CliffsNotes of the Zeitgeist 146th Edition. What does the SAVE Act, Groypers, A coup in progress, Dominionism, Women staying barefoot and pregnant, and the Lumpenproletariat have in common? A movement, it's leaders, and it's really dim backers. More labels.

The Sign of Their Own Surrender: A misunderstood version of what was, doesn't get you to what ought to be.

This started off as a Blog Mirror on a post on a different blog.

I find the reference to Hillsdale particularly interesting here:

The Sign of Their Own Surrender

Why the Trump administration's new warning signs at the Smithsonian say more about conservative history's weakness than its strength.

I won't claim to have a lot of familiarity with Hillsdale, but what I do know, bothers me.  From my very little exposure to it, it seems to focus in part on a sort of rah rah Americanism, in so far as culture and history are concerned (and of course the two are highly related.

That sort of view of American history was once very common in general.  I'm old enough to have seen the very end of it when I was in grade school, and I'm also young enough to see it pass away.  To give a really bad example, as it doesn't involve school text or teaching at all, if you grew up in the 1970s, you could simultaneously see She Wore A Yellow Ribbon run as a not that old rerun on television, and find Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee in the bookstore.

Students had received a pretty narrowly focused history education prior to the 1970s  The United States was always right. There was that slavery thing but that was fixed.  The West had been won, not conquered, and even if it had been conquered, it was to the benefit of the conquered people.  

The Vietnam War really changed all that in a way that it had not been since the 1840s when the country had gone through the Mexican War.  Conservatives never got over that.

The oddity to it is that people in this cultural camp would rather be taught lies than the truth, which never serves anything, and they want children taught lies if it means they'll come out of school believing in an unvarnished version of American Exceptionalism.  The fact of the matter is, as this article points out, it won't.  In the age of the Internet, while many evils have been spread, you really can't just keep a lid on the past.  Pete Hegseth can restore Medals of Honor conveyed for action at Wounded Knee but you can't keep the facts, on both sides, from being known about what happened there.

People who are following Hillsdale on stuff like this think you can.  In reality, however, what happens is the miseducated student eventually hits university or just real life.  It only takes one crack in the dam to cause a flood, and soon they're off and questioning everything.

This is already happening in various spheres, I might note.  One of the most interesting example is in Christianity.  The entire Protestant Reformation was based on ignorance and its pretty provable.  Of all the Reformation era reformers, only Luther had some serious points, and he didn't intend to cause a separation from the Church at all but, rather, once he started rebelling, he couldn't stop.  At any rate, what this leaves Protestants with is that every single Protestant faith is founded on some sort of error, and often back with lies.  For those with enough savvy or interest, it's easy enough now to find that out.  What was the early Church like, they pose. Well, the Didache isn't too hard to find, nor are the works of the Apostolic Fathers.  Lots of very serious Protestants have done this, often trying to support their view that their brand of Protestantism reflects the early Church, only to find that it doesn't, and then convert to Apostolic Christianity.

The same is true of history.  The American Revolution was founded upon some amazing principals, but at the same time amongst the reason the colonists cited for rebelling was that the Crown was trying to halt westward expansion in recognition that the natives were also his subjects and that they were upset as the Crown hadn't forced the Church of England upon Quebec.  The Constitution is amazing but there was a giant acknowledged hypocritical compromise allowing Southern states partial credit for slaves for representation purposes.  The Civil War wasn't a glorious highly decorative contest between two equally valid points of views, but a rebellion against decency and humanity by Southern oligarchs.  We didn't enter World War Two to save humanity, but entered it only because were were attacked in spite of a real effort by FDR to get us into the war earlier, and once in it, we didn't defeat the Germans or Japanese single handedly by any means.  The British had more troops in the field in Europe until late 1944 and the Soviets always had many more in the field.  The Japanese regarded the war in China as the main event up until some point in 43 or 44.

It's just the attempt to whitewash American history, which by and large is admirable, that leads to something like Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States.  Indeed, that book came out while I was still in high school and within the last two years I was continually in a situation where a highly educated person who just discovered it was repeatedly engaging me with "did you know"?  

Locally there's been a movement in the Trump era to allow for "charter schools" here which are nothing other than private schools that come as close to being Protestant schools as conceivably possible.  I'm familiar with one and it proclaims that teaches an "American Classical Education" and that it is "a Hillsdale College Member School, a distinction that offers our school access to curriculum and training from the Hillsdale College K-12 Education Office.".  I've known at least two families that chose it as their own world view was in the MAGA camp.  The irony here is, as it is so often, that neither of the two families who are so concerned about their children receiving an "American Classical Education"  are living an "American Classical Life".

They probably just don't know that.

Which gets back to, well, this:

In order to get back to what you think needs to be restored, you need to know what actually was.  

I don't know about the rest of it, but history wise, the current variant of an "American Classical Education" ain't going to get you there.

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I was going to post on it individually, but the July 4, or thereabouts, editions of Catholic Answers had some fascinating discussions on Catholics and the United States.

In spite of what poorly catechized American Catholics may think, there's always been tension between being a Catholic and an American, and early on the country was outright hostile to Catholics.  As Catholics always have a worldview that's international in scope, as they view the Church as the Bride of Christ and serving all humanity, Catholics never have the really narrow world view that quite a few very far right wing Evangelical Protestants do.   The episodes are worth checking out, but the second of the two is really fascinating on how Catholicism can and is impacting the United States and American culture long term.

************************

I was also going to post on the recent excommunication of the SSPX and relate it to how far right conservatism has crawled out very far on a branch that's going to snap off.  I ended up shelving that, even though I'd started a pretty developed post on it.  I'll just complete my thoughts on it here.

Pope Leo XIV recently took an action which his immediate predecessors wouldn't.  He excommunicated the SSPX, the Society of Saint Pius X .  As this is sort of a confusing topic, we will refer you to this, which explains it.

This is a really serious action.  The Vatican didn't just address a few figures in the SSPX, but the whole SSPX.  If you are going to an SSPX Mass, you are excommunicated.

Frankly,. while the Pope doesn't consult me on such matters, he did what needed to be done here.  And there may be some who should take heed on on this, such as German bishops.  Pope Leo isn't messing around.   The SSPX is in schism which, in turn, introduces a certain element of irony.

The SSPX is not as large of group as the controversy might cause a person to suppose.  Part of the reason this briefly received so much attention is that the SSPX stream sort of flows into the lake of traditional Catholicism, and that's a much larger group.

