Recently on The Ooze we experienced a wave of trolling some call VV-Gate, others The Recent Unpleasantness. I think of it as The Troubles. It was a technicolor reminder of the vitriol that exists out there against anything related to the Vatican. Like the bile that comes out against George Bush from other corners, the scale and heat of it, seeming all out of proportion to reason, really puzzled me.
Recently I've been listening to a CD course on Science and Religion that mentions some 19th-century pseudo-academic anti-Catholicism, like John William Draper. This made me curious to learn more about the historical roots of anti-Catholic prejudice. I'm always intrigued by the web that history weaves, the roots of present currents of thought that may be hidden in time. After all, even though Draper and his more respected contemporary Andrew White were terrible historians whose ideas don't even make common sense, these ideas (e.g. that the Catholic Church opposed scientific progress) have rooted themselves in the popular mind as fact.
Straight off I should mention that there certainly exists Orthodox polemics against Catholicism and the papacy. It seems to be of a different character than others, however. After all, it is not the presence of a bishop or patriarch that the Orthodox take issue with, but the particular role of the bishop of Rome.
That said, it struck me as really curious to read the statements in the Westminster Confession and Book of Concord affirming as an article of faith that the Pope is the Anti-Christ. The statements declare that the Holy Spirit has revealed this to the church as a firm truth. These are statements that all conservative Lutheran synods, to my knowledge, have affirmed. It seems strange to me to assert something so particular with, dare I say, magisterial firmness, which seems rather based on historical events than careful exegesis. For instance, among the few times Scripture mentions antichrists (yes, plural!) it says they will deny that Jesus has come in the flesh; this can hardly apply to the Pope? Reading this, I was reminded that dispensationalism has earlier roots in this historicist view.
The "magisterial" Reformation lent to the popular imagination visions that soon became more apocalyptic. The only woodcuts in Luther's Bible occur in Revelation, a book he didn't even consider proper Scripture, but which allowed him to illustrate his anti-papal message. For instance, in one of them the seven-headed beast wears the papal crown. (The Counter-Reformation had apocalyptic beasts and woodcut propaganda of their own.) Thus even the illiterate got the message, and ran with it. Once the peasant rebellions and the Thirty Years' War got going in earnest, the apocalyptic visions became more grotesque and urgent. People believed it was the end times, and the Whore of Babylon was trying to usher in hell on earth.
This rather gothic element to anti-Catholicism carried on into later centuries. In the 19th century, besides Draper's novel account of the history of science, several sordid "expose's" from supposed ex-priests and nuns became wildly popular. Though these have been largely discredited as hoaxes, you still see Maria Monk or Chiniquy pop up on anti-Catholic websites as supposed "historical texts." Some commentators attribute their reception to the popularity of gothic fiction. Catholicism is still seen in horror films and movies-of-the-week as the best place to go for real evil. During The Troubles on TheOoze, some people noted the black background of the trolls' home website, in addition to their tabloid-style posting. Visit a well-known anti-Catholic website, Jesus-Is-Lord (to which I will not link, so as not to increase their search engine profile) and you'll be treated not only to black backgrounds and pronouncements of hellfire, but creepy music to boot. Then of course there is Jack Chick's cheerful macabre.
In both the 16th century and 19th century versions of anti-Catholic polemics, the papacy competed for black honors with the Jews, Muslims and the Masons or other secretive societies. Often they were seen to be in cahoots with each other, all to deceive the true faithful remnant. Some even speculated that Islam was a plot by the Vatican to deceive true Christians. This, too, is a feature you'll see in present-day anti-Catholicism, as we saw on TheOoze. The Vatican is either a front or is behind such strange bedfellows as Mormonism, the Illuminati, Unitarians, and the Emergent Church, whose anti-institutional leanings don't keep them from suspicion. In all this the Orthodox either get a strange pass (as with Draper), or are seen as a footnote to the Catholics.
To end on a positive note, we can say that if so much opposition has been cause of purification and humbling for the papacy, it is ultimately to the good. The same might be said of TheOoze, where Christians of diverse opinion were nevertheless able to recognize a kind of faith-promotion to which we do not subscribe and to unite in opposing it. God has a way of working like this.
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4 comments:
In all this the Orthodox either get a strange pass
Not so strange - there's, what? ~1 million Orthodox in the US (as opposed to ~60 M Catholics)? Most people haven't heard of us, or think we're Jewish, or some Greek or Russian ethnic club (too often true, alas). Triumphalist writings about how the Orthodox are the fastest-growing religious group in the US aside, we'll know we've really made it when Jack Chick publishes 'The Death Loaf'.
LOL Welcome to the blog, "Flame of the West." :) I just found it strange when Draper said "I'm not going to attack the Greeks because they never really did any of this stuff" and then proceeded to talk about the pagan origins of Marian devotion and liturgical vestments. I think he meant that the Orthodox didn't "oppose science," as he saw it in Catholicism.
"This made me curious to learn more about the historical roots of anti-Catholic prejudice. I'm always intrigued by the web that history weaves, the roots of present currents of thought that may be hidden in time."
For your consideration. This telling of the "religious wars" goes along way to explaining the historical source of the nutty folk theology of VV and her ilk.
A FIRE STRONG ENOUGH TO CONSUME THE HOUSE: THE WARS OF RELIGION AND THE RISE OF THE STATE
Thanks Robert, good read. It's a strong endorsement of Fr. Alexander Schmemann's contention that secularism arose from, not in opposition to, Christianity.
I notice this on page 2: "The Reformation maintained itself wherever the lay power (princes and magistrates) favoured it; it could not survive where the authorities decided to suppress it." (quoting George Elton) I've said similar things on The Ooze before, ie that it was the support of lay power- force- that made the Reformation a church- and society-changing event rather than an inner-Catholic reform movement, of which it resembled many such earlier currents. The Reformers' soteriology, for instance, echoed earlier medieval Augustinian discussions.
Now, you could certainly say that God was working in and through the secular powers to achieve His ends. But it does undercut the idea that the Catholic Church played dirty politics while the Reformers stayed pure of such tactics. Ditto for the propaganda that paints the picture that the only martyrs in the Reformation were Protestant ones.
The philosophical discussion re. Hobbes etc. reminds me why I stick with the Middle Ages. The medieval mind is so much more sensible than the modern one. :)
(I'm still on page 8... perhaps more later when I finish the document.)
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