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How anti-Catholic is John Hagee?
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Since endorsing John McCain in February, Texas megachurch pastor John Hagee has been backpedaling out of decades’ worth of anti-Catholic statements. From labeling Hurricane Katrina the “judgment of God against the city of New Orleans”—dished out because of the city’s homosexual subculture—to penning a book that explains how “the Roman Church shaped the policy of the Third Reich,” Hagee had the marks of McCain’s own Jeremiah Wright. (The McCain camp even pulled an Obama when the senator explained his relationship with the pastor: “He says that he has never been anti-Catholic, but I repudiate the words that create that impression.”)
An uproar came from Catholic League President Bill Donohue, who linked to a YouTube clip of Hagee where, equipped with an ominous pointer, he calls the Catholic Church the “Whore of Babylon.” The biggest stir, though, has come from guys like New York Times columnist Frank Rich. Running with Hagee’s pro-Israel stance, Rich scoffed that his “rantings may tell us more about Mr. McCain’s policy views than Mr. Wright’s tell us about Mr. Obama’s.”
But Hagee’s interview last week with Deal Hudson, director of InsideCatholic.com, may help explain for Rich and others why McCain-Hagee is not really analogous to Obama-Wright (besides the fact that the mostly areligious John “Agents of Intolerance” McCain didn’t sit in Hagee’s Cornerstone Church for 20 years listening to his sermons). Hagee categorically denied that his “Whore of Babylon” bit refers to the Catholic Church, saying in his eschatology it instead pertains to the post-Rapture Church, but he also told a personal story that Hudson said shows “another side of the man who has now become a symbol of anti-Catholicism.”
In the 1990s, Hagee bought a Catholic girls’ school—San Antonio’s first, founded in 1851—run by Ursuline sisters, who had to sell the property because they’d become too old and too few to maintain it. The sisters couldn’t reach a deal with the archdiocese, so they offered it to Hagee. Hudson says:
Hagee was then told that the delay in selling the property had meant the sisters had to draw on their retirement accounts to live. Hagee then said, “I want to buy this school by the close of business tomorrow.”
Hagee, the sisters, and their attorneys met the next morning. The Ursulines’ attorney said, “Shall we tell Reverend Hagee the real problem?” . . . The attorney for the sisters explained that the archdiocese had expected them to move out of the convent immediately after it was sold and asked what Hagee wanted the sisters to do.
“My plan would be to give them a five year lease to the convent, and I will charge them ten dollars a year. We will pay all utilities and up-keep.” Hagee then took a 50-dollar bill from his pocket and paid the lease himself. One sister looked at the attorney and said, “Let’s get this thing done.”
The following Sunday, Hagee sent his church bus to the Ursuline convent, picked up the sisters, brought them to his church, and seated them in the front row for both services (5,000 attend each service). “I thanked them publicly for their lives of sacrifice and devotion to Jesus Christ. The congregation gave them standing ovations because the campus we bought was the fruit of their labor, a testimonial of their commitment to Christ.”
Hagee let the Ursuline sisters stay in the convent for twelve years, free of any cost. “Our children hugged them,” he said. “They would reach out and grab them by the hands. They were very precious to us for what they had done with their whole lives which had been invested in building this wonderful school. We were glad to honor them as long as they walked on this earth.”
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Topic: Campaign 2008, Front Page, The Nation |  |
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Soul searching
Catholic bashing = the last acceptable prejudice.
Last Friday night ABC did a special on the Sistine Chapel in Rome. I was shocked ABC would do a pro-Catholic TV show.
Of course it turned out they didn’t. They just interviews 2 rabbis who ridiculed the Chapel. These rabbis were more interested in slamming the Catholic Church than they were in praising Judaism.
Hagee has also called the Catholic Church the “false cult system” and the “apostate church”.
But my favorite remark of his was Hurricane Katrina was punishment to the city of New Orleans.
So following Hagee’s “logic” God punished the poorest sections of New Orleans but He left the French Quarter untouched. It would appear that God does work in mysterious ways.
Hagee does not occupy a position in relation to McCain that is analogous to Wright and Obama.
It would be more accurate to cast it as being somewhat similar to that of Farrakan and Obama.
I worked for Catholics a long time and I heard them say much worse about Protestants.
