Archbishop Chaput on JFK’s Houston speech
This September it will be fifty years since John F. Kennedy gave his famous speech on religion and politics to Baptist ministers in Houston. Archbishop Charles Chaput has anticipated the anniversary by giving a speech critical of Kennedy’s at the Baptist University in the same city. You can find it at Sandro Magister’s blog.
Two years ago the Fordham Center on Religion and Culture hosted a symposium on “The Kennedy Moment: Religion and the Race for the Presidency,” which was entirely devoted to Kennedy’s speech and its relevance for the then current presidential campaign. You can find a transcript of the discussion at the Center’s website here.
One of the participants in the Fordham symposium, Shaun Casey has a lengthy study of the 1960 campaign and of Kennedy’s Houston speech in his book The Making of a Catholic President: Kennedy vs. Nixon 1960 (Oxford University Press, 2009).
May I suggest that we read both Chaput’s speech and the transcript of the discussion before commenting on either?
on March 2nd, 2010 at 11:54 am
Thanks for the link to a thought-provoking debate on an issue that deserves discussion.
I liked the quotations from Fr. Dodaro in Chaput’s speech, especially its recognition of the limited and mixed success, the finally less than ideal results that can be achieved even by good Christian leaders doing their best for the state, and he makes a good point about the need for the individual Christian to be loyal to the state and its authorities while remaining ever aware of the human errors that can be magnified by the complexity and centralized governance of the large, authoritative, political institution within which he or she may be working.
” No political order, no matter how seemingly good, can ever constitute a just society. Errors in moral judgment can’t be avoided. These errors also grow exponentially in their complexity as they move from lower to higher levels of society and governance. Therefore the Christian needs to be loyal to her nation and obedient to its legitimate rulers. But he also needs to cultivate a critical vigilance about both.”
A real problem comes when the individual Christian (and I think this would be true for adherents of other organized religions) is faced with the equally important need to exercise the same sort of “critical vigilance” about the human errors in moral judgment within their own denomination and its legitimate authorities.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 12:32 pm
I do not have time now to read the transcripts now but I couldn’t help thinking, as Susan mentioned, that the critique that errors magnify as they move up the tree of authority applies to the Church as well as government. The statement that “no political order, no matter how seemingly good, can ever constitute a just society” applies every bit as much to the Church as it does to other political institutions.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 1:28 pm
It seems to me that the Archbishop conflates the concepts of Church and individual believer. He seems to argue that a strict separation of Church and state means that no individual official may evaluate policies according to his or her religious belief.
And of course that’s not what’s meant. For him to claim that Kennedy was wrong is also to ignore the context of the period and situation Kennedy found himself in; one in which on the one hand many non-Catholics (and even some Catholics) believed that every Catholic takes detailed marching orders from the pope (as some still believe).
To me they key is how religious belief impacts governmental policies. It is entirely correct and appropriate that believers should draw on their religious traditions when developing policies and legislation for the common good. It is entirely inappropriate that believers should attempt through policy or legislation to inject religious practices into government or that any one religious tradition should be integrated into government culture.
The Archbishop also conflates opposition to abortion with a single approach to dealing with it: the narrow legislative/judicial approach adopted by the current pro-life leadership and blessed by the bishops. For 30 years we have been chained to this approach, which no one can say would be effective if its goals are met and which has demonstrably calcified the pro-life movement, deepened the divide in society, and led to an unhealthy fixation on Roe v. Wade that envisions the Supreme Court as a sort of waiting room where one ensconces conservative justices for the primary purpose of waiting for the day when–perhaps decades from now–when some case remotely connected to Roe may finally appear int heir docket (and in the meantime they may do whatever mischief they desire). This approach, which the Archbishop and others seek to make the only way to exercise one’s opposition to abortion is like the Cuban embargo, designed to unseat Castro: it’s been going on for 50 years with no effect, but we have to keep it up because any day now it’s going to work.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 2:11 pm
“The statement that ‘no political order, no matter how seemingly good, can ever constitute a just society’, applies every bit as much to the Church as it does to other political institutions.”
Not true. The Church that Christ was Baptised into before inviting us to follow Him, The Church that Christ promises to be with until “The end of Time”, is not a political institution.
It is through The Grace of God that His Church will not err in Faith and Morals.
Justice requires The Truth of Love.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 2:37 pm
Without the abortion issue Chaput would be a liitle known narrow minded bishop with insular views. He is similar to the priest who is the head of Priests for Life–what else has he done? One has to give credit to the American bishops who have continually refused to elect Chaput to any position of importance. If I were a member of the Separated Brethren I would be very suspicios of Chaput who would in a millisecond refuse their rights to practice their faith according to their conscience.
Chaput, after saying the list is long trumpets one issue: “I believe abortion is the foundational human rights issue of our lifetime.” Praytell where is the rest of the list?
He might as well condemn John Courtney Murray who was the champion of religious liberty at the Vatican Council. Does Chaput still believe that Giordano Bruno was wrong? And Galileo, Descarte???
I know there are some Catholics who want to return to the Middle Ages. They have their leader in the Archbishop of Denver. No one has to forward this to Charles Chaput as he is a constant reader of this blog.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 3:08 pm
“It is entirely correct and appropriate that believers should draw on their religious traditions when developing policies and legislation for the common good. It is entirely inappropriate that believers should attempt through policy or legislation to inject religious practices into government or that any one religious tradition should be integrated into government culture.”
Eric – what is the difference between these two statements? (Or could you provide an example that might illustrate the difference?). Reading what you wrote and trying to discern their meaning, I wonder if the difference between the two statements is cut-and-dried.
I’d think that Archbishop Chaput believes that the prevailing wind would be to restate your first statement something like this: ‘It is incorrect and an effront on others that believers should draw on their religious traditions when developing policies and legislation for the common good. Religion is a private thing and moral considerations founded on religious belief have no place in the public square.’
on March 2nd, 2010 at 3:17 pm
Let’s try to stay on focus, folks. The question is about Abp. Chaput’s take on Kennedy’s speech and the soundness of the argument of either man, judged in terms either of the situation then or the situation now, with the varied views of the members of the Fordham symposium providing other perspectives. Let’s check out ad hominem arguments at the door, please.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 3:31 pm
Every Human Individual’s Human Rights depend upon protecting that Human Individual’s Right to Life to begin with.
That being said, John Courtney Murray did not distinguish between private and public morality in regards to The Laws of Nature and Nature’s God because he understood that The Truth does not depend on location.
Archbishop Chaput is not afraid to follow Him, The Truth of Love. If you are among the group of those who are suspicious of a conscience grounded in the Truth of Love, “Be Not Afraid”.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 3:38 pm
Brave effort Joe!
Looking back at the transcript, I was struck by this observation from Shaun Casey, who wrote a book on Kennedy’s speech and the role of religion in the ’60s election.
“In many ways, contemporary analysts read the speech divorced from its context. It’s something of a political Rorschach test — that people see in it what they want to see or what they don’t want to see.”
on March 2nd, 2010 at 3:49 pm
If I may echo Ms. Steinfels words: I find Chaput’s statement that Kennedy was “wrong” to be out of place; too strong; and indicative of the ox he wants to gore. His “wrong” statement revises history and compares apples to oranges. It also reveals that he did not take the time to study the context, evolution, or various speeches and stages of the election process that Kennedy faced.
Am reminded of my graduate school days and courses on “revisionist histories”. For example, most early American histories were compiled by narrative historians. But, in the early 20th century, along came Charles Beard and his use of economic data and patterns that supported his “revised” history of the U.S. Some of his revisions have led to very good insights; his use of other schools of data to reflect on our American experience has led to very good results. But, we have had other revisionists who had a tendency to re-write history from a narrow, partisan, or ideological stance. Think about the current debates in trying to rewrite textbooks using creationism; or eliminating any mention of women; social movements; sexual movements, etc.
In carefully re-reading the Fordham seminar, there seems to be a balanced approach that recognized the times/context of a speaker; how this influenced his/her interpretation or emphasis on the separation of state-religion; or public role-religious morals; or a middle ground that notes the significance of individual’s religious morals impacting how they make decisions, support public policy, etc. It is more of a “both-and” approach rather than strict separation or an “either-or” approach. Yet, Kennedy tried that approach but given the circumstances, his Houston speech at that specific time and place in his campaign took one issue and hammered it soundly. To then interpret all of this tought, thinking, and future decisiions in that light or to say his speech said everythin on the subject goes too far – thus, my complaint about Chaput’s comments.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 3:51 pm
Leaving aside Nancy’s confusing (the Church entirely with Christ – how easy), I certainly would agree that:
-there is clearly and importantly a place for religion in the public square – hence the distinction between Church/State and religion and politics is important to say the least.
I would have liked that there be some examination of the real interplay of the two – there seems at times a tacit assumption that the goal is our religion shapes our politics, but it’s often hard to see that it’s not the other way around -yea, even among religious leaders.
-it struck me that the Archbishop could use a better and deeper sense of historical perspective. I thought it intesting that several notable Catholic minds vetted the JFK speech so to talk about that speech without much historical view struck me as easy and biased.
