“To get elected in 1960, John F. Kennedy, a Catholic, was forced to tell the nation that he wouldn’t take orders from the pope. In 2016, no such separation will be needed. With a record number of Catholics seeking the presidency and the wildly popular Pope Francis visiting the nation this fall, many candidates—Catholic or not—are seeking ways to tie themselves to the mission and vision of this Argentinian pontiff.
The times have changed with a Catholic:
- vice president,
- six Catholic Supreme Court justices,
- a Catholic Speaker of the House, and
- a large number of Catholics in Congress, the golden age of Catholicism in American politics has arrived. This would have been unimaginable just a few decades ago. Kennedy was the first Catholic president. Irish-Catholic Al Smith likely lost the 1928 campaign because of his religion.
This ascendency of Catholics to the forefront of American politics has only been accelerated by the groundbreaking papacy of Francis. His September trip to the U.S. will be a major event of the 2016 presidential primaries. “That day, His Holiness will be the first pope in our history to address a joint session of Congress,” US speaker of the house John Boehner told reporters.
Politicians and candidates are likely scheming how they can best utilize the pontiff’s first trip to the U.S. to push forth their agendas. Francis’s trip isn’t about politics, but it would be naïve to ignore the political implications of a visit during which he is expected to lift up his recent encyclical letter on the care for God’s creation, the religious obligation to defend the dignity of immigrants, the poor, and the unborn, and the moral scandal of social inequality and of an economy that kills.”
“Since more than half of the 12 potential Catholic presidential candidates attended a Catholic high school, Catholic college or both, it’s likely that Catholic value was instilled during the educational process, he said. “
Protestants have tampered with and patronized popery; they have made compromises and concessions which papists themselves are surprised to see, and fail to understand. Men are closing their eyes to the real character of Romanism, and the dangers to be apprehended from her supremacy. The people need to be aroused to resist the advances of this most dangerous foe to civil and religious liberty. {GC88 566.1}