Everything about Anti-catholicism totally explained
Anti-Catholicism is
discrimination, hostility or
prejudice directed at Roman Catholics or the
Roman Catholic Church. The term applies to the
religious persecution of Catholics.
In the
Early modern period, the Catholic Church struggled to maintain its traditional religious and political role in the face of rising secular powers in Europe. As a result of these struggles, there arose a hostile attitude towards the considerable political, social, spiritual and religious power of the pontiff and the Catholic clergy. This hostility to their exercise of power in the secular sphere is referred to as "
anti-clericalism". To this was added the epochal crisis over its spiritual authority represented by the
Protestant Reformation giving rise to
sectarian conflict. In contemporary times anti-Catholicism has assumed various forms, including the persecution of Catholics as members of a religious minority in some localities, assaults by governments upon Catholic faithful, discrimination, and virulent attacks on clergy and laity.
Origins
Protestant and Reformed Christian countries
Beginning with
Martin Luther, Protestants attacked the
Pope as representing the power of the
Anti-Christ and the Catholic Church as representing the
Whore of Babylon prophesied in the
Book of Revelation. The identification of the Papacy as the Anti-Christ was an article of faith for many Protestant denominations:
» Westminster Confession of Faith:
» "25.6. There is no other head of the Church but the Lord Jesus Christ: nor can the Pope of Rome in any sense be head thereof; but is that Antichrist, that man of sin and son of perdition, that exalts himself in the Church against Christ, and all that's called God.
» The London Baptist Confession of 1689:
» 26.4. The Lord Jesus Christ is the Head of the church, in whom, by the appointment of the Father, all power for the calling, institution, order or government of the church, is invested in a supreme and sovereign manner; neither can the Pope of Rome in any sense be head thereof, but is that antichrist, that man of sin, and son of perdition, that exalteth himself in the church against Christ.
Protestants also condemned the Catholic policy of mandatory
celibacy for priests, and the rituals of
fasting and
abstinence during
Lent, as contradicting the clause stated in
1 Timothy 4:1-5, warning against doctrines that "forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth." Partly as a result of the condemnation, many non-Catholic churches allow priests to marry and/or view fasting as a choice rather than an obligation.
England
Anti-Catholicism in England originated with the
English Reformation under
Henry VIII. The
Act of Supremacy of 1534 declared the
English crown to be 'the only supreme head on earth of the Church in England' in place of the pope. Any act of allegiance to the latter was considered treason because the papacy claimed both spiritual and political power over its followers. It was under this Act that saints
Thomas More and
John Fisher were executed and became martyrs to the Catholic faith.
Although the Act of Supremacy, which asserted England's independence from papal authority, was repealed in 1554 by Henry's daughter,
Queen Mary I, who was a devout Catholic, when she restored Catholicism as England's State religion, the Act was restored in 1559 under
Elizabeth I, who aggressively reasserted England's presecution of those who remained loyal Catholics and refused to apostatize and place their faith in the Church of England.
As a result, anyone who took office in the English Church or State (
remains in effect today) was forced to take the
Oath of Supremacy, and there were penalties for violating that oath(hanging and quartering). Attendance at Anglican services was obligatory. Those who refused to attend Anglican services, whether Catholics or Protestants(Puritans), were fined and physically punished as
recusants.
In the time of Elizabeth I, the persecution of the adherents of the Reformed religion, both Anglicans and Protestants alike, which had occurred during the reign of her elder half-sister Queen Mary I was used to fuel strong anti-Catholic propaganda in the hugely influential
Foxe's Book of Martyrs. Those who had died in Mary's reign, under the
Marian Persecutions, were effectively canonised by this work of
hagiography. In 1571 the Convocation of the
English Church ordered that copies of the
Book of Martyrs should be kept for public inspection in all cathedrals and in the houses of church dignitaries. The book was also displayed in many Anglican parish churches alongside the Holy Bible. The passionate intensity of its style and its vivid and picturesque dialogues made the book very popular among
Puritan and
Low Church families, Anglican and Protestant
nonconformist, down to the nineteenth century. In a period of extreme partisanship on all sides of the religious debate, the exaggeratedly partisan church history of the earlier portion of the book, with its grotesque stories of popes and monks, contributed much to fuel anti-Catholic prejudices in England as did the story of the sufferings of those several hundred Reformers, Anglican and Protestant alike, burnt at the stake by Mary and the misguided and overzealous Catholic cleric,
Bishop Bonner.
