Marco Rubio, Dinesh D’Souza and the end of the Reformation?
Florida’s Republican Senator-elect and Tea Party heartthrob Marco Rubio is the youngest member of the senate, the GOP’s only Latino senator (he is Cuban-American), and a straight-talking Catholic who brings the same sense of conviction to his faith as he does to his politics. A flattering profile of him at Catholic Advocate last February was called, “Marco Rubio, A Catholic Candidate Who Will Not Compromise.”
But now it turns out (I have a piece on it all at PoliticsDaily) that Rubio has been attending a Southern Baptist-affiliated megachurch near Miami for much of the past decade, a revelation that has surprised many folks and dismayed a few supporters. After many requests, a Rubio spokesman said that the senator-elect “regularly attends Catholic Mass, and he was baptized, confirmed and married in the Roman Catholic Church. On the final Sunday of the campaign, for example, he attended Mass at Christ the King Catholic Church in Tampa. . . . He also attends services at a Christian church with his wife and children.”
The “Christian church” is apparently Christ Fellowship. Asked why Rubio attended a non-Catholic church regularly, Burgos said: “He attends both regularly.” His donations, some $66,000 since 2000, go to Christ Fellowship, however.
Dinesh D’Souza, another Catholic paladin on the right, also surprised and unsettled more than a few of his allies last August when he was appointed to lead The King’s College, a small evangelical college located in the Empire State Building. How’s that? D’Souza D’Souza told Christianity Today at the time that he himself is “non-denominational” and has been attending an evangelical megachurch in San Diego for several years.
He added:
“My apologetic is very nondenominational; it’s very much inspired by the C. S. Lewis idea of mere Christianity. I’m quite happy to acknowledge my Catholic background; at the same time, I’m very comfortable with Reformation theology.”
“Being a Protestant is a term defined in opposition to Catholicism and refers to a set of historical battles over denominational issues. As far as I can tell, those denominational issues are not the center of what’s being argued today.”
Earlier this month, Marvin Olasky, the provost at The King’s College, resigned, and it’s not clear there will be any further fallout for D’Souza. And Rubio, whose positions on gay marriage and abortion are in line with his conservative faith-based supporters, will likely be protected behind the “ecumenism of the barricades.”
But if Rubio were a Democrat, I don’t see thing playing out so irenically. And what of his religious double-dipping? Or D’Souza’s take on post-Reformation theology? It all seems rather wobbly men of such strong convictions.
Thanks for this. Amazing. A new old saw: Politics makes for strange pew-fellows. (Do they have pews at megachurches?)
If I can quibble with one thing. Why is the ecumenism of the trenches so bad? The New Deal coalition was urban catholics and jews, and southern white evangelicals. They shared a cultural conservatism too, although obviously it was economics that united them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jiUQg3u_oQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08GNXVvKq18&feature=related
After reading this and never having seen a megachurch, I thought I would see what came up on youtube. I am reminded of the Edward Gibbon quote that if Jesus were to walk into one of those churches, he would inquire into the name of the deity being worshipped there…assuming that he recognized it as a church and not a concert.
JC, I think the issue is that these guys are being lauded as Catholic leaders, when their actions suggest that affiliation with other churches is at least as important to them, and perhaps more important (judging by contributions). Anyone on the left who tried this would be dismissed as a cafeteria Catholic or worse–a heretic, traitor, failing the smell text for orthodoxy, etc.
Because (surprise!) the Catholic Church does not share these politicians’ views about dual membership, the puzzle is that they themselves don’t have any scruples about it. They are at odds with their (Catholic) Church, but consider themselves not only in good standing but exemplary.
OK, one final point. I am a little jealous about the money. Our little Catholic parish here has a school that’s on the ropes. I am sure others have examples of similar needs. $66,000 in contributions would make a difference to a good many of our smaller Catholic institutions; instead, this “Catholic” politician is supporting a megachurch. OK, fine. Join the megachurch. But then don’t present yourself as some kind of model Catholic leader.
