Of Wendy Wagner, Barack Obama, and Paula Deen

St Patrick's Church of Irleand (Anglican)

Cathedral, Dublin

I am anxious to get back to the issue of Anglican history but history happens faster than one can chronicle it and there are several items in the past week that I want to address before we go back to what I think will be the most fascinating chapter of Anglican history—the separation of the Church of England from the Roman Communion.  As we have seen the Church of England does not begin with Henry VIII but is an ancient institution going back to the Roman occupation of Britain, perhaps as early as the end of the first century in the common era.  And we have seen that the term “Anglican Church”—Ecclesia Anglicana in Latin—was used for at least three centuries before  Henry VIII ascended the throne.  But I digress.  I want to bring up the fabled bugaboo of the wing-nuts, the right wing wing nuts that is, President Obama.  The crazies are after him for “decrying” Catholic Schools in Ireland and calling for them to be abolished.  Of course, this has nothing to do with the facts, but then the crazies don’t need facts when they have opinions.  Just ask Wendy Wagner of Leesburg Virginia who says that she doesn’t hesitate to tell people how they need to think.  Ah yes—“don’t think for yourself—we’ll do your thinking for you.”  Whether is a dyspeptic matron from Loudon County or a corpulent Cardinal from Rome, no thank you.  God gave me a brain and I will think for myself.  It is I who will stand before the Judge of the Universe some day and be quizzed on my record; it is I who must make the decisions since it will be I who bear the responsibility.  But I digress.
When the President spoke in Belfast last Sunday, June 17^th, he said:

“There are still wounds [in Northern Ireland] that haven’t healed, and communities where tensions and mistrust hangs in the air.” … “If towns remain divided – if Catholics have their schools and buildings, and Protestants have theirs – if we can’t see ourselves in one another, if fear or resentment are allowed to harden, that encourages division. It discourages cooperation.”

Northern Ireland has come a long way since President Clinton mediated the “Good Friday Peace Accords” of 1998.  Sectarian violence has receded and Catholics have been given a more proportionate share in the economy as well as government and social services.  But prejudice, anger, and hatred still simmer below the surface.  And the separate schools do not help but provide reinforcement for the stereotypes and intolerance that still run through Northern Ireland society. 

You will notice that the President challenged not Catholic Schools but sectarian schools—Catholic or Protestant—in Northern Ireland.  Don’t compare the situation in Ireland—North or South—to the American experience of Catholic Education.  The Republic of Ireland, which does not include the six counties of “Northern Ireland,” has an excellent system of public schools.  It does not have “parish schools” as we have had in the United States and what Catholic Schools there are, are what we would call “private schools”—rather upper crust and select—and inclusive of students from a variety of religious backgrounds.  Unlike American public schools, there is room for religion in the public school curriculum.  The vast majority of citizens in the Republic are Catholic.  Until the recent scandals the vast majority were devout Catholics.  But the Catholic Priest, Church of Ireland (Anglican) Minister, Methodist and Presbyterian Parson all have access to the school where their congregants study to teach religion to their respective students.  Such public schools put Catholic and Protestant youth on the same teams rather than pitting them against one another.  Friendships are formed across denominational lines.   And the political, social, and economic tensions that continue to divide the Catholic and Protectant communities in the North have long vanished in the South. 

It is a bit of a canard to go after President Obama for “attacking” Catholic Education when he did nothing of the kind.  But then the voices raised against him are the same voices that decry his administration’s lead on health care , immigration reform,  same-sex marriage,  and other contemporary issues. And the dissatisfaction with these policies more often than not is, like this flap over Northern Ireland, based on faulty facts and distorted simplifications.  It becomes obvious over a period of time that the problem is not the issues, but the man.  And what is there about the man that excites such anger?  Hmmm.  The answer is too obvious to name, is it not, Paula Deen?

The Knights and the Leesburg Crusade

Now, I admit it is a bit secular but wouldn't it be

nicer at the Courthouse than a skeleton in a Santa

suit--and more traditional too, in fact more in Virginia

tradition than a creche. 

