I was alive and very aware of politics when Kennedy ran, I never once remember anyone saying he worshiped a false god.
Now people talked about his philandering a lot.
You see there was no need to say Kennedy worshiped a false god, because he didn’t.
Think born-again Jimmy Carter.
You must not have lived in the mid west or the south. Catholics were considered members of that PAPIST group centered in ROME. They were sure that Kennedy would sell out US interests to the interests of Rome. This was written about and talked about rather routinely. Protestants and Roman Catholics have a history of...ahem....disagreeing on theology. Trust me it was not pretty