Conclave Clash: Cradle Catholics vs. Evangelical Converts

As we await a new pope, an oft-ignored part of the fight against Christo-fascism has gone viral.

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If you are lucky enough to not have a mild Tiktok addiction, or maybe your algorithm doesn’t keep you on religiontok, you might have missed the fascinating fight taking place between Cradle Catholics (people who were born and raised in the Catholic Church, regardless of their current practice) and the Radical Traditionalist Converts (adult converts to Catholicism that reject Vatican II, and typically come out of Evangelical Protestantism.) Since the death of Pope Francis, (my thoughts on that here) Tiktok seems to have been flooded by arguments between these two groups, with Rad Trad converts saying that they’re the only ones who understand Catholicism, while Cradle Catholics of all stripes are confused and defensive about how we were raised. It's even gone so far as Evangelical Converts claiming that Cradle Catholics are appropriating Catholic culture.

If someone can explain to me how one can appropriate the culture they were born and raised in I would appreciate it.

This argument has been going on within Catholic spaces for years now, going back to at least the 1960s and the post-Vatican II era. But in an era where Rad Trad politics are playing a major role in the decimation of American Democracy, it’s now a matter of interest to anyone concerned about Christian nationalism.

Before I get into this, I will be completely upfront and admit my bias on this fight. I’m a Cradle Catholic with massive political and theological issues with the Rad Trad movement, as well as what I and many others have described as the “fundiefication” of the Church. Even growing up in a mixed faith family (my dad never converted), culturally speaking my day to day was steeped in Catholic tradition, both in terms of religious belief and cultural practice. I went to Catholic school in a small town where the Catholic community was relatively separated from our Protestant neighbors, and where the distinction really did have social consequences, even in the early 'aughts. I went through the sacraments to First Communion, but chose not to get Confirmed at the normal age. At that point in my life I wasn’t confident enough in what I believed to feel that I could honestly make that type of commitment, and my parents were fine with that. But I attended Catholic school until sixth grade and CCD after that. My family attended weekly mass and were heavily involved in our Church community until we were pushed out of our parish when it began to increasingly embrace radical conservatism and reject political diversity. Much of my home life was also tied to the rhythm of the liturgical season, something very common amongst people raised Catholic to the point that we don’t even really notice it until we’re adults.

I also want to be up front here and say that I’m not saying everything about my Catholic upbringing was fantastic. I’m gay, trans, and disabled, none of which are things that traditionalists think are acceptable. I grew up in one of the most conservative parts of the country. Had I not been lucky enough to have the parents I did, my knowledge of sexual and reproductive health would have been basically non-existent. I struggle with my relationship to concepts like shame and guilt. And of course I have massive problems with the way the Church hierarchy has handled any number of issues, from sexual abuse to the rights of women and reproductive freedom to the truly astounding amount of interference in secular politics. But ultimately being Catholic is so heavily baked into my cultural DNA that it’s become an intrinsic part of my identity. There are so many ways to “be Catholic” beyond the hyper conservatism of the Rad Trad movement and the Church hierarchy that it can be hard to explain to outsiders who see the Church as a monolith under the Vatican.

Luckily though, it seems the Internet is finally getting a look at the argument that has been growing within Catholic spaces for a long time now, and seeing just how many different voices exist under the Catholic umbrella. With American Rad Trad poster boy J.D. Vance becoming Vice President and people like Secretary of Defense and Signal Chats Pete Hegseth bearing “Deus Vult” tattoos (from what I can tell it’s unclear if Hegseth is Catholic, but his tattoo, meaning “as God wills it” is a historical battle cry during the First Crusade and modern dog whistle for conservative extremism and white supremacy in the Catholic Church), Rad Trads have amassed significant political power by aligning itself with the Christian nationalist movement. And Progressive/Leftist/Liberal/Whatever you want to call us, Catholics, who traditionally have been less interested in seizing power in the same way as the Rad Trads, have been buried under their incredibly loud rhetoric. As discourse over the next pope and the future of the Catholic Church has spiked in recent weeks though, many progressives, reformers, and social justice oriented Catholics have felt the need to defend the idea that progress and liberalism is, in fact, good for the Roman Catholic Church.

