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1921 slaying of Catholic priest gets renewed interest
RNS ^ | May 27, 2010 | Greg Garrison

Posted on 05/28/2010 7:41:33 AM PDT by GonzoII

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (RNS) The 1921 murder of the Rev. James E. Coyle on the front porch of his rectory was no ordinary slaying. Involved were the anti-Catholic Ku Klux Klan, a future Supreme Court justice and a preacher’s daughter who secretly married a Puerto Rican.

In her book “Rising Road: A True Tale of Love, Race and Religion in America,” Ohio State University law professor Sharon Davies digs deep into the Coyle’s murder—and the dark chapter of anti-Catholicism in American history.

“There are so many things about this story that are really compelling,” said Davies, who stumbled across the case while doing research for a law journal article. “When I found it, I was absolutely captivated by it. This story needed to be told. We can’t afford to forget this.”

The murder trial was historic partly because future U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black defended the accused killer, Edwin R. Stephenson, a Methodist minister and member of the Ku Klux Klan.

(Excerpt) Read more at religionnews.com ...


TOPICS: Catholic; History; Religion & Culture
KEYWORDS: anticatholicism; catholic; kkk
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1 posted on 05/28/2010 7:41:33 AM PDT by GonzoII
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To: All
PREACHER KILLS CATHOLIC PRIEST

We are happy to offer these articles for your reading, concerning Father James E. Coyle

2 posted on 05/28/2010 7:42:36 AM PDT by GonzoII ("That they may be one...Father")
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To: markomalley

I found an article you didn’t...ha..ha...


3 posted on 05/28/2010 7:44:10 AM PDT by GonzoII ("That they may be one...Father")
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To: markomalley

I found an article you didn’t...ha..ha...


4 posted on 05/28/2010 7:44:46 AM PDT by GonzoII ("That they may be one...Father")
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To: GonzoII
Democrats.

Ain't they full of fun?

5 posted on 05/28/2010 7:45:06 AM PDT by ClearCase_guy
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To: GonzoII
and the dark chapter of anti-Catholicism in American history.

I am afraid that chapter is still being written around the globe.

6 posted on 05/28/2010 7:45:10 AM PDT by Puppage (You may disagree with what I have to say, but I shall defend to your death my right to say it)
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To: GonzoII

Bookmark for DH! (ty)


7 posted on 05/28/2010 7:59:57 AM PDT by mlizzy ("Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person" --Mother Teresa.)
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To: GonzoII

There was an unholy connection between the old Methodist Church and the Ku Klux Klan and part of the connection was because of the anti-alcohol stand of the Klan and of the Methodist Church.

They probably viewed the Catholic Church as a particularly virulent opponent as they used real wine in their liturgy instead of fruit juice. (I guess the Methodist Bible of the time didn’t include the Miracle at Cana.) In some areas the Ku Klux Klan was employed to enforce prohibition.

Read “The Invisble Empire” all about the Klan. At its height in the 1920’s it was not a Southern phenomenon. Places as disparate as New Jersey, Montana and Maine had Klans and people as high as governors and Senators were Klan members. As late as the 1950s I remember reading a Life Magazine article with a bunch of Klansmen in brightly colored robes - Kleagles, etc posing with their hoods off for the camera, grins on thier idiotic inbred faces.

Harry Truman, a Democrat and briefly a Klansman, condemned them as a society of Hooded Bigots after he had left them with disdain.

Today’s United Methodist Church is still anti-alcohol - sort of, but has strayed from the path of anti-Catholocism to the equally disagreeable path of Political Correctness.

How idiots in the Klan could reconcile their virulent anti-Semitism with the worship of a Jewish Christ is beyonod me.

But I guess if you are a nut, there is no room for logic in your brain.


8 posted on 05/28/2010 8:01:56 AM PDT by ZULU
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To: GonzoII

***darn it*****

The story of Coyle is an interesting one and truly reveals the heart of the Democratic Party...particularly as it operated in the deep South.


9 posted on 05/28/2010 8:02:32 AM PDT by markomalley (Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus)
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To: ZULU
"They probably viewed the Catholic Church as a particularly virulent opponent as they used real wine in their liturgy instead of fruit juice. (I guess the Methodist Bible of the time didn’t include the Miracle at Cana.)"

I can't stop laughing at that one....;0)

10 posted on 05/28/2010 8:12:10 AM PDT by GonzoII ("That they may be one...Father")
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To: ZULU
Back in the 1920s, the Klan was very strong on Long Island in New York, and had control of the Islip Town* government for much of the decade. Until about 30 years ago, there was a plaque at Islip Town Hall under the American flag that said "donated by the daughters of the Ku Klux Klan." The Brooklyn chapter used to have their meetings at a hall right across from Prospect Park that still stands.

