Statistics are not a sure guide because not all cases of bigotry are reported. Persons who “blow the whistle” on discrimination are more likely to appear in newspapers than those who just “grin and bear it.”

Perhaps other groups like Jews, African Americans and gays are more successful in protesting discrimination than Catholics, who may suffer equally from bigotry but are not as skilled in fighting back.

Remember also that there are a billion Catholics worldwide. Even if the rate of insults were the same as all others, there would be more numerical cases of bigotry against us than against other Christians.

One could also argue that Catholicism merits more discrimination since it is a church of sinners with many faults. In that point of view, Catholics deserve all the opprobrium sent their way, and telling “the truth” about the church is no more a case of bigotry than observing that many Jews have long noses or that many Mafioso have Italian surnames, etc.

Just to be clear, I don’t subscribe to any of the above. My measure is different. Take the ever-sartorial Lou Dobbs, for example. On virtually every show, the pretentious Mr. Dobbs manages to show disdain for Catholicism’s stance on immigration.

When words do not suffice to attack the church, this condescending TV populist resorts to a raised eyebrow, inflections showing incredulity, or the nodding head accompanied by an omniscient tsk-tsk. His target is Catholicism’s resolve to apply Gospel values to a burning social question.

However, I have never heard Mr. Dobbs criticize the Presbyterian, the Methodist, the Lutheran, the Episcopal or any other church with a similar stance to that of the Catholic bishops. As far as I can see, he discriminates only against Catholics. He fully earns the label of an “anti-Catholic bigot.” This is not for what he says -- but for what he does not say when he singles out Catholics as if they were the only religious group in the US opposed to the immigrant cleansing he espouses. Such is what I mean by “Anti-Catholicism.”

The Catholic Church is attacked by the right-wing for its stance against the Iraq War, against capital punishment and its pro-immigrant compassion. It is attacked by the left-wing for its condemnation of abortion, mercy-killing, human cloning and the like. Catholicism’s enemies come in all shapes and sizes and pop-up repeatedly in history.

Hitler and the Nazis threw every Polish priest under the age of 45 into the concentration camps and der Fürher planned to murder the pope. The Communists in the Stalin era arrested priests, bishops and Cardinal Mindzenty, subjecting them to show trials and torture. Archbishop Romero was assassinated in El Salvador while the US gave tacit support to the ARENA Party of Roberto D’Aubuisson.

The Evangelical Protestant dictator of Guatemala, General Rios Mont, persecuted bishops, priests, nuns and Catholic catechists, ordering them shot on sight for being “Communists.” All this came after having hands laid on him by U.S. Evangelicals. The Reaganite Jeanne Kirkpatrick spoke hours after the rape and murder of the religious women in El Salvador saying that “obviously” they merited the treatment they received. (P.S. -- The assassins got legal U.S. residence too.)

As if being attacked -- often with lethal force -- were not enough, individual Catholics say and do enough stupid things to merit condemnation. The church has been categorized as protector of pedophile priests, up-tight censor of theatre and cinema, and a wasteful administrator, squandering the good-will offerings of the faithful. And while exaggeration may be present in each criticism, so is a kernel of truth.

Such attacks, both those merited and those imposed, make it seem incredible that the Catholic Church continues to exist, function, and even grow. There is no earthly reason why a flawed church with so many enemies has lasted so long or has a billion members today.

Since “On Faith” seldom admits reasoning that is not rational, I will close with a question rather than a statement. “If there is no earthly reason to explain how Catholicism endures, ought we conclude then that the Catholic Church has heavenly protection?”