Religions of Fascist Dictators
June 27, 2018
by William P. Meyers

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Fascist dictators were mainly Roman Catholics

I added a table of the religions of fascist dictators to this site. I am reproducing it for this blog, but it has a permanent residence: Fascist Dictators with Religions Table.

Lots of my liberal to leftist friends have amplified their President Trump is a Fascist theme lately, and of course they are upset by recent Supreme Court rulings on the right of a religious person to refuse economic services, the right of someone who benefits from being in a labor union to not pay for those benefits, the right to gerrymander, etc. Plus the prospect of a new young ultra-right Supreme Court judge replacing Justice Kennedy.

Being right of center does not in itself make one a classic fascist. But most people, even leftists who think they are well educated, don't really know very much about classic fascist. To most people, a fascist is any government leader who does something you don't like. I think Trump and right-wing Republicans are quite distinguishable from Hitler and crew, at least so far.

So here is the table:

Of course, it is possible to preserve the other elements of fascism and switch from Roman Catholic to another religion like evangelical Protestantism. However, that might be difficult because evangelicals don't believe in a top-down authoritarian church structure like Catholics do (or are supposed to).

Soon it will be a century since Benito Mussolini seized power, marking the beginning of an era. A lot has changed. We can learn from history, but we can also be misled by it.