The anti-Catholic fear among many English people that the pope sought to reimpose not just his religio-spiritual authority over England but also his secular power of the country was exacerbated by various actions stemming from the Vatican. In 1570,
Pope Pius V sought to depose Elizabeth with the
papal bull Regnans in Excelsis, which declared her a heretic and purported to dissolve the duty of all Elizabeth's subjects of their allegiance to her. This rendered Elizabeth's subjects who persisted in their allegiance to the Catholic Church politically suspect, and made the position of her Catholic subjects largely untenable if they tried to maintain both allegiances at once.
In 1588, some Elizabethian loyalist cited the failed invasion of England by the
Spanish Armada as an attempt by
Philip II of Spain to put into effect the Pope's decree. In truth, King Philip II was attempting to claim the throne of England he felt he'd as a result of being the widower of Mary I of England.
Elizabeth's resultant persecution of Catholic
Jesuit missionaries led to many executions at
Tyburn. Those priests who suffered there are counted as
martyrs by the Catholic church; though at the time, they were considered traitors to England. In recent decades, a convent has been established nearby to pray for their souls.
Later several accusations fueled strong anti-Catholicism in England including the
Gunpowder Plot, in which
Guy Fawkes and other Catholic conspirators where accused of planning to blow up the English Parliament while it was in session. The
Great Fire of London in 1666 was blamed on the Catholics and an inscription ascribing it to 'Popish frenzy' was engraved on the
Monument to the Great Fire of London, which marked the location where the fire started (this inscription was only removed in 1831). The "
Popish Plot" involving
Titus Oates further exacerbated Anglican-Catholic relations.
The beliefs that underlie the sort of strong anti-Catholicism once seen in the
United Kingdom were summarized by
William Blackstone in his
Commentaries on the Laws of England:
» As to
papists, what has been said of the Protestant dissenters would hold equally strong for a general toleration of them; provided their separation was founded only upon difference of opinion in religion, and their principles didn't also extend to a subversion of the civil government. If once they could be brought to renounce the supremacy of the pope, they might quietly enjoy their seven sacraments, their purgatory, and auricular confession; their worship of relics and images; nay even their transubstantiation. But while they acknowledge a foreign power, superior to the sovereignty of the kingdom, they can't complain if the laws of that kingdom won't treat them upon the footing of good subjects..
:— Bl. Comm. IV, c.4 ss. iii.2, p. *54
The gravamen of this charge, then, is that Catholics constitute an
imperium in imperio, a sort of
fifth column of persons who owe a greater allegiance to the Pope than they do to the civil government, a charge very similar to that repeatedly leveled against
Jews. Accordingly, a large body of British laws, collectively known as the
penal laws, imposed various civil disabilities and legal penalties on
recusant Catholics. These laws were gradually repealed over the course of the nineteenth century with laws such as the
Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829.
Despite the Emancipation Act, however, anti-Catholic feeling continued throughout the nineteenth century, primarily as a response to the influx of Irish immigrants into England during the
Great Famine.
The re-establishment of the Catholic ecclesiastical hierarchy in 1850 created a frenzy of anti-Catholic feeling, whipped up by the newspapers. An effigy of
Cardinal Wiseman, the new head of the restored Catholic ecclesiastical hierarchy in England, was paraded through the streets and burnt at
Bethnal Green and graffiti proclaiming 'No
popery!' were chalked up on walls
Even now, however, as a result of centuries-old legislation enacted during penal time, a member of the British Royal Family automatically gives up any chance of succeeding to the throne if he or she joins the Catholic Church or marries a Catholic.
