Posted on 07/23/2008 2:47:21 PM PDT by Pyro7480
When Gov. Alfred E. Smith ran for president in 1928, his candidacy was derailed in large part by anti-Catholic prejudice. It has been nearly 48 years since John F. Kennedy became the first (and so far only) Roman Catholic president, but experts say that anti-Catholic sentiment — much of it originating in, or as a response to, immigrants in New York — remains an enduring force in American culture.
That was the consensus of a panel assembled at the Museum of the City of New York on Tuesday night to consider the question, “Is Anti-Catholicism Dead?”
...The Rev. Richard John Neuhaus — a leading conservative intellectual, a former Lutheran pastor and the editor of the leading Catholic journal First Things — offered a surprising view on the question.
“To be a Catholic is not to be refused positions of influence in our society,” he said. “Indeed, one of the most acceptable things is to be a bad Catholic, and in the view of many people, the only good Catholic is a bad Catholic.”
...He added that anti-Catholicism was as likely to come from the left — sometimes from commentators who believe that a “threatening theological insurgency is engineered and directed by Catholics,” with evangelical Protestants merely as the movement’s “foot soldiers.”
(Excerpt) Read more at cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com ...
Ut unum sint, and all that. John 17:21-22.
Is your view as to why the United States and Canada are not at all like Mexico, Central and South America, and the Philippines, that Catholics have been persecuted and defamed in the USA and Canada?
“No - denominations are unnecessary in the final analysis.
“Ut unum sint, and all that. John 17:21-22.”
Oh, yes, I am in utter agreement with you, no matter what it might be called.
You are probably responding to my more or less general rhetorical statements. I am not a denominationalist in any sense. I do recognize, however, that they do exist.
You know what? I haven’t seen anybody suggest that perhaps Alfred Smith was actually just a bad egg.
“Anti-defamation conferences”?
Gimme a break.
An anti-defamation conference is what it appeared to be to me. What’s wrong with the expression “anti-defamation?” Someone was concerned about the Catholic church being defamed. Isn’t that correct?
Amen to your post. Only individuals will stand before the Great Throne Judgement, being a member of any organized church will not save them, only the Blood of the Lamb will.
Amen!
Maybe if you would post in complete sentences, without caps and without silly animation there would be less confusion.
You're maintaining you DO have a bridge in Brooklyn you want to sell me?
I don't believe it is. Read the story. I'm not sure defamation was even mentioned.
Then read the responses on the blog.
The question as posed is “Is Anti-catholicism Dead?”
It's not a protest against anti-catholicism, it doesn't mention defamation, it's not a statement at all! it's a question!
Don't you think that if it had been a self-pity party the NYT would eagerly have pointed that out?
Now skim the response on the blog. It seems to be a common
“take” on bunch of scholars getting together to wonder about the state of Anti-Catholicism: they simply MUST have been engaged in self-pity and objection.
What I personally brought to the article, as distinct from thee nonsense which followed on FR, was an interest in their opinions on the state of things, not some lament or sense of injury. I hope Neuhaus write it all up in First Things.
We have a culture clash here. Lots of things go into it. One is the difference of opinion about whether Athens has anything to do with Jerusalem. Another is a sense of history.
Some of us would think it a good thing that the Church would at least value and try to influence secular powers to value, say the life of neonates, monogamy, the general bad-idea-ness of daddies raping their daughters, and so on. Even now, I think some Protestants might think it a good thing if Christians, even if they labored under the horrible burden of the Ho of Bab'lon, actually succeeded in persuading, say, the USSR to be a little open to Solidarity.
Or do you think it a bad thing that Catholic clergy willingly died in Poland in the struggle that led to Gorbachev and then the dissolution of the USSR?
I think if we try to evaluate the historic behavior of the Catholic Church in terms of a system of nations states with constitutions and institutions which more or less accurately pretend to some notions of innate human rights and representative government, then we will fail to understand the political turmoil of the time from, say, Nero to Henry VIII. And failing to understand that we will be guilty of despising the giants on whose shoulders we stand, and mocking them for not being as tall or seeing as far as we do.
What happened from the first Pentecost, through the Milvian Bridge, Ferdinand and Isabella, to Lepanto and Augsburg had never happened before. There was no book of instructions. To us it's a big duh that denominations should not be political entities. I wonder if Luther, Calvin, Cromwell, or Pope St. Pius V would have found it so obvious, not having the evidence of their own errors to consider?
I thank God for you and this post.
What more can I say?
Is there any question or dispute that, whether or not Smith was otherwise a bad egg, his being Catholic was an issue in his campaign?
Is anyone saying he lost only because he was Catholic?
The article is judged without being read, and irrelevant arguments are posed as thought they were indicative of great insight.
On the contrary, I think that many are trying to prove that, at least on FR, anti-Catholicism is very much alive.
Tried and succeeded.
The target audience of the New York Times is secular humanist and while they hate traditional Christianity, they do not consider themselves “anti” anything. They believe that ALL Christians, whether Catholic or Protestant, should be more in the “progressive” mold of the John Kerry, Obama, the Clintons and the like.
The New York Times really doesn’t care that among the “bitter clinging” crowd in fly-over country that really does care about traditional Judeo-Christian values, anti-Catholicism is rampant.
Actually, I do agree that Smith’s Catholicism was an issue, and that that is indicative of something much deeper in American history, and it’s not bigotry. It answers one poster’s comment that “the Catholic Church is the only church that matters.”
I want one of your t-shirts, please!
You need to get a life, Petronski.
So do you have a bridge or not?
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