By Florida Catholic staff - Florida Catholic

ORLANDO | To help Catholics become informed voters, the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops once again released results from its 2018 Candidate Questionnaire Project.

Generated for more than two decades, the project offers all candidates — incumbent and new — for Florida gubernatorial, state legislative and congressional seats up for election the opportunity to answer a set of questions that cover topics of importance to the Catholic Church.

The conference composes the questions based on issues likely to be acted on by lawmakers during the coming term. Candidates respond to each of the 10 questions (one set for congressional and another set for state legislative and gubernatorial) with support or oppose. They are also given the opportunity to include brief comments on each question, which are only available to view online.

While each question on the two questionnaires is distinct, some topics are covered in both the congressional and state legislative polls. For instance, both surveys cover “parental empowerment” in terms of education, but the questions are different.

For example, the congressional question reads: “Creating education savings accounts for students in military and Native American families to use for nonpublic school tuition?”

As listed on the backgrounder provided by the conference, this question involves “an education savings account (ESA) program would follow the principle that ‘the money follows the child’ by allowing more taxpaying parents to select the education setting deemed suitable for their children.”

The state legislation question reads: “Creating education savings accounts to use for nonpublic school tuition?” The conference’s backgrounder again lists the idea of an education savings account that follows the child. It also lists how Florida currently has several school choice programs such as the McKay Scholarship, voluntary prekindergarten (VPK) and the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship Program.

In terms of covering abortion, the congressional questionnaire asks, “Abortion conscience protection: Passing the Conscience Protection Act to further protect health care providers from being forced to participate in abortions?”

The state questionnaire asks, “Abortion regulations: Requiring parental consent before a minor child’s abortion, notwithstanding previous judicial concerns?”

In all, the topics covered within both surveys include:

• Abortion.
• Health care and mental health.
• Affordable housing.
• Death penalty.
• End-of-life care/assisted suicide.
• Freedom to serve.
• Immigration.
• Juvenile justice.
• Education (parental choice and school safety).
• Environment.
• Gun control.
• International assistance.

Results of this valuable tool and the backgrounder that explains each question can be found online at https://www.flaccb.org/2018cqp. The conference is also working with parishes to post results through bulletin inserts. Information for those inserts is disseminated by each diocese, including state and congressional districts within those diocesan lines. They are also found online at https://www.flaccb.org/2018cqp.

Although early voting is already underway for the primary election, the majority of voters will head out to the polls for the primary on Aug. 28. The results of the survey will be updated and ready to use weeks before the Nov. 6 general election.

The U.S. bishops remind all Catholics “in the Catholic tradition, responsible citizenship is a virtue, and participation in political life is a moral obligation.”

FYI

• For more information, visit the conference online at: https://www.flaccb.org/2018cqp.