Can a Catholic Be a Democrat? [Paperback]

David Carlin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 30, 2005

When author David Carlin was a young man, it was scandalous for a good Catholic to be anything but a good Democrat. In the pews, pubs, and union halls of America's cities, millions of poor European immigrants and their children pledged allegiance to the Church of Rome and the party of FDR. All that changed in the 1960s, with the rise of a new kind of Democrat: wealthy, secular, ideological. Even as Carlin served the party he loved - twelve yearsas a Rhode Island state senator and once a candidate for Congress - he could only watch in dismay as its national leaders abandoned their blue-collar, pro-life, and religious constituencies and took up with NOW, Hollywood, and the abortion lobby. So complete this transformation has been that we no longer speak of a natural alliance between Catholics and the Democratic Party. Indeed, Carlin here asks whether today it's even possible to be both a faithful Catholic and a Democratic true believer. A veteran sociologist, philosophy professor, and author of The Decline and Fall of the Catholic Church in America, Carlin shows how his party and his religion have taken opposite sides in the Culture War. On issues of human life, sex, faith, morality, suffering - and the public policies that stem from them - the modern, secularist Democratic Party has become the enemy of Catholicism; indeed, of all traditional religions. Carlin shatters the excuses that Catholic Democratic politicians employ in a vain attempt to reconcile their faith and their votes, and then, with what he calls the "political equivalent of a broken heart," he examines his own political conscience. As a faithful Catholic and a Democrat approaching his seventieth year, must he now leave the party he's called home since birth? David Carlin's arguments challenge all religious Democrats to ask themselves the same question

Product Details

• Paperback: 220 pages
• Publisher: Sophia Institute Press (August 30, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1933184191
• ISBN-13: 978-1933184197
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #59,174 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #69 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Church & State

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a must-read for Democrats, October 25, 2006

By 

roger williams (providence) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Can a Catholic Be a Democrat? (Paperback)

This book, written by a 68-year-old Rhode Island politician who has been a lifelong Democrat, should be a wake-up call to the leadership of the national Democratic Party. Unfortunately for the party, those leaders who most need to read the book are the people least likely to do so. Their minds are closed.

The book explains, in a brief and easy-to-read manner, what should be obvious -- but apparently isn't -- to leaders of the party. The Democratic Party is losing the support of church-going traditional Catholics, just as it earlier lost the support of church-going traditional Protestants. Why? Because it has taken money, lots of it (it's needed for TV advertising), from what the author calls "affluent secularists," i.e., well-to-do cultural liberals who are strongly hostile to traditional Christianity and its moral code, especially its code of sexual morality. As everyone knows, he who pays the piper calls the tune.

This political alliance with America's anti-Christian forces might be a smart idea if the US were an anti-Christian nation. But since it isn't that kind of nation, it is an alliance that has produced a string of electoral defeats for the Democrats. Oh, we Dems may get lucky and win control, or at least partial control, of Congress in November of 2006, but this will do little to alter the party's long-term downhill slide.

Strongly recommended.

23 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Insightful Analysis; Excellent Read; Highly Recommended, October 17, 2006

By 

Dr. Dennis Bonnette (Youngstown, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Can a Catholic Be a Democrat? (Paperback)

Today many people realize that primary political advocacy for abortion, the homosexual agenda, and the secular side of the Culture War is found in the ranks of the Democratic Party. David Carlin's excellent book explores and documents the historical, sociological, and philosophical developments which transformed the party of Andrew Johnson and Franklin Delano Roosevelt into its present day anti-Christian incarnation. Professor Carlin is uniquely positioned by birth, education, and life experience to write this significant analysis of political history. Born into an Irish Catholic working class Democratic family, he rose to high political office as majority leader of the Rhode Island State Senate. Presently, he is a professional sociologist and philosopher who has taught at the college level for the last two decades.

Unlike those critics outside the Democratic Party who so often attack its anti-Christian stances today, Senator (who is also Professor) Carlin approaches criticism of his beloved party much as a wounded lover who is betrayed by his beloved. Living through this transformation to secular values as a faithful member of the party himself, Carlin witnessed over several decades the ascendancy of moral liberalism as the Democratic Party's dominant force. With the keen analytic eye of a professional sociologist and philosopher, he discerns each step in this metamorphosis to secular values, lucidly explaining this historical evolution in terms of its sociological dimensions and the unfolding inner logic which inexorably dictated subsequent developments.

In the main body of the text, Carlin documents what the Democratic Party has become and why it is now utterly irreconcilable with the traditional Christianity. This alone makes this work an important contribution to present political dialogue as well as to the historical record. Still, five appendices which constitute the latter third of the book are of nearly equal importance. In these, the author deftly illumines relevant topics such as the nature and history of American secularism, the development of liberal Christianity and its connection to secularism, and a devastating analysis and refutation of Mario Cuomo's scandalous, self-serving defense of pro-abortion Catholic politicians. In a final personal note, Senator Carlin offers a somewhat surprising, yet cogent, explanation of his own present and future attitude toward his once beloved Democratic Party.

This book is a good read, and an incisive expose of how today's Democratic Party has come to embrace a social and political activism alien to its own traditions and to Christianity. I strongly recommend this carefully reasoned work to all who wish to understand the origins of the ideology which pervades today's Democratic Party, as well as its probable future role in American politics. I might add that "Can a Catholic Be a Democrat?" well merits selection for sociology or political science holdings in all college and university libraries.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What it truly means to be a Democrat., January 5, 2007

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Can a Catholic Be a Democrat? (Paperback)

Can a Catholic Be a Democrat? How the Party I Loved Became the Enemy of My Religion is the personal testimony of devout Catholic David Carlin, who became increasingly alienated from the changes in the Democratic party. In the 1960s, Carlin observed wealthy, secular, and ideological Democrats steer the party away from its pro-life and religious constituencies and form connections with NOW, Hollywood, and the abortion lobby. Carlin openly questions the Democratic party's position on human issues of life, sex, faith, morality, and suffering, and explains in depth how he came to the conclusion that the Democratic party and the Catholic Church are irreconcilable. Though the reader may not agree with Carlin's arguments, it greatly behooves open-minded thinkers of all faiths to contemplate them at length, and evaluate what personal values are embraced through voting for a specific candidate, and what it truly means to be a Democrat.