The actual SSPX has approximately 1,500 formal, professed members globally, including about 750 priests. The SSPX claims around 600,000 worshippers worldwide, with an estimated 25,000 adherents in the United States, but that's a rough number as not everyone who enters the doors of an SSPX church actually quite appreciates what it is, and some are Trads flirting with the society.  The SSPX dates back to November 1, 1970 when  French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, who had served the Catholic Church as Apostolic Delegate for French-speaking Africa, Archbishop of Dakar, and Superior General of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit, a missionary order of priests, formed it in contravention to the Vatican.  In 1988 the organization went into schism the first time when it ordained Bishops without the authority of the Vatican.  The ordinations, as they were done by Bishops with valid holy orders, were illicit, but valid ordinations.  They were slowly brought back into the Church and the ordinations lifted, but now they've done it a second time.

Okay, so what's behind this all?

Archbishop Lefebvre, who was at Vatican II and seemingly approved of it at the time, was in the group of traditionalist Catholics that came to take exception to it, most specifically, in the case of the SSPX, ecumenicalism and the new form of the Mass.  Ecumenicalism is more of a European thing than an American one, so that one might baffle Americans a bit.  It was a big deal here for awhile, but as the Baptist and Baptist like churches are such a big deal here, as opposed to everywhere else, it's more or less gone away.  At the same time, in the US, the churches that were closest to Catholicism, the Anglican churches and the Lutheran churches, have been suffering a substantial decline and, as their churches "liberalized" and they began to self educate, they've started to cross over to Catholicism on their own.  

For that matter, the Catholic Church globally has become more conservative in recent decades. The Latin Mass, however, is another matter.  After Vatican II, and actually separate from it, the new form of the Mass came in and it came in with the "vernacular".

The Latin Mass, in its high version particularly, is beautiful, but frankly the new ordinary form of the Mass is as well, and, well, it has real advantages, the ability to understand it in your own language being a big one. Beyond that, however, the Church enormously expanded the set of readings with the new Ordinary Form from the much more limited set in the Latin Mass.  There are real historical reason for both the long lasting use of Latin, which had started off as the vernacular for the Roman Rite, and the limited number of readings, but neither of them held any longer by the mid 20th Century.

The real dispute, however, is over Vatican II's reforms or more particularly, "Dignitatis Humanae," which recognizes a civil right to religious freedom, and "Nostra Aetate," which encourages dialogue with non-Christian religions while recognizing elements of truth and holiness within them.   The SSPX feels that these went too far because (to reduce the argument unfairly) "there's no salvation outside the church".  The SSPX maintains that these documents are not magisterial whereas the Church maintains they are.

The ultimate irony here is that there's no question that all observant Catholics acknowledge a duty of obedience and that the Pope is the head of the Church.  As ultra traditionalist, the SSPX acknowledges this as well.  Given that, it's almost impossible to rationalize their taking the SSPX into schism, which is a grave sin.

There's probably a forlorn hope in the part of members of the SSPX that the Church will change its mind on the excommunication and, for that matter, on  "Dignitatis Humanae," and "Nostra Aetate".  It's not going to.  

While the SSPX may refuse to accept that, the entire event brings into focus why Pope Francis clamped down on the Latin Mass.  The Mass can still be said, and for that matter the Ordinary Form of the Mass can still be said in Latin, but to say the Traditional Latin Mass requires permission and that's largely been withdrawn.  

This was baffling to American Catholics when it happened, but the fact of the matter is that Traditionalist Catholics center around TLM, even if that's not what makes them traditionalist.  It's probably difficult to explain to outsiders, but it's one form of observance that's very obviously traditional.  Added to that, the persistent use of forms from the TLM in the Ordinary Form (kneeling when others are standing, not taking communion form Extraordinary Ministers, the wearing of manteas, all are visible form.  You could be, however, a traditionalist, and I'm sympathetic with traditionalist, without doing any of those things.  The line, I suppose, is when a type of devotion crosses into intolerance of a certain sort, or a rejection of something that's magisterial.  

I'd thought that Pope Leo might open the TLM back up, but now that this has occurred, I doubt it.  I think he's acting forcefully in keeping the sheep inside the gate for their own good.

Before "liberal" Catholics start rejoicing, however, I suspect certain "liberal" groups within the Church are next.  

A hint that Pope Leo may be redirecting cames nearly simultaneously.  The Pope has called for meeting of the Presidents of the world's Bishops' conferences to discuss Amoris laetitia, Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation on marriage and the family, and which was not popular with "conservatives". On June 30 Pope Leo announced that he is calling the presidents of the world’s bishops’ conferences to Rome in October for “synodal discernment” on how “to proclaim the Gospel to families today, in light of Amoris laetitia.”  My guess is that it's going to be scaled back.

Pope Leo has been left with the Synod on Synodality, started by Pope Francis, which is supposed to issue its final report in October, 2028. June 30, 2027 is the deadline for Dioceses and Eparchies to prepare their reports. An international Ecclesial Assembly is slated to occur in October 2028.  Some of the group reports have been released already, although that gives input on their thoughts and not really on where the Vatican may be headed.  Pope Francis had throughout this process wrestled with the German Bishops who, in the eyes of many, were headed towards schism.

Whether it comes in October, or in 2028, I suspect the German Bishops are going to get the same message the SSPX did and told to conform or be excommunicated.  The big difference, however, is that the laity who follow the SSPX are all volunteers, so now they have to determine if they follow their desires, or the Church.  My guess is that a fair number will follow the Church.  German Catholics, however are to the right of their Bishops by quite some measure and are much more conservative, and the Bishops themselves have been faced with the fact that their leadership has been plagued with declining attendance.  If Pope Leo excommunicates the Bishops, or some of them, a large number of their laity are not going to be that upset, and the Bishops for that part have no real ability to follow the example of Martin Luther and take entire congregations out of communion with Rome. Those days are over unless you have a willing laity, and they do not.

All of this means, accordingly that Pope Leo is acting, well, very Catholic, and very traditional Catholic at that.  For those who were hoping for a Pope that acted that way, it appears we now have one.

Speaking of Bishops, it was Pope St. John Paul II who required Catholic clergy to no longer hold elective office, as a small number did.  That didn't prevent association with politicians, however.  One figure who has done that a fair amount since Donald Trump's second term started has been Bishop Robert Barron, who was a highly popular Bishop with a blog.  Bishop Barron's close association with Donald Trump has made some of us quite nervous, as Trump definitely isn't a religious man.

There's a lot that occurs within the Trump administration that should worry Catholics.  A core membership of the Trump inner circle are American Evangelicals of the far right persuasion who don't believe Catholics are even Christians (and therefore share an interesting mindset with the SSPX which believes that pretty much all American Evangelicals are going to Hell).  

