Playing the `Catholic card'

So it takes an ecumenical group of zealots charging anti-Catholicism in an ad running in a state with a Greek Orthodox senator to make me fully understand the word chutzpah. Is this what it means to live in a multicultural society?

The Bush Republicans have poked more than a few holes in the wall between church and state. We've seen faith-based policies in the White House, Bible study in the attorney general's office, and senators parsing good and bad Catholics in the Senate. Now anyone working to patch up the wall is accused of attacking religion.

Playing the ''Catholic card'' infuriated many, especially four Catholic Democrats on the Judiciary Committee. This same quartet had to sit through a committee meeting where a Mormon and a Methodist parsed a good Catholic from a bad Catholic.

How do you spell that word again? C-H-U-T-Z-P-A-H.