America is weird about the Pope
let's talk about the Know Nothings
Early this week, Donald Trump went on a long rant on Truth Social about how the Pope is soft on crime (?) and nuclear war (???), then posted an AI image of himself as Jesus that he had to take down. JD Vance has just told the Pope he doesn’t know enough about theology. Thus the unhinged embarrassment that is the Trump-Vance administration joins in the the long, unhinged embarrassment of American anti-Catholicism — despite the fact that Vance is himself Catholic (though I believe he only converted for political reasons). Every major political movement in America that made anti-Catholicism central to its identity ended in collapse. So, it’s on brand that the losers occupying the White House would take up yet another political and historical self-own.
“A Flood of Popery”! Not to be confused with potpourri
Anti-Catholicism arrived in America roughly when the Puritans did — which makes sense, of course, since much of early Anglo-Protestant identity was constructed in direct opposition to Rome. In colonial America, Catholics were barred from voting in all but three of the original 13 colonies; in Virginia, priests could be arrested for even entering. Maryland, originally founded as a refuge for English Catholics, soon imposed those same restrictions under Protestant pressure, plus more: Catholics were eventually not allowed to own land.