Trump's far right positions has naturally caused the rise of the far left in some quarters, notably in New York, which will be sending a Democratic Socialist to Congress, and in Colorado which appears slated to do so.  Democratic Socialists are not Communist and, indeed, in the revolutions of the 1910s through 1970s, Democratic Socialist would get the bullet in any country Communists took over.  Nonetheless, Donald Trump, who did not seem that gung ho about fighting communists in the 1960s when he actually literally could have, had he wanted to, is all about fighting the Reds now.

All of the above gets back to what should true conservatives and true traditionalist do?

In terms of the Church, as I noted above, I'm sympathetic with traditionalist and I feel badly for them about the general loss of the Latin Mass.  But I've noted that when there's a very orthodox priest and traditionalist Catholics in the Catholic population, it tends to show up best a devotionals in their behavior.  Frequent attendance at confession, the wearing of outwardly Catholic clothing, and often large families  Good for them. They serve, I'd note, as an influence on the larger Catholic community as a sobering and inspiring reminder of the core of the Faith.

But here's the thing.  The education of everyone, like it or not, at a younger age, is much better now than it was in the 1960s. For that matter, it's much better now than it was in the 1990s, or 2000s.  Vatican II is actually part of that. Following Vatican II the new Mass included many more readings than the TLM did, and no wonder.  Advances in printing and the like no longer meant that the Church was challenged with the transmission of the Gospel to a polyglot world the way it had once been.  If there are beautiful traditions to look back on, we have to acknowledge at the same time that restoring something means restoring what should benefit us, and that we can't go back, as much as we might want to, to an era when most people knew less and their world was smaller.

Put another way, modern Americans are not going back to what they think the 1950s were like in terms of education (what the 50s were actually like is another matter) and even Rod Dreher doesn't think we're going to build Benedictine walled cities any longer.  

That doesn't mean accepting the present either, particularly one in which Americans, civilly, are in the Age of Stupidity.

Do the right thing.

 

Today is, of course, Easter.

I saw a comment from a blog I've sort of followed where the poster fairly frequently remarks that he's a fallen away Catholic, although at the same time his world outlook is obviously Catholic.  Today he chose to explain why he fell away.

What's struck me over the years is that an awful lot of people who take that path fall away as they're self centered.  The post made that really clear.  Supposedly he couldn't reconcile the message of the Church and the direction of society. That's not a reason to fall away, that's the very reason we need to be saved.  Without Christ, we're just a bunch of self centered whiners out to destroy ourselves.

Religion is not magic, which some people seem to think it is. Christians discuss the problem of evil, but part of the reason that evil is in the world as we have free will and we like it.  I saw a comment from a Monk once reflecting, and he meant it, that he asked the question "God, why do you law injustice in the world?" and actually got a reply, that being "Why do you?"

We know what's wrong and right and frequently just choose what's wrong.  The big Mega Churches will be packed today with "Christians" who are on multiple divorces and remarriages, or just living in sin, even though we all know that's wrong.  For that matter, Catholic churches will be packed today with those who only make it to Mass twice a year.

That's not to be lamented.  It's a sign of hope.  We know what's wrong.  We're often just to lazy and accommodating to do what's right.

Today is a good day to start doing what's right, including comporting our actual conduct to God and the the nature God created.

Straying from this a bit, I'd note how overarching this really is.  While I can't get into details very much, recently I've been dealing with a massive inter personal fight between two people I've known for a long time. Both are flat out wrong.

One of them is now upset with somebody that he once deeply loved as that person harshly criticized him.  Frankly, the nature of the criticism was brutal.  I've been criticized by the same person brutally myself, but I haven't lived a particularly sheltered life so I learned to just disregard it and the person eventually wondered on.  This person, however, hero worshipped the person who turned on him.

Additionally, there's an element of financial stress going on in there somewhere and while the person in question regards themselves as a very devout Christian, it's really clear that their concept of Christianity involves a deep love of the Church and its sacraments, but not so much some of its lessons, including the one that holds love of money is the root of all sin.

It's a classic failing.

The other person is an archetypical Baby Boomer.  For some reason a lot of Boomers just can't let go.  Handed everything early on, they really became the "Me" generation of the 70s.  This person really only has their work left, as his marriage fell apart and for the classic reasons, and, well, I won't go into it.  At some point if you were the center of all of your major life choices, however, all you have left, is you, and that isn't much.

Our current President, and indeed our last, both epitomized that Boomer view in some ways.  Trump has lived the Playboy lifestyle and his soul is imperiled.  He's also endangering us all, and all because to him, it's all about him.

Christ came to save humanity, but we're supposed to participate in that.  The road is fairly clear.  We're to try to take the narrow one.  Americans seemingly think that doesn't apply to them, and wonder why they're miserable.

Χριστὸς ἀνέστη!

Ἀληθῶς ἀνέστη!

Do the right thing. 

Happy Shrove Tuesday, Pancake Day, Mardi Gras, Carnival, Fastnachtsdienstag.

Holy Ghost in Denver.  While you cannot see it in this photograph, opposite this wall is a row of confessionals.  Confessions are heard during Mass.

Shrove Tuesday.

Shrove derives from "shrive", which means to give absolution. So, while I don't know how many parishes offer confession the day prior to Ash Wednesday, that's what it refers to.

It's also called Shrovetide, the evening before the Shrove, which makes more sense, really, reflecting the penitential nature of Lent.

Pancake Day.

It's also Pancake Day in England and strongly English countries, for the custom of eating pancakes on this day.  Pancakes use a fair amount of fat in them and this was part of the Lenten practice of abstaining from fat during Lent.  It's also therefore one of the odd little ways where England's history as a once deeply Catholic nation is retained.

In Ireland the day is known as Máirt Inide, from the Latin initium (Jejūniī), "beginning of Lent".  It's still associated heavily with pancakes.  That's sort of indicative of Ireland's history of being heavily impacted by the English.

Of some interest here, potentially, the Anglican Church retains confession, but not the requirement that its members annual confess, like Catholics have.  Catholicism is now outstripping Anglicanism in actual practice in the UK.  It's often noted that Catholicism has declined in Ireland, a prediction that the Church made at the time of the Anglo Irish War when it did not want to become involved in the Irish government and was forced to against its will, but the Irish remain very heavily Catholic.

Mardi Gras in New Orleans in 1937.

Mardi Gras.

Of course, it's also Mardi Gras, or "Fat Tuesday", from the custom at one time of trying to use up all the fats in the house on this day, in French speaking countries. Contrary to American belief, Mardi Gras is in fact not unique to New Orleans but occurs everywhere that French speaking people are located.

