Rick Hinshaw

The upheaval over New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s attack on charter schools highlights the urgent need for more alternatives to failing public schools in our inner cities and other areas of poverty; for greater parental choice in determining the best schools for their children; and—in order to both empower parents and broaden their alternatives—for fairer, less politically volatile methods of allocating educational resources.

What the current situation cries out for is an educational voucher system.

For years parents looking for alternatives to failing inner city public schools turned to Catholic schools to provide their children with the rigorous academic standards, discipline, core values, and parental involvement essential to a quality education. But because they were denied access to public funds to educate their children, many such parents—despite the fact that per-pupil expenditures to educate a child in Catholic schools are well below those of public schools—were simply unable to afford Catholic school tuition. So many inner city children remained trapped in failing public schools, while many high-performing Catholic schools have been forced to close.

Over the last two decades, charter schools have stepped into the breach, offering, according to noted New York writer Seth Lipsky, “a compromise effort to save public schools” through modest reforms —primarily freeing these schools from the stranglehold of the teachers’ unions. In doing so, charters have clearly followed the successful Catholic school model, from academics and parental involvement to discipline and values—right down to the importance of school uniforms. Obviously missing is the spiritual component, which has allowed charter schools to sidestep the bogus “church-state” issue used—by anti-Catholic bigots, yes, but more cynically by the teachers’ unions that have exploited such bigotry to maintain their monopoly on educational tax dollars.

We saw this again just weeks ago in New York State, when the state legislature—”despite explicit support from the vast majority of the state’s elected officials,” according to Cardinal Timothy Dolan— omitted from the state budget an Education Investment Tax Credit opposed by the public school teachers’ unions. This proposal would have allowed tax credits for donations to public schools as well as to scholarship programs for private or parochial schools. “Once again, Catholic school kids get kicked to the curb,” said Dolan—despite the fact that Catholic schools save New York taxpayers $9 billion a year.

As de Blasio has now made clear, however, charter school parents are always one election—or one large teachers’ union campaign contribution—away from having their children’s high-performing schools ripped out from under them. So charters too, like Catholic, private and other parochial schools, need a more stable system for allocating public funds than one that places their children’s education at the mercy of shifting political winds and opportunistic politicians.

Again, Seth Lipsky: “A true voucher system would give parents, who are the customers of the school system, far greater choice,” allowing parents to direct the money being spent on their child’s education to the school of their choice— whether it be a charter or traditional public school, or a private or parochial school.

As Adam Emerson of the Fordham Institute for Advancing Educational Excellence reports, some 16 voucher programs nationally already direct state funds to families “to help offset the cost of a private (mostly religious) education.” And Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) recently proposed a federal educational voucher program. But most of these voucher plans are severely restricted—by income levels, locations, or limitations of allocated funds. As such their impact, while positive, has been very limited. Ideally, the state would determine the total amount of public funds to be spent per student, and issue a voucher to every parent to direct that money for their child to the school of their choice.

Of course, charter school leaders might be resistant to the idea, as the current system, whereby they have access to public funds, gives them a decided advantage over private and parochial schools. But given the long waiting lists for charter schools virtually anywhere they exist—and the limits on their number imposed under current funding systems—a true, comprehensive voucher program, by allocating tax dollars in direct proportion to the demand for each type of school, would free up money for expansion of charter schools, private or parochial schools—or traditional public schools, if that’s where the increased parental demand was.

It would also engender a competition for the education dollar that could only stimulate the pursuit of excellence in all types of schools, where any school closures would result from level of performance, not, as is the case today, from political favoritism, union strong-arming, and religious discrimination.

And a comprehensive voucher program would also secure the rights of parents who want spiritual formation to be an integral part of their children’s education –”a freedom,” Emerson notes, “guaranteed by federal and state courts alike.”

“It’s time,” writes Lipsky, who is Jewish, “to start addressing the legal legacy of the kind of bigotry that was turned on Catholic education in the 19th century.” It is “time to make it easier for religious schools to help educate our children.”

 Rick Hinshaw is editor of the Long Island Catholic magazine.

After reading an article by Kansas Congressman Tim Huelskamp on the state of religious liberty in the military, I asked a staff member to contact his office, requesting permission to reprint it. It was happily granted. It is the best summary of this subject I have seen.

We have been tracking this issue for some time, and we are especially concerned about the undue influence that Mikey Weinstein has had in bullying the armed forces to walk his secular line. Weinstein is the president of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation. Earlier this year his lawyers tried to bully me when I criticized his work, but to no avail: I told them to take a walk.

As president of the nation’s largest lay Catholic civil rights organization, and as a U.S. Air Force veteran of the Vietnam era, I take great umbrage at those who seek to squash the First Amendment rights of servicemen and women. Things have gotten out of control, and that is why I threw the support of the Catholic League behind Rep. Huelskamp’s bill, the Military Religious Freedom Protection Act.

For decades, a movement has been under way to secularize our culture and our social institutions. We, along with others, have been pushing back, and have scored a number of victories. But the assault on the military, in the form of political correctness, is not just another turf war: it’s a pernicious effort to drive religion away from those who rely on it for life and death reasons.

This article was originally published on August 1 by Breitbart.com. Please pass it around to your family and friends, especially to those in the military, and veterans. Thank God we have congressmen like Rep. Huelskamp, a Roman Catholic, to represent us.

Bill Donohue

Congressman Tim Huelskamp:

If Army chaplain Emil Kapaun served in Afghanistan today rather than Korea six decades ago, President Obama would probably give the Catholic priest discharge papers instead of the Congressional Medal of Honor.

In Obama’s Army, the Pentagon brass is ordained in the priesthood of political correctness, while devout Christians such as Medal of Honor recipient Emil Kapaun are shunned and ostracized.  At all times between the presidential terms of George Washington and George W. Bush, the open practice of Christianity in the ranks was widespread and the open practice of homosexuality was deemed incompatible with military service. In the Obama era, the reverse is true.

President Obama is a wartime Commander-in-Chief. No, I don’t mean the obvious (Iraq or Afghanistan). I’m talking about his preference for waging a race war, a gender war, class warfare, generational warfare, and – with escalating aggression and mounting casualties – a culture war.  With the exceptions of free enterprise and traditional marriage, no institution has been more “radically transformed” by the Obama regime than our Armed Forces. Given President Obama’s notorious contempt for Americans who “cling to their Bibles” and “guns,” perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised by his Administration’s hostility to service members who espouse traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs.

The persecution of Christians and conservatives has become increasingly brazen and pervasive since the President took office four and half years ago.  To “protect patients” from proselytizing or prayer, Walter Reed Army Medical Center banned wounded warriors’ family members from “bringing or using Bibles” during visits. The Department of Veterans Affairs barred Christian prayers at a National Cemetery. The President signed the law that repealed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the Attorney General refused to defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in court, and the Department of Defense authorized unholy “matrimony” ceremonies at military installations even before the Supreme Court struck down part of DOMA.

A war games scenario at Ft. Leavenworth identified evangelical Christian groups as a national security threat.

A field grade officer listed the American Family Association and Family Research Council as “domestic hate groups” and directed his subordinate officers to monitor soldiers who might be supporters. Evangelist Franklin Graham was un-invited from the Pentagon’s National Day of Prayer service. A training exercise funded by the Department of Homeland Security portrayed home-schooling families as the domestic terrorists.

Last year, I introduced the Military Religious Freedom Protection Act. The bill requires the military to accommodate service members’ moral principles and religious beliefs so long as they don’t “threaten good order and discipline,” forbids the military from using an individual’s beliefs as the basis for an adverse personnel action, and forbids the military from forcing chaplains to perform homosexual marriage ceremonies. My bill’s language was included in the National Defense Authorization Act passed by Congress last December.

When President Obama signed it into law, he claimed the conscience protections I authored were “unnecessary and ill-advised.” But recent events confirm the new law was necessary, well-advised, and prophetic. These episodes exemplify the new military culture, one that rebukes those who practice Christianity and rewards those who worship at the altar of political correctness.

Army Master Sergeant Nathan Sommers’ superiors told him to remove the conservative, Republican, and scripture-quoting bumper stickers from his personal vehicle. He was told he must avoid being seen reading books authored by Mark Levin, Sean Hannity, or  David Limbaugh while in uniform. He was investigated for serving Chick-fil-A food at his promotion party to express his support for traditional marriage. In retribution, the Army is pursuing trumped up disciplinary charges against him.

The Utah Air National Guard cancelled the six-year re-enlistment contract of Tech Sergeant Layne Wilson because he told a chaplain he thought the chapel at West Point shouldn’t be used for a homosexual wedding. An Air Force officer was required to hide from view the Bible he once kept on top of his desk. An Air Force chaplain’s video tribute to sergeants was banned for fear it would offend an “agnostic, atheist, or Muslim.” The chaplain’s video narration said: “On the eighth day, God looked down on His creation and said, ‘I need someone who will take care of the Airmen.’ So God created a First Sergeant.”

Coast Guard Rear Admiral William Lee told a National Day of Prayer audience that Christian service members are being told to hide their faith and religious liberty is being threatened by Pentagon lawyers. Army Reserve training materials listed Evangelical Christianity, Catholicism, and Orthodox Judaism as extremist religious groups alongside Al-Qaeda and Hamas.  This is especially outrageous since the Obama Administration continues to classify the mass shooting at Ft. Hood (in which 13 people were killed by Army Major Nidal Hasan) as “workplace violence” rather than admit it was a terrorist attack carried out by a radicalized Muslim.

In April, several Generals consulted Mikey Weinstein–the anti-Christian zealot dedicated to attacking men and women of any faith–to solicit his help writing Air Force policies concerning “religious tolerance.” If there’s one person whose advice the Pentagon brass shouldn’t solicit, it is that of Mr. Weinstein, a man who says the military ranks are full of “Christian fundamentalist monsters” whose evangelizing constitutes “spiritual rape,” “a national security threat,” and “sedition and treason.” After Weinstein telephoned the Pentagon to complain about a painting displayed at Mountain Home Air Force Base in Idaho, it was removed less than one hour later. The painting bore the word “Integrity” and the citation “Matthew 5:9” (the verse says: “Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called children of God”).

Mr. Weinstein bragged to the Washington Post that the Defense Department expressed its willingness to ban proselytizing (i.e., evangelizing, sharing one’s faith, or spreading the Gospel) and added, “We need half a dozen court-martials real quick.” Days later, the Pentagon issued a statement to the news media that announced: “Religious proselytization is not permitted within the Department of Defense.”  After reading about this alarming situation on my Facebook page, a Sergeant First Class posted the following comment: “This is why I am retiring. … The liberals are destroying our values.” One wonders how long before the radical Weinstein and his Pentagon pals find and punish this Sergeant.

These revelations highlight the fact that Obama’s war on God-fearing servicemen is not only morally repugnant, but also threatens the long-term soundness of our voluntary military. Who wants to join an organization that increasingly caters to homosexuals and atheists, meanwhile denigrating Christians and traditional marriage? If you care nothing at all about the constitutional free exercise rights of our servicemen, surely you can at least see the dangers to military readiness posed by such harassment and persecution.

In April, I attended the White House ceremony at which President Obama presented Ray Kapaun with the Congressional Medal of Honor awarded posthumously to his uncle, Chaplain (Captain) Emil Kaupan. A farm boy from my congressional district in Kansas, the “Patriot Priest of the Korean Conflict” saved countless lives of fellow soldiers on the battlefield, along the death march to the Pyoktong Prisoner of War camp, and during the seven months of captivity that preceded his murder by communist Chinese guards in May 1951.

I can only imagine what Mr. Weinstein would say about the “how to witness Christianity” proselytizing clinic that Fr. Kapaun put on in the POW camp or this report of repatriated American soldiers: “He was their hero – their admired and beloved ‘padre’. He kept up the G.I.’s morale, and most of all [caused] a lot of men to become good Catholics.”

It speaks volumes that Fr. Kapaun had Protestants, Jews, and atheists saying the Rosary, singing the Lord’s Prayer, and praying together at the Easter sunrise service he led, all in defiance of the communist camp guards who ridiculed his devotion to faith and punished him for it. In a detailed account of the priest’s life, Arthur Tonne wrote: “He has transmitted to every one of us a new appreciation of America, and a keener, more realistic understanding of our country’s greatest enemy – godlessness.”

When Fr. Kapaun was being carried to the “Death House” (i.e., isolation without food or water), the Muslim POWs from Turkey stood at attention to honor him.  According to witnesses, Fr. Kapaun blessed the very guards who were murdering him by saying, “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.” President Obama should be earnestly and prayerfully seeking more such men, not forging a military where they are not welcome, or where the very actions that once earned them the Medal of Honor are now forbidden by the Commander-in-Chief.

Congressman Tim Huelskamp represents the Big First District of Kansas.

Bill Donohue

The Catholic Church has many teachings that touch on public issues, and it’s only fair that they be subject to critical analysis. But it’s hardly too much to ask that its critics substantiate their charges. Unfortunately, the tendency of the media to swing wildly became commonplace once it was learned that Pope Benedict XVI had resigned.

Take, for one example, a recent front-page story in the New York Times. Reporter Laurie Goodstein wrote a piece containing factual errors and blatant omissions; she also used many sources with damaged credentials.

Goodstein claimed that Benedict “put children at risk by failing to report pedophiles or remove them from the priesthood.” This is thrice incorrect: (a) many priests have been removed from ministry under Benedict (b) children have not been put at risk and (c) pedophiles have never been the problem.

Rev. Marcial Maciel was rightly cited as “a pathological abuser and liar,” but for Goodstein to mention his name while contend- ing that the pope never removed a molesting priest from ministry, was positively astonishing. Who does she think dumped Maciel in 2006? Moreover, the pope not only removed him, he put the entire order of priests he founded, the Legion of Christ, in receivership.

