Socially acceptable Catholics
By Phil Lawler ( bio - articles - email ) | Oct 11, 2016
In a revealing email exchange that was made public today by Wikileaks, Jennifer Palmieri, the communications director of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign explains why many influential conservatives are Catholics:
I imagine they think it is the most socially acceptable politically conservative religion.
Oh, so that’s why people become Catholics. It has nothing to do with pursuit of truth or desire for salvation. It’s because they’re politically conservative, and want to be socially acceptable. You know, like Dorothy Day.
Phil Lawler has been a Catholic journalist for more than 30 years. He has edited several Catholic magazines and written eight books. Founder of Catholic World News, he is the news director and lead analyst at CatholicCulture.org. See full bio.
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Posted by: Ave Maria -
Oct. 12, 2016 11:35 AM ET USA
👀 ...does NOT surprise me in the least since the last time I heard (Mrs.) Clinton talk of Catholicism it was when she was in Mexico City, quite a few years back now, and she asked while at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe...Who painted the picture?! 🙄
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Posted by: dfp3234574 -
Oct. 12, 2016 10:53 AM ET USA
It gets even worse, Phil: "There needs to be a Catholic Spring, in which Catholics themselves demand the end of a middle ages dictatorship and the beginning of a little democracy and respect for gender equality in the Catholic Church," Sandy Newman, president and founder of the progressive nonprofit Voices for Progress, writes to Podesta in an email titled "opening for a Catholic Spring? just musing." : http://www.lifezette.com/polizette/wikileaks-podesta-left-wing-activist-plot-catholic-spring/
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Posted by: ElizabethD -
Oct. 11, 2016 5:56 PM ET USA
Speaking as a former progressive, progressives saw politics as primary and religion as secondary--something that supported politics. They also saw liberal/conservative divide based not on reasoned principles but through the lens of George Lakoff's theory of neuro-linguistically based "frames" ie conservatives believe on gut level in the badness of children & the need for a strict father, progressives believe in goodness of children & need for a nurturant parent. This would be prior to religion.
