When the Diocese of Arlington was established in 1974, to serve the growing Catholic population of northern Virginia, Bishop Thomas Welsh was consecrated as the first bishop for the new diocese. He later moved on to head the Allentown, Pennsylvania diocese, and eventually retired in 1997.

The Diocese of Arlington presents some unique pastoral challenges. Thousands of the Catholic faithful in Arlington’s parishes commute into nearby Washington, DC, to work in the federal government. Thousands more work at the Pentagon, the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency, or the military installations located within the bounds of the diocese. So political and military affairs play a particularly important role in the lives of the community.

One of the first initiatives that Bishop Welsh launched in Arlington was the establishment of a newspaper, the Arlington Catholic Herald. This year the Catholic Herald celebrates its 25th anniversary, and the editor, Michael Flach, asked Bishop Welsh to reflect on the role of the Catholic press in influencing public opinion. He also asked some pointed questions—and received some blunt answers—about the moral responsibilities of Catholic politicians.

Could you share with our readers the early history of the Arlington Catholic Herald?

Welsh First of all, my background was as a priest in Philadelphia. I was very interested in the Catholic Standard and Times up there. I came from St. Charles Borromeo Seminary.

At that time, the now-Archbishop John P. Foley, who has worked in Rome for many years, was editor of the Catholic Standard and Times. He also was on the seminary faculty teaching philosophy. So I had frequent discussions with him about the challenges the Church faces in trying to get its message out in this day and age, when secular means and secular ideas control communications. I was very happy with his work at the Catholic Standard and Times.

I came down here and was new to the area, even though I had gone to school here in the late 1940s. The changes here in Virginia and then the liberal bent of the local press convinced me that we needed to have our own vehicle. We were a long distance from Richmond. We needed our own paper. It wasn’t too complicated an idea.

How did you find the right person to head this new paper?

Welsh I think we had a little committee. We started looking and Charlie Carruth’s name surfaced pretty quickly. I was much impressed with his approach, his credentials. After my initial conversation with him I felt he was intelligent, dedicated, and orthodox Catholic. I was hoping the editor would give us a Catholic paper and it would have some quasi-independence; the bishop’s office wouldn’t have to be holding hands on day-to-day things.

Since the diocese was so new, there was a lot of work that you needed to accomplish. What were some of the more pressing issues for you and the diocese and how did the paper help you get your message out?

Welsh: A new diocese has to establish its own identity. The paper fits very much in that. The Catholic paper functions in a couple of different areas. We want to get our people to hear the Church’s understanding or explanation of whatever the topic might be. We want the people to have up-to-date explanations of theological controversies. We want the people to know what’s going on in our own diocese.

Arlington is blessed and challenged by the caliber of so many of its people. The Church has an obligation to them, but they also have an obligation to the Church. We try to work in both directions: Find out who those people are, get them involved, learn from their perspective.

Looking back, what was the reaction of the clergy to the establishment of the new paper?

Welsh There was some negative reaction. When you’re paying bills, you notice: “Here’s a new bill.” How do you justify it?

Once the paper got started, my idea was quickly being translated by Mr. Carruth and his staff. It was doing what we hoped it would do. Most people were happy with that. I’m sure they still are, these days. In fact, I read the paper.

This area remains an area of concerns and controversies. It’s very important for the Church to be able to add bits of information. Many of the things that come to us in the secular media are biased, for a variety of reasons. We have to work with that, and try to challenge it as much as we can. We can’t expect a secular paper, on a regular basis, to explain things from a Catholic perspective.

When you went to Allentown, you also started a paper there. You transferred those same concerns to the new diocese there. Do you still see a valid need for a weekly Catholic paper or is there something else that could supersede that?

Welsh There may be something in the future. Things happen very rapidly. But there’s nothing yet. We still have to have some way of getting the material from you to the consumer.

