We Need to Have a Talk About Leonard Leo
A new book investigates a secretive Catholic sect that appears to have an outsized influence on U.S. courts and the law. British financial journalist Gareth Gore has shown that the group remains active and prominent. Gore’s new book, Opus: The Cult of Dark Money, Human Trafficking, and Right-Wing Conspiracy Inside the Catholic Church, traces the group from its origins in Franco’s Spain to its rising influence in Washington, D.C., where it has focused on capturing the federal judiciary and shifting it far to the right.
Leonard Leo controls more money than both political parties right now in the United States! He’s one of the most powerful people in the country, arguably in the history of the country, when it comes to influencing the judiciary, and increasingly, political races. And yet anytime anybody criticizes him or his vast dark-money network, he claims the mantle of victimhood. He waves the flag of victimhood and alleges that anybody who would dare to say a cross word about him or his operation is in fact an anti-Catholic bigot. He also referred to his opponents as the modern Ku Klux Klan, which is a deeply offensive comparison. He suggests that his critics are wounded people who have been taken advantage of by the devil, by Satan himself, in order to stop his “noble” work to restore traditional values to America.
He is promoting conservative Catholic values that frequently infringe upon the freedom of others. These are values that prohibit women from obtaining an abortion, even in the case of rape, even if it is necessary to preserve her health or even spare her from death. He has made it clear he believes that same-sex relationships should be unlawful, same-sex marriages should be nullified, abolished. He believes that much of modern secular society is under the control of the devil. So he uses his authority, and specifically his money, to try to restrict other people’s rights and to try to impose these reactionary values. But he also insists his work, his values, are above all criticism—that vigorous public debate and allowing for vigorous public criticism of this work is off the table because he claims it’s anti-Catholic bigotry.
This is one of the best-funded projects to change American life and restrict American freedoms that we’ve ever seen in this country, and if we can’t talk about it, then they just win automatically.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2024...icism.html
How Opus Dei Conquered D.C.
Opus Dei (Latin for “the Work of God”), is not focused on ministering to the masses (and if it were, it would be failing spectacularly, as more Americans are leaving the Catholic Church than joining it, by as much as four to one). Instead, it is focused on marshaling the people who have various forms of authority over the masses (Opus Dei reportedly calls them the “intellectuals”) to its various revanchist causes. The group targets, and attracts, people like Donald Trump’s current running mate, J.D. Vance, a convert to conservative Catholicism by way of Opus Dei–connected clergy and influencers.
The CIC, which doubles as the Opus Dei office in Washington, and the national network of wealthy and powerful right-wing Catholics affiliated with it are among the most effective forces in MAGA world and the American Christian-nationalist movement. It is allied with Protestant Evangelicals in many of its goals but is more hierarchical and often more institutionally organized. Opus Dei can marshal centuries of intellectual heft of the Church behind it.
The now-infamous Project 2025 was cooked up under the auspices of the Heritage Foundation’s conservative Catholic and Opus Dei–connected president, Kevin Roberts. All three of the Trump-appointed Roe-wrecking Supreme Court justices (two of whom are Catholic) got there thanks in part to the tireless dark-money-funded efforts of the right-wing Catholic Leonard Leo, a major CIC donor who has also become the go-to conservative disburser of anonymously donated big bucks to political causes. The three other justices in the Dobbs majority are hard-right Catholics. Beyond the high court, current and former Washington power lawyers and influencers have Opus Dei connections.
Numerary priests, affiliated converts, and their allies have worked in the courts and in league with non-Catholic “faith-based” politicians to crush reproductive rights, oppose gay marriage, and bash down the wall between church and state through Congress and at the Supreme Court. The conservative Catholic convert community in Washington includes some power players in this long game: One is Ginni Thomas, who converted in 2002, not long after Opus Dei associate Leonard Leo shepherded her husband, Clarence, through contentious nomination hearings and Anita Hill’s sexual-harassment allegations. Ginni Thomas has credited the Opus Dei–affiliated Scalias — Maureen Scalia, wife of the late Supreme Court justice Antonin “Nino” Scalia, has been spiritually directed at Opus Dei — for bringing Thomas back to the church. “Both Nino and Maureen [Scalia] really loved and prayed Clarence back to the Church,” Ginni Thomas has said. Clarence had grown up Catholic, and even considered becoming a priest, but had fallen away.
During his research, Gore learned the organization keeps detailed records on priests and numeraries to gauge how serious a potential convert or member’s Catholicism is, who is in their networks and families, and how much money they’ve got — information even gleaned sometimes, he said, from Confession, which officially is under seal of confidentiality.
“Opus Dei has more in common with the KGB or the Stasi than it does with other parts of the Catholic Church,” Gore said. “It has this meticulous recordkeeping. I spoke to one prominent D.C. conservative who said he had incontrovertible evidence that McCloskey had collected deeply personal and compromising information about him during Confession and then passed it on to senior members of Opus Dei.”
