The Transformation of American Catholicism: The Pittsburgh Laity and the Second Vatican Council, 1950-1972

CHAPTER THREE Catholic Separatism and the Opening of the Catholic Ghetto

M          Catholic Separatism and the Opening of the Catholic Ghetto        Communism and affirm society’s spiritual dimension, they also instructed Catholics to create a social and cultural world relatively safe from the forces in American culture that denied the spiritual realm. Catholics were to build and sustain a cultural ghetto that clearly separated them from others.Walls separating Catholics and Protestants on specifically religious matters stood most rigidly, but the limits to interaction existed in a broad range of areas. The ghetto was not a geographical locale in which only Catholics lived and interacted, but rather a cultural and social space in which Catholics could operate apart from their fellow citizens or in ways that distinguished them from their neighbors.Charles Morris suggests in his recent history of American Catholics that Church officials sought to establish, and largely succeeded in creating, a “state within a state,” an environment in which Catholics could “carry out almost every activity of life—education, health care, marriage and social life, union membership, retirement and old age care—within a distinctly Catholic environment.”1 Many separate Catholic cultural practices were unique but not countercultural. They protected Catholics from the implications of full immersion but did not fundamentally challenge or condemn American culture.2 Catholics could inhabit this space safe from contamination and still operate in the public culture. Catholics first constructed the ghetto walls in the nineteenth century when American culture was more overtly hostile to the faith, but maintained the barriers through the twentieth at great economic and social cost. By  Pittsburgh Catholics operated not only distinct worship sites and practices, but an entire school system for many of its children and an elaborate set of social and cultural rules for all which prescribed strong cultural insularity. Church officials worked hard to maintain these rules, and the Catholic discourse consisted in large part of their regular interpretation and reiteration.3 Catholic separatism emphatically prohibited overt attempts to bridge denominational differences and extended beyond into the “secular” world as well. Though the ban on interfaith discussions did not officially extend to nonreligious matters, Catholics constructed a world that sought to minimize such contact. Catholics maintained an extensive array of organizations for the laity, for example, that served primarily to affirm the members’Catholic identity with little other basis for existence. Catholic teachers might belong to the Catholic Audio Visual Educators organization to keep up to date on the latest A/V pedagogical techniques, though no discussion in the Catholic discourse revealed a uniquely “Catholic” take on audiovisual education. Similarly, Catholic physicians might join the Saint Luke’s Guild for Catholic Doctors, and Catholic nurses might belong to the Catholic Nurses Association, though these organizations identified no distinctly Catholic health care perspective.4 Catholic students at non-Catholic institutions could join either the University Catholic Club or the National Federation of Catholic College Students, or both. Catholic students at Catholic colleges might join the latter organization. Though these organizations urged participation in liturgical functions, they served primarily as an avenue for social interaction. Catholic women who worked outside of the home could join the Catholic Business and Professional Women’s Association, a group that met occasionally to provide networking opportunities and to assist programs that the Diocesan Council of Catholic Women sponsored. Even when Catholics interacted with non-Catholics in endeavors the Catholic discourse sometimes created an artificial separation that allowed parishioners to see a separate Catholic world. For example, for a number of years in the s the Pittsburgh Catholic published the National Catholic Welfare Council’s AllCatholic All-American football team roster composed of standout players from Catholic colleges and universities. No all-Catholic league or conference existed from which to choose the players,and non-Catholic players could make the team. So even when the football lives that the players, coaches, and fans experienced did not exist within the Catholic cultural ghetto, the discourse could manufacture its appearance. Similarly, when the Pittsburgh Pirates finally found themselves in a pennant race unusually late in the season (mid-June), the Pittsburgh Catholic ran a feature story on the team’s eight Catholic players and one Catholic coach.5 Catholic Separatism and the Opening of the Catholic Ghetto  M  G W: W, E,  M In Pittsburgh, the Catholic cultural ghetto shaped almost every aspect of Catholic lives, though nowhere more clearly than in the areas...