Why Catholicism is Different

Forgive my tardiness as I've been milking the last ten days of vacation out of summer, but I wanted to offer a response to Rick's post last week in which he wonders why folks like Christopher Hitchens single out Catholicism as a threat to a judge's impartiality. Rick asks "why the possibility of exclusion from the Catholic Church and its sacraments is treated so differently by Hitchens, in terms of its possible corrupting influence on a judge's deliberations, than would be the possibility of exclusion from any other association, institution, or relationship?"

There are two reasons, in my view, why Catholicism is seen as more threatening to impartial judging than other associational ties, even religious ties. Take Catholicism versus Protestantism. First, the vast majority of Protestant denominations are congregational with nothing approaching the hierarchical authority found in the Catholic Church (for better or worse).  Many years ago one of my family members engaged in some outrageously un-Christian behavior and was removed from the membership of our evangelical congregation (by a majority vote of members). This act had no impact on his ability to attend or participate in worship at the church, nor did it hinder his ability to join another church -- even another church within the same denomination. Bill Clinton's public positions or private conduct could get him kicked out of his local congregation, but there's no mechanism (as far as I know) by which the Southern Baptist Convention could have him excluded from all member churches. In other words, the threat of exclusion is much broader for Catholics than for Protestants.

Second, for Protestants, exclusion from the church has little or no impact on their salvation. There is nothing akin to the Catechism's statement that "they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or remain in it." For Protestants, belief on the Lord Jesus Christ (John 3:16) is the whole ball of wax; whether or not an individual is in or out of a church's fellowship is important, but has no eternal ramifications. In other words, the threat of exclusion is much more serious for Catholics than for Protestants. (And obviously, of a wholly different nature than is an exclusion from the Boy Scouts, the 4-H Club, etc.)

To be clear, I agree with Rick and others that Hitchens is wrong, chiefly because it's difficult even to imagine situations where the Church would consider excluding a judge for fulfilling her public duties. But I don't think we can equate Catholicism with other associational ties in terms of the pressure they could bring to bear on an individual member.

Rob