Carrie Prejen Boller was kicked off President Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission last week. “I am a Catholic, and Catholics don’t embrace Zionism,” [Boller] said. That’s not accurate. It misrepresents Catholics. Per NBC News, Boller defends Candace Owens, who has been accused of flagrant antisemitism.
In fact, the Vatican recognizes Israel and maintains diplomatic relations. Israel has a right to exist is the Vatican’s position. 1.4 billion Catholics across the globe are in general agreement. There’s a forever misconception that the Roman Catholic Church is rigidly hierarchical. It isn’t. There is a diversity of opinions, though core teachings are inviolate. Catholics – and that includes clerics – are bound by those teachings.
Perhaps Boller – a recent convert to Catholicism – in a ham-handed way was attempting to express that Catholic teaching doesn’t comport with evangelical Protestants’ belief that Israel – per evangelicals’ interpretation of the Old Testament – is God’s promise to the Jewish people fulfilled. Evangelicals also hold that the establishment of the Jewish homeland (Israel) is tied to End Times prophecy. Such evangelicals claim that Israel’s rise is a sign that the End Times have begun.
Shawn Carney, president and CEO of 40 Days for Life, a pro-life organization, who denounced Boller’s assertion, provided a smart summary of Catholic teaching, which contrasts with the Christian Zionist sensibility.
From Fox News, February 13:
“For centuries, Catholics have understood that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the Davidic kingdom and that our faith comes from the Jews. Catholic teaching holds that the Church is the fulfillment of the promises of the Old Covenant. To suddenly claim that Catholics are against Jews is absurd — it is a modern, internet-based error.”
In other words, goes Catholic belief, God’s covenant with the Jews is fulfilled in the divinity of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the messiah, and the New Testament is God’s truth revealed through His Son. Catholic understanding is that one day Jews will reconcile themselves to Jesus Christ as savior.
Hence, Catholics aren’t likely to fashion themselves as “Christian Zionists” in the same manner that evangelical Protestants do. Most Catholics support Israel’s right to exist. Many would say they support Zionism – a longtime Jewish national movement – which, per Grok, traditionally asserts that Jews are a people, not just a religious body; they have a right to “self-determination and national sovereignty”; and, finally importantly, “this sovereignty should be realized in their ancestral home – the Land of Israel.”
Roman Catholics can and do support Israel’s right to exist, but diverge from the evangelical Protestant interpretations. I’ll leave it to others to debate the finer points of Catholic and evangelical belief in regard to Israel.