TikTok Catholicism: Beneath the veil of the internet's 'Trad Caths'

Two years ago, a headline in The New York Times declared that the hottest club in New York City was the Catholic Church. While that was never true, celebrities and TikTok influencers alike have gotten Catholic-curious over the past few years.

More specifically, there's been an uptick in "Trad Cath" content — internet for "traditionalist Catholic" — promoting traditions like the Latin Mass and women wearing veils in church. A lot of these traditions are vibes and aesthetic-based, and easily translatable to social media.

But scratch the surface, and many Trad Caths have beliefs about how all of society should look, not just church on Sundays. Endless Thread goes to mass to hear the Trad Cath creed and witness the transformation of a former saint of Catholic TikTok.

Show notes:

• Behind the Catholic Right’s Celebrity-Conversion Industrial Complex
  (Vanity Fair


• New York’s Hottest Club Is the Catholic Church (The New York Times)


• ‘A step back in time': America’s Catholic Church sees an immense shift toward the old ways ( The Associated Press)


• Between Butker, Candace Owens, and Nick Fuentes, TradCaths are Having a Moment — A Moment With Something to Tell us About Christian Nationalism (Religion Dispatches)


• The Life of Ev (TikTok)

This episode was originally created for an audio listening experience. An auto-generated transcript is available on Apple Podcasts. Heads up that some elements (i.e. music, sound effects, tone) are harder to translate to text.