Let’s take a moment, though, to break a few things down, because if I’ve learned anything in recent years, it's that what is often obvious to me about Catholicism is not always obvious to those whose interactions with the Church are limited.

The modern iteration of this fight goes back to the 1960s and the Second Vatican Council, also known as Vatican II. Initiated in 1959 by Pope John XXIII (the Pope after the Nazi Pope) and lasting from 1962-1965 (completed under the leadership of Pope Paul the VI), the Second Vatican Council came about during a transition of power in the post war era, seeking to modernize the Church for the 20th century. It was what is called an “ecumenical council” in which bishops and other important Catholic leaders convene to resolve conflicts in formal Catholic doctrine and redirect the future of the Church. Since the first ecumenical council, the Council of Nicea in 325 CE, there have only been twenty-one of these meetings in the entire history of the church, the most recent one being Vatican II itself. These councils are rare and important, having a major impact on Catholics across the world, and often having major political consequences globally as the decisions made there impact how Catholics vote, engage in social action, and engage with their communities.

Modernization of the Church was a necessary change, and one that is still sorely needed. Over four sessions and 169 General Congregations, Vatican II represented a massive change in Roman Catholicism, much of which has been written about extensively by priests, scholars, theologians, historians, political scientists, and others, but to provide a brief summary of some of the major changes that occurred:

• A new Roman Missal (the book of prayers, chants, and instructions for the celebration of mass) was created, including a new cycle of readings that provide a wider variety of Scripture read at mass. This also included allowing the mass to be said in the language of the local community, rather than in Latin, in order to improve accessibility and connection for lay people. This new form of mass is known as the Novus Ordo. Catholics were also permitted to take communion in the hand if they chose (as opposed to the priest or eucharistic minister placing it directly on the tongue), and the change in the mass structure led to the gradual decline of women covering their hair during mass, leading to the requirement being formally removed in the 1980s.
• The liturgical calendar, which organizes the year based on various holidays, and tells Catholics which readings and prayers to read when, was simplified. The modern liturgical calendar consists of six “seasons”: Advent, Christmas (lasting 12 days), Lent, The Sacred Paschal Triduum (consisting of the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, Good Friday, and the Mass of the Resurrection), Easter (lasting 50 days), and two phases of what is known as “Ordinary Time” the first between Christmas and Lent, and the second between Easter and Advent. Certain saint feast days were moved or eliminated, and certain seasonal practices were no longer required.
• The Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults (RCIA), the process through which adults go through the conversion process was revived and reformed.
• Lay people (non clerics) were given better representation in leadership and access to ministry, being permitted to serve as lectors and Eucharistic ministers at mass, given places on parish and diocesan councils, and lay men and women were appointed to administrative positions previously exclusively held by clerics. This also put into motion the steps that would eventually lead to parishes being permitted to allow girls to be altar servers, though it would not become an officially recognized practice by the Vatican until 1994 (three years before I was born, and only one year after my older sister was born, making us both a part of the first generation of altar servers to not face a gender barrier.)
• A renewed emphasis on Scripture.
• An end to forced Latinization, allowing the Eastern Rites that are in communion with Rome to return to their traditional practices in line with their cultures.
• New formal dialogue and fellowship with other religions, including a change in doctrine that acknowledged the possibility of salvation for non-Christians. This included a new push for religious tolerance and an end to conversions at any cost, as well as an acknowledgement of the need for the Church to respect the separation of church and state in secular government, a promise that it has not lived up to, but made marginal progress on.
• Religious orders were given more freedom, particularly orders of religious sisters, who were granted a new level of autonomy over their work, governance, beliefs, and forms of dress (this is why you see many nuns and sisters wearing modern clothing as opposed to the traditional habit, though some orders have retained the tradition.)
• The permanent diaconate, a group of men who, rather than intending to transition to the priesthood, are able to permanently serve as deacons, was reestablished, and married men were permitted to become deacons (though women, who in the early church were permitted to serve as deacons, are still excluded.)
• The “Synod of Bishops” was formed, uniting the Pope and Bishops as a single body, with the Bishops acting as frequent advisors to the Pope.
• Moral theology was also placed into greater focus, with the intent of shifting the Church away from legalism and towards Biblical sources and individual conscience. This led to a greater focus on charitable activities and social action, with a special emphasis on the rights of the poor and marginalized. Political activity was encouraged in the spirit of social justice, rather than in trying to establish so-called “Catholic nations.”