Are these revelation good news or bad? I really wonder. Probably it is all relative to the observer. Another instance of pernicious relativism?
David, I read your column at PD and some of the comments below. Isn’t that one poster correct who said the obligation for Catholics is to attend Mass every Sunday, not once a year? (I think the Easter duty is to receive the sacraments once a year.)
I don’t think it should matter to anyone what religion, if any, a politician believes in or practices or contributes to. And if s/he attends more than one church/synagogue/mosque, so what? Our country is a melting pot. The wedding announcements in the NYT every Sunday make that clear. The old days are over. Now an Irish girl can marry a German girl. A Jewish boy can marry a Catholic girl. Etc.
Rita, I agree completely. Rubio does not impress. My comment is a little off topic as usual.
I guess I like the First Things ecumenism. It reaches christians that we have no formal ecumenism with because they have no formal structures. I don’t think it should be dismissed as it has been here by Prof Kaveny, I think, as political only.
An afterthought, I wonder if Rubio gives money to the Prots because he feels that he has more say in how it is spent. One of the reasons Prots generally give more than Catholics is because the laity doesn’t have as much say in where the money goes.
Is this a logical explanation? Rubio is Catholic and his wife is evangelical. They were married in a Catholic church, and he continues to attend mass, probably with about as much regularity as the average dotCommonweal commenter. The wife continues to worship at the mega-church and he goes along to help keep the kids in order. She is more devout than he, so the mega-church ends up getting the contributions and the kids by default.
A lot of families are like that.
I’m kind of reminded of General Wesley Clark, whose Jewish father died before he was born. So he was a Methodist, because his mother was. When they moved in with his grandmother and went to church with her, he became a Baptist. At West Point, he married, and his bride was Catholic, so he became Catholic. Then his wife left the Church, taking him along, and he became Presbyterian. The possibility that religion is anything other than something you do to keep the women in the family happy seems never to have occurred to him. I think John McCain has a similar theology.
(I may have some details confused, but I think this is accurate in outline.)
Who cares? He wasn’t elected Pope.
Perhaps an important lesson here that ecumenism in excess can easily lead to indifferentism. But it sounds like Felapton reads this right, if Rubio’s wife is evangelical.
“Anyone on the left who tried this would be dismissed as a cafeteria Catholic or worse–a heretic, traitor, failing the smell text for orthodoxy, etc.”
And they would also be robustly defended by their fellow progressive Catholics as having the right – nay, the “primacy of conscience” – to do so. But when the conservative Rubio does it…we get negative posts such as this.
“And they would also be robustly defended by their fellow progressive Catholics as having the right – nay, the “primacy of conscience” – to do so.”
Not by me, PF.
“A lot of families are like that.”
I agree. We have several so-called ‘mega-churches’ in our area, including one of the most renowned, Willow Creek. There are definitely people in our congregation who go to our parish one week and Willow Creek the next. Or they go to both each week. Or some other permutation/combination.
It’s a huge pastoral issue in our country, with many millions of “mixed marriages”. What I see anecdotally is that most marriages that cross denominational lines become somewhat unreligious, for the sake of peace in the family. So the Rubio family’s arrangement at least doesn’t slide to that lowest common denominator.
I’d like to hear that he also brings his children to Catholic church. There’s something about that in the marriage rite that presumably was used in his Catholic wedding.
D’Souza’s comments are the ones that just seem “out there”. It’s hard to understand his words and actions to mean anything other than, “I’m not Catholic anymore”.
Let your yes mean yes and your no mean no.
” (Do they have pews at megachurches?)”
Lots of theology packed into that question, JC.
“And they would also be robustly defended by their fellow progressive Catholics as having the right – nay, the “primacy of conscience” – to do so. But when the conservative Rubio does it…we get negative posts such as this.”
P. –
For your theory to hold water you’d need to give us at least one instance of a progressive Catholic politician attending two Churches regularly and calling himself only “Catholic” until he was outed. I’ve never heard of anyone like that, have you?
