Anti-Catholic or just a joke?

"Pope John Paul II was a soccer goalie in his youth. Even as a young man, he tried to stop people from scoring."

Is that joke, told by NBC's late-night host, Conan O'Brien, an example of good humor, bad taste or anti-Catholicism?

The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, which watchdogs contemporary American society for instances of the latter, includes the joke in its "1996 Report on Anti-Catholicism." The 37-page booklet examines everything from art galleries to nightclubs, colleges to government offices, finding scores of what the League calls "expressions of Catholic-bashing."

Those expressions range from one-liners by O'Brien to pornographic "art" featuring Jesus and the Blessed Mother, leading the introduction to the report to conclude that "anti-Catholicism is alive and well in the U.S."

But is it alive and well on television, too? Here is a sampling of TV examples from the League's report; after you read them, I have some questions for you:

* On NBC's "Law & Order," a policeman discounts the rape of a dead woman by saying, "It must have been an immaculate conception. Her panties are intact, no fluid anywhere."

* On "Naked Truth," which has run on both ABC and NBC, a character says she considered becoming a nun until "a little thing called the pill" was invented. When she goes to confession, the priest throws holy water on her and says, "Get thee back, Satan."

* On PBS, says the report, a documentary about John Salvi, who murdered workers at an abortion clinic near Boston, "sought the source of his derangement in his Catholicism....The message of the show was unmistakable -- practicing Catholics are potential maladjusted people."

* On CBS, "Thorn Birds: The Missing Years" focuses on an archbishop with a "fatal flaw -- his lust for Meggie."

* On ABC, "Nightline" profiled commentator and presidential candidate Pat Buchanan "and tried," said the League, "to establish a link [between] his Jesuit education and his alleged sympathy toward bigotry."

* On syndicated stations, "The McLaughlin Group" featured one of its regular panelists, Eleanor Clift, saying that Buchanan, a sometime panelist, was "even more giddy than when he kept the Uzi and the Rosary beads under that chair."

* On HBO, comedian George Carlin joked that he was a Catholic until he reached "the age of reason." He followed that with more offensive language about the Church and religion.

* On CBS's "This Morning," during a conversation about the Pope's health, a reporter asks: "Could I even go so far as to say that the Vatican is lying about the Pope's health?"

* On ABC's "Townies," a priest character, seeking funds to repair a statue of Mary, says that children could be hospitalized "because they cut themselves on Our Lady's jagged rusty stumps."

I'd like to hear from you about what you think.

(Write to me at The Evangelist, 40 N. Main Ave., Albany, NY 12203. My e-mail address is [email protected]. For information and publications about the League, write the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, 1011 First Ave., New York, NY 10022.)

(07-24-97)

[[In-content Ad]]