“… penning a book that explains how ‘the Roman Church shaped the policy of the Third Reich,’”
Ben Stein, Richard Weikart, and the whole Discovery Institute will be very sad to hear this.
So following Hagee’s “logic” God punished the poorest sections of New Orleans but He left the French Quarter untouched. It would appear that God does work in mysterious ways.
Yes, I believe Colbert put it as follws (while showing an illustrative map of New Orleans): “God doesn’t hate gays, he hates the gay-adjacent.“
Nick H. Peters writes: “Catholic bashing = the last acceptable prejudice.”
So, there won’t be any more lawyer bashing? How nice!
I never knew that Hagee had been so kind to the nuns. That should be made public. Had Wright something like this he could point to, things might not have gone as that did.
Hagee had the marks of McCain’s own Jeremiah Wright.
Isn’t this unfair Clint? Hagee’s endorsement of McCain doesn’t imply McCain’s endorsement of Hagee, Does it?
It does because John McCain actively sought the endorsement of Hagee.
Except that Obama unreservedly denounced Farrakan, whereas McCain actively sought Hagee’s endorsement and later said he was glad to receive it.
And that is supposed to make it better, not worse? Obama had a long-standing relationship with his pastor that was founded on shared faith, mutual friendships, and joint service. McCain was willing to actively court a man well known to be a bigot, purely for political gain among a group from which McCain had previously distanced himself (with the “agents of intolerance” remarks). McCain and Hagee did not share other experiences or beliefs, Hagee is just a political tool. McCain seems quite willing to sacrifice his principles for political gain.
JJ — It would appear you missed the point of my question. Again, the fact that McCain actively sought the endorsement of Hagee does not mean that McCain endorses, supports, approves of Hagee.
Endorsement is asymmetrical.
Roger,
So you believe that sitting silently in a pastor’s church is tacit endorsement of his ideology (Obama-Wright), but writing and calling a pastor to ask that he publicly throw his clout behind your campaign is not endorsement of his ideology?
I think you’re bending through crazy contortions to find a way to blame Obama and let McCain off.
Think about it this way: Imagine Obama had called Farrakan and asked him, “Please publicly endorse my campaign.” Would you be arguing that Obama wasn’t endorsing Farrakan’s ideology because “endorsement is asymmetrical”?
Locally in San Antonio Hagee aint all that much. The more respected revered pastor is the now retired Buckner Fanning of Trinity Baptist. For many years Buckner and San Antonio Archbishop Patrick Flores were good friends who never spoke ill of the other. Talk about Kirk hugging the Klingons!
A trustworthy lady I know here in SA had John Hagee’s son in her classroom. Evidently the plan is for Hagee sr to annoint Jr as his very own dynastic successor at Cornerstone a la the Kim dynasty in North Korea.
At a time when the secularist proAbortion Culture of Death has such a grip on our culture, can we really afford quaint doctrinal spats with conservative proLife Catholics?? Folks tell me that the current pope was at one time derided as a Fritz Falwell for his defense of marriage and opposition to abortion
krm post 3,
but he arguably holds such a position with respect to the religous right as a whole.
roger post 7,
but what does it say regarding McCain’s solicitation of Hagee’s endoresement and prominant placement during key news events?
I do sense an amusing double standard showing up here, but we have already seen this double standard in evidence in WMB earlier.
roger post 9,
you mean with this statement:
“JJ — It would appear you missed the point of my question. Again, the fact that McCain actively sought the endorsement of Hagee does not mean that McCain endorses, supports, approves of Hagee. ”
that McCain denounces, despises and utterly rejects Hagee’s ideas?
What a quaint way of demonstrating this!
I see the usual Liars for the Left are out and about and busily engaged in their usual stinking work of propping up racism and hatred.
The close association of Obama with the rabid racist anti-American hater ‘Rev’ Wright (two decades of the two reprehensible characters being joined at the hip - spiritually, politically, and personally) would be analogous to McCain only IF he were associated with Phelps, or someone like Phelps.
Of course that is not the case: So the Left (and the obedient little soldiers of the Left-wing machine here) try to obscure the Left’s hatred, intolerance, and contempt for America by spreading their usual manure, instead of just manfully admitting the total depravity of their position and of their ‘candidate’ and getting on with their nasty business. But the only thing the Left knows is to spin, spin, spin, slander, fabricate, and lie - and so we have this kind of ‘comparison’ which would be completely hilarious, were it not so malicious and so foul.
drill post 15,
it wuold seem that you need to develop your argument further.