There a multiple examples (one was Tom Daschle) of politicians who call themselves Catholic in their speeches, campaign literature and official websites but attend church so rarely their religious practice is indistinguishable from agnosticism. Isn’t that analogous?
A practicing evangelical (allegedly) calls himself Catholic. A practicing agnostic calls himself Catholic.
It won’t affect my vote either way, in either case.
For reference, I have posted below two items from Canon Law that I think are most pertinent for this case.
My own uninformed opinion is that this may be a good thing for Rubio and for the Church. His support for the megachurch could be considered support for the Church, though I would be surprised if his bishop, or any bishop, agrees. All Christians are ‘related’ to the Church to different extents, and increasing the ties among them, as Rubio does, is a benefit.
But there is the problem of the Cafeteria, since Rubio (and children) are presented with both the Catholic and Protestant sides of the cafeteria. Does he work to “remove dangers of defecting from the faith”?Protestant dialectic, fundamentalist biblicism, Baptist political theology, and indifferent nondenominationalism are all problems that call for caution. If he has worked these things out, he may be at the forefront of a great movement in the Church. If he has not, it is simply sad.
Can. 222.1. The Christian faithful are obliged to assist with the needs of the Church so that the Church has what is necessary for divine worship, for the works of the apostolate and of charity, and for the decent support of ministers.
Can 1125.1 the Catholic party is to declare that he or she is prepared to remove dangers of defecting from the faith and is to make a sincere promise to do all in his or her power so that all offspring are baptized and brought up in the Catholic Church.
“But if Rubio were a Democrat, I don’t see thing playing out so irenically.”
Why assume that Democrats would be less tolerant than Republicans of religious diversity in their candidates?
Felapton,
But Tom Daschle was publicly scolded by his bishop and instructed to cease calling himself Catholic!
Will we need new monikers such as ProtCaths and CathProts to keep affiliation scorecards straight? ;)
Personally, I find myself agreeing with Rita’s 9:53 am comment.
In fairness I think we need to know what Rubio’s non-Catholic pastor’s message is. Is it the sort of generic Christianity that is largely about generally agreed upon morality and the Creed, or does it take more specific theological positions, e.g., on predestination and explanations of the Eucharist.
I occasionally listen to such preachers on TV and have found that there is often a great deal of agreement between their beliefs and mine. OK, so they’re bland, but that doesn’t make them wrong. I bet Billy Grahman, for instance, preached a goodly number of sermons that some Catholic priests might have wished were their own.
What I’m saying is that there is not necessarily more disagreement between certain non-denominalational Christians and some Catholics than there is between Catholics with extreme positions.
In fairness I think we need to know what Rubio’s non-Catholic pastor’s message is.
Ann,
Isn’t the issue that Rubio claims to be a Catholic but splits his time between a Catholic and a non-Catholic church (and contributes financially only to the non-Catholic church)? Although millions of Catholics don’t seem to feel obligated to attend Mass every Sunday, official Church teaching is that, without a sufficient reason, this is seriously sinful. With the current state of Mass attendance, it seems to me much more likely that Rubio’s actions would influence fellow Catholic on church attendance than a pro-choice Catholic politician would influence fellow Catholics on the issue of abortion.
Will there be a statement from Rubio’s bishop? Or will the bishop call him in for a talk? Rubio lists himself on his web site as Roman Catholic, but it really doesn’t matter how close his non-Catholic pastor is to preaching a Catholic message. You can’t skip Mass on Sundays and attend non-Catholic services and claim to be an “orthodox” Catholic.
David N. –
I agree that what I mean by “a Catholic” is not someone who has, so to speak, dual-Churches. But the beliefs of the young people these days are so far removed from what I was taught and believe (that the RC is the true Church of Christ, at least in the fullest sense of the term) and that membership in other ones is at least a partial rejection of the teachings of Christ. Since what he hears at the “Fellowship” isn’t — perhaps — different from what he hears in his Catholic parish I won’t judge him too harshly — if, indeed, that is what is going on.