Take the business of cloning. The whole business of morality in these things is hardly every discussed in any intelligent fashion for the ordinary person to see. Or take the idea of in vitro fertilization for married couples who can’t have children. We live in a very pro-abortion culture. Where are they going to find out what the moral principles are if we don’t give that to them? We need some place where, in a concise fashion, the truth can be expressed. They can look at this and talk to someone about it.

Would you mind answering a few political questions? We just saw the exit polling indicating that in November 2000 the majority of Catholics voted for a pro-abortion candidate. As a bishop, is that something that concerns you?

Welsh Why is there an increasing gap between Church teaching and the action of people who say they are Catholic? I don’t know what the answer is, but obviously it is a serious question.

It seems more and more of our people think it is acceptable to say I’m a Catholic, and yet to think that allows them to disagree—not only intellectually, but also in conduct. I find it most alarming because in this election there was a clear-cut choice . . . . When we’ve had arguments with pro-abortion people, they have said that the reason to vote for them is that they will guarantee pro-abortion judges on the Supreme Court and in the federal system. The division is clearer then ever.

There’s some theological problem at the basis of this. I think so many people are trying to compartmentalize their existence. They need to go to Church. They need baptism, confirmation, and First Communion. They need marriage in the Church. And yet the other six days of the week, they say, “Keep the Church out of the bedroom. Keep the Church out of my day-to-day life.” They think the Church doesn’t understand.

I think it’s a tremendous problem in education and in motivation. Ideas have consequences. If your idea of faith is that you can pick a few commandments and say, “I can keep them, and not the rest”—what are the consequences of that? If you say the Church is wrong about one serious item like the pro-life stance, then you’re undermining the whole nature of the Church. The Lord didn’t say, “I’m with you all the time, except on some major issues.” Nothing is more “major” than this whole issue of life and family. The Church is supposed to be guiding people on a day-to-day basis on how to get to heaven. We are saying this—abortion—is intrinsically evil. There’s no time for anybody at any place to have an abortion and say, “This is right.” It’s always, always wrong.

It’s very fundamental. Some of these people are going to leave the Church or they’re going to have to have a conversion process to get back to the idea that the tenets of the faith have consequences.

One of the concerns that people have, especially in this area, is for the Church to keep its nose out of politics. In many ways, either from the pulpit or the pages of the Herald, we have restrictions on what we can and can’t say during political campaigns. Do you think the Church is stepping too softly? Are we doing enough?

Welsh First of all, it’s galling to us to see the double standard. We are watched with hawk eyes if we dare step over the line. Other people can be in the pulpits of Protestant churches up and down the landscape. No one ever seems to object.

The Diocese of Arlington was part of a lawsuit some years ago, which was finally thrown out. It was trying to remove the Catholic Church’s [tax] exemption. Part of the suit was the argument that one pro-life man, Henry Hyde, a cathedral parishioner, did a Scripture reading. They were trying to establish that Henry Hyde, a politician, was being influenced by the Church in an overt fashion. The suit was defeated finally, but it cost the Church hundreds of thousands of dollars.

It’s a double standard that we suffer from. If we were allowed an even playing field, then we could speak like Jesse Jackson speaks. We would have a better chance. I think we do speak more openly than ever before.

The time may come when we have to say we have to give up the tax-exempt status. Our message isn’t getting out. Our people, for whatever reason, aren’t accepting it.

We have to be involved. We are citizens. We have to form our Catholic citizens to vote and to vote intelligently. We have an obligation in conscience to be involved in the process of civil society. We are in the Commonwealth of Virginia. We are part of the commonwealth. We have an obligation to safeguard the “common wealth.” The number-one “wealth” is the life of our citizens.

By nature, I’ve always been tempted to go further. But with the responsibility of being a bishop, I can’t speak as a private citizen anymore. I would like to. I should be able to.

What disturbs me, besides the uneven playing field, is that we’re held to a higher rule than other churches and congregations. What disturbs me, then, is the politician—man or woman—who wants to have it both ways. They say, “I’m a Catholic,” then espouse all sorts of things that the Catholic Church says are wrong.