RELIGIOUS

LIBERTY

QUESTIONED

ABBREVIATIONS
DVII The Documents of Vatican II
Dz Denzinger, The Sources of Catholic Dogma
GS Gaudium et Spes
PIN Enseignements pontificaux. Lapaix intérieure des nations
PL Patrologiae Latinae Cursus Completus
ST Summa Theologica
 INTRODUCTION
Can the conciliar declaration on religious liberty, Dignitatis Humanae, be reconciled with
the traditional doctrine of the Church?
The question may seem scandalous, even absurd, since by principle Vatican II has to be
the living reflection and today’s voice of the biblical, patristic, and magisterial tradition of the
Church.
But Vatican II wanted to be also the reflection of “the signs of the times,” 1 which are for
the Church so many “impulses of the Spirit” 2 to assimilate elements outside divine Tradition:

“The problem of the sixties was to acquire the best values expressed by two centuries
of “liberal” culture. These are in fact values which, even though they originated outside
the Church, can find their place—provided they are clarified and corrected— in the
Church’s vision of the world. This task has been accomplished in these years.” (Joseph
Cardinal Ratzinger) 3

The balance between divine Tradition and these values has not been found, confesses the
cardinal—values such as awareness of liberty of action, dignity of the human person,
redemptive worth of other religions, merit of a pluralistic society, emancipation in the
juridical order from spiritual values, etc. Can then these values be finally considered
incompatible with the Catholic vision of the human person and of civil society? That question
is certainly pertinent, twenty years after the promulgation, on December 7, 1965, of the
declaration on religious liberty.

To answer the questions we will resolutely place ourselves at the level of the immutable
truth of Revelation and of the constant Magisterium of the Church as well as the equally
immutable principles of the natural order.

In the first place, at the level of Revelation, which corresponds to that of human society,
the most important fact is the dogma of the social kingship of Our Lord Jesus Christ and of
the primacy of the Church, from which the great doctors and scholastic rheology elaborated a
body of doctrine—clarified by the popes of the 19th century—as immutable as the revealed
principles from which they were deduced. This body of doctrine can be summarized as the
union of the temporal and spiritual powers and the indirect subordination of the temporal
power to the spiritual. As a consequence, the care of religion (cura religionis) of the State—
that is, its duty to recognize and favor the true religion and its members—results both from
the proper end of the State, which is the temporal common good of civil society, and from its
ministerial” function with regard to the spiritual power.
Consequently, indifferentism on the part of the State and of the juridical order of civil
society constitutes an error against the faith which was condemned as such with remarkable
persistence by the popes.

In the second place, at the level of the natural order, which corresponds to that of the
individual, the most important fact is the principle (recalled to us by Revelation) “the truth
shall make you free.” 4
The necessary consequence is that liberty, whether it is moral liberty or liberty of action,
cannot have any other foundation than truth. Again, it is what the popes, especially Leo XIII,
taught.
1
Gaudium et Spes, 4, DVII, p.2Ol; hereafter, GS.
2
Subtitle of GS 11, DVII, p.209.
3
“Pourquoi la crise,” interview with Vittorio Messori, Jesus, November 1984, p.72.
4
Jo. 8:32. All citations to the Bible are to the Douay-Rheims translation of the Vulgate.

2
 A certain liberal-evolutionism tries to obscure these immutable truths by building a
theology of the historical evolution of doctrine based on a historical relativism of this
doctrine.
According to this theory, we can always attribute to any teaching of the Church, most
particularly its political doctrine, an essential historical condition resulting from the historical
period during which that doctrine was elaborated and promulgated.
The consequence is that since one new “historical climate” follows another, the doctrine
of the Church is forced to change and find new foundations. 5
That is why religious liberty, which was condemned by the popes of the 19th century
because of its premises of absolute liberalism and rationalism, should now allegedly be
rehabilitated in the name of human dignity. That is also why the relations between the
temporal and the spiritual order should allegedly be revised at a time during which the
monarchy of a “sacred” type of the Middle Ages and of the Reformation has been replaced
today by a democratic and social State.
Not only was the condemnation of religious liberty motivated by its intrinsic Opposition
to the immutable doctrine of which we spoke, but the idea that a change of foundation 6 can
justify a change of doctrine falls squarely under the condemnation of Pius XII:

“There is also a kind of false “historicism,” which attends only to events of human life,
and razes the foundations of all truth and absolute law, nor only insofar as it pertains to the
philosophical matters, but to Christian teachings as well.” 7

To establish the scope of our doubts, it has been necessary to analyze closely the several
“foundations” given to religious liberty by Dignitatis Humanae.
We could not but uncover a certain number of ambiguities and confusions, such as
confusion between the ontological dignity of man and his operative dignity;

• illegitimate conversion of the “subjective rights” of men to “objective rights”;

• illegitimate break between “positive” and “negative” “rights” of men;

• false symmetry between being forced to act against one’s conscience in religious
matters and being stopped from acting against one’s conscience in religious matters. 8

It will be relevant also to cast mote light than we have on the contradiction that seems to
be expressed by Dignitatis Humanae between the affirmation that man is essentially
connected to God (and therefore subject to compulsion by God) and the affirmation that “all
men are to be immune from coercion on the part.. .of any human power.” 9
Is it not precisely human law that enforces and specifies divine law and its requirements?
Finally, we have tried to demonstrate systematically the formal identity that seems to exist
between the three of Dignitatis Humanae and the three parallel assertions 10 condemned by
the encyclical Quanta Cura of Pius IX if, as we have tried to explain, Quanta Cura condemns
the three assertions in question, then in consequence there are many agonizing questions
5
Since they were allegedly born of a preceding historical context which no longer exists, the doctrines of that
preceding historical period—such as the doctrine of the social kingship of Christ—are considered irrelevant.
6
I.e., a change of historical foundarion.
7
Humani Generis, August 12, 1950; Denzinger, The Sources of Catholic Dogma (Herder, 1957), 2306;
hereafter, Dz. All citarions to Humani Generis are to this source.
8
Having heard Archbishop Lefebvre speak numerous times on the subject, I think His Grace meant “stopped
from acting according to one’s conscience in religious matters”—what is actually written in this French edition
being, perhaps, an editorial mistake? [Translator’s note.]
9
DVII, pp.678-679.
10
I.e., the three main assertions.

3
which the Church will have to answer.

The first part of our work consists of a brief philosophical explanation of the notion of
liberty. This is a necessary preliminary to any scrutiny of the notion of religious liberty.
The second part shows the theological, dogmatic, and doctrinal principles of the
traditional doctrine of the Church on religious liberty as they emerge from the documents of
the Magisterium.
[The third and final part is made up of a number of dubia and questions on the document
Dignitatis Humanae of Vatican II.]

4
 PART ONE

WHAT IS LIBERTY?

Liberty can be of three different types:

- psychological liberty or free will—that is, the possibility of acting according to one's de-
liberate choice towards one specific good rather than another without being predetermined to
one choice;

- moral liberty—that is, the faculty to do good; and

- liberty of action, or liberty from coercion—that is, the capability of acting without being
forced to act against one’s conscience or restrained from acting according to one’s
conscience.

Psychological liberty or free will

Psychological liberty is a fact of nature; and because it is rational, it belongs to any man
who has the use of reason.

Moral liberty

Moral liberty has as its unique sphere goodness. Outside of goodness, it is corrupt and
becomes license. Only goodness and truth can be the basis for moral liberty.

“Liberty is the faculty to choose between different means, provided the orientation to
the end [goodness] is preserved.” (Fr. Santiago Ramirez, O.P.) 11

“Liberty is the faculty to act within what is good.’ (Leo XIII) 12

“Liberty is a power perfecting man, and hence should have truth and goodness for its
object.” (Leo XIII) 13

“For, as the possibility of error, and actual error, are defects of the mind and attest its
imperfection, so the pursuit of what has a false appearance of good. though a proof of our
freedom, just as a disease is a proof of our vitality, implies defect in human liberty.” (Leo
XIII) 14

“... the possibility of sinning is not freedom, but slavety.” (Leo XIII) 15

11
The meaning is that outside of the “orientation to the end,” liberty is abused.
12
13
Immortale Dei, December 1, 1885; “A Light in the Heavens”: The Great Encyclical Letters of Pope Leo XIII
(TAN, 1995), p.123; hereafter, “A Light in the Heavens.” All citations to Immortale Dei are to this source.
14
Libertas Praestantissimum, June 20, 1888 (Angelus Press, 1998), p.6, §6; hereafter, Libertas. All citations to
Libertas are to this edition.
15
Ibid, p.7, §6.

5
 “...the truth shall make you free.” (St. John) 16

CONCLUSION: There is no moral liberty for error or moral evil.

Liberty of action or liberty from external coercion

1) Liberty of action is legitimate within the just limits of the common good of society.

“We have said that the State must not absorb the individual or the family; [it is just
that] both should be allowed free and untrammeled action so far as is consistent with the
common good and the interests of others.” (Leo XIII) 17

2) Liberty of action is not an absolute liberty. Indeed, constraint is, in and of itself,
morally indifferent and often can be used for good. Jail is good for evildoers, and certain
types of constraints can be good to oblige ignorant and lazy people to know the truth so that
afterward they can freely practice virtue; such is the essence of education and of the exercise
of authority.

“You now see therefore, I suppose, that the thing to be considered when anyone is
coerced, is not the mere fact of the coercion but the nature of that to which he is coerced,
whether it be good or bad: not that anyone can be good in spite of his own will, but that,
through fear of suffering what he does not desire, he either renounces his hostile
prejudices, or is compelled to examine the truth of which he had been contentedly
ignorant; and under the influence of this fear repudiates the error which he was wont to
defend, or seeks the truth of which he formerly knew nothing, and now willingly holds
what he formerly rejected.” (St. Augustine) 18

“Similarly, human liberty cannot be defined as a freedom from all constraint—

otherwise all authority is destroyed. The constraint can be physical or moral. Moral
restraint, in the religious sphere, is very useful and is found through the Holy Scriptures:
“The fear of God is the beginning of Wisdom.”...
It is one thing to state the present need for authority to allow greater liberty and quite
another to state that this condition is in fact more in conformity with human dignity. Such
a claim would implicitly allow that scandal was admissible, either through error or through
vice. God preserve us from this!” (Archbishop Lefebvre) 19

3) Liberty from any constraint, conceived as the greatest good of mankind, is the absurd
maxim of liberalism.

“Nothing more foolish can be uttered or conceived than the notion than, because man is
free by nature, he is therefore exempt from law.” (Leo XIII) 20

“This fundamental principle of liberalism is absurd....Absurd because it alleges that the

principal right of man is the absence of any tie that could hinder or restrain his

16
Jn. 8:32.
17
Rerum Novarum, May 16, 1891; “A Light in the Heavens,” p.230. All citations to Rerum Novarum are to this
source.
18
Letter No. 93 to Vincentius; Letters ofSt. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, trans. J. G. Cunningham (T & T Clark,
1872), p.409.
19
Remarks sent to the Secretariat of the Council, December 30, 1964; I Accuse the Council (Angelus Press,
1982), pp.30, 31.
20
Libertas, p.8, §7.

6
 liberty....Liberty cannot be an end in itself or the ultimate end [of man] since it is only an
operative faculty, and any faculty is oriented towards its operation, and all our operations
in this life are oriented entirely towards some good.” (Cardinal Billot)

CONCLUSION: To declare that “man is free by nature, aspires to be free, and, therefore,
has the right to be free from constraints” is to profess the absurd and condemned principle of
liberalism.

THE LAW

The law, whether divine or human, directs mankind to his end and determines the means
to be used to obtain said end.

De Ecclesia Christi, II, p.2O; summarized by Fr. Henri le Floch in Le cardinal Billot
lumière de La théologie (1932), p.46.
Hence, far from being the enemy of liberty, law, especially civil law, is the guarantor of moral
liberty.

Such, then, being the condition of human liberty, in necessarily stands in need of light
and strength no direct ins actions no good and no restrain them from evil. Without this, the
freedom ofour will would be our ruin. First of all, there must be law; that is, a fixed rule of
teaching what is to be done and what is to be left undone. (Leo XIII)22

[Liberty consists] rather in this, that through the injunctions of the civil law all may more
easily conform no the prescriptions of the eternal law. (Leo XIII)23

The law—”an ordinance of reason for the common good, made by him who has care of
the community, and promulgared”24—is essentially an act of reason; but since in the state of
sin-
25
ful nature it is not enough no know the proper order of means
and ends to abide by them, in is therefore imperative that the legislative power be at the same
time constraining. Legal coercion is thus legitimate and necessary for the common good.

But since some are found no be depraved, and prone no vice, and not easily amenable to
words, in was necessary for such to be restrained from evil by force and fear, in order that,
an least, they might desist from evil-doing, and leave others in peace, and that they
themselves, by being habituated in this way, might be brought no do willingly what
hitherto they did from fear, and thus become virtuous. Now this kind of training, which
compels through fear of punishment, is the discipline of laws. Therefore, in order that man
might have peace and virtue, it was necessary for laws to be framed. (Sn. Thomas
Aquinas)26

For, law is the guide of man’s actions; in turns him towards good by ins rewards, and
deters him from evil by ins punishments. (Leo XIII)27

22 Libertas, p.8, §7.

7
29 Ibid.,p.11,§10.

Summa Theologica, I,II, q. 9O, a.4. Citations to the Summa Theologica are to Christian
Classics (198]); hereafter, ST
I.e., corrupted by original sin. [Translator’s note.]
26 ST I II, q.95, a. 1.
2’ Libertas, p.8, §7.
CONCLUSION: Far from being antagonistic to liberty, law is its indispensable help,
especially through legal coercion.

CONSCIENCE

I) Conscience is the moral judgment of man on his action in specific circumstances.

Conscience is the proximate and sub jecrive rule of action whereas law is the remote and
objective rule of action.

2) To do good, man must follow his conscience, provided

28
said conscience is not guiltily erroneous. Honest error is exempt
from guilt but will nor transform a bad and illicit action into a good action.29

3) Consequently, once an act goes from the intimacy of the soul to an external and social
setting, the norm that comes into effect cannot be error, nor even honest error, but has to be
objective truth. To maintain the contrary is to remove the radical opposition between what is
real and what is not, to accept that social order be based on fiction and order be replaced by
chaos.

CONCLUSION: Conscience is the norm of action in our individual life (provided it is not
guiltily erroneous); but life in society does not have any other norm than truth. Therefore,
only truth can give its tights to our conscience.

CONSCIENCE AND CONSTRAINT IN GENERAL

Is it violating someone’s conscience to force him to act against it or to restrain him from
acting according to it? What must we think of legal coercion?

• Concerning legal coercion, we must distinguish between internal and external acts,
private and public acts. Purely internal acts, which by their very nature escape all coer28
ST, I II, q.19. a. 5&6.
2’)
ST I II, q.l9, a. 6, ad 1.
cion, are not the object of our inquiry; only those acts that are called “mixed” because
they are internal (of the soul) and external (of the body) are of interest to us.

Private acts are exempt by their nature from legal coercion unless they have bad social
consequences—for example,

• inhuman cruelty to their children by unworthy parents;

• private meetings of secret societies or other sects which subvert the common good.

8
 On the contrary, public acts fall directly under the dominion of legal constraint if they
disrupt the common good.

• To restrain someone from acting according to his conscience is obviously heir if it is

for his own good or for the common good.

• To prevent someone from committing suicide is an act, or even a duty, of charity.

• It is a duty of justice towards the common good for civil authorities to prevent the
distribution of drugs30 or the spread of immoral and seditious ideas regardless of
whether or not the delinquents are convinced of their right to commit illegal or
immoral acts.

• Is it permissible to oblige someone to act against his conscience? We have to

differentiate between two possibilities:

For a conscience guiltily in error. After having reminded a person of his duties, it is
permissible to force that person to fulfill them. For example:

• in the private domain, to oblige a student to study;

• in the public domain, to oblige a father to support his children or a supplier to fulfill
his contract.

