Kennedy faced rampant anti-Catholic bigotry when he launched his presidential bid. In some states, his faith was not just an issue it was the issue of his campaign. His critics charged that electing a Catholic president would amount to swearing in the Pope to run America. One wild story claimed Kennedy planned a trans-Atlantic phone cable to connect the White House with the Vatican.
His fortunes began to improve during the primary in West Virginia, a largely Protestant state. Trailing in the polls, Kennedy reportedly asked an aide how he could improve his fortunes. “Convert,” was the instant reply. Instead, Kennedy confronted the issue of religion head on.
“I am a Catholic,” he told a questioner at a campaign event. “I am able to serve Congress, and my brother was able to give his life (in World War II), but we can’t be president?”
Then he stated: “I will not allow any Pope or Church to dictate to the president of the United States.” Kennedy won West Virginia and, whenever religion was raised during a long campaign to the presidency, he affirmed his Catholic faith but pledged allegiance to “an America where the separation of church and state is absolute.”
For Kennedy, that meant splitting his political and religious identities. He became a president who happened to be Catholic, not a Catholic who was the president. To so bluntly make that distinction was new ground in Western politics, and the aftershocks still reverberate today.
It would be a stretch to suggest that Kennedy’s presidency launched the modern age of secularism. The birth of a culture that tends to praise individuality, consumerism and celebrity ahead of God has many root causes. But Kennedy certainly played a part. He led the way for office holders in the United States and Canada to be politicians first and Catholics second.
As a result, Catholic values have taken a steady beating over the past half century as even Catholic politicians, citing separation of church and state, have been silent or complicit as lawmakers keep bending with the breeze of public whim. There is less respect for life, family and marriage in a society that often can’t find its moral or ethical compass. That is as true for individuals as it is for business and political leaders.
It seems unlikely Kennedy could have foreseen all this. But 50 years after his death it is the reality of our times.