Mayor Tom Koch (Twitter)
In an age when too many Catholic politicians are choosing their careers over faithfulness to Church teaching, the Democratic mayor of Quincy, Massachusetts who recently left the party over its extreme abortion position, is a refreshing change.
LiveActionNews.com is reporting on the decision by Mayor Tom Koch to end what had been a lifelong affiliation with the Democratic party because of the hard line it is taking on abortion. He had been watching the party move further to the left on abortion over the years, but when Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez came out last spring with the statement that there is no room in the party for pro-life people, it was more than he could take.
“I said, ’OK, I guess that’s the last straw for me,” Koch told the Patriot Ledger. “The party platform is so far left on abortion it’s sickening.”
Although he didn’t make his decision public until recently, he changed his registration shortly after the comments were made.
Not even Perez’s attempts to placate the pro-life Democrats he offended were enough to change his mind, especially after he witnessed the blowback the DNC leader got from the powerful pro-abortion lobby that provides so much of the party’s funding.
It was all just a “bridge too far” for this devout Catholic.
As he explained to the Ledger, he was 10 years-old when the Supreme Court handed down the decision on Roe v. Wade that legalized abortion in the U.S. and said it was important to everyone in his family.
“It was a big issue in my house,” he said.
And it still is.
“I’m certainly a believer in life starts at conception,” he says, even though in Massachusetts, abortion up to 24 weeks is legal with some exceptions allowing later-tern abortion.
Leaders in the Democratic Party are becoming increasingly concerned about the radical abortion position party leaders. Even stalwarts like The New York Time’s David Brooks is calling the party’s position “toxic” due the fact that the American public has been moving steadily away from support for abortion after 20 weeks, the point at which infants can feel pain.
The latest polls show that 68 percent of Americans believe abortion should be limited to the first trimester, which is up almost 10 percentage points from this time last year. And that number includes a majority of Democrats, proving that even a majority of people who consider themselves to be “pro-choice” still want significant restrictions on when abortions should be legal.
Let us pray that Mayor Koch’s courageous decision – one that he was not afraid to link to his Catholic faith – may encourage other Catholic politicians to take a similar stand and put the welfare of the innocent and faithfulness to Christ over personal gain.
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