Why We Picket The Pope -- Spring 1999

Why We Picket The Pope

by Ellen Johnson

As President of American Atheists, Ellen Johnson presided over a special American Atheists conclave in St. Louis at the time of the foray of Pope John Paul II into that city in January of 1999. The theme of the conference was “Opposing Theocracy: Standing up to the Vatican’s Political Agenda for America.” In her speech for that occasion, Ms. Johnson explains why American Atheists always pickets the pontiff’s invasions of America.

hose of you who will be joining us in tomorrow’s picket are carrying on a tradition that began two decades ago not too far from here - in Chicago, in 1979. American Atheists became the first organization in the United States - and possibly in the world - to go out and picket the Pope of Rome. There were 47 people there for that demonstration; because of that, they earned the affectionate title of “The Chicago 47.”

When the pope made subsequent visits to the United States, American Atheists was there too: in Phoenix, San Diego, New York, and Denver. Sometimes we were alone - especially when we demonstrated in Chicago. But as the years have gone on we have found much to our pleasant surprise that at least some groups are now willing to join us on the picket line.

Tomorrow we will be asked by both theists and Atheists, “Why are you bothering to picket the pope?” We are told that we are wasting our time. Some have said, “How dare you picket that dear, sweet man?” Well, I want to discuss the reasons why we are going to picket the pope tomorrow and why we shouldn’t be the only ones out there doing it. The pope has an agenda for America, and it is not just for Catholic Americans. His agenda is intended for all Americans.

Why are we picketing? It is all about freedom and the Constitution. It’s about the freedom to think for yourself, to have control over your own body, to be free from the strictures of religious ideology. It’s about the separation of state and church: it’s about defending our constitutional liberties against the intrusion of religious dogmas. It concerns choice, freedom of the mind, and freedom from religion.

The Roman Catholic Church remains a leading threat to civil liberties, the rights of Atheists (and a lot of other people too!), and the separation of government and religion. It remains in the forefront of the effort to abolish reproductive rights for women. Over the past four years, it has campaigned vigorously against late-term abortions, and the National Conference of Catholic Bishops has even gone as far as to condemn the president of the United States for vetoing bans on such operations. When bishops, archbishops, cardinals, and local priests get on television and talk about the alleged evils of late-term abortions, the real agenda is to use that as a wedge in trying to eventually ban all abortions - at any term and under any circumstances.

What especially outrages me, as both a woman and a mother of two wonderful children, is that a group of men, supposedly celibate, at the urging of a foreign potentate - the pope - want to use the American political system to take away what is a legal right in this country.

The Catholic Church has a new tactic in undermining American women’s access to reproductive services: controlling the hospitals women go to for those services. About sixty percent of women access healthcare through these services. The magazine Nation did a story on this in its January issue, where it reported that:

According to the records of the Catholic Health Association, 10 percent of nonfederal hospitals and 15 percent of nonfederal hospital beds are Catholic. And Catholic hospitals are the largest nonprofit healthcare provider. The Catholic church currently owns five of the ten largest hospital corporations - amounting to more than 800 hospitals and health-care systems and caring for more than 70 million patients.

As Catholic HMOs proliferate, they are serving a growing number of Medicaid patients as well, which is a frightening prospect for low-income women; because as more and more hospitals merge with Catholic hospitals, the result has been that in half of those instances, reproductive health services have either been cut back or wiped out completely. It is called stealth elimination. The result is a healthcare system that effectively bypasses not just Roe v Wade, but Grislwold v Connecticut - the 1965 Supreme Court decision that allowed married couples to use contraception.

Let me assure you that the reasons why the Roman Catholic Church is making war on abortion rights for women isn’t just because they are concerned about clumps of fetal tissue. The real issue here is an old one - the status of women. Western Christianity has served to reinforce the institutions of patriarchy, the notion that women were a form of chattel property, that women should be “silent in the churches” as the Bible commands. Without Susan B. Anthony, Margaret Sanger, Elizabeth Cady Stanton - just to name a few who have opposed this patriarchal system - where would we be today? Do you think that positive change for women would come out of the Vatican?

What about gay rights?
The foreign entity known as the Vatican is in the forefront of the campaign to slur and marginalize ten percent of the world’s population, which happens to be gay. Gay men and women who are struggling for simple legal equality can always count on the full opposition of the Roman Catholic Church. Take the issue of medical benefits for same-sex partners. A few cities like San Francisco, and even many companies such as Disney, are finally enlightened enough to extend equal coverage to both same-sex and mixed-sex partners. When they campaign for that equal treatment under the law, they inevitably have to go up against the considerable opposition of the Roman Catholic prelates.