(-I also want to note thanks to a Times Mag letter about our being a Christian nation that, as the Treaty of tripoli noted in 1797, “The government of the united staes ..is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian Religion.”)
-A kind of bottom line in the continuing divide is how the politician, catholic, fundamentalist, muslim, atheist, inculcates his belief in political action in a pluralistic society.
Sorry, I left out Mormon -Mr. Romney’s book tour I guess is underway and he’s clearly running with the issue being submerged into his being the “jobs man” and mocking O.bama
But there is divide on how important beliefs about life, family and justice and community should come into practice and should one’s religious leaders have the power not only to state the truths and basic principles loud and clear but also command specific actions in law for all .
I thought the Archbishop’s comments then were lacking in both perspective and generosity and did not do sufficient justice to the complexity of the problem.
I suspect my unhappiness with him is rooted in our political differences as much or more than our religious ones.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 3:57 pm
Rocco Palmo posted a video of Archbishop Chaput’s speech: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEMHWy9urzU&feature=player_embedded#
on March 2nd, 2010 at 4:03 pm
Archb. Chaput: “John Kennedy didn’t create the trends in American life that I’ve described. But at least for Catholics, his Houston speech clearly fed them.”
One of the trends Chaput mentions is making religion strictly personal. If Charles Taylor has it right in A Secular Age, this “trend” of interiorizing religion may have been going on since at least the Medieval Period. Jim McCartin has a new book coming out called The Prayers of the Faithful, in which he traces this interiorizing and personalizing of prayer among immigrant Catholics in the 19th and 20th Century.
That Kennedy may have reflected the “trends” of his time is hardly a surprise, what seems historically naive to me is that Chaput would make this a linchpin of his observations. A handy whipping post, but reminds me of another prelate who I have heard ascribe our current sad state to Descartes!
on March 2nd, 2010 at 4:52 pm
Interesting speech by Chaput, and interesting also to put it in the contest of the two-year old Fordham discussion.
Galston (among others) historicizes Kennedy’s speech, stressing its relevance to America — especially Protestant America — in the 1960s, to which Chaput might say, That is all very well, but knowingly or unknowingly, Kennedy set us sliding down the slippery slope which insists that religion is a private matter, and has no place in public life (though he might have added that this is not true when religion is used to support what secularists might believe in — e.g., M.L. King’s religiosity in the service of civil rights). Chaput’s argument about the Kennedy speech deserves a hearing, and I think it has some relevance to Luke Timothy Johnson’s piece in the current Commonweal.
The trouble is that Chaput, even though he is addressing a Baptist audience, is hampered by a Catholic episcopal tradition that all too often behaves as if the Church has nothing to learn from the world at large (despite clear historical evidence to the contrary) and is all too often unwilling to engage in conversation those of different beliefs (addressing a friendly Baptist audience doesn’t really count). Take this, for example, from his talk,
“Second, no political order, no matter how seemingly good, can ever constitute a just society. Errors in moral judgment can’t be avoided. These errors also grow exponentially in their complexity as they move from lower to higher levels of society and governance. Therefore the Christian needs to be loyal to her nation and obedient to its legitimate rulers. But he also needs to cultivate a critical vigilance about both.”
Who could disagree? But as has so often been the case when Catholic leaders speak about the virtues of freedom, human rights, and so forth, they exclude their own institution from such generalizations. Should not Chaput’s remarks about the political order apply just as much to the governance of the Church, when its leaders appear to lean — as they so often historically have, when in a position to do so — towards creating a political order in the name of their religion, and seeking not just to influence, but to dominate a particular political world? How would Archbp. Chaput apply his own remarks to, say, the Papal States before 1870? What kind of a “critical vigilance,” if any, should be cultivated by the Christian towards the government of, say, Gregory XVI, whose “Mirari vos” had much to say about politics and the Church, or Pius IX and his Syllabus of errors?
Of course, we can historicize such pronouncements of the magisterium, putting them in the context of their own day, dismissing them as part of a bygone era; but it’s awkward to do so if one believes that the Church never changes its teachings.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 5:08 pm
JIm, I think an example of someone drawing on their religious beliefs would be to consider Matthew ch. 25 when making decisions about legislation to assist the homeless. An example of enshrining a religious practice into government culture would be a demand that an elected official declare Jesus Christ as his personal savior as a litmus test during a campaign.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 5:15 pm
“The Church entirely with Christ” is not confusing if you understand that it is through, with, and in Him, that His Church exists.
No doubt, it is clear that politics had a role in President Kennedy’s Houston Speech when you compare his remarks at Boston College on February 1, 1953, with his Houston Speech.
http://www.jfklibrary.org/Historical+Resources/Archives/Reference+Desk/Speeches/JFK/JFK+Pre-Pres/1953/002PREPRES12SPEECHES_53FEB01.htn
on March 2nd, 2010 at 5:30 pm
Mr. Clifford – excellent analysis and comments. Appreciated it. Do you not sometimes feel like we are again living through the modernist revolt of 1870-1900; only now it is 1985-2015…..
on March 2nd, 2010 at 5:34 pm
Without the abortion issue Chaput would be a liitle known narrow minded bishop with insular views.
Without the abortion issue, Chaput would be a Successor of the Apostles and shepherd of the Church, and entitled to respect as such. As stated at Vatican II, “the Sacred Council teaches that bishops by divine institution have succeeded to the place of the apostles, as shepherds of the Church, and he who hears them, hears Christ, and he who rejects them, rejects Christ and Him who sent Christ.” LG 20.
As for President Kennedy, he did much to confuse the issue, not help it. Aside from strictly theological matters pertaining to God, there is nothing in Catholic teaching, inasmuch as it is grounded in reason and justice, etc., which is necessarily inconsistent with the American tradition. In suggesting otherwise, in suggesting that the teachings of the Church were totally arbitrary and matters of policy and opinion, rather than matters of moral truth, Kennedy not only slandered the Church, but set back the cause of proper church-state relations.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 6:45 pm
I attended the Fordham conference on Kennedy’s speech, and remember well Shaun Casey’s rebuttal to those, such as Chaput, who insist that the speech was an effort to “privatize” religion. “After the [Kennedy] speech there was a question-and-answer period,” Casey said, “The transcript of the Q&A session is actually three times as long as the speech itself. The exchanges there, in particular, I think helped knock down the argument that somehow Kennedy was declaring his Catholicism to be purely private, and hence irrelevant. He embraces his Catholicism. He says he’s not renouncing his church. At the very end, he said, ‘I don’t think I made any converts to my church in the process of this meeting, but I don’t repudiate my faith.’”
So it seems clear to me that Chaput’s reading of the speech is anachronistic at best. Chaput’s talk is also studded with provocative but vague declarations about the false faith of others: “It’s a form of lying,” “They’re not optional,” “I wonder if we’ve ever had fewer of them who can coherently explain how their faith informs their work, or who event feel obligated to try,” “Too many live their faith as if it were a private idiosyncrasy—the kind that they’ll never allow to become a public nuisance. And too many just don’t really believe.” This doesn’t strike me as the kind of language one uses when trying to persuade those who might disagree with you, let alone fellow Christians. In any event, Chaput fails to make a plausible case that Kennedy’s speech “profoundly undermined the place not just of Catholics, but of all religious believers, in America’s public life and political conversation.” Even if you accept the notion that religious believers have been marginalize in this way—which I don’t—it’s quite a stretch to lay the blame at Kennedy’s door.
As many contributors to this blog know, long-time Commonweal columnist John Cogley was an important adviser to Kennedy and a speechwriter Ted Sorenson for the Houston address. Cogley concluded his 1973 book “Catholic America” as follows: “While Catholicism can coexist very well with separation of church and state, its best representatives will always refuse to separate religion and life. And that makes all the difference.”
on March 2nd, 2010 at 7:46 pm
Actually, what makes the difference, is affirmation of The Truths that are self-evident because they come from God.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 7:50 pm
“As stated at Vatican II, ‘the Sacred Council teaches that bishops by divine institution have succeeded to the place of the apostles, as shepherds of the Church, and he who hears them, hears Christ, and he who rejects them, rejects Christ and Him who sent Christ.’ LG 20.”
Bender: I assume that you will grant the same degree of deference to the utterings of Fabian Bruskewitz and Geoffrey Robinson? George Pell and Rembert Weakland? I’m sure many more comparisons can be made. The same for bishops who has apostasized?
To do so strains one’s sense of credulity a bit, don’t you think?
And don’t forget that LG was a bit self-serving on the part of those being so adulated.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 8:06 pm
May I put in a good word for the comments of Fr. Brian Hehir. I’m no expert on his work, but whatever of it I’ve seen has regularly struck me as first-rate.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 8:43 pm
Paul, I agree with you entirely on Chaput’s speech, but I think you do not go far enough.
