Sotomayor Would Be Sixth Catholic Justice, but the Pigeonholing Ends There

She sounds like most Catholics I know. My DH claims he's in the reserves.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/31/us/politics/31catholics.html?hpw

Sotomayor Would Be Sixth Catholic Justice, but the Pigeonholing Ends There

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
Published: May 30, 2009


If Judge Sonia Sotomayor is confirmed for a seat on the Supreme Court, she will be the sixth of the nine justices who are Roman Catholic — a stunning robed portrait in a country where Catholics were once targets of discrimination and suspicion.

Four of the Catholics on the court are reported to be committed attenders of Mass, and they make up the court’s solid conservative bloc — Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. The fifth Catholic, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, often votes with them.

There are indications that Judge Sotomayor is more like the majority of American Catholics: those who were raised in the faith and shaped by its values, but who do not attend Mass regularly and are not particularly active in religious life. Like many Americans, Judge Sotomayor may be what religion scholars call a “cultural Catholic” — a category that could say something about her political and social attitudes.

Interviews with more than a dozen of Judge Sotomayor’s friends from high school, college, law school and professional life said they had never heard her talk about her faith, and had no recollection of her ever going to Mass or belonging to a parish. Her family did not return phone calls for comment.

A White House spokesman, speaking on background, put it this way: “She currently does not belong to a particular parish or church, but she attends church with family and friends for important occasions.”

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The court’s liberal wing is made up of Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer, who are Jewish, and John Paul Stevens, a Protestant.

The Rev. Joseph A. O’Hare, a Jesuit priest and the former president of Fordham University, who came to know Judge Sotomayor when they both served on the New York City Campaign Finance Board in the 1980s, said: “I just don’t think Sonia would fit in with Roberts, exactly, and certainly not Scalia. I think they’re very different Catholics.”

The general ranks are rather thick with Catholics. There are a load in the Navy, too, up at the top, but the Marines beat the pack for "density."

Most of the justices are not active in their putative religion