Politics In
Red Robes
By Sidney Blumenthal
07 April, 2005
The
Guardian
President
Bush, a militant evangelical Protestant, has lowered the American flag
to half-staff for the first time at the death of a pope. Also for the
first time, a US president will attend a papal funeral. Bush's political
rhetoric is deliberately inflected with Catholic theological phrases,
in particular "the culture of life", words he used to justify
his interference in the case of Terri Schiavo, the brain-damaged woman,
the removal of whose feeding tube was upheld 19 times by state and federal
courts.
In the 2004 election,
Bush's campaign helped organise the attack on John Kerry's Catholic
authenticity by conservative bishops who threatened to deny him communion.
Inside the White House, policy and personnel are coordinated in line
with rightwing Catholicism. Not only are issues like international population
control, reproductive health and women's rights vetted, but so are appointments.
Since the accession
of Pope John Paul II, the conservative mobilisation within the American
church has been a microcosmic version of the ascendancy of the conservative
movement in the country generally. As the authority of the Vatican was
marshalled on behalf of the conservatives, the Republican right adopted
its position as its own in order to capture Catholic votes. Now the
social agendas of conservative Catholics and Republicans are indistinguishable.
John Paul II welcomed
American democracy as a counter to communism, but he had no experience
with democracy of any kind. He envisioned his mission as restoring the
authority of the church. America appeared to him as a liberal inferno
- its citizens, he lectured American bishops last year, were "hypnotised
by materialism, teetering before a soulless vision of the world".
The Pope asserted
his control over the American church in 1984 with his naming of conservatives
Bernard Law and John O'Connor as archbishops of Boston and New York.
They became his chief agents. At the same time, the Vatican refused
to deal with the elected officers of the US conference of Catholic bishops,
who were largely imbued with the spirit of Vatican II.
Cardinal Joseph
Bernardin of Chicago was acknowledged as the leader of the bishops and
represented the broad progressive tradition of the American church.
He articulated the concept of Catholicism as a "seamless garment"
in which abortion was only one among many important issues. In 1994
he announced a common ground initiative, entitled Church in a Time of
Peril, calling on the church to overcome its polarisation and suppression
of discussion on the issues tearing it apart - from women's changing
roles to the fact that many Catholics did not accept most church teachings
on sexuality to the declining numbers of priests. Bernardin was a consensus
builder and believed he had touched all bases with the Vatican before
unveiling his project. But the same day, Cardinal Law, clearly acting
with Vatican authority, denounced it: "The fundamental flaw in
this document is its appeal for 'dialogue' as a path to 'common ground'.
"
Bernardin died months
later and was replaced by a protege of Law's. In 2002, the Boston Globe
ran the first of more than 250 stories on paedophilic molestation by
parish priests. Law resisted investigating the sex scandal and faced
potential criminal prosecution for his cover-ups. The Pope rescued him
with a sinecure in the Vatican. In the aftermath of the sex scandal,
conservatives under siege lashed out more ferociously. As they saw it,
their failure to overturn the law on abortion demonstrated that they
had not been hardline enough. Thus the sex scandal set the stage for
the rightwing Catholic offensive on behalf of Bush in the 2004 campaign.
With the Pope's
death, American Catholics yearn for openness. According to a poll by
Gallup, 78% want the next pope to allow Catholics to use birth control;
63% say he should let priests marry; 59% believe he should have a less
strict policy on stem cell research; 55% say he should allow women to
be priests.
But the Republicans
are moving aggressively on the conservative social agenda. This week,
in Kansas, gay marriage was banned in a referendum. Four states have
passed bills permitting pharmacists to refuse to fill prescriptions
for contraceptives. The governor of Illinois has issued an emergency
order to ensure that pharmacists fill all prescriptions. California's
legislature is debating a law to require druggists to do the same.
By consolidating
power, the Pope believed that he was strengthening the church. Now the
conservatives want a post-John Paul papacy to extend his stringency.
Others want moderation, openness and discussion. Catholics in America
do not now hold the same principle of hope. No one monitors the church's
crisis more closely than the White House, and no one plots to exploit
its division more ruthlessly. Religion is politics under red robes.
So Bush travels to Rome.
Sidney Blumenthal
is former senior adviser to President Clinton and author of The Clinton
Wars [email protected]