Ireland
Ireland's Catholic majority has been subject to persecution from the time of the English Reformation under Henry VIII. This persecution intensified when the Gaelic clan system was completely
destroyed by the governments of Elizabeth I and her successor,
James I. Land was appropriated either by the conversion of native Anglo-Irish aristocrats or by forcible seizure. Many Catholics were dispossessed and their lands given to Anglican and Protestant settlers from Britain, (however it should be noted that the first plantation in Ireland was a Catholic plantation under Queen Mary I, for more see
Plantations of Ireland).
In order to cement the power of the Anglican
Ascendancy, political and land-owning rights were denied to Ireland's Catholics by law, following the
Glorious Revolution in England and consequent turbulence in Ireland. The
Penal Laws, established first in the 1690s, assured
Church of Ireland control of political, economic and religious life. The
Mass, ordination, and the presence in Ireland of Catholic Bishops were all banned, although some did carry on secretly. Catholic schools were also banned, as were all voting franchises. Violent persecution also resulted, leading to the torture and execution of many Catholics, both clergy and laity. Since then, many have been
canonised and
beatified by the
Vatican, such as Saint
Oliver Plunkett, Blessed
Dermot O'Hurley, and Blessed
Margaret Ball.
Although some of the penal laws restricting Catholic access to landed property were repealed between 1778 and 1782 this didn't end anti-Catholic agitation and violence. Catholic competition with Protestants in
County Armagh for leases intensified, driving up prices and provoking resentment of Anglicans and Protestants alike. Then in 1793, the
Catholic Relief Act enfranchised forty shilling freeholders in the counties, thus increasing the political value of Catholic tenants to landlords. In addition, Catholics began to enter the linen weaving trade, thus depressing Protestant wage rates. From the 1780s the Protestant
Peep O'Day Boys grouping began attacking Catholic homes and smashing their looms. In addition, the Peep O'Day Boys disarmed Catholics of any weapons they were holding.A Catholic group called the
Defenders was formed in response to these attacks. This climaxed in the
Battle of the Diamond on 21st September
1795 outside the small village of
Loughgall between Peep O' Day boys and the Defenders. Roughly 30 Catholic Defenders, but none of the better armed Peep O'Day Boys were killed in the fight. Hundreds of Catholic homes and at least one Church were burnt out in the aftermath of the skirmish. After the battle
Daniel Winter,
James Wilson and
James Sloan changed the name of the Peep O' Day Boys to the
Orange Order devoted to maintaining the Protestant ascendency.
Though more of the Penal Laws were repealed and Catholic Emancipation in 1829 ensured political representation at Westminster significant anti-Catholic hostility remained, especially in
Belfast where the Catholic population was in the minority. In the same year, the Presbyterians, reaffirmed at the Synod of Ulster that the Pope was the anti-Christ and joined the Orange Order in large numbers when the latter organisation opened its doors to all non-Catholics in 1834. As the Orange order grew, violence against Catholics became a regular feature of Belfast life. Towards the end of the nineteenth and early twentieth century when
Irish Home Rule became imminent, Protestant fears and opposition towards it were articulated under the slogan "Home Rule means
Rome Rule.
Scotland
In the 16th century, the
Scottish Reformation resulted in Scotland's conversion to
Calvinism through the
Church of Scotland. The revolution resulted in a powerful hatred of the Roman Church. High Anglicism also came under intense persecution also after
Charles I attempted to reform the Church of Scotland. The attempted reforms caused chaos, however, because they were seen as being overly Catholic in form in being based heavily on sacraments and ritual.
Over the course of later mediæval and early modern history violence against Catholics has broken out, often resulting in deaths, such as the torture of
Saint John Ogilvie and the execution of a Jesuit priest.