For a conscience honestly in error. To act against one’s honestly erroneous conscience is
to sin. Thus, to force someone to act

30 I.e., the illegal distribution of drugs. [Translator’s note.]

against such conscience is to cooperate in his sin; but again, we need to further distinguish
between two different cases:

• To formally cooperate in someone else’s sin is never permissible (in this case,
willing precisely to extort from someone an act against his wishes); it is a sin
against charity.

• It is, however, permissible to cooperate materially in someone else’s sin (desiring

that someone do willingly what at first he did not want to do without opposing the
eventuality of a forced act) provided that this cooperation be remote and that there
is a grievous proportional cause for such a course of action. The material
cooperation will remain remote if only moral constraints are used, such as some sort
of civil discrimination. A proportionate reason for such constraints will be that
because of the circumstances a serious conversion (intellectual or moral) by per-
suasion alone could not be hoped for from a majority of obstinate people in the
absence of such constraints.

Specific example: combating polygamy and divorce in a country in which the government
tries to restore the natural law.

CONCLUSION: To force a conscience is not always a violation,3’ far from it. But to
understand that, the distinctions set forth in moral theology must be kept in mind.

9
HUMAN FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND THEIR LIMITS

• To moral liberty corresponds in the social order the tight or moral faculty to demand.
Man has rights as long as he has matching duties—towards God, towards himself, and
towards his neighbor.

• To the natural duty of honoring God corresponds the right to worship God.

31
I.e., a violation of the forced conscience. [Translator’s note.]
• To the natural duty of educating their children corresponds the right of the parents
to raise their children according to their own religious conviction.

• The principal natural rights of man are what we call his “fundamental rights.” Pius XII
enumerated a certain number of them during his radio message of Christmas 1942:

Whoever wants the star of peace to rise and shine upon human society must do his part
to restore to mankind the dignity conferred on man by Cod since the beginning.
..promoting the respect and the practical exercise of the fundamental rights of man, that is:

• the right to maintain and develop a corporal, intellectual, and moral life,
particularly the right to a religious formation and education;
• the right to worship God, privately and publicly, including religious charitable
activities;
• the right to marriage and to the pursuit of its end rprocreation and education of
children];
• the right to domestic and conjugal society;
• the right to work as an indispensable means to sustain family life;
• the right to a free choice of state of life, including priestly or religious state of life;
• the right to material goods with the awareness of one’s personal duties and societal
limits.32

These fundamental rights are not only “negative” rights (the right of not being prevented
from acting, or being forced to act differently) but also “affirmative” rights (the right to act).
They are natural rights, therefore inalienable, and they must be recognized as civil rights.

• However, we have to ask ourselves whether man loses his natural rights when they are
applied to

32

Documents 1942, p.341, or PIN 803-804. [Documents refers to Documents pontificaux, one
of the 21 volumes of pontifical documents published by Editions Saint-Augustin; PIN
refers to La paix intérieure des nations, one of the 18 volumes of pontifical documents
published by the Benedictine monks of Solesmes, France, in the 1950s. Translator’s note.]
• what is objectively an error or a moral evil;

• what is contrary to divine positive law. After all, Pope John Paul II did declare:

Human rights cannot be in effect truly but where the imprescriptible rights of God are
respected; and the commitment to the former is illusory, inefficient, and short-lived if
pursued outside or in spite of the latter.33

10
 Does man have a right to error or moral evil?—The answer is no: only truth and goodness
have tights. Error and moral evil never have rights.
At the time of Vatican II, some thought to be clever by objecting, “But neither truth nor
error has rights! Rights are ‘subjected’34 in persons, who either have those rights or don’t.”
This approach was used to confuse the subject and push into obscurity “objective rights” so
as to speak only of “subjective rights.”
It is possible indeed to distinguish between “objective” and ‘‘subjective’’ right.

• Subjective right is the power of demanding, as rooted in the individual, regardless of its
application; for instance, the right to worship God, regardless of the type of worship.

• Objective right is, on the contrary, the specific object of the right: this particular
worship, this specific education.

So the solution is very simple: the objective right is alienable and the subjective right is
inalienable.
The reason is that the subjective right is based on a corresponding duty to be fulfilled—or,
to put it another way—on the transcendental relation between a faculty (e.g., the will) and its
object (e.g., to worship God or to educate one’s children). That relation and that duty remain
no matter what happens.
On the contrary, the objective right, or the specific object of right, is based on the
objective order of beings and their end; it disappears as soon as the individual, by his actions,
severs himself from that order. This is what Pius XII teaches:

Letter to the Bishops of Brazil, December 10, 1980; Documentation catholique 1802,
February 15, 1981, p.152.
~“ I.e., the person is the subject of the rights. [Translator’s nore.l
... that which does not correspond to truth or to the norm of morality objectively has no
right to exist, to be spread or to be activated.05

The trick36 was to consider only that transcendental while conveniently pushing aside the
objective order: truth or errot. But the proper answer is as follows: even with error or with
moral evil, man does keep his subjective rights; but he loses all objective rights—which goes
back to what we were saying at the beginning: Error and moral evil have no rights; only truth
and goodness have tights, if by “rights” we understand “objective rights.”
Consequently, man loses all his objective natural rights when they are applied to error or
to evil.
More particularly, when Pius XII speaks of the right to worship God as a fundamental
right, he always implies the subjective right of worshiping God and the objective tight to the
true worship of the true God. In some instances, he explicitly makes that clarification:

The respect of the human person—of his inalienable rights and, more specifically, of
the rights of the individual and of the family, among which there are the complete liberty
of true divine worship and the right of the parents to raise their children and to provide for
their education—is one of the fundamental principles on which “Christian politique” must
be based. This is why the Church must preserve—and will preserve, no matter what-the
right of Catholic parents to schools that respond to their
38
convictions.

Do we have a right to what is opposed to divine positive law? What is opposed to divine
positive law is error. Therefore, why ask the question since it has been solved in the

11
preceding paragraphs? We nevertheless do ask the question in that form in order to answer an
objection.

Ci Riesce, December 6, 1953; Michael Davies, The Second Vatican Council and Religious
Liberty (Neumann, 1992), p.31 1, §V All citations to Ci Riesce are to this source.
For some at Vatican II. [Translator’s note.]
0•’
Of the subjective right. [Translator’s note.]
55
Allocution to the Christian-Democrat youth of West Berlin, March 28,
1957; Documents 1957, p. 129, or PIN 1252.
St. Thomas Aquinas does teach indeed, according to that objection, that divine positive
right does not take away objective natural rights;39 e.g., Muslim parents remain the natural
educators of their children.
But this principle of St. Thomas obviously cannot be applied when a natural right is used
contrarily to divine positive law; thus, the teaching of the Muslim religion (which denies the
Trinity, the Incarnation, and the Redemption) to children is not a natural objective right of
Muslim parents but only the object of practical non-repression (also called negative
tolerance).40
The same should be said of the teaching and of the practice of any religion that professes
beliefs contrary to the true religion by rejecting explicitly some of its dogmas.
On the other hand, followers of a religion which, without superstitions, renders some sort
of natural worship to God as He can be known by the lights of natural reason, ignoring
without guilt the dogmas of the true religion—such people do benefit from a natural objective
right to practice their religion. But the existence of such a religion is merely hypothetical.

CONCLUSION:
1) If we want to speak of the fundamental rights of man and of his objective rights, we
must honestly admit that these rights have no existence outside of the truth.

2) More specifically, the right to the worship of God as an objective right has for its
object the true religion only, to the exclusion of all other religions.

3) If it is a case of reacting against regimes that persecute indiscriminately all religion,

the Catholic Church may evoke, and justly so, the fundamental

30 ST II II, q 10. a 10.

You cannot take children from the Islamic education of their parents against their will
without, at the same time, depriving the parents of their natural objective right of
educating their children. (See ST II II q. 10, a. 12 and Pius XI, Divini Illius Magistri.)
[Note from the second French edition. Translator’s note.]

right of man to worship God in abstracto, since it is the root itself of that right—
that is, the subjective right—which these atheistic regimes attack.

IS THERE A NEGATIVE RIGHT TO ERROR AND EVIL? OR A RIGHT TO

TOLERANCE?

• Man has no natural objective positive or affirmative right to do what is either erroneous

12
 or evil. We have demonstrated just that in the preceding paragraphs.

For example, no one has the right to sell drugs or to practice a religion opposed to the true
religion.

... it must be clearly stated that no human authority, no state, no community of states,
whatever be their religious character, can give a positive command or positive
authorization to teach or to do that which would be contrary to religious truth or moral
good. (Pius XII)

that which does not correspond to truth or to the norm of morality objectively has no
right to exist, to be spread, or to be
42
activated. (Pius XII)

• Is it not possible for man to benefit from an objective negative right to that which is
contrary to truth or moral law? That is to say, the right not to be restrained from acting
in religious or moral matters, even when such action departs from what is true or good?
To summarize, the right to be tolerated?

The answer to that question takes three words: such a right is absurd, false, and
condemned by the Church.

1) The absurdity of such a negative right to err is abhorrent to common sense.

• Can a father say to his son, “You do not have the right to smoke marijuana, but you
have the right not to be stopped from doing so by me” without ruining his paternal
authority? It is one thing to refuse to

Ci Riesce, p. 3lO, §V.

stop one’s son from taking drugs and thus to tolerate that evil; but it is a completely
different matter to acknowledge to such a son a right to non-repression.

• Likewise, can the Church say to Catholics, “You do not have the tight to apostatize
and become Protestants or Muslims, but you do have the right not to be impeded by
the Church if you feel like it” without ruining its right to direct souls and without
renouncing traditional canon law which imposes severe canonical punishments on
apostates? Must we say that the Church made a mistake by imposing such
punishments, or that the Church must adapt itself to a modern mentality which
demands now, in the name of some sort of alleged metamorphosis of human nature,
a right to be exempt from any constraints whatsoever?

• Generally speaking, to create within the legislative power a dichotomy according to

which whatever the legislator cannot accept as a positive right (the right to do
something) he may legitimately grant as a negative right (the right not to be
restrained from doing something) is the symptom of an obvious and incurable
schizophrenia which defies common sense. It is, in any case, an aberrant self-
destruction of the power of jurisdiction which brings to mind the anarchist maxim:
“If everything is not permitted, at least it is forbidden to forbid.”

2) This alleged negative right is against sane reason.

Not to stop someone from doing evil or accepting error is to open the door to evil and

13
error. It is the “liberty of perdition” and the right to scandal. Such liberty is an evil in itself
even if by accident, as a result of some circumstances, it must be considered the lesser of two
evils because it avoids a greater evil. As Sr. Augustine simply put it, “If you do away with
harlots, the world will be convulsed with lust.”43

“ See ST II II, q. 1O, a.11

But anything that is evil in itself cannot be the object of any rights, as we have amply
demonstrated before. Therefore, a negative right to evil is as unthinkable as a positive right to
evil.

3) The Magisrerium of the Church has condemned the negative tight to error or evil.

that which does nor correspond to truth or to the norm of

morality objectively has no right to exist, to be spread, or to be

activated.44

We emphasize “to be spread” because, by definition, it means diffusion without any

restrictions since propaganda is meant to influence public opinion, which will be impossible
if it is restrained. The right to propaganda is thus, and indissociably so, both posirive and
negative: the right to propagate, and the right not to be restricted from propagating. That is
why Pius XII condemned both positive and negative right to propagate error or evil.

CONCLUSION: We cannot, in the absence of a positive right, proclaim the existence of a

negative right to error or evil in any realm whatsoever, particularly in the religious realm,
without, by the same token, falling victim of a sophism.45

Ci Riesce, p.311, §V.

In this section, it was demonstrated that a natural negative right to error and evil cannot
exist—that is, that immunity for error or evil can never be a natural right.
Archbishop Lefebvre in his book They Have Uncrowned Him (Angelus
Press, 1988) specifies that although it can never be a natural right, such
immunity may, on occasions, be a civil right when the legislator may have to tolerate this
or that particular manifestation of error or evil. “Without ever admitting the right to do
evil, there may be a civil right not to be restrained from doing so when a just law forbids
such restraint for
sufficient reasons.” (Joseph Baucher, “Liberté,” Dictionnaire de théologie catholique, IX,
col. 701.)
But one thing is the civil right to tolerance guaranteed by law in view of securing public
peace for a specific people in a specific set of
circumstances; and another very different one is an alleged and inviolable right to
tolerance in principle, and at all times, regardless of
circumstances, for every conceivable deviation from truth and goodness. Consequently,
religious liberty, as an immunity for the public worship of false religions, can never be a
natural right but only a civil right to
tolerance, and only in certain circumstances. [Note from the second
French edition. Translator’s note.l

14
 PART TWO

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY PROPERLY SPEAKING

Is the dignity of the human person independent from the choices of that person? That
question cannot be properly answered without first distinguishing between the ontological
dignity and the operative dignity of man: one thing is what man is by nature, and another is
what man becomes by his actions. The answer to the question depends on that distinction.

Ontological dignity of man

The dignity of man consists in the intellectuality of his nature; that is, the nobility of a
nature endowed with intelligence and free will. Man is essentially called by it to know God,
his Creator and his ultimate end: “To love, honor, and serve God,” as St. Ignatius put it at the
beginning of his Spiritual Exercises. Furthermore, man is capable of the beatific vision, as St.
Thomas Aquinas said, by, first, being capable of elevation to a supernatural state through
sanctifying grace.

“0 God, who in creating human nature, didst marvelously ennoble it, and hast still more
marvelously renewed it,” as the Church puts on the lips of the priest at the offertory of the
Mass.

It can be said that this ontological dignity of man consists

mainly in a transcendental orientation to God and is thus a “divine call” which is the
foundation in man of the duty to search for the True God and the true religion to which, once
found, man must adhere.
Finally, since all men have the same nature, which cannot be had without being fully
human, it must be said that the onrological dignity of the human person is the same in
everyone and can never be lost.
However, it is important to remember that original sin profoundly wounded human nature
in its faculties, most especially in its capacity to know God. The natural dignity of man has
suffered, as a consequence, a universal degradation that not even the grace of baptism can
heal completely in Christians.
Moreover, all races and all people, already provided with different natural gifts by the
Creator, have not been wounded exactly the same way by original sin: some are affected
more deeply by the blinding of their intelligence, others by the weakness of their will, others
by a hatred rooted in a dissolute concupiscence, others, finally, by fear rooted in a disordered
irascibility, etc.46 The result is radical inequalities among different people in the concrete47
natural dignity of persons, inequalities which require unequal treatment from both divine and
human authority.

Operative dignity of man

The operative dignity of man is the result of the exercise of his faculties, essentially
intelligence and will.
In other words, to the perfection of nature is added to man a supplementary perfection
which will depend on his actions.
Faculties are by nature oriented towards their actions, 48 and the perfection of these

15
actions will be to attain their end: the end of the intelligence is truth, the end of the will is
goodness.
Hence the operative dignity of man will consist in adhering in his actions to truth and
goodness, thus ultimately acquiring the virtues which make good actions “prompt, easy, and
pleasurable,” as Aristotle said, not to mention infused supernatural virtues. It follows that if
man fails to be good or if he adheres to error or evil he loses his dignity, the good action
being replaced by an act that even if not necessarily a formal sin is nonetheless objectively
evil. Virtue will rapidly be replaced by bad habits—that is to say, by vice.

