And Now Comes Father SCOTUS
The takeover of the U.S. Supreme Court by conservative Roman Catholics includes an ordained priest who is a clerk for Justice Brett Kavanaugh
Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.
– Jesus Christ, as quoted in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof….
– The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution
Jesus and the Founding Fathers seem to have been of one mind when it comes to church and state: Everyone should stay in their own lane.
But however divine a division, it apparently does not hold much sway with the U.S. Supreme Court. Despite already counting five conservative Roman Catholics among its nine jurists, the court has now hired a Catholic priest to clerk for Justice Brett Kavanaugh as it starts a new term in October.
The first-ever appointment of its kind will put a clergyman in a position to help to shape U.S. law at the highest level. Justice Kavanaugh, who was nominated by former President Donald Trump, is part of the Catholic majority (including Justices Samuel Alito, Amy Coney Barret, and Clarence Thomas, plus Chief Justice John Roberts) who overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. (Both Neil Gorsuch, who voted to overturn Roe, and Sonia Sotomayor were raised as Catholics.)
The 38-year-old cleric Patrick Reidy, is a member of the Congregation of the Holy Cross, an 187-year-old order of priests and brothers who work as educators and missionaries and whose motto is “Hail the Cross, our Only Hope.”
Reidy served as a rector of a men's dormitory at Notre Dame and chaplain of the university's law school before attending Yale Law School, where he excelled enough to be editor of the prestigious Yale Law Journal. After completing his law degree in 2021, he clerked for Judge Thomas Hardiman of the Third U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, another conservative Catholic and a member of the right-wing Federalist Society. Hardiman was on Trump’s short list of candidates to fill Supreme Court seats vacated by the death of Antonin Scalia and the retirement of Anthony Kennedy.
The appointment of “Father Pat,” as he is known, was first reported by The National Catholic Register. It comes as an influential group of Roman Catholic conservatives works to break down the wall between church and state and foment what The Associated Press has called “a counterrevolution in which they would take over government bureaucracy and institutions like universities from within, replacing entrenched ‘elites’ with their own [while] acting upon their vision of the ‘common good.’”
Really keeping the faith. Republican vice-presidential nominee JD Vance – a convert to Catholicism (what’s more dogmatic than a covert?) who also has a JD from Yale – seems intellectually aligned with this group of so-called “post-liberals.”
“His conversion put Vance in close touch with a Catholic intellectual movement, viewed by some critics as having reactionary or authoritarian leanings, that has been little known to the American public until Vance’s rise to the national stage,” the AP’s Michelle Smith and Peter Smith wrote.
In The Atlantic last month, Damon Linker profiled the group of Catholic intellectuals influencing Vance that “is known for its sweeping attack on classical liberalism. It claims that a long list of contemporary problems (rising rates of economic inequality, drug addiction, suicide, homelessness…) can be traced back to moral-philosophical errors made centuries ago by the American Founders and their ideological progenitors. In place of our polity’s commitment to individual rights, autonomy, and pluralism, the post-liberals aim to create a society unified around the common good, which is itself fixed on a theological vision of the Highest Good.”
Four of those thinkers – including Patrick Deneen, a political science professor at (where else?) Notre Dame and author of the best-selling Why Liberalism Failed – started a Substack newsletter, the Postliberal Order in 2021. Its “About” says: “The liberal ordering of the world is exhausting us. We are addicted to endless innovations which don’t improve our lives, and the more we seek to transgress every moral limit, we find ourselves ever more solitary, ever more detached from ourselves, from our families, from our countries, and our God.”
Should Donald Trump secure a second term, Vance – a buddy of Deneen’s – will be at his side, presumably advancing the decidedly undemocratic leanings of an American President who fomented an insurrection against the federal government and the peaceful transfer of power; who has repeatedly denigrated the rule of law; and who has talked openly about using power to punish political enemies — all while genuflecting to his not-so-beatific self.
It's already obvious that Trump has friends in high-court places, and with Vance in the Executive Branch, two out of three pillars of the U.S. government could be influenced by conservative Catholic dogma.
Father Pat is a nice sprinkle on this Sunday sundae.
