Something unusual happened last month at the session during which President Joe Biden introduced Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson as his choice for the Supreme Court. When her turn to speak came, she began by thanking not Biden but God.
These days nominees for high office in the nation’s capital don’t ordinarily declare themselves by speaking first of God. But Jackson made it a point to credit God at the start “for delivering me to this point in my professional career.” Speaking as prospectively the first black woman justice, she told the world that “one can only come this far by faith.”
It may be grasping at straws. But those unexpected words on what was a very special occasion for her offered at least a glimmer of hope that on the bench she might emerge as something rather different from the acolyte of abortion and LGBTQ rights that the liberal media have made her out to be.
That said, I readily admit it may be wishful thinking. But we shall see.
Don’t expect much light on this subject from the four days of confirmation hearings by the Senate Judiciary Committee that begin March 21. Following well established precedent set by other Supreme Court nominees, Jackson is expected to announce that she firmly supports Goodness, Truth, and Beauty and thinks the U.S. Constitution is just swell. Concerning specific questions she will face as a member of the Supreme Court she’ll stay mum.
Years back, Jackson clerked for Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, author of the majority opinions in all the court’s major abortion cases of the last two decades. Aside from the most obvious differences–gender and race–the most significant difference between Breyer and Jackson is age. He is 83 and she is 51, which will make her the court’s second youngest member after Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who is 50.
Breyer will formally retire when the court’s current term ends in late June, and Jackson, presumably confirmed by then, will immediately succeed him. Barring the unexpected, it’s a good bet that once on the Supreme Court, she will remain there for the next quarter century or more.
As an associate justice she will be part of a three-woman liberal minority composed of herself, Elena Kagan, and Sonia Sotomayor. The six other justices, generally described as conservatives, are Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Barrett.
Jackson will be joining the court shortly after it announces its decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. The outcome in that closely watched case, involving a Mississippi law barring virtually all abortions after the 15th week of pregnancy, is widely expected either to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 ruling that legalized abortion, or at least to permit meaningful state restrictions on the practice.
Either way, the court will face a slew of new cases involving new state enactments. Anticipating a favorable outcome in Dobbs, prolife state legislatures have already adopted dozens of new laws setting limits on abortion and there are more to come if the Supreme Court does as expected. Challenges to those laws will keep Jackson and her colleagues occupied for years.
Casting grave doubt on the faint hope that the new justice might be anything less than totally pro-choice was the ecstatic reaction of abortion rights groups to her nomination. Typical of the comments was the statement from NARAL Pro-Choice America, which hailed her “demonstrated record of defending” abortion rights. That includes co-authoring a brief supporting NARAL in a case that involved a Massachusetts law establishing a “buffer zone” around abortion clinics to keep pro-life protesters at bay.
Against this background, it’s reasonable to suppose that the prospects that Jackson will disappoint the abortion lobby and embarrass Joe Biden lie somewhere between unlikely and impossible. And yet–mightn’t a person who thanks the Lord of Life for bringing her to the apex of her career have second thoughts about voting in favor of destroying unborn lives?
Don’t count on it, but don’t count it out entirely.
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No, she might’nt.
She will say, as did His High Lordship Obama: “God bless Planned Parenthood.”
“…it’s reasonable to suppose that the prospects that Jackson will disappoint the abortion lobby and embarrass Joe Biden lie somewhere between unlikely and impossible.”
Sorry, Mr. Shaw. I disagree.
I’d place it somewhere between zilch and zero.”
Interesting, too, was Jackson’s language: Crediting God for having ‘delivered’ her in her professional career!
We HOPE that KBJ will allow God to deliver all human creatures to life. We hope KBJ will not proclaim freedom to the misbegotten ‘mother’ to kill her offspring.
Satan tempted and contested Jesus’ conception of God the Father. May Jesus grant KBJ the graceful strength to answer Satan as He did. May KBJ deliver herself unto Christ.
And I’ll say quite simply that the God I worship and pray to as a 70 year old lifelong practicing Catholic is on the side of LGBTQ rights. He/She is a God who weeps when ‘religious’ people trample on the rights of others to love in the way He/She made them.
I’m sure there will be self righteous howls of indignant protest at these comments. No matter. I’m at peace with God.
And you are self satisfied ignoring the Holy Scriptures and the teachings of the Church? People with your convictions are destroying the Church. You might want to think a little harder and read the CCC
I’m quite well read in Scripture, Theology, & the Cathechism, and I’m going with my conscience (which is well formed, Thank You). I’ll take my chances with the mercy of God. He/She understands the way I love.
We’re not howling, Drew. Be quietly advised: God is a He, a Father. And He is not “on the side of” sodomy.
I’ll take my chances with God. He/She understands human love and I, and many, many of my gay Catholic friends have lived lives of love and service. Drew Casti
The God I’ve prayed to for my 70 Catholic years is on the side of good, decent people loving each other. My many Gay Catholic friends have lived deep spiiritual lives of love and service. I’ll take my chances with God who is indeed Mother and Father. So much for your ‘quiet advice’ which has led to a world of homophobia and violence against my community, often from so called religious people.
The God I pray to is very clear on practicing homosexuality. He wants them to repent, the shed blood of Jesus Christ will cleans them from all unrighteousness if they confess their sins. On the other hand, the Apostle Paul advises what they may expect if they do not confess.
Romans 1:26-28 For this reason God gave them up to dishonourable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.
God advises man so he relent and reform.
It should be noted that any reference to “faith” by the Left means little or nothing. Words are easy. Faith is tougher, because it requires a certain commitment to moral standards. Citing “faith” as the force that has allowed her to get this far in life is glib, but it doesn’t necessarily denote any connection to religious scruples. Note Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi and all the self-described “devout Catholics” in our government who continue to support abortion on demand, fund Planned UnParenthood, and use taxpayer dollars (the only resource they have) to murder children in the womb.
One should ask what denomination she practices as suspect her Christianity is quite progressive, perhaps “Lordy, Lordy”. She certainly would have a different perspective of the Constitution rejecting original intent in favor of the more progressive, speculative interpretations.
To the author, just because she uses words that tickle your ears, does not mean she is using those words as you know then as those words excite the progressives who know what she means bt those words.
From Alice Through the Looking Glass: “”When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master—that’s all.”
They thank “God” because that’s what they’re told to say to camera if they wish to receive this promotion.
Pray for her conversion
I appreciate Mr. Shaw’s insights and I think he is on to something. with high hopes.