Linkmeister

Church-State Separation

Update: Josh at Talking Points Memo has followed up on his early discussion; he's found an earlier article from the WaPo which is even more blatant. Check out the remarks he found in that article.

How's the old outrage meter? Pegged? Try this:

During his June 4 visit, Bush asked the Vatican to push the American Catholic bishops to be more aggressive politically on family and life issues, especially a constitutional amendment that would define marriage as a union between a man and a woman.

A Vatican official told NCR [National Catholic Reporter] June 9 that in his meeting with Cardinal Angelo Sodano and other Vatican officials, Bush said, “Not all the American bishops are with me” on the cultural issues. The implication was that he hoped the Vatican would nudge them toward more explicit activism.

Other sources in the meeting said that while they could not recall the president’s exact words, he did pledge aggressive efforts on the cultural front, especially the battle against gay marriage, and asked for the Vatican’s help in encouraging the U.S. bishops to be more outspoken.

According to sources, Sodano did not respond to the request.

Sources say Bush made the remark after Sodano thanked him for his stand on the issues of family and life. They also said that while Bush was focusing primarily on the marriage question, he also had in mind other concerns such as abortion and stem cell research.

That's from the Vatican correspondent in the June 11 issue.

By comparison, here's a speech given by JFK in 1960:

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute--where no Catholic prelate would tell the President (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishoners for whom to vote--where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference--and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the President who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

I don't know about you, but the idea of asking the Pope to recruit campaign help from American bishops is so far out of line with the intent of the Constitution that I'm hard pressed to believe it. In 1960 JFK had to assert to a skeptical American public that he would take no orders from Rome; in 2004 we have GWB asking for Rome's help. (Story first seen at Scott's place).

Josh Marshall has some thoughts on this, as do some people the NYT interviewed.

Posted by Linkmeister at June 14, 2004 12:08 AM