Anti-Catholicism: America's Last Acceptable Prejudice
The Thinking Man's Anti-Semitism
Part I: In Principio…
I went to Catholic school from ages 3-22. I grew up in a (mostly) Catholic household. I have studied Catholic tradition, doctrine and scripture since I was a wee lad. Catholics make up around 20% of Americans and roughly the same amount of the entire world with over 1.2 billion Catholics across the globe. Many of you know, or are, Catholics, yet in our modern world, anti-Catholicism is perfectly acceptable on all societal levels, be they interpersonal, corporate, governmental or anything else. It doesn’t matter. Anti-Catholicism has been around in this country since its inception, and it remains today as the bigotry of choice in secular, liberal and elite circles, as perfectly described by Father James Martin, S.J. in his excellent piece “Is Anti-Catholicism The Last Acceptable Prejudice?”
Another expert in the field is Philip Jenkins, who wrote “The New Anti-Catholicism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice.” In this book, he argues that given America’s long history of anti-Catholicism, we have embedded in our culture a large body of stereotypes that we can draw on whenever the Church does something. It allows us to say “well, this is just the way this group behaves,” in a way that used to work for the right-wing in this country with anti-Semitism. Anti-Catholicism, in turn, has become a similar tradition for the left-wing in this country, hence the idea of the “thinking man’s anti-Semitism.” I will further discuss this left-wing discrimination of Catholics later in this piece, but first, we need to discuss the history of anti-Catholicism in America.
Part II: Historia Anti-Catholicismi in America
We all learn as kids about the Pilgrims who came to the rocky shores of Massachusetts looking for religious freedom. This is true, but not in the way you probably think. No, they came to America seeking freedom from the Anglican Church where they could practice only their puritanical form of Protestantism and not afford others the same luxury. Not even other Protestants, let alone Jews or Catholics, could practice their religion freely. See Massachusetts Bay Colony’s “Act Against Jesuits and Popish Priests” from 1700 which banned Catholics from the colony in its entirety. Even Rhode Island, founded by Roger Williams as a place for true religious freedom in the colonies, forbade Catholics from holding office after 1719.
By the 1840’s, the Industrial Revolution had taken hold, and soon, millions of Catholics from Ireland, Italy and Germany would immigrate to the United States, where they were met about as well as Sheriff Bart when he arrives in Rock Ridge in Blazing Saddles. Discrimination was plentiful, with possibly the most famous example being in “Irish Need Not Apply” signs which adorned store windows as late as 1909.
Racial prejudice was far from the only source of hatred towards Catholics, as conspiracy theories were wildly popular, perhaps none more so than those found in the 1836 book Awful Disclosures by Maria Monk: The Hidden Secret of a Nun’s Life in a Convent Exposed. In this book, Monk claimed that Sisters in a convent in Montreal were forced to have intercourse with the priests from the nearby seminary. Supposedly, the priests came to the convent through a secret tunnel, and if they produced a child after copulating, the child was baptized, strangled, then dumped in a pit in the basement. As it turns out, Protestant clergymen were sent to investigate the claim and the convent, and they discovered that the interior was incompatible with Monk’s descriptions. Despite this debunking by a neutral third party, the book was published many times and sold over 300,000 copies.
Despite all this, Catholics continued to come to the New World, and some began to view them as a threat towards democracy (sound familiar?). Ellen G. White, co-founder of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church, claimed that Catholics would force every citizen to worship on Sunday, including the Seventh-Day Adventists, who worship on Saturday. This conspiracy is still promoted today in a book titled National Sunday Law.
The influx of Catholics into the country also led to the creation of the nativist Know-Nothing Party, which often used violence and intimidation prevent Catholics from being elected to public office. For example, on August 6, 1855, armed Know-Nothing mobs made a show of force to prevent Catholics from rigging the election (ironic, isn’t it?) and then proceeded to rob, beat and murder Catholics across the city of Louisville, Kentucky, as well as destroy the city’s cathedral. Know-Nothing mayors, such as Levi Boone of Chicago, banned Catholic immigrants from the city’s government and police force. Article Six of the Constitution forbids any religious tests for candidates seeking public office, but it wasn’t until 1961’s Torcaso v. Watkins Supreme Court case where it was ruled that this applied to state government positions, not just federal government positions. Up until then, many Catholics were simply forbidden from running for office on the state level.
Of course, I would be remiss to discuss anti-Catholic bigotry in this country without mentioning the notorious Ku Klux Klan, who took over as the primary antagonizer of the Catholics after the dissolution of the Know-Nothings in 1860. From cross burnings to murdering priests such as Fr. James Coyle, the Klan did it all to fight the “papists” (as they liked to call the Catholics). They also tried to intimidate politicians, with one famous example happening in 1923 when Harry Truman was approached by a KKK member who tried to intimidate him into not appointing Catholics to positions of power while he was a county court judge in Jackson County, Missouri.
