Celebrity Catholicism

I found a book the other day at Chapters (crappy canadian version of Barnes and Noble) that had 9 different celebrities writing about their experience in Catholicism. Dan Akroyd's thoughts were interesting, he showed a knowledge of the Anglo-Catholic tradition (which his father converted out of to become RC near the end of his life). He was kind of a Spinozan Pantheist.

This combined with reading First Things at the Catholic centre yesterday, and thinking about Fr. R.J. Neuhaus, got me thinking about who the public face is in North American culture.

It was troubling. I remember the line from "I now pronounce you Chuck and Larry" where Adam Sandler says he's Jewish and didn't want to piss his mother off, to which Kevin James responded "I'm Catholic and I don't want to piss Mel Gibson off".

Then I read a quote from Madonna the other day on her views of Catholicism: "Catholicism is not a soothing religion. It's a painful religion. We're all gluttons for punishment". Now I am no defender of Madonna's lifestyle or new religion, and she has done some pretty sacraligious things over the years. But I still find it interesting that every time the Vatican condemns her she tries to plead that she still values Catholicism and the Christian message, etc. Usually celebrities just outright condemn the Church and move on. Anyway those are my thoughts, or at least that's what I've garnered from Wikipedia.

All of this is a little troubling. I guess Mother Teresa was a good Catholic public figure. For the first time I had the distinct thought that perhaps God could actually have a vocation for someone to be a famous good Catholic. That would be helpful, especially in North America. If Tony Blair would just stop sounding Anglican, we might have a prospect.