181 CHRONICLESncally extolled in Catholic education. This political doctrine,nsooner or later, was bound to have its effect on thenoutlook of the Catholic Church in America.nAlexandre Vinet, the Reformed Swiss theologian, warnednus ages ago that in a synthesis of Christianity and democracy,nthe latter would finally devour the former. Little was itnrealized that, psychologically, there yawned an abyss betweennthe patriarchal Catholic outlook and the “democratism”ndominating the lower American scene. Thenlouder American ‘Trotestants” voiced their suspicion thatnall Catholics must be royalists at heart and that the CatholicnChurch was really a monarchy, the more frantically manynAmerican Catholics emphasized their boundless venerationnfor democracy—pardy in order to prove their so frequentlyndoubted loyalty to America.nAs we can see, American Catholics—qua Americans—noften had chips on their shoulders. They were considerednimmoral, and thus they asserted their Jansenistic puritanism;nthey were called illiterate, and thus they establishednmany more schools than any other religious community;nthey were suspected to be unassimilable aliens, and thusnthey protested their patriotism; they had arrived as pennilessnpaupers, and thus they climbed as a group economicallynhigher than any other group (if sociological data gathered bynthe University of Chicago is correct). American Catholicsnwere overly keen to prove to all and sundry that they weren”not different from the rest”: hence also their enthusiasm inndropping a language as outlandish as Latin in their ritual,ntheir delight at no longer being called “fisheaters,” their joynin shedding countless characteristics which in one way ornanother distinguished them from the rest of their fellowncitizens. Universities formerly well-known as “Catholic”nhave made great strides in that direction. It might be arguednthat such schools removed crucifixes from classrooms innorder to get Federal aid, but this is not the only explanation.n(I know of a Catholic institute of higher learning where anbrilliant, internationally famous scholar received no appointmentnbecause an administrator considered him to ben”too Catholic”) The alacrity^shown by nuns in sheddingntheir religious garb, the issuing of religious textbooks whichncarefully avoid the supranatural, the eagerness in transformingntheir Church into some sort of organization fornmere social services, to make her appear like an unprinciplednassociation of harmless do-gooders, all point in thatndirection.nTrue, there was a crisis everywhere after Vatican II, butnin the Netherlands and, even more so, in the United Statesnit assumed a specific character. The symptoms had alwaysnbeen there: a lot, in addition, was sheer reaction. A nationalnfiag next to the altar? (I would not tolerate this in our localnchurch, but today certain American bishops seem to benready to offer their country to the Soviets on a platter.)nLacking in America was the characteristic anticlericalism ofnthe Catholic World, but it always lurked well-hidden in thenbackground. A young priest in Austria, obviously, wouldnnot dare to call a gray-haired lady by her first name. I havenheard American mothers calling their own priestiy sonn”Father,” a form of address reserved with us for members ofnreligious orders only. In Poland, it is “Mr. Priest.”nPastors with the humility of St. Jean Vianney, the Curend’Ars, did not abound in America. The lay editor of thennndiocesan weekly would kowtow before the old monsignornwho really ran the show: the lay professor in Catholicncolleges would tremble before his clerical superior. Now, inna way, this has come to an end, and in a way it has not. Innthe old days the people, by and large, were near to theirnpriests, the grumbling of certain intellectuals (good and badnones) notwithstanding. Now there is, interestingly enough,na gap between them. The crisis descended from the top, yetnthe people were more steadfast than their clerical leaders.nMany of them no longer are respected. Some of the bishopsnhave become bombinantes in vacuo.n. I think that there must have been something wrong aboutnthe education of American priests. Once the director of anseminary, looking over a group of his students, said to mensadly: “All mechanics with Roman collars.” Scholasticismnalone dominated the scene, the leading theological periodicalsnwere called New Scholasticism, The Thomist, ThenModern Schoolman. Roman precepts were meticulouslynobeyed, but there was always an undercurrent of resentmentnagainst the “Italian” capital. The narrowness was oftennunbelievable and a weekly like Commonweal once had antruly important part to play. (“Officially” it was not Catholicnand thus could boast of having no “moderator.”) There wasnthe Legion of Decency which could have had a constructiveninfluence but came to the most incredible decisions andncoaxed the faithful into obedience to their often ludicrousnjudgments. The Legion banned some of the best Frenchnfilms, like La femme du Boulanger or Regain, not becausenthey were French (and hence obviously immoral), butnbecause they featured “illicit love.”nAmong the American bishops there were only few of realneminence; they were rarely scholars or saints but primarilynadministrators. A brilliant man like Bishop Wright ofnPittsburgh (later Roman Cardinal and head of all secularnpriests), a genuine conservative, was a rare exception.nCardinal Spellman was perhaps neither a saint nor a scholarnbut an excellent organizer and, at least, a man of principlesnand a patriot. But the average? I once asked an urbanenbishop in the Middle West what would be the chances for anman of Boston Brahmin stock, an exceptionally gifted,npious Catholic convert and priest, to join the ranks of thenhierarchy in the United States. The answer, given with ansardonic grin and in all candor, was: “None whatsoever.”nStill, the bishops of the U.S. show sometimes unexpectedncourage which is truly needed for talking about things ofnwhich they know so littie, as, for instance, politics andneconomics. If you listen to some of them you get thenimpression that they think economically in the terms of anprison cell in which there are four inmates and one is anhuge bully who deprives the rest of half of their dailynrations. He gets stronger and stronger, the others weakernand weaker. I grant that this, indeed, forms a “socialnproblem.” In that fatal cell, however, there are only fournwalls, four stomachs and a lavatory, and this situation offersnno analogy whatsoever to a free economy in a free society,nwhere the surplus values of “capitalists” and managers by nonmeans “go down the drain.” Yet practical economics andneconomic theories have for a long time been the Achilles’nheel of the entire Orbis Catholicus. Hence the weird texts ofnepiscopal pronouncements in matters where fools rush innand angels fear to tread. (Has not the servant who didn