What we have here is a classic example of a valuable Beltway skill — the non-apology apology. Basically, the person in the news says, “I am very sorry that you were offended by something that you thought that I said, when I really said something else.”
We are, of course, talking about the letter to the Catholic League sent by the Rev. John Hagee, the televangelist/pastor who endorsed Sen. John McCain. GetReligion has been following the coverage of this story for some time now, and there isn’t a lot of new material in this new variation on the them.
Still, covering this kind of after-the-media storm mini-story can be tricky, in part because it requires the mainstream reporters to briefly summarize what Hagee has been saying, as well as what his critics say that he has been saying. Here’s some material from the top of the short story in the Washington Post:
… (Pastor) John Hagee, a McCain supporter whose controversial comments about Catholicism angered church leaders, issued a letter of apology to the president of the Catholic League, who heartily accepted it. In the letter, Hagee admitted that he “may have contributed to the mistaken impression that the anti-Jewish violence of the Crusades and the Inquisition defines the modern-day Catholic Church. It most certainly does not.”
Hagee, an evangelical who has been outspoken in his support for Israel, had enraged Catholics with statements about the “apostate church” and the “great whore.” He said in his letter that he meant neither of those to apply to the Catholic Church. He continued: “I pledge to address these sensitive issues in the future with a greater level of compassion and respect for my Catholic brothers and sisters in Christ.”
Catholic League President William Donoghue accepted the apology.
Of course Donoghue accepted the apology, in large part because he is a leader in a certain stream of Roman Catholic life — pro-Vatican — that tends to produce a certain type of “Catholic voter.” Remember that typology from the other day? Here are those four “Catholic vote” groups, again:
* Ex-Catholic/estranged Catholic vote.
* Cultural Catholic/several Masses a year Catholic vote.
* Sunday only, I’m OK at the American-Catholic-doctrinal-cafeteria vote.
* Catholics who sweat the details and go to confession vote.
So Donoghue embraced the apology, while many other Catholics declined to do so. Care to predict some of the doctrinal and political ties among those on one side or the other, when it comes to the status of the Hagee apology?
Meanwhile, our friends over at Beliefnet.com have plugged some new Donoghue interview material into their ongoing “God-o-Meter” feature. Check it out.
Here’s a key question in that Q&A:
How far back does Hagee’s record of making anti-Catholic statements go?I wrote to him in 1997 and he never wrote back. We had somebody from our chapter go to one of his events and he had some video that was casting aspersions (on Catholics) and he never answered me.
People like Tony Perkins and Richard Land and James Dobson, we obviously have theological differences, but there has always been comity and an amicable relationship. I get involved with them occasionally on policy things, like Justice Sunday, and Hagee is not only not invited, his name is not even mentioned. He’s kind of out of the loop.
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Comments (15) |
May 14, 2008, at 3:21 pm
Is this typology of the Catholic vote now official? I have my doubts about its usefulness. Certain Catholics vote differently from other Catholics:
1) Black Catholics vote heavily Democratic
2) Hispanic Catholics vote heavily Democratic, though far less so than blacks
3) Female Catholics swing between the two parties, after having been a Democratic constituency
4) Male Catholics are now a strong Republican constituency
5) White Catholics are a marginally Republican constituency in every region of the country, except in the West.
May 14, 2008, at 3:22 pm
The last paragraph says it all to me and is a classic illustration of the intersection of politics and religion:
May 14, 2008, at 3:58 pm
I am not surprised that the “Catholic League” embraced Mr. Hagee’s politics - and that after all is the primary consideration isn’t it, given the political ideology of the officers and board of the League? Their understanding of “Catholic” diminishes the word.
May 14, 2008, at 5:45 pm
No but I can describe mine: I am or at least try to be a faithful orthodox Catholic who obeys the Magisterium of the Church and lives my Catholicism if it were true. And I utterly reject Hagee’s “apology.” If Andrea Marcotte’s outrageous sacrilege was worthy of condemnation — and it certainly was — why is Hagee’s calling us the “Whore of Babylon” not worthy of equal opprobrium? Certainly not because of the quality of his “apology” — as you noted, it was no such thing. Why the selective preemptive graciousness on Donohue’s part?
Dan Crawford has already answered that question.
I can take the political calculation, really. But please don’t insult my intelligence! Don’t go around assuming that people who take offense at Hagee are somehow “bad” or “liberal” Catholics.
