Mel Gibson’s father, denounced for his anti-Semitic views
Hutton Gibson, a Roman Catholic traditionalist and outspoken critic of the modern church who gained wide notoriety as the father of the actor Mel Gibson and for his anti-Semitic views, died on May 11 in Thousand Oaks, Calif. He was 101.
His death, at Los Robles Hospital and Medical Center, was not publicized at the time. It was confirmed by a search of a California records database. Requests for information from several family members, including his son Mel, were not answered.
Hutton Gibson belonged to a splinter group of Catholics who reject the reforms of the Second Vatican Council of 1962-1965, known as Vatican II. These traditionalists seek to preserve centuries-old orthodoxy, especially the Tridentine Mass, the Latin Mass established in the 16th century. They operate their own chapels, schools and clerical orders apart from — and in opposition to — the Vatican.
Into his 80s, Mr. Gibson would drive 300 miles roundtrip from his West Virginia home to attend Mass at a traditionalist church in Greensburg, Pa. But after what was described as a “power struggle” between Mr. Gibson and other parishioners, he left to form a new church.
Mr. Gibson, who had early in life attended a seminary before dropping out, was extreme in his views. He denied the legitimacy of Pope John Paul II, once calling him a “Koran Kisser,” and said Vatican II had been “a Masonic plot backed by the Jews.” Mr. Gibson earned the nickname “Pope Gibson” for his outspoken, dogmatic opinions on faith.
After he was expelled from a conservative group in Australia, where he had moved with his family from New York state in 1968, Mr.
Gibson formed his own: Alliance for Catholic Tradition. Beginning in 1977, he disseminated his ultraOrthodox views in a newsletter, “The War Is Now!” and through self-published books, including “Is the Pope Catholic?” (1978) and “The Enemy is Here!” (1994).
Mr. Gibson never reached more than a small audience with his writings. But after his son Mel, the sixth of 11 children, became a Hollywood star, the father’s profile rose, largely to the detriment of his son’s public image.
In 2003, as Mel Gibson was directing “The Passion of the Christ,” his film about the crucifixion, Hutton Gibson gave an interview to The New York Times laced with comments about conspiracy theories. The planes that crashed into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, had been remote-controlled, he claimed (without saying by whom). The number of Jews killed in the Holocaust was wildly inflated, he went on.
“Go and ask an undertaker or the guy who operates the crematorium what it takes to get rid of a dead body,” Mr. Gibson said. “It takes one liter of petrol and 20 minutes. Now, 6 million?”
In a radio interview a week before the February 2004 release of “The Passion,” Mr. Gibson went further, saying of the Holocaust, “It’s all — maybe not all fiction — but most of it is.” The comments added to an already simmering controversy that the film was anti-Semitic; the chairmen of two major studios told The Times that they wouldn’t work with Mel Gibson in the future.
Interviewed by Diane Sawyer of ABC News, the actor was asked to repudiate his father’s statements. He stopped short of doing so, saying: “He’s my father. Gotta leave it alone, Diane. Gotta leave it alone.”