Renewed Catholic-Protestant tensions over nationalism, Israel
The evangelical-Catholic coalition that came together on social and political issues over the past three decades is showing some fraying and division, as both conservative Catholics and evangelicals battle over issues such as support for Israel and religious freedom, writes Jacqueline O’Hara in the UK-based Catholic Herald (March 24). The 2024 election and the assassination of Christian activist Charlie Kirk in 2025 set hopes high for a unified conservative Catholic and Protestant front against secularism. But by early this year, “increased political vitriol [was] driving a wedge” between Catholics and Protestants, and what O’Hara calls “growing anti-Catholic sentiment…” In mid-March, Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas promoted an essay, said to be generated by AI, that accused Catholic integralists, those holding to a Catholic political order, of dividing the conservative movement and contributing to the growing evangelical skepticism about support for Israel. The essay strongly criticized traditional Catholic groups, claimed that evangelicalism was inherently connected to Zionism, and accused Catholicism of being anti-Zionist.
Idaho Reformed preacher Doug Wilson drew fire in March for calling Catholic Marian and Eucharistic processions “idolatrous” and saying that in a Protestant America they should be outlawed. Wilson is a frequent participant in National Conservative conferences and was hosted by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth at the Pentagon. O’Hara adds that other commentators have equated Catholicism with growing anti-Semitism on the political right. “Tensions rose to the point that the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops felt compelled to publish a video reminding Americans that the Catholic Church stands firmly against anti-Semitism and discrimination of any kind,” O’Hara writes. Liz Wheeler, a conservative commentator, said that there was irony in the fact that the same anti-Catholic bigotry reflected in a Biden-era FBI memo alleging that traditional Catholics posed an extremist threat was now to be found among fellow conservatives. “The faith-related vitriol on X/Twitter recently is unacceptable and damaging to the conservative movement at large,” O’Hara concludes. “Catholics have no expectation that Protestants subscribe to Catholic beliefs on issues such as Marian devotion or the Real Presence of the Eucharist. They do expect mutual religious respect from their allies against what they see as the left’s hostility to religion.”