Changing American Evangelical Attitudes towards Roman Catholics: 1960-2000 Don Sweeting Don Sweeting is Senior Pastor of Introduction summing up forty years of evangelicalism Cherry Creek Presbyterian Church, in In 1960, Presidential campaign historian since 1945, Bayly said, “We inherited a Englewood, Colorado. He has also Theodore H. White observed that “the Berlin Wall between evangelical Chris- served as the founding pastor of the largest and most important division in tians and Roman Catholics; we bequeath Chain of Lakes Community Bible Church American society was that between Prot- a spirit of love and rapprochement on in Antioch, Illinois. Dr. Sweeting was estants and Catholics.”1 As a vital part of the basis of the Bible rather than fear and educated at Moody Bible Institute, American Protestant life, evangelicalism hatred.”7 Lawrence University, Oxford University reflected the strains of this conflict.2 Anti- By the mid 1990s, it was clear that atti- (M.A.), and Trinity Evangelical Divinity Catholicism, according to church historian tudes were changing. On a local level, School (Ph.D.) where he wrote his dis- George Marsden, “was simply an unques- evangelicals and Catholics were meeting sertation on the relationship between tioned part of the fundamentalist- to discuss issues from poverty and wel- evangelicals and Roman Catholics. evangelicalism of the day.”3 fare reform to abortion. On the national This posture of outright public hostil- level changes were also apparent. Evan- ity was evidenced in many ways. It could gelical publishing houses were printing be seen in the opposition of many evan- books by Catholic authors. Some evangeli- gelical leaders to the presidential candi- cal parachurch ministries began placing dacy of John F. Kennedy in 1960. It could Roman Catholics on their boards. Catho- be read in the missions textbooks used at lic masses were being conducted at an seminaries such as Fuller, which saw evangelical university. Evangelical schol- Catholicism, along with communism and ars held some key teaching posts at Notre modernism, as one of the three massive Dame University. For the first time a world forces threatening Christianity.4 It Roman Catholic was invited to give a could be heard in the founding documents seminar at InterVarsity’s Urbana Missions and speeches of the National Association conference. Moreover, key evangelical of Evangelicals.5 And it could be sensed leaders were having audiences with the in the opposition to appointing American pope. ambassadors to the Vatican. Yet nearly In 1994, these changes dramatically forty years later, due to various cultural, came to public attention with the publish- political and theological shifts, there has ing of the Evangelicals and Catholics Together been a significant change in the way many (ECT) statement—a document providing evangelicals perceive Roman Catholics.6 a rationale for evangelical and Catholic As early as 1985, Joseph Bayly, writing dialogue. Then in 1997, ECT was followed in Eternity magazine noticed that things up with another proclamation called The were changing. Writing on what the evan- Gift of Salvation (GOS), which announced gelical leaders of his generation were pass- that certain evangelicals and Catholics ing on to a new generation of leaders, and had come to a shared understanding of 20 salvation.8 Reformers believed that Rome abandoned Such changes and claims are extraor- the pure gospel of grace. The Reformers dinary when we consider the tortured responded with a call to sola fide—the doc- history between these two groups over the trine of justification by faith alone, and sola centuries, as well as the hostile climate scriptura—the supreme authority of Scrip- that existed just four decades ago. There ture. There were also protests against is a remarkable new openness between all the extra-biblical traditions of Rome many Catholics and evangelicals. The that obscured the gospel. ECT statement itself boasted of a new Early American colonialists from New spirit of “historic cooperation.” England Puritans to Virginia Anglicans Clearly, significant changes were feared Rome’s claim to political and spiri- taking place. Attitudes were changing. tual supremacy. These fears were present Whereas once many evangelicals thought in American culture right up to the mid of Catholics as theological and cultural 20th century. Furthermore, anti-Catholi- enemies, today, many evangelicals think cism was not an exclusively evangelical of Catholics as theological and cultural stance. Secularists, like John Dewey, and allies. mainline Protestants as represented by the Of course, the word “many” properly Christian Century, held similar sentiments. clarifies that not all evangelicals feel this American anti-Catholicism is complex way. and has taken various forms. Sometimes While some see these changes as a sign anti-Catholicism took a nativist form. that evangelicalism is coming to maturity, Nativist anti-Catholicism feared the others see them as indicating serious theo- power-threatening influx of immigrants to logical compromise. Still