46 Concupiscence and irascibility here are the names of the lower faculties of

the soul as defined by Aristotelian philosophy. They are also called sensitive appetites (as
opposed to intellectual appetites). Concupiscence can be
defined as the desire for the absolute good, whereas irascibility can be
defined as the desire for the arduous or difficult good. [Translator’s note.] As opposed to
abstract. [Translator’s note.]
Le., intelligence will think. [Translator’s note.l
Grant, we beseech Thee, almighty God, that the dignity of human nature may be restored
by the persevering practice of healing self denial. (Missale Romanum) 49

If the mind assents to false opinions, and the will chooses and follows after what is wrong,
neither can attain its native fullness, but both must fall from their native dignity into an
abyss of corruption. (Leo XIII)50

From where, in fact, does the person derive his dignity? He

draws his dignity from his perfection. Now the perfection of the human person consists in
the knowledge of the Truth and the acquisition of Good. This is the beginning of eternal
life and eternal life is “that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ
Whom Thou hast sent” (Jn. 17:3). Consequently, so long as he clings to error, the human
person falls short of his dignity.
The dignity of the human person does not consist in liberty set apart from truth. In fact,
liberty is good and true to the extent to which it is ruled by truth. “The truth shall set you
free,” said Our Lord, that is, “the truth shall give you liberty.” Error is of itself an
objective, if not subjective, lie. And through Our Lord we also know him who “when he
speaketh a lie, he speaketh from his own” (Jn. 8:44). How then is it possible to say of a hu-
man person that he is worthy of respect, when he misuses his intelligence and his liberty,
even when there is no blame to be
assigned to him?
The dignity of the person also comes from the integrity of his will when it is ordained
to the true Good. Now error gives birth to sin. “The serpent deceived me,” said Eve, who
was the first sinner. No truth can be clearer than this to all mankind. It is sufficient to
reflect upon the consequences of this error on the sanctity of marriage, a sanctity of the
greatest interest for the human race. This error in religion has gradually led to polygamy,
divorce, birth control, that is to say, to the downfall of human dignity, above all in woman.
(Archbishop Lefebvre)51

CONCLUSION: The dignity of man, when we consider man in his actions, consists in his
adherence to truth and goodness. There is no real dignity outside of truth.

~“ Collect of Thursday in Passion week. [Translator’s nore.l Immortale Dei, p.124.

Intervention filed with the Secretariat for Vatican II, November 26, 1963; I

Accuse the Council, pp.28-29.

16
Dignity and liberty

The dignity of man, in the concrete area of human activity, consists in its de facto
adherence to truth and goodness, as we have just demonstrated. Therefore, liberty of action,
or the concrete autonomy of man in this adherence, is not the essential element of human
dignity, even if it is legitimately desirable. To exalt liberty of action to the extent of
transforming it into the essence of the operative dignity of man is a condemned error which
only exacerbates human pride at the expense of humble adherence to the received truth from
outside52 by a teacher and, what is more, with constraints in the form of threats of divine
chastisement for those who will refuse it.

He that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved: but he that believeth not shall be
condemned. (Sr. Mark)53

... at the root of all their fallacies on social questions lie the false hopes of the Sillonists
on human dignity. According to them, Man will be a man worthy of this name only when
he has acquired a strong, enlightened and independent consciousness, able to do without a
master, obeying only himself, and able to assume the most demanding responsibilities
without faltering. Such are the big words by which human pride is exalted, like the dream
carrying man away without light, without guidance, and without help into the realm of
illusion. (Sr. Pius X)54

CONCLUSION: The dignity of the human person does not consist in liberty set apart
from truth. In fact, liberty is good and true to the extent to which it is ruled by truth. “The
truth shall set you free,” said Our Lord; that is, the truth shall give you liberty.

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY CONDEMNED

BY THE POPES OF THE 19TH CENTURY

1) The popes of the 19th century condemned “liberty of conscience and of worship.”

52 Le., from outside oneself [Translator’s note.l

Our Apostolic Mandate, August 15, 1910 (Angelus Press, 1998), p.29, §25. All citations to
Our Apostolic Mandate are to this edition unless otherwise noted.
• Pius VII in Post Tam Diuturnas condemned Article 22 of the French constitution of
1814:

Another subject of sorrow which painfully affects Our heart and, We confess,
torments Us with extreme anguish and despondency, is the 22nd article of the
[French] constitution. Not only is the liberty of worship and of conscience
permitted, but, to use the very words of this article, support and protection are
promised to that liberty and to the ministers of those so-called denominatsons as
well.55

• Gregory XVI in Mirari Vos condemned the proposition according to which “we must
establish and guarantee for every man liberty of conscience”:

We now come to another and most fruitful cause of the evils which at present afflict
the Church and which We so bitterly deplore; We mean indifferenrism, or that fatal
opinion everywhere diffused by the craft of the wicked, that men can by the

17
 profession of any faith obtain the eternal salvation of their souls, provided their life
conforms to justice and probity....
From this poisoned source of indifferenrism flows that false and absurd, or rather
extravagant, maxim that liberty of conscience should be established and guaranteed
to each man.56

The expression “liberty of conscience,” according to the language of the time and ours
today, is

the faculty given to any man to adopt the religious doctrines of

his choice without being harassed by civil authority.57

The Diction naire des dictionnaires” specifies further:

From the indisputable liberty of our conscience, must we logically deduce liberty of
conscience? The liberty of our conscience is internal whereas liberty of conscience is
external and

April 29, 1814; PIN 19. [No known translation of the whole document
English. Translator’s note.]
August 15, 1832 (Angelus Press, 1998), pp.11-12. §§14-15. All citations to
Mirari Vos are to this edition.
“Conscience,” Nouveau Larousse illustré III, 206 col. 3. [This encyclopedia was published
under the direction of Claude Augé around 1900. Translator’s note.]
Dictionary of dictionaries. [Translator’s note.]
has to do with the profession of our beliefs publicly, within society. The liberty of
conscience can be considered as a political
59
right, protected by constitutional guarantees.

• Pius IX in Quanta Cura condemned the following propositions:

..... the best condition of human society is that wherein no duty is recognized by the
Government of correcting, by enacted penalties, the violators of the Catholic Reli-
gion, except when the maintenance of the public peace requires it.

the liberty of conscience and of worship is the pecu,,61

liar (or inalienable) right of e very man.
[This right] must be proclaimed and guaranteed by

law in every properly constituted society.6

• Leo XIII in Immortale Dei condemns the following opinion:

[The State] is bound to grant equal right to every creed, so that public order may
not be disturbed by any particular form of religious belief. And it is a part of this
theory that all questions that concern religion are to be referred to private judgment;
that every one is to be free to follow whatever religion he prefers......

2) What was condemned was religious liberty in the sense in which it is still understood
today:

18
 • liberty of action (the negative right not to be restrained);

• liberty in the public arena;

• natural and civil right.

~“ “Conscience,” III, 130, col. 3. [Edited under the direction of Paul Guérin. Translator’s
note.]
December 8, 1864 (Angelus Press, 1998), p.6. §3. All citations to Quanta

Cura are to this edition unless otherwise noted.

~‘ Ibid
PIN 40. [Sentence omitted in English translations of Quanta Cura.

Translated for this book from the Italian and French versions of the encyclical (they are
identical). Translator’s note.]
P121.
Religious liberty is condemned even when it remains in pracrice within the bounds of
public peace and those who use it do nothing mote than “violate the Catholic religion,” that is
to say, transgress against the worship and the discipline of the Catholic Church.

3) The circumstances and the historical origin of this false religious liberty are clearly
delineated, both in their logical order and in their links of cause and effect:

• The individualistic rationalism and absolute liberalism, inherited from the so-called
French Revolution, according to which man is the absolute subject of rights indepen-
dently of any superior authority from which to receive those rights:

All [men] are equal in the control of their life;.. .each one is so far his own master as
to be in no sense under the rule of any other individual;. . . each is free to think on
every subject just as he may choose, and to do whatever he may like to do. (Leo
XIII)65

• The monism66 and indifferentism of the State in religious matters:

government is nothing more nor less than the will of the people....
And since the populace is declared to contain within itself the spring-head of all
rights and of all power, it follows that the State does not consider itself bound by
any kind of duty towards God. Moreover, it believes that it is nor obliged to make
public profession of any religion. . .or to prefer one religion to all the rest. (Leo
XIII)67

With the exception of the “moderate liberalism” espoused by the “liberal

Catholicism” of Lammenass and condemned by the encyclical Mirari Vos of Gregoty XVI,
as shown by the preceding quotations. [Note of the
second French edition. Translator’s note.l
Immortale Dei, p.l 20.
66 Monism, from Greek monos, meaning one. Philosophical theory according

to which the ultimate reality is entirely of one substance; for instance, modern materialism
is a form of monism. As applied to the State it is a theory that affirms that all authority of
any kind, including spiritual or

19
 religious, belongs to the State only, which does nor recognize any authority (especially
that of the Church) outside its own. (See “Monism” in The
Catholic Encyclopedia). [Translator’s note.]
• The consequence is the right to that false religious liberty within society:

but [government] is bound to grant equal rights to every creed, so that public
order may nor be disturbed by any particular form of religious belief.
And it is a part of this theory that all questions that concern religion are to be
referred to private judgment; that every one is to be free to follow whatever religion
he prefers, or none at all if he disapprove of all. (Leo XIII)65

To say that this condemnation of a false religious liberty was caused by historical
circumstances, that is, the particular liberalism and rationalism of a rime long gone, and
furthermore, that those historical circumstances were the only reason behind the
condemnation, is a step—nay, an abyss—which we will not bridge, as we are now going to
demonstrate.

4) Reasons for the condemnation of liberty of conscience and

of worship by the popes:

a) Considered in itself,69 this liberty is false and absurd, that is, contrary to the natural
order and to reason.

• Pius VI in Quad Aliquantum condemned the civil constitution of the clergy in France:

It establishes, as a right of man in society, that absolute liberty which nor only
grants the right of nor being harassed because of one’s religious opinions, but which
also grants a license to think, to write, and even to print with impunity anything
suggested by the most disturbed imagination; a monstrous right ... 70

• Pius VII in Post Tam Diuturnas gave the first reason for the condemnation:

67 Immortale Dei, pp.l2O-l2l.

I.e., independently of any time-line. [Translator’s note.]

“‘ March 10, 1791; Receuil, p.53, or PIN 1. [No known translation of the whole document in
English. Receuil refers to Receuil des allocutions
consistoriales. encycliques et autres lettres apostoliques des souverains pontifs
Clément XII, Benoit XIV, Pie VI, Pie VII, Léon XII, Grégoire XVI et Pie IX
cities dans l’encyclique et le Syllabus bus du 8 décembre 1864, suivi du concordat de 1801
et de divers autres documents (Adrien le Clere, 1865). Translator’s note.]
By the very fact that one establishes the liberty of any
worship without distinction, truth and error are mixed
7’
up.

• Gregory XVI in Mirari Vos condemned “liberty of conscience” as a “false and absurd,
or rather extravagant, maxim” called by St. Augustine “the liberty of error”; “what
more certain death for souls!”72

• Pius IX in Quanta Cura condemned the first proposition quoted above as being
“contrary to the teachings of the Holy Scriptures, of the Church, and of the Holy

20
 Fathers [a] totally false notion of social government.” Moreover, following Gregory
XVI, he condemned liberty of conscience and of worship as being “that erroneous
opinion most pernicious to the Catholic Church, and to the salvation of souls” and a
“liberty of perdition.”73

b) Considered in its immediate consequences, it constitutes a violation of the public rights

of the Church, that is, of all the principles that flow necessarily from the dogma of the social
Kingship of Jesus Christ and from the divine constitution of the Church which are connected
to Revelation and are therefore absolutely immutable.

• Pius VII in Post Tam Diuturnas gives the second and principal reason for
condemnation:

.the very fact of establishing liberty of worship indiscriminately. . .reduces to the

level of heretical sects.. .the Immaculate Spouse of Christ, the Church, outside of
which there is no salvation.74

• Leo XIII in Immortale Dei points out the immediate consequences of that liberty of
worship:

Now when the State rests on foundations like those just named—and for the time
being they are greatly in favor—it readily appears into what and how unrighrful a position the
Church is driven. For when the manage~‘ PIN19.
72 P12,§15.

P.6, §3.
PIN 19.
ment of public business is in harmony with doctrines of such a kind, the Catholic
religion is allowed a standing in civil society equal only, or inferior, to societies
alien from it; no regard is paid to the laws of the Church, and she who, by the order
and commission of Jesus Christ, has the duty of teaching all nations, finds herself
forbidden to rake any part in the instruction of the people. With reference to matters
that are of twofold jurisdiction, they who administer the civil power lay down the
law at their own will, and in matters that appertain to religion defiantly put aside the
most sacred decrees of the Church. They claim jurisdiction over the marriage of
Catholics, even over the bond as well as the unity and the indissolubility of
matrimony. They lay hands on the goods of the clergy, contending that the Church
cannot possess property. Lastly, they treat the Church with such arrogance that,
rejecting entirely her title to the nature and right of a perfect society, they hold that
she differs in no respect from other societies in the State, and for this reason
possesses no right nor any legal power of action, save that which she holds by the
concession and favor of the government. If in any State the Church retains her own
right—and this with the approval of the civil law, owing to an agreement publicly
entered into by the two powers—men forthwith begin to cry out that matters af-
fecting the Church must be separated from those of the State.
Their object in uttering this cry is to be able to violate unpunished their plighted
faith, and in all things to have unchecked control.75

c) Another disastrous consequence of liberty of conscience and of worship is that it

propagates the pestilence of religious indifferentism (father of today’s false ecumenism).

• Pius VII in Post Tam Diuturnas:

21
 In addition, by promising favors and support to heretical sects and their ministers
are tolerated and favored not only the persons but their errors as well. It is implicitly
the disastrous and always pernicious heresy mentioned by Saint Augustine in these
words: “It affirms that all the heretics are in the right and say the truth, absurdiry so
monstrous that I cannot believe any sect really professes it.”76

Pp.121-122.
76 PIN l9.
• Pius IX in the Syllabus, condemned proposition 79:

Moreover, it is false that the civil liberty of every form ofworship, and the full
power, given to all, of overtly and publicly manifesting any opinions whatsoever
and thoughts, conduce more easily to corrupt the morals and the minds of the
people, and to propagate the pest of indifferentism7

CONCLUSION: We must affirm without hesitation that under the expression “liberty of
conscience and of worship,” religious liberty understood as the natural and civil right to
liberty of action in religious matters and recognized for any member of any religion was
condemned in the 19th century:

• not only in its premise, which is the absolute liberalism of the time,

• but in itself as absurd and false, and by reason of its immediate consequences:
violation of the public rights of the Church and religious indifferentism in man.

5) Authority of the Magisterium for this condemnation:

The constancy and recurrence of the condemnation of religious liberty gives it the highest
authority of the ordinary Magisrerium of the Church.
But it seems that the condemnation of religious liberty in Quanta Cura goes further and
meets the four conditions of an ex cathedra78 document and is therefore infallible.
Here are the condemned propositions: They are the three propositions we have quoted
before which we quote again here in their context:

“ Appendix to Quanta Cura (Angelus Press, 1998), pp.28-29. All citations to the Syllabus of
Pius IX are to this edition.
Ex cathedra means “from the chair” (of Sr. Peter) and refers to the infallible pronouncements
of the popes in what is called the exercise of their
extraordinary Magisterium; for instance, the dogmatic proclamation of the
Assumption of Our Lady in the 1950s by Pius XII was cx cathedra. [Translator’s note.]
Contrary to the teachings of the Holy Scriptures, of the Church, and of the Holy Fathers,
these persons do not hesitate to assert, that “the best condition of human society is that
wherein no duty is recognized by the Government of correcting, by enacted penalties, the
violators of the Catholic Religion, except when the maintenance of the public peace
requires it.” From this totally false notion of social government, they fear nor to uphold
that erroneous opinion most pernicious to the Catholic Church, and to the salvation of
souls, which was called by Our Predecessor, Gregory XVI (lately quoted) the insanity
[deli ramentum] (Ibid.): ~‘ namely, “that the liberty of conscience and of worship is the
peculiar (or inalienable) right of every man, which should be proclaimed by law, and that
citizens have the right to all kinds of liberty, to be restrained by no law, whether
ecclesiastical or civil, by which they may be enabled to manifest openly and publicly their

22
 ideas, by word of mouth, through the press, or by any
“so
other means.

