Being a pragmatic centrist is no fun. It’s lonely to be both the most liberal and most conservative person at the same party, depending on the topic of the moment.
I say this partly in jest because I think I’m actually among the majority in the middle. We are seldom heard, just as planes that land safely rarely make news.
Issues like gun control and abortion, which dominated national and local headlines this week, make my internal GPS system go haywire. They do not compute because there is no route to common ground. These issues cannot be solved, only won by whichever group of bullies currently tips the scales.
My views on abortion (and premarital sex and divorce, by the way) have never deviated from my Catholic upbringing: I don’t “believe in” them. That may surprise people who know that my political views on these things — and virtually all domestic issues — are far to the left.
I have no problem holding both views any more than reconciling faith and evolution, both of which I learned at a Catholic high school. As my science teacher, who later became principal, told me, “We teach science in science class and religion in religion class.”
In my opinion, that is the only logical approach to these issues, whether you worship God, guns or both.