Father Neuhaus was indeed one of a kind, and also a deeply admirable man. He was the happy warrior of the culture wars: eager to mix it up with those with whom he disagreed, but always with respect. There seems to have been no anger or spite in him—a rare thing among those engaged in hot-button cultural debates. Neuhaus embodied one of the most important developments of our time, and also one of the most surprising: the hold conservative Catholics have on the political and legal views of conservative Protestants. Likewise, American Protestants of my generation have placed more weight on cultural symbols—crosses and crèches in public spaces, prayers at public school graduations and sporting events, the phrase “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance—than our predecessors in generations past. Battles over those symbols have absorbed too much of Christians’ political attention, and a host of other problems too little.
Link to Work