Anti-Catholic political cartoons depicted Catholics in a similar vein as to how the Soviets were depicted in Cold War propaganda: a lurking predator waiting to strike at a moment of weakness. One of the Klans biggest efforts to destroy Catholicism in America was with their 1922 tag-team effort with the Freemasons to pass the Oregon Compulsory Education Act, which would have closed down all private schools and forced all students to attend public school, where Catholic children could be indoctrinated into abandoning their Catholic roots. After opposition from parents and the Knights of Columbus, the case was brought before the Supreme Court in 1925’s Pierce v. Society of Sisters where the court decided that the Act was unconstitutional and that parents had the right to determine their children's education.
Protestants in America would continue to detest and reject Catholics in the United States into the 20th century, with Democrat Al Smith losing the 1928 presidential election in part due to his Catholic faith, as many voters outright refused to vote for a Catholic, and others still claiming that his opposition to prohibition was him imposing his Catholic values onto the public. It wouldn’t be until 1960 when another Catholic would step into the presidential election ring, this time a young senator named John F. Kennedy. In 1960, famed Evangelist Billy Graham held a secret meeting with fellow Protestants to find a way to halt Kennedy’s momentum in his campaign, as they had doubts regarding a Catholic’s ability to run the country without being influenced by the Vatican. Kennedy had to give a speech to keep the “religion issue” to the sidelines, and this laid the groundwork for future Catholic candidates.
Part III: Praeiudicium Saecularium
Starting in the 1980’s, anti-Catholic sentiment began to come less and less from Protestants and more from secular, atheistic sources, thanks to the unification of Protestants and Catholics on issues such as abortion and the Sexual Revolution. Of course, some bigotry against Catholics still comes from Protestant sources, but mainly from conspiracies, such as those of Jack Chick, who claimed such wacky things as the Vatican having a computer in its basement that kept the names of every Protestant in the world, the Jesuits sinking the Titanic, and that the Jesuits also sent seductive teenagers to trick Protestant pastors to fall into sin. Riiiiiiiight.
Secular forces came to become the biggest anti-Catholic group in America. In 1989, hundreds of protestors were arrested at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, claiming the Church’s opposition to abortion and homosexuality were threats to their very lives. This event, known as Stop the Church, saw protestors telling parishioners to “curb your dogma” and other similar sentiments. One man dressed up as Jesus Christ and said such things as, “I am JC, the son of man, and I support a woman’s right to choose. Jesus is pro-choice!” and, “Jesus says, ‘teach safe sex,’” and, “Well there was a rumor that I used to hang around with about 12 guys, so let me tell you, the Passion in the garden, I really could have used a condom then cause boy did I get fucked.” I hope I don’t have to explain to you why this is incredibly offensive and bigoted.
Throughout the 80’s & 90’s, more open hostility towards Catholics emerged from the secular elites. This could be seen with anti-Catholic films like The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) and Dogma (1999), Catholic characters in television becoming more and more stereotypical, with modern depictions often portraying priests as pedophiles and nuns as ninny, superstitious morons. Don’t believe me? Watch any cop show from the last 20 years and tell me when either of these types of people were portrayed in a positive light. Imagine of TV shows had every rabbi character be a greedy moneylender, or every imam be a terrorist insurrectionist, it would be called out, and rightly so, but why is it ok to portray priests like this?
After news of the Catholic Church sex abuse scandal broke thanks to the Boston Globe’s Spotlight team, many people used this to retroactively justify their anti-Catholic bigotry and continue to do so to this day. The sex abuse scandal was a horrible and evil thing, no doubt about it, but blaming and hating all Catholics or even the faith itself for that is akin to blaming all Muslims for terrorism and saying that Islam is a dangerous faith because of it. We don’t tolerate that way of thinking as a society, so why do we still tolerate this exact same way of thinking around Catholicism? How about this example from Sharon, Massachusetts. Shortly after 9/11, the local high school was concerned that their Halloween celebration may see upticks of anti-Arab or anti-Muslim prejudice, so the teachers were placed on high alert. Fortunately, no one came dressed as Bin Laden, so they all enjoyed a wonderful day without prejudice… and then they awarded the prize for the most comical costume to three boys dressed as two pregnant nuns and priest who impregnated them. This prejudice wasn’t just acceptable, it was invisible to the school and the society as a whole.
Many might say that they are only attacking the Church’s leaders for the scandal and not ordinary Catholics, but this is a logical fallacy. As an example, if you attack the NAACP, no one will argue that is an attack on African-Americans, so what makes the Catholic Church different? Other organizations do not occupy the integral and central role in the structure of the religion that the Church occupies for Catholics. If you’re just attacking the Chruch and clergy, then what does that say about the ordinary Catholics who believe in that horrible, evil and stupid religion? How foolish and gullible must they be? Catholicism is a special case in which one simply cannot separate the institution from the believers of it because it is the tenet upon which their faith and religious lives revolve. An attack on it is an attack on Catholics.
Part IV: Odium Catholicorum in Modernis Temporibus
From 2018-2020, anti-Catholic hate crimes rose by 50%, and there has been an epidemic of vandalism and arson attacks on Catholic churches and schools (don’t worry too much, Catholics, Jews still far outpace you in terms of hate crimes committed against them).
