The year is 1884. James G. Blaine, Republican nominee for President of the United States, is the favorite in what is expected to be the seventh straight GOP presidential win (going back to Lincoln’s first win in 1860). On October 29, he attends a campaign event in New York City. He is introduced by Reverend Samuel D. Burchard, who ends his address with these now infamous words:
We are Republicans, and don’t propose to leave our party and identify ourselves with the party whose antecedents have been Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion.
For the historically uninitiated, “Romanism” was the 19th Century insult for Catholicism. Blaine ignored the Reverend Burchard’s speech, and delivered his own with no comment on Burchard’s slur. The Democratic press seized the phrase (and Blaine’s lack of disavowal) and spread it to every corner of the country. Thousands of Catholic New Yorkers abandoned Blaine for the Democratic candidate: Grover Cleveland. Cleveland went down in history as the only Democrat to win the White House between 1860 and 1910.
Fast forard to 2008. Mike Huckabee, the man who all but screams “bigot!” to anyone who questions his record as Governor of Arkansas, is just about to share the pulpit (literally) with Reverend John Hagee, a preacher who has a long history of virulent anti-Catholic statements (Catholic League).
I get the feeling Huckabee is about to learn a very painful lesson in religious politics. Coming from the state with the third lowest percentage of Catholics (Ask a Catholic), he likely doesn’t see followers of the ancient faith as a major constituency. He will soon learn just how wrong he is.
Of course, Huck could take the time to disassociate himself from Hagee’s anti-Catholic rants; that would be enough for me. Some Catholics (say, Shaun Kenney and Chris Beer over at Mason Conservative) may not be happy unless the appearance is cancelled. Either way, if Huckabee does what I expect him to do on this subject (namely, nothing) he will reap the whirlwind.
For years, evangelicals have assumed they were all alone in fighting the lonely fight for social conservatism. Many (but not all) have been unwilling or unable to notice the millions of Catholics who stood beside them. Among other things, this has led evangelicals to assume they are stronger than they really are. However, Huckabee may just give millions of bonafide social conservatives Reason Number 1 to never vote for him - ever.
Tomorrow could be the beginning of the end for Mike Hucakbee.
Cross-posted to Virginia Bloggers Against Mike Huckabee
December 23, 2007 at 12:40 am
Since Pastor Hagee seems to think that Catholics are not Christians, it is not surprising that he thinks that Mr. Huckabee is one.
December 23, 2007 at 12:40 am
Association with Hagee is an anti-Catholic statement? I thought Bob Jones Univ was the big anti-Catholic litmus test.
Hagee is a great preacher. I enjoy listening to him. Try it. His theology shouldn’t tar Huckabee. Huckabee should fail on his own politics, not his preaching past, or present, from the pulpit.
Who are these Evangelicals who don’t know that Catholics are in the fight with them for the culture? I don’t know any such person.
I wrote some time ago about the ABCs of the Religious Right - Assembly of God (Pentacostal), Baptists and Catholics.
December 23, 2007 at 10:48 pm
James, I admire your perceptiveness in seeing the significance of that internecine culture war. (There are others, both intranational and global, as I’m sure you’d agree.) There’s something that strikes me as odd about the way in which it’s being handled here, and it has given me a brain worm, as I can’t pinpoint it. Perhaps it’s that the Evangelical Catholic match-up is a non-parallelism somehow, I don’t know. I’m pretty sure that Catholics would find this oversimplistic and misleading, though.
Alternatively, it may be that the mainline Prots are missing, for as dissipated and seemingly benign as they may be, they still have little use for Catholics, and their fitful efforts at ecumenism are all but ridiculous. One tiny symptom of this was their willful silence this Fall on the attacks in San Francisco on Catholics, Catholicism and the Eucharist. It was as though the Proddies simply didn’t consider the Romists or their Eucharist Christian. The rabbinate was more concerned than were either the Evangelical or mainline churches. (Jews are bloody sensible, as well as sensitive, that way; Protestants, daft and careless.)
In any event, Huckabee does not preach, or otherwise witness, from pulpits only. In the Florida debate he reframed a question put to him so that he could deliver a canned spiel defining the essence of the Christian creed: helping the poor! What kind of Christian is that? An idolatrous, “statistical” one, one willing to say any damn lowest-common-denominator thing he deems necessary to gain the most powerful political office in history, a “Christian” willing even to sell out “Jesus and Him crucified” (the simplest of the correct answers) to do it.
