Pelosi Says She Has a Duty to Pursue Policies in Keeping With The Values of Jesus, 'The Word Made Flesh'

By Nicholas Ballasy, Video Reporter
CNSNews.com
Jun. 01, 2010

(CNSNews.com) --House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) says she believes she must pursue public policies "in keeping with the values" of Jesus Christ, "The Word made Flesh."

Pelosi, who is a Catholic and who favors legalized abortion, voted against the ban on partial-birth abortion that was enacted into law in 2003.

At a May 6 Catholic Community Conference on Capitol Hill, the speaker said: “They ask me all the time, ‘What is your favorite this? What is your favorite that? What is your favorite that?’ And one time, ‘What is your favorite word?’ And I said, ‘My favorite word? That is really easy. My favorite word is the Word, is the Word. And that is everything. It says it all for us. And you know the biblical reference, you know the Gospel reference of the Word.”

“And that Word," Pelosi said, "is, we have to give voice to what that means in terms of public policy that would be in keeping with the values of the Word. The Word. Isn’t it a beautiful word when you think of it? It just covers everything. The Word.

“Fill it in with anything you want. But, of course, we know it means: ‘The Word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us.’ And that’s the great mystery of our faith. He will come again. He will come again. So, we have to make sure we’re prepared to answer in this life, or otherwise, as to how we have measured up.”

John 1:14 states, "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we saw His glory, the glory as it were of the only begotten of the Father) full of grace and truth."

The passage from the Gospel of John, Christians believe, refers to God (the Word) becoming a man, Jesus Christ, at the moment of the Annunciation, when the angel Gabriel told the Virgin Mary she was going to have a child. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, “the Incarnation is the mystery and the dogma of the Word made Flesh.”

Section 423 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church states: “We believe and confess that Jesus of Nazareth, born a Jew of a daughter of Israel at Bethlehem at the time of King Herod the Great and the emperor Caesar Augustus, a carpenter by trade, who died crucified in Jerusalem under the procurator Pontius Pilate during the reign of the emperor Tiberius, is the eternal Son of God made man. He 'came from God', 'descended from heaven', and 'came in the flesh'. For 'the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father … And from his fullness have we all received, grace upon grace.”

After Pope Benedict XVI met privately with Speaker Pelosi in February 2009, the Vatican issued a statement saying: "His Holiness took the opportunity to speak of the requirements of the natural moral law and the Church's consistent teaching on the dignity of human life from conception to natural death which enjoin all Catholics, and especially legislators, jurists and those responsible for the common good of society, to work in co-operation with all men and women of good will in creating a just system of laws capable of protecting human life at all stages of its development."

Pelosi’s office did not respond to CNSNews.com’s follow-up questions regarding the speaker’s statement that she seeks to make policy in conformance with the values of the Word made flesh.