Then, we have a global condemnation of the theses denounced in the encyclical:

Amid so great a perversity of depraved opinions, We, remembering Our Apostolic duty,
and solicitous before all things for Our most holy Religion, for sound doctrine, for the
salvation of the souls confided to Us, and for the welfare of human Society itself, have
considered the moment opportune to raise anew Our Apostolic voice. Therefore do We, by
our Apostolic authority, reprobate, denounce, and condemn generally and particularly all
the evil opinions and doctrines specially mentioned in this Letter, and We wish that they
may be held as reprobated, denounced, and condemned by all the children of the Catholic
Church.8’

Finally, we have the verification of the four conditions for an ex cathedra document
(according to the constitution Pastor Aeternus of Vatican I), 82 thus infallible:

• The pope speaks as pastor and teacher of all Christians.

~“ I.e., Mirari Vos. [Translator’s note.] Quanta Cura, p.6, §3.

“‘ Ibid.,p.11,§6.
“~ July 18, 1870; Dz 1839.
• The pope speaks concerning a doctrine on faith or morals, connected with divine
Revelation.

• The pope “defines”—that is, he specifies precisely-the terms of the theses that are
either defined or condemned and pronounces on said doctrines or theses a judgment
which is definite and irrevocable.

• The pope specifies that the faithful must abide by the proposed doctrine.

CONCLUSION: The doctrines condemned in Quanta Cura do seem to have been

condemned infallibly, at least those which were clearly described in their formulation. That is
indeed the case of the three propositions mentioned in paragraphs 1 and 5. Therefore, these
three propositions are infallibly condemned. Consequently, liberty of conscience and of
worship is condemned-and, in all likelihood, based on the formulation of Quanta Cura,
infallibly so.

IS THE DIGNITY OF MAN A

FOUNDATION FOR RELIGIOUS LIBERTY?

1) Religious liberty: a new foundation

In the years before Vatican II, a new theory on religious liberwas born, with the same
meaning of negative right not to be
withheld from any form of worship. This theory has become famous because of its use by
Vatican II.
According to this theory, liberty of action for anyone in religious matters is founded on
the dignity of man. This dignity of man, regardless of any consideration of the truth, consists

23
in the simple fact that man by nature is ontologically connected to God by a transcendental
ordination of which we spoke earlier.
In this view, any man, regardless of his subjective dispositions (truth or error, good or bad
faith), is inviolable in the actions by which he operates his “relation” to God, that is, in his
personal quest of the divine together with acts of worship, whether private or public, alone or
collectively.
According to this theory, the right to liberty of action in religious matters is no longer an
absolute right “without God or mas
ret,” as the liberalism of the 19th century affirmed, but the right of a person essentially
connected to God, even if he is wrong in his free choice and does not actually fulfill his duty
to honor God and to worship Him in the true religion.
To perfect the argument, its proponents will claim that the same right to religious liberty
was condemnable by the popes of the 19th century because of its individualistic, materialistic
liberal premise but can be proclaimed today in the name of human dignity. The content is the
same but its foundation will be radically different:

It cannot be denied that the declaration on religious liberty [by Vatican II in Dignitatis
Humanae 2] does say materially something else than the Syllabus of 1864; it even says
just about the opposite of propositions 15 [and] 77 to 79 of this document.

Fr. John Courtney Murray, who did belong to the intellectual and religious elite,
showed that, although materially contradicting the Syllabus (which was written in 1864
and conditioned therefore, as Mr. Roger Auger demonstrated, by specific historical
circumstances), the declaration [on religious liberty] was the continuation of the struggle
by which the popes, faced with Jacobinism and totalitarianism, fought more and more
energetically for the dignity and the liberty of man because he is made according to God’s
image.84

What is new in this doctrine compared to the teachings of Leo XIII, and even of Pius
XII, although the movement started then, is the determination of the proper and proximate
foundation of this liberty, established not on the objective truth of religious or moral
goodness but on the ontological quality of the human person.

That theory of the new foundation of religious liberty as the basis for the conciliar
declaration Dignitatis Humanae cannot be described and characterized any better.

~‘ Congar, La crise dans l’église et Mgr. Lefebvre, p.51.

Congar, “A propos d’Ecône et la présente tempête,” Documentation catbolique. 1704, 5-
19, September 1976, p.790.
Congar, Bulletin Etudes et documents du Secrétariat de l,épiscopat français 5, June 15,
1965, p.5.
2) Rebuttal of the new theory on religious liberty

a) The new thesis on religious liberty bases liberty of action (nor to be restrained) in
religious matters on the ontological dignity of the person. It is an error: the ontological
dignity of man refers only to his free will86 and not at all to moral liberty or liberty of action.87
Actually, moral liberty and liberty of action are in relation to the operations or actions of a
person and not to his essential being. They have therefore as a foundation the operative dig-
nity of man, or, what amounts to the same thing, truth: that is, the actual adherence of the
person to the truth.
When, on the contrary, man cleaves to error or moral evil, he loses his operative dignity,

24
which therefore cannot be the basis for anything at all.

If the mind assents to false opinions, and the will chooses and follows after what is wrong,
neither can attain its native fullness, but both must fall from their native dignity into an
abyss of corruption. Whatever, therefore, is opposed to virtue and truth, may nor rightly be
brought temptingly before the eye of man, much less sanctioned by the favor and
protection of the law. (Leo XIII)58

The initial—and, in fact, new-argument was based on the freedom of every man to
practice inwardly and outwardly the religion of his choice, on the basis of “the dignity of
the human person.” In this view, liberty is based on dignity which gives it its raison
d’être. Man can hold any error whatever in the name of his dignity.
This is putting the cart before the horse. For whoever clings to error loses his dignity
and can no longer build upon it. Rather, the foundation of liberty is truth, not dignity. “The
truth will make you free,” said Our Lord. (Archbishop Lefebvre)89

Consequently, if one wants to base a right of man to religious liberty on the dignity of the
human person, it can only be the right to religious liberty in relation to the true religion
which is thus established, and not, in any case, a right to wrong religions or to

s~ I e., as a faculty. [Translator’s nore.l

I.e., the usage of said faculty. [Translator’s note.]

Immortale Dei, p.l24.
Open Letter to Confused Catholics (Angelus Press, 1986), p.83.
all religions without distinction. That is the acceptable meaning of the expression “liberty of
conscience” given by Leo XIII: liberty pursuant to the true religion is the only liberty which
concurs with true human dignity.

Another liberty is widely advocated, namely, liberty of conscience. If by this is meant

that everyone may, as he chooses, worship God or not, it is sufficiently refuted by the
arguments already adduced. But it may also be taken to mean that every man in the State
may follow the Will of God and, from a consciousness of duty and free from every obstacle,
obey His commands. This, indeed, is true liberty, a liberty worthy of the sons of God,
which nobly maintains the dignity of man and is stronger than all violence or wrong—a
liberty which the Church has always desired and held most dear. This is the kind of liberty
the Apostles claimed for themselves with intrepid constancy, which the apologists of
Christianity confirmed by their writings, and which the martyrs in vast numbers
consecrated by their blood. And deservedly so; for this Christian liberty bears witness to
the absolute and most just dominion of God over man, and to the chief and supreme duty
of man toward God. (Leo XIII)95

It is hardly necessary to point out that “to follow the will of God,” “to obey His
commands,” “this Christian liberty” refer obviously to the duties of the true religion.

b) Undoubtedly, the ontological capacity of man to “adore, love, and serve God” is
already in itself, even before it is used, something indeed of great dignity and inalienable: any
man, no matter how depraved he may be, does keep that “possibility of the divine” which
God can always “activate” if He so wishes—He who, by His sanctifying grace, transforms a
sinner into a saint. This is certainly the foundation of a charitable and prudential duty towards
the person in error, following the example given to us by Our Lord, ‘Who, according to
Isaias, “the bruised reed.., shall not break: and smoking flax... . shall not extinguish.”9’

25
 But a duty of leniency, or even a charitable duty towards the misguided soul in the hope
of a conversion, does not imply in that misguided soul any right; that is, nothing is due to him
in justice

Libertas, p.26, §30.

“‘ Mt. 12:20.
regarding his liberty of action. Charity (I give you of what is mine) should not be confused
with justice (I am giving you what is your due, what you are owed). In justice, only that
which answers to truth and virtue has a right to liberty of action (see “tolerance,” below).

c) Finally, the key argument in the attempt to justify this new theory of religious liberty--
that is, “the change of foundation”— will prove itself to be a glaringly obvious sophism.
In good logic, if religious liberty for any religion was good in itself, it would nor have
been condemned “because of the bad principles” which were its foundation in the 19th
century (individualistic rationalism and State monism); only those principles would have
been condemned. Any type of liberty is either good or bad according to the object to which it
is applied, not according to the motives advanced to justify its existence, contrary to the
following little story:92

“Daddy, I am going to join the Moonies,” Valerie, a 17-year-old Catholic, declares one
day
“Why?” kindly asks her father.
“Because I am free to do what I want!”
“Alas, my dear, I am afraid that under the circumstances, you do not have the right to
do so,” mumbles contritely her father.

The following day, Valerie tries again.

“Father, I want to follow Han Krishna.”

With no less kindness than the day before, her father asks:
“Why?”
“In the name of my dignity as a human person. ..and,” she adds pensively, “I am
searching; I feel somehow connected.”
“If that is the case,” says the father enthusiastically, “go ahead; you now have that
right!”

In general, the morality of human acts is essentially determined by their object and not by
the intention of the person acting. It is therefore irrelevant to invoke the rationalism of the
19th century or some personalism of the 20th century as the intention behind religious liberty.
It is religious liberty which must be judged, either in itself or in its fruits.

92 Which will prove the point by reduction ad absurdum. [Translator’s note.]

• It is precisely religious liberty (liberty of action in relation to any religion without
distinction) which was condemned by the popes of the 19th century, both in itself, as a
“liberty of perdition,” and in its fruits—or, rather, in its immediate consequence, the
violation of the public rights of the Church. Religious liberty was not condemned at all
because of historical motivations of the time but in itself, as a careful reading of the
documents has just proved.

CONCLUSION: This alleged “new foundation” of religious liberty, that is, the dignity of
man, is nothing more than a false excuse. Religious liberty in relation to any kind of religion,

26
regardless of truth or error, is and remains condemned as false; absurd; in violation of Our
Lord’s rights as well as the rights of His Church; and, finally, as imbuing souls with the
poison of religious indifferentism.

WOULD THE “LIBERTY TO SEARCH”

BE A FOUNDATION FOR RELIGIOUS LIBERTY?

The new thesis on religious liberty has wanted to use also, as a foundation for liberty of
action in religious matters, a “liberty to search”; that is, a soul in error but said to be
“searching,” thus potentially “connected” to God and the truth. Here is their argument: to
influence or to constrain such a soul in the midst of its research will be deflecting it from a
way that will guide it to God and truth. It is necessary, therefore, to insure everyone’s liberty
to “free search,” even though it may express itself publicly and externally by acts of worship
or any other acts that may be contrary to the true religion.
This thesis alleges three things:

• Those who accept the truth only potentially would have the same right of expression as
those who accept it in fact.
• Any honest soul can, by itself, arrive at religious truth.
• Any religion could be a way to reach the true God and the true religion.

Let us examine these allegations, one by one.

1) Rights of the “searching man”

• To be searching” is at the most a potential acceptance of the truth only and

therefore cannot be the basis for rights due solely to the actual acceptance of said
truth. Only the effective dependence from God and His revealed truth confers on
man dignity and thus a right to liberty of action.

• The sincere search94 is indeed worthy of charitable patience on the part of the
Church (in a Catholic country), but more worthy of evangelical zeal.

Furthermore, it is not the case at all for non-Christians or non-Catholics. The mind set of
non-Catholics is opposed to any “research” or even to dialogue:

These people are enormously attached to their ideas. Entrenched in what they call “free
thought,” they are, generally speaking, very set in their mind. It is even surprising to see
their self-assured opposition to dogmas of faith in the name of “true dogmas”....The
pertinacity (II II, q.5, a.3; q.l 1, a.2), that is,... the stubborn entrenchment in their ideas, is
the characteristic of their mind-set. Because of it, they, who pride themselves on being so
open-minded, appear to us stubborn and narrow-minded.
(Fr. R. Bernard)95

Likewise, the fanaticism of the Islamic religion is, in and of itself, an obstacle to any
sincere search for the truth on the part of any Muslim individual. The only religious liberty to
which these people can legitimately aspire is their liberation from the social and religious
Islamic yoke that confines them in error.

CONCLUSION: To demand tolerance for all the followers of any religion

indiscriminately, in the name of a “liberty to search,” is to fall into the mirage and the trap of
a blind liberalism.

27
 I.e., to be searching/or the truth. [Translator’s note.]
I.e., the sincere search/or the truth. [Translator’s note.]
“~ Somme théologique de saint Thomas, Revue des Jeunes, La foi (Desclée et Cerf,
1963), II, 383; hereafter, Somme thiologique.
2) Can any honest soul by itself arrive at the knowledge of religious truth?

To affirm such a thing shows an unwarranted confidence in the capacity of human

intelligence. This affirmation seems inspired by a bewildering, unrealistic idealism and a
heretical naturalism.

• Such “liberty to search” is unrealistic.

To illustrate the point, let us quote Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre on the declaration on
religious liberty, textus emendatus:

Search for truth: This paragraph clearly shows the unreality of such a declaration. The
search for truth, for men living on this earth, consists above all in obeying, in submitting
his intelligence to whatever authority may be concerned: family, religious, and even
civil.96

• Such “liberty to search” is naturalistic.

This idea forgets original sin and its consequences, especially the “wound of ignorance”
which now affects man’s intelligence, as clearly explained by Sr. Paul in Romans 1:18-23 and
Ephesians 4:
14, 17-18 to which we refer our reader. Here is what Fr. R. Bernard has to say on the subject:

By the action of the first man who carried our destiny, humanity is at fault. It did not
remain as God made it and wanted it to be. Hence the heavy ignorance of divine truth
as well as indifference to God’s friendship. Hence also that kind of powerlessness to
connect to divine revelation, to discover it, to distinguish it, and to penetrate oneself
with it. Nobody, of course, is abandoned by God, everyone is touched by God enough
times to be saved. But our whole human race is burdened by a painful blindness: many
individuals have little time in life and little light in their spirit to open themselves to
God’s light; more often, while thinking themselves wise, they stupidly dedicate them-
selves to darken the light from above, thus preventing enlighten97
ment.
As St. Thomas said simply,

96 Remarks sent to the Secretariat of the Council, December 30, 1964; I Accuse

the Council, p.31.

Somme théologique, p.370.
[by original sin] all the powers of the soul are left, as it were, destitute of their proper
order, whereby they are naturally directed to virtue; which destitution is called a wounding
of nature... .In so far as the reason is deprived of its order to the true, there is the wound of
ignorance. 98

Hence the necessity of a Revelation external to man so that he can know not only
supernatural truths but also natural truths connected to God and His religion.

28
 Indeed, it must be attributed to this divine revelation that those things, which in divine
things are impenetrable to human reason by itself, can, even in this present condition of
the human race, be known readily by all with firm certitude and with no admixture of
error. 99

If anyone shall have said that it is not possible nor expedient that through divine revelation
man be taught about God and the worship to be given to Him: let him be anathema.100

The connarural way of imparting that external Revelation is precisely by the predication
of evangelical workers:

How then shall they call on him, in whom they have not believed? Or how shall they
believe him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear, without a preacher?
And how shall they preach unless they be sent, as it is written: How beautiful are the
feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, of them that bring glad tidings of good
things! [Is. 52:7] But all do not obey the gospel for Isaias saith: Lord, who bath believed
our report? [Is. 53:1].’

CONCLUSION: To affirm that any honest man can obtain the knowledge of religious
truth by searching freely is to contradict implicitly the Holy Scriptures and the Magisrerium,
and thus to profess implicitly the heresy of naturalism.

ST I II, q.85, a.3.

Vatican I, Dogmatic Constitution concerning the Catholic Faith, Dz 1786.
““‘ Ibid., Revelation, Canon 2, Dx 1807.
Romans 10:14-17 [translator’s brackets]. Cf Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, June 29, 1896; A
Light in the Heavens, p.352. All citations to Satis Cognitum are to this source.
3) Can any religion be a way to reach God and religious truth?