There were a plethora of other changes that occurred as well, but if I were to describe all of them, we would be here all day. But these are to the Rad Trad set, the most controversial and objectionable changes.

The Rad Trads, though they weren’t called that right away, started appearing pretty much immediately after the end of Vatican II. Their appearance wasn’t surprising, remember that while to many Vatican II was a welcome modernization, these were still major changes to an ancient institution. People often dislike change, especially when it comes to spiritual matters. So pushback was expected. Pope Francis reportedly once said in response to the anti-Vatican II crowd that it takes one hundred years for people to accept an ecumenical council.

What I think was less expected, though, was just how politically dangerous Rad Trads would become, especially in the United States, in their quest to turn back the clock on both the Roman Catholic Church and secular governments.

From what I have been able to find, it appears that the term “Rad Trad” as the movement of reactionary Radical Traditionalists that I’m referring to was coined sometime in the mid 1990’s, though there are competing claims amongst writers that were corresponding around that time as to who actually came up with the term. This isn’t an uncommon etymological phenomenon when terms like this are created, they frequently come about through discussions amongst people in the same field, and it’s not always clear who exactly was the first to come up with it. I agree with scholars that note that it is important to distinguish between “traditionalist Catholics” and “Rad Trads.” There is nothing wrong or inherently dangerous with having a preference for the Latin mass or choosing to cover one’s hair for prayer or observing some pre-Vatican II traditions. I, for one, while far from a “traditionalist” think the Latin mass is beautiful, and think it is important to preserve certain traditions, even if they are no longer a part of mainstream culture and practice.

The “Rad Trad” movement, particularly in the American context (which from here on out please just assume I am discussing the American context to save us all some time), goes far beyond that. One of the writers that has claimed credit for the term, Sandra Miesel, wrote in 2004:

“As the person who coined the term RadTrad, what I had in mind was a certain complex of views exemplified by the pages of The Remanant, Catholic Family News, The Fatima Crusader, and allied productions: anti-Semitic, Gallophilic, pro-Confederate, anti-American, and fond of conspiracy theories…Their beau ideal of a ruler is Salazar, the former dictator of Portugal, since there’s no King of France available at present. The supreme contemporary example of a RadTrad writer is Solange Hertz who views electricity and even brick-making as inventions of the Devil.”

Later in 2008, Miesel reiterated that:

“It doesn’t mean simply preference for the Old Mass and traditional devotions. RadTradom carries a lot of other social and political freight that has nothing to do with praying in Latin: Integrism, Gallophilia, anti-Semitism, Confederate sympathies, attraction for aristocracy and authoritarian forms of government, etc.”