Every year, Supreme Court justices typically hire four clerks each to serve for the duration of the court’s term. They conduct legal research, prepare questions for oral argument, and often write the first draft of opinions that ultimately become the highest – and final – rulings in the nation on a whole range of legal disputes, some of them involving the most divisive social issues confronting the country.
About 75 percent of the U.S. population observes some form of religion according to the Pew Research Center, the vast majority being Christians of varying denominations (Catholics comprise the second-largest share after Protestants). A 2022 Pew survey found deep divisions over the role of religion in Supreme Court decisions: While 45 percent of respondents said the U.S. should be a “Christian nation,” fully 80 percent opposed the idea of Supreme Court justices bringing their personal faith into official decision-making.
That conflict is particularly acute over social issues such as reproductive rights, and the court is expected to hear several new cases in the coming term dealing with follow-on issues to its ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which struck down abortion rights.
The appointment of Reidy raises questions about what role Father Pat’s religion would play in the drafting of opinions involving highly charged issues, including contraception and the death penalty. "By our vow of obedience, we commit the entirety of our life in Holy Cross to a faithful adherence to the decisions of the community and the authority of Church Magisterium," reads one of the vows of the Congregation of the Holy Cross.
Crème de la crème. Supreme Court clerkships tend to be awarded to top students from the nation’s most prestigious law schools, such as Yale and Harvard. Clerks have gone on to become U.S. presidents, senators, and Supreme Court Justices themselves, as is the case with Alito, Barrett, and Kavanaugh. Those clerks who go into private practice are routinely awarded hiring bonuses worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
“My phone was ringing off the hook with justices who were interested in interviewing [Father Reidy],” Judge Hardiman told the National Catholic Register. “Justice Kavanaugh was first. …Father Reidy is a great lawyer and a great American, and I’m thrilled that he’ll have another opportunity to serve the country at the next level.”
Hardiman and Reidy share connections to Notre Dame, which was founded in the mid-1800s by members of the Congregation of the Holy Cross. Both received their undergraduate degrees there, and Reidy also obtained a Master of Divinity degree.
The careers of Justice Barrett and Reidy overlapped at Notre Dame, and it is not unreasonable to think they knew each other when Barrett was a law professor there and Reidy served as the law school's chaplain. That makes the Catholic cabal on the Supreme Court ever so much cozier.
According a 2014 article in the publication Denver Catholic, Reidy grew up in Centennial, Colorado, the oldest in a family with four children. He was born in New York on the day after Christmas in 1985, a magazine from the Congregation of the Holy Cross Office of Vocations said. A bio of Reidy on Notre Dame's website paints him as a regular guy: "He enjoys skiing, cycling, Chipotle burritos, used bookstores, and the Denver Broncos."
The Congregation of the Holy Cross is dedicated to social justice in some of the world’s poorest countries. In a 2018 interview, Reidy said he spent two summers working in Uganda and wanted to pursue more work in the field of human rights. But he also pinpointed the potential conflict between his dueling oaths to the Church and the court, saying, “My career trajectory is circumscribed by my vow of obedience. That commitment to Holy Cross is what drives me.”
A message for the Reverend Reidy requesting comment was left at the office of Justice Kavanaugh. He had not responded by the time of publication.
Investigative journalist Christian Berthelsen contributed mightily to the reporting.
My Book Report
By Deidre Depke
Made in New York
What were you like at age 33? New Yorker Brooke Orr, for one, believes she has hit her stride: She’s got a grown-up job, a new wardrobe, and a plan to upgrade from her studio to a one-bedroom co-op. There’s a problem, though. Orr, the protagonist of Rumaan Alam’s excellent new novel, Entitlement, is so seduced by her new life that she quickly evolves from gratified to grasping to sociopathic.
The Black adopted daughter of a single mother who works as a reproductive-rights attorney, Orr has landed a job at the family foundation of billionaire Asher Jaffee. In short order, their relationship becomes something more complex than junior employee and CEO. Soon, the inappropriate octogenarian Jaffee is showing her a side of New York known mostly by the top one percent of its residents.