You provide no justification for why Wrights arguably anti-white sentimates are different than Hagee’s arguably anti-catholic sentimates, but are, based on your arguments, similar to Phelp’s sentimates.
My sense is you need to develop your argument more fully.
P.S. anti-catholicism can be itself a form of hatred.
Heh heh. Wow, Drill. That’s a lot of bile in a little space.
Drill, take a deep breath, find a zen place, count to ten, and then tell us rationally why you think it unjust to censure McCain for soliciting the support of a well-known bigot.
The Hagee/McCain thing is being blown out of proportion. And so is the Wright/Obama thing. Both are minor issues not deserving of the over-wrought attention that partisans on both sides have brought it. Of course our media is all to happy to fan the flames of controversy to drive up their ratings and income. It distracts from the real problems and issues that our nation needs to deal with.
anlir post 18,
what, you mean economic policy, foreign policy, energy policy, and positions on the constitution might be more important than who someone was accidentally at the same meeting with???
This is down right unAmerican AND likely to help kill off the celebrity pressette publications.
Naughty naughty!
JJF - “Except that Obama unreservedly denounced Farrakan”
Except when he doesn’t denounce him - like at all black Chicago functions where it is to his advantage to be friendly with that faction.
Has McCain ever met Hagee? Is there any connection at all?
As for being anti-Catholic, please define the word Protestant.
While I have many Catholic friends and love them dearly, if the subject is theology then I and all Protestants are by definition fundamentally anti-Catholic (except in cases where their views align with the Bible).
Denouncing theological heresy (whether Catholic on Protestant or Protestant on Catholic or High Buddhist versus Low Buddhist or Eastern Wiccan versus Western Wiccan) in terms of lamenting moral and spiritual false doctrines, hardly qualifies as raw racist bigotry and hatred.
There is a huge difference in 1) publicly wishing God will damn America, inciting racial hatred and lionizing cop-killers and racist thugs and 2) believing that someone theologically opposed to you is in error, and dangerous spiritual error at that. That first type would be Obama, by the way - Wright is nothing, just Obama’s mouth-piece - Obama is the key figure here.
Wright is simply saying what Obama has been actively pursuing for twenty years and more - until recently, when Obama and his handlers found enough television-educated morons and racist haters to push him into the campaign for the presidency.
As you full well know. And yet you chose to attempt to pretend that your Emperor is clothed; when he is naked as a jaybird. You waste your own time and you waste others time with your totally absurd attempts to muddy the waters.
As I said, support your candidate without lying and attempting to fabricate crap about his opponent - or opponents. But I won’t be too optimistic on that. I really don’t think you are capable of anything but.
JJ — So you believe that sitting silently in a pastor’s church is tacit endorsement of his ideology (Obama-Wright), but writing and calling a pastor to ask that he publicly throw his clout behind your campaign is not endorsement of his ideology?
Roger — I said nothing about Obama; I questioned whether Clint’s statement that “Hagee had the marks of McCain’s own Jeremiah Wright” was fair given that Obama’s comments about his pastor are not at all similar to McCain’s seeking the endorsement of Mr. Hagee.
Contrary, to the picture you painted, i.e. a man sitting silently in church, Obama openly praised his mentor early in his campaign.
I don’t remember hearing McCain openly support Hagee, or endorse his views.
Xion — Has McCain ever met Hagee?
Roger — I recall watching Hagee give his endorsement while McCain stood behind him. I can only assume they met each other.
Musing — but what does it say regarding McCain’s solicitation of Hagee’s endoresement and prominant placement during key news events?
Roger — First answer my question. Is the act of an endorsement asymmetrical or not?
xion post 21,
it appears tha the followig captures the situation reasonably well:
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/02/28/hagee-mccain-endorsement/
the reports suggest that McCain sought Hagee’s endorsement, and was on the stage with McCain at the time of the announcement of the endorsement.
roger post 23/25,
well let me see, I can resturcture you r question as follows:
Wright actively solicited Obama when young to join his church. And Wright’s church observationally does perofrm some very good works.