In the last 150 years, Irish immigration to Scotland increased dramatically and at the beginning of the immigration period Catholics were treated like second class citizens. As time has gone on Scotland has, however, become much more open to other religions and Catholics have seen the nationalisation of their schools and the
restoration of the Church hierarchy. The
Orange Order has also grown in numbers in recent times. This growth is, however, attributed mainly to the rivalry between
Rangers and
Celtic football clubs as opposed to actual hatred of Catholics.
Cooperation between
The Kirk and the Catholic Church in Scotland has grown greatly in recent times as both churches are moving to eradicate sectarian violence from football and are also working together to fight poverty. The Moderator of the Church of Scotland and Cardinal Patrick O'Brien both attended a follow up to the
G8 summit in May 2007.
United States
John Highham described anti-Catholic
bigotry as "the most luxuriant, tenacious tradition of paranoiac agitation in American history". The bigotry which was prominent in the United Kingdom was exported to the
United States. Two types of anti-Catholic rhetoric existed in colonial society. The first, derived from the heritage of the Protestant Reformation and the
religious wars of the sixteenth century, consisted of the "Anti-Christ" and the "Whore of Babylon" variety and dominated Anti-Catholic thought until the late seventeenth century. The second was a more secular variety which focused on the supposed intrigue of the Catholics intent on extending medieval despotism worldwide.
Historian
Arthur Schlesinger Sr. has called Anti-Catholicism "the deepest-held bias in the history of the American people."
The roots of American Anti-Catholicism go back to the
Reformation, whose ideas about Rome and the
papacy travelled to the New World with the earliest settlers. These settlers were, of course, predominantly Protestant, and many opposed not only Catholicism but also the remaining Catholic traditions of the official Anglican State Church, the
Church of England, which they felt was insufficiently Reformed. A large part of American culture is a legacy of Great Britain, and an enormous part of its religious culture a legacy of the more extreme Protestant tendencies of the English Reformation. Monsignor John Tracy Ellis, in his landmark book American Catholicism, first published in 1956, wrote bluntly that a "universal anti-Catholic bias was brought to Jamestown in 1607 and vigorously cultivated in all the thirteen colonies from
Massachusetts to
Georgia." Proscriptions against Roman
Catholics were included in colonial charters and laws, and, as Monsignor Ellis noted wryly, nothing could bring together warring
Anglican clerics and Puritan ministers faster than their common hatred of the Church of Rome. Such antipathy continued throughout the 18th century. Indeed, the virtual penal status of the Catholics in many of the colonies made even the appointment of bishops unthinkable in the early years of the Republic. Another result of this was that the first constitution of an independent Anglican Church in the country bent over backwards to distance itself from Rome by calling itself the
Protestant Episcopal Church, incorporating in its name the term,
Protestant, that Anglicans elsewhere had shown some care in using too prominently due to their own reservations about the nature of the Church of England, and other Anglican bodies, vis-à-vis later radical reformers who were happier to use the term Protestant.
In 1788,
John Jay urged the
New York Legislature to require office-holders to renounce foreign authorities "in all matters ecclesiastical as well as civil." .
Anti-Catholic animus in the United States reached a peak in the nineteenth century when the Protestant population became alarmed by the influx of Catholic immigrants. Fearing the end of time, some American Protestants who believed they were Gods chosen people, went so far as to claim that the Catholic Church was the
Whore of Babylon in the
Book of Revelation. The resulting "nativist" movement, which achieved prominence in the 1840s, was whipped into a frenzy of anti-Catholicism that led to mob violence, the burning of Catholic property, and the killing of Catholics. This violence was fed by claims that Catholics were destroying the culture of the United States. Irish Catholic immigrants were blamed for raising the taxes of the country as well as for spreading violence and disease. The nativist movement found expression in a national political movement called the
Know-Nothing Party of the 1850s, which (unsuccessfully) ran former president
Millard Fillmore as its presidential candidate in 1856. A similar sentiment was also expressed by the
Ku Klux Klan.
Acts of U.S. Presidents against Anti-Catholicism
)