There is in such a statement more than just an ambiguity; there is a barely implicit error:
religious indifferenrism. This error is double: 1) latitudinarian concept of salvation; 2)
indifferenrism properly speaking.

• Latitudinarian concept of salvation

The Church teaches that one may be saved outside the visible limits of the Catholic
Church by the “baptism of implicit desire," which can
be found in some non-Catholics or non-Christians who
are afflicted by an “invincible ignorance” of the true
reli102
gion—thar is, without guilt on their part —and who at the
same time do observe the natural law; lead an honest, righteous life; and are willing to obey
God. This doctrine was again reaffirmed in a letter of the Holy Office to the Archbishop of
Boston on August 8, 1949. 104
Not only those outside the visible limits of the Church “cannot be sure of their salvation"
105 but “who would arrogate so much to himself as to mark the limits of such an ignorance,
because of the nature and variety of peoples, regions, innate dispositions, and of so many
other things?”1 6
Therefore, the affirmation in question is latitudinarian in the obvious sense that it

29
broadens without limits the possibilities of baptism of desire to include the false religions.

• Indifferentism properly speaking

To understand the indifferentism barely hidden in the aforementioned proposition, it is

important to take note of the following:

• Although it is true that God can, by the invisible grace of the Holy Ghost, attract to
the truth a soul

Pius IX, Singulari Quadem, December 9,1854; Dz 1647.

Pius IX, Quanto Conficiamur, August 10, 1863; Dz 1677.

104 American Ecclesiasti cal Review, CXXVII, 4 (October 1952), 307-315.

Pius XII, Mystici Corporis, June 29, 1942; The Papal Encyclicals 1939-1958, ed. Sr.
Claudia Carlen (McGrath, 1981), p.58, §103.
Pius IX, Singulari Quadem, Dz 1647.
living within a false religion, it is false to affirm than God positively uses that false
religion as a way to reach Him. A false religion with its erroneous beliefs and
practices, at least superstitious in nature if not worse, cannot be, in itself, a way to
God.

• It is in spite of the false religion, in spite of its superstitious and superfluous rites,
that a soul can be saved. Therefore, the public or external manifestations of that
false religion cannot at all be considered as the expression of that “search” of such a
soul, even supposing its good will.

• It is the invisible influence of Christ and the Church which will save that soul. It is
because that soul, without knowing it, is already Christian and Catholic—that is
why it will be saved. The way followed by that soul is not its erroneous religion but
Christ, ‘Who is “the way, the truth, and the light.” To say that there is another way
of salvation is precisely the heresy of indifferentism.

If we were to qualify the formula that we are criticizing, it deserves without hesitation the
theological censure of “heretical smell,” or even of being frankly heretical.

4) A few reminders on religious indifferentism

Religious indifferentism seems the most fundamental error of our time; that is why we
think it useful to give a brief summary of it. Undoubtedly, indifferentism will appear under
different aspects or propositions which can be classified by order of erroneous magnitude:
fallacious formulae; statements smelling of heresy; errors close to heretical; heresy; and,
finally, apostasy:

“People living outside the true faith can obtain eternal salvation.”
“We can well hope for the salvation of those who stay in other religions.”
“All religions carry a ray of the truth that illuminates all men.
“Christ is said to be ‘the way and the life’ inasmuch as only in Him do we find the
fullness of religious life.”
“We can save our soul in any religion.”
“No religion as such is bereft of meaning in the mystery of salvation.”

30
 “The Catholic religion is the ordinary means of salvation whereas the other religions
are the extraordinary means.
“All men, regardless of what is their religion, are in the way of salvation.”
“We [Christians, Jews, Muslims] believe in the same one God.”
“We [Christians and Jews] await together the Messias.”

The historical causes of this religious indifferentism are of a great diversity as well:

• agnosticism of the “philosophy of lights" 1O7 and its naturalism;

• rationalism, according to which every individual is the sole judge of right and
wrong;

• the maxim “liberty-equality-fraternity” of the Freemasons, their liberalism, and the

Revolution;

• the soreriological optimism of the sentimentality of the romanricists of the 19th

century;

• the “authenticity” of the religious experience in all the other religions, affirmed by
Modernists of the beginning of the 20th century and of today;

• the actual concept of the “people of God” imagined as a super-church that includes
within itself the Catholic Church and other religions said to be “in some sort of
communion” with the Catholic Church.

It really does not matter what the multiple historical reasons for religious indifferenrism
may be since it is indifferenrism as such which was condemned in all its known variations in
their time by Popes Gregory XVI, Pius IX, Leo XIII, St. Pius X, and Pius XII and that,
sooner or later, will also be condemned in its

The “philosophers of lights” were Voltaire, Rousseau, and Co. Explicitly and violently
anti-Catholic, they caused the French Revolution with its
attendant massacres and miseries. [Translator’s note.]
actual presentation. We will refer the reader to the documents of the Magisterium which
condemned indifferentism, quoted in Appendix I.

CONCLUSION ON INDIFFERENTISM

• Religious indifferentism is the heresy most often condemned by the popes since the
secret societies have spread their venom into the world, even into the bosom and the
veins of the Church.

• The basis for this heresy is the philosophical error of relativism of truth: the Catholic
truth and dogmas are assuredly true, but so are the truths of other religions. The truth is
no longer one, and the Catholic religion is no longer the only true one. A deadlier
venom for the Church can hardly be imagined, since it made the Church doubt itself, its
character of absolute and total truth, and its universal mission of salvation.

• Actually, indifferentism is more than just a heresy, it is sheer apostasy because it denies
that Our Lord Jesus Christ is the only God, our only Savior, the only one who has the
right to be our King, through Whom we must be regenerated, and in Whom we must be
incorporated by baptism to be saved. To attribute “values ofsalvation,” "meaning in the

31
 mystery of salvation,” to other religions is a monstrous insult to Jesus Christ. Even if
some souls save themselves within a false religion, it is still through the graces and the
truth coming from Our Lord and His true Church and certainly not through these false
religions which in themselves are an obstacle to the Holy Ghost and to Our Lord.

• This indifferenrist apostasy is the very foundation ofthe false ecumenism and of the
false religious liberty: if, in fact, any religion can be a means to reach God, missionary
spirit must be replaced by ecumenism, and adepts of any religion, without any
distinction, must be granted total liberty of expression and of “liberty to search.”
CONCLUSION ON “LIBERTY TO SEARCH":

• “Liberty to search” in religious matters is indeed an error:

• unrealistic in itself, since it silences and denies in practice the necessity of an

authority, or teacher, to be able to reach the truth;

• full of naturalism inasmuch as it denies in practice original sin, fallen human

dignity, and especially the wound of ignorance which always remain in human
intelligence;

• infected by the heresy—or, even more, the apostasy—of religious indifferenrism

which makes any religion into a means of salvation.

• Consequently, we cannot base anything on the alleged “liberty to search”: religious

liberty cannot invoke “liberty to search” as its foundation without, at the same time,
condemning itself.

• Furthermore, it seems now clear that the religious liberty of today is historically
motivated by errors much more harmfrl still than the errors that were the underlying
basis of the 19th century’s proclamation of the “liberty of conscience and of worship.”
The latter was, as we have said, inspired by the rationalism and the absolute liberalism
of the rime, but what is that in comparison to the naturalism and, even more so, to the
indifferentism of today, which, as we have demonstrated, has all the signs of aposrasy?

Is RELIGIOUS LIBERTY
A FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT OF MAN?

Popes Pius XI, Pius XII, and John XXIII, opposing totalitariand, at the same time,
distancing themselves from the liberalism inherent in the false “rights of man,” have
proclaimed the principal natural tights of man, calling them “fundamental.” Among these
rights there is the “right to freely worship God.” What is the exact meaning of this right? Is
religious liberty for all the adherents of all religions within that fundamental right? Can
we say that this right is the result of the “harmonious development” of the doctrine of the
Church?

1) Successive formulations of the fundamental right to freely worship God

But it [the liberty of conscience] may also be taken to mean that every man in the State
may follow the Will of God and, from a consciousness of duty and free from every
obstacle, obey His commands. This, indeed, is true liberty, a liberty worthy of the sons of
God, which nobly maintains the dignity of man and is stronger than all violence or wrong
—a liberty which the Church has always desired and held most dear. (Leo XIII)”'”

32
 man as a person possesses rights he holds from God, and which any collectivity must
protect against denial, suppression or neglect. (Pius XI)’

The believer has an absolute right to profess his Faith and live according to its dictates.
Laws which impede this profession and practice of Faith are against natural law. (Pius
XI)””

Promote the respect of the fundamental rights of the human person—that is, the right to
maintain and develop corporal, intellectual, and moral life, specifically the right to a
religious formation and education; the right to worship God in public and in private,
including charitable religious action. (Pius XII)”’

Also among man’s rights is that of being able to worship God in accordance with the right
dictates of one’s own conscience, and to profess his religion both in private and in public.
(John
XXIII)

The use of the expression “man’s rights” is, in that last encycheal, to be greatly regretted
because since its invention that expression always meant the rights of man as absolute subject
of said rights rather than the rights of a creature made to “worship, hon“'“Libertas, p.26, §30.
“'s’ Mit Brennender Sorge, March 14, 1937; The Papal En cyclicals 1903-1939,

ed. Sr. Claudia Carlen (McGrath, 1981), p.532, §30. All citations to Mit Brennender Sorge
are to this source.
““Ibid, §31.
“‘ Radio message of December 24, 1942; Documents 1942, p.341.
112 Pacem in Terris, April 11, 1963; The Papal En cyclicals 1958-1981, ed. Sr. Claudia
Carlin (McGrath, 1981), p.lO8, §14.
or, and serve” his Lord and Creator. It is the latter that deserve precisely the appellation of
“natural fundamental rights.”

2) Object of the fundamental right of man to the liberty to worship God

a) It is a right that

• is natural, but needs to be recognized also as a civil right;

• is affirmative (right to honor God by worship) and negative also (without

constraints);

• is subjective (rights that man receives from God) and objective (right to worship
God, to charitable religious action, to religious education).

b) The expressions “to follow the will of God,” “believer, to profess one’s faith,”
“worship God,” “to be religious” mean

• explicitly, a religion, either natural or positive, by which God wants to be honored;

• implicitly, the only true positive religion: the Catholic Church, excluding all others.

Actually, as soon as we speak of “objective right” (specific object of the right in

question), this right cannot but be morally good or true. That is indeed the teaching of two of

33
the above-mentioned popes:

For right is a moral power which-as We have before said and must again and again repeat
—it is absurd to suppose that nature has accorded indifferently to truth and falsehood, to
justice and injustice. (Leo XIII)”3

... that which does not correspond to truth or to the norm of morality objectively has no
right to exist, to be spread, or to be activated. (Pius XII)”4

““' Libertas, pp.2 1-22, §23.

“~ Ci Riesce, p.311, §V.
c) Nevertheless, Leo XIII and John XXIII speak of a right of the human being to honor
God “from a consciousness of duty” or “according to the sincere dictates of his own
conscience.” Isn’t it recognizing an objective right, in religious matters, to right consciences,
even if they are wrong through no fault on their part? We must answer: absolutely not.

• Error without fault excuses from sin but does not create any objective right to
profess said error or to practice it.

• The text of Leo XIII, read in its entirety, cannot be interpreted subjectively. The text
of John XXIII may not leave room but for a small doubt.

• Therefore, a restrictive sense must be given to these two quotations: “as long as the
conscience, rectified by the virtue of prudence, knows the true religion”;
i 15
they can never be given a subjective sense, as in
“practice religion as conceived by the conscience.

CONCLUSION: In the sense of an objective right, the “fundamental right to liberty

to worship God” applies to the true religion excluding all others. To allege that the
Magisrerium of the Church may deduce from Catholic doctrine and the invariable
affirmations of the popes, as an homogeneous development, a new doctrine of an
objective right to religious liberty applied indifferently to all religions constitutes an error,
an absurdity, an imposture, and a heresy since that allegation attributes to the Church the
capacity to contradict itself. It is, finally, an impiety since it condemns the Church to lie
shamelessly by telling us, “calm down, there is continuity,” when in fact there is an
obvious rupii6
ture.

3) Practical attitude of the popes when demanding fundamental religious rights

“~ I.e., the quotations by Leo XIII and John XXIII. [Translator’s note.]

116 A rupture, that is, between the doctrine of all time and the new theories.
[Translator’s note.]
Popes Pius XI and Pius XII must nor be accused of duplicity because they affirmed either
a right to “worship God” without any further precision or specifically the right to profess the
Catholic faith.
It is the same doctrine of the fundamental religious right explained under its two aspects:

34
subjective right and objective right.
Let us present two scenarios, to which we will add later a third.

a) First, there is the case of persecuting regimes (communist regimes, for instance) which
seek to destroy all religions without distinction by denying them not only the objective right
to practice freely but also attacking the root itself of the right to worship God, that is, the
subjective right.’17 The Church then affirms the fundamental right to worship God in
abstracto, that is, the subjective right to the true worship of the true God. Hence the docu-
ments we have just quoted.

b) Then there are Christian or even Catholic countries in which the government
persecutes especially the Catholic Church, its clergy, its associations, and its members (fascist
Italy and especially national-socialist Germany, for instance). In those cases, the Church does
not hesitate to demand specifically the “objective right” of the “believers,” that is, the
Catholic souls, both at the supernatural and at the natural level. 118

Ar the natural level:

The believer has an absolute right to profess his Faith [abstractly speaking, faith in
divine Revelation, but also in this case specifically the Catholic faith] and live according
to its dictates. Laws which impede this profession and practice of Faith are against natural
law. (Pius XI 119

Ar the supernatural level:

Le., the subjective right even to believe privately. [Translator’s note.]

116 In that regard, the reader will read profitably in their entirety the encyclicals

Mit Brennender Sorge and Non Abbiamo Bisogno of Pius XI. [Translator’s note.]
“~ Mit Brennender Sorge, p.532, §31.
the sacred and inviolable rights of souls and of the Church”; because this matter concerns
the rights of souls to procure for themselves the greatest spiritual work of the Church, the
divinely appointed and so mandatory of this teaching and of this work in that supernatural
order which is established in the blood of the Redeemer and is necessary and obligatory
for all of us if we are to share in the divine redemption. It concerns the right of souls so
formed to share the treasures of the redemption with other souls, thus participating in the
activities of the Apostolic Hierarchy.’2”
It was in consideration of this double right of souls that We lately declared Ourselves
happy and proud to wage the good fight for the liberty of consciences. No, indeed, (as
someone, perhaps inadvertently, has represented Us as saying) [We are not in favor of]
“the liberty of conscience,” which is an equivocal expression too often distorted to mean
the absolute independence of conscience and therefore an absurdity in reference to a soul
121
created and redeemed by God. (Pius XI)

Let it be noted the care with which Pius XI clarifies possible ambiguities of vocabulary. It
is for the same reason that “liberty to worship God” must not be confused with “liberty of
worships.” Likewise, the expression “religious liberty,” ignored by all the popes prior to
Vatican II, is to be avoided precisely because of its ambiguity: Which liberty? Which
religion?
The two cases a) and b), presented above, exemplify rather well the necessary distinctions

35
between subjective rightlobjective right, abstract rightlspecific right (which do not coincide
entirely). It is, however, necessary, for the sake of completeness, to present a third case.

c) We have, indeed, to examine also the case of missionary countries in which pagan
governments fight especially the Catholic religion by forbidding her any type of proselytism
(such as India, for example). i22 The Church could then use an argument ad

120 Pius XI had in mind the Catholic Action which had been disbanded under

pressure from the Italian State. [Note from the second French edition. Translator’s note.]
121 Non Abbiamo Bisogno, June 29, 1931; The Papal Encyclicals 1903-1939, ed. Sr.
Claudia Carlen (McGrath, 1981), p.453, §40-4 1. All citations to Non Abbiamo Bisogno are
to this source.
122 To which can be added all Muslim countries and Israel. [Translator’s note.]
hominem demanding for her and her missionaries the same common right, that is, the
objective right which the government concedes (wrongly) to other religions. It must be duly
noted, however, that it remains an argument adhominem, from which it will be absurd and
impious to infer that the Church recognizes the principle of an objective, natural, and civil
right to liberty of action for all religions without distinction.

i23
THE USE OF FORCE IN RELIGIOUS
MATTERS IN BIBLICAL HISTORY

The doctrines on religious liberty, from both the 19th and 20th centuries, demand
independence, liberty of action, and, more specifically, liberty from the use of force by any
human power in religious matters.
Does biblical history confirm or, to the contrary, oppose this allegation? ‘What doctrine
can we deduce from the Holy Scriptures regarding the use of force in religious matters?

