In Light of Jamie Stiehm & U.S. News What Is Acceptable Anti Catholicism

The disturbing Jamie Stiehm 's Anti Catholic Rant in U.S. News and World Report makes me want to return to a subject that comes up from time to time. As to public life what is acceptable anti Catholicism and what is not . For that matter just take out the word Catholicism and insert Baptist , Evangelical , etc.

I thought Michael Potemra thoughts on this were good today at Sonia Sotomayor and Anti-Catholicism . He says in part :

In recent years, the term “anti-Catholic” has been getting too much like “racist” and “sexist” for my taste: a bludgeon with which to bully people who disagree on some issue. If you fling that accusation against somebody, you’re basically saying the reason he disagrees with you is that he’s a bigot. Our public life has lost a great deal because of the promiscuous use of these words.

Amen to that .

Catholics are sometimes the worse at being offended and  throwing out anti Catholic in a context it should not be as to participation in the public square. In fact this often becomes an anti Evangelical  attack in the worse sense of the word.

Examples of this can be found on Pastor Hagee's scriptural and theological views on the Catholic Church and how it became problematic to appear on a platform with him. Recall the Huckabee situation .

The same can be said for the situation involving a big Southern Baptist Dallas minister and his scriptural and theological views on Catholicism during the Romney campaign. The fact that they viewed Catholicism and Mormonism  as horribly wrong , misguided , is not an " extreme " view.  Yet many said NO YOU CAN'T associate with these people as a common political cause.

It should be noted that none of these pastors ever that I could find said you could not or should not vote for an Catholic in public life .

Thomas Jefferson and John Adams might have thought the Church of Rome was off it's rocker and viewed it with suspicion . However there is nothing in their letters , or history , that said they transferred this attitude that Catholics had an couple of strikes against them if they wanted to enter the American public square. In fact there is nothing I have read among Catholic American Patriots of the time that worked with Adams and Jefferson that saw them as a threat to their public involvement.

Let us also recall that the President Jefferson pretty much made the Catholic population of the United States increase by an incredible number by the Louisiana purchase. He had to battle the anti Catholic objections that were a part of that discussion.

The improper SCARY needs to be called out anti Catholicism is what we saw in U.S. News and World  Report. As Michael Potemra said " in this case, use of such language is appropriate: That article over at U.S. News is, simply, anti-Catholic. "

A double Amen to that. 

I think it is fine that I think the Southern Baptist doctrine of one saved always saved might be leading folks to hell. On the flip side I have no problem in my political and social associations with folks if they think I am a misguided Mary worshiper whose soul is in danger.

There is a difference between an anti Catholicism that disagrees with the Catholic doctrine of the Pope and an anti Catholicism that basically tries to excommunicate you from social , civic , and political life. What we saw in Newsweek is the latter.