POLITICS APRIL 30, 2012
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When Charles Colson died last weekend, he was best known as the Watergate felon turned prison minister. But Colson, a constant presence in Christian Right circles for over two decades, had perhaps his greatest impact in another sphere of American life: expanding evangelical-Catholic cooperation in the fight against legalized abortion into a broader political alliance.
For signs of his success, look at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ latest manifesto, published just last month. Titled “Our First, Most Cherished Liberty,” the statement embraces the long-standing conservative evangelical campaign against secularism in the courts and in the Obama administration. To protest the alleged threat to religious liberty, the document announced a “fortnight of freedom” series to occur in churches across the country this summer—coinciding with the quickening of the 2012 general election.
The Catholic document, which adopts culture-war memes long associated with the Christian Right, clearly reflects Colson’s long-standing campaign to identify religious freedom with the right of churches and church institutions to defy laws and polices they find repugnant. The statement even included a prominent shout-out to a similar, if more sharply worded, manifesto issued by Evangelicals and Catholics Together (ECT)—a loose alliance of thinkers and actors founded in 1994 by none other than Colson and his Catholic comrade, Richard John Neuhaus. (Neuhaus, a Catholic priest and former Lutheran minister, is responsible for creating much of the basic vocabulary of the more cerebral elements of the Christian Right in his 1984 book The Naked Public Square.)
When ECT issued its first manifesto, it was a highly controversial exercise that attracted considerable criticism from both evangelicals and Catholics. ECT proclaimed that the moral and political emergency facing conservative Christians trumped their vast theological differences—not to mention centuries of conflict, persecution, and vituperation. And while ECT’s struggle to achieve Catholic-evangelical convergence on doctrinal issues had at best a mixed record, the more fundamental claim that the most urgent matter for today’s Christians is common opposition to “secularist” policies has made astonishing strides, as witnessed by the Bishops’ statement.
But even as conservative Catholics and evangelicals agree to subjugate their continued differences in doctrine, worship, and non-cultural political traditions to a unified front against the enemy of moral relativism, the often-ignored third force in American Christianity—mainline Protestants—have been steadily overcoming precisely those doctrinal barriers that have long divided them from Rome. We may be on the brink of a religious realignment, whereby the issues on which Christians argued, fought, killed, and persecuted each other (and others) since the sixteenth century are giving way to a different source of division: the culture wars.
The signs of this realignment are most visible in politics. A highly traditionalist Catholic, Rick Santorum, who belongs to a parish where the Latin Mass is still celebrated, became the preferred presidential candidate of conservative evangelicals. Over the course of the primary campaign, it became clear that he shares the common conservative evangelical view that mainline Protestants are largely apostates, barely deserving inclusion in Christianity.
Yet the single most notable trend in mainline American Protestantism in recent decades has been the adoption of liturgical practices associated with Catholicism, such as frequent communion and observance of liturgical seasons, particularly since Rome reformed its own liturgy during and after the Second Vatican Council Catholics and most mainline Protestants have long since adopted a common “lectionary” of scripture readings for use during worship services throughout the year. At the same time, the radical theological experiments that were once so fashionable in liberal Protestant circles have been subsiding; mainliners are far more likely to recite the historic Nicene or Apostle’s creeds during worship than are evangelicals. In other words, a growing number of mainline Protestants now worship much like Catholics. And on non-cultural issues, from social justice to anti-war protests, Catholic and mainline Protestant cooperation—particularly at the local level—has become a familiar part of the civic landscape. This tradition, in fact, is continuing currently in the combined criticism of Paul Ryan’s budget proposal by both mainline Protestants and Catholic Bishops.
For anyone familiar with the history of intra-Christian conflict, the mainline-Catholic convergence on doctrine and worship is jarring. I recently attended a Sunday service at a mainline Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) congregation in Atlanta where the Lord’s Supper was referred to as a “sacrifice.” This would have been startling not only to that denomination’s nineteenth century founders, but to the Protestant Reformers themselves, who abandoned regular communion precisely because of its treatment by the medieval Church as a sacrifice instead of as a testament of faith.
The oddity of the ever-strengthening conservative Catholic-evangelical alliance against the “modernist” mainliners on cultural issues, if nothing else, is most evident in the battles within the mainline denominations over acceptance of homosexuality among lay people and clergy. More often than not, the evangelicals who accuse denominational leaders of abandoning “orthodoxy” in moral teaching are most avid to promote innovation in styles of worship. As an Episcopal priest in Maryland ruefully told me of conservative dissidents in his parish during the 1990s: “These people come to church with a Christian Coalition tract in one hand and a ‘praise hymnal’ in the other.” In the broader fight over ordination of LGBT priests and bishops that has shaken the Anglican communion during the last decade, it’s the evangelicals indifferent or hostile to traditional worship who are leading the battle for “traditional” moral views, while the liturgically conservative Anglo-Catholic wing has generally been indifferent or supportive towards the advent of openly gay clergy.
