Look Elsewhere for True Anti-Catholicism

THE NEW YORK TIMES, March 4 — The controversy swirling around George W. Bush's appearance at Bob Jones University misses the real story on anti-Catholicism in modern America, said religion columnist Peter Steinfels.

“Opposing anti-Catholicism in the United States by denouncing Bob Jones is about as relevant to today's reality as combating medical errors by condemning leeches and snake oil. The Catholic Church takes more nasty hits weekly on cable television than yearly from Bob Jones.

“Yes, anti-Catholic animus rooted in the theological polemics of the 16th-century Reformation still exists in the United States. But the anti-Catholic animus rooted in the political polemics of the 18th-century Enlightenment and the cultural polemics of 19th-century American nativism have long since taken over all the traditional themes:

“The church is an authoritarian monolith; its doctrines are hopelessly premodern; its rites are colorful but mindless; its sexual standards are unnatural, repressive and hypocritical; its congregations are anti-Semitic and racist; its priests are harsh and predatory; its grip on the minds of believers is numbing. These themes still ring in some fundamentalist pulpits. But they are far more apt to be interjected into the more adult sitcoms and late-night comedy, and to be reflected in films, editorials, art, fiction and memoirs considered enlightened and liberating.

“American culture ... is a maelstrom of prejudices and stereotypes, some of them expressed only in private, some allowed in the mass media, some relished (while others are reprobated) among the well-educated.

“Muslims, Italians, Latinos, gays, blacks, women, atheists, even Protestant blue bloods can justifiably complain about some of the ways they are popularly portrayed. Indeed, if rebuking Bob Jones University is a low-cost way to oppose anti-Catholicism, the reason is that evangelical and fundamentalist Christians are farther down in the national pecking order of prejudices than Catholics.

“The constant pitter-patter of gibes, jokes and sneers about Catholicism on television, in films, in celebrity interviews, in university and alternative newspapers probably makes it harder for some impressionable adolescents and young adults to avow their beliefs and ultimately to maintain them.

“Anti-Catholicism would be a worthy subject for study and debate, freed, one hopes, from the manipulative politics of victimhood. But the place to begin is not Bob Jones University.”

Santa Fe Archbishop Moves to Protect Flock

ALBUQUERQUE JOURNAL, March 15 — The findings of a recent study of Hispanic Catholics prompted Santa Fe Archbishop Michael Sheehan to speak out against aggressive proselytism of Catholics by some Protestant groupss, the Albuquerque daily reported.

According to the study, conducted by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and entitled Hispanic Ministry at the Turn of the New Millenium, one of every seven Hispanics in the United States has left the Church over the last 25 years.

“We don't appreciate their efforts to undermine the Catholic faith,” Archbishop Sheehan said. “A lot of churches spend time in the pulpits running down and attacking the Catholic faith. We feel that is wrong.”

Archbishop Sheehan said his archdiocese “needs to show as great a spirit of welcome and hospitality as we can so that [immigrants] know they're welcome,” adding, “a lot of improvement has been made.”