In his second caveat, Chaput more or less paraphrases Kennedy’s position: “no nation, not even the one I love, has a right to my allegiance, or my silence, in matters that belong to God or that undermine the dignity of the human persons He created.” is the same as “Kennedy said that if his duties as President should “ever require me to violate my conscience or violate the national interest, I would resign the office.”” His portrayal of “a wall of separation”, marked by an opposition of national interests against “outside religious influences”, applies to his own words as well as to Kennedy’s.
Chaput needs to give Kennedy the same benefit of the doubt that he is hoping will be given to him. Kennedy did not believe there was an opposition between national interests and religious influences, but needed to address those who did believe such an opposition might exist. And because he addresses the position of those with whom he disagrees, Kennedy is taken as promoting their idea that Catholicism and the US government are irreconcilable? Doesn’t Chaput understand that Kennedy was running to be the head of that government?
Chaput’s position is a great disservice to the Church. Some who drift away from the Church will identify with Kennedy more quickly than they will with any bishop or Pope. Kennedy is a part of their Catholic community, and repudiating Kennedy strikes at the communion they believe in.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 8:51 pm
John Cogley wrote: “While Catholicism can coexist very well with separation of church and state, its best representatives will always refuse to separate religion and life. And that makes all the difference.”
Archbishop Chaput said: “Christianity is not mainly – or even significantly –- about politics. It’s about living and sharing the love of God. And Christian political engagement, when it happens, is never mainly the task of the clergy. That work belongs to lay believers who live most intensely in the world. Christian faith is not a set of ethics or doctrines. It’s not a group of theories about social and economic justice. All these things have their place. All of them can be important. But a Christian life begins in a relationship with Jesus Christ; and it bears fruit in the justice, mercy and love we show to others because of that relationship.”
An extended and respectful conversation around these two quotes may offer some promise for (dare I use the phrase?) common ground.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 9:37 pm
No one should separate religion and life and our relationship to God through Jesus Christ is paramount. Yet we do not operate without the awareness of history where the RCC has too often hammered rather than persuaded people in that embrace. It is in that context that we must view Chaput’s comments on Kennedy. Finally in our lifetime we have seen popes apologizing for some terrible Church leadership through the ages. It is to John Paul II’s everlasting credit that he made a point of this. To revert to the practices he deplored is an issue here. If we keep trumping the Medieval church we are declaring our refusal to come to common ground.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 10:23 pm
“But a Christian life begins in a relationship with Jesus Christ; and it bears fruit in the justice, mercy and love we show to others because of that relationship.”
I think this sentiment would have more meaning if Apb. Chaput would practice what he preaches. Then we might reach common ground.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 11:23 pm
Some very good points here, and thanks to Father Komonchak for starting this thread. I read the address and recall some of the Fordham session, which was first rate.
Two items come to mind: One is that Archbp Chaput seems to persistently conflate the separation of church and state (a good thing) with the separation of church and politics (not a good thing, to my mind). I don’t think JFK was doing the latter, at all.
The historical context is rather important, too. Kennedy was trying to emphasize that Catholics accepted the separation of church and state at a time when the Catholic Church itself had not explicitly accepted such a thing, as this was pre-V2. And he was speaking to Baptists, who were the leading exponents of church-state separation. (Southern Baptists did not come out against Roe v. Wade, for example, until the early 1980s, having seen it as a matter of personal liberty.)
That gets to my second point, in that the “common ground” (if you will!) that Kennedy and Chaput seem to share is that both were telling their audience what they wanted to hear. Kennedy was trying to convince Baptists (and by extension Protestants) that Catholics are trustworthy Americans; and the Archbishop is trying to convince Baptists (conservative evangelicals really) that Catholics are their friends.
They are both engaged in a diplomatic (or political, if you will) mission, though Chaput’s effort — in part thanks to Kennedy’s legacy of mainstreaming Catholicism — is further along. As the archbishop says, he gets a friendlier welcome from Baptists than from many Catholic audiences.
Chaput’s comment indicates a recognition that he is also engaged in an internal Catholic Church struggle, and I think Kennedy was representing a certain strain of American Catholicism that was set to emerge.
on March 2nd, 2010 at 11:34 pm
I wish Archbishop Chaput would have explored Augustine’s understanding of the role of the Christian in the state as I think it is more nuanced and speaks to the contemporary political sensibility more than Catholic social teaching of the modern era. Augustine, as I understand it, supported the toleration of prostitution by the state even though he was morally opposed. He believed that worse ills would result from its prohibition than its toleration from the state. It seems to me Augustine might have been a bit of libertarian.
I tend to instinctively move to a more libertarian political posture even though I know that this does not square entirely with the social doctrine of the Church as it developed since Rerum Novarum. While I fully support what would be considered very liberal economic policies, at the same time in my experience I see that it is individuals who are driven by the good, giving people chances,as well individuals who work hard and work through adversity, that make much more of an impact than social programs although I see how these are necessary.
I also think it is important not to mythologize the Kennedy era or family as the quintessence of Catholic life. I mean no disrespect to his memory, he could speak and was poetic and certainly did some good things. However, Kennedy’s speech really needs to be seen in the context of the political realities of electoral politics and less as a reflection on the role of a Catholic in public life.
So as to the substance of the Archbishop’s speech, I think it is time to move on from the Kennedy era and recast the role of the Catholic in what is an increasingly postmodern historical climate. It seems to me that as the romance of Camelot fades, Augustine’s realism is the way to go.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 12:03 am
Shaun Casey said at the Fordham forum: “Now, lastly, maybe the most important background thing to understand is the shape of what I call the pan-Protestant argument that Kennedy was facing. This is often forgotten today. Let me give you sort of a synthetic version of what that Protestant argument was against Kennedy’s Catholicism.
“It goes something like this: the Roman Catholic Church is both a church and a state, and as such it has rejected the American understanding of separation of church and state. They argued all you need to do is look at Europe, and the notion of a state- established Catholic Church still being embraced in certain parts proved that separation of church and state was not a Catholic concept. Because it is a hierarchical church led by the pope, all Catholics have to strictly obey the teachings of the church in order to preserve their salvation. There is no such thing as individual or private conscience for politicians; indeed, the hierarchy controls them and dictates to them what public policies they have to embrace.
“The Syllabus of Errors, the 19th-century document promulgated by Pope Pius IX, was the lodestone for the Protestant critics, because there was a formal rejection of church and state separation, there was a rejection of liberal democracy, and it said that error has no rights.
“Add to this the “doctrine” of mental reservation, which in Protestant reading said Catholics are empowered to lie about the truth of these teachings in order to acquire political power on the part of the pope and his ultimate political triumph. So even though Kennedy might choose politically correct answers on specific public policy questions, he was not to be trusted because he could not resist papal instruction to do otherwise once he was president. “If you want to see what America under a Catholic leader looks like, look at Spain or look at Latin America; that’s the path, the slippery slope, we would go on if you voted for John Kennedy.”
“Now, it’s against that background that Kennedy gave his counter- narrative in the Houston speech. He was able to demonstrate that he believed in the separation of church and state in a specifically Catholic fashion. As he made clear in the speech and in the Q&A session, he believed his view represented the view of the American Catholic Bishops in a document they promulgated in 1948, and he believed the vast majority of American Catholics shared exactly that view.”
Three points: Shaun Casey is, I believe, a Presbyterian, so he is recounting this history not from a Catholic perspective, but from a perspective that was critical of Kennedy, of the Catholic Church, and of the “doctrine” of separation of church and state. He understands the Protestant suspicions of Catholic political philosophy and the doctrine prohibiting the separation of church and state.
Which leads to point two: the position of the Catholic Church in 1960 was opposition to the separation of church and state. This was before Vatican II when the church changed its position.
Three, Kennedy “believed the vast majority of American Catholics shared exactly that view.” That may hold no water with the Chaputians, but I think this is in fact true for the vast majority of Catholics, who then as now, were lay people and simply saw no reason to fear the separation of church and state. Flourishing as they were, they had no reason to fear it.
Today, the ground has moved to the relationship between religion and politics and whatever merit Chaput’s position may have on that subject, he has not laid his argument on the right foundation.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 3:23 am
Looking back on that time. I think sectarianism pretty much had a free ride as far as the “public square” was concerned. Atheists were below the radar and homosexuals were in the closet. School prayer was allowed and the teaching of evolution prohibited by state law, as was the sale of of condoms. There were blue laws, state and Church censorship of movies (via the production code) and government censorship of books abetted by the post office and US Customs, not to mention Prohibition and state laws that made homosexuality a felony.