That that is not what is going on is suggested by the fact that in running for office he never seems to have mentioned his other church. Looks like a lie by silence. I also wonder about the local newspapers that never reported that fact. Surely if its a mega-church his dual membership must have been well known. How did he keep it out of the media? There is a certain lack of transparency there that doesn’t sit well.
Same with D’Souza who, it seems to me, has profited among some Catholics by his Catholic reputation. Or how long has he not been a Catholic?
Says D’Souza:
“Being a Protestant is a term defined in opposition to Catholicism and refers to a set of historical battles over denominational issues. As far as I can tell, those denominational issues are not the center of what’s being argued today.”
As far as he can tell?? He’s never heard of the invective hurled at Francis Beckwith since his conversion to Catholicism? He’s never heard of John MacArthur, R. C. Sproul, James White, and Al Mohler? He’s never heard of bloggers like Frank Turk at First Things, of all places?
$66,000 over 10 years (520 Sundays) = $12.69 per Sunday.
Whippy Skip.
That’s probably still better, however, than most Catholics are at giving. My parish of 400 souls (not families) averages $11.89 per Sunday, based on the annual October Count the Bodies exercies for the Archdiocese.
Jimmy, you missed a zero there. $66,000 divided by 520 is $126.92. That’s $115.03 more than the average weekly donation in your parish.
Jimmy–
Are you in a parish of lefties? Stats show they donate much less money and time than non-lefties.
I am actually surprised. If you present yourself as a conservative and a practicing Catholic it seems to me that you should actually attend Catholic mass fairly regularly and not go to mega-churches.
I am only 45 but I recall my first time even stepping in a Protestant Church. I thought I had to go to confession after (no kidding!!)
I am all for ecumenism and it seems to be that the fact that these two men can so breezily move back and forth to different faith communities strikes me as odd but that does not make it wrong.
It does mean, however, that perhaps things are actually changing on the ground. Besides, I am not sure that the definition of practicing Catholic needs to include each Sunday mass but even that is an intellectual exercise. I was raised by a very traditional, conservative Catholic dad so all of this
Rita: math was NOT my strong suit!
Mark: I’ll match my parish’s giving of time talent and treasure with ANY Catholic parish on a per capita basis anytime.
BTW, I’m in a parish of Catholics. What about yours?
Are you in a parish of lefties? Stats show they donate much less money and time than non-lefties.
Mark,
I can’t find the study right now, but I believe that while conservatives give a greater proportion of their income in charitable donations than liberals, if you divide liberals and conservatives up into religious and nonreligious, it is religious liberals who are the most generous givers of all four groups (followed by religious conservatives, nonreligious conservatives, and nonreligious liberals). I don’t think any studies have been done of liberal versus conservative Catholics or Catholic parishes.
For the record, Rubio spokesman sent me this email regarding Rubio’s Catholic practice:
Much the same as earlier statement, but I responded by asking if he has a home parish, and why he goes to Christ Fellowship as well, and if he attends both on a weekend or how it works. It’d be best if Rubio responded, I think, but I’ll pass along updates if and when they become available.
Not to say there isn’t a legitimate issue IF Rubio is deliberately misrepresenting himself for political gain, but there’s something creepily inquisition-like about some of what I’m reading here.
Jimmy–Touche, Catholics here too.
David–
The book “Who Really Cares” showed surprisingly (to the author) that the left gives much less than the right, and the more often you attend church, the more you give (not just to the church). I don’t recall the stats for religious left vs. religious right, but one of the conclusions was that the left gives less because they assume the government should be the one doing the giving, the right believes the individual should give.
http://www.amazon.com/Who-Really-Cares-Compassionate-Conservatism/dp/0465008232/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1290000751&sr=8-1
David G. –
So he also attends church with this wife and children? I wonder if his children are Catholic. Do they go to Mass with him? Hmm.