Goodstein’s claim of children being at risk under Benedict while citing pedophilia as the problem, has been undercut by many scholars, including one she cites, psychology professor Thomas G.. Plante. Plante found that “80 to 90% of all priests who in fact abuse minors have sexually engaged with adolescent boys, not prepubescent children. Thus, the teenager is more at risk than the young altar boy or girls of any age.”

In other words, the scandal—which ended more than a quarter-century ago (most abuse cases occurred between the mid-60s and mid-80s)—rarely involved children. This finding is consistent with the work of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, which found that less than five percent of molesting priests were pedophiles. In almost every case, it’s been homosexual priests hitting on teenage boys, the most common offense of which has been “inappropriate touching.”

Unfortunately, for politically correct reasons, even those who honestly collect data, including Plante and the John Jay professors, are reluctant to discuss the role homosexual priests have played in molesting minors. In fairness, it’s important to keep in mind that while most molesting priests have been homosexuals, not pedophiles, most homosexual priests have never been molesters. One reason this problem is almost non-existent today is because Benedict made it very difficult for practicing homosexuals to enter the priesthood. The results are in the numbers: in the last ten years, the annual average number of credible accusations made against over 40,000 priests has been in the single digits.

It needs to be said that the New York Times doesn’t exactly come to the table with clean hands on these matters. Consider Mark Thompson. On November 12, Thompson took over as the president of the New York Times Company, following a trail of accusations that when he was BBC chief, he failed to report child rapist Jimmy Savile, the BBC icon who worked there for decades.

Thompson denies hearing of Savile’s predatory behavior. Yet last September, his lawyers wrote a letter on his behalf threatening the London Sunday Times with a lawsuit if it ran a story implicating him in the Savile scandal.

Most astoundingly, he then claimed knowing nothing of the letter’s contents! So when it comes to pointing fingers about a sexual cover-up, the Times should be the last to do so.

One of the most irresponsible critics of the Catholic Church on this matter is Judge Anne Burke. She is quoted by Goodstein as blaming every single cardinal for this problem. “They all have participated in one way or another in having actual information about criminal conduct, and not doing anything about it.” Ideally, she should be sued for libel. But she knows that no cardinal is going to do that. So she continues to throw mud.

In 2006, Burke said priests aren’t entitled to constitutional rights, and should be removed from ministry on the basis of a single unsubstantiated accusation. Anticipating criticism, Burke said, “We understand that it is a violation of the priest’s due process—you’re innocent until proven guilty—but we’re talking about the most vulnerable people in our society and those are children.” But her alleged interest in child welfare didn’t allow her to say whether non-priests should be denied their civil liberties when accused of wrongdoing.

Goodstein likes to use Terry McKiernan’s name as a credible source. McKiernan is director of a website tracking abuse cases. At a 2011 SNAP conference, he said, without a shred of evidence, that New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan was “keeping the lid on 55 names” of predator priests. This is an out-and-out lie: Dolan isn’t covering for any priest.

If Dolan is guilty, then McKiernan himself should be willing to disclose the names of the 55 priests, but he refuses. This is typical of him. Like Burke, he has a different standard for accused priests: in 2011 he said they should be removed from

ministry before an accusation is even investigated. Not surprisingly, when the John Jay study was released, McKiernan condemned it the day before it was issued.

The last critic Goodstein cites is SNAP director David Clohessy. In the New York Daily News, he is quoted saying, “We’re trying to keep this issue front and center.” He needs to—he’s broke. On February 23, SNAP sent a desperate e-mail to its donors saying, “We are barely meeting our everyday expenses.”

One reason why SNAP is in bad shape is that Clohessy has had to come up with the big bucks to pay for lawyers after being sued for refusing to turn over SNAP records about his allegedly shady operations. Although he demands transparency from the Church, Clohesssy refuses to disclose his own funding sources (we know that much comes from Church-suing lawyers like Jeffrey Anderson). As dishonest as they come, Clohessy was asked before a Missouri court in 2011, “Has SNAP to your knowledge ever issued a press release that contained false information?” He didn’t blink. “Sure.”

For decades, Clohessy has thrown rhetorical bombs at the Church, arguing what a crime it is for anyone in the Church not to report a suspected molester. But when it comes to himself, it’s a different story. In the 1990s, he knew about the predatory behav- ior of a molesting priest and never called the cops. That priest was his brother Kevin. This is no matter of conjecture—he’s admitted it.

No one with any sense of dignity should ever seek to defend the behavior of a molester. It must also be said that when such a serious issue like this is being discussed, no one with any sense of dignity should make irresponsible charges or sweeping generalizations.

Unsubstantiated accusations aren’t limited to the Times. Over the past several weeks, most of the big city newspapers have car- ried stories hurling wild accusations at the Catholic Church. Nor is the problem confined to the U.S.

On the eve of the conclave, two Australian newspapers, The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald, ran a story by Barney Zwartz indicting Cardinal George Pell, Archbishop of Sydney. It cited accusations by Dr. Paul Collins that Pell had “long [been] dogged” by charges of sexual abuse, thus disqualifying him as a serious papal candidate. This is a pernicious lie.

First of all, Collins is an ex-priest who resigned in 2001 after clashing with the Vatican; he has a long record of defending every dissident on a wide range of subjects. Second, Pell was completely exonerated of allegations that he abused a teenager in the 1960s. Third, Zwartz knew Pell was innocent: in 2010, he wrote that “an independent investigation by a retired non-Catholic judge cleared him.” Fourth, for Zwartz to cite accusations made by SNAP, the wholly discredited so-called victims’ group, showed how irresponsible he is. Fifth, CathNews, a prominent Catholic Australian media outlet, picked up the trashy story and then had to apologize for making “unfair, false and seriously defamatory allegations against Cardinal Pell, who has worked hard to eradicate the evil of sexual abuse.”

All of this is despicable. Zwartz used an embittered ex-priest to slam Cardinal Pell, knowing full well he’d been cleared of all charges. Most distressing was the work of the Catholic media. This isn’t the first time Catholic dissidents masking as Catholic journalists have sundered the reputation of a high-ranking member of the Church, but it’s one of the most egregious. Pell was so angry he threatened to sue the culprits.

The problem with yellow journalism is that once a false story is disseminated, especially in this day and age of Internet bloggers and social media, it’s difficult to root out. Corrections are sometimes printed in newspapers, but are rarely posted by bloggers. In the case of the false stories about Catholic leaders, it’s almost impossible to correct the record: believing the worst rumors about Catholicism isn’t a hard sell these days.

In 1964, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in New York Times v. Sullivan that public persons (those who are in the news), as opposed to private citizens, didn’t have the same rights for suing when their reputations were unfairly damaged. There’s a certain logic to this that’s commendable: how can there be a robust media when authors, writing about public persons, must extreme caution in what they say?

Under the ruling, people who believe they’ve been libeled must prove that those doing so knew what they said was inaccurate, and acted with malice. That’s a high bar to clear, but it protects the reporter’s right to free speech. It also plays into the hands of unscrupulous journalists who know they can get away with almost anything.

Is there more yellow journal- ism? Yes, but we shouldn’t put too much emphasis on Sullivan. What explains the surge in unpro- fessionalism is found in our culture, not in law. Frankly, the poli- tics of destruction—making ad hominem attacks designed to smear one’s reputation—reflects our culture of radical individual- ism, a culture long on rights, but short on responsibilities. The social results aren’t pretty.

It’s important to understand the social context that gives rise to unsubstantiated accusations, but ultimately there’s no excuse. The guilty know what they’re doing, and they should be held accountable.

The following article is adapted from Bill Donohue’s article on this subject that was posted on Newsmax.com on September 26.

The conventional wisdom holds that both vice presidential candidates, Rep. Paul Ryan and Vice President Joe Biden, are roughly equal in terms of their Catholic standing: Ryan is good on the life issues, but weak on social justice; the reverse is said to be true of Biden. But is it a draw? Not even close: only one of these Catholics—Biden—has been criticized,  reprimanded, and sanctioned by the bishops. Make that 17 bishops.

Before detailing all the trouble Biden has gotten into with the bishops, some debunking of the conventional wisdom is in order. Sister Simone Campbell, executive director of NETWORK, a Catholic dissident organization, is responsible for much of the mythology about Ryan.

Sister Simone began her speech at the Democratic National Convention saying, “Good evening. I’m Sister Simone Campbell, and I’m one of the ‘nuns on the bus.’” The fact of the matter is there were hardly any “nuns on the bus” (only two made the entire trip, and at no time were there more than six). In other words, the “nuns on the bus” story was a colossal media scam.

Sister Simone made more news when she said, “the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops stated that the Ryan budget failed a basic moral test, because it would harm families living in poverty.”

To put it politely, Sister Simone overreached. There was one bishop, Stockton Bishop Stephen Blaire, who wrote a letter on April 16 to two congressmen, Rep. Frank D. Lucas and Rep. Collin C. Peterson, leaders of the Committee on Agriculture, asking them to resist “unacceptable cuts to hunger and nutrition programs.” Nowhere in the letter is Rep. Paul Ryan’s name mentioned.

Bishop Blaire is the chairman of the Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), and he did speak on their behalf. But by saying on national television that the bishops had condemned the Ryan budget, Sister Simone was, in the words of theologian George Weigel, being “either woefully ignorant or willfully malicious.”

After distorting the record, Sister Simone proclaimed, “We agree with our bishops.” What is so remarkable about this statement is that it comes from the leader of NETWORK, a group hardly known for practicing fidelity to what the bishops say. In fact, when Sister Simone was asked at the Democratic National Convention if she supports laws that ban abortion, she took a page from her hero, President Obama, and replied, “That’s beyond my pay grade. I don’t know.”

NETWORK was founded in the early 1970s by radical nuns professing a strong belief in social justice but no interest whatsoever in abortion. It is so radical and disrespectful of what the bishops say that it has butted heads many times with the Church hierarchy in the U.S., as well as in Rome. In 1983, it took the side of a dissident nun who refused to denounce publicly funded abortions; when the nun refused, the Vatican stepped in to force her to leave her order. The very next year, Sister Marjorie Tuite, a founder of NETWORK, was herself threatened with expulsion from her order for her pro-abortion activities. I mentioned all of this to Sister Simone on a radio show earlier this year but she refused to comment on it.

In other words, it is not Rep. Ryan who has been called out by the Vatican for his dissident views—it is Sister Simone’s group.

The nonsense that Ryan’s budget was condemned by the bishops was floated by Dana Milbank in the Washington Post on April 27, just eleven days after Bishop Blaire’s letter was released. In his article, Milbank said, “the bishops sent letters to Congress” about Ryan’s budget. But the link he provides is only to Blaire’s letter. Similarly, on August 11, Melinda Henneberger wrote in a Washington Post blog that “the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops took the unusual step of repudiating the deep cuts envisioned in Ryan’s budget”; the link is to Milbank’s piece. Then on August 20, Robert P. Jones did an article for the same site saying “the bishops sharply repudiated the Ryan budget”; predictably, he linked to Henneberger’s post.

The Washington Post earns an “A” for getting its talking points down with precision; too bad it fails the test for accuracy. Their grade is actually worse than this: not only is it inaccurate to suggest that more than one bishop was upset with Ryan’s budget, it is intellectually dishonest not to mention those bishops who have spoken favorably about the Wisconsin congressman’s work. And unlike Bishop Blaire, Ryan’s supporters mentioned him by name.

Just before Milbank got the anti-Ryan train running, Ryan’s own bishop, Robert Morlino of the Diocese of Madison, wrote a column commending him. Bishop Morlino cited Ryan’s “accomplishments as a native son, and a brother in the faith.” In a subsequent radio interview, he said Ryan is an “excellent Catholic layman of the very highest integrity,” adding that he “understands the principles of Catholic social teaching” and applies them “very responsibly.”

More recently, Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois spoke in Green Bay, Wisconsin, saying, “Congressman Ryan is undoubtedly correct in asserting that the preferential option for the poor…does not entail ‘a preferential option for big government.’” Similarly, the president of the USCCB, Timothy Cardinal Dolan of the Archdiocese of New York, has written favorably of Ryan’s commitment to Catholicism.

When it comes to Vice President Joe Biden, it’s a different story. To put it mildly, he has incurred the wrath of the bishops, and on more than one occasion.

Biden got into big trouble with the bishops after his infamous 2008 appearance on “Meet the Press.” Tom Brokaw asked Biden if he agreed with the Catholic Church on abortion. “I’m prepared as a matter of faith to accept that life begins at conception. But that is my judgment. For me to impose that judgment on everyone else who is equally and maybe even more devout than I am seems to me is inappropriate in a pluralistic society.” He also said that in the Catholic Church there has long been a “debate” on when life begins.