It never ceases to amaze me how the pope convinces the American people that he truly wants civil and equal rights for all people when it is religious institutions like the Catholic Church that are exempt from all anti-discrimination laws.

Women should be equal with men says the pope. BUT, not in the Church where they cannot be priests. The Catholic Church will take government money to house AIDS patients in their nursing homes but will not follow laws that require safe-sex counseling and condom distribution for those patients. They do not have to abide by fair-employment laws in their hospitals and even claim that hospital unions are contrary to the teachings of Jesus.

So, if you ask me WHY ARE WE HERE? WHY ARE WE PROTESTING? at least part of my answer has to focus on these two issues - gay rights and equal rights for women.

What about the Atheist?
The catechism of the Catholic Church states “Atheism must be regarded as one of the most serious problems of our time.” Well, I guess that reason - rather than superstition - scientific thinking, and love of humans over love of ghosts are all serious problems for the Catholic Church, but not for America. Still, this is Roman Catholic bigotry and every able-bodied Atheist in America should make a point of being here in St. Louis to challenge the words of the Catholic Catechism. When we march tomorrow at the papal mass, another of the points American Atheists will be raising is the issue of diplomatic recognition of the Vatican. In 1980, Ronald Reagan was elected President, and it was under his administration that the US government extended full diplomatic recognition to the Vatican. This makes the Roman Catholic Church both a religious and a political entity. The Vatican is a geopolitical entity: it has ambassadors, it has diplomatic ties throughout the world. It has observers and representatives at the United Nations, and it has an apparatus-of-state working in capitals such as Washington, DC.

Diplomatic recognition of the Vatican is wrong and should be withdrawn. It is unconstitutional; it is violative of the principle of separation of state and church. Non-Catholics - and this includes the 25 million or so Americans who are Atheists or profess no religious belief - are compelled, through their tax dollars, to support this diplomatic arrangement. And this special diplomatic status for the Vatican makes the Roman Catholic Church the only religious entity receiving such special treatment by the US government. No religious entity - Protestant, Jewish Islamic, you name it - is accorded this privilege, nor should it be. So let me say that one of the goals of American Atheists is to call upon the Congress of the United States to end official diplomatic recognition of the Vatican.

When the foreign pope and his prelates call for action against reproductive rights, and the Catholic bishops pass declarations condemning our president, or spend millions of dollars in publicity campaigns for or against legislation (which they do illegally, because tax-exempt religious entities are prohibited from lobbying by the IRS) aren’t they de facto acting as agents of another country? We continue to hear revelations about the soft money scandal which enveloped the 1996 presidential campaign, a scandal which has raised questions about foreign “countries and interests” meddling in our American political process. We would be outraged if the Russian Federation, or China, or any other country - especially one which is not democratic - insisted on conducting political campaigns, threatening candidates and telling voters how to vote on issues which affect our lives. We would be outraged if any foreign leader, whether it be Tony Blair or Boris Yeltsin or Muammar Qaddafi, funneled money into this nation with the goal of restricting American civil liberties, or telling voters which candidates they may select, or threatening political leaders with retaliation and even excommunication (if they happen to be Catholic). But this is precisely what the so-called “Holy See” is doing. Some Catholic officials like Cardinal John O’Connor have even gone as far as to threaten our public officials with excommunication and damnation in hell if they don’t toe the church line on the abortion question.

Funding Parochial Schools
Another issue which has emerged since 1979 is the question of public funding of Roman Catholic and other religious schools. Historically, the Catholics and Protestants have battled each other over control of the minds of the nation’s youngsters. In Baltimore, Philadelphia, and other cities, full-scale riots took place during the nineteenth century, as sectarian mobs battled in the streets over whose version of the Bible was to be used during religious instruction in the public schools.

You can be proud that it was a lawsuit filed by an Atheist, the founder of this organization, Madalyn O’Hair, which was one of the pivotal cases - Murray v Curlett - that ended the practice of forced prayer and Bible-verse recitation in the public schools of America. You can also be proud of the fact that Murray v Curlett stands tall as the first legal suit of its kind that unabashedly stated a case for Atheist civil rights, for freedom from religious indoctrination and coercion. Murray boldly let the world know that, in that case, “Your petitioners are Atheists...”

It was this contest over whose version of the Bible was to be used in the public schools that precipitated the founding of the parochial school system. Today that question faces us as religious institutions mobilize behind the so-called “charter and private school voucher” movement. We know that in city after city, whether you’re talking about New York or Milwaukee, the greatest beneficiaries of voucher programs are the parochial schools, where legal discrimination on the basis of IQ, religion, gender, race, and sexual orientation.

