"The coming anti-Catholic storm"
Analyst predicts tough road ahead for Church in US
Washington D.C. (CNA) -- An "anti-Catholic storm" is looming in the United States because of the Church's stance against "postmodern ideologies" and because well-funded Catholic supporters of President Obama provide cover for Catholic politicians who dissent from Church teaching, says Catholic analyst Deal Hudson.
Hudson, who has served as an advisor to Republican leaders on Catholic issues, wrote at InsideCatholic.com that a "relentless barrage" of reporting in the mainstream media is intended to force changes demanded by dissenting Catholic groups.
Revelations of clerical sexual abuse in Europe have provided "Catholic bashers" the opportunity to attack Church teachings about abortion and same-sex "marriage," he added. A call to arrest Pope Benedict XVI in the United Kingdom should have been regarded as "a crank call" but has led to speculation about whether the papal trip to Britain should be canceled.
While Iraqi Christians are being expelled from their homelands, this only receives "occasional mention" in the New York Times, whose reporters "dig through Vatican documents" hoping to link the Pope with clerical sexual abuse, Hudson wrote.
"The use of courts and commissions to harass and threaten Catholics and other Christians has already been auditioned in Canada," noted Hudson. "And the expansion of hate-speech laws signed by President Barack Obama last October sets the stage for similar tussles here when a minister, priest, or voluble layperson too heatedly denounces homosexual sex."
While the Church is not the only institution insisting on universal moral standards, it is the largest and therefore stands in the way of "postmodern ideologies achieving complete dominance in the West," he said. Those who hold the "postmodern" belief that all truth is power "don't hesitate to use the power of the media, government, and the courts to attack any institution thwarting their influence."
According to Hudson, political donors have combined resources with labor unions, which once had a "vital" relationship with the Church, to support "faux Catholic groups that provide cover for politicians who don't vote Catholic." He suggested that it is these groups' fault that the majority of candidates who oppose abortion and same-sex marriage are Republican.
"The coming anti-Catholic storm will be linked, sadly, to the reelection campaign of President Barack Obama," he predicted. Though the president is out of favor at the moment, his supporters will "quickly recover" enthusiasm in the face of a Republican opponent.
"There will be a furious and well-funded effort by Catholic Obama supporters to keep Obama in office," Hudson wrote. "By 2010, the storm will be felt throughout the Church, and those who blithely claim that the Church and politics are not connected will be as helpless as a fallen leaf caught in a tornado."