Following the interview, the bishops weighed in with vigor:

• Cardinal Justin F. Rigali, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Pro-Life Activities, and Bishop William E. Lori, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Doctrine, issued a joint statement “to correct the misrepresentations” of Church teachings advanced by Biden. Indeed, they argued that “the Senator’s claim that the beginning of human life is a ‘personal and private’ matter of religious faith, one that cannot be ‘imposed’ on others, does not reflect the truth of the matter.”
• Speaking explicitly of Biden, as well as those Catholic politicians who share his position,  Bishop Samuel Aquila of Fargo, North Dakota said, “they really should not be presenting themselves for Holy Communion because it is a scandal.”
• Bishop Gregory Aymond of Austin released a statement by the bishops’ Administrative Committee, the highest authority of the USCCB outside the conference’s plenary sessions, affirming support for the position as outlined by Cardinal Rigali and Bishop Lori. “As teachers of the faith, we also point out the connectedness between the evil of abortion and political support for abortion.”
• Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput said of Biden that “I certainly presume his good will and integrity and I presume that his integrity will lead him to refrain from presenting himself for Communion.”
• Bishop Paul S. Coakley of Salina said, “Senator Biden confused the matter [of abortion] further by saying that he ‘knows when (life) begins for me,’ but that this is a ‘personal and private issue.’ That life begins at conception is a scientific fact, not a personal or subjective or philosophical or religious opinion.”
• Denver Auxiliary Bishop James D. Conley joined with Chaput in accusing Biden of “poor logic” and “bad facts.”
• Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy Dolan accused Biden of taking it upon himself to “explain Catholic teaching on abortion to the nation—and blundered badly.”
• Bishop W. Francis Malooly of Wilmington labeled Biden’s position “simply incorrect.” He said, “The Didache, probably the earliest Christian writing apart from the New Testament, explicitly condemns abortion without exception.”
• When Bishop Joseph F. Martino of Scranton was asked what he would say to Biden, he restated his position that “No Catholic politician who supports the culture of death should approach Holy Communion.” He added, “I will be truly vigilant on this point.”
• Bishop R. Walker Nickless of Sioux City slammed Biden for using a “false argument to justify [his] cooperation with evil.”
• Boston Archbishop Sean Cardinal O’Malley complained that he finds it “disturbing when politicians and others try to dismiss us [the bishops] as people with merely an ecclesiastical or religious sectarian point of view or opinion.”
• Bishop John Ricard of Tallahassee-Pensacola said Biden’s position indicated “a profound disconnection from [his] human and personal obligation to protect the weakest and most innocent among us: the child in the womb.”
• Bishop Edward Slattery of Tulsa blasted Biden for his “erroneous beliefs” about the beginning of life and for creating a “division” between “privacy and social responsibility” that was “tenuous.”
• Archbishop Donald Wuerl of Washington chastised Biden for not recognizing that “When life begins is not a matter of faith, but a matter of science.”

These 15 bishops are not alone. Prior to the “Meet the Press” fiasco, Biden was banned by his own bishop from speaking in Catholic schools. In 2006, Wilmington Bishop Michael A. Saltarelli also intervened to stop a building that was to be named after Biden at the Catholic high school he attended. In 2008, he said that if Biden were to become Vice President, he would still be barred from speaking at Catholic schools.

Subsequent to his “Meet the Press” interview, Biden was told in 2010 by Bishop Emeritus Henry Gracida of Corpus Christi that he “crossed the line as a Catholic” when he lobbied for a pro-abortion law in Kenya. Referring to Biden’s two aneurysms, the bishop said, “Perhaps God, who knows whether or not Biden’s brain was permanently damaged by his brain surgery, will not judge him too harshly, but the Church, which does not have that kind of knowledge should certainly speak out and reprimand him.”

The record is clear: there is absolutely no comparison between the Catholic standing of Rep. Paul Ryan and Vice President Joe Biden. Biden’s public defiance of Catholic teachings has gotten him into hot water with the bishops. Ryan, on the other hand, has never been punished by the bishops, and has indeed won the plaudits of many.

Fr. Robert Sirico

“Freedom rightly understood is not a license to behave like spoiled adolescents but rather the noble birthright of creatures made in the image of God,” says Fr. Robert Sirico in his new book Defending the Free Market: The Moral Case for a Free Economy. “As long as we refuse to sell this birthright for a mess of materialist pottage, hope remains.”

Fr. Sirico, president of the Acton Institute, recently talked to Catalyst about how markets can be made moral, the Christian’s role in health care, and why consumerism is incompatible with capitalism.

What does it mean for a market to be “moral”?

FR. SIRICO: The human person is the center of the market so the morality of a market is rooted in the morality of the human person. The market itself is neither moral nor immoral, but it becomes a vehicle for the moral and economic expression of the acting human person, who has the free will to choose good or bad. A moral market is therefore a market in which humans are making moral economic choices.

What does theology have to do with economics?

At its most fundamental level, economics is not about money—it’s about human action. How we answer the big questions—Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? What is man?—has an enormous impact on every facet of our lives, including how we work and buy and sell, and how we believe such activities should be directed. Much more than numbers are at stake here: intrinsic human dignity, flourishing and rights hang in the balance. That is why our theological commitments, particularly how we understand man, influences how we think about economics.

But economists don’t usually incorporate such theological commitments into their theories do they?

No, not directly. But their theological commitments are reflected in their anthropological presupposition, a view of man that I’d call homo economicus—economic man.

Homo economicus is the theoretical construct that appears frequently in the work of mainstream economists. Economic man is self-interested. His sole purpose in life is to maximize utility. He never stops calculating costs and benefits, and he’s anxious to render these in monetary terms so they can be put on a balance sheet and bought or sold in a market. The results dictate the choices he makes in life.

While homo economicus serves a purpose in the economics literature, we need to be careful not to mistake this economistic caricature for an accurate representation of man. In real life, people are motivated by much more than what economists describe as “maximizing utility”—especially where “utility” is understood in narrowly materialistic terms. What might be called “the economic truth of man” is true enough, but it is not the whole truth about who we are as human beings. That is why a theological understanding of man—a Christian anthropology—is necessary for developing a truly moral economy.

How would starting with a Christian understanding of man, rather than economic man, change our approach to economics?

Any man who was only economic man would be a lost soul, a physical being without transcendence. And any civilization whose markets and other institutions were filled by such economic men would soon enough be a lost civilization. Fortunately, this is not how human beings really are. We find ultimate fulfillment not in acquisition but in developing, sharing, and using our God-given creative capacities for good and giving of ourselves to others—for love.

While this is a Christian understanding of man, it’s not just the pie-in-the-sky thinking of a Catholic priest. There is hard data to back it up. For instance, researchers have found that sudden, unearned wealth does not permanently alter one’s level of happiness. What does tend to make people happier is earned success—in other words, the feeling of accomplishment that comes with a job well done, a job others find valuable.

Failing to understand that man is more than economic man leads to major errors in addressing social problems. If we treat only the symptoms of social ills—slapping more meddlesome regulation, government spending, or targeted tax cuts onto the surface of a problem without nourishing the wellsprings of human happiness—our solutions will fail. We need the more robust understanding of man that comes from the Christian tradition.

In your book you argue that the market can do a better job of taking care of people’s material needs than can a government safety net. Can you explain what you mean?

One thing we know about markets from a wide array of economic studies is that the less taxed and regulated a society is, the more prosperous it is. We also know the material needs of people are best met in societies that are prosperous, both in terms of the abundance of economic opportunities available and the amount of superfluous wealth that can be used generously to support the needs of those unable to provide for themselves.

How would you respond to critics who claim that defending capitalism is defending “big business”?

Too often when people object to “capitalism” what they are really against is the effects of crony-capitalism—the close relationships between “big business” and “big government.” I’m against this too.

Those who act from within the bureaucratic mentality are looking to conserve or advance their sphere of power and so will favor their friends and political allies. When linked to business, this dynamic in effect politicizes economics so that the businessperson is no longer attempting to serve the consumer but is attempting to increase their political power. The result is that businesses hire lobbyists to approach politicians and their representatives to curry favor in order to do business. This is not a phenomenon of markets but of politics.

Many Christians are skeptical about capitalism because it seems to encourage consumerism. But in your book you argue that consumerism actually makes capitalism “impossible over the long term.” What do you mean?

Many confuse a market economy with consumerism because they see a buy-buy-buy mentality as the outcome and goal of economic liberty. But consumerism is the muddled idea that only in having more can we be more. Consumerism is wrong not because material things are wrong. Consumerism is wrong because it worships what is beneath us.

Far from a synonym for capitalism, consumerism makes capitalism impossible over the long term, since it makes capital formation all but impossible. You can’t have sustainable capitalism without capital and you can’t have capital without savings. A consumer culture isn’t a saving culture; it isn’t a thrift culture. It’s too fixated on buying the next toy to ever delay gratification, to ever save and invest for the future. If people are running around spending everything they’ve earned, you may have a consumerist society but you don’t have a capitalist one.

Another common perception is that advocates of free enterprise are supporters of the greed and selfishness popularized by the atheist novelist Ayn Rand. Even GOP vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan has expressed his admiration for Rand. What is the attraction of her philosophy and why, as you mention in your book, is this problematic?

Since the 1940s Rand has had a strong appeal, especially to the young in search of heroes and idealism. Her idea of man is noble, and she is second to no one in defending freedom in the face of the totalitarian impulse, which she saw firsthand as she grew up in the newly formed Soviet Union. She also wrote passionately about man’s creative capacity and entrepreneurial potential, and about the need for social conditions that protect man’s freedom to be creative. These themes can be riveting and inspiring in Ayn Rand’s novels—they inspired me when I was in my twenties. But her foundational belief in radical individualism—an autonomy that precludes social obligation and responsibility—is obviously problematic.

Fortunately, most of the people I know who read her when they are young outgrow her. I suspect that is true of Congressman Ryan too. When he talks about what he likes about Rand all his references are to what we might call the “Good Rand.” Ryan is certainly not a “Randian.” In fact, Ayn Rand would despise much of what Ryan believes in, such as his pro-life views and his Catholic faith. It would not take a great imagination to construct what Rand would say about Ryan.

Rand rejected the Christian view of man, which holds that society consists of unique, unrepeatable humans, each made in the Image of God in such a way that each contributes something to society that no other individual could. People complement each other through their varied strengths and weaknesses so that all may survive and flourish.

In your book you discuss the role the Church played in developing hospitals and the modern health care system. How has the role of Christianity in health care changed in recent decades?

The Christian, and specifically, the Catholic influence on health care has suffered as government has taken a larger role. The establishment of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965 was perhaps the defining moment in the federal government’s becoming a permanent player in the health market. Since then the government’s participation has increased to the extent that there is virtually no truly free market for health care in the United States today. The effect has been that the role that Christian mercy once played has been replaced by anti-Christian values. By legalizing, condoning, and then subsidizing practices such as abortion and, increasingly, euthanasia, the federal government sends the message that these practices are morally permissible, and even a basic human right.

Consider the recent attacks on Catholic conscience by the Obama administration. The infamous HHS mandate that Catholic hospitals provide morally objectionable “services” such as contraception and abortion drugs is essentially a requirement that they give up their Catholic identity.

Unfortunately, the public has been slow to recognize this threat. Catholic health providers face the daunting challenge of convincing people the federal government is wrong in condoning and supporting such immoral actions. The Church will also have a difficult time continuing to provide the high quality health care that has emerged over the centuries, while attempting to avoid the federal government’s backlash. The challenges that we face—and let us be clear, this involves Catholics and non-Catholics alike—and the social unrest they may cause, should highlight the importance of religious freedom and economic freedom for the preservation of a just and flourishing society.

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Bill Donohue

In September, Bill Donohue wrote a four-part series that was featured on Newsmax.com. The series focused on the war on religion that has been waged by the administration of President Barack Obama. The series caught the attention of many in the media and is sure to be a topic of discussion in many quarters.

Obama’s Secular Mindset

The American people have been exceedingly fair in drawing a distinction between the personal religious beliefs and practices of presidential candidates and the public policies they adopt. This does not mean that personal predilections are without policy implications. To be sure, there are occasions when key personal anecdotes reveal something important about the mindset of candidates. Take, for example, what Michelle and Barack Obama told People magazine in 2008 about the “Obama House Rules.”

Of the seven “House Rules” they enumerated, most were conventional, but one stood out: Michelle and Barack do not believe in giving Christmas gifts to their children. Barack explained that he wants “to teach some limits.” The goal is noble. But of all the other choices available to them—setting spending limits, putting a limit on TV time—for some reason they chose the Christmas holiday as their teaching moment. This is more than unusual: non-Christians, as well as agnostics and atheists, are known to exchange Christmas gifts.

Against this backdrop, we can make sense of the controversy that erupted during the Obamas’ first Christmas at the White House. At issue was whether they should break tradition and nix the display of a manger scene.

The flap started when the New York Times reported that the Obamas were planning a “non-religious Christmas.” The leak came from a former White House social secretary who attended a luncheon for the new appointee, Desirée Rogers: allegedly, the Obamas were not going to permit the display of a nativity scene. When Times reporter Sheryl Gay Stolberg contacted the White House to see if this was true, the story was confirmed. Stolberg was told “there [have] been internal discussions about making Christmas more inclusive and whether to display the crèche.” In the end, the Obamas decided to allow a manger scene. However, Christmas did not escape without controversy. For reasons never explained, the White House Christmas tree was adorned with ornaments depicting drag queens and mass murderers (Mao Zedong was featured; he killed 77 million of his own people).

In 2008, when Obama was a presidential candidate, he made a comment about white working-class Christians that would come back to haunt him. “It’s not surprising,” he said, “[that] they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”  What proved to be so revealing about this admission was the venue: in a closed-door session, he addressed a forum of wealthy, left-leaning secularists in San Francisco.

Given his mindset, it is not surprising that Obama is opposed to the posting of the Ten Commandments on public property. More surprising are his reservations regarding the display of religious symbols on private property. He was only in office a few months when his advance team told officials at Georgetown University that they had better put a drape over any religious symbols that might appear as a backdrop to where the president was going to speak. To drive the point home, they made sure that the IHS symbol, a monogram of the name Jesus Christ, was not in sight.

On September 15, 2009, Obama addressed the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute’s 33rd Annual Awards. It was to be a perfunctory speech, although it didn’t turn out that way. To wit: Obama did not reference God, or the “Creator,” when citing the Declaration of Independence. Here is what he said: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, endowed with certain inalienable rights….” This is not what Jefferson wrote. He was explicit about the origin of our rights, noting that all men were “endowed by their Creator” with certain unalienable rights. What Obama said was no accident; the remarks were prepared. Moreover, even after being roundly criticized for this startling omission, Obama did the exact same thing only a month later at a fundraiser in Rockville, Maryland.