All these cross-cutting trends and counter-trends in American (and global) Christianity call into question any glib arrangement of denominations, movements, or individuals as conservative or liberal, traditionalist or modernist. Neuhaus and Colson certainly had little doubt that what brought them together as culture-warriors was more important than any of the divergent ways their two Christian traditions have developed doctrinally in two millennia.
And for now, at least, the most powerful leaders among conservative evangelicals seem to agree with Colson. It’s too early to conclude that Neuhaus’s argument has won over the U.S. Catholic hierarchy for good—much less the many millions of Catholic lay people, priests and religious who have not enlisted in the culture wars. But if the recent alarms raised by the Bishops on “religious freedom”—complemented by the Vatican’s crackdown on non-compliant American nuns—are any indication, that’s the direction they seem to be headed. If so, they will stand against the mainline Protestants who increasingly find common ground with them at the altar and in the pews, if not on the cultural and political barricades.
Ed Kilgore is a special correspondent for The New Republic, a blogger for The Washington Monthly, and managing editor of The Democratic Strategist.
13 comments
This reminds me of the doctrinal battles and alliances in the Soviet Union. Of course, the whole realignment operation was started by the sociopath Chuck Baby Colson. These people just can't give up their exercise of power in the world and focus on caring for what Jesus thought was more important than everything else put together--His flock, which included, yes, even the rich.
- magboy47.
April 30, 2012 at 1:46am
One does tend to wonder how the Catholic hierarchy got from thinking about economic and social justice (and nuclear weapons) in the 1980s to where they are today. It certainly doesn't look like a retreat from politics in the town square to the pastoral meadow. It looks like a strange generational shift in order to adjust to becoming more American, but in a very limited sense. But it's a process definitely going to be marked by the millions of Hispanic residents of the U.S. who are Catholic -- this new conservative message may not play out entirely positively with them.
- ironyroad
April 30, 2012 at 2:33am
While Catholics and Protestants both believe that the one path to God is through Jesus, the former believe that the one path to Jesus is through the Church while the latter believe the one path to Jesus is through a personal relationship with Him. No amount of ecumenism on cultural issues can change that fundamental difference in doctrine. Besides, unlike us unsuspecting (some say naive) Episcopaleans, Roman Catholics aren't about to become so welcoming that they would allow those who don't believe in Catholic doctrine to have any say (much less control) over the Church, its liturgy, or its property. As for mainline Prostestants, the urgency is to stem the tide of defections to independent community (and mostly evangelical) churches, which have the dual advantage of no hierarchy (or large charitable organizations) to support and a more positive (i.e., egocentric) message for its members. I'd say there are more choices for Christians than there are for Walmart shoppers, even if both are seeking a bargain.
- rayward
April 30, 2012 at 7:33am
An interesting article that, however, misses several key points. First, the movement towards a more "catholic" style of worship among mainline protestants is the result of several trends, but not least among them the loss of any remaining moral authority. Something has to bring the people in, so a patina of liturgical conservatism is serving for now, fulfilling a human need that could be seen in the strange survival of rituals in the Soviet Union that paralleled those of the church. Second, the author might note that, as regards Episcopalians, he is talking about the Incredibly Shrinking Church, an organization that has been reduced to living off of its trust funds as its moral capital has collapsed. (Don't take my word for it, just check the numbers.) That Anglo-Catholics are more supportive of gay clergy is hardly surprising to anyone familiar with the history of Anglo-Catholicism. Meanwhile, former members have fled to either breakaway, more-or-less "Anglican" churches or to Western Rite Orthodoxy or now to the new Roman Catholic Anglican Ordinariate. In this strange new world that neither Reinhold Niebuhr nor the Second Vatican Council could have foreseen, all the high cards are in the hands of men like Pope Benedict and the Southern Baptist Convention. Mixing and matching liturgical customs to suit the new mood isn't going to save mainline protestantism.
- timteeter
April 30, 2012 at 8:40am
During the weekend, I traveled off island and attended a meeting of atheists where we watched the excellent movie LAKE OF FIRE, a documentary about abortion. Even among a group of fairly hard core atheists, there was no consensus about the issue. In my view, no one knows the mind of God (as He probably does not exist), so anyone who claims to know it is very suspect in my book. We are on our own in a cold, uncaring universe. Brr.
