Note that this page is about conspiracy theories, pseudohistory, and other crank ideas about the Church. For legitimate criticism of the Roman Catholic Church see relevant articles in the category Catholicism.
“”A penny loaf to feed ol' Pope. A farthing cheese to choke him.
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| —[1] |
Anti-Catholicism refers to staunch opposition to the Roman Catholic Church and its members, usually grounded in conspiracy theory, nativism, and misrepresentation of Catholic theology (and, often, copious amounts of tangentially related wingnuttery). Some brands of the anti-Catholic conspiracy theory paint the Catholic Church as a lone conspirator seeking world domination, though many depict the Church as being in bed with the Illuminati or Freemasons. (Ironically, the former were suppressed by the Church, and they have been staunchly opposed to the latter since the beginning). While anti-Catholic bigotry was once rampant among Protestants, recent political re-alignments have strengthened ties between conservative Protestants and the Catholic hierarchy. Increasingly, so-called "anti-Catholicism" is merely whining about criticism of the Church, coverage being insufficiently pro-Catholic, or disagreement with Catholic positions on issues such as birth control, abortion, and gay rights.[2][3]
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[edit]The Reformation and England
“”Anti-Catholicism has always been the pornography of the Puritan.
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| —Richard Hofstadter[4] |
The idea of the pope as antichrist plays a central role in the anti-Catholic conspiracy theories. This idea dates back to the Protestant Reformation, whenMartin Luther, whose complaints about financial and theological improprieties the Church had ignored, set off a schism within Western Christianity. Luther believed, following a popular conception of the day, that during the End Time Satan would work to corrupt the Church. Luther believed that the institution of the papacy was that corrupting influence, and, borrowing the term from the first and second letters of John, he called it "antichrist."[5] Luther produced a series of woodcarvings with side-by-side depictions of the pope (labeled as "antichristus") and Jesus in which the pope was doing the opposite of Jesus (e.g., in one carving, Jesus is washing the feet of the poor while the pope is having his feet washed by the poor).[6]
Conspiracy theories about the Catholic Church found especially fertile ground in England due to the English Reformation and creation of the Church of England. The Gunpowder Plot of 1605, an actual conspiracy by Catholics to assassinate King James I, also helped fuel anti-Catholicism in England. The most famous of these theories was probably the so-called "Popish Plot," a conspiracy theory cooked up by one Titus Oates that implicated the Catholic Church in a conspiracy to assassinate King Charles II. This led to a moral panic in the 1670s and 1680s that was used to justify the execution of at least fifteen alleged conspirators and the Exclusion Bill, which sought to de-legitimize James, Duke of York, as heir to the throne due to his Catholic faith. The idea that the Jesuits were foot-soldiers in the vast Catholic conspiracy, another common theme in anti-Catholicism, was also present in Popish Plot theories.[7]
Beginning in the mid-16th century, a number of penal laws were passed with the intent of suppressing Catholicism and re-asserting the authority of the Church of England. The Clarendon Code, four acts passed from 1661-1665, targeted the political and religious freedoms of Catholics and other Protestantheretics.[8]
[edit]America and Know Nothingism
[edit]The US into the mid-19th century
Protestant settlers in America often took with them the anti-Catholic sentiment found in Europe. However, due to the overwhelmingly protestant religious make-up of the nascent United States, anti-Catholicism did not become a major political issue until the 19th century. Anti-Catholic sentiment in the 1800s arose in large part as a response to the large influx of Roman Catholic immigrants from Ireland and Germany. One of the most popular early anti-Catholic tracts was written by none other than the inventor of the telegraph himself: Samuel Morse. In 1835, Morse published a book called Foreign Conspiracies Against the Liberties of the United States, which alleged the Catholics were part of a larger conspiracy based in Austria to install a member of the House of Habsburg as the imperial ruler of the US.[4] During this period, anti-Catholicism began to become intertwined with early versions of the Freemason and Illuminati conspiracy theories, all of which played into nativist ideas about a European monarchical takeover of the US.
[edit]Know Nothingism
See the main article on this topic: Know Nothing Party
In the mid-19th century up until the American Civil War, the nativist Know Nothing movement represented the high-watermark of anti-Catholicism in American politics. The Know Nothings believed in an imminent papal takeover of the US via the "political Romanism" of newly arrived immigrants and attempted to have Catholics banned from public office. They also managed to field Millard Fillmore as a candidate on the Know Nothing ticket in the election of 1856.
