Fr. Ripperger and Ninjas

[mythbuster1]

Indeed. I have seen idolatrous devotion to media series, but that has more to do with people becoming obsessed with their entertainment than the series itself encouraging it.

 

[anon91549587]

Unsure about the modern practise of ninjitsu but mudra-like hand signs were part of the discipline. Imo practising stuff you dont subscribe to CAN inhereit its consequences and effects.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Coughlin wasn’t far-right when he started. He was anti-KKK and pro-New Deal for a long time, and it was during that time he achieved his peak audience. He was against Communism, but that was not considered “far right” in those days, rather it was the standard position for Catholics because Communism was anti-clerical, and the Church preached against it. He shifted more to the right as time went on and became less supportive of FDR and eventually pro-fascist, but these weren’t exactly popular views at the time. As shown by the voting patterns in the country back then, most US Catholics were supporting FDR and the prelates like Spellman who were against Coughlin. Spellman wasn’t exactly a giant conservative as we would define it today. (He became more conservative much, much later.)

We always hear a lot about how right-wing Coughlin became and how he was taken off the air, but relatively little about his positions when he was actually the most popular. If he’d started out with the platform he eventually adopted, he likely would not have gotten a huge Catholic audience.

Anyway, while Coughlin’s style of presenting propaganda no doubt influenced many (including non-Catholics), he bears little relation to the Catholic conservatives today who are mostly focusing on issues within/ reform of the Church itself. Coughlin wasn’t on there complaining about the Pope, or about Vatican II which was still a long way off.