NEW YORK (CNS) — Race must never be a motivating factor in deciding for whom to vote, Bishop Blase J. Cupich of Rapid City, S.D., said in the Oct. 27 issue of America magazine. “As we draw near an Election Day on which one of the major party candidates for president is for the first time a person of African-American ancestry, we should be able to do so with a sense that whatever the outcome, America has crossed another threshold in healing the wounds that racism has inflicted on our nation’s body politic for our entire history,” Bishop Cupich wrote. But he said media reports about possible race-based voting show that “this potentially healing moment could turn into the infliction of one more wound if racism appears to determine the outcome.” Recalling the “central affirmation” of the bishops’ 1979 pastoral letter, “Brothers and Sisters to Us,” that “racism is a sin,” Bishop Cupich said, “The promotion neither of abortion nor racism can ever be a motivation for one’s vote.”