a former altar boy to the national press corps regarding that “devout” Catholic, Rick Santorum [View all]

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Dear National Press Corps,

Please stop describing Rick Santorum as a “devout Catholic.”

Santorum’s a “devout” Catholic only in the same sense Torquemada was a “devout” Catholic.

Pro-war, pro-death penalty, racist hatemongerers aren’t devout Catholics.

Devout Catholics follow all the Church’s teachings, not just the weirder and and most twisted ones on sex.

Also, devout Catholics do not thump their bibles to make even theological points, never mind political ones. We cite saints and the nuns who taught us. Catholics don’t expect public policy to be “bible based.” We don’t want it to be bible-based because for one thing we recognize that the bible is a very mixed up and self-contradicting document, and for another the bible that’s likely to be used to base policies on would be a Protestant bible.

You might want to educate yourselves on the differences between Catholics and Protestants, particularly on the subject of “good works.”

Devout Catholics are more likely to wish that public policy was based on the teachings of St Francis of Assisi. If there’s a part of the bible we’d like to see enshrined into law it’s the Sermon on the Mount. Where in the public blatherings and political posturings of Rick Santorum is there anything remotely like the Beatitudes? Where in his biography since he entered politics is there even a hint that he’s modeled himself or his politics on St Francis’s life and works?

Finally, beware the layman who rattles his beads more loudly and insistently than any nun or priest. He’s trying to hide something.

Thank you,

Lance M******

PS. Also, you should also stop referring to Santorum’s “working class roots.” MBA-lawyer sons of clinical psychologists aren’t exactly Teamsters.