declined yesterday to disclose contents of the meeting, which followed the president's brief meeting with Pope John Paul II.

Said Jeanie Mamo, a White House spokeswoman: "They had a good, private discussion. They discussed a number of priorities of shared concern, and the president's and the Vatican's positions on these issues are well-known."

The Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, called the report "mind-boggling."

"It is just unprecedented for a president to ask for help from the Vatican to get re-elected, and that is exactly what this is," Lynn said.

Linda Pieczynski, a spokeswoman for Call to Action, a liberal Catholic group, said, "For a president to try to get the leader of any religious organization to manipulate his fellow clergymen to support a political candidate crosses the line in this country."

But some with experience in Roman Catholic politics said they were hardly shocked. "Any head of state who goes to the Vatican will attempt to present a case," said Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete, who has served as a translator in meetings with heads of state and now is a professor of theology at St. Joseph's Seminary in New York. "If it is done in a very rude way, then the Vatican will remember and you won't get invited again. But if it is done in a diplomatic way, that is why they go to the Vatican anyway. It is not an act of devotion. It is a political thing."

Bush's campaign is betting heavily on churchgoers in his re-election effort, and how Roman Catholic voters apply their faith to politics is emerging as a focal point of the race. Bush campaign pollsters have said people who attended church regularly voted disproportionately for Bush in 2000, although the 63 million Catholics were much more evenly split than Protestants.

Catholics, once a reliably Democratic constituency, have divided over social issues such as opposition to same-sex marriage, abortion and stem-cell research. But Bush is a born-again Methodist who is likely to face a Roman Catholic opponent, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts. And the pope and other Catholic officials have criticized the Bush administration repeatedly over the war in Iraq.
 
A few Catholic bishops in the United States already have weighed in on the presidential race by threatening to withhold communion from Catholic politicians who disagree with the church's stance on abortion, a group that includes presumptive Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry.

Other bishops, however, have said that threatening to withhold communion over one controversial issue goes too far, and the pope has warned of "the formation of factions within the church" in the United States. The bishops are expected to take up the matter at a closed-door conference this week in Colorado.

The pope, for his part, praised Bush last week for "the promotion of moral values" but reminded the president of his "unequivocal position" on Iraq.

Other campaign news:

Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina is favored among registered voters to be the Democratic vice-presidential candidate, according to an Associated Press poll. More than one-third of 788 registered voters — 36 percent — said they would most like to see Kerry choose Edwards. Among Democrats, Edwards fared even better, at 43 percent. Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri, retired Gen. Wesley Clark and Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack were next, far behind.

Kerry endorsed Nancy Reagan's efforts to find a cure for Alzheimer's disease, challenging the Bush administration yesterday to relax restrictions on stem-cell research to pursue cures for that and other diseases.

The Edwards and Kerry items were reported by The Associated Press.