A letter from a former altar boy to the national press corps regarding that “devout” Catholic, Rick Santorum

Dear National Press Corps,

Please stop describing Rick Santorum as a “devout Catholic.”

Santorum’s a “devout” Catholic only in the same sense Torquemada was a “devout” Catholic.

Pro-war, pro-death penalty, racist hatemongerers aren’t devout Catholics.

Devout Catholics follow all the Church’s teachings, not just the weirder and and most twisted ones on sex.

Also, devout Catholics do not thump their bibles to make even theological points, never mind political ones. We cite saints and the nuns who taught us.  Catholics don’t expect public policy to be “bible based.”  We don’t want it to be bible-based because for one thing we recognize that the bible is a very mixed up and self-contradicting document, and for another the bible that’s likely to be used to base policies on would be a Protestant bible.

You might want to educate yourselves on the differences between Catholics and Protestants, particularly on the subject of “good works.”

Devout Catholics are more likely to wish that public policy was based on the teachings of St Francis of Assisi.  If there’s a part of the bible we’d like to see enshrined into law it’s the Sermon on the Mount.  Where in the public blatherings and political posturings of Rick Santorum is there anything remotely like the Beatitudes?  Where in his biography since he entered politics is there even a hint that he’s modeled himself or his politics on St Francis’s life and works?

Finally, beware the layman who rattles his beads more loudly and insistently than any nun or priest.  He’s trying to hide something.

Thank you,

Lance Mannion

PS.  Also, you should also stop referring to Santorum’s “working class roots.”  MBA-lawyer sons of clinical psychologists aren’t exactly Teamsters.

Comments

[Sean Paul Kelley]

Amen Brother Mannion!

[Walter Biggins]

Amen, Lance! By the way, did you read Garry Wills's take on contraception, in which Santorum is, ahem, prominently featured?

[Rivenhomewood]

Thank you!

[JH Shannon]

well said, my friend! aren't self-promoting hypocrites subject to being smitten by fire and brimstone, anyway?

[nancy]

Lance -- thanks ever so.

[scribbler50]

Bravo and amen, Lance, well said. In fact perfectly said!

[actor212]

I was a day late and a dollar short on your post, Lance, but then I'm Lutheran.

[Earl Bockenfeld]

Ayatollah Santorum Takes Climate Change Denial To A Biblical Level!!!

Great. God gave us the earth to have dominion over for our benefit, so we should rape the Earth good and proper because it's a thumb in the eye to "BIG GUBMINT". So, how does destroying the environment that allows us to exist - benefit us, Rick?

Reminds me of when Reagan's Interior Secretary James Watts said, "We don't have to protect the environment, the Second Coming is at hand.”

[food doctor]

Getting up at 6:15 AM walking to church in freezing weather in the dark for 7:00 AM mass - putting on the casik for the mass is what i remember most about being and alter boy. i wasn't thinking much about gods role in politics. i was worried that i wouldn't catch the host on the paten should it fall from someones mouth.i probably would have dove for it like a line drive hit sharply to short.

[Mok]

Sorry, but this just smacks of "No True Scotsman".

Santorum *IS* a devout Catholic, whether you like it or not, until he either renounces his faith or is excommunicated. He's unquestionably devout, and unquestionably a member of the Catholic church. Q.E.D.

This is like all the folks who whine that Phelps or Falwell aren't "real Christians" because of their warped and hateful ideology. Sorry, but if they believe in the resurrection of Jesus and all that jazz, they're Christian, end of story. Warped, twisted Christians, but Christians.

You can't just surgically excise anyone who you dislike, for fear of their reputation contaminating your own. If his views really are so out of line, why hasn't he been forced out (formally or informally)? Why hasn't the Church told him to shut the hell up?

I'm not saying he's representative, but you can't exclude someone from their own declared and deeply-held faith just because of some disagreements over priorities and interpretations and actions.

Shit, if we're gonna do that, we can just say that the Pope isn't Catholic, because no true Catholic would shield pedophiles and allow them to re-offend.