[edit]Post-bellum America into the 20th century
Smaller Know Nothing-esque movements, however, persisted in American politics. The Panic of 1893 was latched onto by the newly formed American Protective Association as "proof" of a Catholic conspiracy to destroy the financial institutions of the US. This fringe political movement spawned a host of new conspiracy theories, including allegations that agents of the Church had assassinated Abraham Lincoln.[9]
Anti-Catholic conspiracy theories continued to incubate on the fringe right until the revival of the Ku Klux Klan in the early 20th century. The KKK promoted Protestant white supremacism, leading them to target not just blacks, but basically all minorities. The Klan worked at the local level to shut down Roman Catholic churches and schools largely in the 1920s.[10][11]
Anti-Catholicism became a major issue once again during the presidential campaign of 1928, which pitted the Irish Catholic Governor of New York Al Smith, the first major-party Roman Catholic candidate in a presidential election, against Herbert Hoover. Smith's opponents used the phrase "Rum and Romanism" (Smith was also a "wet" opposed to Prohibition) as a pejorative reference to his campaign,[12] echoing an earlier description of the Democrats as the party of "Rum, Romanism and Rebellion."
The so-called "Catholic Question" once again became an issue in the 1960 campaign of John F. Kennedy. Prominent Protestant ministers, such as Billy Graham, distrusted Kennedy's Catholicism and tried to derail his campaign.[13] The more extreme, paranoid wing of the American conservative movement dredged up the old anti-Catholic conspiracy theories in response to Kennedy's candidacy and subsequent presidential administration as he became the first Roman Catholic president of the US.[14][15]
[edit]Modern variants
Anti-Catholicism as a political movement has mostly dropped off the radar in the current American political landscape. Most major criticisms of the Church originate in more secular issues like the child sex abuse scandal and the Vatican establishment's social conservatism, and come from lay Catholics themselves as often as not. However, hardcore anti-Catholic wingnuttery still finds a home in many fringe movements and subcultures. The following conspiracy theories often cross-pollinate into unholy alliances of crankery as well, just like in the good old days.
[edit]New World Order conspiracists
Conspiracy theorists pushing "New World Order" theories allege a vast global conspiracy made up of the (Jews/Illuminati/Freemasons/Insert your favored conspiratorial bogeyman here) will often throw anti-Catholicism into the mix, mining the conspiracist literature of yesteryear for ever more pseudohistory toshoehorn into the New World Order framework.
[edit]Wingnut fundamentalist Protestants
Hardline fundamentalists still continue to claim that the pope is the antichrist and that Roman Catholics engage in Satanic, demonic, occult or otherwise un-Christian practices. [16]
Chick tracts are replete with Evangelical hatred for the Church. One tract argues that the Church created Islam, Communism, Nazism, Freemasonry and more.[17] In fact, there are more Chick tracts that condemn the Catholic church than there are Chick tracts which condemn Mormonism, Islam, and theJehovah's Witnesses combined.
The antichrist theory inevitably leads to a round of crankery every time a new pope is selected, i.e. "This time, he really is the antichrist and the end is surely nigh!"[18] Wash, rinse, repeat.[19] Pope Francis is due to be the very last according to some predictions,[20] so mass hysteria may follow.
Religious anti-Catholicism often merges into New World Order conspiracism. Pat Robertson's 1991 screed The New World Order is such an instance. That makes these theories a staple among the religious element of the hard right black helicopter set.
[edit]The Da Vinci Code
Dan Brown's publication of The Da Vinci Code in 2004 made anti-Catholic conspiracy theories cool again by popularizing and ripping off the pseudo-scholarship of the 1982 book Holy Blood, Holy Grail. The ideas about a cover-up of Jesus' relationship with Mary Magdalene and the true nature of the Holy Grail are sometimes subsumed into the wider anti-Catholic conspiratorial framework or, alternately, open up those with the inclination toward crankery to a vast wealth of anti-Catholic pseudo-scholarship. The secretive Opus Dei sect of the Church often plays a big role in these theories. Brown has admitted, however, that he does not believe in these conspiracy theories but only adapted them to suit his novels and write fiction.
[edit]Northern Ireland
Anti-Catholicism was cross-pollinated with Unionist (pro-British) extremism during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, with gruesome results. While the IRAare remembered as the main terrorist group of the conflict, Protestant extremists like the Ulster Volunteer Force and the Ulster Defense Association had a major hand in the fighting. Ian Paisley, the ideological godfather of Protestant extremism in Northern Ireland, earned notoriety during his time in the European Parliament for denouncing Pope John Paul II as the antichrist. The Troubles are perhaps the most recent case in the Western world of anti-Catholicism contributing to actual bloodshed.