To blame one speech by John Kennedy for single handedly banishing religion’s monopoly on the public square and abolishing the church/state partnership as guardians of public morals seems a bit much to me.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 4:04 am
It is rather odd to focus a theological discussion on a political speech made 50 years ago. Such speeches are always pragmatic, contextual affairs, not deep, authoritative clarifications of first principles. Also, one must be suspicious when Augustine is invoked as the supreme authority in this area; surely the Church later came to a fuller and richer appreciation of the legitimate autonomy of the secular realm thanks to Thomas Aquinas? There is much to be said for civic ethics disengaged from religious confession and even for civil religion that has no denominational odor; Obama gives a good lead here. Religious individuals and institutions can feed into the public debate, playing the game according to the rules — that is, invoking only principles of ethical wisdom that can be agreed on in rational debate without religous dogmatic presuppositions. Christians are by definition concerned about justice and peace, so they are in profound ethical alignment with just states and seek to build up just societies. But they must not push these issues in a divisive way — e.g. by pushing Catholic or biblical rather than universally ethical views in the political realm. In the case of abortion and gay marriage the Church would benefit by putting its case in a more open democratic context of rational debate and consultation. Peremptory dogmatic condemnations of an alleged culture of death and discrediting of the legitimacy of States that legislate abortion (as in John Paul II’s Evangelium Vitae) are very destructive, for they posit the Church as a religious group out for power rather than a group contributing to the ethical wisdom of society in a humble and reasonable way.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 8:36 am
I am coming to this thread rather late, but let me make a few observations. First of all, the good bishop is simply wrong in his understanding of the historical context of the Houston speech. I try to sketch this background in great depth in my book The Making of a Catholic President: Kennedy vs. Nixon 1960. I would be keen to hear his views after reading my account. George Weigel, who may be the bishop’s ghostwriter for some of this speech, similarly ignored my arguments when he reviewed my book for First Things. JFK, according to John Cogley, who worked for JFK in 1960, had not only to quell Protestant unrest in this speech, he also had to retain his large Catholic voter base as well. Kennedy had to come off as acceptable to Protestants and as a true Catholic to Catholics. It is only from the safety of 50 years later that someone can honestly suggest Kennedy was choosing an explicitly secular tone in the Houston speech. Two leading Catholic theologians, John Courtney Murray and John Wright influenced the speech. Whatever discomfort Murray had over the separation of church and state language was overcome by Murray’s indignation over the Protestant bigotry displayed a few days before by Norman Vincent Peale and co. at a large meeting in Washington.
Kennedy believed that his position was a mainstream Catholic position in the United States and among the American bishops. He argued his case as a Democrat who was a Catholic. The problem today is that JFK is seen and the Houston speech interpreted through two equally incorrect lenses: the Chaput-Weigel lens that wants to paint him as the beginning of the secular trajectory that allegedly leads to Pelosi and Kerry and the hagiographical lense that makes JFK into an icon. The truth is far more nuanced.
Sadly, the current turmoil among the bishops over how to treat Democrats has cast an anachronictic shadow on the intepretation of the Houston speech in Chaput’s treatment. Clearly Kennedy’s position is this speech is not fully tenable today given the seismic shifts in the Church, in society, and in politics. But it was not the first stop on a long slippery slope toward secularism.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 8:36 am
It should not escape our notice that Chaput again placed abortion as the central issue of our times. And that abortion is an issue that the right has aligned itself as a way to gain or retain power. In that way it may well be a “foundational issue” as Chaput insists. Just a cursory look at the way politicians have handled this shows clearly that this is a political pawn or football, if you will. W was very coy in not being clear about abortion while letting his Rovians maximize the political gain. Mainly because Republican women are in the main pro choice. BTW did Kennedy mention abortion?
on March 3rd, 2010 at 8:46 am
Shaun: Thanks for contributing to the thread. I had meant to make a reference to your book, but somehow forgot. So I’ve added it to my original post above.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 9:07 am
Professor Casey writes:
“The problem today is that JFK is seen and the Houston speech interpreted through two equally incorrect lenses: the Chaput-Weigel lens that wants to paint him as the beginning of the secular trajectory that allegedly leads to Pelosi and Kerry and the hagiographical lense that makes JFK into an icon. The truth is far more nuanced.”
I find that statement persuasive. But I also think the Archbishop is not as unnuanced as some seem to find him. He does say: “John Kennedy didn’t create the trends in American life that I’ve described. But at least for Catholics, his Houston speech clearly fed them.”
on March 3rd, 2010 at 9:25 am
With all due respect to Archbishop Chaput, the point he misses is that John F. Kennedy, our last decent president, was an “American Catholic” in the tradition of Bishop John England of Charleston, who delivered an address to Congress and emphatically declared:
“We do not believe that God gave to the Church any power to interfere with our civil rights, or our civil concerns.” “I would not allow to the Pope, or to any bishop of our church, the smallest interference with the humblest vote at our most insignificant balloting box.”
This tradition runs deep: similar views were expressed by Archbishop John Carroll and James Cardinal Gibbons, who had more loyalty (obsequiousness) to presidents than he did to popes, even refusing Pope Benedict XV’s appeal to persuade his (Gibbons’) friend President Wilson from entering World War I.
It’s one thing when a presidential candidate pledges his independence from the Holy See; another entirely when a prelate pledges his independence from the Holy See. And that is the American Catholic tradition.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 9:50 am
If I remember rightly Cardinal Spellman once said, “My country, right or wrong,” with an allusion to Stephen Decatur.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 9:57 am
Honestly, contemporary American Catholics read the Kennedy speech from the vantage point of having been accepted and included in the mainstream. The acceptance, so taken for granted now, came in part because Kennedy was able to articulate how it was the Roman Catholics could maintain allegiance to an authoritarian tradition and still participate in an anti-authoritarian democratic process, even as leaders. The last Catholic who ran for president prior to Kennedy was Al Smith — closer in time to Kennedy’s run than Kennedy is to us, today — and Smith was utterly rejected in the so-called heartland.
Like a lot of people, Chaput wishes history had marched to a different drummer, but honestly, I don’t see how Catholics would have more influence or be more accepted by diverse constituencies if Kennedy had articulated a stronger religious vision. Chaput assumes the current, relatively high, level of influence achieved by Catholics qua Catholics as a given when, in fact, it is still highly negotiable. Even today, if a Catholic politician stood up and said that he or she will take direction from the Holy See, do you think they would win national office?
on March 3rd, 2010 at 10:12 am
In his essay, “Catholic & Patriot,” published in the June 1927 issue of The Atlantic Monthly, Gov. Al Smith explained in detail how his faith placed no burden on him as a public official, and, among other things, expressed his complete opposition to public funding of Catholic schools. And this is the man the Archdiocese of New York honors with its famous fundraising banquet!
A key part of the essay:
“…. I summarize my creed as an American Catholic. I believe in the worship of God according to the faith and practice of the Roman Catholic Church. I recognize no power in the institutions of my Church to interfere with the operations of the Constitution of the United States or the enforcement of the law of the land. I believe in absolute freedom of conscience for all men and in equality of all churches, all sects, and all beliefs before the law as a matter of right and not as a matter of favor. I believe in the absolute separation of Church and state and in the strict enforcement of the provisions of the Constitution that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.
“ I believe that no tribunal of any church has any power to make any decree of any force in the law of the land, other than to establish the status of its own communicants within its own church….”
on March 3rd, 2010 at 10:12 am
The Kennedy speech requires a bit of context. The late Ralph de Toledano (no Kennedy friend!) argued that the speech was not for the preachers but for the Catholic vote. The speech was shown repeatedly at Catholic venues with the hope that Catholics would react by saying something like this: It is shocking that a good Catholic war hero should have to explain himself to a bunch of Baptist bigots! If that was the true intention of the Kennedy campaign then the fervent protestations of his faith being a private matter makes a lot of sense. It certainly persuaded me, devout Catholic, viewing the campaign from Rome where I was a student. Kennedy’s speech, following this line of argument,was not so much a principled statement of church/state relations but a profoundly clever piece of political theater.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 10:24 am
The question of audience is a good one, a key one — I sense that both JFK and Archbp Chaput were/are addressing intramural issues as much as external ones, no?
on March 3rd, 2010 at 11:38 am
BTW, in comments on the post on this at the First Things blog, where Joe Carter very much likes Chaput’s speech, two of the researchers and organizers of the address respond to a critique of the Archbp’s understanding of the Founders’ intentions:
http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2010/03/02/archbishop-chaputs-redress-of-jfks-faith-speech/#comments
on March 3rd, 2010 at 12:02 pm
Loosely related to Fr. O’Leary’s comment posted early this morning is my musing on today’s Gospel passage (Matthew 20: 17-28).
Jesus tells the disciples that they have to go to Jerusalem, where He has to suffer and die. The IMMEDIATE response of James, John and their mother is to ask to be first ” in the kingdom.”
My musing: James, John and mom represent a persistent temptation that the Church (all of us, from pope all the way down to me) has, namely always to keep at least one eye out to see “what’s in it for us,” “us” being our sense of what is due us because we’re the church.
Relate this to the “Give to Caesar” passage. Notice that we (the Church) are supposed to be givers, not takers. Givers to Caesar and givers to God.
It’s really tough to be called upon to give and keep giving without worrying about receiving. But then, the fullest gifts are always those not given in exchange for expected benefits.
Can we, as Church, fashion a “Church-State or “religion-politics” practice that is fully gift-giving?
on March 3rd, 2010 at 12:57 pm
Secularization in the US was not caused by Kennedy and when he made his speech, it seems to have been constructed for both Catholics and Protestants who were prepared to accept his argument (as ambiguous as it might have been). In other words, like any good politician (but not great politician) his words lagged behind what was going on in society.
