COMMENTARY: Salem, then and now

c. 1999 Religion News Service (Andrew M. Greeley is a Roman Catholic priest, best-selling novelist and a sociologist at the University of Chicago National Opinion Research Center. Check out his home page at http://www.agreeley.com or contact him via e-mail at agreel(at)aol.com.) UNDATED _ A vast mall runs the length of the university at which I […]

c. 1999 Religion News Service

(Andrew M. Greeley is a Roman Catholic priest, best-selling novelist and a sociologist at the University of Chicago National Opinion Research Center. Check out his home page at http://www.agreeley.com or contact him via e-mail at agreel(at)aol.com.)

UNDATED _ A vast mall runs the length of the university at which I teach some of the time _ a broad sweep of grass, not a shopping center. Intermittently at noon time a preacher appears on the mall, Bible in hand, to harangue the students.


He wears a black suit, a white shirt, and a string tie. His hair is slicked back, his eyes are bright, his face glows with enthusiasm and he smiles with the confidence of a man who knows he has the truth _ all of it.

In a nasal, angry voice he demands of the students that they repent of their sins, convert to the Lord Jesus, or face the terrible pains of the fires of hell. Most of the students ignore him. Some bait him. Others listen thoughtfully for a bit, shake their heads and walk away.

Doubtless the man is sincere. Undoubtedly, he has the right to preach his form of religion: even if it is filled with anger and hatred, even if it provides an excuse for some people to dismiss all religion.

However, I have the right to think him wrong as well. Life, the world, God, are all more complicated, intricate, and problematic than he realizes. There are few simple answers and many gray dimensions to the human condition.

I am also offended because he would deny my heritage the right even to have the name”Christian.” The”House Managers”of the trial of President Clinton remind me of that preacher _ dark suits, bright eyes, glowing faces, nasal voices, sly smiles, evangelical confidence in their possession of the truth.

They are pursuing evil and intend to destroy it, to crush it, and cast it off the earth, whatever the costs. It is Salem in the late 17th century and they are witch hunters. Cotton Mather and the Puritans are alive and well.

The Puritans helped create this country and there is a deeply Calvinist strain of Puritanism that is still part of our culture. This strain explains the anti-slavery campaign of the 19th Century, the anti-liquor campaign of the early 20th Century, the anti-Communist campaign of the 1950s _ even the anti-war campaign of the 1960s. That’s quite a mix.


Puritans seek to force people to be virtuous and to punish those who are not. It has therefore stood for causes most of us would support today, as well as other causes most of us would reject. Our most serious mistake is to misunderstand how strong that propensity to punish sin and enforce virtue still is in our society.

I do not question the sincerity of Puritans. Moreover many of those who are Puritanism’s logical and historic heirs _ contemporary evangelicals _ are not fanatics. Finally, every tradition has its own fanatical fringe. Dress Rep. Henry Hyde, Irish Catholic and a Papal Knight, in the black and white robes of the Dominican Order and he becomes Tomas de Torquemada, head of the Spanish Inquisition.

I argue merely that the House Managers are clearly Puritanical fanatics, the authentic heirs of the people of Salem in 1790 Massachusetts. To understand that is to understand the last strange year of American history.

Why are Americans so angry at President Clinton and so intent on punishing him? Europeans ask. It would never happen in our country, they add.

Ah, but your country is not a Puritan country! Why would these men push a resolution of impeachment through a doubtful and lame duck Congress? Why would they force the Senate to paint itself in a corner for a trial without end?

Think about my preacher friend on the mall and you’ll understand.

The weakness of the indictments, easily refuted by the president’s lawyers, does not matter. Neither does the dubious constitutionality of the House Managers’ demands. The will of the majority of Americans is irrelevant. Bipartisanship is the devil’s trick. These white, mostly southern, men know they are right.


They know evil has been done and it must be punished. They will not give up until they have hung (or otherwise disposed) of the sinner. The neo-Puritans are nowhere near a majority of the country or of the Congress. But their faith makes up for their lack of numbers. Faced with such absolute faith and determination, so-called moderate Republicans are powerless.

Bill Clinton is not merely an evil man to be thrown out of office, even if it means canceling an election. He represents the evil of moral relativism in this country of which America must be purged. America has been led down the path to corruption and sin. Those who are good and virtuous (Puritan) Americans must do all that they can to save the country from evil, even if it doesn’t want to be saved.

With that position, the preacher on the mall would agree completely.

IR END GREELEY

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