Cardinal Timothy Dolan speaking at a Hudson Institute conference on ISIS. Photo: Hudson Institute.
Not only does the US Conference of Catholic Bishops not necessarily reflect the focus of the papacy, it doesn’t even reflect the beliefs of its members or many of its priests. Instead, these bishops have allied themselves with the ultra-right Christian nationalist movement in the United States; a movement which saw its powers (if not its numbers) increase during the time Donald Trump was in the White House. Calling themselves traditionalists, these Catholics are anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant, anti-gay, and ultimately anti-women. This essentially fascist movement masquerading as a religious one sets the tone of way too many conversations in what the media terms the US culture wars.