In 2017, during Amy Coney Barrett’s Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals nomination, former senator-turned-living husk Methuselah Diane Feinstein questioned Barrett’s capability to serve on the bench, not due to any lack of qualifications from the highly competent judge, but rather because of her Catholic faith. “The dogma lives loudly within you, and that is a concern,” the then-octogenarian (now nonagenarian) senator said. These apparent concerns popped up again during the hearings for her Supreme Court nomination in what can only be described as an unconstitutional religious test. She’s not the only one, as many in the elite, liberal circles of intelligentsia, academia and government have taken umbrage with the supposed Catholic domination of the Supreme Court, with six of the nine justices being Catholic (anti-Catholic folks tend to count Justice Gorsuch as a Catholic since he was raised as one but later converted to Anglicanism, making it 7). For example, late night host Bill Maher said during the Barrett confirmations that the Supreme Court has “too many Catholics,” and that, “Chuck Schumer said Democrats won’t make Barrett’s religion an issue, but they should, because being nuts is relevant.” Imagine someone saying that there were too many blacks on the Supreme Court; how well would that go over?
The U.S. so-called Justice Department has done nothing to combat this rise in anti-Catholic hate crimes. Instead, the FBI has been targeting devout Catholics as radical extremists. Apparently having a fondness for a Latin mass and praying the rosary daily are indicators of religious extremism. Did you hear the story of Mark Houck? He is a Catholic, pro-life man from Pennsylvania who alleged committed the misdemeanor of disorderly conduct at an abortion facility. The local Democrat DA didn’t even bother to prosecute since there was no case, and a private civil suit that occurred afterwards was dismissed, but that didn’t stop Attorney General Merrick Garland’s Justice Department from sending 30 FBI agents armed with high-powered rifles and riot shields to his home in the wee hours of the morning after he had offered to turn himself in voluntarily. He was later found not guilty, despite the corrupt DOJ’s attempt to silence him and his beliefs. Below is a video of Senator Josh Hawley absolutely destroying the blubbering buffoon Garland’s attempt at justifying his anti-Catholic and anti-American weaponization of government. (I recommend watching from 0:45-4:00)
And most recently, I can’t mention public and brazen displays of anti-Catholic bigotry without mentioning the LA Dodgers’ hosting of the “Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence,” a group of anti-Catholic degenerates who mock and disgrace the Sisterhood of Nuns. These are men who dress like nuns in such a perverse way to put the perennial “slutty nun” costumes to shame. They also give themselves highly offensive names based on those of real Catholic saints, just to mock them, with some examples including: Sister Anita Blowjob, Sister GladAss of the Joyous Reserectum, Sister Hellena Handbasket, Sister Sensible Shoes, and Sister Homo Celestial.
The Dodgers awarded these limp-wristed, licentious losers with their coveted “Community Hero Award” in case you needed any more proof that Los Angeles is beyond saving. Catholics across the country, including players on the Dodgers, voiced their opposition to their faith being so openly and cynically mocked and degraded as some sort of perverse entertainment, and the Dodgers rescinded their invitation… only to cave in and reinvite them. One can only imagine the kind of backlash the Dodgers would receive if they invited the “Harem of Muhammed’s Child Brides” who wear suicide vests and perform sex acts on goats, or “Schmeckle, Fakakta and Shekelstein” who wear big hook nose prosthetics and dive like Scrooge McDuck into giant piles of gold drenched in the blood of Christian children. These sound ludicrous and offensive, and they are, so why is it so repulsive to our society to degrade and stereotype every other religion and ethnic group except for Catholics?
Part V: Finitione
So, what is the solution here? For non-Catholics we as a society need to get over our animosity towards Catholics. They are deserving of the same rights and respect as every other group in this country. We need to stand up against anti-Catholic bigotry whenever we see it and call it out for what it is. This stereotyping and hatred has been normalized in our society for a long time, but we can be the ones to change it. For Catholics, we need to avoid falling into the trap of perpetual victimhood, as that only ever harms the group who thinks that way. People are allowed to poke fun and make jokes at Catholics’ expense, just like with everyone else. However, that does not mean you have to sit and take everything. No, it is best to clear up falsehoods surrounding the faith and stand up when it’s something truly offensive, like the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, attacks saying there are “too many Catholics” on the Supreme Court, or your religious tradition being call evil, pedophilic, nuts, backwards or anything like that.
Let’s all come together as one nation and finally stamp out the last acceptable prejudice in this country, Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam.
For those who are interested in further reading on the subject, below are some great books and articles on anti-Catholicism in the United States that I recommend and used while researching this topic.
The New Anti-Catholicism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice by Philip Jenkins (Book)
“Is Anti-Catholicism the Last Acceptable Prejudice?” by James Martin, S.J. (Article)
“The Last Acceptable Prejudice, an Interview with James Martin, S.J.” by Emma Green (Article)
The Persistent Prejudice: Anti-Catholicism in America by Michael Schwartz (Book)
Anti-Catholicism in America, 1620-1860 by Maura Jane Farrelly (Book)
Great read. Everything is perfect (although we all know the jesuits DID sink the Titanic)
Excellent article , Mark. Well said and we do have to speak up more. !