Maria Teresa Kumar is a self-proclaimed Catholic and former member of the board of Planned Parenthood. She was also the Saturday guest host of MSNBC’s Velshi where she accused the Supreme Court of implementing Catholicism across the country after it struck down Roe v. Wade.
During a discussion with Slate editor, podcaster, and NBC law and politics analyst Dahlia Lithwick, Kumar declared the U.S. is now going against global trends, “just last year we saw South American countries, heavily Catholic countries like Colombia, like Mexico, saying that abortion was the law of the land. We have a Supreme Court justice that is very much tilted on Catholicism saying that this is something that shouldn’t be done.”
She further claimed “As a Catholic myself, I find it abhorrent” and wondered “How do you reconcile this whole idea that we are now seeing an activist judge on the Supreme Court that is basically saying, mandating how a majority of Americans should live, based on their own religious beliefs?”
For Lithwick this is “the question.” Based off her response viewers might have come away with the impression the Court banned abortion, instead of just returning it to the states, “this is fundamentally a theological issue, it is fundamentally a matter of personal conscience. And there’s so much in this discussion around Roe, around Casey that is inflected, as you say, by not just religious ideas but sectarian religious ideas about when personhood begins, about what’s called ensoulment, which is a theological concept.”
When life begins is also a scientific question that is answered in every high school biology class in the country. Yet, Lithwick declared “those are not secular ideas and yet the Court frames this as a purely secular, non-religious conversation and so we cannot even have the conversation about why we are having the Court imposing what in many, many instances are theological notions on people of other faiths around the country who have different beliefs.”
To try to justify her claim, Lithwick further added there “is a synagogue in Florida who’s actually going to challenge Florida's abortion law because they say that has nothing to do with our theological beliefs and you can’t impose them on us. So, I think you're quite right to say part of the problem here is that we are having a conversation that is fundamentally about religion without calling it that.”
Abortion is still legal in Florida, it’s new law just moved the prohibition limit from 24 to 15 weeks. Furthermore the synagogue claimed in their statement, that Lithwick did not read from, that they are obligated to perform abortions “if necessary to protect the health, mental or physical well-being of the woman.” Florida’s law also has a maternal health exception. The stunt lawsuit will fail.
This segment was sponsored by LeafFilter.
Here is a transcript for the June 25 show:
MMSNBC Velshi
6/25/2022
8:08 AM
MARIA TERESA KUMAR: But what I also found was striking is just last year we saw South American countries, heavily Catholic countries like Colombia, like Mexico, saying that abortion was the law of the land. We have a Supreme Court justice that is very much tilted on Catholicism saying that this is something that shouldn’t be done. As a Catholic myself, I find it abhorrent. How do you reconcile this whole idea that we are now seeing an activist judge on the Supreme Court that is basically saying, mandating how a majority of Americans should live, based on their own religious beliefs?
DAHLIA LITHWICK: It's—it’s--not just a great question, Maria, I think it’s the question. That this is fundamentally a theological issue, it is fundamentally a matter of personal conscience. And there’s so much in this discussion around Roe, around Casey that is inflected, as you say, by not just religious ideas but sectarian religious ideas about when personhood begins, about what’s called ensoulment, which is a theological concept, those are not secular ideas and yet the Court frames this as a purely secular, non-religious conversation and so we cannot even have the conversation about why we are having the Court imposing what in many, many instances are theological notions on people of other faiths around the country who have different beliefs and one of the interesting thing that came about recently, is a synagogue in Florida who’s actually going to challenge Florida's abortion law because they say that has nothing to do with our theological beliefs and you can’t impose them on us. So, I think you're quite right to say part of the problem here is that we are having a conversation that is fundamentally about religion without calling it that.