*Note: On Long Island, "Towns" refer to large collections of villages and hamlets, and usually comprise 1/4-1/3 of a county.

Since most Puerto Ricans have black blood (a no-no back in the day), it doesn't surprise me that the reaction was so violent.

11 posted on 05/28/2010 8:15:00 AM PDT by Clemenza (Remember our Korean War Veterans)
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To: Clemenza

The Klan didn’t like Jews, blacks, Catholics, Italians, Spaniards, Orientals, or American Indians. There were probably a few groups I let out there.

I remember a pretty funny news item back in the 1960s about a group of Lumbee Indians in North Carolina who oraided a Klan rally. They had nice shots of the hooded bigots running away in terror, persued by the yelling indians.


12 posted on 05/28/2010 8:19:33 AM PDT by ZULU
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To: Clemenza

Heck, the Klan was strong in many parts of the country, not just in the South.


13 posted on 05/28/2010 8:28:53 AM PDT by Pyro7480 ("If you know how not to pray, take Joseph as your master, and you will not go astray." - St. Teresa)
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To: GonzoII

Roll Tide Role. The author an Ohio State employee probably wants to influence future voters for the national championship to shun the State for alleged improprieties. Find it strange she doesn’t mention similar incidents in Ohio or Michigan where both state universities had coaches (Crisler, Yost and Hayes)who refused to play Catholics at various junctions of the 20th century,


14 posted on 05/28/2010 8:30:30 AM PDT by bronx2
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To: ZULU

ZULU:

More to the point, much of Protestantism in the Southern U.S., where I was born, raised and still live, and other parts of the U.S. such as the rural midwest, was tied to the KKK in some form back first half of the 20th century, either explicitly in this case or implicitly in most cases.


15 posted on 05/28/2010 8:34:12 AM PDT by CTrent1564
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To: ZULU
The Ku Klux Klan was against Koons, Kikes and Katholics. Prejudice against the first two is now beyond the pale so why is anti-Catholicism still acceptable, asks Michael Burleigh
16 posted on 05/28/2010 8:35:16 AM PDT by A.A. Cunningham (Barry Soetoro is a Kenyan communist)
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To: Pyro7480

Most notoriously, they had a majority of the state legislature in Indiana in the 20s (the high point of Klan support in the United States), but were brought down in the Hoosier State thanks to their leaders propensity to rape and murder.


17 posted on 05/28/2010 8:36:11 AM PDT by Clemenza (Remember our Korean War Veterans)
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To: GonzoII

Never heard this story. Interesting read.


18 posted on 05/28/2010 8:41:55 AM PDT by mockingbyrd (Remember in November.)
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To: CTrent1564

True, but the Methodist connection was a very strong one. So was the Presbyterian one.

The Klans’ height was in the 1920’s but it remained a serious menace up through the 1950’s. With the end of segregation, it seemed to implode.

But the Klan is a funny thing. It has a LONG history going back to the post Civil War and during that time it flared up, died down, and repeated itself again and again so, like Frankenstein, it has the potential to rise from the grave at any moment.

I think the reasson it may be dead for good is more people are better educated today, the population has become more ethnically diverse yet at the same time more culturally and biologically amalgamated.

I’m a white Protestant. I don’t hate any religion and respect them all with the singular exception of Islam which I view as a cult, not a legitimate religion.

I don’t see anyone’s religion or race as any of my business as long as they consider themselves AMERICANS.

Today, conservative Protestants and Catholics should realize they have more in common with each other than they differ. Right to life, sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman, an oppostion to acceptance of homosexuality as a life style and most importantly - the worship of the same God Jesus Christ.

And Christians and Jews today, I beleive, recognize themselves as cousins. They come out of the same religious background in Hellenistic Judaea.


19 posted on 05/28/2010 8:44:37 AM PDT by ZULU
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To: A.A. Cunningham
I think in many ways anti-Catholicism today comes not from Protestants but from a virulent group of anti-western leftists who view Judaeo-Christian values as a threat to their socialist world order. Catholicism is the largest, most powerful target due to the number of Catholics worldwide, the willingness of so many of them to die for their faith and the strong organization the Catholic Church presents.

If they take out the Catholic Church, they can take us all out.

20 posted on 05/28/2010 8:50:00 AM PDT by ZULU
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