- skahn
April 30, 2012 at 9:24am
"I recently attended a Sunday service at a mainline Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) congregation in Atlanta where the Lord’s Supper was referred to as a 'sacrifice.' This would have been startling not only to that denomination’s nineteenth century founders, but to the Protestant Reformers themselves, who abandoned regular communion precisely because of its treatment by the medieval Church as a sacrifice instead of as a testament of faith." Ed, as a member of the Church of Christ, it's apparent that you do not know us very well. Regular Sunday observances of the Lord's Supper have always been a part of our services, because that is what the original Christians did (Acts 20:7). But I have never heard of communion itself being a sacrifice, but as a memorial for Christ's sacrifice to be observed until the Second Coming.
- zardoz67
April 30, 2012 at 11:54am
ray: the former believe that the one path to Jesus is through the Church while the latter believe the one path to Jesus is through a personal relationship with Him. This is not really true as far as Catholics are concerned. Catholics also have to have faith primarily, the way to attain the state of grace is through confession with the church as the intercession but the path to Jesus, for both groups, lies fundamentally with the individual. This is based on pure practicality, if the church had the rule that only those who are saved had death bed confessions then the church would have fallen apart centuries ago. If anything the essential difference between RC's and Protestants is in the Justification theory, whether faith alone is sufficient for salvation, or good works are required. Catholics believe that faith without good works is dead. Pretty much this is what all the centuries of fighting and killing was about.
- blackton
April 30, 2012 at 3:08pm
I'm an Episcopalean, so naturally I believe in both Justification by Faith and in Good Works as the key to salvation; it's the advantage of being the "middle way". For those who subscribe to the Good Works version of Christianity, I would point out that many textual scholars consider the term an anachronism (as used, for example, in James' Epistle), and had more to do with the division among the Brothers with regard to Jews and Gentiles: Good Works didn't relate to widows and orphans, but rather adherence to Jewish Law. Christians have more divisions than the German Army.
- rayward
April 30, 2012 at 4:43pm
While the insight of this article is generally appreciated, it's well to caution against too much equation of mainline Protestant worship practices with those of Catholicism. Such trends as increased use of common lectionary and more frequent communion (though not frequent enough for this Presbyterian pastor wannabe) are hardly widespread yet, as my weekly experiences attest regularly. The trend may be in that direction but it is hardly there yet. It should also be noted that such practices are not "only" associated with Catholicism; the Anglican/Episcopal tradition and Lutheran practice (to some degree) have also maintained some of these elements historically, and these traditions are more likely borrowing points for other American denominations edging towards more liturgical worship. Meanwhile, timteeter thoroughly misreads things. If anything these trends in mainline Protestantism are far more the result of the loss of their influence than any attempt to stave it off. If the trend for putting butts in seats is big flashy video displays and rock bands, liturgical vestments and weekly communion don't seem the most likely way to retain numbers. If anything, after decades of being the mainline of American Christianity (and the poison that too often meant for such churches), some of these denominations, shrunken as they may be, are finding that being on the periphery means freedom to re-engage with things they may have disposed of in too much haste all those years/centuries ago. Throw in the benefits of current scholarship (say, that Calvin actually wanted his churches to maintain weekly communion, but got played out of it by the Geneva elders), and the impulse towards "liturgical renewal" makes a lot more sense.
- cspencef
April 30, 2012 at 5:18pm
Perhaps a more accurate description would be that Christianity in US politics is now aligned more along political than theological lines. Conservative (usually fundamentalist) Protestants and conservative Catholics have set aside their theological differences, and Mainline Protestants have a lot more in common with more moderate Catholics than with evangelicals. The division within US Catholicism, (the bishops and the traditionalists a minority but with more power) is almost as important as the fundamentalists overcoming their objections to those dreadful Papists.
- K_Wilson
April 30, 2012 at 6:10pm
Kilgore is right on most of these issues but he should have mentioned that in the recent primaries Catholics went for Romney, not Santorum. And his generalizations do not at all apply to Lutherans, who have been there all along on both social justice and especially "high church" worship.
- NR164085
April 30, 2012 at 6:32pm
Says zardoz67: "it's apparent that you do not know us very well etc." Actually, it seems you're making the same point he is. The general Protestant view since the Reformation has indeed been that the Lord's Supper is not a sacrifice but instead a commemoration or a thanksgiving, since it didn't make sense to nominalists like Luther that the single sacrifice of Christ could somehow be multiplied with every Mass or service. And this is precisely why Kilgore was surprised to hear the S-word at that Disciples of Christ service. Blackton: The (more liberal) Lutherans and the Roman Catholic church have actually tried to paper over some of the differences re: justification by faith, setting out common ground in the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification over a decade ago. I don't think it fully succeeds, but from a historical perspective it's striking that they tried.
- frippo
April 30, 2012 at 7:44pm
frippo, my surprise was that he didn't realize we have weekly communion.
- zardoz67
May 2, 2012 at 10:18am