Did Kennedy’s speech accelerate the church-state divide that Archbishop Chaput is worried about? This is tricky, because I think that it depends on how one thinks that individual politicians or parties can influence a (no pun intended) secular trend in something like the trend to secularity. What I like about Archbishop Chaput’s speech is that he reaffirms that if this trend is bad we are the ones who have to reverse it. However, I don’t think that there is an organized political movement today anywhere that doesn’t operate off of some of the basic assumptions of secularity; including the Church.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 3:11 pm
Nice quotation from Al Smith, Mr. Likoudis, and valuable to reminded that Kennedy’s speech was not as groundbreaking on question of separation of Church and State as it seemed at the time. Wasn’t it also Al Smith who, when asked what he would do if he found his ideas challenged by a papal encyclical, replied, in true puzzlement, “What’s an encyclical?”
on March 3rd, 2010 at 3:20 pm
Perhaps some of us are getting matters confused. Separation of Church and State is a good thing, I would argue. Committed Christians have to work for the welfare of the poor and downtrodden and justice for all. To have relgious leaders call the shots would be a mistake as clearly shown by the disastrous meddling of the church in politics throughout the ages. Ironically it has been the state that compelled the church to come to justice for the victims of clergy abuse.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 3:27 pm
Jimmy Mac, the key word left out is “communion”, as in, Bishops in communion with the Pope. One can not be in communion and autonomous at the same time, although there are some, such as the authors of the “Land O’Lakes Statement”, who, despite their good intentions, failed to fully understand the meaning of communion, and claimed, erroneously, that one could be autonomous while in communion with the Church.
One has to wonder if the same logic was used in the “Mandatum”, as well as in John F. Kennedy’s Houston Speech.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 4:14 pm
Nicholas Clifford: I believe the full Al Smith quote was, “What the hell is an encyclical?”
If that ’s an urban legend, it is, as they say at the tabloids, too good to check out…
on March 3rd, 2010 at 4:37 pm
It’s not an urban legend. Thomas Shelley, historian of U.S. Catholicism, has two articles on the matter. The more scholarly one is in the “US Catholic Historian” 15/2 (Spring, 1997), pp. 87-107; a more popular piece appears in “America” October 13, 2003.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 5:10 pm
“The truth is far more nuanced.”
In my experience, Truth is stark. Nuance only enters when people try to work around it.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 6:38 pm
“One can not be in communion and autonomous at the same time, although there are some, such as the authors of the “Land O’Lakes Statement”, who, despite their good intentions, failed to fully understand the meaning of communion, and claimed, erroneously, that one could be autonomous while in communion with the Church.”
Nancy, find me one bishop who can match the life of Theodore Hesburgh, who was the promoter of the “Land of lakes Statement”, in following Jesus Christ.
Following Jesus trumps following bishops.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 7:04 pm
I confess that I find a lot to agree with in Archbishop Chaput’s talk. Maybe everybody does, and we are concentrating, rightly or wrongly, only on those points that we suspect have partisan political implications. I also have to admire it as well written and argued, whether that’s to the archbishop’s credit or, as Shaun Casey surmises, George Weigel’s or both.
Of course Archbishop Chaput has not justice to the speech or its historical context in turning it into a symbol of Catholic and American religious decline — as almost everyone here, Shaun Casey most knowledgeably, points out.
But as Shaun also says, Chaput is not the only one. The speech has been regularly distorted by viewing it through two lenses, one of alarm at secularism and the other of JFK hagiography. Let me add a third: the lens of secular liberal triumph. How many times has the New York Times editorial page referred to or quoted the Houston speech as the gold standard for resolving current questions of the relationship between church and state and religion and politics? That has always been a good rhetorical move precisely because Kennedy was identified as a Catholic, not a secularist, and also because it is effective in complaining about this or that position, wise or stupid, taken by the bishops.
In the painfully long presidential campaign of 2007-2008, the JFK speech was repeatedly trotted out, often inaccurately, by people on all sides, most notably as the stick against which Romney’s handling of his Mormonism would be measured. It was this promiscuous use of the speech that made us at the Fordham Center on Religion and Culture decide to devote an entire forum to it. I think Archbishop Chaput’s characterization of the speech is largely a polemical counter to the secular liberal polemical characterization.
There is another aspect of his remarks that so far has gone unnoticed. I quote: “The life our country is no more ‘Catholic’ or ‘Christian’ than it was 100 years ago. In fact it’s arguabley less so.”
It is always hard to determine how Christian one era is in comparison to another. Undoubtedly the public culture of the U.S. in 1910 enjoyed a Christian language and shared assumptions missing today. But below that surface, how truly Christian was the country’s life?
Speaking in what was 100 years ago a racially segregated city to a religious group that then wholeheartedly accepted that racism, at a time when women did not have the vote and working people were largely unprotected from economic or health disasters — when interviews from a little later show that many people actually did not go to church on Sunday because they lacked decent or respectable clothes — I am surprised that Archbishop Chaput did not take at least some notice of gains in human dignity and freedom over the past century — maybe even over the 50 years since Kennedy’s speech — that the church has recognized as marks of a Christian form of life.
It’s not all downhill, from either the Middle Ages or Kennedy’s Houston speech.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 8:29 pm
Mark Proska: “Truth is stark. Nuance only comes in when people try to walk around it”.
If Mark Proska had ever been involved in historical research of any kind he could not have made that statement!
The French Church screamed in 1905 but now the Separation of Church and State is generally viewed as a good thing by French Catholics. The vitality of French Catholicism in the 20th century may owe something to it.
on March 3rd, 2010 at 8:40 pm
Here is his “creed as an American Catholic” that Al Smith published in response to Protestant fears that he would be subject to Vatican authority as president:
“I believe in the worship of God according to the faith and practice of the Roman Catholic Church. I recognize no power in the institutions of my Church to interfere with the operations of the Constitution of the United States or the enforcement of the laws of the land. I believe in absolute freedom of conscience for all men and in equality for all churches, all sects, and all beliefs before the law as a matter of right and not as a matter of favor. I believe in the absolute separation of Church and State and in the enforcement of the provisions of the Constitution that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. I believe that no tribunal of any church has any power to make any decree of any force in the law of the land, other than to establish the status of its own communicants within its own church…. And I believe in the common brotherhood of man under the common fatherhood of God.”
on March 3rd, 2010 at 10:12 pm
“The vitality of French Catholicism in the 20th century”
Seriously, you were trying to be funny, right?
on March 3rd, 2010 at 11:45 pm
No doubt, our Founding Fathers were rendering onto God when referring to the universal Truths that are self-evident.
on March 4th, 2010 at 1:10 am
Hi Nancy, how about if I look at the bishops in communion with Rome and “adopt-a-bishop”? Geographical boundaries mean so little nowadays. Simply pick my favorite bishop and start supporting him on the one hand, listening to him carefully on the other hand?
on March 4th, 2010 at 1:33 am
Let’s not forget that the French Church is above all others the Church of Vatican II. Some curial figures are claiming that France has fallen into “apostasy,” but apparently church attendance in France is twice as high as in Italy! A French priest asked his parishioners recently, “Ou sont ils alles, ces athees d’antan” “Where have they gone, the atheists of yesteryear?” In fact among French intellectuals now, Catholicism is hugely popular.
on March 4th, 2010 at 8:58 am
JAJK @ 8:40 pm, Mar. 3: Al Smith’s Creed sounds like Kennedy’s: So Archbishop Chaput should get on Al Smith’s case! But wait: Al Smith lost.
Peter Steinfels: “I confess that I find a lot to agree with in Archbishop Chaput’s talk. Maybe everybody does, and we are concentrating, rightly or wrongly, only on those points that we suspect have partisan political implications. I also have to admire it as well written and argued, whether that’s to the archbishop’s credit or, as Shaun Casey surmises, George Weigel’s or both.”
Can we have some examples of your agreement? And some examples of how well written and well argued the talk is?
on March 4th, 2010 at 9:24 am
“Speaking in what was 100 years ago a racially segregated city to a religious group that then wholeheartedly accepted that racism, at a time when women did not have the vote and working people were largely unprotected from economic or health disasters — when interviews from a little later show that many people actually did not go to church on Sunday because they lacked decent or respectable clothes — I am surprised that Archbishop Chaput did not take at least some notice of gains in human dignity and freedom over the past century — maybe even over the 50 years since Kennedy’s speech — that the church has recognized as marks of a Christian form of life. ”
In the 1950s the Church and the hawks decried Communism and its ills while ignoring the many injustices to blacks, women and the poor. Not to mention the collusion with Nazi Germany previously. Now there is one issue again while injustices abound throughout the world, children and women are abused and the church is rather quiet. This is what John XXIII tried to reform and much of his work has met a response. Yet clergy is still comfortable while even middle class people suffer job losses and lack of necessities. Yet on issue remains. For shame. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/04/opinion/04kristof.html?ref=opinion
on March 4th, 2010 at 9:44 am
James Cardinal Gibbons’ famous letter to President Woodroow Wilson of October 6, 1917:
“…Guided as we are by the sublime teachings of Christianity, we have no other course open to us but that of obedience and devotion to our country….We wish our people to see, and we are striving to help them to realize that they owe unswerving loyalty to the rulers whom they have elected to office, and that in so doing so they are not acting in a slavish manner, for obedience is not an act of servility we pay to man, but an act of homage we pay to God.