The fact is Obama is uncomfortable with America’s Christian heritage. In 2010 he could not bring himself to utter the words “In God We Trust” when speaking in Indonesia about our national motto; instead, he substituted “E Pluribus Unum.” But he is quite comfortable with atheists.  In 2010, Obama became the first president in U.S. history to welcome a gathering of atheists: administration officials met with activists from the Secular Coalition for America, an umbrella group that includes American Atheists and other virulently anti-Christian organizations.

Obama is not equally jittery about all religions. When it comes to Islam, he can be very accommodating. For example, in 2010 he said he supported the right of Muslims to build a mosque at Ground Zero. The real issue, of course, was not a legal one—it was a moral one. He refused to discuss this matter.

It is not simply Obama who is uncomfortable with religion; it is true of the most active members of his party. Consider what just happened at the Democratic National Convention. On the first day, there was a panel discussion led by a notorious foe of the religious rights of Catholics, namely, Catholics for Choice (CFC). This group, which is nothing more than a well-funded letterhead sponsored by the likes of the Ford Foundation—it has no members—has twice been condemned by the bishops’ conference as a fraud. Perversely, CFC addressed the subject of religious liberty! This would be like having the Klan speak about race relations at the RNC.

Until 2012, every Democratic Party Platform made some reference to God. But things changed this year, demonstrating once again that the administration has a “God problem.” In 2008, the Platform mentioned that government “gives everyone willing to work hard the chance to make the most of their God-given potential.” The italics, which I added, were deleted from the 2012 Platform. Worse, when CNN’s Piers Morgan asked DNC chair Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz why someone “deliberately” excised the word “God,” she replied, “I can assure you that no one has deliberately taken God out of the Platform.” After listening to this remarkable response, Morgan pressed her again, asking, “So it was an accident?” She refused to comment.

Once the pushback began, the Obama team folded and reinstated God. But even this process turned out to be a disaster. After ignoring the expressed will of the delegates—a voice vote to put God back in the Platform was split (it didn’t come close to the two-thirds majority that was needed)—it was ruled, by fiat, to have passed. Terri Holland, a New Mexico delegate, made a very revealing remark when she said that the revisions were made to “kow-tow to the religious right.” In other words, thoughtful Democrats would never want to pay homage to God in their Platform.

Obama’s Secular Allies

To learn more about Obama’s approach to religion, consider his base of religious friends. He sat for 20 years listening to Rev. Jeremiah “God-Damn-America” Wright. A black liberation theologian, Wright is known for his racially inflammatory sermons; for example, he has accused Zionism of containing an element of “white racism.” He is so extreme that he even blamed the 9/11 attacks on American foreign policy.

Another clergyman Obama greatly admires is Rev. J. Alfred Smith Sr., an Oakland, California pastor who was honored in 1975 by the violent Black Panther Party; in 1990, he was given an award by the anti-Semitic Nation of Islam. In Catholic circles, Obama’s favorite priest is Father Michael Pfleger, a race-baiting preacher from Chicago who has welcomed Nation of Islam minister Louis Farrakhan to speak in his church.

It was in Obama’s first job where he cultivated his ties to the Catholic community. To be exact, he laid anchor with Catholic activists, not with Catholics in the pew. In 1985, he took a job with a Saul Alinsky-trained community organizer; from then on his network with Catholic left-wing operatives would only expand. What he took from these contacts was not Catholicism; rather, it was how to work with the Catholic left to promote a radical agenda.

Those same associations paid a hefty dividend when it came time for Obama to launch his Catholic National Advisory Council in 2008. Quite frankly, Obama’s Catholic friends are almost all Catholic dissidents, at least on the major social issues. In the last presidential election, there wasn’t one of his 26 Catholic advisors who accepted the Catholic Church’s teachings on abortion, embryonic stem cell research, and school vouchers. That almost all of them agreed 100 percent of the time with NARAL, the radical abortion organization, was hardly surprising.

True to form, the 2012 group, “Catholics for Obama,” is populated with dissidents like Rep. Rosa DeLauro, a staunch abortion-rights advocate who has a history of openly defying the Catholic Church. While this is hardly unusual anymore, it is still mind-boggling to learn that Catholic Democrats PAC is so queasy about orthodox Catholicism that it features a “Catholic League Watch” database online. What scares them about the Catholic League remains a mystery.

Obama’s network of Catholic dissidents came into play when he selected Kathleen Sebelius as his Secretary of Health and Human Services. Her long-time involvement in the pro-abortion movement calls into serious question her status as a Catholic: Catholics can excommunicate themselves when they persistently and deliberately foster policies that are considered “intrinsically evil” by the Catholic Church; abortion is certainly one of those evils.

Sebelius was not simply a friend of George Tiller, the physician who specialized in killing babies who were 80 percent born—she raised money for him. So off-the-charts is Sebelius in her passion for abortion rights that she admits to never backing a single abortion-restricting law. For these reasons, Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas once advised her not to present herself for Holy Communion.

There are several other persons chosen by Obama who have had their problems with Catholicism. Harry Knox, a gay activist with the Human Rights Campaign, was appointed to serve on the Advisory Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. While Knox was denied ordination in the United Methodist Church and the United Church of Christ because he is a sexually active homosexual, it was his vile comments about the pope that garnered the most publicity at the time of his appointment.

For Knox, the pope is a liar who needs to “start telling the truth about condom use.” He even held the Holy Father accountable for “endangering people’s lives,” never explaining how someone who preaches abstinence could be held responsible for sexual recklessness. No matter, Knox also accused those who belong to the Knights of Columbus of being “foot soldiers of a discredited army of oppression.”

Another gay activist who hates Catholicism is Kevin Jennings. A former drug user and irresponsible teen counselor, Jennings was chosen to be the Safe Schools Czar. He is also a Christian basher who belongs to an urban anti-Catholic group, ACT UP. In 1989, activists from ACT UP stormed St. Patrick’s Cathedral during Mass; they chained themselves to the pews and spat the Eucharist on the floor. Predictably, Jennings is fond of lecturing Catholics about the Church’s teachings on sexuality, and for railing against the “hard core bigots” who comprise the “religious right.”

It was also the appointment of Chai Feldblum to join the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that made Christians wince. The Georgetown law professor was on record saying that in conflicts between religious liberty and sexual rights, the latter should triumph. Never mind that religious liberty is a First Amendment right and that sexual rights are nowhere mentioned in the Constitution—Feldblum was adamant in her conviction that religious freedom should bow to sexual rights.

Feldblum is actually more extreme than this: she signed a statement in 2006, “Beyond Same-Sex Marriage,” that is the most astounding assault on marriage ever written. Every conceivable “partnership” and “relationship” was deemed worthy of governmental and private recognition. This means that both the public and the private sector must grant rights to “queer couples who decide to jointly create and raise a child with another queer person or couple, in two households.” Churches, obviously, would be expected to comply as they are part of the private sector.

It was not good enough for Obama to hire persons who reject Christian tenets or who speak coarsely about Christianity: he sought to hire activists who want to punish the Catholic Church. His choice of Dawn Johnsen to be assistant attorney general in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel proves this charge. Though she eventually withdrew her name from consideration—a contentious fight lasting more than a year precipitated her withdrawal—the former ACLU and NARAL lawyer should never have been nominated in the first place. In the late 1980s, she cut her legal teeth by working on an ACLU lawsuit that sought to strip the Catholic Church of its tax-exempt status. We can only guess what she might have been up to had she gotten the job.

Obama’s allies in the gay rights community led him to oppose the “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” policy on homosexuals in the military even before it was repealed. Even more revealing, his steadfast refusal to enforce the Defense of Marriage Act shows how his commitment to the gay rights agenda trumps his duties as the nation’s chief executive. It also explains his support for gay marriage. In the 1990s, while running for the Illinois state senate, he said, “I favor legalizing same-sex marriage, and would fight efforts to prohibit such marriages.” However, when he ran for the U.S. senate in 2004, he backed away from this position, and did so again when running for president in 2008. This was pure posturing: in 2008, he opposed Proposition 8 in California affirming marriage between a man and a woman showing his true colors. In 2012, he reverted back to his original support for the right of two men to marry.

Obama’s Secular Policies

President George W. Bush was the first president to initiate faith-based social service programs; he wanted to put an end to the exclusionary policy of funding only public social service entities. There is a mountain of social science evidence showing the yeoman results of faith-based programs: homes for juvenile delinquents; drug rehabilitation centers; counseling services; foster care arrangements; prison ministries. The list is endless. On the one hand, Obama knew these faith-based programs were popular, so he felt obliged to keep them; on the other hand, his secular leanings pulled him the other way.

Early on Obama announced that these programs were not any better than their public counterparts (the data said otherwise), raising serious questions why they should be funded. “I’m not saying that faith-based groups are an alternative to government or secular nonprofits,” he said, “and I’m not saying that they’re somehow better at lifting people up.” Worse, he toyed with the idea of gutting the faith component from the faith-based initiative.

To be specific, an open debate ensued questioning whether people who run faith-based programs should be allowed to hire those of their own religion. Similarly, should those who run foster care programs be permitted to place children with parents of their own religion? The idea that Orthodox Jewish foster care homes should insist that they care for children of their own religion is hardly unreasonable. But to many in the Obama administration, the proposition was at least rebuttable, if not simply wrong.

If the Obama administration were serious about faith-based programs, it wouldn’t ask their opponents for advice on how to run them. This is exactly what it did. It sought the input of Barry Lynn, president of Americans United for Separation of Church and State: he was invited to address the first faith-based council. Ever since, this initiative has floundered, as even those who have served on the council have acknowledged. What happened is not in dispute: endless conversations on the proper role of religion in such initiatives yielded no consensus. More important, Obama’s heart was never in it.

The most decisive evidence that the Obama administration sees no fundamental difference between religious institutions, and those that are purely secular, came during oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court in the Hosanna-Tabor case. At issue was the right of a Lutheran school to fire a teacher found unsuitable by its standards.

Traditionally, the government has respected what is called a “ministerial exception,” the idea that religious institutions enjoy constitutional insulation from government oversight when making employment decisions. But for the attorney representing the Obama administration, Leondra R. Kruger, no such insulation was ever warranted: she actually maintained there was no real difference between religious associations and voluntary associations of a secular nature.

Justice Antonin Scalia was astonished by Kruger’s reasoning. “That’s extraordinary. That’s extraordinary. We are talking here about the Free Exercise Clause and about the Establishment Clause, and you say they have no special application?” Justice Elena Kagan, an Obama appointee, was similarly struck by Kruger’s argument. “I too find that amazing, that you think that the Free—neither the Free Exercise Clause nor the Establishment Clause—has anything to say about a church’s relationship with its own employees.”

Kruger’s extremist position in the fall of 2011 resulted in a 9-0 victory for the First Amendment in the spring of 2012; the “ministerial exception” rule was sustained. While this was impressive, it yielded even more fruit: it revealed the way the Obama administration thinks about religious liberty. Had the administration won, the federal government would have been able to steer the employment decisions of every religious entity, effectively neutering their right to craft internal strictures that reflect their doctrinal prerogatives. In short, had the president’s views prevailed, religious liberty as we know it would no longer exist.

If there is one issue that has been at the heart of the culture war over the past several decades, it is abortion. The nation is split on this issue, though the vector of change is certainly moving in a pro-life direction: more Americans consider themselves pro-life than ever before, and there is scant support for abortion-on-demand through term. Without doubt, President Obama is the most radical president we’ve ever had on this subject. His enthusiasm for abortion rights—he has never found an abortion he could not justify—is so unyielding that he even supports selective infanticide.

When Obama was in the Illinois state senate he fought the “Born-Alive Infants Protection Act” on three occasions. The bill would have required doctors to attend to infants born alive after a botched abortion. Obama saw this as a threat to abortion rights, and so he found an exception to his embrace of universal healthcare: this was one human being who was not entitled to care—he could legally be left to die.

Now it is possible to take an abortion-rights position that at least respects the right of religious institutions not to cooperate in what the Catholic Church calls an “intrinsic evil.” But Obama has shown no such respect. Indeed, his war on religion extends to the days when candidate Obama made a pledge to Planned Parenthood in 2007. He told his fans that “the first thing I’d do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA).”

FOCA is the most radical piece of abortion-rights legislation ever written: it would overturn virtually every law restricting abortion in the nation. Worse, it might very well force Catholic hospitals to perform abortions. If they refused, federal funds would be cut off, effectively putting them out of business. This is Obama’s vision of healthcare and religious liberty. Fortunately, the bill never made it to his desk; Catholics and Evangelicals fought hard to block it.

As an interesting side note, when he was in the U.S. senate, Obama supported government intervention in the case of Terri Schiavo; he voted to provide the physically disabled woman with nutrition. But his pro-life epiphany didn’t last long: in 2008, when asked which senatorial vote he regretted the most, he cited this one.

In the same year, Obama was asked when life begins (Senator John McCain answered “at conception”). Obama’s answer was classic. “Whether you’re looking at it from a theological perspective or a scientific perspective,” he allowed, “answering that question with specificity is above my pay grade.” It was a dishonest dodge.

Once in power, Obama moved quickly to enshrine the abortion agenda. Three days after becoming president, Obama reversed President George W. Bush’s ban on federal funding for international groups that promote or perform abortions; only 35 percent of Americans agreed with him on this issue. The ban, called the Mexico City Policy, was just the first of many abortion-restrictive laws that would be targeted for repeal. For instance, Obama officials attempted to repeal the Hyde Amendment that bans federally funded abortions in public health insurance options. They had more success in effectively gutting the Dornan Amendment, i.e., the ban on tax-funded abortions in the District of Columbia.

When coupled with Obama’s opposition to school vouchers, including a successful scholarship voucher program for the residents of D.C., this effectively meant that if a poor inner-city pregnant woman, typically an African American, wanted to end her pregnancy, the government would pay for it. But if she insisted on taking her baby to term, hoping to later place her child in a private school, the same government wouldn’t give her a dime. The prospects for the women are stark, but for the child they are worse: either the baby’s life will be cut short, or his life chances will be.

