What Does it Mean to Vote as a Catholic?

I was recently haggled into giving my opinion on what it means to vote as a Catholic. I intended to speak to this question in light of the schism between Apollos and Paul in the early church, in the wake of which people factionalized as disciples of Paul or of Apollos. 

I will forego this for a discussion of the nested question:  What does it mean to be a Catholic?

To vote as a Catholic, means foremost to be a Catholic. It means to vote in a manner that is oriented towards unity, towards catholicity. Now, it is naive to think that catholicity is to be had merely on the level of religion, less doctrine. 

Doctrine is upheld through the ongoing historical project of conciliar tradition, which we trust to be led by the Holy Spirit. That is, doctrine is upheld with an attention to dispute and contention, not through inadvertence to it. 

My unworthy and provisional understanding leads me to believe that catholicity is a gift.  It grants us the opportunity to give ourselves to be adapted and subsumed into the mystical body of Christ. 

It is the gift of cooperative unity in which we submit ourselves to be sanctified and unified to Christ in His baptism and resurrection.  We unite ourselves to God’s self-same plan and will for all of Creation.

What is most disconcerting to me about the drivel among students, both leading up to and proceeding from the election, is the condescending attitude with which a person relegates another insofar as she finds herself in disagreement with another. 

There seems to be an ever-growing chasm between subjects. One sees with all the more clarity than her peer. One is all the more competent to answer the question of immigration, of leadership, etc…

It is obvious that one is correct, that her conversation partner is wrong-headed and morally insensible. It is rare that one gives herself to be chafed by the problematic that is at hand: that there are a multiplicity of concerns and that one can only elect for oneself that which is relevant and compatible for one to uphold to vie for. 

That the concerns of another are not wrong-headed but profoundly and really scaled differently according to one’s own personal history and the nuances with which God has knit one’s heart to wound for certain issues over others. 

Our bipartisan government is staked on the ideal of learning and growing through the tension of other minds. Yet, we are at an impasse because we have resolved to be complaisant and self-satisfied with our own minds, as though they were ever really our own. That is, we forget ourselves if we really ever do believe that we are our own. 

We belong to one another, we are benefactors of one another. Most of all, we belong to God, and we submit ourselves to voting in faithful surrender to God’s authority. 

It is a privileged position to vote. It is a privileged position to vote in this country. It is a privileged position to care and to have our cares reckoned at all by our leaders.  As Catholics, it is a privileged position to care and have our cares reckoned by our loving Creator, who has given himself that we would be sanctified in truth, that we would be one, abiding in Him as Christ abides in the Father and the Father abides in Him (John 17). 
My long-winded answer to this question is that we ought to vote in a posture of surrender and humility rather than self-assertion and solipsism. We vote because we care. All of us.