Monday, February 27, 2012
Santorum's Nausea
Sen, John F. Kennedy's Address to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, 9/12/60, is required reading in both great American oratory & First Amendment writing.
Kennedy's speech pretty much settled the matter of Roman Catholics in American public office. In response to Kennedy's campaign, the Vatican made an important change to its official view of church/state separation (from disapproval to alright for a Democracy; a key adjustment that eventually made it possible for the United States to open diplomatic relations in 1983, although Baptist Harry Truman had wanted to do it in 1951).
We've since had a Roman Catholic candidate, John Kerry, & a Greek Orthodox Catholic candidate, Michael Dukakis, neither of whom lost due to their religions. Vice President Biden is Roman Catholic. Six Supreme Court justices are Roman Catholic or were raised Catholic.
Rick Santorum, a Roman Catholic whose run for the presidential nomination as a candidate soliciting votes of conservative protestant Republicans seeking to erode church/state separation was ironically made possible by John F. Kennedy, says this great speech made him want to "throw up."
Would Santorum take orders from the Pope? His reaction makes me wonder about it. It's clear Santorum doesn't like secular laws contrary to Catholic doctrine. Never mind required health insurance coverage for contraceptive methods. What about the public availability of contraceptive devices & medications, including those Trojans on display in 7-Eleven? The Roman Catholic Church is against artificial insemination, also covered by many insurance plans. Marriage equality? Maybe Santorum wants to restore so-called "sodomy laws" that made heterosexual oral sex illegal.
***
Santorum backed away from the "throw up " statement but not from opinion attached to it. He thinks there's some terrible threat to religious expression in America. Has there ever been more religion in American political discourse? Have the religious beliefs of presidents & presidential wannabes ever been more scrutinized & more important? What major religion in America is suffering more suppression than Islam? Every Muslim in America is still expected to apologize for 9/11 as a precondition to expressing a public opinion on anything else. "I'm sorry for the terrorist attacks, I condemn them, & would you please fill the pot hole in the street in front of my house?
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." Thomas Jefferson
I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish; where no public official either requests or accept instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source; where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials, and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.What little I recall of the 1960 presidential election: First, grownups of my parents' generation were excited by it; a win by either Kennedy or Nixon would mark a passing of the torch to a new generation. Second, there was already a general air of sleaziness about the Kennedy men's personal lives, although adults didn't discuss the rumors in front of children. But it was there. Third, there was an uneasiness among many protestants regarding Kennedy's Catholicism. It wasn't so pronounced in my town; just something picked up from wisecracks of other protestant kids I figured they picked up from their parents. My Republican dad, an ex-Catholic (raised strictly), so detested J.F.K. as a person & politician that I doubt religion even figured into it. He certainly had no qualms voting for Catholic Republicans. But it surely meant more in the protestant South & Midwest farm states.
Kennedy's speech pretty much settled the matter of Roman Catholics in American public office. In response to Kennedy's campaign, the Vatican made an important change to its official view of church/state separation (from disapproval to alright for a Democracy; a key adjustment that eventually made it possible for the United States to open diplomatic relations in 1983, although Baptist Harry Truman had wanted to do it in 1951).
We've since had a Roman Catholic candidate, John Kerry, & a Greek Orthodox Catholic candidate, Michael Dukakis, neither of whom lost due to their religions. Vice President Biden is Roman Catholic. Six Supreme Court justices are Roman Catholic or were raised Catholic.
Rick Santorum, a Roman Catholic whose run for the presidential nomination as a candidate soliciting votes of conservative protestant Republicans seeking to erode church/state separation was ironically made possible by John F. Kennedy, says this great speech made him want to "throw up."
Would Santorum take orders from the Pope? His reaction makes me wonder about it. It's clear Santorum doesn't like secular laws contrary to Catholic doctrine. Never mind required health insurance coverage for contraceptive methods. What about the public availability of contraceptive devices & medications, including those Trojans on display in 7-Eleven? The Roman Catholic Church is against artificial insemination, also covered by many insurance plans. Marriage equality? Maybe Santorum wants to restore so-called "sodomy laws" that made heterosexual oral sex illegal.
***
Santorum backed away from the "throw up " statement but not from opinion attached to it. He thinks there's some terrible threat to religious expression in America. Has there ever been more religion in American political discourse? Have the religious beliefs of presidents & presidential wannabes ever been more scrutinized & more important? What major religion in America is suffering more suppression than Islam? Every Muslim in America is still expected to apologize for 9/11 as a precondition to expressing a public opinion on anything else. "I'm sorry for the terrorist attacks, I condemn them, & would you please fill the pot hole in the street in front of my house?
Labels: blogging against theocracy, religion, sex with a Republican, THE election
