(LifeSiteNews) — Carrie Prejean Boller charged a U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops committee chair of misrepresenting her in a theologically problematic private memo to bishops ostensibly responding to statements she made as a Catholic member of the White House Religious Liberty Commission before she was ousted from that body last month.
In his March 13 memorandum addressed to “All Bishops,” Bishop Joseph Bambera of the Diocese of Scranton sought to provide guidance to priests on the topic of “Jews and Judaism during Holy Week and Easter” in response to Boller’s public statements that he suggests were in some way erroneous.
Breaking the story on Saturday, Catholic journalist Joe Enders presented a full copy of the memo and provided some critiques of the four “basic” points it presents as “essential teaching,” even while it cites primary source documents that hold no doctrinal authority in the Catholic Church.
Claiming to speak on behalf of the Bishops’ Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, Bambera provided no direct quotes from Boller or anyone else that he contested as being false yet suggested that his memo was necessary to provide a level of correction to “misleading statements made by media personalities.”
False accusations by suggestion
His first point quoted the Second Vatican Council’s Nostra Aetate, affirming that what happened in the passion of the Lord Jesus Christ “cannot be charged against all the Jews without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today.”
Yet, as Enders observed, the statement didn’t seem to apply to this particular case. “Neither Carrie nor any other mainstream apologist I’ve seen defending her is claiming (anything contrary to this teaching).”
In a late Sunday statement on X, Boller responded to this point and also affirming, “I accept that teaching fully.” But this wasn’t the point of her remarks on the commission which involved a “straightforward question about free speech and modern definitions of antisemitism.”
Citing what even many Jews and scholars have considered to be a ridiculous definition of this term, the former Miss California referenced the IHRA’s version that includes: “Using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism (e.g., claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterize Israel or Israelis.”
“Could one of the IHRA definitions be used to label parts of the New Testament itself as antisemitic?” Boller asked. She then referenced as an example 1 Thes. 2:14-15: “The Jews who killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets … ” which would seem to violate the IHRA guidelines.
“That is Sacred Scripture. Quoting the Bible is not antisemitism,” she confirmed.
READ: How the ‘antisemitism industry’ became the biggest threat to freedom in the West
Bishop Bambera affirms Boller’s point that 1948 Israel not a fulfillment of prophesy
Continuing, the recent Catholic convert from Evangelical Protestantism cited Bishop Bambera’s third point where he affirmed that Catholics “interpret the re-emergence in 1948 of a Jewish state in a historical rather than theological context.”
“That is precisely the point I made at the hearing. The Catholic Church does not teach that the modern State of Israel fulfills biblical prophecy. This is exactly what I said on stage at the hearing,” she recalled, adding that the bishop’s apparent misunderstanding of her actual testimony was “remarkable.”
“(T)he bishop’s own citation confirms the point he accused me of making improperly,” Boller challenged.
For his part, Enders added, “with all the preceding indignation toward Mrs. Prejean Boller earlier in this directive, it seems out of place to take this long to say she was right about the political state of Israel having ‘no biblical prophecy fulfillment.’”
Bishop’s primary doctrinal source is actually ‘not a magisterial document’
Bishop Bambera perhaps makes his greatest overreach in his second point, which, again, he classifies as “essential” Church teaching on this topic.
He cites a 2015 document from the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity titled “The Gifts and the Calling of God Are Irrevocable” (GCGI). He wrote that “building on the teaching of popes since the Second Vatican Council” this document “affirmed that the Church holds in tension both ‘belief in the universal salvific significance of Jesus Christ’ and ‘the equally clear statement of faith in the never-revoked covenant of God with Israel’” (emphasis in original).
From this premise, he went on to suggest it could be a matter of Catholic doctrine that self-identified Jews have a divine right to the land of the Middle East, asking, “If God’s covenant with the Jewish people has not been revoked, what, then, of God’s promises to Abraham concerning, not only descendants, but land?”