New York City itself is an essential character in Entitlement. Jaffee’s daughter died on September 11. He eats regularly at Jean-Georges, the haute Manhattan restaurant. There’s a scene set at Lincoln Center, where the Philharmonic is performing Beethoven and Mozart. Meanwhile, the city’s women are being stalked by the Subway Pricker, who is jabbing them underground with some sort of needle-like object.
Orr herself becomes a stalker — but her target is Jaffee’s New York, with its Central Park views, chauffeur-driven Bentleys, and galleries stuffed with million-dollar art for sale. Her family and friends are mystified by this new version of the woman who had only recently left a job teaching at a charter school uptown. Orr tries to explain why she has changed.
“I don’t want much. I want freedom…I don’t want what I have. I’m nothing, I’m no one.” She wanted safety in a mad world. She wanted what most wanted and was the thing that rich people hoarded: not money, but the grace of God and the universe, a way to be in the world and enjoy it. She wanted selfhood.”
Alam is the author of Leave the World Behind, a 2020 National Book Award finalist about race and class and societal collapse. Julia Roberts and Mahershala Ali starred in the Netflix adaptation. The creepy and captivating Entitlement would make a fine movie of its own – and an excellent candidate for the literary awards.
Mea Culpa, Kate Atkinson
Last week, I wrote a snarky item about Atkinson’s new crime novel, Death at the Sign of the Rook, noting that the setting is a hokey murder-mystery weekend in a British great house. Regrettably, I judged the book by its cover (and inadequate blurb) rather than giving Rook the full read it deserves —which I now have done. It’s true that murder among the hedgerows is central to the story, but the novel is much more than that. It marks the return of detective Jackson Brodie, last seen in 2019’s The Big Sky, and has a satisfyingly twisty plot, abundant dark humor, and complex characters. Plus, it’s organized as a sort of homage to Agatha Christie or maybe Nancy Drew, and I won’t disparage anything Nancy Drew. Nor should you.
Why Not Cook Dinner Tonight
For fun, take a look at The New York Times’ 10-year celebration of its Cooking app. (I know, an app is not a book. But whatever.) The editors compiled 50 greatest hits, albeit in a sort of subjective way. The list is based on “recipes that racked up five-star ratings, topped our charts and went viral – plus a few that lit up the comments section.”
Categories generally begin with a popular best-of. Classics, for instance, is topped by roast chicken. Memorable Comments is led by Katharine Hepburn’s Brownies, to which reader Sydne Newberry contributed this:
“This has been my go-to brownie recipe for 30 years, even after going to baking school! ... In the ’80s, an acquaintance in Germany to whom I brought some of the brownies, and who considered herself a great cook, asked for the recipe but was never able to get it to work. She kept asking me what she was doing wrong, and I was never able to solve her problem. Eventually, she moved to the U.S. and stole my husband.”
A friend of mine says the Times now is a collection of apps surrounded by news. That’s not much of an exaggeration: In 2023, 100 million readers clicked on Cooking. That year, digital subscriptions contributed $1 billion in the Times’ subscription revenue – double print subscription returns.
The anniversary special allows you to create a bucket list of recipes you’d like to give a go, as well as a list of recipes you’ve already made. I’m going to try Mississippi Roast. The best NYT thing I’ve made: Marcella Hazan’s Bolognese Sauce.
BTW, the app’s Top 50 is free to access this week, even without a subscription.
Dump, The Musical
Nota bene: From now until November 5, The Constant Tribune will feature excerpts from a musical about the Election of 2016 and its aftermath. Some scenes include songs from an album available on Spotify.* Others will be linked to animated videos. For previous scenes, see earlier issues, starting with the newsletter of September 12.
Act One, Scene 3
The hallway of an upscale hotel in Iowa. Lala Nazari, Democratic presidential candidate Marcy Madison’s closest aide, is seeing her boss to her room after a day on the campaign trail. In the background lurk two burly Secret Service agents.
LALA Here we are. Second-floor suite, just as Albert and Anton [jerks her head toward the agents] like it.
MARCY Now come on in, Lala, and tell me how it went today. Rodney and Judy are great campaign managers, but you’ve been at my side for so long that you can just feel what’s working.