That same week Mitt Romney gave his notoriously anti-secular speech in which he repeatedly circumambulated mention of Christ’s divinity, as any such reference is, for a Latter Day Saint, sacrilege, though it be a prerequisite for a Christian. And yet ironically Mr. Romney is more Christian in word and (public) deed than is Pastor Huckabee the Statistical Christian (as distinguished from Christian).
December 24, 2007 at 12:17 pm
HughVic: Expect nothing from Mainline Protestants. Evangelicals are persecuted in SF too - you read about it.
Mainline Protestants for the most part aren’t in the fight. They are diminishing. FYI, the Southern Baptists, who don’t benefit from child baptisms in their count, have gained more members over the past years than the combined losses of the mainline Episcopalians, Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, etc. Also, the non-denominational Evangelical Bible Churches have grown. (See http://www.barna.org for the best stats).
I refer to these mainline Protestants as Sissy Christians. Double entendre intended.
I don’t support Huckabee or Romney for political reasons.
The ABCs who are aligned in the Great U.S. Culture War ( ACW II) are not all Pentacostals, all Baptists or Catholics, but we are the majority of the Religious Right that makes a difference politically. And we are the one third of the Nation that will win ACW II. And, eventually, WW IV against Islamists.
Back to the orginal post… don’t worry too much about Hagee. I like hearing him preach the gospel. Hagee won’t, and can’t, start an inquisition. He isn’t the enemy. The Liberal Human Secularists are the enemy. Islam, which is to Christianity as Baal was to the Hebrews, produces the Islamist enemies.
December 24, 2007 at 8:30 pm
James, I very much appreciate–on Christmas Eve no less!–your informed straight talk. Thank you. I tried to except the SBC, in acknowledgement of its growth. Dr. Page is even talking about rapprochement with the Calvinists in his ranks. Very cool. Hagee certainly is not the enemy, but he takes the Scottish “muscular Christianity” schtick so bullishly that he obviously appeals to a great many folks looking for someone to give expression to their anger. In my opinion he’s well aware of that, and even plays to it. Still, I learn from him, though sometimes he is cocksure about the damnedest things, especially about chimaerical events of non-history. As long as he stays with the Gospel, he’s loud and clear and rock solid.
I feel like a bleating fool, reviewing my elders as though they were new restaurants. Do sheep swap critical reviews of sheepdogs? Anyway, I’ve seen San Francisco’s horrid contempt for Evangelicals first-hand, and I’m not talking about that Gadarene fool and his crazed daughters; I mean Bay Area evangelicals. (I am in Georgia.) The exception is the Filmore District, smack in the center of the City, where Black folk are as churchy and saline as anyone in Oklahoma or Carolina. Very dear people. Without them, probably brimstone.
Your very severe read of Salafism is nonetheless warranted, as the Salafis professedly choose to answer to your description. It feels like a categorical error, though, to lump ‘em in with the very fine people I’ve known who are Muslim, most of them gentle and unassuming in a distinctly Muslim manner. The Muslims of Jerusalem (though not in the rest of Israel) understand us and accord us common respect. Likewise those in Turkey and Pakistan and one day soon, I feel confident, in venerable Iran also. The troops coming home, by His Grace, are, as a matter of pure sociology, a largely Christian lot with many good regards for Muslims, though of course our guys are ready to kill a Salafist on sight, thank you. Some of the especially distinguished troops are themselves Muslim, the latter day counterparts of the superlative Japanese American 442nd. So my attitude toward our Muslim enemies is informed by that of our newest veterans. And, as goes the old saying, “You can’t be holier than the Pope!” (And no, you needn’t beg to differ.)
As for our invisible battle with the tribe of Esau, I am satisfied to submit by prayer to our Conqueror Lamb, against whom they stand not a chance. To avoid complacency in this regard, I do keep learning about those particular enemies we are commanded to love, and pray whenever some new Islamic discovery warrants, variously for peace or at least for safety through speedy victory.
I flat-out agree with you, Brother, about who the real enemy is in our time. I’ve paid a frightful cost for holding your same view, however, so I think you would agree that it is incumbent upon me to counsel you to put caution and prudence before boldness. We’re going to continue to need you. Godspeed, then.