One Sunday morning, Justice Antonin Scalia of the U.S. Supreme Court faced a phalanx of reporters as he left Mass at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston. A reporter asked Scalia, a devout Catholic, whether he should be considered impartial in matters of church and state given his religious affiliation and devotion. Scalia responded with a hand gesture that is unfamiliar to most Americans but is considered indecent by some Italians. The Boston Herald covered the incident, called the gesture obscene, and even included a photograph of Scalia making the gesture. Offended by the newspaper's characterization of his action, Scalia wrote a letter to the editor defending himself and defining the gesture as not obscene but merely expressive of his lack of concern for the reporter's question.

Scalia's church-steps encounter with the press followed on the heels of another news story about Scalia from earlier that month. In a question-and-answer session after a speech in Switzerland, Scalia had commented on the Bush administration's detainment of suspected terrorists, a topic that was closely related to a case pending before the Court. Criticism about Scalia's comments quickly followed, and a public effort was made to get the outspoken justice to recuse himself from the case. Scalia refused, initiating another round of publicity.