1) The use of force in religious matters in the Old Testament

God enjoins severely His people to remain faithful to the true religion and to avoid the
worship of false gods.
To this effect, God promulgated a fundamental law in the book of Deuteronomy, chapter
13, in which He commanded the Israelites to reject

• false prophets (1-5),

• seducers who draw people to other religions (6-1 1), and

• towns fallen into idolatry (12-18).

This precept is renewed in chapter 17 verses 2-7.

Rigorous chastisements were mandated against the violators of these precepts: pain of the
sword and pain of fire.

23

In other parts of the book, “contrainte” has been literally translated

36
 “constraint”; but in this particular context, the word “force” is more
accurate. [Translator’s note.]
All those chastisements are then faithfully applied by all the good judges, the good kings,
and the prophets during all the course of the history of Israel:

• Jos. 23:6-8; 24:14-15

• Judg. 6:25-26
• III Kings 18:40
• IV Kings 10:18-31;, 23:5-24
• II Par. 15:13; 17:6; 19:3; 23:16-17; 30:14; 34:33
• Neh. 9:37; 13:16-18
• I Mac. 2:24-25; 9:73
• Dan. 14:21, etc.

2) The use of force in religious matters in the New Testament

At the end of the existence of the theocratic state of Israel, “the goodness and kindness of
God our Savior appeared,~~i24
Christ, “meek, and humble of heart. ,,i25
Nevertheless, Jesus frequently acted decisively and vigorously. He accomplished
miracles, such as the resurrection of Lazarus,
i26
which rendered the Jews inexcusable of their sin. He rebuked
very strongly hypocritical scribes and pharisees who “shut the kingdom of heaven against
men, for you yourselves do not enter
,,i27
in; and those that are going in, you suffer not to enter. ‘With
the parable of the evil workers of the vineyard,128 and also weeping
i29
over Jerusalem while predicting its destruction, Our Lord tried
to convince the Jewish people to turn away from infidelity—at least if nothing else by the
fear of future temporal disasters. Even more, He chased the merchants and their clients from
the temple, disturbing thus public order.’3” Finally, He predicted eternal chastisements for
those who refuse to believe in the spoken word of the missionaries of the Gospel. i3i

24 Tit. 3:4.
125 Mt. 11:29.
26 Jo. 15:24.
127 Mt. 23:13.
‘ss Mt. 21:33-46.
129 Lk. 19:44.
‘35Jn. 2:15.
‘~‘ Mk. 16:16.
The apostle St. Peter rebuked severely Ananias and Saphira for their lie in a religious
matter, and they received from God the pain of instant death-so that “there came great fear
upon the whole church, and upon all that heard these things.”’32 In his second epistle, he
scolded strongly “the false prophets among the people,” calling them “fountains without
water, and clouds tossed with whirlwinds, to whom the mist of darkness is reserved,” and
again “the dog is returned to his vomit: and, the sow that was washed, to her wallowing in the
mire.”’33

37
 The apostle St. Paul rebuked Elymas, magus and false prophet who tried to turn away
from the faith the proconsul Sergius Paulus; and after the confrontation with St. Paul, Elymas
became blind, “not seeing the sun for a time." 134 In his second epistle to the Corinthians,
Paul himself affirms that he has the power to “deal.. .severely". 135 with those who do not
walk according to his word. And in the epistle to the Galatians, he says of the Judaizers:
,,i36
“I would they were even cut off, who trouble you.
The apostle St. John called some false doctors seducers and antichrists, and speaking of
relations with them he gives this precept to the Christians: “If any man come to you, and
bring not this doctrine, receive him not into the house nor say to him, God speed you. For he
that saith unto him, God speed you, communicateth with his wicked works.”’37
The apostle St. Jude in his epistle reprimands thus false doctors: “. . . clouds without
water, which are carried about by winds, trees of the autumn, unfruitful, twice dead, plucked
up by the roots: raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own confusion; wandering stars, to
whom the storm of darkness is reserved for
,,i38
ever.
Finally, in the Apocalypse it is said to the “angel” (that is, the bishop) of Pergamus: “But I
have against thee a few things: because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam,
who

132 Acts 5:1—11.

II Pet. 2:17,22.
Acts 13:8-11.
II Cor. 13:10.
136 Gal. 5:12.

‘i” Jude 1:12-13.

taught Balac to cast a stumbling-block [sic] before the children of Israel, to eat, and to
commit fornication: So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaires. In like
manner do penance. ,,i39 Even more strongly is the bishop of the Church of Thyatira blamed
for his excessive mildness towards a false prophetess: “I have against thee a few things:
because thou sufferest the woman Jezabel, who called herself a prophetess, to teach, and to
seduce my servants... .And I gave her a time that she might do penance.... Behold, I will cast
her into a bed. And I will kill her children." 140

CONCLUSIONS TO BE DRAWN FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT:

From God’s actions throughout the whole history of salvation in the Old Testament, as
well as the way the inspired writers expressed themselves, we can evidently deduce the
following points of doctrine:

• God never permitted any tolerance in the juridical order of the people of Israel towards
the worship of idols and the preaching of false prophets.

• On the contrary, God commanded the repression of the worship of false gods with the
most violent external coercion.

• Kings and prophets who acted in conformity with the will of God in that regard are
greatly praised by the sacred writer, whereas those who acted contrarily to that will
were denounced.

38
 CONCLUSIONS TO BE DRAWN FROM THE NEW TESTAMENT:

• Undoubtedly, the actions of Our Lord and of the apostles are much more imbued with
mercy and meekness than those imposed by God upon the Israelites under the Old
Law.

• But it is also very certain that Christ and the apostles used force: moral force first, with
public blame or announcement of temporal chastisements (let us not forget the

‘~‘ Apoc. 2:14-16.

threat of eternal punishment against those who refuse to accept the Gospel when preached
to them); then, physical force itself, expulsion from the Church and the Christian
community, or even stronger uses of force against hypocrites, false teachers, heretics,
apostates, and sectarians.

• More particularly, Our Lord does not permit that liberty be granted to false teachers: thus
in the Apocalypse the bishop of Thyatira is rebuked because he permitted Jezabel to teach
and to seduce.

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS:

• Firstly, a simple fact to be remembered: the use of coercion in religious matters is constant
throughout biblical history.

• Secondly, it is theologically certain that coercion or force in religious matters, whatever

its form, is not intrinsically against human nature.

• Thirdly, it is Catholic doctrine that:

• In the Old Testament, the coercive authority directly belonged to God (theocratic
government); human authorities were there only to carry it out, primacy being given to
temporal and often violent coercion.

• In the New Testament, primacy is given to persuasion and moral coercion with the
threat of eternal damnation but without, nevertheless, taking away all temporal
coercion, nor even violent coercion. Also, after the Ascension, the coercive authority
in religious matters rests with the apostles; and although supernatural, it is a human
authority.

• Finally, the thesis of the exemption of coercion from any human power, because the
expression “any human power is too general and vague, is manifestly in contradiction
with the doctrine of the Holy Scriptures as expressed in the New Testament.
DOES RELIGIOUS LIBERTY GUARANTEE
THE RIGHT TO BE EXEMPT FROM
ANY COERCION IN RELIGIOUS MATTERS?

As we have seen, the right to error is no less absurd when considered as an affirmative
right (right to profess error) or as a negative right (right not to be restrained from professing
error). This absurdity of the right to error remains even if the error is a religious error because
it is still an error.

39
 Some, however, allege that the person who is in religious error has a right to be exempted
from any coercion because, it is said, to coerce a conscience in religious matters is to violate
it. And, they add, the Church herself rejects any coercion of a person to convert him to the
Catholic faith.

Nobody may be forced to embrace the Catholic faith against his

will.’4’

There is some confusion that must be clarified:

• That no one should be forced to embrace the Catholic faith against his will is indeed
what the Church has always defended, although a certain number of clarifications must
be added.

• But that no one may be restrainedfrom embracing or professing a false religion is

certainly a proposition both false and condemned.

Let us explain:

1) It is not permitted to force anyone to embrace the Catholic faith against his will

a) Doctrinal explanation:

• The act of faith on which salvation depends must be absolutely free. Thus, any
coercion which may diminish the liberty of the act of faith cannot be used to force
someone to become Catholic.

141 1917 Code of Canon Law, Canon 1351; Stanislaus Woywod, O.F.M.,A

Practical Commentary on the Code o/Canon Law (Wagner, 1939), II, 107.
Cf. 1983 Code of Canon Law, Canon 748 §2.
• This principle is explained by the Fathers, especially Lactantius and Sr. Augustine.
It is from the latter
i42
that the canon law was quoting, and it is taught by
Leo XIII.

And in fact the Church is wont to rake earnest heed that no one shall be forced to
embrace the Catholic faith against his will, for, as Sr. Augustine wisely reminds us, “Man
cannot believe otherwise than of his own free will.’43

b) However, it is necessary to present several cases which engage other principles:

• Those who never received the faith, such as the pagans and the Jews—St. Thomas
fully applies to them the principle of the liberty of the act of faith.

these are by no means to be compelled to the faith, in order that they may believe,
because to believe depends on the will.”””'

• Heretics and apostates, since they have received the faith by baptism and therefore
are subjects of the Church, can, on the contrary, be forced (by the Church or its
delegates), even by “bodily compulsion,” specifies St. Thomas, “that they may

40
 fulfil what they have promised, and hold what they, at one time, received.”

This teaching is reaffirmed with apostolic authority by Pius

VI:

Let us examine now the word liberty under another aspect. Let us see clearly the
distinction to be made between men who always have been outside of the Church, such as
the Jews and the infidels, and those who subjected themselves to the Church by the
baptism they received. The former need not be coerced to profess the Catholic faith
whereas the latter it is necessary to force.’46

“‘i [Tract. xxvi in Joan.; in ST II II, q.lO, a.8. Translator’s note.] “~ Immortale Dei, p.l27.
ST II II, q.lO, a.8.
Ibid.
146 Quod Aliquantum; Recueil, p.57.
Fr. Bernard comments thus on this document of the Magisterium:

The pope meant that liberty is nor an end in itself and what is important is only to
make good use of it. The Church does not believe it has the right to intervene for those
who are not connected at all to the Catholic faith; the Church wants to respect their liberty
and, if possible, the zeal to guide and illuminate it. But for those connected to the Church
by the sacraments received or by promises, the Church has the right to intervene, nor to
violate that liberty but to call it to order: the Church acts in this case like a society towards
its members, like a motherland
towards its own children. In that respect, the Church always
maintained that great difference: “This difference, concluded
Pius VI, was explained by St. Thomas Aquinas with, as always,
“‘47
very solid reasons.

Let us hold to the principle “it is necessary to coerce the heretics.” It is immaterial
whether they are in good or bad faith, whether they committed formally or not the sin of
infidelity: the fact is that they promised at their baptism to remain faithful to the faith they
received and that—objectively, at least—they have broken their promise. Therefore, the
Church their Mother calls them to order—if necessary, by force.
Nevertheless, prudence and charity will require often not to use violent coercion, but
rather a certain amount of tolerance towards the heretics born in error, sometimes for
generations; for the use of force can have the effect that they openly rebel against the Church.
But when it is a recent heresy and there is no danger of” [rooting] up the wheat also
together with [the cockle]” and scandalizing the good faithful (because the heresy is well
known and repudiated by them), then St. Augustine and St. Thomas are in agreement: “[T]he
severity of discipline should not slacken." 148

2) It is permitted to stop someone from embracing or professing a false religion or

propagating errors

Here is a truth often silenced but which belongs to Catholic doctrine as much as the
preceding one. It is demonstrated by rea Somme théologique, p.4O8.
ST II II, q.lO, a.8, ad 1.
son, by the Fathers, by the Magisterium and the practice of the Church, by the practice of
Catholic princes with the approval of the Church, and, finally, by the teaching of the

41
“Common Doctot,” Sr. Thomas Aquinas.

a) Proof by reason:

There is no right to error nor to its propagation. Hence, it is licit to prevent someone from
embracing or professing religious error; in doing so “we do not wrong him, neither in the
good to which he has a right nor in his right to this good, " 149 to use words of Pius XII on
another subject but which are perfectly adapted to our purpose.

• Neither in the good to which he has a right: that is, to profess a religion according
to the will of God, which is the true religion;

• nor in his right to this good: that is, his (subjective) right to worship God in
abstracto.

b) Teachings of the Fathers:

The workers of the parable of the cockle and the good wheat said to their master: “Wilt
thou that we go and gather it up?” The master answered them: “No, lest perhaps gathering up
the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it.”’5”
St. John Chrysostom commented on this parable and applied it to the heretics:

[Our Lord] doth nor therefore forbid our checking heretics, and stopping their mouths, and
taking away their freedom of speech, and breaking up their assemblies and confederacies,
but our killing and slaying them.’5’

But, note well, earlier on in the same sermon, Sr. John Chrysostom had clarified himself
by saying that the killing of heretics

Allocurion to surgical specialists of the eye, May 14, 1956; Documents 1956, p.264.
Mt. 13:29.
‘~‘ Homily XLVI on Mt. 13:24-30; A Select Library o/rhe Nicene and PostNicene Fathers of
tbe Christian Church, ed. Philip Schaff (Christian
Literature, 1888), X, 289.
is forbidden if by killing them we may “at the same time root out the good wheat,” that is,
scandalize the faithful.

c) Teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas:

Whether Heretics Ought to Be Tolerated? [The holy doctor speaks of heretics newly
arisen within a Catholic nation.]
I answer that, With regard to heretics two points must be observed: one, on their own
side, the other, on the side of the Church. On their own side there is the sin, whereby they
deserve not only to be separated from the Church by excommunication, but also to be
severed from the world by death. For it is a much graver matter to corrupt the faith which
quickens the soul, than to forge money, which supports temporal life....
On the part of the Church, however, there is mercy which looks to the conversion of
the wanderer, wherefore she condemns not at once, but after the first and the second
admonition, as the Apostle directs: after that, if he is yet stubborn, the Church no longer
hoping for his conversion, looks to the salvation ofothers, by excommunicating him and
separating him from the Church, and furthermore delivers him to the secular tribunal to be

42
 exterminated thereby from the world by death.’52

The Catholic doctrine of recourse to secular tribunals is explained further in depth. As for
the death penalty to be applied to obstinate heretics, it seems that it should be restricted only
to those who cause heresy, not to their victims. Other nuances are advanced by recent authors
who limit the death penalty to relapsed heretics, that is, converted once and fallen again into
their heresy. But St. Thomas’s thought does not seem to suffer from such watering-down.

d) Magisrerium and practice of the Church in defense of the faith of her children against
the contagion of infidelity:

• Religious error and its propagation are very pernicious evils to the Church and to souls:
it is easy to divide and ruin in a very short time what took long and hard years to build.
“For the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of
light.”’53 Hence, the Church

152 ST II II, q. 11, a.3.

Lk. 16:8.
always considered as one of her first duties to stop her children from embracing error;
and, as her most strict right, to demand from civil authorities the restraining or
limitation of the public manifestation of false religions: the Church claims for herself in
those cases, as Fr. Bernard says, “the right to intervene among people who are not hers
to protect the faith of her own people. It is a sensitive role, especially considering that..
.the existing order (natural right) is not to be disturbed and confrontation of powers
(spiritual and temporal) is to be avoided. But it is a role eminently good since it looks
for nothing less than true liberty and the protection of the faith.”’54 Let us explain
further: it is the protection of the faithful against the scandal of infidelity (in the
theological sense of the word: that is, to incite someone to sin) or against the scandal of
some of the practices of the infidels which are against the natural law.