Sterilization is another option that is attractive to the Obama administration. In 2009, Obama appointed John Holdren his “science czar.” He is a proponent of forced abortions and compulsory sterilization. In 1977, Holdren co-authored an article with radical environmentalists Paul and Anne Ehrlich whereby they entertained the notion of “adding a sterilant to drinking water or staple foods.” Keeping an open mind about draconian methods, they also argued that while compulsory control of family size is “an unpalatable idea,” the alternatives “may be much more horrifying.” They were most excited about implementing their population-reduction ideas in poor, non-white nations.

The idea that abortion and sterilization are a positive good is so appealing to the Obama administration that it has sought to punish those who don’t subscribe to its agenda. For example, Catholic programs to combat the human trafficking of women and children have long received federal funds. But because these initiatives do not provide for abortion, they were denied a grant by Obama officials. It didn’t matter a whit that the Catholic proposal garnered high marks from an independent review board, or that it actually scored higher than some that were awarded a grant. What mattered is that Catholics don’t view abortion as a way of helping women and children living in a state of near slavery.

Obama’s Assault on Catholicism

Americans who oppose abortion have learned to live with Roe v. Wade, but they (as well as some abortion-rights advocates) have never come to terms with proposals forcing them to fund abortion. This was on President Obama’s mind when he addressed the graduation class of 2009 at the University of Notre Dame. “Let’s honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion and draft a sensible conscience clause,” he said. For this he was hailed by the president of Notre Dame, Father John Jenkins. Three years later the priest sued Obama for breaking his vow.

The Notre Dame speech notwithstanding, the Obama administration’s willingness to violate conscience rights in pursuit of ObamaCare was evident from the beginning. In 2009, Senator Orrin Hatch and Senator Mike Enzi sought to include language in the healthcare bill that would prohibit public funding of abortion. It was voted down, much to the applause of the Obama administration. A similar bill by Rep. Eric Cantor went down to defeat. Senator Tom Coburn sponsored an amendment that would provide conscience-rights protections for healthcare workers, and it too was defeated. Rep. Bart Stupak, Rep. Joe Pitts, and Rep. Sam Johnson also tried to bar federal funds for abortion; their efforts met the same fate.

What was most exasperating about this entire matter was the insistence on the part of Obama officials that nothing in the healthcare bill would allow for the public funding of abortion. Then why fight with such ferocity bills designed to make sure this never happens?

By the end of 2009, the real agenda of the Obama administration had become so transparent that even its friends at the New York Times felt obliged to come clean. That November the Times ran a news story showing how Obama had betrayed his promise. Reporter Robert Pear wrote that the president “was not comfortable with abortion restrictions inserted into the House version of major health care legislation, and he prodded Congress to revise them.” The pro-life community, largely faith-based, felt disabused by these shenanigans. But they had no idea how bad matters would soon become.

On January 20, 2012 Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius rolled out what would come to be known as the HHS mandate: Catholic institutions would be required to pay for contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs in their healthcare plans for employees. The inclusion of abortion-inducing drugs was striking. The administration could have settled for contraception, but instead it sought to stick the camel’s nose in the tent. Its real long-term interest was plain: eventually, as broached by FOCA, Catholic hospitals would be required to perform abortions.

On January 31, Press Secretary Jay Carney stunned even Obama supporters when he said, “I don’t believe there are any constitutional rights issues here.” No one was buying it, especially not the bishops.

After Catholics pushed back, a new version was introduced three weeks later. But it was a distinction without a difference: it mandated that the insurance carrier of Catholic non-profits must pay for these services.

This was just a shell game. In reality, many Catholic non-profits are self-insured (for example, the Archdiocese of Washington is self-insured). Then there is the issue of Catholic entities that are not self-insured: why should they have to pay their insurance company for services they deem immoral? Another issue that won’t go away is the right of Catholic business owners not to pay for services that violate their conscience.

It is important to acknowledge that Catholics are not asking for special rights—they are simply asking the Obama administration to respect the status quo. The administration won’t budge, saying the best it will do is exempt Catholic churches. So what about Catholic non-profits?

Without doubt, the most contentious, and frankly diabolical, demand of the Obama administration is the proviso that only Catholic institutions that hire and serve mostly people of their own religion are entitled to an exemption. In practice, this means that Mother Teresa’s worldwide health and social service programs that serve people of all religions, as well as non-believers, would not qualify for a religious exemption.

Obama officials arrived at this conclusion by following the thinking of the ACLU (as I have recounted in two books on the organization, the ACLU has never been a religion-friendly institution). In 2000, ACLU lawyers helped devise legislation in California that took a novel view of what constitutes a religious institution. It argued that a truly religious entity had to employ and serve mostly people of its own faith. By adopting the ACLU rule, the Obama administration essentially sought to punish Catholic universities, hospitals and social service agencies because they do not discriminate against non-Catholics. In other words, if these institutions were to display signs saying, “No Jews Allowed,” they would be just fine.

Catholic bishops, led by Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, have made their objections known loud and clear. So have non-Catholics. Evangelical Protestants, in particular, have joined with their Catholic brothers in registering their outrage. It is apparent to everyone that Obama’s war on religion has reached a new level of opposition.

The determination of Obama officials to push forward led them to attack another First Amendment right: the right to free speech. The archbishop of the military services, Thomas Broglio, joined with his fellow bishops in issuing a pastoral letter criticizing the Obama administration for violating the conscience rights of Catholics. He got into trouble with the Army’s Office of the Chief of Chaplains when he asked military chaplains to read the letter from the pulpit. The Obama team initially ordered the letter censored, but eventually modified its position after a compromise was met.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled ObamaCare constitutional in June, although it did not rule on the constitutionality of the HHS mandate (it was not promulgated until after the high court agreed to decide the fate of ObamaCare). The November election may make all of this moot if Obama loses, but if he wins, Catholic rights will be tested in the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, new legislative efforts are being made to secure conscience rights.

It is still hard to get the president and his administration to speak truthfully about this issue. In August, President Obama told a crowd at the University of Denver that “We worked with the Catholic hospitals and universities to find a solution that protects both religious liberty and a woman’s health.” Yet as recently as February, Bishop William Lori, who chairs the bishops’ Committee for Religious Liberty, said point blank that “no one from this administration has approached the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops for discussions on this matter of a possible ‘compromise.’” He also made it clear that only after the original HHS mandate was revised did the White House contact Archbishop Dolan.

When pieced together, all of these issues—Obama’s secular mindset, his secular allies, his secular policies, and his assault on Catholicism—show an animus to religious liberty. It is no exaggeration to say that this nation has never witnessed anything like it. The frontal assault on religion, especially on its public role, is unprecedented. Explicit references to our religious heritage have been scrubbed clean from speeches and official pronouncements; the professed enemies of Christianity have been given a free hand shaping public policy; faith-based programs have been allowed to wither; the radical pro-abortion and pro-gay agendas have been set loose to undermine our First Amendment freedoms; and attempts to force people of faith to violate their conscience have reached a dangerous level.

The war on religion carried out by the Obama administration is not the product of someone’s imagination—it is real. Whether it succeeds depends less on them than on us.

Jeff Field, director of communications for the Catholic League, recently interviewed Bill Donohue on the subject of religious liberty. Below is a transcript of the interview.

Bill, you’ve been doing this job at the Catholic League for about two decades. How have things changed in the last couple of decades in terms of the threats to religious liberty?

Well, I would say that if you look at the Catholic League’s annual reports we generally have seen the greatest degree of hostility against Catholicism coming from the media. We’ve certainly seen it from the artistic community, from activist organizations, from some segments of business and the workplace. Education has clearly been a venue of hostility toward the Catholic Church from kindergarten right through graduate school. But what is most striking to me is that government is now the seat of hostility to Catholicism more than any other sector of our society; this is particularly troubling. After all, government in this country was created to ensure rights, not to erode them.

In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson wrote that our rights do not come from government. Our rights are unalienable. That is to say, our rights come from “the Creator,” from God. We have God-given rights. We don’t look to government to give us our rights. We look to government to ensure our rights. Now, regrettably, over the last decade, we have seen many examples at the local, state and federal level where government has become the problem.

This is very troubling because, unlike problems coming from the media, which tend to be more in the way of dissing Catholics, these are real threats to our religious liberty.

Bill, could you give us some examples of the threats to religious liberty coming from the local level?

Well, right here in New York City, we have a mayor, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is not exactly religion-friendly. Let me give you a particular example.

When we had the 9/11 commemoration in September of 2011—the ten-year anniversary—the clergy wanted to speak. Obviously, the clergy always speak at some commemorative exercise in this country. They are expected to speak. Mayor Bloomberg censored them. He did something unprecedented. He said that everybody can speak who is a person of notoriety, but we don’t want the clergy. So, he literally banned the priests, the ministers and the rabbis, the imams and others from speaking.

This is censorship. Only the government can censor. Private institutions such as newspapers, for example, they don’t have to publish people’s letters or op-eds. It may show a bias but you can’t call it censorship in the strict sense of that word. Here we have the government—the chief executive of New York City, Mayor Michael Bloomberg—making a decision on his own, without consulting the public, saying, “Listen, I don’t want the clergy to speak.” That’s a hostility I don’t think that we can put up with, that kind of censorship.

The same mayor has denied non-white Protestants who belong to the Bronx Household of Faith use of school property and buildings on Sunday mornings—when nobody else is using them—for their religious services. They’ve been doing this for a very long time, up until Mayor Bloomberg decided that, while you can have LGBT meetings and anything else in the public buildings on a Sunday morning, you cannot have a religious service. This was a mean-spirited attempt to erode the religious liberty of these Protestants.

On the west coast, in San Francisco back in 2006, the Board of Supervisors, who essentially run the city, went after the Vatican. They accused it of meddling in the internal affairs of San Francisco, and engaging in hateful speech. Now, what in the world did the Vatican do to meddle in the internal affairs of San Francisco? I’ll tell you what they did: the Catholic Church simply has a position—which is held by many, many other religions—that they are not in favor of gay adoption. Now, people can agree or disagree with this decision, but what they can’t do is to assert that somehow you’re meddling in somebody’s internal affairs. One could just as easily argue that the City of San Francisco is meddling in the internal affairs of the Vatican because they believe in gay adoption. Of course, that would be absurd, and so was what they said absurd.

More recently in California, there was an attempt to ban the crèche in Santa Monica, this time coming from the Freedom From Religion Foundation based out of Madison, Wisconsin. It’s an atheist group. It’s not just indifferent to religion, they hate religion. But they don’t hate all religions equally. They have a particular animus against the Catholic Church. After they tried to get the crèche banned from public property, the local government said it would develop a lottery, allowing Christians, Jews and atheists an equal chance of obtaining the right to display their symbols.

Well, last year Christians got the short end of the stick, and after they complained, the spineless leaders in Santa Monica decided that in 2012, there will be no displays at all. Who was delighted? The Freedom From Religion Foundation. This proves that their real agenda was to deny us the nativity scene. Instead of the government defending religious liberty, it took the cowardly way out by censoring everyone equally.

Bill, are there any examples at the state level that you’d like to discuss where you see a threat to religious liberty these days?

Actually, let’s pick up on this whole question of gay adoption. Two states, Massachusetts and Illinois, as well as cities like San Francisco and D.C., have essentially stopped the Catholic Church from practicing its adoptive services. The Catholic Church, like a lot of other religions, does not believe in gay adoption. It believes children belong with a mother and a father, ideally. And what’s happened is that, in Massachusetts and Illinois, they’ve said there will be no state funding for the adoptive and foster care services of the Catholic Church, unless you change your teachings and accept the wisdom of the secular state that homosexuals should be adoptive parents. Because the Catholic Church obviously is not going to prostitute its principles, we’re therefore punished. This is another example of the hostility I am talking about.

Outside this realm dealing with sexuality is another element. In Connecticut a few years ago, two gay lawmakers decided that they actually wanted to have a takeover of the Catholic Church in Connecticut. This sounds mind-boggling, but it’s actually true. These gay lawmakers went into the legislature with a bill to take over the administrative apparatus of the Catholic Church. Oh, yes, they said that the priest could still say Mass and the like. But, they felt that, no, they, the state lawmakers, were in a better position to make decisions about the administrative affairs of the Catholic Church than the priests and the bishops. Just imagine, for one moment, if the bishops in Connecticut and the priests said, “We want a takeover of the state government in Connecticut in Hartford.” Wouldn’t people be screaming, “Whatever happened to separation of church and state?” Well that’s exactly what we had here, except that the state was going to take over the Church.

Now, thank God for Bishop Lori of Bridgeport, now the Archbishop of Baltimore. He led people into the streets. The Catholic League was very vocal in supporting him at this point because we had to pare back their draconian legislation. But it gives you an example of what we’re up against.

We have also had problems in Alabama, Jeff. Here I’m talking about the fact that some Republicans—in their quest to secure the borders, which is a legitimate thing to do—have actually gone so far as to say that priests shouldn’t tend to the ministerial needs, the pastoral needs, of undocumented aliens. Well, quite frankly, it’s up to the government to decide how best to deal with the immigration problem. But, you can’t tell the clergy, you can’t tell priests, for example, that you’re not allowed to service people who may be in this country and are in need. We’re not going to turn people away. We do believe in the Good Samaritan approach.

It is important for Republicans to understand the Catholic Church is neither Republican nor Democrat. We will fight the Republicans as much as we fight the Democrats on the issue of immigration and these other issues. You can take care of the problem of immigration on your own terms without interfering with the rights of Catholics. Religious liberty matters to Catholics whether we are dealing with gay adoption or the question of immigration.

Bill, are there any examples at the federal level that you could speak to in terms of the current threats to religious liberty?

