The death of a Pope is a time for assorted reflections on the Catholic Church. Protestants can be wary of speaking up. Even the word ‘Protestant’ is not a very familiar one these days. Sure, most of us know that the Church of England is Protestant, and that Luther was Protestant and that the Reformation was the birth of the Protestant movement. But the Church of England doesn’t draw attention to its Protestant identity. There’s a vague sense that to do so would be bigoted. For doesn’t Protestant mean anti-Catholic?
The last proud Protestant was Ian Paisley – and even he softened in old age. It is now widely felt to be embarrassing that the British constitution has an anti-Catholic aspect (the monarch is still not allowed to be a Catholic, though the ban on marrying a Catholic has recently been lifted).
Protestantism still has much to learn from Catholicism
So the old sectarianism is dead and gone, to the relief of all, and mutual respect reigns supreme. But not quite. It seems to me that the playing field is not very level. If a Protestant suggests that Catholicism is rigid and reactionary, that is seen as the bad old bigotry, but if a Catholic denigrates Protestantism – as weak, wet, muddled, spinelessly in thrall to secular trends – no one blinks.
Traditionally there were two main grounds for opposing Catholicism. It was seen as linked to tyranny. And it was seen as clouding the Christian message with made-up rules and rituals. Of course, these criticisms were often crudely expressed, and accompanied by terrible bigotry. But I suggest that neither of them has become entirely redundant.
Modern British politics was born kicking against Catholicism. By the late seventeenth century, ‘liberty’ was central to national identity, and it was decidedly a Protestant rather than a Catholic thing. Why? Because the Catholic Church opposed freedom of religion and favoured ‘absolute’ monarchy. Admittedly, most Protestants were not very good liberals either, but the aspiration was there. But the Protestant state didn’t allow religious freedom for Catholics! True, but Catholicism was viewed in much the same way as communism or Islamic extremism: a total ideology that had to be banned, if frail liberty was to have a chance. There was a huge political difference between Catholic and Protestant: only one favoured political liberty.
The reader probably assumes that this difference had faded away by the early twentieth century. No: for most of the century the Church was in cahoots with extremely right-wing regimes; only in the 1960s did it officially agree that religious liberty was a good thing. And of course its affirmation of liberal values has remained incomplete. You could say that it still associates Christianity with nostalgia for a pre-liberal order, in which the Church has cultural supremacy. Protestants (or rather the majority of them) are more affirming of the liberal state, and the principle of secularism. They should feel free to say so, even if it means sounding critical of other Christian traditions (by the way Orthodoxy is also wide open to such criticism, as its Russian version shows).
Many readers will be shaking their heads sadly: what a shame that I want to reheat a dated polemic. Let’s move on, and assume that these days all forms of Christianity sincerely seek the best political outcomes. But why should Protestants be pressured into shutting up? The fact is that most Protestants see Christianity as firmly in tune with modern political ideals, and this puts clear water between them and Catholics. This is fundamental to their identity: why shouldn’t they too take pride in their identity?
The other grounds for opposing Catholicism is that it clouds the Christian message with rules and rituals. This is, of course, the original message of Protestantism. Luther’s first target was the web of rules around penance that the Church had developed; this became an indictment of a whole religious culture.
In this case, political correctness is even stronger, for Protestants are liable to offend Muslims and Jews as well as Catholics when they focus on the question of religious rules. Among monotheists, Protestants are uniquely averse to religious rules. They reject the idea that certain moral rules express God’s will; they say that the gospel frees us from this ‘legalistic’ approach. So Protestants naturally resist a hard line on abortion, divorce and homosexuality. Again, this is central to their identity, they should take pride in it.
My comments might seem to jar with Pope Francis’ reputation as a lovely liberal grandpa type. Hmmm. I’m a bit wary of that reputation. It seems to me that the Catholic Church has been doing an odd variant of ‘nice cop, nasty cop’: nice pope, nasty rules. I’d rather that the Church began to reform its rules, than confusing critics with an open-minded front-man.
It is good, at least, that Protestants and Catholics have become wary of offending each other. But we should be allowed to criticise each other’s religions. And in a funny way, a more liberal form of religion has it hands tied these days. For it is assumed that one cannot be authentic and serious without being distinctive and counter-cultural. And Protestant identity overlaps with the mainstream liberal culture, making it rather invisible.
As you might expect of an Anglican, my position contains ambivalence. I admire much about Catholicism, especially its confident affirmation of ritual. But ‘ritual’ is too small a word. I mean its deep knowledge that religion is as big as culture, not an odd compartment of it. For most of its history, Protestantism got too close to a bloodless rationalism and lost sight of the dramatic otherness, or weirdness, of religion. In fact, I was first struck by this when Pope John Paul II died in 2005, and huge crowds, from all corners of the globe, converged on Rome in a festive spirit despite their grief. Watching the coverage, I had a twinge of faith envy: this form of religion was not abstract and muddled and weak, as Anglicanism often feels. It was a world-sized show, a purposeful pageant, colourful, alive.
So, to attempt a conciliatory conclusion, Protestantism still has much to learn from Catholicism. But it should not be ashamed of its stating its core difference, though of course it will sound like the carping younger brother.
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