If there is a strange providence to the left’s many deleterious victories in American life over the last sixty years or so, it is that certain old hostilities have been lessened. Catholics and Protestants began to see that, though their disagreements were real, they shared much more in common than was always evident both religiously and practically. Much of the modern conservative movement’s success has relied on serious Christian cooperation across confessional lines.
Recently, however, political operatives have been trying to disrupt that partnership with a series of information operations, some of which are wholly bogus and some of which rely on well-known divisions that the left intends to exploit. Catholics and Protestants who care about the country need to see through these ops and keep pushing for shared interests.
The rapprochement between Catholics and Evangelicals began in the 1970s when Evangelical figures such as Baptist Jerry Falwell and Catholics such as Paul Weyrich, co-founder of the Heritage Foundation, began to realize that, culturally and politically, the two groups needed to work together for the sake of the country. Though it was Falwell who was most associated with it, it was actually the ordained Catholic deacon Weyrich who came up with the name of the organization they founded in 1979: The Moral Majority.
Continuing and advancing that partnership, Chuck Colson and Fr. Richard John Neuhaus convened a group of scholars and pastors who released a 1994 statement titled Evangelicals and Catholics Together. In that first of many documents, signed by luminaries of both traditions, they did not shy away from describing the theological differences between the two groups. They firmly claimed the theological commonalities, however, and the love of Christ that animated and should animate all Christians.
They also identified the areas of public concern on which they should be cooperating. “Together we contend for the truth,” the signatories declared, “that politics, law, and culture must be secured by moral truth.” They then went on to outline the many subjects for which there was strong agreement. These included: religious freedom and a free economy, both grounded in the nature of man in the image of God and bounded by moral limits; opposition to abortion, euthanasia, pornography; responsible public education that respects parental authority and parental choice in education; policies that support and respect the family more broadly; and a responsible foreign policy that is neither amoral nor moralistic.
That movement of cooperation has been successful in many ways, most recently in pushing back against the dangerous ideologies around sexuality and gender. But, success means putting a target on your back.
Thus, the movement we’ve seen over the last few weeks to drive a wedge between the two groups. Two true statements added to two phony stories have been used to divide Catholics and Protestants.
The first true story came out in mid-March. Liberal group People for the American Way and others promoted clips of an interview with Doug Wilson, the Calvinist pastor connected to Pete Hegseth, saying he would ban Eucharistic and Marian processions in his ideal Christian country.
Second, a papal tweet on April 10 read: “God does not bless any conflict. Anyone who is a disciple of Christ, the Prince of Peace, is never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs. Military action will not create space for freedom or times of #Peace, which comes only from the patient promotion of coexistence and dialogue among peoples.”
While Leo is fairly clearly against the U.S.’s operation in Iran, he has encouraged soldiers in their work recently. The tweet, however, without any context, read as an endorsement of pacifism.
Neither of these statements was very helpful for relations between Protestants and Catholics. Of course, one could easily find Catholic integralists saying the same kind of things about their ideal Catholic states that Wilson did. I debated a traditionalist Catholic about 15 years ago who proposed that Protestants be allowed to worship but not publicly advertise their services. I don’t think this is the way forward even in an “ideal” situation, but to say such things when there is no chance of a Catholic or Protestant official state is not helpful.
So, too, while Pope Leo’s opposition to our Iran venture is not objectionable (I know Protestant conservatives who hold the same position), expressing (or allowing underlings to express) it in ways that allow for obvious misunderstandings harms not only Catholic authority but also relations with Protestants. They pointed quickly to divinely sanctioned Old Testament wars and historical calls to arms by popes themselves.
These unfortunate statements were exacerbated by the left, which has been busy making up new reasons for distrust. Jennifer Bendery at The Huffington Post reported on Holy Thursday that Pete Hegseth had not “allowed” a Catholic Good Friday “Mass” at the Pentagon but had a Protestants-only service. “The Pentagon has invited more than 3,500 employees to attend a Good Friday service at its in-house chapel. Except it’s only for Protestants, not Catholics,” she wrote.
While the article was later updated to note that Catholics do not celebrate the Mass on Good Friday and that the reason there was no Good Friday liturgy was because the Catholic chaplain was not available, many saw this report and ran with it. Even AF Post, an America First news site, ran with a long tweet assuming this report was true before correcting this outlandish story.
Additionally, this past week, a report from The Free Press about tensions between the Vatican and the U.S. was amplified by Democrat operative Chris Hale, who reported that a January meeting between Elbridge Colby’s team and that of then-Apostolic Nuncio Christoph Pierre included Colby or one of his team members threatening the Vatican with references to the Avignon Papacy. As Hale summarized, the U.S. threatened the pope “with the prospect of an American Babylonian Captivity.” One podcaster even claimed the next step might be to “bomb the Vatican.”
Of course, anybody who knows anything about the deeply Catholic and prudent Elbridge Colby instantly knew this report was crazy. In any case, the Vatican later released a statement saying, “The narrative offered by certain media outlets regarding this meeting does not correspond to the truth at all.”
Left-wing operatives do what they do. What serious Protestants and Catholics ought to do, though, is see through the obvious attempts at division. It’s perfectly fair to criticize Pope Leo or Doug Wilson – and many of their own faith criticized them as well. But to use imprudent speech by pastors to drive divisions between Christians who share so much is foolish.
Even more important is to retain a deep skepticism about reports that do drive such wedges. The Huffington Post is no friend of Catholics or Protestants. Chris Hale was part of John Podesta’s attempt to turn the Catholic Church into a serviceable Democrat Party tool. Outlandish reports from such sources should be treated as political ops until proven otherwise.
It’s difficult to imagine what the country would be like without almost fifty years of cooperation on moral issues. We don’t have to agree on everything to see that Evangelicals and Catholics belong together for the benefit of each other and the country.
David P. Deavel teaches at the University of St. Thomas in Houston. A past Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute, he is a Senior Contributor at The Imaginative Conservative. Follow him on X @davidpdeavel.
