Roberts Nomination Raises the Issue of the Role of Religious Faith in Public Life

NY Times ^ | 2 August 2005 | PETER STEINFELS

[Aussie Dasher]

Scarcely had Judge John G. Roberts been chosen for the Supreme Court than religion reared its lovely head. And just as swiftly, opponents and supporters of the selection traded accusations over who was responsible.

Were opponents playing with religious prejudice and trying to erect an unconstitutional religious test for public office? Were supporters smearing the opposition and trying to block legitimate lines of inquiry about Judge Roberts's views by charging that these amounted to anti-Catholic or anti-religious hostility?

From the narrow viewpoint of this column, all this attention to religion could be welcomed as simply that much more grist for the mill. The partisan maneuvering is not really that hard to detect and discount.

But these exchanges threaten to convey a subtler message, not partisan at all but at least as questionable

[Aussie Dasher]

Surely, in this modern world of ours faith in God and service in public life are not mutually exclusive?

[Originalist]

Certainly not per the founding documents of this country. Just the NYT trying to stir up the anti-Catholics, agnostics, and atheists.

[Jeff Head]

The liberals believe that they are mutually exclusive and want to push that agenda to the max.

Of course, they are abjectly and absoultely wrong. Our founders knew this and somehow we survived to this date.

[Paloma_55]

Which part of "no religious tests" do they not understand???

[Congressman Billybob]

This is typical of the New York Times. Anyone with the slightest knowledge of American history knows that the "issue of the role of religious faith in public life" was first raised when the Pilgrims drafted the Mayflower Compact before coming on shore. And it has remained a lively issue ever since.

The editors and reporters of the Times cannot be so stupid as to be totally unaware of this history. The other conclusion is that they think from their ink-stained ivory tower that we are so stupid we won't notice their lies.

Congressman Billybob

Latest column: "South Pacific" Lesson about Muslims

[k2blader]

I saw these two charming bumper stickers today (on the same car):

"Last time we mixed politics with religion, people got burned at the stake."

"One nation, under-educated."

[TitansAFC]

---"Which part of "no religious tests" do they not understand???"---

Precisely. How bout a daily barrage of attacks on oh, say, all of the Muslim countries on this very issue at the NY Times?!?!

I thought not.

So enough with the "Catholicism/Christianity will affect the way they do their job......whine, whine, b*tch, b*tch, piss and moan."

I mean seriously, NY Times, every friggin' day?!?!?!?

[Random Nonsense]

What if John G. Roberts was a muslim, 5 times a day praying toward mecca, strict follower of the koran, muhammad and allah follower ? The liberals would quickly embrace this judge don't you reckon. Hey, he'll have full support from international communities, islamic countries, arabs , the UN, and what not. And support from those currently silent muslim majority.

[oceanview]

mark Levin was questioning the way the republicans have been (read: have not been) out there defending this guy so far. he was commenting that, as always, we seem to be on defense.

[Triggerhippie]

The best part is that they probably didn't get the irony of their own bumper stickers.

[GSlob]

"Surely, in this modern world of ours faith in God and service in public life are not mutually exclusive?"
Of course not, especially if one converts to Alcoholism:
"Is public worship, then, a sin,
That for devotions paid to Bacchus
The lictors dare to run us in,
And resolutely thump and whack us?"
Jorace (Ambrose Bierce)

[k2blader]

Classic, isn't it? :o)

[FlingWingFlyer]

This must be part of the 'RATS' new, "Let's show 'em we got religious values too" program. I hope EVERY Catholic is watching this.

"...but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States."

Article VI, Section III. The U.S. Constitution.

[calex59]

I thought the first amendment was still in effect in this country. Maybe I am wrong, but I didn't think his religion was allowed to enter into the dicussion. Dems don't read the constitution much I guess.

[loveliberty2]

"The editors and reporters of the Times cannot be so stupid as to be totally unaware of this history. The other conclusion is that they think from their ink-stained ivory tower that we are so stupid we won't notice their lies."

Let's go with your second conclusion, plus the fact that the Left believes it has adequately "dumbed down" the citizenry through its censorship of textbooks, indoctrination of teachers, and almost total elimination of the ideas of our liberty from the public schools and public forums of the nation.

Perhaps they haven't noticed the revolutionary new way to access the wisdom literature of the ages and the writings of America's Founders (the world wide web), and the popularity of that pursuit among many ordinary Americans today.