Other writers have developed litmus tests over the years to distinguish between the RadTrads and mainstream traditionalists. One particularly thorough one that I’ve come across in my research comes from Dr. Taylor Marshall, who provided the following list of traits as a snapshot of radical traditionalism in 2013:

“ a) the denial of the Jewish holocaust

  b) the outright denial of Vatican 2 as a valid council

  c) rhetorical style of the Rorate Caeli blog

  d) the embrace of isolationist sub-culture of Catholicism or “Amish Catholicism”

  e) the denial of charismatic gifts and the charismatic movement

  f) sympathy for the Bp. Williamson’s style of traditionalism

  g) disdain for Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis

  h) the belief that Latin Mass Catholics are “A Team” and Novus Ordo Catholics are “B Team”

  i) Gnostic ecclesiology – that “traditionalists” form the one true indivisible Catholic Church “

I do agree with Dr. Marshall’s assessment that not everyone, and likely not even the majority of people who attend Latin mass are Rad Trads, though Latin mass has absolutely become one of the major hallmarks, to the point that I and many other people feel outright unsafe at Latin mass parishes. But I think now, over a decade later, we have seen a further evolution in the Rad Trad movement as it has become increasingly intertwined with the Christian nationalist movement that needs to be examined further.

Around this time last year, I was getting brunch with some friends, one of whom is also Catholic, and we happened to note that much of the Church feels very different from when we were kids, to the point that we’re both frequently uncomfortable and feel unwelcome in a lot of Catholic spaces. This shared feeling is particularly of note as this friend is a cisgender, heterosexual man whose wedding was officiated by his own brother, an ordained Catholic priest. That feeling of unwelcomeness and uncertainty in institutional spaces is one that many would be surprised to hear that we share. But there has been an exponential uptick in Catholic hyper conservatism in the past 20-30 years, that in my opinion has been in hyperdrive in the past ten, to the point that it often feels like despite the fact that Rad Trads are not the majority of Catholics, much of the hierarchy and priests seem to be catering more and more to those who share those political views.

I’ve been thinking about that phenomenon a lot since that conversation, and that conversation has come up even more in my mind since the death of Pope Francis and the aforementioned social media kerfuffle.

This is where we get into Evangelical Converts, as not all Rad Trads are converts (though there definitely has been a shift). In recent years there’s seemingly been an uptick in people from Evangelical and Fundamentalist Protestant sects converting to Catholicism. I’ve speculated on why this is in the past, but I think the largest reason stems from much of American Protestantism lacking the same type of history that the Roman Catholic Church has claim to. Seeking out historical connection and spiritual meaning that is often lacking in the traditions many of these new converts come from, they’ve flocked to the Catholic Church. Now I don’t have an issue with converts. I also don’t have an issue with non-Catholics, non-Christians, or anyone who isn’t a fascist really. I think we waste far too much time arguing about those types of things that could be spent doing actual meaningful work. The problem that comes up, though, is that many of these converts are coming in with a ton of cultural and spiritual baggage, and the institutional powers that be, being so desperate for converts in the wake of the Church hemorrhaging numbers, are not properly guiding these converts through the process of deconstructing those world views, and instead are adopting them as “Catholic.”

It is true that a lot of Cradle Catholics have left the Church, though slightly more than half remain Catholic into adulthood. But the reasons for leaving are often not as simple as no longer believing in God. While the majority of people who left across those who identify as either unaffiliated or Protestant, the most common reason for leaving is that there was just a gradual drift away from the Church, followed by no longer believing in Church teaching, and spiritual needs not being met. Amongst those who now identify as “unaffiliated” the most frequent reasons for leaving are not lack of belief, but the Church’s failures on social issues including homosexuality, women’s rights, abortion, birth control, and divorce and remarriage. Amongst those who converted to a Protestant denomination, the most common reasons were finding a tradition they liked better, disagreement with teachings on the Bible, and dissatisfaction with the atmosphere at worship services. Other less common reasons included the many sexual abuse scandals, the lack of married clergy, and others. Less than half of respondents stated that they no longer believe in any religion.

But instead of addressing those issues, looking to the plethora of work by progressive theologians that could bring the Church into the modern world, it seems that in the U.S. at least our hierarchy has decided to reject its own cultural background in favor of the power granted to it by this particular brand of convert. After all, it is far easier to chase out those who follow their conscience to dissent than to actually listen and create meaningful change. These Evangelical Converts also give the Catholic Church a greater proximity to whiteness, and the associated political power that comes with it in the United States. This is appealing to the ambitions of a large number of bishops, who appear to be far more interested in hoarding power than serving their communities.