There are a lot of them, Jeff. Let’s begin with what happened in 1996. President Clinton signed a law, a federal law, the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which said that states which don’t recognize same-sex marriage don’t have to; they can recognize traditional marriage as being between a man and a woman. Only 14 senators refused to sign on with this. It was basically uncontroversial.

Now we have a situation today where President Obama, who was sworn to uphold congressional legislation, has ordered his Justice Department not to enforce congressional legislation on this issue, on DOMA.

Here is what we have now, to show you how perverse it is. In New York State, a lesbian couple who work at St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Westchester are now suing because they want the Medical Center to recognize their quote “wedding,” their marriage. It is true that in New York State gay people can marry. I should point out that, unlike the other 32 states which have discussed this issue and allowed the people to vote on it (and in every single case people vote against gay marriage, even in California), they did not allow people to vote on this issue in New York State. Even worse, they had no public hearings. So here we have people intentionally working at a Catholic institution trying to force Catholic institutions now to prostitute their teachings so that they can exercise their so-called rights.

Bill, there’s been a lot of talk about the HHS mandate, the Health and Human Services mandate, the “Fortnight for Freedom” that the bishops have been promoting in June and July. This idea that we are threatened by the federal government. Speak to us: what’s at stake here?

Well, after the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case dealing with the individual mandate—which we now know is constitutional—HHS, the Department of Health and Human Services, issued a mandate saying that Catholic nonprofits have to pay for abortion-inducing drugs, contraception and sterilization.

This led to an outcry. They issued this on Friday, January 20. Cardinal Dolan felt betrayed by the president who told him that he wouldn’t have to worry about these kinds of things when they met in November of 2011. Well, with the outcry, three weeks later on Friday, February 10, there was an accommodation. The accommodation, according to the Obama administration, was that Catholic individuals won’t have to pay for services deemed immoral by the Catholic Church, but they’ll have to pay for their insurance plans.

Of course, this is a shell game. Where does the insurance company get the money except from the employees? And then you have the situation of self-insured entities such as the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. How do you resolve that question? For that matter, what if a Catholic owns an Italian restaurant? Does he have to pay for something he deems immoral, as well? So, in other words, we felt we were right back to where we started from.

Bill, what’s driving this? It seems to me that there is a real strong interest in promoting abortion rights in this administration?

Jeff, that’s exactly the case. Let’s recall that when Barack Obama was in the Illinois State Senate, he promoted a bill which said this: A baby born alive as a result of a botched abortion is not entitled to healthcare. To be specific, they can let the baby die on the doctor’s table. That’s entirely okay with Barack Obama. Now that goes to show you what we’re talking about. This is selective infanticide. The baby is fully outside the woman’s body, and, because the baby survives a botched abortion, therefore it is not entitled to the right to life.

Remember what happened in 2007, when Barack Obama, then a candidate or about to become a candidate, said to Planned Parenthood that when he becomes president United States he’s going to sign FOCA, the Freedom of Choice Act. Now, he never did get a chance to sign this legislation because the Catholic community, including the Catholic League, rose up against him. What it would have done, according to the attorneys for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), it would have forced Catholic hospitals to provide for and pay for abortions. Now, obviously, we’ll close down the Catholic hospitals before we’ll ever perform abortions, but this goes to show you the appetite, the lust for abortion that is coming from this administration. The bill never succeeded, but we know where they wanted to go.

Then we have the case dealing with the Catholic Relief Services. Catholic Relief Services has for a long time received a grant from the federal government to fight human trafficking of women and children, modern-day slaves. And, the Catholic Church has a very good program to combat human trafficking. So they issued their proposal again last year. This time, it was knocked down. Was it insufficiently prepared? No, as a matter of fact, the proposal actually scored higher than did those proposals which won out in the end. So, why did the Catholic Relief Services lose? Because the Church is against abortion.

Then there’s the question of conscience rights. President Obama spoke at the University of Notre Dame at the commencement address in 2009. The Catholic League said he had every right to speak at a Catholic university. He is, in fact, the President of the United States. We objected to his receiving an award. Why would any Catholic institution want to give an award to a man who has such an unbridled passion for abortion rights? Doesn’t make any sense. We don’t give awards to anti-Semites and we don’t give awards to racists, nor should we.

Well, what happened during that speech is that he said, basically, “Listen I know I’m in somewhat hot water with the Catholic community. I want to let you know I believe in conscience rights. I believe that people should not be forced—as a matter of a religious objection—to do something that they find inherently immoral.” That was greeted with some degree of relief, including by the Catholic League. Isn’t it interesting, now, Jeff, that a few years later the same president, Father Jenkins, who welcomed President Obama there, has now turned around and is suing? Notre Dame is suing the federal government because of the disrespect and contempt that it shows for the religious liberty rights of Catholics. It’s a rather amazing turnaround.

Now, Bill, let’s ask a different question here. Besides abortion, there’s been a lot of questions about the Obama administration redefining what qualifies as a religious institution. Can you speak to that at all?

Why, yes. Quite frankly, the most pernicious thing the Obama administration has done is to redefine what qualifies as a religious institution for the purpose of an exemption.

The Obama administration says that a Catholic institution is not Catholic unless it hires and serves people mostly of its own faith. Now that is to turn on its head the virtue of Catholic institutions. We are proud of the fact that we do not discriminate in our social service agencies, soup kitchens, hospitals, schools, Catholic universities, and colleges. We don’t discriminate against people because they’re Protestant or Jewish, or atheist, agnostic, or Muslim or Mormon. We welcome everybody. And this is what I find so perverse. We’re saying now that unless you discriminate—what do they want us to do, put up signs saying, “No Jews Need Apply”? Should they say, “No Protestants are welcome in our hospitals”? That we do not serve Muslims? Is that what they really want? They want to punish us for being Catholic with a small c, meaning universal? No, we can’t put up with this.

Bill, where’d they get this idea in the first place?

Amazingly, Jeff—this will come as a surprise, or maybe not a major surprise to some people—it came from the ACLU, the American Civil Liberties Union; it has been hostile to freedom of religion for a very long time, going back to 1920. The ACLU, in 2000, helped draft a law in California on contraception which came up with this bizarre, invidious notion that you’re a Catholic institution only if you hire and serve people of your own faith.

Now the ACLU—let me digress here for a moment—I’ve written a Ph.D. dissertation and two books on the ACLU. I interviewed the founder of the ACLU, Roger Baldwin, in June of 1978 in his home on Hudson Street in lower Manhattan. He founded the organization in January of 1920, and I asked him, “Mr. Baldwin, your organization in its first 10 objectives lists freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, freedom to petition and the like, but you never mentioned that other component of the First Amendment called freedom of religion. Why not?” He was very blunt. He said, “That’s because I’m an atheist. We don’t value freedom of religion.” Indeed, he certainly does not value freedom of religion. I remember asking Mr. Baldwin—who was certainly very nice to me, he was an elderly man at the time—I said to him, “Listen, what’s wrong with a voluntary prayer, when people have a moment of silence?” I said, “Whose rights are being infringed upon if somebody prays silently to himself?”

His answer was rather chilling. He said, “Well, they’ve tried to get around it even more than you, they call it meditation.” So I said to the founder of the ACLU, “Mr. Baldwin, what’s wrong with meditation? A child sits there at his desk and he meditates. What if he meditates about popcorn? What difference would it make to you, the great guardians of the Constitution?”

Well, that kind of stopped him in his tracks, but it does give you an idea of where they’re coming from. Just to show you how absurd the ACLU is on this, they’re actually against “In God We Trust” on the coins; they want “under God” taken out of the Pledge of Allegiance. Somebody actually found a huge statue of Jesus off the coast of Key Largo, on the ocean floor, and the ACLU said we have to remove it. I mean, who are they protecting now? You see, what you’re dealing with here is a maniacal hatred of religion. Unfortunately, there are some people in the Obama administration who accept this kind of thinking.

Bill, let’s pick up on that idea of the thinking. Could you explain the mindset of these people? Whether in or out of the Obama administration, who has this kind of ACLU mindset?

I’ll give you a perfect example, Jeff, of what happened in 2011. You had a woman for the Obama administration go before the Supreme Court in oral argument, and she maintained that a Lutheran school should not be allowed to make up its own rules and regulations regarding employment decisions; she said the government should do so. Now for a very long time in this country, we’ve had what’s understood as the ministerial exception. Meaning that, when it comes to ministers, or the clergy in general, that they can be excepted from this idea that the government should police hiring decisions. That’s because you have to have freedom of religion, you have to have some insularity between church and state. This woman actually said that there isn’t any difference between a religious association and any other association.

Now that startled Justice Antonin Scalia, but what was even more dramatic was that Elena Kagan, a liberal appointee of the Obama administration, said she wanted clarification. She said to the woman: I want to get this right, are you saying that there’s no difference between a religious organization, which has rights grounded in the First Amendment and that of a secular, voluntary association? That there’s really no difference? And she said, that’s right, there is no difference. Well, in one sense this zealot did us a favor because the Supreme Court did rule 9 to 0 against the idea that the government has the right to police the hiring and firing decisions of a religious entity.

I’ll give you some other examples of where there is this mindset that is very troubling. Remember a couple of years ago when President Barack Obama was to speak at Georgetown University? His advance team went out there just to check out the place, and they told the officials at Georgetown that they have to put a drape or a cover over IHS, over the crucifix, over all religious symbols. When the president speaks from Georgetown, they said we don’t want the public to see on TV religious symbols of any sort out.

Only an administration which is fundamentally hateful in its ideas toward religion would go into a religious institution and tell them to cover up, and to neuter and to censor their own religious symbols. It’d be like going into a Jewish facility and saying get rid of that Star of David. This kind of hostility has no place in a society which prizes the First Amendment. That’s an example of the mindset.

Unfortunately, on many occasions when President Obama cites the Declaration of Independence, he leaves out the word “Creator.” So, when we talk about how the “Creator” has given us our unalienable rights, to understand that our rights come from God and not from the government—the president many times leaves out the word, “Creator.” That’s not a mistake. That’s not some editorial mistake on the part of his people. That’s deliberate. Our national motto is “In God We Trust.” How many times has he said it’s “E Pluribus Unum”? No, it’s not “E Pluribus Unum.” It’s a great statement, but that’s not our national motto.

So, there is an hostility. Indeed, the Obama administration is the first in the history of the United States to welcome an openly public atheist organization, one that is publicly aggressive in its hatefulness against religion. I’m talking about the Secular Coalition of America. That they were granted a White House reception tells us something very troubling about this administration.

Then there’s the question of freedom of worship versus freedom of religion. Freedom of worship means that you should practice your religion indoors. It’s a very insular idea. It’s the idea of privatizing religion. That’s what President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have spoken about: they’re all in favor of freedom of worship. That means that the priest can tend to the little old ladies in the pews. You can have your sororities and the like and sodalities. You can have your church Christmas parties and the like, but just don’t take it outside. It would be on the order as if somebody said, “You can have music played in concert halls, but no longer in public parks. You can have artistic exhibitions in museums, but not on sidewalks or in public parks.” That would express an hostility to art and music.

Well, that’s what they’re doing here. They’re saying that freedom of religion—which of course is the public expression of religion, the core foundation of religion, which Pope Benedict XVI has spoken about so eloquently—they’re saying that that should not be exercised. So, if you want religion, take it indoors.

No, we will not, Mr. President. We will take it outdoors and we will indeed evangelize. It’s not only part of our freedom of religion in the First Amendment, it’s part of our freedom of speech, which is also in the First Amendment.

Bill, can you talk to us about some of the nominees and appointees of this administration, which could give some trouble to people who believe in religious liberty?

Jeff, I am very proud of the fact that the Catholic League fought Dawn Johnsen, an Indiana University professor of law, from getting a position in the Office of Legal Counsel. Why did we not want her? We exercised our freedom of speech by simply publicizing and giving air to her background. Back in the 1980s, she actually as a young woman worked on an amicus brief with the ACLU to deny the tax-exempt status of the Catholic Church. Imagine this: somebody who wants to strip the Catholic Church, and by extension all religions, of their tax-exempt status. This person is to be granted a high position in the administration?

Well, thank God she’s not there to do that kind of damage, but we do have Kathleen Sebelius, don’t we, running Health and Human Services? The last three consecutive archbishops of Kansas City, Kansas have called her on the carpet and asked her point blank: can you name a single abortion law that restricts abortion that you’ve ever supported? She said no. Not only that, but she has actually raised money for the infamous partial-birth abortionist who was taken out, George Tiller—George “The Killer” Tiller. Now, this is why one of the archbishops told her you need not present yourself at the communion rail because you are that far gone.

There’s also people there like Chai Feldblum in the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Chai Feldblum, she taught at Georgetown University Law School, is now working for the Obama administration. She said a few years back that whenever sexual rights conflict with religious rights, religious rights need to bow to sexual rights. Now, just think about it. There’s nothing in the Constitution about sexual rights. There is something in the Constitution, namely the First Amendment to the Bill of Rights, about freedom of religion. And, yet, our First Amendment right is to take a backseat to sexual rights so that gays and lesbians can win out on some of these fights? This is absolutely mind-boggling.

There’ve also been people like Kevin Jennings, and people like Harry Knox and others, who have expressed hateful thoughts against the pope and the Church, and who wind up in this administration.

I must say also, regrettably, that we also have in the Obama administration a situation where, in 2009, the big debate at Christmastime was: Should there be a religious presence at Christmas? In other words, should we have a manger scene at Christmastime? Well, what else would we be celebrating? It’d be like not recognizing Martin Luther King on Martin Luther King Day. What else would you be doing?

They did put up an ornament of a drag queen. They did put up an ornament of Mao Zedong. Maybe this had something to do with why the president and his wife do not believe in exchanging Christmas gifts at Christmastime. I know lots of people who are Jewish and who are atheist and agnostic and they all exchange gifts. Now what the Obamas do in the privacy of their own home is their business, but it’s my business when this kind of attitude spills over into public policy.