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/...vance.html
A new book investigates a secretive Catholic sect that appears to have an outsized influence on U.S. courts and the law. British financial journalist Gareth Gore has shown that the group remains active and prominent. Gore’s new book, Opus: The Cult of Dark Money, Human Trafficking, and Right-Wing Conspiracy Inside the Catholic Church, traces the group from its origins in Franco’s Spain to its rising influence in Washington, D.C., where it has focused on capturing the federal judiciary and shifting it far to the right.
Leonard Leo controls more money than both political parties right now in the United States! He’s one of the most powerful people in the country, arguably in the history of the country, when it comes to influencing the judiciary, and increasingly, political races. And yet anytime anybody criticizes him or his vast dark-money network, he claims the mantle of victimhood. He waves the flag of victimhood and alleges that anybody who would dare to say a cross word about him or his operation is in fact an anti-Catholic bigot. He also referred to his opponents as the modern Ku Klux Klan, which is a deeply offensive comparison. He suggests that his critics are wounded people who have been taken advantage of by the devil, by Satan himself, in order to stop his “noble” work to restore traditional values to America.
He is promoting conservative Catholic values that frequently infringe upon the freedom of others. These are values that prohibit women from obtaining an abortion, even in the case of rape, even if it is necessary to preserve her health or even spare her from death. He has made it clear he believes that same-sex relationships should be unlawful, same-sex marriages should be nullified, abolished. He believes that much of modern secular society is under the control of the devil. So he uses his authority, and specifically his money, to try to restrict other people’s rights and to try to impose these reactionary values. But he also insists his work, his values, are above all criticism—that vigorous public debate and allowing for vigorous public criticism of this work is off the table because he claims it’s anti-Catholic bigotry.
This is one of the best-funded projects to change American life and restrict American freedoms that we’ve ever seen in this country, and if we can’t talk about it, then they just win automatically.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2024...icism.html
How Opus Dei Conquered D.C.
Opus Dei (Latin for “the Work of God”), is not focused on ministering to the masses (and if it were, it would be failing spectacularly, as more Americans are leaving the Catholic Church than joining it, by as much as four to one). Instead, it is focused on marshaling the people who have various forms of authority over the masses (Opus Dei reportedly calls them the “intellectuals”) to its various revanchist causes. The group targets, and attracts, people like Donald Trump’s current running mate, J.D. Vance, a convert to conservative Catholicism by way of Opus Dei–connected clergy and influencers.
The CIC, which doubles as the Opus Dei office in Washington, and the national network of wealthy and powerful right-wing Catholics affiliated with it are among the most effective forces in MAGA world and the American Christian-nationalist movement. It is allied with Protestant Evangelicals in many of its goals but is more hierarchical and often more institutionally organized. Opus Dei can marshal centuries of intellectual heft of the Church behind it.
The now-infamous Project 2025 was cooked up under the auspices of the Heritage Foundation’s conservative Catholic and Opus Dei–connected president, Kevin Roberts. All three of the Trump-appointed Roe-wrecking Supreme Court justices (two of whom are Catholic) got there thanks in part to the tireless dark-money-funded efforts of the right-wing Catholic Leonard Leo, a major CIC donor who has also become the go-to conservative disburser of anonymously donated big bucks to political causes. The three other justices in the Dobbs majority are hard-right Catholics. Beyond the high court, current and former Washington power lawyers and influencers have Opus Dei connections.
Numerary priests, affiliated converts, and their allies have worked in the courts and in league with non-Catholic “faith-based” politicians to crush reproductive rights, oppose gay marriage, and bash down the wall between church and state through Congress and at the Supreme Court. The conservative Catholic convert community in Washington includes some power players in this long game: One is Ginni Thomas, who converted in 2002, not long after Opus Dei associate Leonard Leo shepherded her husband, Clarence, through contentious nomination hearings and Anita Hill’s sexual-harassment allegations. Ginni Thomas has credited the Opus Dei–affiliated Scalias — Maureen Scalia, wife of the late Supreme Court justice Antonin “Nino” Scalia, has been spiritually directed at Opus Dei — for bringing Thomas back to the church. “Both Nino and Maureen [Scalia] really loved and prayed Clarence back to the Church,” Ginni Thomas has said. Clarence had grown up Catholic, and even considered becoming a priest, but had fallen away.
During his research, Gore learned the organization keeps detailed records on priests and numeraries to gauge how serious a potential convert or member’s Catholicism is, who is in their networks and families, and how much money they’ve got — information even gleaned sometimes, he said, from Confession, which officially is under seal of confidentiality.
“Opus Dei has more in common with the KGB or the Stasi than it does with other parts of the Catholic Church,” Gore said. “It has this meticulous recordkeeping. I spoke to one prominent D.C. conservative who said he had incontrovertible evidence that McCloskey had collected deeply personal and compromising information about him during Confession and then passed it on to senior members of Opus Dei.”
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/...vance.html
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