• This direct right of intervention over her children (and indirectly over the infidels as
well) that the Church claims for herself for the legitimate defense of the faith cannot be
exempt from a real but good coercion. Here is what Fr. Bernard has to say on the
subject:

The Church warns us with protective care against any contacts with the infidel
and against the contagion of infidelity. The Church does so using all the means
granted to her by Our Lord.
For that purpose the Church surrounds the faithful with a web of obligations and
sanctions. It may surprise the unbeliever, but the faithful should congratulate him-
self, for it is a web of security and benevolent protection. Since faith cannot be
imposed or kept by force, it should be understood that the Church will always and
above all try persuasion. All the other means, in the mind of the Church, are there
only as an aid to persuasion. Nevertheless, since persuasion is ofren totally
powerless and ineffective, the Church, in practice, adds a certain amount of
coercion which she tries to adapt to the particular conditions of persons, places, and
times. It is sure and obvious that the Church does not interact with the faithful today

Somme théologique, p.42O.

as it did in the Middle Ages. And even today, her discipline is stricter in some

43
 countries as compared to others in things that regard the protection of the faith.

The following is a list of practical measures and canonical sanctions used by the Church
for the defense of the faith of her children:

• Profession of Faith, oath of fidelity and anti-modernist oath to be sworn for the
reception of holy orders, for academic titles, for academic professor-ships of
sacred sciences, and for ecclesiastical posi156
tions.

• Imp rimatur and Index of forbidden books.’57

• Theological censures brought by the Church against condemned propositions.

• The Holy Office itself, an office for the protection of the faith and not of
theological research. iSS

• Excommunication and refusal of Christian burial for apostates, heretics, and those
who favor heresy. i60

Prohibition of participation in non-Catholic worship; prohibition of mixed marriage

without dispensation i6i and solemn oath from both spouses to raise the children in the
Catholic faith 162 because mixed marriages are in themselves, and also often in practice, a
danger to the faith of the Catholic spouse and of the children; canonical punishment for those
who ignore that; 163 prohibition of resorting to non-Catholic or “neutral” schools; etc.

Ibid, p.419.
156 1917 Code of Canon Law, Canons 1406-1407; Sr. Pius X, Pascendi,

September 8,1907.
1917 Code of Canon Law, Canons 1384-1405.
‘5S Ibid., Canon 247, §4.

Ibid., Canon 247, §1.

160 Ibid, Canons 2314-2318.

Ibid, Canons 1060, 1070.

162
Ibid., Canon 1061.
“~ Ibid, Canon 2319.
CONCLUSION: It is hardly necessary to emphasize the common sense of the good and
sane coercion that the Church has the right to use with her children, and indirectly with
others, for the protection of the faith of her own people, measures that are not only of a
spiritual nature but of a temporal nature as well: such as, to forbid a book may ruin its
publisher; or the closing down, at the request of the Church, of the meeting place of a sect—
these are very material and concrete measures.

e) The practice of Christian princes with the approval of the Church; for instance, the
practice of Roman emperors towards pagan worship:

44
 [Emperors Constantius and Constans] to Taurus, Praetorium
Prefect.
It is Our pleasure that the temples shall be immediately closed in all places and in all
cities, and access to them forbidden, so as to deny to all abandoned men the opportunity to
commit sin. It is also Our will that all men shall abstain from [pagan] sacrifices. But if
perchance any man should perpetrate any such criminality, he shall be struck down with
the avenging sword.164

3) Finally, is it licit to use constraint or a simple discrimination to repress or justly limit

religious error, with the salutary advantage of making those who are its target think, so that
they may at least study the truth they had despised?

a) Opinion of St. Augustine, explained by J. Tixeront in his Histoire des dogmes:

It is true that, at first, Saint Augustine was not in favor of imposing on heretics and
schismatics even the external appearance of the profession of faith so as nor to make
hypocrites: he does so write explicitly in his letter 93,17. It is also true that he always rejected
as excessive the death penalty and some other of the most terrible penalties against
dissidents... .On the other hand, he always recognized as legitimate not only the severe
measures applied to repress the excesses of Donarists and Circoncellians but also the more
moderate measures (fines, jail, ex164 The Theodosian Code and Novels and the Sirmondian
Constitutions, trans.

Clyde Pharr (Princeton UP, 1952), bk. XVI, 10, 4, Dec. 1, 346, p.472;
hereafter, Theodosian Code.
ile) against them and other dissidents because they were heretics and schismatics.... His
Contra epistulam Parmeniani, from the year 400, is particularly clear on this point. The
author [Sr. Augustine] claims for the emperors the right to punish those who preach a false
doctrine in exactly the same fashion they punish idolaters and poisoners. These measures
have as their goal and effect to make their recipients think and to protect the weak against
the oppressive violence of the wicked.’

b) Practice of Louis XIV, king of France, towards his Protestant subjects from 1661 to
1671:

“I believed, my son, that the best way to curtail the Hugue166

nots in my kingdom was, in the first place, not to pressure
them with renewed rigor, to respect what they had obtained from my predecessors, but not
to grant them anything further and to interpret it as strictly as possible within the limits
which justice permitted. As for the graces that were for me alone to grant, I determined,
and I applied it rather punctually, not to grant them any; and that, not out of bitterness but
out of goodness, to force them thus to consider from time to time and without violence
whether they had any good reason to deprive themselves voluntarily of the advantages
available to all my other subjects.”’67

Louis XIV did not keep that wise moderation, but his imprudence of 1685168 does not
take anything from the legitimacy of his original resolution.

165 (Gabalda, 1931), II, 994. [History of the dogmas. Translator’s note.]
166

45
 Name given to French Protestants. [Translator’s note.]
167 Mimoires de Louis XIV pour l’instruction du Dauphin (Memoirs of Louis XIV

for the instruction of the heir to the crown [translator’s note]), ed. Dreyas, II, 456; quoted
in Jean Guiraud, Histoirepartiale, Histoire vraie [partial history, true history. Translator’s
note.] (Beauchesne, 1916), III, 77-78.
168 He revoked the edict of Nantes, by which his grandfather, Henry IV, on April 13,
1598, had provided Protestant communities with a certain number of privileges and
guarantees. The immediate result of the revocation was the mass emigration of half a
million Huguenots, which did represent a severe financial blow to the country. It was
imprudent, all right; but in his defense it must be noted that he was facing an increasingly
hostile alliance of Protestant countries (England, the Netherlands, and several German
principalities) which were already financing and fomenting subversion within these French
Huguenor communities during the reign of his father, Louis XIII. [Translator’s note.]
CONCLUSION:

• It is permissible to use just force, spiritual and even temporal, in religious matters. Its
goal is the protection of the faith of the faithful against the contamination of error or
immorality.

• To proclaim in religious matters “the right not to be restrained” in the name of the
“right not to be forced” is a despicable deception.

• To proclaim in religious matters the “right not to be restrained” is the same as to want
to eliminate twenty centuries of theology and of the life of the Church.

• Finally, in explaining the “right not to be forced” it is advisable not to be too

categorical. A certain amount of indirect constraint is very beneficial for the misguided
souls, even if it is only from the social discrimination which results from the natural
horror of the faithful when confronted with infidelity and immorality.

TEMPORAL COMMON GOOD,

THE CATHOLIC RELIGION, AND OTHER RELIGIONS

The two last parts demonstrated the legitimacy of the use of constraint in religious matters
on the part of the Church for the protection of the faithful. Now it must be demonstrated that
the State can use legitimate constraint in religious matters. The State has a double claim to
such use of force in religious matters: first, the State is the guarantor of the common temporal
good; second, the State is the protector of the Church. The doctrine we have just summed up
is that of Sr. Thomas and of all the popes until Pius XII and John XXIII.

1) The common good is the proper end 169 of any civil society or State. It is mainly a
moral good. It is not independent but, on the contrary, intrinsically dependent on an objective,
moral, and religious order.

169 Or purpose. [Translator’s note.]

Still we have insisted that, since the end of society is to make men better, the chief good
that society can possess is virtue (Leo
XIII).’7”

... the lasting achievement of the common good—that is, of those external conditions

46
 necessary to the citizens for the development of their qualities; their functions; their
material, intellectual, and religious life. (Pius XII)’7’

But then, how is the common good to be defined, for this should be wholly based on an
objective norm of morality? (Archbishop Lefebvre)’72

2) This moral and religious order can be a perfect order. Such is the order that reigns in a
Catholic society. It can be a more or less imperfect order, even an apparent order only,
according as it pertains to a Christian but non-Catholic society, a pluralistic society in
religious matters, a pagan society, or, finally, a communist society. Only Catholic social order
can be the real guarantor of true common good and true liberties.

‘75
No, Venerable Brethren, We must repeat with the utmost energy in these times of social
and intellectual anarchy when everyone takes upon himself to teach as a teacher and
lawmaker-the City cannot be built otherwise than as God has built it; society cannot be set
up unless the Church lays the foundations and supervises the work; no, civilization is not
something yet to be found, nor is the New City to be built on hazy notions; it has been in
existence and still is: it is Christian civilization, it is the Catholic city. It has only to be set
up and restored continually against the unremitting attacks of insane dreamers, rebels and
miscreants: Omnia instaurare in Christo. (St. Pius X)’74

To facilitate this [procuring the common good], Catholics must urgently wish for and
pursue only those goals which are seen quite truly to lead to the common good, in
preference to their own personal opinions and interest. This would ensure... that [the
Catholic] religion excels in its own function and spreads its

““ Rerum Novarum, p.229.

‘~‘ Radio message, December 24, 1942; Documents 1942, p.334, or PIN 782. 172
Intervention filed with the Secretariat of the Council, November 1963; I

Accuse the Council, p.23.

Courtesy title the pope uses when writing to other bishops. [Translator’s note.]
‘~‘ Our Apostolic Mandate, pp.19-20, §11.
power, a power which brings safety to civil, domestic, and economic affairs as well, in a
wonderful way.. .by uniting public authority and freedom in a Christian manner.... (Leo

Today, like other times before, contemplating the nativity of the divine Prince of Peace,
We are forced to declare: how far is the world from the order wished by God in Christ, the
order that guarantees the only true and real peace... .The exhortation [of the Church] in
favor of the Catholic social order, as a factor of pacification, is at the same time an
encouragement to true liberty. Because, in the ultimate analysis, Catholic order as an
organizanon for peace is essentially an order of liberty. (Pius XII)

3) The more necessary it is to tolerate moral evil or religious error in a society—or, worse,
error in part of the society’s institutions—the further away is that society from perfection.
The more liberty error has for its propagation, the lesser will be the liberty of souls to pursue
truth, especially religious truth, and to continue to profess it.

But, to judge rightly, we must acknowledge that, the more a State is driven to tolerate
evil, the further is it from perfection;.... (Leo XIII)’77

47
 the State is acting against the laws and dictates of nature whenever it permits the
license of opinion and of action to lead minds astray from truth and souls away from the
practice of virtue. (Leo

The excesses of an unbridled intellect, which unfailingly end in the oppression of the
untutored multitude, are no less rightly controlled by the authority of the law than are the
injuries inflicted by violence upon the weak. (Leo XIII)’75

The “untutored multitude” “oppressed” by unbridled ideas is, today more than ever, the
greatest sociological reality: “Our contemporaries are.. .abandoned without protection to the
perpetual aggression of the media, which spreads, with incredible effica‘~ Permoti Nos, July
10, 1885; The Papal En cyclicals 1878-1903, ed. Sr. Claudia
Carlen (McGrath, 1981), p.372, §6.

Radio message of December 24, 1951; Documents 1951, pp.562,564, or PIN 1174,1177.
“a’ Libertas, pp.28-29, §34.
‘i”' Immortale Dei, p.124.
‘~‘ Libertas, p.22, §23.
ciousness, corruption of minds and of morals. " 180 Consequently, insuring the common
good today requires, more than ever, repression of the liberty of thought, especially in
religious matters (e.g. sects, illuminism, esoterica, Eastern Mysticism). In general, we must
affirm that one of the components of the common good is the liberty of access of the souls to
religious truth. Therefore, to obtain that common good, the State must repress the spreading
of errors, suppress their organizations, and do everything in its power to break the social and
religious yoke characteristic of all the sects, particularly of Islam.

4) On the contrary, a religious consensus of the citizens in the true religion is the
indispensable consequence of the perfect realization of the common temporal good. That is
why the principle of religious unity must be enshrined in the Constitution of the State.

a) First, the facts:

Religious or ideological unity is a constant in all the States where there is “order.”
Pluralism is, on the contrary, the constant in States where the former Christian order is
decomposing.
There is no State without ideology. There are Communist States, Buddhist States, Islamic
States, Protestant States, Masonic States—anything, then, but Catholic States?
‘When numerous full-fledged Catholic States still existed, or were in the process of
restoration, the fertile but deluded intelligence of Jacques Maritainiii made him look at the
religious pluralism of nations as being the irreversible and providential direction of history.
Based on this idea, as gratuitous as it is erroneous, this metaphysician, out of place in the
realm of politics, decreed the elimination of Catholic States and built his mythical “new
Christendom” as a pluralistic society of Christian inspiration—as if Christ, King of nations,
should resign Himself to cohabit peace“'“ “Mgr. Lefebvre erIe Saint-Office,” Itinéraires, 233,
May 1979, pp.69-70.
“'‘Jacques Marirain (1882-1973) was a French philosopher who converted in 1906. Early in
his career, he was one of the bright lights of the renaissance of Thomistic philosophy, but
he went astray and became the father of “integral humanism.” He was the personal friend
of Paul VI, hence his very strong
and undue influence on Vatican II. [Translator’s note.]
ably with Buddha and Mohammed and to build with them a “Christendom.”
Alas! That blasphemous apostasy had become the dominant ideology on the eve of

48
Vatican II.

b) However, Catholic doctrine is radically opposed to that treasonous bias. It reminds us

of the benefit, even for the common temporal good, of religious unity in a Catholic nation and
of the duty of the State to enshrine it in its constitution:

On these days, all of Spain is in prayers, full of spontaneous fervor, at the feet of Jesus
Christ in the Eucharist. What Spain thinks of religion is thereby proclaimed with such
evidence that it is impossible to be more obvious. [Spain] has testified in the most
affirmative manner, not only by numbers and [public] proclamations, but in reality and in
a profoundly Catholic manner, that it always wants to keep its faith. (Sr. Pius X)”'2

It is precisely because the glory of Spain is so intimately connected with the Catholic
Religion that We feel doubly afflicted in witnessing the deplorable endeavors that for
some time have been continually repeated to deprive this beloved nation, with her
traditional faith, of her most beautiful title of civil grandeur.
.We shall not delay here to repeat that it is a serious error to affirm that this separation
[of Church and State] is heir and good in itself, especially in a nation almost totally
Catholic. (Pius
XI)

May the Lord keep you within the unity of the Catholic faith, and may He make your
country always... more faithful to its historic mission. (John XXIII)

In these ecumenical times when the world, confused and agitated, turns its eyes upon
the Catholic Church... the example of the Church in Spain is very consoling because
throughout the centuries, even in the most difficult times of her history, it has always
defended its spiritual patrimony with intrepidity and

182 Allocution to the Consistory, November 27, 1911;Actes, VII, 155.

“'s Dilectissima Nobis, June 3, 1933; The Papal En cyclicals 1903-1939, ed. Sr.

Claudia Carlen (McGrath, 1981), p.49l, §2, p.492, §6.

