This can undermine the very idea of America and its place in the world. Every people and their culture need a coherent and respected story of origin. The Old Testament has numerous genealogies (the old “begats”) that establish the ancient heritage of the Jewish people, and lists of kings that show their royal lineage.
The Jewish people were unique, however, in having God as their true leader and lawgiver. They remembered this fact whenever they recited the great prayer, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one God…” which was passed on from father to son.
The New Testament begins with the genealogy of Jesus, linking him to David, king of Israel, and declaring him to be the Messiah.
Now, of course, the story of Columbus is not on par with these biblical accounts. But we still need to be careful how we “revise” Columbus.
Since I work at the headquarters of the Knights of Columbus, I am occasionally asked why our fraternal Order was named after the explorer who has something of a mixed reputation these days. The simple fact is that when the Knights of Columbus was founded in 1882, Christopher Columbus was a highly revered and universally respected hero.
The group of Catholic men who gathered with Father Michael McGivney nearly 130 years ago in the basement of St. Mary’s Church in New Haven, Conn., chose “Columbus” to show that they were both fully Catholic and fully American to a hostile Protestant culture. Those were the days of “Irish Need Not Apply,” when Catholics were not welcome in some jobs or most sectors of society. Fr. McGivney saw first-hand that Catholics needed an organization that would lift their spirits, protect their interests, defend their faith and provide a death benefit to widows and orphans when the breadwinner of the family died, a frequent occurrence at a time when most Catholic men worked dangerous jobs in factories, construction and railroads.
