As the Catholic Right gains strength, one man is trying to ensure the Catholic Left doesn’t get left behind
The political prominence of figures like JD Vance, Marco Rubio, and Karoline Leavitt signals the rise of the "Catholic Right" in the United States. Historically, the Catholic Church in the US aligned with social causes championed by Democrats, stemming from Pope Leo XIII's 1891 encyclical focusing on workers' rights. Catholic support for the Democratic party has become less monolithic since the 1980s, with a sharp decline in support from regular Mass-going Catholics in the 21st century. Christopher Hale, head of "Letters from Leo," is actively working to ensure the visibility and expansion of the Catholic Left, noting that Mass-attending Catholic Democrats under 40 are a small minority.
2 months ago
Prominent Catholic figures like Vice President JD Vance, a recent convert, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt signal the growing influence of the Catholic Right in U.S. politics.1
Social media amplifies conservative Catholic voices, including some far-right figures claiming Catholicism amid racist and antisemitic rhetoric.1
Since Pope Leo XIII's 1891 encyclical Rerum novarum, the Church has championed workers' rights, unions, and labor dignity while opposing laissez-faire capitalism.1
Historically aligned with Democrats—evident in Catholic presidents Kennedy and Biden—the Church was once dubbed "the Democratic Party at prayer."1
Catholic support for Democrats has waned since the 1980s, plummeting among regular Mass-goers in the 21st century.1
Christopher Hale, a Mass-attending Catholic Democrat under 40 and head of the "Letters from Leo" website, represents a minority—less than 10% of Sunday Mass communicants.1
Active on social media (formerly Twitter), Hale engages combatively with the Catholic Right more than most on the Left, positioning himself outside struggling Left institutions.1
Hale warns the Left's post-Vatican II focus on internal reforms like women priests and homosexuality has limited appeal.1
Overrepresentation in Church staff, journalism, and religious orders skews the Left's view toward elites and "professional Catholics," alienating average "Jane-and-Joe" parishioners.1
He urges evangelizing those outside pews, critiquing synodality processes as dominated by functionaries rather than everyday families.1
Hale highlights shared skepticism toward unregulated AI and Silicon Valley's influence as a unifying issue across Left and Right.1
Pope Leo XIV's frequent comments on AI could mobilize Catholics, drawing significant attention to Hale's writings on the topic.1
He cites Rachel Maddow's return to practice—despite her personal life—as evidence that lapsed Catholics remain drawn to the Church.1
Assess Catholic Church’s historical political alignment shifts
The Catholic Church's engagement with political powers has evolved dramatically over centuries, transitioning from symbiotic alliances with monarchies to a posture of independence in the face of revolutionary secularism, ideological condemnations, and modern democratic pluralism. Rooted in its mission to proclaim moral truths derived from faith and reason, the Church has consistently prioritized human dignity, the common good, subsidiarity, and solidarity over partisan alignments. This analysis traces key historical shifts, highlighting how the Church critiqued errors like socialism and unchecked liberalism while adapting to new realities without compromising core teachings, culminating in Vatican II's affirmation of religious freedom and ongoing calls for conscience-formed citizenship.
In pre-modern Europe, the Church enjoyed a close, though often tense, alliance with Catholic monarchies, forming the "throne and altar" model that characterized Christendom for a millennium. This arrangement provided mutual support but subjected the Church to state interference, as monarchs viewed themselves as heads of national Catholicism. The French Revolution (1789) and Napoleonic Wars shattered this paradigm, demolishing monarchies and imposing secularism (laïcité) as a political program aimed at refashioning society around worldly values, viewing the Church—especially its asceticism—as the primary obstacle to "progress."
Post-1801, with concordats like France's limiting state control, the Church asserted itself as a "perfect society"—autonomous, sovereign in spiritual matters, parallel to the state's temporal authority. This marked a pivotal shift: no longer reliant on thrones, the Church freed itself from suffocating royal embraces, embracing a post-Constantinian model at Vatican I and under Leo XIII (1878-1903). Pius VII's resistance to Napoleon exemplified this resilience, dying reconciled while the emperor fell. Thus, revolutions unwittingly advanced ecclesiastical liberty, though at the cost of aggressive secularism.
The 19th century saw the Church confront liberalism and socialism as twin threats to human dignity. Early papal condemnations—Gregory XVI's Mirari Vos (1832), Singulari Nos (1834), and Pius IX's Syllabus of Errors (1864)—rejected liberal notions of absolute religious freedom and indifferentism, insisting coherent societies require religious unity under truth, not procedural neutrality. Liberalism's "deliberate neutrality about ultimate matters" clashed with Catholicism's comprehensive claims on truth, right, and wrong.
Simultaneously, Leo XIII's Quod Apostolici Muneris (1878) and Rerum Novarum (1891) targeted socialism's denial of private property and class warfare, while critiquing laissez-faire liberalism for neglecting the poor. Rerum Novarum addressed industrial exploitation, affirming workers' rights, unions, property, and state duties to protect the vulnerable—principles of solidarity and subsidiarity—without endorsing class struggle or state omnipotence. Leo XIII urged Gospel-based remedies over ideological ones, fostering social transformations like labor laws and welfare. This social doctrine became a "point of reference," evaluating systems by their conformity to Gospel anthropology.
These encyclicals signaled no partisan shift but a defense of the Church's moral authority in politics, rejecting both socialist collectivism and liberal individualism.
The 20th century brought further adaptation. Amid totalitarianism and welfare states, Pius XI and John XXIII built on Rerum Novarum, but Vatican II (Dignitatis Humanae, 1965) marked a watershed: affirming religious freedom as a human right rooted in dignity, without coercion, even as the Church sought no establishment where impossible. This responded to U.S. experiences, where John Courtney Murray argued the Constitution aligned with Catholic principles like spiritual primacy over temporal power.
Scholars debate if this was development, accommodation, or moderate liberalism embrace, but all agree it rejected "doctrinaire" liberalism. Post-VII, the Church engaged democracies non-partisanly, prioritizing life, dignity, and the vulnerable over parties. USCCB's Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship (2023) echoes this: the Church teaches moral frameworks for public life, rooted in baptismal duty, without endorsing candidates. It critiques "photo-ops" politics, calling for principle-driven engagement focused on the weak.
Today, tensions persist in the U.S., where "assimilated Catholicism" allows "personally opposed, publicly supportive" stances on abortion or immigration, criticized as incoherent with Catholicism's public nature. Postliberals, drawing from Communio thinkers like David L. Schindler, challenge "Whig Thomism" (Murray, Neuhaus, Weigel), arguing American "freedom" contradicts Catholic logic, urging the Church to transform culture by fidelity, not policy seats.
Integralists push further, advocating state subordination to spiritual power, but USCCB maintains: principled, non-ideological, promoting dialogue and civility. "Consistent ethic of life" risks equating intrinsic evils (abortion) with prudential matters (taxes), where legitimate disagreement exists per Gaudium et Spes. Recent bishops reiterate: form consciences per dignity, common good; vote values, not parties.
The Church's political shifts—from monarchic alliances, through revolutionary independence and ideological critiques, to Vatican II's freedoms and modern citizenship—reflect not alignments but fidelity to Christ's mandate: teach moral truths illuminating public life. Recent sources take precedence, affirming non-partisan moral witness amid democracy's blessings and flaws. Catholics must integrate faith-reason consciences, transforming politics toward justice, without ideological compromise. This enduring posture ensures the Church remains a leaven for the common good.