There is a reciprocal relationship between these Evangelical Converts, many of whom have embraced radical traditionalism, and the most conservative parts of the Catholic hierarchy. Their conservatism and accustomization to authoritarian structures allow the Bishops greater access to the conservative Protestant groups that have traditionally held power in the U.S. These converts, in exchange are then led to believe that the tradition that they follow is the only valid tradition and expression of Catholicism. They view Progressive Catholics as enemies of the Church, despite our communities and values having been present since the days of small home churches in the first century CE, and are so attached to the authoritarian mindset that they cannot fathom the idea that someone can dissent and remain a faithful Catholic. So beneficial to the hierarchy is this arrangement that they blatantly ignore the unique position of Catholic-American culture.

One of the more ignored aspects in all of this is that in the United States, Catholicism is deeply tied to ethnic identity. European-American Catholics, historically, have only been considered “white when convenient” or when we reject much of our previous cultural identity in order to assimilate into “white” (read Protestant) cultural practices. American Catholics have long been accused of being incapable of being “real Americans” due to fears surrounding loyalty to the Pope. Catholics have been frequent targets of white supremacist groups like the KKK, leading many Catholic communities, including the ones that I grew up in to adopt semi-isolationist tendencies. The Catholic school system, for example, came about in no small part due to the harassment and Protestant proselytization that used to be extremely prevalent in American public schools. 

During the 1960 Presidential Election, Billy Graham, Norman Vincent Peale, and groups like Protestants and Other Americans United for Separation of Church and State rallied against JFK’s candidacy, claiming that a Catholic in the White House would become a puppet of the Pope. I did bring up that last name for a reason – that last group is now known as Americans United for Separation of Church and State (AU), a group I think many of my readers would be surprised to learn was involved in that type of action. Now I have friends, colleagues, and mentors that work over at AU, and I can say with relative confidence that I would be in absolute shock if they participated in that kind of rhetoric today – this is proof in my mind that it's more than possible to move past weird xenophobic Anti-Catholic sentiment. It’s important to remember though that while some of the groups involved in Anti-Catholic propaganda have changed, this really was not that long ago. For reference my own parents were born in 1952 and 1963.

But Anti-Catholicism (distinct from reasonable opposition to and critique the harms of the Church) is still prevalent in the United States today. Talk to anyone raised Catholic and they will have at least one story of being accused of not being a “real Christian” if not being unable to be a “real American.” Most people raised Evangelical or Fundamentalist will have at least one story of the inverse, being taught that Catholics were evil statue worshipers bringing about the anti Christ. In my work in the state-church movement I’ve experienced elements of it amongst atheists as well, particularly in the form of rhetoric that states that if you still in any way claim a Catholic identity, you support the worst and most horrific forms of child abuse, gender based violence, and beyond. The frequent message is that it does not matter what you actually believe, do, or how you spend your money; by claiming that cultural identity, you are declaring yourself incapable of dissent or independent thought. 

Interesting how similar those two lines of thinking are.

Catholicism in the United States is always met with xenophobic suspicion, and at best, Catholics are seen as being in need of saving and assimilation, either by white Protestants or by atheists, from their foreign superstitions.

Returning to the point of this blog then, I think one of the big evolutions that has occurred in recent years is that the Evangelical Converts in the American Church have not deconstructed this attitude that they are spiritually superior to Catholics, but instead have copy-pasted it onto Radical Traditionalism as the “true” form of spirituality that Cradle Catholics have abandoned.

