As a resident of the Bible Belt, I can testify that right-wing Protestants do not regard Catholics as "real" Christians (though they do grudgingly prefer them to Muslims, Wiccans, and atheists). Moreover, I suspect that evangelicals tolerated Mel Gibson because they saw (correctly) that Gibson was in rebellion, in various ways, against his own church, and they inferred (wrongly) that this made him more "Protestant."
by Roderick T. Long on November 8, 2004 at 12:05 AM