The only problem is the good bishop misrepresented the nature of the GCGI document, classifying it as “essential” Church teaching that “builds on the teaching of the popes” and “affirms” a point of doctrine.
However, this is far from the case, at least according to GCGI itself that clarifies in its preface, “The text is not a magisterial document or doctrinal teaching of the Catholic Church, but is a reflection … ”
Why is a bishop of the Catholic Church proposing as “essential” Church teaching an inflammatory and discredited heresy, which remains a cause for perpetual war in the Middle East, based on a document which explicitly affirms it is “not a magisterial document or doctrinal teaching of the Catholic Church?”
Holy Land Christian leaders protest Bambera’s second non-magisterial document
Additionally, Bishop Bambera proposed another document with no magisterial authority in his list of “essential teaching” sources to assist priests across the nation in preparing to preach the Gospel during upcoming Palm Sunday and Easter Triduum celebrations.
“Translate Hate” was a joint venture between Bambera’s USCCB Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs Committee and the pro-abortion, “pro-gay marriage” American Jewish Committee that was released in December 2024.
This document, which ostensibly seeks to address supposed verbal hatred of Jewish identity in the United States, was so offensive to Christian leaders in the Holy Land that it prompted a sharp protest letter in the spring of 2025 requesting it be retracted.
READ: Palestinian Christian leaders sharply admonish USCCB for collaboration with Zionists
Signed first by former Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, His Beatitude Michel Sabbah, the letter charged that Translate Hate “misrepresents” the situation in Palestine and “seeks to silence voices advocating for truth and justice in the Holy Land.”
It further affirmed the document to be fundamentally biased and “a form of hate speech against Palestinians.”
READ: Israeli extremist rabbis instruct soldiers heading to Gaza: ‘Kill all their children’
Boller: ‘I will not accept a Catholic bishop misrepresenting my testimony’
“I think everyone should know ‘Translate Hate’ is not magisterial teaching of the Catholic Church,” Boller said in an additional statement on X. “Catholics owe religious submission of mind and will to the Magisterium, not to external speech codes created by advocacy organizations.”
“I will not accept a Catholic bishop misrepresenting my testimony or implying that quoting Scripture is hatred,” she said. “The Gospel cannot be rewritten to satisfy modern political sensitivities.”
“Catholics have both the right and the duty to proclaim the truth of Christ clearly and without fear,” the wife and mother of two concluded.
Rep. Thomas Massie calls for hearings on Boller’s dismissal
Boller was removed from President Donald Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission after she challenged the notion that anti-Zionism is antisemitism, citing many Jewish scholars and Catholic doctrine.
READ: Orthodox rabbi: Zionism a ‘cardinal sin’ for Jews, creation of Israel is ‘satanic’
According to the assessment of many, she was ironically terminated from this commission for exercising her religious liberty.
On Friday, Republican Congressman Thomas Massie released a statement, observing that Boller “was reportedly removed” from the commission “for making statements that mirror remarks from the Pope. Removing members for religious viewpoints undermines the very purpose of the Commission.”
“I’m asking two Congressional committees to review,” he announced.
Coming to Boller’s defense also is the Catholics for Catholics organization, which will be honoring the former Religious Liberty Commission member during their “Catholic Prayer for America Gala” on Thursday, the Solemnity of St. Joseph.
She will be given their “Catholic Champion Award” for her “courageous defense of the Catholic Faith,” according to a February 12 statement by the organization’s president, John Yep.
🛎 BREAKING: The Catholic View on Zionism and the 1948-State of Israel – @CforCatholics releases comprehensive statement 🛎
BACKGROUND: With the unjust removal of @CarriePrejean1 from the Religious Liberty Commission 2 days ago, and given the importance of understanding the… pic.twitter.com/JfTCY5FNhe
— Catholics for Catholics 🇺🇲 (@CforCatholics) February 13, 2026
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