Knights of Revelry parade down Royal Street in Mobile during the 2010 Mardi Gras season, By Carol M. Highsmith - This image is available from the United States Library of Congress's Prints and Photographs division under the digital ID highsm.05396.This tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11990882

American Mardi Gras, or rather American New Orleans Mardi Gras, has become heavily Americanized which means, like all American holidays, it's associated with booze.  It is always a big party wherever it occurs, but the weird boozy topless event is an American thing, not a real French thing or culturally French.

Carnival in Rome, 1650.

Carnival and Fastnachtsdienstag

Carnival, from the Medieval Latin carne vale, "farewell meat",  is the same holiday in other Romance Language speaking countries.  The same sort of linguistic intent is found in the German name for the day, Fastnachtsdienstag.  The latter reflects the fact that European Lutherans observe Lent, but in the same fashion as the Anglicans.  It's not associated with the same Canon Law that it is with Catholics, but the observance remains.

We've actually touched on all of this, fwiw, before.

All of these days reflected a period when the Lenten fast was much more severe than it currently is.  People were using up fats as they wouldn't keep for the forty days of Lent.  Now, in the Latin Rite, there's no restriction on using fats at all, the obligation to fast is just on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, when the obligation to abstain from meat also exist, during Lent.  All the Friday's of Lent are meatless for Catholics.

In the Eastern Rite of the Catholic Church the fasting rules are much more strict.  Starting on Pure Monday, yesterday,   As Catholic News Service explains it:

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — In the eyes of Latin-rite Catholics, the extent of Eastern Catholics’ Lenten fasting and abstinence is perceived as particularly strict.

The traditional Byzantine fast for Great Lent includes one meal a day from Monday to Friday, and abstinence from all animal products, including meat, fish with backbones, dairy products and eggs, as well as oil and wine for the entire period of Lent. Shellfish are permitted.

Fasting and abstinence are maintained on Saturdays, Sundays and on the eve of special feast days, although loosened to permit the use of oil and wine. On important feast days, such as the Annunciation and Palm Sunday, fish may be eaten.

“Oil and wine were restricted because, in the past, they were stored in animal skin,” explained Mother Theodora, the “hegumena” or abbess of the Byzantine Catholic Christ the Bridegroom Monastery in Burton, Ohio. “Though this is no longer the case, the tradition continues.”

There are varying degrees of fasting, from stricter to more lenient, depending on one’s work and state of health. Monks and nuns will often submit to the most strict fasting.

Holy Week is not considered part of Great Lent but “an additional, more intense time of fasting and prayer,” said Mother Theodora.

However, Eastern Catholics don’t plunge into fasting and abstinence cold turkey. “Meatfare” and “Cheesefare” weeks help them enter into the Great Fast gradually. By Meatfare Sunday, one week before the start of Lent, Eastern Catholics will have emptied their refrigerators and pantries of meat products. By Cheesefare Sunday, they will have cleared out all of their egg and dairy products, ready to enter into the Great Fast that evening, after Forgiveness Vespers.

In an effort to keep Eastern Christians faithful, yet creative, in the kitchen, cookbooks with fast-friendly recipes have been published.

By Laura Ieraci, Catholic News Service.  The rules for the Eastern Orthodox are similar, although I'm never certain of the degree to which the Orthodox are required to observe them.  Orthodox churches using the "Old Calendar" start Lent this year on February 23.

With all this, Catholics in the US enter Annual Question Time and the time of slightly difficult observances, the latter taking note of the fact that unlike some past times in the country, we're not likely to get killed or anything, so its nothing like it used to be.  Rather, as the US is not only heavily Protestant, but Puritan, Lenten practices baffle non Catholics.

Puritans disapproved of pretty much everything, including observing Christmas as a special day, so Lent was way beyond the Pale for them.  English culture, on the other hand, loved sports, so when the English dumped the Calvinist, which they did as soon as they could, their love of sports came roaring back. American culture has been impacted by English culture in every way, so Americans love sports but don't understand the Apostolic Faiths very well, in many instances, and in fact sometimes fail to realize that their own branches of Christianity are fairly recent innovations not reflecting the original Apostolic faith.

So for Lent, including its beginning, and its end in Holy Week, Americans just don't really have any observations, other than using Mardi Gras, like St. Patrick's Day, as an excuse to drink.  They way it shows up for Catholics, however, is that things that are fairly easy to observe in Catholic countries, like Holy Week or Ash Wednesday, are a lot tougher to do in the US, and of course, you'll be getting a lot of questions if you are Catholic about "why do you do that" and "why can't you . . .".

Churches of the West: Claiming the mantle of Christ in politics. Addressing politicians in desperate times, part 3.

Churches of the West: Claiming the mantle of Christ in politics. Address...: Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus. Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora p...

Claiming the mantle of Christ in politics. Addressing politicians in desperate times, part 2.

Ave Maria, gratia plena,

Dominus tecum.

Benedicta tu in mulieribus,

et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus.

Sancta Maria, Mater Dei,

ora pro nobis peccatoribus,

nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.

This series was kicked off on a companion blog, and followed up upon in another one that has a more limited focus.  That's why we're posting this one here.  I.e., we acknowledge that questions that are important to hunters, fishermen, campers, etc., may not be to the sincerely religious.*

I fear, gentle reader, that this will have a rather long winded introduction, but there's no real way to avoid that.

More than any other era in my lifetime, religion is in the public sphere.  In Wyoming, the least religious state in the country, decades went by in which politicians never openly stated anything about their faith.  I knew very sincere Catholic politicians who never mentioned that in a race, or while in office.¹ The same is true of two deeply Mormon politicians I know.  If you knew them, you knew that they were Mormons, but they never mentioned it even once in their campaigns.

The same was true of Congressional candidates.  There were longserving Congressmen from Wyoming whom I could not tell you anything about their religions.  I assume that they were Christians, but it's just an assumption. I'm sure I could look it up, but it's not something you automatically knew.

Well, those days are over, and they're over because radical Calvinists of the New Apostolic Reformation are waging a holy war on American culture, and by extension, effectively on other faiths, including the main of the  Christian faith.  They're franky fairly open about it.  

As part of this, a lot of politicians now wrap themselves in the mantle or religion, claiming Christ and Christianity, and directly interjecting questions of faith and morals into their politics.  Prime examples today are people like Mike Johnson, who is some sort of Evangelical Christian and who has the Christian Nationalist Pinetree Flag outside of his office.² The election of Donald Trump brought to the forefront Christian Nationalist and National Conservatives, movements that were around before Trump but who see Trump as their once in a millenium opportunity.  

In that group, moreover, there are two distinct camps.  One one hand, you have National Conservatives, a movement defined by people like Patrick Dineen and Rod Dreher and who are often Apostolic Christians looking back basically to the 19th Century.  They distrust democracy entirely, and therefore espouse a sort of democracy that can only exist within cultural guiderails.  Adherents to their views who are in the Administration or who have close influences on it are J. D. Vance and Kevin Roberts.³ 

These people are influential, but not as much as the second group.