We also know that vouchers and charter schools drain money away from our nation’s public schools. You, as a taxpayer, indirectly fund religious organizations, including schools, through your tax money. You can pay for busing of students, textbooks, and other materials so long as “technically,” that subsidy does not pay for religious indoctrination. But let’s admit it, and stop the legal obfuscation - we all know that the parents who receive the money are simply the conduits for that money to be funneled into the Catholic schools which are nothing more than the extensions of churches.

The voucher issue isn’t about “bettering education” or “putting kids first.” If the supporters of charter schools were really interested in those goals, they would be out supporting the public school system rather than trying to destroy it. It isn’t about creating “safer” schools or “fighting drugs.” It’s about getting rid of the nation’s secular educational system, and herding tens of millions of American youngsters into religious schools. AND, having the taxpayer pick up the tab. That is what it is really all about!

What about sexual crimes committed by the clergy? We will picket the pope tomorrow because he and the popes before him have turned a blind eye to the thousands upon thousands of sexual assaults committed against women and children by those who supposedly should know better - the clergy. If religion makes people more “moral,” then one would think that those who are “professionally religious” would be the most moral. But no. One of the more despicable aspects about the predatory clergy that has so outraged me when reading about these cases in the newspapers is that the church and the clergy never admit guilt and never apologize for their heinous crimes. When the church gets sued over these cases, it pays up and that’s it.

The Church in Your Pocketbook
There is another area I want to briefly talk about, and that concerns the impact of organized religion, and especially the Roman Catholic Church, on our pocketbooks. In 1974, J. P. Tarcher, Inc., published a book written by Madalyn O’Hair titled Freedom Under Siege. It still stands as one of the few books ever published which tried to excavate the truth about the financial holdings of religious groups in America, especially the Vatican. Now, back to an earlier point. I asked: how would Americans react if Tony Blair or Muammar Qaddafi, or some other foreign leader openly and aggressively poured money into the American political process with the intent of electing candidates and influencing legislation. I think most people would be outraged.

So let me rephrase this question: how would Americans feel if they knew that a foreign political entity had accumulated vast financial holdings in this country, everything from real property to financial instruments, and that most of these holding were tax exempt? How would they feel?

Madalyn O’Hair’s book - and remember, this was written twenty-five years ago - talked about the corporations, holding companies, stock portfolios, and other assets which religious groups in the United States had accumulated. Much of it was and is tax exempt. The figures about church wealth were based only on the public record. It told only a part of the larger story. Another point, is that we simply do not know what the total holdings of religious groups are in the United States. It’s generally agreed that the Roman Catholic Church leads the pack in terms of wealth, but because of the tax laws and the history of this nation - and again, I suggest that you get a hold of Freedom Under Siege - because of this, we simply have no way of ever discovering the full holdings of churches and other religious groups. In 1974, O’Hair estimated that the average American was paying hundreds of dollars a year extra in taxes, because the churches didn’t pay anything.

While we’re on the topic of economics, let me just say something about another popular stereotype. One of the arguments we constantly hear as Atheists, especially when we talk about the financial power of religious groups is “Well what about all of the charity the churches provide?” My response is that I am very gratified when religious institutions employ Atheism to help solve society’s problems. After all, feeding, providing medical treatment, housing, and clothing is Atheism. Praying or waiting for miracles is the province of the religious.

Let’s look at some statistics. Since the 1960s, religious groups have moved aggressively into the “business” of obtaining public funding to operate social services. The government has permitted this because it put in place “guidelines” which stipulated that this money could not presumably be used for religious proselytizing, which is the same rationale which is cited on behalf of aid to parochial schools. So, you can have a “Catholic” hospital which accepts Medicare, or a religious agency which runs homeless shelters or other social outreaches and is funded with government money. And for the government, anyway, as long as this funding isn’t used directly for proselytizing, that’s okay.

Most of the money for these religious social services comes from us - the taxpayer. We know that last year, for instance, over 60% of the revenue for National Catholic Charities, Inc., which is the largest religion-oriented charity except for the Salvation Army, came from public funding resources. It didn’t come from the local parishioners or the bishop, or even the Vatican - it came out of your pockets. A lot of religious groups are cashing in on something called “Community Development Block Grants.” This basically doles out government money - your money - to any non-profit organization that has a social program.