Why, just give us time, and we may be as "knowledgeable" about our constitution's ideas and philosophy as were the citizens of the 1830's when Alexis de Tocqueville traveled through the wilderness and found the most constitutionally literate group of citizens he had ever encountered.

Think the Times might send some folks down to the Blue Ridge wilderness and find one such citizen, Congressman?

[Congressman Billybob]

Enjoyed your post, especially the last line.

In the long run, the Internet may just be the methodology for us to gain a good education about our nation, and to take it back politically, ethically, and historically. That's what I'll be working toward.

John / Billybob

[MNJohnnie]

Surely, in this modern world of ours faith in God and service in public life are not mutually exclusive?


Interesting how concerned the NY T is about religion and public service as long as we are not talking about Dems speaking at Church's during election season or radical leftist church groups (like the ones here in Minnesota) suing to get a state conceal carry gun law over turned.

[kcvl]

Peter Steinfels, a prominent Catholic writer, educator, and speaker and senior religion correspondent for the New York Times from 1988 to 1997, writes “Beliefs,” a biweekly column for the Times. He received his A.B from Loyola University in Chicago and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Columbia University. Dr. Steinfels joined the staff of Commonweal magazine in 1964 and was editor from 1984-88. His articles regularly appear in Nation, Dissent, and New Republic. He has been a visiting professor of history at Georgetown University and of American Studies at the University of Notre Dame. Dr. Steinfels is the author of The Neoconservatives: The Men Who Are Changing American Politics, co-editor of Death Inside Out: The Hastings Center Report, and author of A People Adrift: The Crisis of the Roman Catholic Church in America, published this past summer. He and his wife, Margaret O’Brien Steinfels, were recipients of the 2003 Notre Dame Laetare Medal for service to church and society.


Commonweal magazine

EDITORIAL
Unintended Consequences

Bush’s June 28 speech on the war in Iraq was yet another lost opportunity for the president to level with the American people. In order to do that, however, the president would have to own up to the disastrous mistakes made both in going to war and in thinking that the Iraqis would embrace the occupation with open arms. | more


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Commonweal is an independent journal of opinion edited and managed by lay Catholics. It publishes editorials, columns, essays, poetry, reviews of books, movies, plays, the media, a selection of apposite and/or funny cartoons, and lots of letters to the editors. Unfortunately, the magazine does not seem to hold fidelity to the Magisterium in very high regard. By its own admission, the tone and attitude of the articles varies dramatically depending on the author. Over the last few years they have published articles advocating the ordination of women, defending dissident theologian Charles Curran, and many articles openly criticizing the Vatican and its policies. The usefulness of this site and the magazine itself seems to lie only in researching what dissidents are saying.

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Steinfels is a religion columnist for THE NEW YORK TIMES, where he had been the senior religion reporter. Earlier, he was the editor of the liberal, lay Catholic magazine COMMONWEAL, and so, later, was his wife.

Photo of communion Steinfels is also a historian, who says some of the Church's conflicts began with changes in the world around it -- ideas about human sexuality, for instance, and the equality of women.

Other problems, he says, grew from decisions by the Church itself, such as those coming out of the Second Vatican Council in the early '60s.

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Margaret O’Brien Steinfels was editor of Commonweal from 1988 to 2002. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the New Republic, and other publications. Her book, Who’s Minding the Children? The History and Politics of Day Care in America, was published in 1974. Before coming to Commonweal, Steinfels was director of publications at the National Pastoral Life Center and editor of its journal, Church. From 1981 to 1984, she worked as executive editor and business manager of Christianity and Crisis. She has also worked as a social science editor at Basic Books and as editor of the Hastings Center Report. Steinfels is a graduate of Loyola University, Chicago, and New York University. She lives in Manhattan, and is married to Peter Steinfels, columnist for the New York Times. They have two grown children.

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Commonweal boasts among its stable of contributors Washington Post political columnist E. J. Dionne and former New Yorker staff writer William Pfaff.

[kcvl]

Peter Steinfels, the religion columnist for the New York Times and former editor of the unapologetic liberal Catholic magazine Commonweal.

Peter Steinfels is not an Americanist. His Catholic people are adrift and he hopes they can recover a sense of solidarity and possibility through the reassertion of their distinctive faith and practice as Catholics. “The crisis of the Roman Catholic church in America” will be resolved constructively, he argues, only if church leaders can help their people avoid the traps of religious indifferentism and cultural surrender built into American religious freedom and pluralism.