The Archbishop of New York Should Know Charlie Kirk Was No Saint

This is a modest walk from the residence of the New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan, not far from the Cathedral of St. Patrick, to the studio Fox & Friends In the center of the city of Manhattan. For Dolan, the distance, it seems, has become shorter over time. In his last appearance in the popular right morning talk show, he drew attention to what Charlie Kirk, the murdered founder of Turning Point USA, “Modern St. Paul.

This remark should be noted for several reasons. Firstly, this is absurd on the face. Dolan is the leader of 2.8 million Catholics in the second largest archbishwood of the country, prelahed, which was once considered the first dad born in the United States. For uninitiated, Holy Paul It is a high figure of Christianity, as we know him, the Farisa of the first century, who, as you know, turned to Damascus on the way and preached throughout Asia Minor and Europe. Dolan, of course, is familiar with Paul's messages, the Scriptures addressed to the communities about which he served; Readings from them are a standard part of the Catholic liturgy. Again, he is a cardinal – he probably knows the qualities of holiness. Does he really believe that Kirk embodied them? Many Christians and Catholics, condemning the murder of Kirk, also felt obligated to note their report on racist, homophobic, transfer and anti -immigrant rhetoric and tireless propaganda, etc. These include prominent Black church leadersas well as religious orders, such as Catholic sisters of New York's charity, who also directly criticized the Dulana: “Kirk predictive words do not reflect the qualities of the saint,” they said in statementThe field “Compare Mr. Kirk with St. Paul risks embarrassing the true witness of the gospel and give an excessive sanction in words and actions that cause the pain to the most nations that Jesus calls to love.”

Dolan must Know all this. The charity explanation is that he casually chose his words. He, as you know, is tasty, and a widely viewed morning current -show is only his scene. He became a victim of his own oral incomprehensibility – even on Fox, where he One day it will vulgar This “Donald Trump is seriously treated by his Christian vega.” But there is another possible explanation (which is associated with the second reason why his bizarre Pain noted so much): Dolan knew exactly what he said, and was glad to convey this on behalf of the most reactionary elements of the church. Saint Paul was one of the first Christian martyrs, decapitated in order of Emperor Nero. The movement of the magician grabbed the killing of Kirk to claim him as a martyr in his case. Vice President (and Catholic envelope) JD Wance called Kirk “martyr for Christian faithAt the Kirk memorial meeting in Arizona. Now, having directly connected Kirk with one of the most important figures in the history of Christianity, Dolan provides an authoritative Catholic coating of an ethno -nationalist agenda with clearly authoritarian goals.

It is fair to ask why the Catholic cardinal, who talked (albeit too quietly for some) about the inhuman immigration policy of the Trump administration, will be involved in this site, and why so many other Catholics – destructive figures and ordinary people in the bench – consider the same thing. But, unfortunately, there is a sufficient historical precedent. Before the Second World War and even after that, the Catholic authorities often opposed democratic forms of government, while emphasizing the resemblance to authoritarian. Menuzh of ideas, which included “hard anti-communism, the main drum of anti-Semitism and skepticism regarding the democratic policy in the Catholic world in the 1930s,” said historian John T. McGrivi in Catholicism: Global History from the French Revolution to Pope FrancisField

The institutional church and many of its local leaders supported the fascist dictators in Spain (Franco) and Italy (Mussolini), and although the Catholics, as a rule, were more careful in Hitler, they did not reject it at first. The State Secretary of the Vatican Evgenio Pacelli (future Pope Pius XII) praised Hitler for the “Speech against the Bolshevists,” writes McGrivi; When the church signed a diplomatic pact with the Nazis in 1933, known as ImperialPacelli commented that “the Catholics dodged Cultural struggle [culture struggle] Much worse than in the days of Bismarck. ” McGrivi also documents “enthusiasm about Mussolini” among outstanding American Catholics, including Bishop of South Dakota, who compared Il Dusi with George Washington. Charles Koflin-Who considered Charles Lindberg a powerful ally-alleged, transmitting similar feelings, translating millions of millions, a poisonous mixture of anti-Semitic comments, isolationism and supporting the policy of Nazi Germany and fascist Italy. The communist witch hunt, undertaken by the Senator -Republican of the Catholic Republican Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s, was the expansion of these impulses.

The liberal political order created in the post -war years, as well as the reforms of the Vatican II (including support for religious freedom and injunction Not in order to “use coercion in order to force someone to accept the Christian faith against his own will”) showed that Catholicism and democracy can actually coexist and even flourish together. The rudiments of the memories of the destruction caused by nationalist energies forced the governments wary of the nascent authoritarian movements. But with a constant decline in democratic institutions in this century and the growth of populist movements in Italy, Hungary, the United States and in other places this order failed. In American Catholicism, this was accompanied by vocal criticism of the late Pope Francis Archonservative Catholics– Who found him insufficiently devoted To the Church of the doctrine, with a rhetoric, repeating the right-wing military language on various issues, especially in relation to LGBT people. (Until now, dad, born in the USA, Leo XIV seems to have escaped his anger.)

And yet, a more or less basic figure, such as Dolan, seemed a strange bed for believers of the magician, even provided the need for politics. Such an agreement can be partially traced in the informal agreement of American bishops made with evangelical and fundamentalist Christianity in a campaign against abortion, starting with the era of Reagan, which was associated with the rhetoric of confrontation and struggle.

Even today,DobbsThe opposition of abortion should be an outstanding priority for Catholic voters, according to the conference of the Catholic bishops of the United States. In this environment, a new version of Catholic fundamentalism gradually discovered a purchase – a survey of some similarities with previous, Fringe movements of the 20th century, as described in detail by Mark Massk in its most important new book “The Main New Book” Catholic fundamentalism in AmericaThe field is that these movements usually sought to separate themselves from Catholicism Firstly, the disserters in the church itself in the Quixotic struggle with modernity and interaction with secular society. An exception among them was the Jesuit priest of the middle of the century Fr. Leonard Feini from the center of St. Benedict in Cambridge, Massachusetts, whom the mass ascribes to the creation of a “paradigm” for “anti -Modern, reactive and sectarian impulse [that] Alive in the twenty -first century and does not show any signs of disappearance. ”

This impulse finds expression in today's Integralist movementWhich seeks to impose a Catholic doctrine on American society as a whole with the help of aocratic monarchy, which would be the only arbiter of the common good in civil society. This and other conservative Catholic classes are well financed and have institutional bases in places such as Catholic University of America And The Mother of GodIn whose law school, judge Amy Koni Barrett served at the faculty. Reaction Catholics, including those who are associated with Opus Dei, also had a hand Forming project 2025The plan of the authoritarian policy of the second administration of Trump. The movement of the magician benefits from a large and powerful megaphone in the form Catholicwho contributed more than 10 million dollars to help elect Trump in 2024, and whose founder Brian Burch is now the US Ambassador To the VaticanField

All this is to say that the comments of Dulan about Kirke should not be overlooked or seen outside the history. Fox is the propaganda hand of the Trump administration, and the impatient presence of Dolan in its studios implies a degree in which powerful figures inside and are absorbed with the form of the Catholic Church of the United States – and are absorbed – the ethno -nationalist program of the magician regime. After the murder of Kirk, this wicked and completely non-Christian alliance, apparently, strengthens.