LALA I’d love to, but I really need to call home and make sure Carlos is taking good care of Angie and has everything ready for the weekend.
MARCY My God, it’s her birthday. How could I forget? And at three, they know it’s a big deal. [Touches Lala’s arm] Carlos is staying off the messaging thing, right?
LALA Yes, yes. On his best behavior. Anyway, today was your usual excellent performance. That pig farm was a little gross, but hey, it’s Iowa.
MARCY Jesus, don’t I know. The sows aren’t only on the farms here. Did you get a load of that load who’s the county chairwoman?
LALA Yeah. Rodney calls her Debbie Doublewide. Listen, I’ll text and tell you what’s up for tomorrow. Shriners, I think.
MARCY Okay, Honey. Get some sleep.
Act One, Scene Four
Macy flops into an easy chair in her lavish hotel suite and calls her husband, former President Jefferson Madison. She gets a familiar voice on the answering machine.
JEFFERSON (V.O.) I’m not here right now but the forty-second president of these United States would be tickled to chat to you. Leave me a number and I’ll get right back to you.
MARCY Christ, Jeff, where are you? We had an okay day, but I want to talk about Bernie. It’s hard to believe, but that nutcase seems to be getting some traction out here. We need to do some opposition research. He can’t be that big a Boy Scout. Call me when you get this.
Marcy hangs up and dials another number. Her stressed-out daughter Harlem Madison answers.
HARLEM Hello, this is Harlem.
MARCY Harlem, it’s Mommy.
HARLEM Oh, Mommy, how’s it going out there? Look, the baby has a rash and I can’t really talk for long.
MARCY How did that happen?
HARLEM How the hell do I know? The nanny probably didn’t wipe her well. You know, Mommy, babies get rashes.
MARCY O.K., honey, don’t get upset. Give me a ring when you get a moment. Are you coming out here?
HARLEM I’d like to. I don’t know. We’ll see. Aren’t Lala and Judy and Rodney there?
MARCY Yes, but they can’t work the crowd in a diner like you can, and you’re always a hit with the young people.
HARLEM Alright. I’ll see how it’s going here. Bye Mommy. Love you.
MARCY Love you, sweetie. Kiss the ba....
Marcy looks at the honking hotel phone for a moment, lays it back in its cradle, grabs her purse, and heads for the door.
Act One, Scene Five
Marcy is at the piano of the almost-empty hotel lounge, a cigarette burning in an ashtray next to a martini glass. She plinks the keys, laments, and then suddenly bursts out of her funk. She is on a stage looking svelte and slinky. A curtain behind her goes up. Dancers in top hats and star-spangled Uncle Sam body suits are in a chorus line behind her.
Act One, Scene Six
Lala opens the door to a saloon and finds her way to a table where campaign managers Judy Salami and Rodney Schnook, plus a campaign intern, are drinking.
RODNEY How’s the queen?
LALA Oh, stop. She’s fine. Though sometimes it feels like she’s just going through the motions.
JUDY Well, she’d better start breaking a sweat. I hear that the senior citizen from Vermont is flying in tomorrow. I used to think he’d have a better chance getting laid at an anti-abortion rally than landing the nomination....
RODNEY But?
JUDY But, I dunno. Something’s clicking, especially with the goddamn hipster generation. I mean, he’s an angry old man who’s been saying the same things for decades.
LALA Maybe that’s it. Maybe it’s the consistency.
JUDY Well, whatever the fuck it is, we’ve got to tap into it and brush his ass back. This was supposed to be a victory lap not a sprint down the backstretch. And if she’s dragging in the primaries now, imagine how much energy she’ll have for the general.
RODNEY Don’t be such a worrywart.
LALA I need a vodka.
INTERN I thought you were a Muslim, Ms. Nazari.
JUDY Oh, leave her alone. If you knew what she’s got at home, you’d drink, too.
RODNEY Not that these yokels know how to make a cocktail. Jesus, where’s that waitress.
Suddenly, Rodney jumps up and sings. The others join in.
*Songs performed by Tari Kelly and Mike McGowan
TO BE CONTINUED.