Paths of American Catholicism

Post-war American Catholicism...homogeneous, miraculously expansive and prosperous, and (we know in hindsight) shallow in its intellectual and spiritual roots...fell apart immediately and catastrophically after 1965 as the Church "opened its doors" to a world that was turning away from its Christian heritage. The result was a diverse, fascinating Catholic universe of distinct, often conflicting pathways. It may be helpful to identify six major paths and six minor ones.

1.  Generic, moderate,  parish-based Catholicism is the direct heir of the ethnic "ghetto" parish. It is a congenial "co-habitation" of the faith with contemporary, mostly middle-class life. Due to a seminary system that is generally uniform, steady, moderate, tolerant but conservative in a mellow way, the contemporary parish is largely predictable in inviting participants to communion with a loving God in a life of prayer, sacraments, and generous, virtuous living. It's genius is the catholic, maternal impulse to include and embrace all. Normally non-partisan, it welcomes those from all points on the political spectrum. It largely avoids the heated issues of the day: neither endorsing nor condemning contested issues. The pro-life movement is tolerated but not vigorously engaged by most clergy. The same applies to other movements: the Latin mass, charismatic prayer meetings, social activism and so forth. Contraception, pornography/masturbation, and LGBT concerns are not mentioned. To be sure, wholesome families and even holy lives flourish here, but there is a weakness. While it succeeds in offering a respite from the political battlefield, it tries to ignore the Culture War that exploded in 1965 and so leaves the young open to the attractions and temptations of the three competing liberalisms (described below) so that there is a powerful tendency to become NONEs or anemic, assimilated Catholics without heart or fire or backbone or a distinctive intelligence.

2.  Political Liberalism is a continuation of an earlier Catholic social heritage that supported labor unions, state assistance for the poor and neglected, and a strong government that regulates the market and distributes wealth and power in an equitable manner while rejecting socialism and allowing for free enterprise. It maintains a strong sense of social solidarity and political compassion. It largely lost the tradition of subsidiarity as it accepted the reality of large corporations which it contravailed with strong unions and an expansive federal government. Philosophically, this "solidarity" liberalism has less in common with cultural liberalism than does the more individualistic, economic liberalism of the right. But through a strange and striking quirk of history...and mostly because Catholic liberals were so feeble, inarticulate and indeed clueless in defense of their sexual and family ethos...plitical liberalism found an impure alliance with the cultural liberalism that came to dominate the DNC and elite culture after 1965.

3.  Cultural Liberalism is a celebration of the Sexual Revolution and specifically an embrace of contraception,  the disconnect of sexuality from child-bearing,  and so a rejection of St. Paul VI's historic Humanae Vitae. The embrace of sterile, non-uniting sexuality leads inexorably to co-habitation, abortion, gay sex, pornography, and easy divorce. By 1973 (Roe) Cultural Liberalism was firmly in charge of all elite institutions: entertainment, higher education, media, law, medicine. It enlisted the support of Catholic political liberals, feeble and confused about their own sexual ethos, against the Republican right. Catholic Cultural Liberals were already energized in the 1970s in their demands for women priests, approval of contraception, and a "new paradigm" for sex, family and gender. They were the resistance against John Paul and Benedict but have been given new hope and energy by Francis.

4.  Economic Liberalism is what we would call political conservatism: enthusiasm for free markets, low taxes, enterprise, and a minimally intrusive state. It can be associated with a strong nationalism and a hawkish attitude towards enemies such as communism and Islam extremism. Under Ronald Reagan, it experienced a surge of energy especially in so far as he was seen as partnering with John Paul in the downfall of Communism. In its purest form, it is currently in decline in the face of a surging Trumpism that accepts only portions of its ideology.

5.  Traditionalism is the concerted effort to strengthen or restore late-Tridentine (1950s) Catholicism in its clarity, confidence, and continuity. This faction, seen in the Latin Mass community in a pure form, was entirely marginalized in the aftermath of the Council but found encouragement for a while under Benedict. It seems to be strengthened by young people who know a chaotic, disorderly world and cherish the structure, certainty and safety of dogma, ritual, authority and tradition. An inordinate number of our younger priests come from this relatively small community. Some of the newer, flourishing religious orders also exemplify this movement. While small, its vitality, natality and love for priesthood and religious life lend it a hope going forward.

6.  Evangelical, Renewal Catholicism is the most vigorous, hopeful current in the Church. (Disclosure: I am an avid participant!) It is evangelical in its simple, profound focus upon the personal relationship with the (divine-human) person of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. All elements of tradition...liturgy, dogma, moral law, etc...find their meaning and purpose in Jesus and Jesus alone. This pathway finds expression in the lay renewal movements: cursillo, marriage encounter, charismatic renewal, Communion and Liberation, the Neo-catechumenal Way and others. It is communal in that it builds small, intimate groups for support, prayer and accountability. It carries no specific political ideology but is open to moderate expressions of political and economic liberalism as well as anarchism.  It is articulate and fervent in its advocacy of a revived Catholic ethos of sexuality, family and "state of life" (religious, ordained and married) as it draws from John Paul's Theology of the Body, tradition and contemporary scholarship and it fiercely resists Cultural Liberalism and the culture of abortion. It is energetically ecumenical as it partners with evangelical and pentecostal Churches and benefits from the riches of those traditions. It comfortably allies itself with Catholic Traditionalism but differs in focus and emphasis: for example, the flood of non-practicing Catholics in Latin America into the evangelical Churches would be perceived in a more positive manner by the evangelical Catholic. It found a profound, fruitful expression in the theology of John Paul and Benedict.

This list is hardly exhaustive and could be expanded. However, six smaller, significant movements deserve attention.

