The Catholic faith under attack

This has been a disturbing, disheartening and frightening few weeks for Catholics – as it should be for people of all faiths.  A series of arson and vandalism attacks have been sustained by Catholic Churches and their property across the United States.  Many people probably know nothing about this troubling trend in our country because the media outlets have been eerily silent.  Why do hear nothing about these insidious attacks on our deeply held faith beliefs and traditions?  Even the Ancient Order of the Hibernians, the United States' oldest Irish association, has questioned the "deafening media silence" over the attacks and whether the media "has double standards of newsworthiness when intolerance targets Catholics."

On July 10, the Diocese of Brooklyn announced that a statue of the Virgin Mary at Cathedral Prep School and Seminary in Queens had been attacked. According to the Catholic Register, security footage shows "an individual approaching the 100-year-old statue shortly after 3 a.m. Friday morning and daubing the word “IDOL” down its length." Fr. James Kuroly, rector and president of the Queens school, called this “an act of hatred.”

On July 11, at about 10pm, police were called to the scene of an arson attack on the Blessed Virgin Mary outside the church of St. Peter’s Parish, on Bowdin Street in Dorchester. Plastic flowers in the hands of the statue had been set on fire and suffered damage. Pastor John Currie told NBC Boston he "was shocked".

Also on July 11, the Queen of Peace Catholic Church in Ocala was attacked by a man who crashed his minivan into the church and set the building on fire while parishioners were inside preparing for Mass.

Federal and local authorities are continuing to investigate another fire on July 11, that destroyed the roof of the San Gabriel Mission in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. The Mission was being renovated as part of its 250-year anniversary celebrations. Agents from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives were investigating the possibility that the fire was an arson attack.

In recent weeks,  swastikas and anti-Catholic language were painted on the gravestones of Dominican friars  in Providence, Rhode Island.  A statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary was beheaded in Miami.  

Last month, during a riot in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, several hundred people knocked over a statue of Saint Junipero Serra, along with monuments to Ulysses S. Grant and Francis Scott Key, before moving on to deface a bust of author Miguel de Cervantes. On the same day, rioters in Los Angeles destroyed another statue of the saint. On the Fourth of July, rioters in Sacramento attacked a third statue of Serra, burning its face before ripping down the monument and striking it with a sledgehammer while chanting “Rise up, my people, rise up” and dancing atop it.

These acts of pointless vandalism were later justified as having been carried out in the name of justice for the genocide of indigenous peoples — a genocide in which no one has been able to implicate Father Serra.  But as we know, far from oppressing the Native Americans residing in his missions, Father Serra championed them at a time when few would, drafting an extensive bill of rights on their behalf and walking from California to Mexico City to deliver it to the government.  As most missionaries did, Father Serra offered his life in bringing people the light of God’s truth, teaching the Good News of God's salvation in Jesus Christ, and sharing compassionately his love in helping people in every dimension of life. That is what the Catholic Church celebrates in recognizing the holiness of our saints. 

I was struck by the words of Alexandra DeSanctis, a writer for the National Review: 

“There is much to lament about this newfound passion for dismantling monuments and then sanctifying those acts of vandalism with platitudinous nonsense about healing our country from its many sins. The entire process is far less about thoughtfully acknowledging the deficiencies of leaders past than it is about ill-informed citizens’ flexing raw power and watching elected leaders dutifully fall in line. Even at its most considered, the crusade to remove statues seems utterly devoid of any desire to consider our country’s finest leaders in their historical context and understand the fullness of their lives — or so we must conclude, as we watch Christopher Columbus, Frederick Douglass, and George Washington each take their turn on the chopping block. 

That’s the heart of the problem with removing statues before sincerely reckoning with the people and historical moments they represent: How can we decide what to make of our history and the men who moved it without knowing the first thing about them? We are witnessing the extension of thoughtless campus “cancel culture” into the world of public memory and monument, except that the men with targets on their backs are no longer able to defend themselves before the unjust tribunal of the seething mob. It exemplifies the trouble with an ideology so intent on punishing sin and so determined to withhold forgiveness. In the end, I suspect, none of us wants to live in a society where we are forever remembered for the worst things we’ve ever said or done. We should not use that deficient, inhuman standard to judge most men of history. In the case of statues, as in life, men need not be saints to deserve more than that.”

On June 28 in Saint Louis, an angry mob tried to topple the statue of Saint Louis IX, the city’s namesake and a revered canonized saint in the Catholic Church. But in this case a number of brave Catholics stood guard and defended the statue. This group included a young priest named Father Stephen Schumacher who tried to calm the crowd of angry protestors demanding to take the statue down.  “Saint Louis was a man who willed to use his kingship to do good for his people,” Schumacher said through a loudspeaker.  He explained Saint Louis IX’s courageous defense of the Christian faith and extraordinary acts of charity and generosity that touched the lives of countless people who lived in poverty and destitution. The priest attempted to tell the protesters more about the history of the Crusades, but was shouted down several times, while some said, “let him speak.” Schumacher asked the crowd to learn more about Louis IX by visiting the local cathedral to which one of the protestors responded to cheers from the crowd saying: “Eventually, we’re taking that down too, though.”

People have a right to protest and to speak freely and honestly about their grievances.  But no one has a right to destroy property, to vandalize and to desecrate objects that are sacred and dear to other groups of people.  The ends can never justify the means.  Freedom comes with a deep sense of responsibility.  When asked about these acts of destruction, speaker of the house Nancy Pelosi, simply shrugged her shoulders and said “people will be people.”   This is not the kind of leadership that we expect from our government leaders when it comes to protecting our religious liberties.  The media may not cover these heinous crimes and attacks on our faith.  But all people of faith and goodwill must stand up and say enough.  Enough is enough.  We cannot allow those protesting to destroy what is most sacred and dear to our country, to our heritage, to our churches and to our communities.  This is not what people do who want to  build the kind of nation where respect, tolerance, goodwill kindness to others, and where freedoms to life, liberty and religion carry the day, the kind of nation our founders built and many down through the ages have sacrificed their lives in defending -  one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all.   That's a dream we should all share and work hard to make a reality.