The second group are radical Evangelicals who are often part of the New Apostolic Reformation.  They really only barely tolerate Apostolic Christians and some of them, who are pretty ignorant as a rule on Church history and the early history of the Church, do not regard Apostolic Christians, particularly Catholics, as Christians at all.  The standard bearer for people of this mindset was Charlie Kirk, although he seemed to have been evolving steadily towards Apostolic Christianity.  Paula White, whom most Apostolic Christians and Mainline Protestants would fine to be a little weird, is the "faith advisor" from this camp who is very close to the Trump Administration.  Franklin Graham seems to be in this circle as well.⁴

The NAR people believe in a theology in which the United States sort of has a status roughly analogous to Israel in the Old Testament.  That is, they believe the US has a Devine mission.  They're serious about it, and they see the country as a Calvinist country, which is distinctly different from seeing it as a Christian country.  The U.S. is definitely a Protestant Country, even though many Americans don't' realize that, and Puritanism still influences it heavily.  Teh NAR people would bring Puritanism roaring back.

Christianity has had splits and different views right from the onset.  There were early heracies, of course, but there were also local expressions of Catholicism that gave rise to different rights.  World events separated the churches from each other, and some of the divisions meant that distant branches of the Church spent long periods in isolation from other Christians.  I note that to counter what is so often generally supposed, that being that Christianity was completely uniform at first.  That was never true.  Christians could certainly recognize each other, and even when long separated Churches came back into exposure with the main they often instantly recognized that they were in contact with other Apostolic Christians, but there were local different.  Such differences gave rise to the Great Schism and then, more radically, to the Reformation.

I don't note all of this to try to set out a history of the Church, but to further note here a set of additional divides.

The Catholic Church has divides between orthodox, traditional, radically traditional, and liberal, with the latter camp really falling rapidly away.  We won't deal much with the liberal here, as its basically a Baby Boom thing and a product of a misunderstanding of Vatican II.  Over time, orthodox thinking has really returned to the Church, to the relief of almost all, and presently orthodoxy is the mainstream of the Catholic demographic, with liberalism sort of an old Priest and old Bishop hold out sort of thing.  Orthodox Catholics take their Faith seriously, and look inward at the Church, rather than expect all that much of society as rule.  Trads take that one step further, reincorporating some of the things that disappeared with the "spirt of Vatican II".  Rad Trads go even further than that, with hostility towards the modern Church.

Politically, sincere Catholics are hard to peg down.  Even the Trump administration gives us a glimpse of that.  I doubt that Rubio joins Vance for Mass, even though they both go each Sunday and Holy Days.  Anyhow, Catholics that aren't protestantized, and many are protestantized, tend towards the middle of things politically, being very conservative on most social issues involving life or gender, but potentially all over the map on other issues, save for one thing. They can't be "America First" or any nation first on anything.  They hold Christ first and everything else second, some things a distant second.  There's no such thing, for educated Catholics, as an "American church".  In that, they hold the same view as St. Thomas More as expressed in his last words before his martyrdom:

I die the king's good servant, but God's first.

St. Thomas More before his execution on July 6, 1535.

The Orthodox are much the same, save for the fact that there really aren't "liberal" Orthodox, although there certainly are unobservant ones due to a loose understanding of mortal sin in Orthodoxy. The interesting thing here is that the Orthodox, who are very traditional on things, have been experiencing an unanticipated influx into their ranks which is changing the Orthodox Churches.  

For decades, Orthodox Churches were ethnic in a way that Catholic Churches could not be.  Now, many people will note that somebody was "Polish Catholic" or "Irish Catholic", and indeed that meant and means something.  But at the time at which such phrases meant the most, it was also the case that the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church said its Masses in Latin, and that meant that the Church was always very much International in nature.  Any Catholic Church anywhere, no matter how ethnic its parishioners may have been, always had members who were converts or members of other ethnicities, in the United States as well as elsewhere, and CAtholics were always conscience of that.  Orthodox Churches, however, were often extremely ethnic.

The Eastern Rites of the Catholic Church and the Orthodox have, however, seen quite the influx of others in recent decades.  In the case of the Eastern Rites of the Catholic Church, the influx started off with Trad Catholics who were seeking a traditional service. That may have continued on, but frankly at the present time the entire Latin Rite is much more traditional than it was even fifteen years ago.  Put another way, if you are seeking the traditional in the Latin Rite, it's not very hard to find it.⁵. 

But some Protestants who are fleeing their mainline Protestant Churches as those churches decline, and moreover as they've embraced liberalism, can't bring themselves to go all the way across the Tiber.  Many, many do, but some do not.  Some of those swim the metaphorical Bosphorus instead.

As they've done that they've brought a much needed widening to the Orthodox Churches, although not always in a way that ethnic parishioners have always welcomed.  Churches that were Greek Orthodox or Russian Orthodox have started to become American Orthodox, both figurately and early literally.

Holy Apostles Orthodox Christian Church, Cheyenne Wyoming.

In Protestantism, we see some similar things going on.

In the Mainline Protestant Churches we've seen some that have gravitated towards liberalism, and empty pews.  Usually in the same denomination there's a pull away back toward their Catholic origin.  One of the most Catholic wedding homilies I've ever heard, for example, was delivered by a Lutheran pastor.  It was blisteringly orthodox. Entire groups of the Anglican Communion had waded into the middle of the Tiber and waded there.

As that has happened, liberal branches of Mainline Protestant Churches have simply started to die.  Indeed, the entire Protestant Reformation is pretty clearly in its death throes.  The Catholic Church in much of the ground captured by rebels of the Reformation is gaining ground, including in the United States and United Kingdom.  In the same territory, the churches of the Reformation are dying away.

As that happens, however, the radical Reformation churches, those that were the reformation of the Reformation, have held on in their own unique ways.  In some instances, they've done so through having a very lightweight adherence to Christ's message.  Entire branches of Protestantism don't take seriously much of Christ's message on multiple things, the sanctity of marriage, and its enduring nature, in particular.  Most Protestant churches have come around to being completely comfortable with divorce and remarriage, and even multiple mirages, as well as birth control and living together outside of marriage.  

While that's happened, on the far political right we now have a revival of hardcore Calvinism, the sort of Calvinism that's really intolerant of anything else.  And that's the branch of Protestantism that has the most influence on the Second Trump administration.  It's basically at war with American culture.

A Pastor's Warning: We're Not in a Civil War, But a Christian Nationalist Holy War—And They Must Not Win.

What those who are religious, or who take religion seriously must do, or even those who simply take the topic seriously must do, is to ask candidates a series of questions, or ask yourself a series.  We'll start off, after this very long introduction, with those.