There is definitely something in the water in Loudon County Virginia that causes Virginians to alter their reality coordinates.  Jeff Heflin and his mother mounted a holiday display of a crucified skeletal Santa Claus on the Courthouse lawn.  Now that may sound bizarre to you, but it is only the latest chapter in a long saga of religious wars in this solidly Christian and Republican town.  Leesburg, by the way, is the home of former Senator Rick Santorum, currently a 2012 presidential candidate, and the tainted water theory probably explains quite a few things there as well. 

      The issue began several years back when the County government said that there could be no holiday displays mounted on the Courthouse lawn in the center of Leesburg during the Christmas season.  Loudon County is pretty solidly Christian with both strong Evangelical and Catholic contingents.  (The Evangelicals represent many of the long-time residents; the Catholics came mostly with the housing developments that have just swamped this once charmingly rural area into what is now a bedroom-suburb of Washington DC, about an hour to the south along the Potomac.)   Many residents were outraged that there would be no crèche on the Courthouse lawn.  There had been a crèche placed there at private expense for over twenty years and the Rotary club had sponsored a Christmas Tree there for half a century. 

     Knights of Columbus Holy Family Council 6831 attached to Saint John the Apostle Church in Leesburg was not about to stand by for this secularization.  They organized a protest that led the County Board to reconsider the policy and the board decided in fairness to all citizens ten displays could be put on the Courthouse grounds on a “first come first serve” basis.  What the Knights had not foreseen was that not only would Christian groups with good will for all vie for Christmas displays, and perhaps a Jewish group would want a Chanukah display (there aren’t many Jews in Loudon County), but atheist groups might want their displays as well. (I am unaware of any requests from Islamic groups, but that would provoke an interesting response.)   In fact, since atheism isn’t seasonal, disbelievers mounted displays throughout the year.  Now as a reward to the Knights’ efforts, there is a war of competing ideologies going on in the middle of this otherwise quaint town.  It is a bit confusing about this crucified Santa however as the woman who put it up is an atheist but her son who helped her is a Christian.  They claim that it isn’t a pro-atheist statement but rather a “piece of art” that draws our attention to how the true Spirit of the Season has been corrupted into gross materialism.  Well, they do have a point but the work is somewhat ambiguous.  Art, after all, says what the viewer apprehends not necessarily what the artist intends. 

      Anyway, we owe this imbroglio to the Knights of Columbus who undoubtedly meant well but who opened Pandora’s Box of religious strife.   The Knights are now insisting that Christian displays be allowed but that atheists not be given space on the Courthouse lawn.  That solution will obviously not hold up constitutionally.    Tempers are running high in Leesburg and the Prince of Peace is becoming a symbol of civic strife—not for the first time in history.      Of course in colonial days when Leesburg had its origins there would have been no issue.  There would not have been a crèche—far too Catholic in a colony where Catholicism was illegal.  There would have been some festive holiday greens perhaps.  The Christmas tree had not yet come from Germany but Virginians draped laurel and evergreen and holly swags and wreathes to cheer them against the cold days and long nights of winter.  Perhaps if there is to be decoration of public property it should be this discreet sort of greening and let the religious displays be made on private and Church properties.  A crèche on the lawns of the Presbyterian and Methodist and Catholic  Churches would be lovely and a contest among them good ecumenical fun;  an electric Menorah at the synagogue (though I think Leesburg’s solitary synagogue is pretty far out of town center) would be pretty silhouetted against the darkening skies of December would non-offensively to anyone give hope.   And you know, I don’t think anyone—even an atheist—would really want a crucified Santa in front of their home.  As for the Courthouse, deck the halls and call it quits.  Besides, the lawns, though spacious, are not nearly expansive enough to handle ten displays without looking tawdry.    And Knights—let’s do something constructive that reminds the world that Christ came to gather all people together into one and not to stir up sectarian strife.  Crusades are over.  They were a disaster.  This is the age of Pacem in Terris.