There is an idea that progressives/non-traditionalist Catholics have no sense of tradition. This is far from the truth. Instead, it’s just that our traditions are different from the legalistic authoritarianism of the Rad Trad movement. Many of us believe in the idea of the Catholic Church being “Universal” not in the sense that every Catholic must be a mindless robot under the Vatican’s pure authority that acts, worships, and believes completely the same, but in that the Church is meant to be for everyone, bringing together different cultural traditions and frameworks to the same end goal. Many of our traditions have been passed on to us by our parents and grandparents and great grandparents. How we celebrate holidays, observe life milestones, the foods we cook, the ways we help our communities, and even traditional folk practices are often informed by the preservation and adaptation of traditions that our immigrant families brought over, the experiences that led to our families leaving their home countries, and the ways that they were treated when they got to the United States.

Many of us have adjusted to and accepted the change in the Church, and even heavily advocated for it, because unlike in the Radical Traditionalist movement, our understanding of “Catholic expression” is not limited to what mass looks like, or what our priests tell us. Certainly mass, the sacraments, all of those things are still important, but they’re just not the only thing that defines Catholicism. Catholicism happens on the streets and in the home just as much as it does in the church building. This is also why “cultural Catholics” exist. A slightly different archetype, there are also plenty of people who still feel the strong influence of Catholicism baked into their cultural DNA, even if they no longer attend mass or believe in God. Church attendance alone does not make one Catholic, something that it seems many Evangelical Converts have not been able to internalize. This also has roots in one of the core theological differences between Catholics and Protestants. Unlike Protestants, who believe that you only need to believe the right thing, and good works will come from that, Catholics believe that you need to actively pursue good works in addition to faith. To quote James 2:17: “So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.”

Now of course, if you’ve somehow managed to make it this far, you might be asking me: “Kat this really just sounds like a bunch of petty squabbling over two groups’ favorite book, what does this have to do with me, someone who statistically speaking is probably not at all Catholic?”

The answer to this is a whole hell of a lot.

This fight is a mirror of the fight for the very soul of American democracy, and the fight against Christo-fascism.

The Rad Trad movement is increasingly indistinguishable from the Christian nationalist movement. They have made it their goal to make the United States a “Christian nation” in their vision of hyper conservatism, and teamed up with the usual suspects of Evangelicalism and Fundamentalism in order to try and achieve that. They want to justify their harmful politics with the history of the Church as they view it. The Church hierarchy, for better or worse, does have a ton of money, and particularly since Protestants decided to start caring about abortion as a proxy issue for racial segregation, have wielded increasing political power. And when we as a culture validate them as the “true” Catholics, we only manage to empower them to make their political domination a matter of “preserving religious liberty” and not a Christo-fascist authoritarian takeover.

Progressive Catholics, Catholic Dissenters, Cultural Catholics, Leftist Catholics, Liberal Catholics, Liberation Theologians, Folk Catholics, the Catholic Worker Movement, and beyond are trying to fight this. Historically many of us have been more concerned about the fight for liberation on the ground, and not in the halls of government or the culture wars, but finally, finally, finally, we seem to be waking up to the reality that we cannot let the most extremist of our faith tradition be the only voices in institutional power. Because throughout all of this I do want to be clear that even though we disagree with them, Rad Trads are in fact Catholic. No more or less than the rest of us. And therefore they are our responsibility to call out, call in, and stand up to them. But we need those outside of the Church who care about state-church separation to believe us when we say we are here. As I wrote during Holy Week we have to, as a collective, disrupt the narrative that there is a single “Catholic,” “Christian,” or “insert any other religious label” here. Or we will only be opening more and more doors for the harms their theologies cause.

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Kat (they/them) is a queer lawyer, activist, and theorist focusing on the intersections of law, queerness, religion, and politics, with the occasional bit of theology, political theory, and legal theory thrown in for good measure. Originally from rural southern Indiana, Kat earned their B.A. in Political Science in 2019 before continuing on to earn their J.D. in 2022, both from Indiana University- Bloomington. A former Equal Justice Works Fellow for the Freedom From Religion Foundation, Kat has spent their professional career fighting for the separation of church and state and LGBTQIA+ rights. Outside of work you can find them at a ballet or contemporary dance class, sipping on dirty shirleys at their local gay bar, or playing video games with their cat, Merlin.