So, we have to ask ourselves: why, if we’re going to spend public monies on schools, or shelters, or rehab programs, or anything else, why should it be funneled through religious groups which inevitably end up getting the credit? There’s something else for you to remember. We know that in plenty of cases these religious groups are making money for their administrative services. They’re paying salaries, or the money is moving around and we don’t always have a full accounting, and the religious groups end up benefiting. Let me give you one example, in Perth Amboy, New Jersey - and this is just one example, in one state, that we happen to know about - public money paid for the purchase and renovation of an old movie theater which is owned by a neighborhood church and is used for worship services. It’s also used for other functions which are euphemistically placed under the catch-all phrase of “community services,” but this is all you need to do in order to have the government, that is, you, the taxpayer, pick up the tab.

Unfortunately, I cannot tell you exactly how much money is being siphoned out of the public treasury and into the bank accounts of groups like National Catholic Charities. We simply don’t know. Congress, the Office of the Budget, other government agencies - nobody is keeping any sort of central data base that we know of that provides you with that information. I can tell you that one state where we have begun to investigate, and this is thanks to our New Jersey State Director, Dave Silverman, we’re finding evidence of millions of dollars being funneled into religious social programs. And when you call the government agency that is handing out the money, and you ask what sort of oversight program they have in place to make sure that there is no violation of the establishment clause, or that the money is not being used to facilitate religious indoctrination or rituals, they have no idea. In fact, we know of cases where state attorneys have simply “signed off” on these programs, and there is often little or no follow up or enforcement of state-church separation guidelines. We give them the money, they walk. It’s that simple.

Evading the Reporting of Income
Let’s make one thing perfectly clear about religion and social services. No religious group ever gets into the area of social services unless it can proselytize. This includes hospitals and schools. If they couldn’t proselytize they wouldn’t get involved. And I think it is important to mention one more thing about religion and charity. If an organization provides charitable work, it can take its tax exemption under the category of health, education, and welfare as a 501c3 organization. But, it then has to file form 990s with the Internal Revenue Service reporting annually on what it does with its income. Religious groups that provide charitable services never take that 501c3, because they don’t want to report on their income. They take their exemption under Religion so that they don’t have to report to anyone, not the government and not their followers, what they do with their money.

So, one of the areas that American Atheists is going to be moving into, concerns this whole question of public funding of religion-based groups. We’ve always been told that religious groups are wary of public funding because it might result in their loss of “independence” or somehow “compromise” their outreach. We do not see any evidence of this. In fact, often we see just the opposite. I think that faith-based groups are getting greedier than ever when it comes to finding a way to tap into the public treasury, and they have support for this from both ends of the political spectrum. As you know, we’ve been working hard to establish what we call a “beachhead” in our nation’s capital, Washington, DC, so that we can start monitoring more closely the legislative process. Looking into the next millennium, I see American Atheists getting more involved in the fight to end this dangerous trend toward public funding of religion. We’re up against both the liberals and the conservatives on this one, just like we are when it comes to the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. You have political figures like Congressman J. C. Watts and his American Community Renewal Act, which would prohibit the government from discriminating against faith-based social programs. What Watts’ bill is all about is public funding of religion.

At the other end of the political spectrum you have liberal religious groups like the Call to Action who are demanding a so-called “partnership” between churches and the government. So, looking ahead, I think that the state-church separation fights of the coming years will not just include prayer in schools, or nativity displays at Christmas time, but this whole question of public funding of religious institutions and programs. I think that American Atheists will become more involved in this fight against what amounts to a special religious tax, even if it is an indirect one.

American Atheists opposes the nation’s largest tax-exempt organization, the Roman Catholic Church, calling for social programs which are funded by the American taxpayer. This is what the pope will be speaking about during his visit to St. Louis. Last week he said that “international institutions, national governments, and the centers controlling the world economy must all undertake brave plans and projects to insure a more just sharing of the goods of the world.” He offered the church’s social teaching “as an indispensable and ideal orientation” for governments to follow. Translation: Give the money to the church.

It is hypocritical for the pope to denounce the “culture of consumerism,” or castigate working people who want to enjoy some material pleasures in life, while priceless treasures and trappings adorn the Vatican. I should also note that I recently saw a nun selling religious doodads from a vendor’s cart in a shopping mall. I guess that is not considered materialistic. Don’t get me wrong - even if the pope and the archbishops lived in mud huts and begged on the street for food, even then they should not have the right or the power to dictate the lifestyles of Americans, or anyone else.

Incidentally, I just heard a new phrase to describe secularists. I suspect we will hear it more and more, since a replacement for “Atheist and Communist” has been needed for a long time. The new term is “secular and alienated.” Did you know that you are “alienated?”