1.  Catholic Anarchism or Localism can be understood as a rejection of both dominant political ideologies: the Left's confidence in large government and the Right's trust in free, globalized markets. This group prefers small, local, concrete communities of support. A classical, radial expression is Dorothy Day's Catholic Worker. Current discussion largely revolves around Rod Dreher's Benedict Option. A philosophical rooting is provided by the Communion school of theology of David Schindler in DC.

2.  12-Step Spirituality is hidden, modest and anonymous but immensely fruitful and promising. It distances itself from any specific piety but is congenial with the most rigorous religions as well as the many who resent established religion and favor of a more vague 'spirituality.'

3.  Zen-Therapeutic Catholicism is a search for personal integrity and serenity by a relative retreat from the passions and conflicts of the political, theological and cultural wars in favor of non-traditional practices of meditation, natural wholeness, and private therapy. Typically, there is interest in yoga, Zen, alternate diets and exercise programs. This approach is not congenial with the enthusiasms of traditional and evangelical Catholicism as it prefers the relative solitude of "spirituality" to the bonds of "religion."  It is compatible with moderate forms of political and cultural liberalism, generic Catholicism and 12-step rehabilitation.

4.  Pro-life Movement. The most spiritually energized event since Martin Luther King, this has engaged a coalition of generic, traditional and evangelical Catholics, with others, in a life-and-death struggle with Cultural Liberalism. The Kavanaugh hearings highlighted: for better or worse, this cause is allied in the Republican Party with Economic Liberalism and its Trumpist distortion; there is a desperate, apocalyptic hysteria on the part of the Left; and slowly, incrementally the right of the unborn is prevailing. When eventually, the draconian Roe decision is overturned, this culture war (THE defining moral issue of our time) will decline in intensity and be taken up locally and legislatively, by each state and the binary (red/blue) structure of our nation will be all the more pronounced.

5.  Intimacy with the Poor. The towering heroes and great saints of our time all achieved close, concrete intimacy with the poor: St. Theresa of Calcutta, Dorothy Day, Catherine de Hueck Dougherty, Jean Vanier, and Kiko Arguello with his gypsies. The dramatic kenosis of these exceptional figures is a special grace not granted to all, but surely each of us can identify in some manner including prayer, alms and social advocacy.  It is classic Catholic holiness in practice. It is more desperately needed now as our society is more polarized between "winners" and "losers." The redeeming feature of our current papacy is his heartfelt call to move our of our comfort to be with those who suffer.

6. Eccentrics and Oddballs. Our litany would be incomplete without mention of the delightful, serendipitous and creative ones who defy and shatter typology. My daughter reminded me of Eve Tusnet,  who confidently idenifies as lesbian as she is fiercely faithful to orthodox Catholicism in her practice of celibacy. Ivan Illich, the hero of my young adulthood, was recklessly anarchistic in his rejection of bureaucracy, technology and modernity as he practiced a profound, ancient Catholic asceticism. My dear, dear friend John Rapinich was a 50s beatnik who converted to Catholicism in Mexico: he told Alan Ginsburg who flew into demonic rage; he told Jack Kerouac who hugged him and sadly said "I cannot go to Church with you; I am dirty." When I met him he was a fanatic pro-lifer and an obnoxiouly loud charismatic but also an artist, a mystic, and an intuitive, brilliant, widely-read auto-dictat.

I myself am a fervent evangelical-renewal Catholic with strong sympathies with tradition, the poor, anarchism, and the 12-steps. I have strong interest in psychology but none in the meditative traditions of the East. I have problems with political and economic liberalism but am fiercely against cultural liberalism.  My children, for the most part, have their own distinctive mixtures of evangelical and generic Catholicism with an aversion to Cultural Liberalism.

My two brothers are strong economic liberals, adverse to both political and cultural liberalisms, with sympathies for traditional and evangelical Catholicism. My mother is a profoundly pious, traditional in an open and non-nostalgic manner,  but fiercely liberal (political, Democratic) with the strongest working class aversion to economic liberalism and a puzzling tolerance for cultural liberalism. Five of my sisters mirror that strong Catholic social ethic with a fierce political liberalism that despises the economic form and anything that smacks of arrogance, privilege and indifference to the poor. Two of the five are Cultural Liberals. My sixth sister is different: she shares the social compassion even as she seamlessly merges the instincts of the generic, evangelical and traditional Catholic. We were a paradigmatic Catholic family of nine in the 1950s: Irish, liberal, Democrat. Today we reflect all the diversity, antagonisms, chaos and dynamisms of Catholicism! James Joyce said it: "Here comes everyone!"

Pope Francis is a complicated and puzzling case. He is traditional in many ways but despises any rigidity, moralism, exclusion, indifference, superiority, exclusion or indifference to the poor. He can be dismissive of dogma and law. He is certainly generic Catholic in his passion to include and invite, especially those who are away from the Church or at the margins of society. His enthusiasms seem to be with a political liberalism that works for open borders, climate control, wealth distribution and an end to the death penalty. He despises economic liberalism but seems to have allied himself with ecclesial cultural liberals in so far as they support his political agenda and his outreach to those distant from the Church.

These are, of course, ideal types and in real life each of us is a combination of at least two even as we oppose one or more.Any genuine Catholic is at least partially a generic, parish Catholic as we realize that our own preferences are particular and finite and the Mystery of Christ that binds us together vastly exceeds our own limited convictions and passions. In this unusual time of conflict and polarization, Truth demands that we wage a fierce culture war but Love requires that this occur with deepest mutual respect, empathy and admiration. The marvelous De Lubac spoke of "The Man of the Church" as one whose heart and intellect opens out infinitely to the Splendor of the Church in all its depth, dimensions, tensions, and Mystery. May we all break out of any confining models and be captivated by the Beauty, Truth and Goodness of the Church!