The Herald’s latest survey of US Catholic leaders reveals how lay stewardship continues to shape the narrative of politics and education.
Two years after our inaugural survey of US Catholic leaders, where we argued that Catholic leadership in the United States was increasingly in the hands of the laity, rather than clergy, there is little evidence to suggest that anything has changed. Our 2024 survey includes many examples, but few are better than that of Leonard Leo, the 59-year-old lawyer and political influencer behind the Supreme Court conservative (and Catholic) majority, and thus largely responsible for the overturning of Roe v Wade. As co-chair of the Federalist Society, Leo is also using his alliance of conservative non-profits to help set up the first Catholic public, which is to say free, school in the US, in Oklahoma.