Bill, let’s talk more widely, cast it wider. The culture itself, I mean obviously you’ve been talking here about the threats coming from government—from the cities, from the states, from the federal government—what about from the element of culture?

Well after 9/11, Jeff, that’s when things really got worse. Militant atheism was one of the byproducts of the attack on the World Trade Center and in Pennsylvania and in Washington, D.C. One might think that there would be a kind of hatred against Islam. I don’t want people to hate Islam any more than I want people to hate Judaism or Catholicism or Protestantism or any other religion. But interestingly enough, a new wave of intellectuals who never did like religion started to speak up, and who did they really go after? Christianity. And when you talk about Christianity, you can’t help but talk about the bull’s-eye, that is to say the Catholic Church. So, we’ve been the ones who’ve been the victim of this militant atheism since 9/11.

Can you give me some examples, Bill, of where the Catholic League has been involved in this?

Yes. Two years ago, in 2010, I petitioned the people at the Empire State Building to light up on the night of the 100th anniversary of Mother Teresa’s birth, her centenary. I wanted them to light up blue and white, the colors of her order, the Missionaries of Charity. The Empire State Building has a practice of lighting up the colors for various events. When the Yankees win, they’ll light up blue and white as well. They light up green for St. Patrick’s Day and the like. We were rejected.

Now, it’s one thing to be rejected, it’s another thing to be lied to. We were lied to because we were told that the Empire State Building does not recognize religious figures. Now admittedly it is a private entity, but they lied to us because that was not part of their stricture, part of the regulations. They made that up after we were denied. And I had the actual proof, which we put online.

The reason we were denied was because Anthony Malkin doesn’t like Catholicism, I would suppose. Some people said he doesn’t like me—that would make him an even smaller man than what I think he is. But no question about it, we weren’t going to put up with it. We had a rally in the streets and we worked all summer of 2010 to bring people together. Republicans and Democrats, this wasn’t a political issue. We wanted people who were Catholic and Protestant and Jewish and Hindu and Muslim and Buddhists and people from all walks of life. Politicians and celebrities and people like Jackie Mason, the comedian. We wanted to make a universal statement that Mother Teresa was loved.

Why in the world would the Empire State Building, which had recognized the Ninja Turtles, which had recognized the Communist Chinese and their revolution after Mao Zedong—he killed 77 million people—but they would not honor Mother Teresa?

Any other examples you’d like to mention, Bill?

Yes, a few years ago, the Smithsonian—it is a government-supported institution which gets most of its money from the public—it gave monies and hosted a venue where they showed a video of large ants running across the body of Jesus Christ on the Cross. Now they wouldn’t do that to Mohammed, and they wouldn’t do it to Martin Luther King. Our objection was principled: if it is wrong to take public monies to support religion, it should be wrong to take public monies to bash religion.

Bill, what’s probably the worst thing about the culture war in terms of the Catholic Church and what can we do?

The worst thing about the culture war from the perspective of the Catholic League is that it has weakened the moral authority of the Catholic Church. Of course, that’s the goal, isn’t it? An attrition of the prestige of Catholicism. We have to stand up for the voice of the Catholic Church, which is one of reason, one of sanity, one of common sense. We’re the ones who actually had the ideas that basically make for the good society. The Catholic League is here not to speak for the Catholic Church but for the right of the Catholic Church to speak out in these days of moral anarchy.

What can we do about it? Get the word out, fight, educate, sign petitions, support those activist organizations that you strongly believe in. Do what you can to be a participant. We need gladiators in this culture war. What we don’t need are spectators.

Religious and ethnic loyalties are important to me. I am proud to be Catholic and proud to be Irish. I am also very proud to be an American. But pride absent an intelligent appreciation of one’s roots quickly descends to tribalism, and that is not good for the individual or the society. For example, we need to know why it is rational to be proud of our religion. This is one reason why I wrote Why Catholicism Matters. And by “we,” I don’t mean just Catholics. I mean everyone.

There is much to be proud of. Down through the ages, the great philosophers have written widely on the quest for the good society. While it has never been achieved (and given the reality of original sin it can never be fully realized), it is nonetheless true that trying to craft the good society remains a noble enterprise. But we need to the right recipe. Fortunately, it has been available to us for two millennia: the teachings of the Catholic Church provide all the ingredients we need.

Well, if the Catholic Church is so great, what about the sexual abuse scandal? I get this all the time. The short answer is this: every priest who failed us did so because he followed his id, not his vows. Had he followed the teachings of the Catholic Church, he could not have sinned. But we all do. That’s why popes go to confession—they’re human. In other words, beginning with the apostles, some of our teachers have failed us. However, the teachings manifestly have not. The distinction is crucial.

Name something that makes for the good society and invariably it will be shown to have Catholic roots; at the very least, Catholic embellishments can be ascertained. Take the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution. It speaks to a vision of society where justice, domestic tranquility, the common defense of the people, their general welfare, and the blessings of liberty reign supreme.

Justice is one of the cardinal virtues, and no institution has a better record in tending to the needs of the dispossessed than the Catholic Church. Domestic tranquility is not dependent on the police, but on the ability of people to police themselves; here the cardinal virtue of temperance is key. The common defense must allow for just wars, and the proper exercise of another cardinal virtue, namely fortitude, is a must. The general welfare of the people is best served by adopting the teleology, or ultimate purpose, of Catholicism—a “focus on the other.” And without the most senior of all the cardinal virtues, prudence, the blessings of liberty, properly understood, can never be achieved.

From the founding of the first universities, to the triumph of the Scientific Revolution, the role of the Catholic Church has been seminal. Indeed, when it comes to understanding why Europe and North America have been home to almost every technological breakthrough in history, there is no better road map than the one Christianity affords. Moreover, the Church’s contributions to art, architecture and music have proven to be legendary.

The section on prudence begins by discussing the Catholic Church’s role in the makings of a free society. Freedom was not born in Greece—it was a byproduct of the Church’s opposition to temporal powers. By contrast, so unknown was freedom to the Chinese and Japanese that they did not have a word for it until the nineteenth century. To be sure, slavery was a universal institution that was not condemned initially by any civilization or religion, though no entity did more to prudentially undermine it over time—through the promotion of natural law and natural rights—than the Catholic Church. Contemporary challenges to freedom, such as the false idea of abortion as a “right,” have similarly been resisted by the Church.

Justice for the strongest has never commanded the resources of the Catholic Church, but justice for the weakest most certainly has. In this regard, the role of nuns has been pivotal. Whether by founding schools, foster care homes, asylums, hospitals, hospices, and the like, or by personally tending to the psychological and emotional needs of men, women, and children, nuns, along with priests and the laity, have a track record that has no equal anywhere in the world. Reaching out to the diseased, and to the stranger, especially immigrants, has always been a staple of Catholic social teachings. That many Catholics have made good on those teachings is a story that should make all Catholics cheer.

It took tremendous fortitude for Pope Pius XII to fight the Nazis, and no leader in the world won the plaudits of Jews, during and after the war, than he did. It is important to set the record straight—there have been so many lies told—by recounting all the brave words and deeds that this great pope delivered. Similarly, we need to give Pope John Paul II all the praise he deserves in helping to destroy communism in the Soviet Union and throughout Eastern Europe. The historical evidence is clear: Pius XII and John Paul II have secured their place in the annals of freedom. Few world leaders, and no religious ones, did more to combat totalitarianism than they did.

Temperance is a virtue that self-governing people need to inculcate if moral anarchy is to be checked. Here again, the teachings of Catholicism have proved indispensable. By offering a realistic interpretation of liberty, one that is grounded in our responsibilities to others, the Church offers a practical guide to the creation of a free society. The importance of marriage and the family, and a healthy appreciation of sexuality, beckons us all to give Catholic sexual ethics serious consideration.

These are just some of the subjects that bear examination. By moving from papal encyclicals to their faithful implementation, the reader learns how critically important the Church has been in world history. Priests, the religious, and the laity have bequeathed a stunning legacy, one that contrasts sharply with the failed record of secularism.

By comparing the Church’s efforts to that of secular theorists and practitioners, we see ever more clearly why the Catholic voice must be heard in the third millennium. For example, had the secular idea of positivistic law, or law posited by government, prevailed after World War II, Nazis who obeyed orders by killing innocent Jews, Catholics, and others could not have been prosecuted. To do that, the Nuremberg courts had to turn to natural law, a concept that has been embraced by Catholicism for centuries. Similarly, government programs to help the poor have often created more poverty; when compared to Catholic programs, they look even more enfeebled.

The democracies, especially the U.S., fought fascism and communism, but without the efforts of the Catholic Church their ultimate demise would have taken longer to achieve. The secular approach to liberty, one that prizes individual autonomy, has delivered a lot less freedom to its adherents than those who have followed the Catholic approach. Indeed, it has spawned a condition closer to moral anarchy.

Hopefully this book may inspire us to turn to the great heritage of Catholicism as a platform for societal renewal. As indicated, the right recipe for the makings of the good society are right in front of us. There is no better time to show why Catholicism matters than right now.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING ABOUT WHY CATHOLICISM MATTERS

Bill Donohue’s Why Catholicism Matters offers a fresh and compelling look at how the teachings of the Catholic Church continue to provide the best guide for a healthy, happy society. Using the four cardinal virtues – prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance – as a springboard, this insightful book delves into the issues facing the Church and the broader community, and shows how the Church is at the cutting edge of providing solutions to those issues. Why Catholicism Matters should eliminate the tired stereotype of the Church as being little more than a nagging nay-sayer. On the contrary, it reveals that the Church, and Dr. Donohue himself, give an emphatic YES! to all that is good, noble and uplifting in the human person.

His Eminence Timothy Michael Cardinal Dolan

One can rarely finish a commentary by Dr. William Donohue and remain unfazed. In these days of sharp attacks against the Catholic Church and her teachings and values, Bill can be counted on to weigh in, full-blast, and get the attention which our position too often finds ignored in the secular media. In Why Catholicism Matters, readers of every persuasion will find much to inform, deliberate, and, invariably, take issue with. For that, and for his unapologetic commitment to our Faith, I am personally grateful to Dr. Bill Donohue.

His Eminence Edwin Cardinal O’Brien

Why Catholicism Matters is an important contribution at a critical time. As a preeminent voice defending the Church, Dr. Donohue eloquently explains the beauty and importance of Catholic faith. On the canvas of the cardinal virtues, he presents a true and beautiful portrait of the Church that will benefit all people of faith.”

His Eminence Donald Cardinal Wuerl

TV audiences know Bill Donohue as a scrapper; a vigorous defender of the Catholic faith in his public role as leader of the Catholic League. But he’s also a gifted scholar and, as Why Catholicism Matters demonstrates, a thoughtful, vivid and compelling writer. This is a must-read book for anyone who wants to understand the role Catholics need to play in recovering key Christian virtues and renewing American society.”

Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

With religious freedom under assault from many directions, what better moment to be reminded of Catholicism’s wisdom, glories, and multi-faceted contributions to the common good? And who better to remind us than that tireless defender of the Catholic faith, Bill Donohue? Donohue is a treasure and his book is a gem.

Mary Ann Glendon, Harvard Law Professor

Bill Donohue has spent much of his life defending the Catholic Church – in his latest work he joyously celebrates it. This tour of the Church’s forgotten virtues and the many gifts She has given society reminds us all why the Faith remains the prime mover in our time. It also demonstrates why Donohue matters!

Raymond Arroyo, Host of EWTN’s “The World Over”

Bill Donohue

It has come to my attention that the University of Minnesota Duluth is hosting a series of events on the Holocaust; they are scheduled to run between April 12 and April 19. Because many of the events address the religious response to the Holocaust, it is of great interest to the Catholic League. For example, we have a wealth of information on our website about the Catholic response to Hitler. Moreover, we have raised funds for books and articles on the subject, and we even have a reader on Pope Pius XII that covers the Jewish reaction to his noble efforts.

It is our hope that these events will foster an intellectual dialogue that is both educational and productive of good interreligious relations. But I am less than confident that this will happen. Unfortunately, some of what I have learned is very disturbing. There appears to be an effort to cast the Catholic Church in the role of an enabler, if not worse, of Nazi efforts. This is not only historically inaccurate, it is scurrilous.

The first sign that the Catholic Church will be treated in a villainous role is the postcard that was mailed to the public flagging the events: on the front there is an invidious drawing featuring a Nazi soldier and a Catholic prelate standing on a Jewish man. The drawing is nothing new: it was created to demonstrate the Catholic Church’s alleged support for Hitler that the 1933 Concordat supposedly represented.

The second disturbing sign is the April 15 performance of “The Deputy,” a play based on the work of Rolf Hochhuth. It is described in the promotional material as a play “which indicts Pope Pius XII for his failure to take action or speak out against the Holocaust.”

The third disturbing sign is the April 19 event, “Religious Institutions Responses to the Holocaust.” One of the panelists will address what is called “the role of the Confessing Church and the Holocaust.”

My response to these issues is taken from my own book, Why Catholicism Matters, which will be published on May 29 by Image, an imprint of Random House; one part of my new book deals with the role of the Catholic Church and the Holocaust, citing the primary research on this subject that has been done by other scholars.

First Complaint

Pope Pius XI signed the concordat to protect German Catholics from prosecution. Rabbi David Dalin, who has written a ground-breaking book, The Myth of Hitler’s Pope, demonstrates that this agreement was a protective measure; it was not an endorsement of Nazism. Essentially, the agreement allowed the Church to continue to exist in Germany as long as it did not interfere with Hitler’s regime. Not only was it violated by Hitler almost immediately, according to Zsolt Aradi, a Jewish writer who covered Pius XI, “the little freedom that the Concordat left for the clergy and hierarchy was widely used to save as many persecuted Jews as could be saved.” In any event, the pope didn’t have a whole lot of options to choose from at the time. It is important to note that the pope never gave even tacit support to Hitler’s agenda.