1.  Does a candidate who clothes himself in the mantle of religion, in any fashion, live according to the tenants of the religion?

We are seeing a lot of claims by politicians now days that they are religious, or that perhaps some other candidate is.  But what's the evidence for this?

The prime example is frankly Donald Trump. Claims that he is a Godly man are simply absurd.  The claims that he's some sort of Cyrus the Great are less absurd, but still absurd.  He's a genuinely bad man.

You really can't practice serial polygamy and claim that you are some kind of adherent Christian. And while all things are possible with God, having extreme wealth and being focused on it likewise make a person quite unlikely to be any sort of sincere Christian.

I'd start in part with Trump here, not because Trump claims to be a sincere Christian, although he comes pretty close, but because of those who seek to wrap him in the mantle of Christianity.  It's simply not credible, and people who assert that seriously shouldn't be taken seriously.  In contrast, thsoe who take a more cynical view, that they're advancing some kind of Christianity through an irreligious man, are more credible.

This question is a very sincere one.  We have, right now, J. D. Vance, a Catholic, on record supporting IFV, which is condemned by the Church.  How can he do that?  And  he's certainly not the only Catholic politicians who has strayed massively from the tenants of the Faith.

But its not just Catholic politicians.  Plenty of Protestant politicians right now claim to be deeply religious, but are they?  If they are opently not living according to the tenants of their Faith, what is the reason?

2. What religion are they?

This may sound like an odd one, but right now there's a lot of politicians who cite "faith", or claim a relationship with God, or who broadly claim to be Christian, without saying what they really are.  If they make the open claim they need to be asked this question.

The reason is that there are significant differences in the world outlook of various Christian religions.  The Wyoming Freedom Caucus, for example, seems to be heavily influenced by NAR type views, which most Christians are not, and which most do not support.

What about Trump, again.  He was raised a Presbyterian but has disavowed that, interestingly, as an adult.  What is he?

On this, the answer "Christian" doesn't cut it except in the case of the non observant member of the American Civil Religion, who are just sort of vaguely aware that most people in the US are Christians and they are too.

3. Do they actually attend a Church?

There are politicians who might never attend a church. We don't know, for example, if Tammy Duckworth does.⁶ But we also know that Duckworth does not make her religion an issue.  Likewise, we mentioned the other day that one of conservative members of the legislature is Episcopalians, but he doesn't mention religion at all on his legislative biography.

It is not, we'd note, that we're encouraging people to be irreligious. Quite the contrary. But if a person makes being a "Christian" a banner in their campaign, what kind of Christianity do they espouse? The same would be true for any other religions. The new mayor of New York, for example, is a Muslim, but clearly of the branch of Islam, now rare in the Middle East, that was of the progressive tolerant variety.⁷

The long and the short of this is ,that if politician claim to be a devout member of "Fill In Church" here, but doesn't go, well, that says all you need to know about him.⁸

4. Do they adhere to the tenants of their religion?

This is a big one, and you are entitled to ask.

It's one thing for a person to say "I'm a ____________". But all religions  have the concept of a greater entity.  If a person claims, for example, to be a Muslim but slams down a fifth of Jim Beam every night, well. . . 

That is, of course, a bad example. But to give more concrete ones Joe Biden was often cited as a Catholic, but supported the seas of blood that abortion results in, as well as the biological abomination of transgenderism.  This might make more sense (well actually it wouldn't) if you did not claim to be part of a religion that condemns them, but if you do, it shows that you have weak moral character that you may betray for convenience.

Lest it seems like we are endorsing Republicans by default, Donald Trump, who claims sorme loose association with Christianity, is a moral sewer.

Vance has claimed Catholicism, but backs IVF, which the Church condemns.

But what about your local politician?  They may be ramrod straight claiming that they are a member of _______________, but do they live their lives that way? If they claim a faith, you have the right to ask, and demand that they do.  Indeed, part of the problem with modern politics is that politicians are allowed to claim a religion on a tribal, but not practice basis.

5. Have they changed religions?

Religious conversions can be sincere or insincere.  In contemporary American conversions for convenience are less common than they once were, but they still exist.

Something to consider here is that conversion from no religion into a religion, and then practicing it, indicates sincerity.  Also, conversion into a religion that carries they byproduct of contempt for conversion does as well.

For this reason, while I have lots of problems with J. D. Vance, I sincerely credit his conversion into Catholicism.  This isn't something that you do lightly, and it isn't like just showing up at a service.    To be a Catholic is to endure contempt.

I'll also note that as a Catholic, while I feel that joining a Protestant faith if you are a baptized Catholic endangers your soul, I'll credit sincerity with some who have done so.  Mike Pence, who was a baptized Catholic is sich an example. While I feel that his faith journey has been deluded, and I hoep for his return, I believe he's sincere.

On the other hand, a conversion that was one of convenience shows a defect in moral character.  Without naming names, I can cite one local politicians who had a Catholic education and marriage, and then became a Presbyterian when a marriage situation suited that.  He's probably about as sincere Presbyterian as he was a Catholic, but that's the point.  A person whose attachment to the existential is so thin has no attachment to anything that matters at all, as is exemplified by the person I mentioned, who went from middle of the road conservative, to conservative, to MAGA, all with a stern look as if he was paying any attention at all.

5.  Why are they citing their religion?

If they are, why?

There's only two possibilities. Either they think it really matters, or they think it matters to you. 

That's it.

If they think it matters to you, they're claiming a tribal affiliation, not a moral one, and that should be problematic.

6. Do they think that: 1) this is a Christian nation and 2) it should be a theocracy?

The answer matters.

This is a Christian nation.  People who say otherwise are fooling themselves.  More than that, this ia a Puritan nation, although that's dying before our eyes.⁹   Accepting one, without the other, is significant.

Truth be known, this country stopped being 100% Puritan about a week after the Plymouth Rock landing, but it's been a long haul.  It wasn't until the Kennedy election that Catholic's really became part of the country.  Things continue to evolve.

This being the case, the weltanchaung of the NAR is fundamentally adverse to American culture and, oddly enough, the American Civil Religion.  We're not going back, and we're not going back as the NAR is fundamentally wrong.  

We're headed in a new direction. That direction can be conservative, but the NAR doesn't reflectd Christian reality, or the message of Christ. 

7. Does the candidate advocate or excuse bad things?

It's one thing to be irreligious and advocate a bad thing.  It's another to be a Christian.

Invading countries and killing people outside of self dense if deeply immoral. 

Killing people, including the unborn, is gravely wrong.

I'd argue avoiding the natural result of human intercourse is as well.

