JFK

[Flt.Lt.Andrew]

What an irony! Those who had fled could not accept people who are also fleeing from persecution! HAHAHA!


A.


P.S Its stupid of the American nation to percieve a Catholic president as a threat- hello!! You guys DO have the Illuminati, and the Masons are always happy to help.

[Felix/FFDS]

I can think fo two reasons of the top of my head-the original settlers in America who came to escape Catholic persecution (yeah, it actually is cited as a reason)

Then whoever cites that is extremely stupid.  If anything, the English settlers in the northern colonies - the famous "Pilgrims" were actually leaving England because they were being persecuted by the Anglicans (Catholicism was quite illegal at the time, thanks to Henry the Eighth's shennanigans), and the "Pilgrims" as they are known in the US, far from coming for "Freedom of Religion" were being persecuted because the rest of England wasn't buying their brand of Anglicanism/Protestanism.

The settlers in the Southern colonies were quite happily pursuing their Anglican faith (and being quite nasty to Baptists....)

It always amazes me what passes for "history" ...

[WebbPA]

It amazes me what passes for "history" too.

I am a born and bred Southerner and I wouldn't ask or think twice about a candidate's religion - unless he/she is a Satanist or something really wierd like that.

Do you really think that we have some sort of anti-Catholic gene or that our parents pass down horror stories of Catholic persecution?

The reason that Catholics, Jews, Muslims, etc. are not elected to national office more often is that non-Protestants are (or were) minorities.  In south Florida minority (Hispanic, Jewish) legislators are the rule rather than the exception and we get along fine.

http://martinez.senate.gov/public/
http://www.house.gov/ros-lehtinen/

[beefhole]

We weren't "taught" anything I wrote, they're connections that can be easily made.

I don't claim my first point to be a major factor, but it is a factor nonetheless.

Regardless of the reasons the Northern settlers came to the states, accusing someone of Catholic practices in a Northern colony was a very severe insult, and was taken very seriously.  No matter why they came, they disliked Catholics.

Yes, the settlers in the South were actually supposed to be mainly Catholic, but that backfired-more Protestants and Quakers showed up for the boats than Catholics, even for states billed as Catholic safe havens like Virginia.

So essentially, the country has very strong roots in pretty much any religion other than Catholicism, which has led to lasting divisions.  There are, of course, more influential reasons.

[H]

beef, Pennsylvania may be north of the Mason-Dixon line and was a major part of the original 13 (British) colonies but has its differences from those further north. If you read the post made by Felix, he mentions the direct colonial reason for anti-Catholicism. However, not all constituents of the colonies were English and many of the Native Americans, due to previous contact with the French, did adhere to Catholicism. During the American Revolution, there was also a large increase of French (particularly, French Canadians; France allied with the colonies, I'm sure you know) whose religious claim was Catholic.
However, the more current excuses amongst those of the 'protestant' claimants relates to the counterclaims against what the Catholic authorities of the now distant past had charged as heresy. I've been associated with both camps; much of my original theological study was Catholic but I was eventually certified by a 'full gospel' organisation, many of whom are quite well anti-Catholic (whereby my tongue is very short now: bite, bite ).