October 3, 2025
Cardinal Dolan’s latest remarks about Fox News played in the most reactionary elements of the Catholic Church.

Cardinal Timothy Dolan holds further Fox and friends.
(John Lambarski / Getti)
This is a modest walk from the residence of Cardinal New York Timothy Dolan, near St. Patrick’s Cathedral, to the studio Fox & Friends In Midtown Manhattan. For Dolan, it seems that the distance has become shorter over time. In his latest speech in the popular right morning talk show, he drew attention to Charlie Kirk’s return, killed by Turning Point USA “Modern St. Paul“
Note should be noted for several reasons. One of them is out of place on the face. Dolan is the leader of 2.8 million Catholics consisting of the second largest archdiocese in the country, it was once thought that it was the first Pope born in the US. For the uninformed, St. Paul As we know, this is a sublime figure of Christianity, the first century Pharisee, which is known to have turned into a Damascus and preached throughout Asia Minor and Europe. Dolan is definitely familiar with Paul’s messages, the body addressed to the communities he served; Reading from it is a standard part of the Catholic liturgy. Again, he is a cardinal – he certainly knows the qualities of the shrine. Does he really believe Kirk embodied them? Many Christians and Catholics who condemn Kirk’s murder also felt his duty to note his recording about racist, homophobic, transfobic and anti -immigration rhetoric and tireless propaganda about the gun. These include visible Leaders of the Black ChurchAs well as religious orders, such as the Catholic Sisters of Mercy New York, who also directly criticized the dollar: “The strange words of Kirk do not reflect the qualities of the saint,” they said in A., A. statement. “Compare Mr. Kirk with St. Paul the risk of embarrassing the true witness of the gospel and giving excess sanction with words and actions that hurt the people who calls us to love.”
Dolan worth Know all these things. A charity explanation is that he chose his words carelessly. It is glorious, and the morning -current current is only his scene. He used to become prey to his own verbal unbreakable ability – even on Fox where he Once blurred that “Donald Trump perceives his Christian faith seriously.” But there is another possible explanation (which is due to the second reason that his intricate PAin is so characteristic): Dolan knew exactly what he was saying, and gladly conveyed it on behalf of the most reactionary elements of the church. St. Paul was one of the first Christian martyrs who cut his head into the order of Emperor Nero. Movement of the Magic captured the murder of Kirk to qualify for him as a martyr. Vice -President (and Catholic envelopes) JD Vance called kirk “Martyr for Christian faith” On the Kirk Memorial in Arizona. Now, directly linking Kirk to one of the most important figures in the history of Christianity, Dalan provides a reputable Catholic cover of the ethno -nationalist agenda with clearly authoritarian purposes.
It is fair to wonder why the Catholic Cardinal, who spoke (albeit too quietly for some) about the inhuman immigration policy of the Trump administration, will head to this lot, and why so many other Catholics – public figures and ordinary people in the benches is the same. But, unfortunately, there are many historical precedents. Before the Second World War and even afterwards, the Catholic authorities often opposed the democratic forms of power, emphasizing belonging to authoritarian ones. Melangey ideas that included “a tough anti-communism, the main drum of anti-Semitism and skepticism regarding democratic policy, existed in the Catholic world in the 1930s”, historian John T. McGravi notes Catholicism: a global story from the French Revolution to Pope Francis.
The institutional church and many of its local leaders supported the fascist dictators in Spain (Franco) and Italy (Mussolini), while Catholics were usually more wary of Hitler, they did not at first dismissed it. Vatican Secretary of State Eugene Paceli (future Pope Pius XII) praised Hitler for “opposed the Bolshevists”, writes McGgravi; When the church signed a diplomatic pact with the Nazis in 1933 known as ImperialSettli commented that “Catholics were shying away from Cultural struggle (Fighting for Culture) is much worse than in the time of Bismarck. Charles tile-Who considered Charles Lindberg as a powerful ally-ally-ally, broadcasting the audience of millions of poisonous joint anti-Semitic comments, isolation and support for Nazi Germany and Nazi Italy. Communist witches hunting, launched by Catholic Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s, were the expansion of these impulses.
Liberal political order created in the postwar years, as well as Vatican II reforms (including support for religious freedom and an conflict No “use coercion to force anyone to accept Christian faith against one’s own will”) showed that Catholicism and democracy actually coexist and even thrive together. Preliminary memories of destruction caused by nationalist energy forced the governments alert from the authoritarian movements. But with the constant decline of democratic institutions in this century and the rise of populist movements in Italy, Hungary, the US and other places this order crashed. In American Catholicism, this was accompanied by the vocal criticism of Pope Francis from Arche-conservative Catholics—On found him insufficiently devoted To the doctrine of the church-with rhetoric, which sounds the right war of culture on different issues, especially against LGBTC. .
Nevertheless, the more or less the main figure, similar to the Dolan, would seem like a strange guidance for believers, even gave a policy demand. Such an agreement can be partially traced with the informal pact of American bishops made from evangelical and fundamentalist Christianity in the campaign against abortion, starting with the Reagan era, which was in the rhetoric of confrontation and struggle.
Even today, post-OakThe abortion confrontation should be a top priority for Catholic voters, the US Bishops’ Conference reports. In this environment, the new version of Catholic fundamentalism gradually revealed the purchase – having picked up some similarities with the previous, frightened movements of the 20th century, as the brand in its main new book is in detail Catholic fundamentalism in America. The difference is that these movements usually sought to distinguish themselves Catholicism First, the dissents in the church itself in the agile struggle with the present and interaction with the secular society. The exception among them was the priest of the Jesuits of the mid -century. Leonard Finnie from the St. Bnedict Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which is attributed to the “paradigm” skill for “anti-Madranist, reactive and sectarian impulse (which) live and well in the twenty-first century and does not show signs of disappearance.”
This impetus finds expression in modern Integralist movementSeeking to impose a Catholic doctrine about American society as a whole through a theocratic monarchy, which will become the only arbiter of the common good in civil society. IT and other conservative Catholic classes are well -funded and have institutional bases in places such as Catholic University of America and The bridge of GodIn whose legal court, Amy Horse Barrett performed at the faculty. Reaction Catholics, including those who have connections with Opus Dei, also had a hand Simulation project 2025The basis of the authoritarian policy of the second Trump administration. Movement Mags benefit from the great and powerful megaphone in the form Catholicwhich has contributed more than $ 10 million to help select Trump in 2024 and founder Brian Berch, now US Ambassador to the Vatican.
All this to say that Dolan’s comments to Kirk should not be noticed or not seeing on the borders of history. Fox is the propaganda hand of the Trump administration, and the willing presence of Dolan in his studios suggests a degree in which powerful figures within and related to the form of the Catholic Church of the United States-and are absorbed by the Ethno-nationalist program of the Maga regime. After the murder of Kirk, this unclean and completely non -Christian alliance appears to be frozen.