May 14, 2008, at 7:22 pm
Is that all he did, “cast aspersionsâ€? Wow, some people have very thin skin. Can someone please come up with some reporting on Hagee’s supposed slanders against Catholics?
I know it’s not PC from someone to say there are differences between Christians or between other Faiths, but doesn’t he, as a Protestant and a fundamentalist Christian, have the right to say “This other church over there is a False Church, in the Biblical sense, because I believe they are wrong on doctrine, and therefore, are endangering people’s salvation”? Most Christians aren’t Universalists… yet. So exposing differences, even vigorously, is fair game - or did the media change the rules on this?
I don’t have a dog in this fight, and don’t exactly care for televangelists because I don’t buy into their teachings or (often) their tactics. But in fairness, I need to see evidence that this guy is more bigoted than all the other Protestant pastors who simply happen to think Catholicism is the wrong way to go. Because that, friends, is a fair case for a Protestant to be making (and vice versa for Catholic Priests re: Protestantism.)
May 14, 2008, at 7:56 pm
Will the press please ask Catholic League President William Donoghue about the Council of Trent?
May 14, 2008, at 11:00 pm
Of course Donoghue accepted the apology. That’s his job. First, it is the Christian thing to do. Second, it is his job to see that those public anti-Catholic bigots are pressured into recanting. His job is to change the public discourse on Catholicism. Even an insincere apology for a still anti-Catholic bigot assures that he will not speak this way in public again.
Well, done, Bill, good and faithful servant.
May 14, 2008, at 11:56 pm
William Donoghue has his own problems. One might reflect as to whether Mr. Donoghue took some lessons about what it is like to be talked to this way.
May 15, 2008, at 8:08 am
I often encounter principled disagreement with the doctrines of the Catholic Faith, occasionally engaging in an enjoyable debate about them. Anti-catholic prejudice is a whole other matter. I often encounter that, as well.
Not engaging in the latter ought to be an ethical matter for journalists; discerning the difference between legitimate disagreement and bigotry (in this and all matters, of course) ought to be a fundamental skill for a journalist.
May 15, 2008, at 2:17 pm
FW Ken:
I encourage you to work hard at living your principles here. In our earlier discussions, when I was disagreeing with so much Catholic doctrine, you used language that made it clear you thought I was an anti-Catholic bigot.
May 15, 2008, at 5:33 pm
Any other stream would be Protestants masquarading (sp?) as Catholics.
May 15, 2008, at 10:21 pm
Dave,
I do think you are an anti-Catholic bigot, based upon your comments on that thread.
May 16, 2008, at 6:14 am
What Hagee said IMHO should be divided into three elements:
1. Criticizing (I use that term loosely) past wrongdoings by Catholics.
2. Bashing the (past and/or present) Church for these wrongdoings.
3. Calling the Church names (e.g. “Whore of Babylon”)
So far, Hagee has only taken back point 2.
He is seriously wrong in his take on number 1 but that is not bigotry in itself.
I haven’t seen him talk about point 3, where the bigotry is most clear.
Fr. J.,
while I agree that you describe Donahue’s role accurately, I disagree that “accepting apologies” is “the Christian thing to do”. No, the Christian thing is to forgive - quite regardless of whether the other guy repents - and quite independently of exposing bigotry. As others have said, the apology was not a full-fledged apology. It serves Donahue’s aims, which you described, well though.
Stephen A.,
May 16, 2008, at 6:17 am
Sorry about the malformat above. It should read:
Stephen A.,
But it isn’t about this but about anti-Catholic bigotry (of the “Whore of Babylon†type). Sure, it is his right to engage in that but it is also the right of others to expose or criticize this. That other Fundamentalist pastors use similar language doesn’t make it better.
Dan Crawford,
in what way does Donahue diminish the word “Catholic�
May 16, 2008, at 8:23 pm
str1977, I suppose one has to determine where the line is drawn when it comes to evaluating speech about religion. Your efforts above (13) are a good start.
Where is disagree is point 3. For a fundamentalist to say “I really think the Catholic Church is wrong on doctrinal issues” is not bigotry, it’s opinion. For someone to call that church names based on his interpretation of scripture may be bad form, or “mean-spirited,” and we have every right to be critical of these mean words. But unless he’s calling for the church to be banned, or for Catholics to be forced out of their jobs, or wear armbands, it’s not “bigotry” in any sense of the word.
We’ve let “bigot” come to mean “anyone who strongly disagrees with me” and that’s simply not the correct meaning.