We are working to the end that our countrymen may see the folly and grave disobedience of unjust and ill-tempered criticism of national policies. We are bending our efforts to point out to our fellow men that…the Government…is therefore alone in the position to judge of the expediency of national affairs.”
on March 4th, 2010 at 9:51 am
Bill M., the gains in Human Dignity and Freedom over the past century would be consistent with abiding in The Word of Love. This does not change the fact that the definition of communion in, for example, the “Land O’Lakes” document is not consistent with how Our Lady of the Lakes defines communion, “Do whatever He tells you.” We cannot be His Disciples if we do not abide in His Word. We cannot be Catholic and autonomous from His Church simultaneously.
on March 4th, 2010 at 9:56 am
Not autonomous, Nancy. Discerning. As Jesus says. We have to beware the leaven of the Pharisees.
on March 4th, 2010 at 1:55 pm
Writing above, My close friend Margaret Steinfels asked me for examples of what I agreed with in Archbishop Chaput’s talk.
Here are a few:
“I love my country. I revere the genius of its founding documents and its public institutions. But no nation, not even the one I love, haa a right to my allegiance, or my silence, in matters that belong to God or that undermine the dignity of the human persons He created.”
“We have a duty to preach Jesus Christ. We have a mandate to share his Gospel of truth, mercy, justice and love. These are mission words. They’re not optional. And they have practical consequences for the way we think, speak, make choices and live our lives, not just at home but in the public square. Real Christian faith is always personal, but it’s never private.”
“Too many Catholics confuse their personal opinions with a real Christian conscience. Too many live their faith as if it were a personal idiosyncrasy — the kind that they’ll never allow to become a public nuisance.”
“Christianity is not mainly — or even significantly [I might demur at that] — about politics. It’s about living and sharing the love of God. And Christian political engagement, when it happens, is never mainly the task of the clergy. That work belongs to lay believers who live most intensely in the world. Christian faith is not a set of ethics or doctrines. It’s not a group of theories about social and economic justice. All these things have their place. All of them can be important. But a Christian life begins in a relationship with Jesus Christ; and it bears fruit in the justice, mercy and love we show to others because of that relationship.”
“Without a passion for Jesus Christ in our hearts that reshapes our lives, Christianity is just a word game and a legend. Relationships have consequences. A married man will commit himself to certain actions and behaviors, no matter what the cost, out of the love he bears for his wife. Our relationship with God is the same. We need to live and prove our love by our actions, not just in our personal and family lives, but also in the public square. Therefore Christians individually and the Church as a believing community engage the political order as an obligation of the Word of God. Human law teaches and forms as well as regulates; and human politics is the exercise of power — which means both have moral implications that the Christian cannot ignore and still remain faithful to his vocation as a light to the world (Mt 5:14-16).”
These examples mostly turn on Chaput’s rejection of privatized Christianity and his insistence on its public role. He and I probably disagree about the specific ways in which that public role should be carried out in this or that case, but I agree (and, as I suggested, probably most commentators on this thread agree as well) on the principle, which is not a small matter.
The same dear friend also asked for examples of how the talk was well written and argued.
To begin with, the sentences that I’ve quoted — which I suspect she will pretty much agree with — are direct and clear and written with a strong rhythm. I think that Chaput’s use of the consequences for action of a married man’s love of his wife is an effective way to make the point that our relationship to God, too, must be lived out in action. The section on the different historical memories of Catholics and Protestants followed by a warning against papering over different that still exist (or subsist?) is not only clearly and strongly written but an effective way of engaging this particular audience.
Finally, I generally agree with and find very clearly written his summation of the gap between what the Framers understood as separation of church and state and what that has come to mean more recently.
And that brings me to another point. I have enjoyed learning that Al Smith used the very same language about “absolute” separation of church and state that Archbishop Chaput finds so objectionable in JFK’s speech. But just as the understanding of what the First Amendment meant changed, that is became more encompassing and “absolute,” between the days of the Framers to the day of Al Smith (in no small measure because of anti-Catholic prejudice), it also changed from the day of Al Smith to the day of John F. Kennedy — and has changed since then.
When Al Smith said he favored “separation” or “absolute separation,” I suspect that he nonetheless took for granted accomodations between church and state (e.g., prayer in New York public schools?) that were ruled out by those same words by the time JFK used them, and would certainly be ruled out by advocates of “strict” or “absolute” separation who quote JFK today. You can’t plead for awareness of historical context in JFK’s case and not grant it also in Al Smith’s or even in Archbishop Chaput’s.
on March 4th, 2010 at 2:01 pm
MS @8:58 a.m. to PS:
“Can we have some examples of your agreement? And some examples of how well written and well argued the talk is?”
Can they be shared beyond the breakfast table?
on March 4th, 2010 at 2:01 pm
He beat me to it!
on March 4th, 2010 at 2:15 pm
Although I just praised Archbishop Chaput’s brief historical treatment of the gap between the Framers’ understanding of the separation of church and state and current notions, he is in error in suggesting that the phrase had little public resonance until it was “excavated” by Hugo Black from a private letter Thomas Jefferson wrote to the Danbury Baptist Association.
What Black quoted in the 1947 Everson decision wasn’t just Jefferson’s reference to separation of church and state but Jefferson’s image of “a WALL of separation” (my emphasis). That was the image used to justify (and “constituionalize”) what Chaput calls a “modern, drastic sense” of separation. The phrase, minus the wall image, had been quoted earlier by the Supreme Court (and I believe many lower courts) and was obviously current in political debate as witnessed by the Al Smith’s quotes.
The definitive treatment of all this, at least to date, is Philip Hamburger’s Separation of Church and State (Harvard, 2002), which unfortunately I don’t have here to check out my recollections. Perhaps the lawyers can correct me.
on March 4th, 2010 at 2:16 pm
Whenever the state has advocated religion it has made a mess out of it. Religion is used to support dictatorship and tyranny. The romans made religion part of the state. But many in Christianity never gave them credit for it. They said that was paganism. This does show how even a religion can be biased about religion in public. So if you allow prayers you will gravitate to other modifications. Certainly we have to have laws. But you cannot legislate morality. There is a difference. Or would you prefer the federal or state police to visit your bedroom to make sure you are observing the law.
To me the advocates here and those at the Fordham conference have not made a compelling argument why there should not be a strict separation between church and state. And it is when we do not favor any particular religion or philosophy that most people seem to have the most protection and safety to go about their business following their conscience.
on March 4th, 2010 at 2:53 pm
In the JFK speech, he said:
I ask you…to judge me on the basis of my record of 14 years in Congress…instead of judging me on the basis of these pamphlets and publications we all have seen that carefully select quotations out of context from the statements of Catholic church leaders, usually in other countries, frequently in other centuries…
So in trying to understand the context of JFK’s speech, it would be interesting to know the content of the “pamphlets and publications” he was referring to.
on March 4th, 2010 at 3:13 pm
I notice that the tension addressed here is between secularism and sectarianism, whereas the tenor of the JFK speech seems to address the tensions within a pluralistic society, where Catholicism is deemed to be inherently hostile to such pluralism.
on March 4th, 2010 at 3:53 pm
Several commentators have signaled agreement with at least some of what Chaput had to say to the Baptist ministers. My dear friend, Peter Steinfels, has spelled some of those out. We can quibble about how much agreement and with what. Still, what over-all are we to make of Chaput’s words?
Yesterday I read Chaput over a second time looking to see what points I agreed with. I concluded that I didn’t disagree with all of them. And who of a religious persuasion could disagree with those Peter has cited? Dare I say: these are boiler plate in the on-going conversation among Catholics, especially those of a more conservative bent.
And why is it ongoing? Because we have yet to see a resolution of how Catholic politicians are to act–except what is on the table: obey the bishops. Chaput avoided before this audience any mention of the kind of ecclesiastical sanctions that some bishops have threatened or deployed in recent elections. And well he did; I doubt such direct intervention would go over with a group, such as the Baptists, committed to the absolute separation of church and state.
If Chaput is sincere in his concerns (and I will assume he is), he needs to free his argument from its patently anti-Democrat examples, in this case Kennedy, and think more closely about the role of the bishop in appealing not only to Baptists and (some) Republicans.
Chaput is right about this: “Too many Catholics confuse their personal opinions with a real Christian conscience. Too many live their faith as if it were a personal idiosyncrasy — the kind that they’ll never allow to become a public nuisance.” But what did he say that would convince those “many Catholics”?
on March 4th, 2010 at 3:55 pm
Antonio — I think those pamphlets are still around. We got a package of them in the office not long ago from someone anxious about the state of our souls — they included much detail on how the pope not-so-secretly desires to rule all mankind as earthly emperor. (Stuff like this.)
on March 4th, 2010 at 4:10 pm
Peter and Peggy,
Thanks for taking the time to lay out some helpful observations.