This same pope issued an encyclical in 1937, Mit Brennender Sorge, that condemned the Nazi’s violation of the concordat, and took aim at the Nazis’ racial ideology (it was written by the man who would become his successor, Eugenio Pacelli—Pope Pius XII). An internal German memorandum dated March 23, 1937, called the encyclical “almost a call to do battle against the Reich government.” Indeed, the encyclical was roundly attacked in the German newspapers, which wrote that it was the product of the “Jew God and His deputy in Rome.” In fact, some media outlets said the encyclical “calls on Catholics to rebel against the authority of the Reich,” a conclusion that was entirely warranted.

In short, to mail postcards smearing the Catholic Church, as if the concordat was a vote of support for Hitler, is inexcusable. It is also inexcusable to learn that the Duluth News Tribune featured the agit-prop drawing as an advertisement for the event.

Second Complaint

“The Deputy” previewed in Berlin and London in 1963 before coming to New York City in 1964. Prior to that time, the overwhelming consensus in the Jewish community was that Pope Pius XII was a hero. To wit: the pope is credited by former Israeli diplomat Pinchas Lapide of saving approximately 860,000 Jewish lives, far more than any other leader in the world, secular or religious. Indeed, it was proposed in the 1940s that 800,000 trees be planted as a testimony of the pope’s contribution; they were planted in Negev, in southeast Jerusalem. And when Pope Pius XII died in 1958, Leonard Bernstein of the New York Philharmonic stopped his orchestra for a moment of silence. Among the Jewish organizations that praised the pope were the following: the Anti-Defamation League, the Synagogue Council of America, the Rabbinical Council of America, the New York Board of Rabbis, the America Jewish Committee, the World Jewish Congress, the Central Conference of American Rabbis, and the National Council of Jewish Women.

So what new evidence turned up between 1958 and 1963 to indict the pope as an enabler of Hitler? None. Hochhuth, well known in radical circles at the time, made this charge in his play absent any historical evidence. Recent scholarship, particularly the work of Professor Ronald Rychlak, shows that while Hochhuth operated alone, he was an “unknowing dupe” of the KGB. How do we know? Because of the 2007 testimony of Ion Mihai Pacepa. He maintains that Nikita Khrushchev approved a plan to discredit Pope Pius XII. Pacepa was in a position to know; he was a former Romanian intelligence chief and the highest-ranking official ever to defect from the Soviet Bloc.

No serious historian today views “The Deputy” as being anything other than propaganda. In fact, not a single historian has ever remarked on the factual accuracy of this play. But we do know that it nonetheless sparked a rash of anti-Pius books, most of which were written by ex-priests and ex-seminarians whose antipathy of the Church—on matters wholly unrelated to the Holocaust—is palpable. I would be remiss if I did not note that the Catholic League offered to pay for Professor Rychlak to go to Germany a few years ago to interview Hochhuth. Hochhuth declined.

Third Complaint

It is difficult to understand how the “Confessing Church” position can be maintained. What exactly is it that the Church is allegedly confessing? *(The term “Confessing Church” in German history refers to a Protestant breakaway movement that opposed the Nazis.) We know this much: throughout the Holocaust, the New York Times ran a grand total of nine editorials critical of Hitler. Two of them were written to praise Pope Pius XII! To be specific, on Christmas Day 1941, the Times said, “The voice of Pius XII is a lonely voice in the silence and darkness enveloping Europe this Christmas.” On Christmas Day 1942, the Times said of the pope, “This Christmas more than ever he is a lonely voice crying out of the silence of a continent.” So much for the canard that the pope was “silent.”

It must be said, too, that many of those who elected to remain silent did so with the best of motives. For example, when plans were made for an anti-Hitler parade in New York City on May 10, 1933, the American Jewish Committee and B’nai B’rith put out a joint statement condemning “public agitation in the form of mass demonstrations.” They feared such actions would only “inflame” matters. In 1935, after the Nuremberg race laws were enacted, American Jews, led by Rabbi Stephen Wise of the American Jewish Congress, worked against legislation that would have made it easier for Jews to emigrate to the United States. Following Kristallnacht, the “Night of the Broken Glass” (Hitler’s storm troopers went on a rampage killing Jews), several Jewish organizations came together saying “there should be no parades, no demonstrations, or protests by Jews.” Again, they feared an even more vengeful Nazi response.

The author who made the accusation that Pius XII was “Hitler’s pope,” John Cornwell, has since retracted his charge. Do the panelists at these events know about this? Will it be mentioned? Will it also be mentioned that Hitler planned to kidnap the pope? Will the students learn that more Jews were saved in Italy—where the pope was actually in a position to affect outcomes—than in other any European nation? (Throughout Europe 65 percent of Jews were exterminated, but in Italy 85 percent of Jews were saved.) Will they learn that far more Jews were saved in Catholic countries than in Protestant ones?

“Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing the truth.” Those were the words of Albert Einstein. Golda Meir offered similar praise. At the end of the war, the World Jewish Congress was so appreciative of the pope’s efforts to save Jews that it gave 20 million lire to the Vatican. And after the war, the Chief Rabbi of Rome, Israele Anton Zolli, formally expressed the gratitude of Roman Jews “for all the moral and material aid the Vatican gave them during the Nazi occupation.” In 1945, Zolli was received into the Catholic Church and asked Pius XII to be his godfather; he chose the pope’s first name, Eugenio, to be his baptismal name.

It is for these reasons, and many more like them, that I am disturbed to read how patently unfair the campus events on the Holocaust appear to be. In the interest of intellectual honesty, and goodwill between Catholics and Jews, I implore those in the Duluth community to weigh what I have said and give it a fair hearing. No matter what side anyone comes down on, the truth should never become hostage to political propaganda.

William O’Donohue, Ph.D., Olga Cirlugea, B.A., Lorraine Benuto, Ph.D.

We are clinical psychologists (the second author is a graduate student in a doctoral training program) at the University of Nevada, Reno who have been treating sexual abuse victims (the first author for over 30 years). We have treated adults who were abused by priests when they were children; we have also been involved in cases where adults alleged that they were abused by priests, but where the priests deny any wrongdoing. Collectively, we have treated over 2,000 children who have been sexually abused, and also have worked on cases where children have falsely accused others of sexual abuse. As authors, we have published books and peer reviewed journal articles on this subject.

The facts are sometimes difficult to discern: these can be partially shrouded in the mists of history; people offer differing accounts; there are certainly motivations to lie or distort; there are also motivations to falsely accuse—individuals can gain significant sums of money in settlements; individuals may also can have a political agenda against the church; or individuals may even deny that they have abused when they actually have been, to avoid their feelings of shame or embarrassment—or even to protect their abuser. The reporting of abuse and deciding what actually has occurred is no simple matter.

When it comes to priests, we know from an analysis of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice study that a little less than half of the priests were found to be subject to unsubstantiated allegations. An unsubstantiated allegation was defined as “an allegation that was proven to be untruthful and fabricated” as a result of a criminal investigation. This rate of false accusations is much higher than found in the general population. Additionally, 23% of the priests who were accused of abuse were identified as suffering from behavioral or psychological problems ranging from alcohol and substance abuse to depression and a past history of coercive sex, although most never received treatment for these problems.

More than half of the priests had only one allegation brought against them. Also, it is important to note that a few priests accounted for a disproportionate number of victims: 3.5% of priests accounted for 26% of victims. Even though an investigation was conducted almost every time a report was filed, only 217 or 5.4% of priests were charged with a crime by a district attorney. Of the 217 priests that had criminal charges brought against them, a substantial majority (64%) were convicted; but still a significant number were not found guilty. Most received probation (88%) and/or a prison sentence (73%), while 44% went to jail and 18% were fined.

The problem of the sexual abuse of minors is a national problem, involving the clergy of all religions, as well as public school teachers, coaches, et al. For example, 10% of Protestant clergy were involved in sexual misconduct, 2-3% of which committed sexual abuse. In 2007 Jehovah’s Witnesses settled 9 lawsuits with victims alleging that the church’s policies protected child sexual abusers. The Church Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints reported 3-4 yearly lawsuits over the course of the last 10 years, which translates to allegations in .4-.5% Mormon wards. The Jewish community has founded two sexual abuse survivors’ organizations, Survivors for Justice and Awareness Center, the latter of which provides “the names of 107 rabbis accused of sexual misconduct and 279 other trusted officials (for example, parents and counselors), as well as 85 unnamed abusers.”

Did abuse occur simply because somebody said it happened? The clear and simple answer to this question, is “No.” Although we do not know the exact percentage of false reports, it is our clinical experience and the consensus in the field that the majority of children reporting that they have been abused are telling the truth. It is clear that many children have been abused by adults, and this is morally reprehensible, a serious crime and effective measures need to be put into placed to prevent this in the future. However, the matter is complex. Our field, for example, does not have clear statistics regarding the percentage of adults who allege that they have been abused as children and who are in fact telling the truth. It needs to be said that adults have unique pathways to false reporting (for example, they can be motivated by money or may be suffering from delusions).

What causes false reporting? Lies. Children and adolescents do not always tell the truth. In fact while we don’t know exactly how often they lie about being sexually abused, research shows that those numbers are above zero. Furthermore, because children at times recant (meaning that they first state that they were abused and then later state they were not), we know that children sometimes claim that they have previously lied or at least were mistaken. A variety of factors can influence the likelihood of children making false allegations. For example, children may have been coached by a parent involved in a bitter custody battle to make false statements against the other parent, or may have had a personal vendetta against the alleged perpetrator. It’s important to note that children can also lie by claiming that the abuse did not occur when in reality it did. This is more likely to happen if the child was threatened or coerced by the perpetrator.

Beyond lying, false memories can also be formed. In fact, well over 100 scientific research studies have shown that both children and adults can and do form false memories. This research was spurred by the infamous McMartin Day Care case in the 1980s Manhattan Beach, California in which over 360 children alleged that they were abused, often in bizarre ways (for example, placed in planes and forced to watch babies being fed to sharks). In what was then the longest and most expensive criminal trial in California history, all parties were found not guilty. Dr. Michael Maloney examined the interviewing of the children and found that the interviewer used improper methods to question the children and that these were extremely suggestive, biased, and which lead to false memories on the part of the children. This spurred a number of academic research studies which attempted to understand what causes and how easy it is to form a false memory.

For example, in one study, young children were told that a visitor, Sam Stone, was clumsy and always broke thing that were not his. When “Sam” came to visit the children he did not touch or break anything. The next day the children saw a soiled stuffed bear and a torn book. Even though no child had seen Sam do anything, when asked a quarter of the children (25%) hinted that he might have had a part in the problem. Even though the children had not seen Sam do anything, their prior experience of being told that he was clumsy mixed in with their actual experience of observing him and they concluded that he might have had a part in the torn book and soiled bear.

In addition, over the next ten weeks the children were asked misleading questions/statements by the first interviewer such as, “I wonder if Same Stone got the teddy bear dirty on purpose or by accident?” On the tenth week, a second (seemingly independent) interviewer asked what had happened to the toys. The majority of children (72%) accused Sam of having ruined the toys, and nearly half of the children (45%) reported that they remembered seeing Sam do it. Thus the children’s new experiences (being interviewed and having it suggested to them that Sam Stone dirtied the teddy bear) are mixed into the memory of the past event (when Sam Stone came to visit).

Adults may also form false memories. In fact, research has demonstrated time and time again that eyewitnesses often confuse misleading post-event information with what they have witnessed, thus developing false memories. Elizabeth Loftus of the University of California, Irvine has consistently found that about 25% of adults are so suggestible that fairly simple suggestions result in significant false memories of events that in fact did not occur when they were children (e.g., that they were lost in a mall).

False memories are not identical to repressed memories. A repressed memory is a memory of some major event that while initially stored in memory is allegedly completely erased , often for decades; it then suddenly emerges often after some triggering event. Historically there has been much debate regarding the existence of repressed memories. However, there is a large amount of scientific evidence that clearly shows that repressed memories simply do not exist. Furthermore research studies involving traumatic events that have been verified indicate that people do not forget their trauma. Indeed, traumatic events are actually quite memorable.

Despite the scientific evidence, the legal system has used repressed memories to convict people, including priests, on charges of child sexual abuse. For example, the Massachusetts Supreme Court affirmed the conviction of Paul Shanley (a defrocked priest convicted of sexually abusing a child who claimed that for many years he repressed his memory of being molested) despite an amicus brief signed by almost 100 distinguished psychologists and psychiatrists essentially categorizing the repressed memory phenomenon as junk science.

It should be clear that children who have been abused by priests represent a terrible betrayal of trust, a serious injury to these children, and a criminal as well as a moral failing. However, an examination of the best studies suggest that the rate of priestly sexual abuse is about the same rate found in the general population. Futhermore, it is not clear that Catholic priests abuse children at a higher rate than other clergy. Certainly, beliefs that “most priests abuse” or that priests are more risk to children than other individuals, are not justified. Second, the pattern of abuse is rather unique: individuals who are victimized by priests are more likely to be adolescents and males. Third, there is evidence that priests have a higher rate of false and unfounded allegations than adults in the general population: less than half of the allegations were found to be substantiated and even with those that were criminally prosecuted a large number—nearly a third—were found not guilty. All of this raises important questions about the phenomenon of false allegations.

We conclude by warning against a rush to judgment. Concern for past victims and intelligent prevention efforts to reduce the rate of abuse to zero, certainly must be a priority. But it should also be a priority to make sure that prejudices against priests do not come into play to demonize innocent individuals.

A longer version of this article, complete with citations and a bibliography, is available on our website under “Papers, Essays and Research.”