On Leaving the Catholic Church
Salt Lake City, Utah, 1965-1968
Ammon Hennacy was baptized into the Catholic Church on November 17, 1952 with Dorothy Day as his godmother. He later renounced the Catholic Church, although not the radical Christianity which led him to the Catholic Worker. He died in 1970. This essay is excerpted from The Book of Ammon (Fortkamp/Rose Hill, 1994) and is reproduced with permission from the publisher.
This book being the story of my life it would not be worthwhile writing it if I remained in the same groove into which I was born. Great changes have been made in the world, and to meet those changes I have had to revalue what is important to me. These changes have not been to adapt myself to the current but as always to fight upstream against the current.
I have often said that a person living in India would naturally be attracted to Gandhi. In this country the person with the most integrity as a pacifist and anarchist, as well as a Christian, is Dorothy Day. If she had been a Quaker or a Mormon and edited a Quaker Worker or a Mormon Worker I would have been attracted to Quakerism or Mormonism. I have quoted Dorothy as saying that I should not become a Catholic because I loved her and the CW. The reasons why I became a Catholic and was quickly baptized in 1952 (to quickly, I think all concerned would now agree), are still legitimate, if one considers my development at that time. I got along for thirty-three years as a Christian anarchist without belonging to any church.
God. I believe in everything I said on this subject in 1953, but I would add on the subject of the Devil that I do not think he is a person but is only the name for that which is the opposite of good. Hell might be called what the Christians have made of this earth, in Christ's name. If there is such a place, as some priests say, you can't prove there is anyone in it but the Devil. So I am not afraid of going to a place that I do not believe exists. Purgatory is logical, but just how it works I will find out when I die. I am not worrying about it.
The Bible. I believe on this subject what I did in 1953. There may be some words from God in it, but most of it is folklore. Outside of what Christ said on divorce and the usual interpretation of "give to him that asked of thee," I believe in all that Christ said. I think that He meant that we should not be selfish. I would not give a bum money to spend on booze, but I do give the bum a place to sleep and something to eat in my Joe Hill House. I do not agree with the old Jewish idea of a divorced person not being allowed to remarry. (The Greek Orthodox Church allows two re-marriages, but not three.) I think that a person can make a mistake on every other decision in life, so why not in being married? Former Mayor O'Dwyer of New York City, Jackie's sister, Henry Luce, and the president of Peru were allowed to be married after being divorced. The sixteen rules of annulment of marriage by the Catholic Church seem to me not to be based upon the sayings of Christ but upon pull and expediency. I asked the Chancery Office to annul my common-law marriage, and they wouldn't think of it.
The Early Christians. I agree with what I wrote on this subject in 1953, although I see little hope of the Catholic or any other church in trying to live like the early Christians.
Paul and the Churches. I believe, as I said in 1955, that Paul spoiled the message of Christ.
Prayer. There can be spiritual power when spiritual people recite the Rosary, as I wrote in 1953, but today, for me there is no meaning in praying to Mary or the saints but only to Christ and God. I revere St. Francis, Joan of Arc, and Bernadette of Lourdes and get lessons and inspiration from them, but I do not believe in the legend of Fatima or of Guadalupe. People can choose their own saints.
The Catholic Church. A Christian anarchist has no business belonging to such a reactionary organization. I do not believe in original sin, indulgences, the infallibility of the pope, or obedience to any church official if it is against my conscience. I am not interested in earning "merit" or in being saved by priestly incantation. Of course I do not believe in confessing to a priest. Many Catholics can never forgive themselves because of the sense of fear and guilt taught them, and they go to priests again and again in a useless round. I believe in the virgin birth of Christ and in personal immortality, in all of Christ's miracles and in the resurrection, and that we can be "saved" from sin by following Him, whether we belong to any church or not. I consider myself a member of this real church along with St. Joan of Arc, who was burned as a heretic by the Catholic Church. I made a will some years ago in which I desired to be cremated and my ashes put on the graves of the Haymarket anarchists in Waldheim cemetery in Chicago. Later the Catholic Church allowed cremation.
Communion. The supposed effect of this sacrament has seldom changed Catholic into desiring to follow Christ, or there would not be this wholesale denial of Christ daily.
Freedom exists as a theory in the Catholic Church. Let priests and nuns picket for strikers and Negroes, and supposedly liberal bishops like Bishop Lucey of San Antonio are just as quick to punish them as Cardinal McIntyre is in Los Angeles. Here in Salt Lake City I know priests who read the Catholic Worker and the liberal National Catholic Reporter and who really know better than to support war and the conservative system of society around them, but the fear they have makes them subservient to their conservative bishop.
Love is a word used without meaning by the clergy. From the pope down to the layman the emphasis upon pomp and wealth and prosperity while the world starves and wars go on is a denial of Christ.
Heresy is a word that has no meaning to me now, for I renounce the whole system of Catholic or other theology, which is based upon the fear of hell and the hope of getting into heaven by all sorts of dubious bargains.
Reincarnation. I still think that this idea is the most logical, but really there is no answer to the problem of evil. If I don't believe in reincarnation and it is true, I'll be reincarnated whether I believe in it or not. If it isn't true, believing in it will not make it true. It is how you live that counts.
There are others "not of the fold" who remain followers of Christ. I choose to be among them. There is no reason for joining any other church for all churches support exploitation, and mostly they support war. And I sure don't want any Ammonites following me around.
I have reconsidered my response to whether or not I am an anarchist or a Catholic first. I now offer the following thoughts. I choose