Theft, including of lands, is immoral

Avaracie is immoral.

Right makes might has been a proven failure since day one. Our current President seems to have adopted it. Does your candidate"

8. Does their embrace of religion make you 100% comfortable?

This would depend upon the faith, of course, but basically if you are sitting behind the candidate at Mass and wondering, 'how can he?", well, ask him?

Footnotes

*Although we would argue that if you are not out enjoying and experiencing God's creation in nature, in some fashion, you should be.

1.  Highly successful sheep rancher and politician Patrick J. Sullivan, who was Irish born, and a Catholic in Natrona County, supposedly tried to keep his distance from being too publicly Catholic, although that would have been due to the outright hostility to Catholicism in the first half of the 20th Century.  He served one year, more or less, as Wyoming's U.S. Senator upon the death of Francis E. Warren.

The unrelated Gov. Mike Sullivan is a devout Catholic who was ambassador to Ireland under Bill Clinton.  While his Irish heritage was very well known, pretty much nothing was every said about it while he was in office.

2.  Johnson provides an interesting example of what we're discussing here, in that he's from Louisiana.  Louisianans will often sort of wrap themselves around a faux Cajun personality to outsiders, but there are really five cultures that are basically naive to the state, Cajun, Creole, Black Creole and Southern White.  Johnson is Southern White.  This is quite significant in that Cajuns are descendants of Acadians transported there and have a strong French culture, including within it Catholicism.  Creole's and Black Creole's are  a"mixed" ethnicity in Louisiana, descendants of Cajuns, Spanish colonist, and African slaves.  They too have a culture that's heavily impacted by the French, through the Cajuns, but they are not Cajuns.  They are also often Catholic.  The third group, Deep South Whites, are descendants of English and Scottish colonist in the Southeast, and they're uniformly Protestant, and reflect the post Civil War shift from the Episcopal Church toward the Baptist Church and related Evangelical Christian faiths.

I've only known three Louisianans, and of them, only two fairly well.  Two of them were Creole, and one of them was a native French speaker.  One was a Cajun and could speak French, and interestingly was a Catholic with a French Jewish background.

As a total aside, these culture are really distinct and have distinct music and even distinct style of dancing.  

3. Vance wrote the forward to Robert's book  Dawn's Early Light: Taking Back Washington to Save America. Vance and Roberts are both Catholic.

So, of course, is Marco Rubio, who is a fairly devout Catholic  But he's not a National Conservative.

4.  I find White to be a little weird, and I have questions about how Christian she really is, given her personal life.  I can't stand Graham, and couldn't stand his father either, for reasons I really can't define.

I've been this way, I'll note, since I was a child.  One are where I really differ from my father, who grew up without television of course, is that I, who did, basically will never turn a television on until the evening and I never watch TV during the day.  Never.  My father pretty much turned the TV on as soon as he was in the house.  It was just sort of background noise, really.  As there were only three television channels locally when I was a kid, that means he'd sometimes turn hte TV on and there'd be some Billy Graham revival, and he'd just leave it on.  I couldn't stand Billy Graham and I didn't like him being on, even though I probably was only ten years old or younger at the time.

5.  Thirty years ago I probably could have counted the women I'd see at Mass wearing a mantilla with one hand and have fingers to spare.  Now it's becoming common, and even with preteen girls.  There have been restrictions on the Traditional Latin Mass, but most typical Catholic Masses now would rival any High Church service that Episcopalians might choose to hold.

6. She was raised a Baptist, but is intensely private about her religious beliefs.

7. The world's most oppressed religion, Judaism, seems uniquely exempt from this in some ways.  Secular Jews get tarred with the same brush as highly religious ones, while on the flip side, at least in contemporary America, opposing somebody simply because they are Jewish remains intolerable. Having said that, the prejudices that have resurfaced under the Trump Administration now make this statement suspect, as openly hating Jews because heya re Jews has returned (openly hating Catholics because they are Catholic will not be far behind).  

I'll also note that I've heard open contempt for the Mayor of New York, simply because he's Muslim. But then, at the same time, at least two members of Congress have received open contempt for the same thing, with one receiving contempt from Donald Trump seemingly because she's a black African.

8. I'll note that Mike Johnson, who at one time compared himself to a Biblical Patriarch, is on record as being too busy to alway attend church.

This is baloney. I've, to my regret, often worked seven days a week, but I make Mass.  I'd gladly exchange my role with Mike's.

9. Wihtin a generation, for multiple reasons, this will be a Catholic country.

Prior editions:

Questions hunters, fishermen, and public lands users need to ask political candidates. Addressing politicians in desperate times, part 2.

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Addressing politicians in desperate times. A series.

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Religion, J.D. and Usha Vance.

Because this blog is steadfastly horrified by Donald Trump and his administration, it'd be easy to assume that it's run by a rampaging leftist.  

It isn't.  

Indeed, if you follow the thread you'll see where we come out on the right a fair amount, which in our view doesn't mean supporting fascism.  I'm a conservative, not a right wing populist.

We note this, as there's been a flap over J. D. Vance's comments about hoping that his wife, Usha, converts to Catholicism, as if that's somehow inappropriate.

It isn't, and any sincere Catholic with a non Catholic spouse, which includes me, hopes for that.

Vance wasn't a political figure that I followed at all until he started to campaign for the VP slot next to Donald Trump.  Frankly, I found and still find his political migration to Trumpian authoritarianism appalling.  Anyhow, I knew that he was a convert to Catholicism, but I wasn't really aware of how recent of convert he is.  Vance grew up in Evangelical Protestantism, which isn't surprising given his "hillbilly" background, and at least according to an interview I heard of him some time ago, his influential grandmother was of the non churched Southern type of Christian view.  Vance himself was an atheist by the time he went to college   By 2014, the time of his marriage, he had resumed being a non denominational Protestant Christian but he was evolving towards Catholicism by 2016.  He converted to the Faith in 2019.

Vance's path is a lot more common than people suppose.  Vance is an intelligent man, my numerous political disagreements with him notwithstanding, and he became an atheist in ignorance.  The more educated he became, the more Christian he became, and exhibiting Cardinal Newman's Rule, that lead him ultimately to Catholicism somewhat against his own will, much like C. S. Lewis became a High Church Anglican after having been an atheist, or like G. K. Chesterton argued himself into the Faith.

Vance's path to Catholicism coincided his increasing rightward political draft and his barely camouflaged transformation into a Illiberal Democrat.  He's trod the same path in that regard ad Rod Dreher, whom is a friend of his (and who is pretending, frankly, to be Orthodox).  There's numerous other intellectuals on the right at this time who likewise share that distinction, such as J. R. Reno and Patrick Dineen, and amongst them are notable converts like Eva Vlaardingerbroek.  Indeed, there's a notable movement amongst conservatives from Lutheran nations in this direction, even as a non political boom in conversions occurs in various areas in Europe.  For cradle Catholics the association with illiberal democracy can be disturbing, and even result in outright internecine fights, but it is going on.  We here will note, as we have before, that becoming politically conservative does not mean having to become a populist let alone an illiberal democrat.