With regard Peggy’s last comment: on the one hand she thinks some of the sentences that impressed Peter to be “boiler plate.” On the other hand, she concedes that the Archbishop is right that “Too many live their faith as if it were a personal idiosyncrasy — the kind that they’ll never allow to become a public nuisance.”
Could it be that the boiler plate, if allowed to become real and not merely notional, would turn out to be gold plate?
on March 4th, 2010 at 4:17 pm
One other thing, although it’s understandable that Chaput diplomatically omitted any reference to the anti-Catholic rancor that gave rise to the speech, that omission undercuts Chaput’s thesis regarding the impact of the JFK speech. In that regard, reviewing Sean Casey’s book, “The Making of a Catholic President”, Gary Wills writes:
While Nixon worked on Catholic outreach with [Sulpician priest John Cronin], he had allies secretly stirring up Protestant resistance to Kennedy. He said publicly that he would not make religion an issue in the election, but he had friends organizing evangelical and other ministers to make religion the overriding concern. A principal agent in this activity was Orland K. Armstrong, who worked closely with Protestants and Other Americans United and others to revive old fears of Rome. Billy Graham deliberately stayed in Europe so he would not be drawn into electoral controversies, but he held a summit meeting in Switzerland of eminences from the National Association of Evangelicals and from Protestants and Other Americans United to plan a larger meeting of Protestant leaders to be held in Washington, D.C., where Norman Vincent Peale would be the nominal convener and spokesperson.
The Peale meeting was held behind closed doors, to form an umbrella group called Citizens
for Religious Freedom. Publicly Peale claimed that it was not an anti-Kennedy meeting, but
two enterprising journalists hid themselves where they could hear the speakers and their
plans to raise money for attacks on Kennedy. At the end of the meeting, Peale held a news
conference in which he misrepresented what had gone on.
The complete Wills review is at:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1141/is_20_45/ai_n35568650/
on March 4th, 2010 at 4:37 pm
With regard Peggy’s last comment: on the one hand she thinks some of the sentences that impressed Peter to be “boiler plate.” On the other hand, she concedes that the Archbishop is right that “Too many live their faith as if it were a personal idiosyncrasy — the kind that they’ll never allow to become a public nuisance.”
Where is the evidence for such a conclusion? It seems to me that religiously based activism is alive and well. From the NY Times:(http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/04/science/earth/04climate.html?hpw )
Last year, the Texas Board of Education adopted language requiring that teachers present all sides of the evidence on evolution and global warming.
Oklahoma introduced a bill with similar goals in 2009, although it was not enacted.
The linkage of evolution and global warming is partly a legal strategy: courts have found that singling out evolution for criticism in public schools is a violation of the separation of church and state. By insisting that global warming also be debated, deniers of evolution can argue that they are simply championing academic freedom in general.
on March 4th, 2010 at 4:54 pm
The Al Smith controversy in the US took place at the same time that French Catholics were going through the upset caused to many of them by the papal condemnation of the right-wing monarchist Action française movement and the ban on Catholics belonging to its political party. Supporters of the party and of its founder Charles Maurras contrasted this drastic interference in the political life of France with the Vatican’s hands-off attitude towards Al Smith’s “creed” even though it contained “a profession of faith in the liberalism that has quite certainly been condemned and whose precise terms absolutely prevent one from interpreting it benevolently as if they only intended a state of fact, the hypothesis, and not a state of law, the thesis.” Two French Catholic journals said that Smith’s text was “tinged with doctrinal liberalism,” a judgment shared by Jacques Maritain who called it “a liberal manifesto” that could only have been written by someone quite unaware of the hypothetical character of the American situation.
It would appear that the Vatican did not want to do anything to make Smith’s candidacy any more difficult. An article in L’Osservatore Romano, 14 May 1927, spoke of the “unfortunate questionnaire” and “tendentious challenge” that Smith had to face, provided excerpts from his reply, referred to “facts and arguments that are beyond discussion” that Smith had adduced, summarized his view of the role of the Church (“the Catholic Church does not impose any civil law on the country, but limits itself to regulating within itself the relations between it and its own children”), and concluded: “In any case it will no longer be an argument from his Catholic faith that will dominate in objections to his eventual candidacy.” According to Thomas Shelley, Cardinal Bonzano, former apostolic delegate to the U.S., sent Cardinal Hayes a private letter in which he called it a “masterpiece.”
on March 4th, 2010 at 5:10 pm
AM: Good point. All I can say is that I took him to be talking about Catholics, and I could name some politicians who fit the bill, but I think for once I will be prudent.
on March 4th, 2010 at 8:10 pm
All of which seems to confirm that politics is the art of the possible. Which means that one must always be aware of shifts and changes.
on March 5th, 2010 at 12:01 am
I find it interesting that John Kennedy had to give this speech in 1963, when the fact is, I can think of no issue in 1963 where his Catholic Faith would be in conflict with his service to his Country.
on March 5th, 2010 at 12:20 am
Nancy – I think it was actually 1960? At any rate … the Cuban Missile Crisis brought us very close to a nuclear exchange with the Soviet Union. Who knows how many millions of innocent civilians would have been killed? To my understanding, the use of weapons of mass destruction has no justification in Catholic thinking. Would a Catholic be expected to step down from the Presidency in such circumstances? But wouldn’t the risk inherent in a change in commander-in-chief make things less stable and thus more likely to result in the launch of such weapons? Would an enemy of the US see a Catholic president as less likely to use nuclear weapons and act more boldly against our interests? Not sure how to sort all that out!
on March 5th, 2010 at 12:25 am
Nancy: The speech in question was delivered to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association on September 12, 1960, while JFK was a presidential candidate.
See:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16920600
on March 5th, 2010 at 10:38 am
I think noting the contexts of these two speeches is important in gauging their relative merits as well:
Kennedy was going “into the lion’s den,” as it were, before a group whose opinions and reactions could have much to do with whether he was successful in his quest for the presidency of the United States and for the role of Catholics in public life.
Archbishop Chaput was speaking to a friendly audience on a topic of mutual agreement and with little expectation of facing much in the way of consequences — except, of course, from the commenters at dotCommonweal.
That is not to dismiss in any way the speech or the fact of his giving it — many will surely follow in the Archbishop’s footsteps between now and September.
It might be useful to try to think of a propoerly analogous situation for Chaput or any other church leader today.
on March 5th, 2010 at 11:22 am
I respect AB Chaput for his saying what he thinks, even if he’s wrong about some things. Too bad more bishops don’t have the same sort of candor. I wonder whether the fact that he is an Amerindian has something to do with it. The Indian braves weren’t called “braves” for nothing, I’m sure.
on March 5th, 2010 at 11:32 am
I see John Allen has joined the issue today, markinh the Bishop as a “very 21st century bishop” -whatever that turn of phrase really means.
As I read through this thread, I think there’s some consensus that the good bishop stretched historically in referencing JFK’s speech.
As Mrs. Steinfels pointed out, the real (21st century issue) is what it means politically today.
Of course there are people who just follow there whims and of course sincere Catholics should bring their faith to bear upon their politic thoughts and actions (as should those of other faiths and non- faiths.) I continue to think, BTW, that not enough attention is paid to the issue of how we often let our politics shape our faith beliefs.
That’s probably boilerplate, not the term I’d use, but basic stuff that doesn’t really come to grips with the heart of the complex (yes, not naked) truths of applying the basic stuff to a pluralistic and increasingly divided and partisan society.
on March 5th, 2010 at 12:17 pm
Someone could do us all a great favor by mapping the range of meanings for separation of church and state in 1960 and 2010. Part of the problem is that many people all across the philosophical spectrum use the term as if the meaing was unitary and self evident both today and in 1960. I don’t think when JFK spoke of an absolute separation he was proleptically channeling Barry Lynn. JFK’s Protestant enemies meant “no Catholics need apply” when they used the phrase. Kennedy clearly did not mean that. Today I find the term hopelessly incoherent.
on March 5th, 2010 at 1:08 pm
Thanks for the correction and full text of the speech. Having read the full text of the speech, it is clear that John Kennedy did not understand that in order to be Catholic, one must be in communion with The Catholic Church to begin with.That being said, our Founding Fathers protected our Religious Liberty so that we can live within the State, not separate from the State. Why did John Kennedy feel the need to separate himself from the Catholic Faith in order to run for President?
on March 5th, 2010 at 1:14 pm
Ann, Archbishop Chaput is brave because he has “the courage to be Catholic”.
on March 5th, 2010 at 1:52 pm
I second Shaun Casey’s proposal.