The Religious Assault on Civil Liberties
Let’s discuss the religious assault on civil liberties. Religious groups in the United States have always called for the censorship of books, magazine, plays, and other forms of communication. Some of you in this audience (especially if you are a recovered Catholic) might remember the notorious Index which was the Vatican’s official “hit list” of taboo publications or programs which the faithful were forbidden to see. Now, think about that, what kind of social organization, what kind of political or religious movement sets up lists of what it does not want adults to see or read? Now what we see is religious groups protesting anything which they consider to be demeaning or insulting to faith per se. It’s not just the Christian Coalition, or the Reverend Donald Wildmon’s American Family Association. I thing that we also have to start being concerned about the Catholic League for Civil Rights, a poorly-named organization if there ever was one. The Catholic League isn’t about “civil rights.” It is an insult to our intelligence, and to the language, for them to appropriate those words. The League IS about trying to stifle any critics of the church, or those who might make insulting or questioning remarks about the Catholic faith.

As an Atheist, I don’t think that ANY group, or topic should be immune from critical examination or debate. And that includes us. You find Atheists being smeared in all sorts of ways today, especially in the media. I recently saw a poll which suggested that nearly 20% of voters would not cast their ballots for a candidate who did not believe in a god. It’s only recently that Atheists have won the right to serve on juries, or hold public office in some states. If Roman Catholics were discriminated against in this fashion, they would surely be up in arms and invoke the cause of “civil rights.” I don’t see “the Atheist police” out passing laws to restrict what people may write, read, see, or hear. I don’t see us telling women or gays or anyone else what they may do with their bodies.

Let me wrap this up by getting closer to home. We know from past visits by the pope that these extravaganzas never end up being paid for entirely by the Roman Catholic Church. I didn’t invite John Paul II here, and neither did you. Why should we be compelled to finance this or any other visit? I would rather see that money spent on the public schools, not the papal road show.

Recently there has been a spate of news coverage about the Church of Scientology and other religious cults. Scientology is often taken to task for believing that there was an enormous intergalactic battle billions of years ago with disembodied spirits coming to our galaxy. Yet today, in St. Louis, the president, the media, public officials, and thousands of followers will welcome a man who believes that he communicates with a ghost. It is a church which teaches that about 2,000 years ago, the son of a ghost was born of a virgin, performed incredible miracles, died on a cross, rose from the dead, flew off to heaven and communicates his will to the world through papal encyclicals which are divinely inspired. Sorry, but I don’t see any difference between that and the equally bizarre teaching of the so-called cults. I think there is something dangerous and unhealthy when a human being - and that is what Karol Wojtyla, who calls himself Pope John Paul II is - is extolled and worshipped, and praised, and elevated and, yes, deified, the way this man is. No man who truly embraced the notion of human liberty would ever tolerate people kneeling at his feet, kissing his ring, and singing his praises as he parades around in a dress.

Somewhat to their credit, the Protestants have outgrown this ostentatious gaudiness. This is one of the truly dangerous facets of modern religion, and especially the brand peddled by the Vatican - the deification and fatuous extolling of people who claim to be a god’s representatives on earth. In a pluralistic society, which should embrace the concept of human reason, liberty and equality, this papal spectacle is more akin to a royal ceremony. It is a throw-back to medievalism. It is hypocrisy, especially when practiced by a pope said to be “of the people.” If any foreign leader came to our shores accompanied by this type of fabulous and ostentatious display of wealth, pomp, and theater, we would surely send him back home, packing - and rightly so.

My predecessor, Jon Murray wrote in 1994 about the pope’s then planned trip to the United Nations:

John Paul II is truly a purveyor of medievalism in its most base form and should be corralled in the Vatican state as something of a museum piece to be used to educate the youth of the world as to the fallacy of Christian dogma, rather than being allowed to prowl the nations of the world corrupting them. It is beyond belief that an institution such as the United Nations would provide a stage for such as the Pope upon which to preach to the nations of the world and to chastise them against the “evils” of modernism, science, free-thought, and democracy. American Atheists shall do what it can to raise the public consciousness against Vatican imperialism. In doing so, we will be ignored by the media... No one will be able to say, however, that we did not try.

We carry on a tradition of protest and intellectual questioning that began two decades ago. Our numbers may be small, right now, but I think that we make a loud, clear, and necessary statement that we will tolerate no foreign despots, whether they lay their claim to the political or the spiritual realm. We need to remind the American people that not everyone agrees with what the pope and his church have to say. We clearly show, using the best tradition of American protest and freedom of expression, that we intend to exercise that right to speak out against John Paul II’s agenda for the American people.

Our message is clear, forthright, and blunt. No submission! THESE knees will not bend, and these heads will not bow. Maintain the wall of separation between state and church. Question authority, be it political or religious. And stand fast for the ultimate freedom - freedom of the mind!

Thank you.