Dorothy Day. Robert Ludlow. Daniel and Philip Berrigan. During a "period of cultural and political transition from cold war consensus to widespread public dissatisfaction" the Catholicity of certain American citizens was becoming more and more prominent. [1] Catholic leaders began to have a political voice, and they screamed for pacifism and conscientious objection. Dorothy Day was highly critical of America's occupation with positions of power in French Indochina following the conflict in Vietnam. Through collaborations with The Catholic Worker, a "consistently pacifist" newspaper, leaders within the Catholic Church used Scripture and just-war theory to fight against convictions of military involvement in Southeast Asia.
The authors note that "the Worker was not an official publication of the church, the vast majority of Catholic leaders and church publications could safely ignore it." [2] But I wonder, if America had been more dominantly Catholic--if Catholicism had played a more prominent role in American civil religion--would we not have gone to war in Vietnam? Would "Vietnam" have been something else to us? Maybe more of a mission field than a battlefield?
[1] Anne Klejment and Nancy L. Roberts, The Catholic Worker and the Vietnam War, p. 156.
[2] Ibid., 154.
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