others see it as a the United States. It reached its zenith in mixed blessing. However one assesses the 1920s and seemed to die out by the these changes, nearly all admit that things 1960s. Sometimes anti-Catholicism took have changed! patriotic forms. Patriotic anti-Catholicism This article will briefly examine the feared the universal claims of the pope. It roots of anti-Catholicism and the histori- suspected Rome for its antipathy to cal factors that led to this change in evan- democracy and American liberty and its gelical attitudes. It will not describe in any claims of ultimate authority in both the detail the differences of beliefs since many spiritual and temporal realms (Unam sanc- studies have already done this.9 Rather, it tum, 1302). Anti-Catholicism also took a will look at the shaping forces that have theological form. Theological anti- been at work—those events, movements, Catholicism focused on doctrinal objec- and influences that have brought us to tions to what Rome does and who Rome is. where we are at the beginning of a new century. Ten Shaping Forces that Have Altered the Landscape A Brief Consideration of the Roots Given the fact that the roots of this of the Conflict conflict are nearly 500 years old, what The roots of evangelical anti-Catholi- explains this shift in American evangeli- cism run very deep. They extend to the cal attitudes? What shaping forces have Protestant Reformation. At its core, the been at work to bring about a change in 21 attitude? There are at least ten that I would try had never elected a Catholic president. like to identify. Looking at them will help The last time one ran for office (Al Smith, us better understand ourselves and the 1928), he was decisively rejected. Kennedy context in which we do ministry in the himself brought things to a defining first decade of a new century. moment when he spoke to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association. It was an The 1960 election of John F. Kennedy event heavily covered by the media. In his In 1960, anti-Catholicism was not speech Kennedy said that he believed in merely an evangelical phenomenon. It an America “where the separation of was an American phenomenon. Both church and state is absolute—where no secularists and Christians, both evan- Catholic prelate would tell the President gelicals and non-evangelical Protestants, how to act and no Protestant minister worried about the universal claims of would tell his parishioners how to vote.”11 Rome. The prospect of having a Roman He said religion should be a private Catholic president frightened many. For affair. He promised to uphold the First this reason John F. Kennedy’s candidacy Amendment’s guarantees of religious in the 1960 presidential election caused a liberty. In addition, he expressed his major controversy. opposition to the appointment of an Evangelicals and non-evangelicals alike ambassador to the Vatican and to the shared the belief that the Roman Catholic granting of aid to parochial schools. Church could never change. It would not The speech persuaded many. It embrace religious freedom, and it would emerged as the turning point of the elec- not renounce its universal claims over civil tion that led to Kennedy’s victory. A governments, let alone its attitude towards Catholic was in the White House, but he non-Catholics. On the Protestant spectrum, turned out to be a strong advocate of the voices ranging from Norman Vincent Peale separation of church and state. Some won- to Harold John Ockenga to Carl McIntire dered how seriously committed Kennedy expressed fear that electing Kennedy was to Catholicism. Others joked that he would be a terrible thing for our nation. seemed to “out Protestant the Protes- Opposition to Kennedy’s election also tants!” Still others mused that he was, by came from Christianity Today and the South- his stance, really the first Southern Bap- ern Baptist Convention. Donald Grey tist president of the United States! Barnhouse argued that his election would Kennedy’s election is significant be “perilous.” because it signaled the full acceptance of Catholics into American life. While The issue is simple. The Roman nativism was not dead in America, nativ- Catholic Church will not allow Kennedy the right to carry out his ist anti-Catholicism was on the ropes. Four own desires. They have made it years later, when Republican candidate unmistakably clear that Senator Barry Goldwater chose a Roman Catholic Kennedy must be a Roman Catholic first and a United States president as his vice presidential running mate, it second, where the interests of the was clear that anti-Catholicism was no 10 Church are concerned. longer an issue in American politics. The debate over religion seemed to take central place in the campaign. Our coun- 22 Vatican II Perhaps most striking was its admission If the first nail in the coffin of political that “the American experience of religious anti-Catholicism was the 1960 Kennedy freedom is not only an advance in Church election, the second nail was Vatican II history: it is also an important break- (1962-1965).