McCain actively solicited Hagee’s endoresement fully knowing in advance hagee’s reputation and positioons.
You are right: the tow situations are assymetrical. from a moral perspective McCain actively courted forcres of what are arguably called hate. Obama was first solicited by a man doingvery good work who over time showed that he also had a hateful side.
I do suggest that if you insist on assymtetry, the assymetry palys againts McCain.
To aregue for Wright being an issue for Obama will I suggest require a different tack.
Observatonally last night suggests that whatever tack is used in linking Wright to Obama will have minimal impact on the electoral process moving forward.
so roger raises an interesting point on the assymetry of the Wright:Obama, Hagee:McCain question.
Arguably the assymetry of the volitional actions present a starker picture for McCain’s situation than Obama’s, but lets let this one lay for a while.
Lets look at the elctoral assymetry.
Conservative Christian’s observationally, as shown in this blog, rationalize a difference between the Wright and Hagee situations.
But very few Conservative Christians are going to vote for Obama or Clinton. Their position on Wright does nothing to change this electoral dynamic.
Very few Obama supporters take the Wright challenges seriously. Obama appears to be taking the position that attacking McCain on the Hagee situation is dilatory. Again no change on the electorate.
Clinton is unaffected by Wright, and may decide to leverage Hagee in the general election were she to win the Democratic nomination. Unfavorable to McCain: conservative Christians are presumably now hoping for an Obama victory.
So the question as usual rests with the independents. And so the questions: do the independents differentiate between Hagee and Wright? I suggest given the high level of symmetry of the Wright Hagee situations from the first order view, that they do not. What Hagee will do, however, is trigger a reexplooration of the Robertson, Falwell et. al positions. I do suggest that this will at best be neutral for Conservative Christians and very probably be highly negative. Hagee, Robertson, and Falwell demonstrate anti-patriotic behavior which will I suggest be very troubling for the independent voter. And this has the potential to have impact which will spill beyond the immediate campaign, and will not be to the advantage of the Conservative Christians.
So yup - lets ocntinue to push the Wright issue. I think it is a wonderful idea. I look forward to some more rancorous discussion so we can continue to explore the less savory statements by Conservative Christian pastors who have made ill considered statements in the past.
P.S. there is one card which might provide some cover for Conservative Christians: most conservative Christian Pastors who are politically active are white. Wright is black. Do Conservative Christians want to openly play this card?
Musing — well let me see, I can resturcture you r question as follows:
Roger — This is why I have stopped talking to you. Why “restructure” the question? If you can’t answer my question the way I stated it, then ask for clarification.
roger post 29,
but I did indeed answer your question as posed. I liked your model of assymetry and showed how I believe it applied to the Hagee:McCain situation vs. the Wright:Obama.
Now if I was supposed to only return your canned answer to the question, why ask me the question: you already know the answer you apparenlty insist you want to receive. And it does appear based on your response that any other answer will not be acceptable to you.
You asked what I considered an excellent question and I have duly credited you with the insight to pose the question and used it as raw material for further discussion. I am unsure how discussions can get better than this.
Musing asks: “I am unsure how discussions can get better than this.”
Well, for one: Try honesty, if it is even in your universe; eternal weaseling is not the hallmark of good discussion.
It’s more of a waste of everyone’s time.
Your motto, rather than ‘I think, therefore I am’, should be ‘I weasel, therefore I am.’
Thank-you Drill
roger post 32,
so lets look at the discussion:
roger post 25:
“Roger — First answer my question. Is the act of an endorsement asymmetrical or not?”
musing post 27:
“so roger raises an interesting point on the assymetry of the Wright:Obama, Hagee:McCain question.
Arguably the assymetry of the volitional actions present a starker picture for McCain’s situation than Obama’s, but lets let this one lay for a while.”
So it would seem I answered your qyuestion regarding the assymtery of the endosement directly.
I sense, however, that you did not like my answer, which you are free to do,.
Instead, however, you seem to be unsettled that your question led me to consider additional ramifications of the assymetry
So it would seem I answered your question.
It would seem that I extended your question
It would seem that I credited you with the insight to raise the issue.
So my tentative conclusion is you appear to be upset because I did not give you the answer you wanted.
So if you want an specific answer, don’t ask the question, just make the point. And don’t waste my time by pretending you want my thoughts and opinions.