I’d propose two categories to gets the distinctions and clarifications started:
The separation of church and state, and the separation of church and politics.
on March 5th, 2010 at 2:06 pm
And then, David, there’s religion and politics.
on March 5th, 2010 at 2:09 pm
I suppose one should begin that discussion by rendering onto Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and to God, what belongs to God.
on March 5th, 2010 at 2:14 pm
Bob Nunz helpfully points out John Allen’s NCR piece on Chaput.
Allen’s opening paragraph: “Sit down and try to compile a list of the ten most consequential Catholic bishops in America. By that, I don’t mean the bishops you like most or agree with, but those who seem to have the most impact.”
Before getting to Chaput, he covers his bases by suggesting some other consequentials. That would include in Allen’s opinion: “Cardinal Justin Rigali of Philadelphia, for example, would probably make the list because of his behind-the-scenes muscle — seeing his protégés named bishops and steering matters through the shoals of Rome. Bishop Gerald Kicanas of Tucson might be included for his ability to forge consensus and get things done within the U.S. bishops’ conference. Archbishop Jose Gomez of San Antonio and Bishop Jaime Soto of Sacramento might make the cut because of their leadership among the exploding sector of Hispanic Catholics, while Cardinal Francis George of Chicago would be in the mix as an intellectual point of reference.”
I had to laugh at Allen’s skill in keeping doors open.
Whole thing here: http://ncronline.org/blogs/all-things-catholic/him-or-not-denvers-chaput-very-21st-century-bishop
on March 5th, 2010 at 3:45 pm
I don’t think when JFK spoke of an absolute separation he was proleptically channeling Barry Lynn. JFK’s Protestant enemies meant “no Catholics need apply” when they used the phrase. Kennedy clearly did not mean that. Today I find the term hopelessly incoherent.
I agree. In 1960 Kennedy was reacting to organizations such as “Protestants and Other Americans United for the Separation of Church and State”, who opposed his candidacy. As you say, seperation meant seperation on their terms.
on March 5th, 2010 at 3:56 pm
Also, it may be worth noting that in 1949 the Vatican had intervened in Italian elections by declaring that Catholics who collaborated with communism would be automatically excommunicated.
on March 5th, 2010 at 6:25 pm
As one who arranged the visit of the Archbishop to Houston, I would like to point out two things: (1) We should not fail to note the significance of the very fact of Baptist hospitality to the Catholic Archbishop from Denver (Cardinal Dinardo will address an HBU audience in a few weeks as well). Why would Mr. Clifford belittle the “friendly Baptist audience”? His friendship with the Baptist community is a highlight of the trip. Fifty years ago there was hostility and suspicion; now there is a warm reception, admiration for his courage, and agreement with many of his arguments. This is the new thing. Of course, Richard Neuhaus and Chuck Colson (et al) first took such steps over 10 years ago with Catholics and Evangelicals Together. Archbishop Chaput fully acknowledges the different time and climate in Kennedy lived and spoke. But now we need to advocate a greater appreciation for the role of religion in the formation of conscience and the energy of Christian love in service to the city. And thus my second point; Kennedy set up the problem in a way that contains the seed of dualism – conscience is set against “outside religious pressures or dictates,” and “power or threat of punishment.” This formulation already puts the Church as an outsider, and in an adversarial, authoritarian position. The deep formation of personal conscience through a relationship to Jesus Christ, the illumination of divine truth, the tradition of social doctrine – here is how faith is brought to bear on politics. And it should make a difference in the public sphere. It must be integral to the mind and heart of a Catholic in public and private. Is it not stretching plausibility for Kennedy to say that he cannot see “any conflict to be even remotely possible” between his conscience and the political trends “on birth control, divorce, censorship, gambling or any other subject”? What kind of faithful conscience would never anticipate that there may be a problem or conflict requiring a courageous stand against the mainstream? During another talk in the Houston Medical Center Archbishop spoke about rights of conscience against the trend to deny Catholics their place as health care professionals (see his website for the text). Archbishop Chaput is admired by the Baptists and many Catholics because he does speak out on matters of conscience and public policy and he challenges many Catholics to do the same. One can see his clarity and courage on the issue of abortion, education, and immigration.
on March 5th, 2010 at 7:57 pm
Kennedy set up the problem in a way that contains the seed of dualism – conscience is set against “outside religious pressures or dictates,” and “power or threat of punishment.
The causal link he draws is far from self-evident to me. Without reopening old wounds or inferring some sort of malign influence, a more charitable and reasonable interpretation would have been to simply note that Kennedy’s stance is no longer applicable to our era.
on March 5th, 2010 at 9:06 pm
Mr. Hittinger – appreciate your comments but would suggest that you are missing the points made by many that AB Chaput’s Kennedy references and comparison to the circumstances of today was too facile; compared apples to oranges; and also ignored both prior poltiical figures and their Catholic speeches and Kennedy’s 3 speeches on this subject earlier in that 1960 campaign.
Ms. Steinfels – have read Allen’s article at least three times and like his last two posted online articles – he seems to have moved towards little analysis; broad & sweeping generalizations; and stretching to capture all sides……this specific article is what my teachers would call “fluff”, it says little to nothing; can not be documented, proved or disproved. It may as well have been printed in the Catholic version of People Magazine.
A few thoughts – a number of you have commented on AB Chaput’s statement about abortion as the “foundational issue”; his pessimism about advances in terms of pro-life issues. My bias and opinion is that AB Chaput compromises his valid points by knee-jerking, as always, to the abortion issue from his perspective only…..this skews history; the church’s movement forward in peace and justice issues e.g. economics, poverty, death penalty, nuclear weapons to name a few. By too rigidly restricting his definition of “pro-life” to anti-abortion, he misses lots of points; rewrites history; and does not do justice to the religious-political debate that is on-going in today’s society (see the most recent post above from Chainti on how Democrats and Republicans view health care).
In terms of Allen’s piece – Rigali (yes, political infighter with impact on episcopal appointments but beyond that – not much of a thinker, writer, etc.); no mention of Dolan (who Allen recently gave a name to) – how can he skip over him; no mention of Mahoney (immigration, eucharist, annual religious education conference, hispanic ministry); no mention of Atlanta’s bishop and prior USCCB president (impact via Dallas Charter; role in Catholic African-American communities); he names George but, would suggest that history will not be kind to Cardinal George – he will be seen as mediocre and marked by the sex abuse scandal; his own biased workings behind the scenes on turning back liturgy, ecumenism, catholic universities, etc.- his style of leadership is pre-Vatican II); no mention of bishops in San Francisco, O’Malley in Boston, Wuerl in DC. At least he left Burke off the list (altho reading his initial criteria, may be he should have been on the list)
Guess he needed to meet a deadline and had a partial article handy….not up to his usual standards but more and more it seems to reflect his current abilities. His Future Church (latest book) starts well but the last three chapters use the same phrases; catchy words & espressions no matter what the chaptaer topic.
on March 5th, 2010 at 9:06 pm
John, one of the reasons I think it is important for the archbishop to better understand the historical context of the speech is because I think by failing to do so the archbishop attributes motives to JFK that are false. As I tried to show in my book Kennedy was being attacked almost universally by Protestants of all stripes because they thought that by definition a Catholic candidate had to be conflicted between being a faithful Catholic subservient to an oppressive hierarchy and any semblance of individual conscience. The Protestants believed that it was impossible to be a democrat (lower case d) and be a loyal Catholic. This understandably frustrated Kennedy. The so called seeds of dualism were set by the Protestant terms. Under advice of bishop John Wright, Kennedy made the statement about resigning from office in order to demonstrate the priority of his Catholic faith over being president! It seems to me that Bishop Chaput wants to deny this, yet it is in the historical record.
on March 6th, 2010 at 2:49 pm
Making the rounds today on the internet is that the good archbishop ordered a pastor in Boulder (sacred heart of Jesus, I beleive) to tell the lesbian parents of a PRESCHOOLER that she could not continue in the school there.
I guess he thinks that’s his idea of teaching the word with clairty.(Needless to say, I have another term for it.)
I think Bill D. is right about him and Allen and the Chaput defenders here.
But one of the things that rankle me on this b.log (though I usually don’t pursue it -it won’t change anything) is the defenders of hierachy no mater what whether directly or tacitly -and that goes for all things Roman as well.
on March 7th, 2010 at 12:50 pm
According to John Kennedy, his decisions as President would be made, “in accordance with what my conscience tells me”. In order to be Catholic, one must be in full communion with the Catholic Church, which means, to begin with, one can not leave their conscience behind.
I have not doubt that Archbishop Chaput is aware that anti-catholicism existed in 1960 and continues to exist in 2010.
on March 7th, 2010 at 12:56 pm
Bob, are you rankled by those who try to undermine the teachings of Christ’s Church?
on March 7th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
Especially when they say they are spokepersons for Christ.
on March 7th, 2010 at 5:03 pm
Those who try to undermine the teachings of Christ and His Church, are not “spokepersons for Christ”, they have their own agenda.
on March 7th, 2010 at 7:49 pm
So why do those who “have their own agenda” say they are “spokespersons for Christ”?
I suspect the answer lies in the remarks about JFK’s conscience, which was “in full communion with the Catholic Church” while still being his own personal conscience.