Anyhow, one of the things about Catholicism is this.  We are not religious pluralist.  If Vance did not wish for his wife to become Catholic, he'd be a very bad Catholic.

Usha Vance is a Hindu.

Catholics believe extra Ecclesiam nulla salus.  There is no salvation outside the church.

Now that's a doctrine that Catholics don't emphasize much, and often real diehard radtrad Catholics don't understand.  It isn't the case that Catholics believe that only Catholics can go to Heaven.  For that matter, Catholics are very far from any kind of "once saved always saved" theology and accept that a lot of Catholics might very well go to Hell.  Rather, Catholics believe, as the Catechism states it:

"Outside the Church there is no salvation"

846 How are we to understand this affirmation, often repeated by the Church Fathers? Re-formulated positively, it means that all salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body:

Basing itself on Scripture and Tradition, the Council teaches that the Church, a pilgrim now on earth, is necessary for salvation: the one Christ is the mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body which is the Church. He himself explicitly asserted the necessity of faith and Baptism, and thereby affirmed at the same time the necessity of the Church which men enter through Baptism as through a door. Hence they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or to remain in it.

847 This affirmation is not aimed at those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Christ and his Church:

Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience - those too may achieve eternal salvation.

848 "Although in ways known to himself God can lead those who, through no fault of their own, are ignorant of the Gospel, to that faith without which it is impossible to please him, the Church still has the obligation and also the sacred right to evangelize all men."

Catechism of the Catholic Church. 

Vance can of course hope, and should hope, that Usha converts, as her chances of salvation are heightened.  Does that mean that if she doesn't, she's damned to Hell?  Well, we can't know the state of anyone's soul, but the fact that she hasn't would suggest that she's not consciously rejecting Christianity, but rather hasn't overcome something.

Vance himself should be worried about the state of his soul. Catholics reject IVF, which he's been backing, and lying on serious matters is a serious sin, which Vance has been doing at an epic level.

At any rate, Vance isn't doing the wrong thing by hoping his wife becomes Catholic.  He's completely correct to wish for that, including openly.

This is, however, where the liberal side of American culture, and even the American Civil Religion, and frankly the Evangelical Christians, all come into conflict with Catholics.

At some point in American history and in American culture, and it goes back pretty far it became really common for people to be sort of religious relativist.  "It doesn't matter what religion you are, as long as you are a good person."  Well, it does in fact matter what religion you are, and of course you should be a good person no matter what religion you are.

Catholicism was an oppressed religion in the United State up until basically the 1960s.  Open oppression of it lessened steadily in the century prior to the 60s, and in fact was intense prior to the 1860s.  Catholics really kept themselves in a major way as a result, and only really began to enter the wider culture after World War Two.  Al Smith's Catholicism is generally regarded as what made it impossible for him to win the Presidency prior to the war.  An early Casper politician of Irish extraction was controversial in the town's Catholic community because of the distance he put between himself and his religion.  The first Catholic Governor of Wyoming was probably Frank A. Barrett, who was a devout Catholic who went on to become the state's U.S. Senator thereafter.  Joe Hickey, another Catholic came after him.  Both Barrett and Hickey were Governors in the 1950s.  Of course, Kennedy broke the dam in 1960, but in part by pledging basically not to let his Catholicism influence him, which was a despicable pledge. 

Vance hasn't pledged that.

The only U.S. Army generals known to be Catholic during World War Two, we might note, were Lieutenant General John E. Hull and Major General Patrick J. Hurley.  This fits into the culture of the professional military class at the time and it might be noted that the first Jewish general in the U.S. Army, Maurice Rose, was a practicing Episcopalian.  Patton, often noted to be very devout, was an Episcopalian, as was Marshall.  

Anyhow, as noted, it's not the case that Catholics feel all non Catholics are going to Hell as they are not Catholic, and Catholics certainly do not believe that all Catholics are going to Heaven as they are Catholic.  Rather, Catholics believe that the Catholic Church, which is the oldest and original form of Christianity, is the church Christ founded and the one entrusted with the instruments of salvation.  In some ways, everyone who is ultimately saved is saved in some way because of the Catholic Church.  As, to use a mistranslation of von Balthasar's statement, we wish "for all men to be saved", we want everyone to be Catholics as that makes it much more assured.

This puts us way outside of the American Civil Religions' views that all religions, or perhaps all Christian religions with Judaism thrown in for good measure, are equal.

One thing it should also do, however, and recent conversions should help cradle Catholics to refocus on this, is to be concerned about people in our immediate orbit.  Vance is basically doing that, but frankly he's in a bit of a tough spot because he and his wife married before his conversion.  

Simply being in a marriage in which one member is a Catholic and the other is not, if the Catholic is a sincere Catholic, has some real challenges.  Catholicism is different and even after decades the non Catholic spouse can be really surprised by the application of the Faith by the Catholic spouse.  In "mixed" couples where the non Catholic spouse is a member of one of the churches that's very close to the Catholic Church this is less so, but even here I've known couples who attended Mass faithfully where one was a Catholic and the other a Lutheran, for instance, with the Lutheran never converting in spite of the two churches being so close.  

As Yeoman's First Law of Human Behavior is a powerful force, general run of the mill Protestant spouses may attend Mass and support their Catholic spouse early on, but over a period time, simply stop attending as most Protestants aren't under a requirement to attend any service on a Sunday. That's inevitably extremely hard on the Catholic spouse who soldiers on.  This has to be even more difficult in a situation such as Vance's in which the other spouse isn't even a member of a Christian religion at all.

Indeed, at one time Catholics were very much discouraged from marrying non Catholics, although its always occurred, and it was often a stipulation by the Catholic spouse that the other convert.  I've known several Catholic couples where this was what happened, although I think it much less common now.  The religion where this frequently occurs is the Mormon religion, which is not a Christian religion and which isn't compatible with any.  Of note there, usually fallen away Mormons simply become intensely anti religious, rather than some other religion.

Catholics only marrying Catholics was a lot easier when Catholics pretty much were associated, culturally, only with other Catholics. That day is long gone, but there's still some wisdom to the old custom here.  As with many things, the Catholic viewpoint on something like marriage is much different than the cultures, if taken seriously.  Catholics married to non Catholics are adding weight to their cross, no matter what.  And part of that weight is the hope the other spouse become Catholic.