“'i Radio address to the Catholics of Spain upon the occasion of the fifth
national Eucharistic congress celebrated in Zaragoza, September 24, 1961;
Acres, LIII, 681.
courage and with the closest communion with Rome. That blessed characteristic has
always been the hallmark of Spain.... The Catholic Church, always anxious to preserve the
values of which she is the repository and to preserve without fail the religious unity of the
country, is sure to cooperate with him [Franco] for the conservation of national unity
which is the best guarantee of the moral elevation of the citizens. (Cardinal Antoniutti,
nuncio in Spain)”'5

5) Finally, to protect this religious unity in view of the common good, the State has the
duty, and therefore must assume the right, of limiting, by the use of legal restrictions, the
public manifesrations of other religions, unless it judges that it is better to use tolerance.
In order to keep society in the unity of faith, which is the supreme good and the fountain
of many benefits even in the temporal order, civil authority can, of itself, regulate and
arbitrate the public manifestations of other religions.

CONCLUSION: Let us retain the two practical rules that emerge from the doctrine of the
Church and that have been, in application of the conciliar declaration on religious liberty,

49
rejected in theory and in practice by the policy of the Holy See since 1965. These two rules
are justified by the common good which the State must insure:

• The religious unity of a Catholic nation must be inscribed as one of the fundamental
principles of its Constitution.

Upon receiving the cardinal’s hat, Madrid, 1962.

1s6
Schema on relations between Church and State and religious tolerance, pt.2,
ch.9, the paragraph concerning Catholic countries; hereafter, schema. [This schema is one
of the schemata (drafts) made by the central preparatory
Commission for Vatican II under the direction of Alfredo Cardinal
Orraviani but discarded at the beginning of the first session by the FrancoGerman liberal-
modernist wing of bishops so that they never reached the floor of the assembly and were
never debated. (See Fr. Ralph M. Wilrgen, The Rhine Elows into the Tiber: A History o/
Vatican IL) They were printed in Latin and several other languages for the use of the
Council Fathers by the Polyglorris Vaticanis (the Vatican printing press) but were never
published for the general public. Translator’s note.]
• The State has, in a Catholic nation, the right to regulate and arbitrate the public activity
of other religions.

MINISTERIAL FUNCTION OF THE STATE

TOWARDS THE TRUE RELIGION

Jesus Christ, King of nations, must reign over temporal civil society. This requirement is a
truth of our faith (ef. I Cot. 15:25). It is, at the same time, the only criterion which allows us
to judge the sense of history, to wit: if Christ reigns, there is peace, “peace of arms and peace
of souls.” ‘When Christ does not reign, then instead anarchy and decadence reign (ef. Is.
60:12).
From the Catholic dogma of the social Kingship of Christ must follow, for all nations and
political governments, a certain number of duties towards Christ and His Church, duties
which will have their full accomplishment in Catholic nations, duties that, in any case, the
Church considers as invariable principles.
Indeed, the popes of the three last centuries, particularly Pius IX and Leo XIII, have
clearly defined in this matter what must be believed as “Catholic doctrine” in opposition to
the modern errors of agnosticism and the religious indifferentism of the State.
As it is, this Catholic doctrine is in perfect continuity with what Catholic theology
deduced from the opinions of the Fathers and the practice of the popes and of Catholic
governments since the scholastic age: that is, we have here an essential and permanent body
of doctrine, known under the name of “indirect subordination of the temporal to the
spiritual,” that should be differentiated from opinions and practices which must be considered
as purely accidental and transitory.
All the manuals of theology prior to the recent crisis in the Church explained a synthesis
of this Catholic doctrine which can be called “the ministerial function of the State towards the
true religion.” The expression “ministerial function” refers to the services the State must
render to the true religion—more specifically, to Christ and His Church.
According to Catholic doctrine, the State as the main organ of civil society must:
1) Honor God, the author of civil society, by the worship of the true religion; and,
therefore, recognize the Catholic religion as the religion of the State (against agnosticism,

50
laicism, and the religious indifferentism of the State).

For men living together in society are under the power of God no less than individuals are,
and society, not less than individuals, owes gratitude to God, who gave it being and
maintains it, and whose ever-bounteous goodness enriches it with countless blessings.
Since, then, no one is allowed to be remiss in the service due to God, and since the chief
duty of all men is to cling to religion in both its teaching and practice—not such religion
as they may have a preference for, but the religion which God enjoins, and which certain
and most clear marks show to be the only one true religion—it is a public crime to act as
though there were no God. So, too, is it a sin in the State not to have care for religion, as a
something beyond its scope, or as of no practical benefit; or our of many forms of religion
to adopt that one which chimes in with the fancy; for we are bound absolutely to worship
God in that way which He has shown to be His will. (Leo
XIII)”'7

Wherefore, civil society must acknowledge God as its Founder and Parent, and must obey
and reverence His power and authoriry. Justice therefore forbids, and reason itself forbids,
the State to be godless; or to adopt a line of action which would end in godlessness—
namely, to treat the various religions (as they call them) alike, and to bestow upon them
promiscuously equal rights and privileges. Since, then, the profession of one religion is
necessary in the State, that religion must be professed which alone is true, and which can
be recognized without difficulty, especially in Catholic States, because the marks of truth
are, as it were, engraven upon it. (Leo XIII)”'”

2) Conform its laws to the laws of God and of the Church so as to permeate its legislation
with them (avoiding practical atheism from the State).

It was quite a general desire that both our laws and our governments should exist without
recognizing God or Jesus Christ, on the theory that all authority comes from men, not from
God.

“'v Immortale Dei, pp.110-Ill.

“'“Libertas, p.2O,§2l.
Because of such an authority itself lost its hold
assum~jtion...
upon mankind. (Pius XI)’5

When, therefore, governments and nations follow in all their activities, whether they be
national or international, the dictates of conscience grounded in the teachings, precepts,
and example of Jesus Christ, and which are binding on each and every individual, then
only can we have faith in one another’s word and trust in the peaceful solution of the
difficulties and controversies. (Pius XI)””'

and moreover it is a dogma of faith that Jesus Christ was given to man, nor only as our
Redeemer, but also as a law-giver, to whom obedience is due. (Pius XI)’9’

Nations will be reminded by the annual celebration of this feast that nor only private
individuals but also rulers and princes are bound to give public honor and obedience to
Christ. It will call to their minds the thought of the last judgement, wherein Christ, who
has been cast out of public life, despised, neglected and ignored, will most severely avenge

51
 these insults; for his kingly dignity demands that the State should take account of the
commandments of God and of Christian principles, both in making laws and in
administering justice, and also in providing for the young a sound moral education. (Pius
XI)”'2

3) Because of the indirect subordination of the end of the State to the end of the Church,
procure the common good in a way that will not only avoid anything that can harm the liberty
of the Church and of souls but also will help positively in the temporal order and the good of
the Church and of souls (against State laicism).

Therefore, since the beatitude of heaven is the end of that virtuous life which we live at the
present, it pertains to the king’s office to promote the good life of the multitude in such a
way as to make it suitable for the attainment of heavenly happiness; that is to say, he
should command those things which lead to the

“'“ Ubi Arcano, December 23, 1922; The Papal Encyclicals 1903-1939, ed. Sr. Claudia
Carlen (McGrath, 1981), pp.23O-23l, §28.
““'Ibid., p.233, §45.
Quas Primas, December 11, 1925; The Papal En cyclicals 1903-1939, p.Z7i3, § 14. All
citations to Quas Primas are to this source.
‘~s Ibid, p.278, §32.
Because of such an assumption.. .aurhority itself lost its hold upon mankind. (Pius XI)”'

When, therefore, governments and nations follow in all their activities, whether they be
national or international, the dictates of conscience grounded in the teachings, precepts,
and example of Jesus Christ, and which are binding on each and every individual, then
only can we have faith in one another’s word and trust in the peaceful solution of the
difficulties and controversies. (Pius XI)’9”

and moreover it is a dogma of faith that Jesus Christ was given to man, not only as our
Redeemer, but also as a law-giver, to whom obedience is due. (Pius XI)”'’

Nations will be reminded by the annual celebration of this feast that not only private
individuals but also rulers and princes are bound to give public honor and obedience to
Christ. It will call to their minds the thought of the last judgement, wherein Christ, who
has been cast out of public life, despised, neglected and ignored, will most severely
avenge these insults; for his kingly dignity demands that the State should take account of
the commandments of God and of Christian principles, both in making laws and in
administering justice, and also in providing for the young a sound moral education. (Pius
XI)”'2

3) Because of the indirect subordination of the end of the State to the end of the Church,
procure the common good in a way that will not only avoid anything that can harm the liberty
of the Church and of souls but also will help positively in the temporal order and the good of
the Church and of souls (against State laicism).

Therefore, since the beatitude of heaven is the end of that virtuous life which we live at the
present, it pertains to the king’s office to promote the good life of the multitude in such a
way as to make it suitable for the attainment of heavenly happiness; that is to say, he
should command those things which lead to the

52
“'‘ UbiArcano, December 23, 1922; The Papal Encyclicals 1903-1939, ed. Sr. Claudia
Carlen (McGrath, 1981), pp.23O-23l, §28.
‘s”' Ibid, p.233, §45.

‘9’
Quas Primas, December 11, 1925; The Papal Encyclical.t 1903-1939, p.273,
§ 14. All citations to Quas Primas are to this source.
‘~s Ibid., p.278, §32.
happiness of Heaven and, as far as possible, forbid the contrary. (St. Thomas Aquinas)’95

Hence civil society, established for the common welfare, should.. .have also at heart the
interest of its individual members, in such a mode as not in any way to hinder, but in every
manner to render as easy as may be, the possession of that highest and unchangeable good
for which all should seek. Wherefore, for this purpose, care must especially be taken to
preserve unharmed and unimpeded the religion whereof the practice is the link connecting
man with God. (Leo XIII)’94

For public authority.. .ought nor to diminish, but rather to increase, man’s capability of
attaining to the supreme good in which his everlasting happiness consists: which can be
never attained if religion be disregarded. (Leo XIII) ‘~‘~

The common good, that is, the establishment of normal and stable public conditions
such as to make it easy for individuals as well as families to have a dignified, regular, and
happy life according to the law of God—this common good is the end and the rule of the
State and its agencies. (Pius XII)’9”

4) Because of the indirect power of the Church over the State, the State must exercise
with regard to the Church a ministerial function, particularly with the help of what is called
the “secular arm” (or “temporal sword”).

And we are taught by evangelical words that in this power of his are two swords,
namely spiritual and temporal... .Therefore, each is in the power of the Church, that is, a
spiritual and a material sword. But the latter, indeed, must be exercised for the Church, the
former by the Church. The former (by the hand) of the priest, the latter by the hand of
kings and soldiers, but at the will and sufferance of the priest. For it is necessary that a
sword be under a sword and that temporal authority be subject to spiritual power.
(Boniface VIII)

... when St. Thomas and the most distinguished theologians of his time, basing themselves
upon that famous text [of St. BerOn Kingship (Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies,
1949), p.64, §115.
Immortale Dei, p.111.
“‘i Libertas, p.21, §21.
196
Allocution to the Roman nobility, January 8, 1947; Documents 1947, p.195,
or PIN 98l.

“‘i Bull Unam Sanctam, November 18, 1302; Dz 469.

nard], taught that the Church possesses the two swords (“The spiritual for execution only,
but the temporal also to the extent that it can order [the spiritual] to be drawn”—St.
Thomas in iv Sentent., Dist. 37, expositio textus), they intended simply to affirm that the
spiritual sword can and ought to direct the temporal sword ... because of spiritual interests

53
 themselves and with a view to the supernatural end, and so merely professed the theory
198
of indirect power.

Historians may discuss the personal inclinations of St. Gregory VII, Innocent IV and
Boniface VIII to the end of time. Whatever
their private views may have been, the only
doctrine they pro‘99
fessed as Popes was the doctrine of the indirect power.

We must assert as a truth superior to every vicissitude of time the supremacy of the
Church over the world and all earthly powers. If the universe is not to suffer a radical
disorder, the Church must lead the nations to the ultimate end of human life, which is also
that of States, and must therefore, in virtue of the spiritual interests entrusted to her, direct
governments and nations to bend before God....On that condition only will they be stable:
“For He does not take away mortal kingdoms Who gives the kingdom of Heaven: He
confirms them.”

“Therefore, by the command of God, kings and princes cannot be subject to

ecclesiastical power in temporal affairs, nor can they be deposed by the authority of the
keys of the Church, either directly or indirectly; nor can their subjects be released from
loyalty and obedience and be freed from fulfilling their oath of allegiance; and this
doctrine, which is necessary for public tranquillity, and which is no less useful to the
Church than to the Empire, must by every means be retained as being in harmony with the
Word of God, the tradition of the Fathers, and the example of the saints.”26’ This
proposition of the Declaration of the Gallican Clergy of March 19, 1682, was condemned
in the following words by Pius VI in the constitution Auctorem Fidei against the Synod of
Pistoia: “Nor should the extraordinary and deceitful boldness of the Synod be passed over
in silence, which dared to adorn not only with most ample praise the declaration

Jacques Maritain, The Things Tbat Are Not Caesar’s, trans. J. F. Scanlan (Scribner, 1930),
p.127.
200 Ibid., p.79.

201 [Dz 1322. It must be clearly understood that this is a condemned proposition.
Translator’s note.]
of the Gallican Council of the year 1682, which had long ago been condemned by the
Apostolic See, but in order to win greater authority for it, dared to include it insidiously in
the decree written “about faith,” openly to adopt articles contained in it, and to seal it with
a public and solemn profession of those articles which had been handed down here and
there through this decree.2”2... [That is why] we reject and condemn as rash and
scandalous the recent adoption of these acts, tainted with so many faults, made by the
Synod.. .as especially injurious to this Apostolic See.”2s3 And the Canon Constantin in
the Dictionnaire de théologie catholique254 (IV, col. 197), declares: “In the present state
of the doctrine and since the [first] Vatican Council, it is impossible to support the 1682
Declaration without being a heretic.”205

The Church has not the power of using force, nor has she any temporal power, direct or
indirect. (Pius D(; condemned proposition 24)

That the Church has received from Christ full authority over baptized people and that,
consequently, in Christian societies the secular authority is, by divine right, indirectly

54
 under ecclesiastical authority. (Cardinal Billot)2”

5) Use the temporal sword without incurring the reproach of interference in religious
affairs against people disrupting religious order (as understood by the Church), especially
those opposed to the propagation of the Gospel.

The privileges that have been granted in consideration of religion must benefit only the
adherents of the Catholic faith. It is Our will, moreover, that heretics and schismatics shall
not only

202 [Dz 1598. Translator’s note.]

255 [Dz 1599. Translator’s note.]
264 I.e., Dictionary of Catholic Theology. [Translator’s note.]
Maritain, pp.1 93-194. [However, this English translation of this work of

Marirain is incomplete. The translator completed it directly from the

French text and the Denzinger translations of the appropriate texts of the Magisterium.
Translator’s note.]
206
Syllabus, p.20.
207 De Ecclesia Christi Editions Gregorian, 1929), vol. II, q. 18, §5,

pp.76-8O. Cardinal Billot refers himself to Suarez’s Defensio Fidei, bk. 3, ch. 22, as well
as to the condemnations of Gallican ideas by Innocent XI, Alexander VIII, and, finally,
Pius VI in the bull Auctorem Fidei against
the Synod of Pistoia. [Note from the second French edition. Translator’s note.]
be alien from these privileges but shall also be bound and subjeered to various compulsory
public services. (Theodosian Code, “Heretics”)20”

It is Our will that Jews and their elders and patriarchs shall be informed that if, after
the issuance of this law, any of them should dare to attempt to assail with stones or with
any other kind of madness—a thing which We have learned is now being done—any
person who has fled their feral sect and has resorted to the worship of God, such assailant
shall be immediately delivered to the flames and burned, with all his accomplices. (Theo-
dosian Code, “Jews, Caclicolists, and Samarirans”) ~‘

Those Christians who have become pagans shall be deprived of the power and right to
make testaments, and every testament of such decedent, if there is a testament, shall be
rescinded by the annulment of its foundation. (Theodosian Code, “Apostates”)21”

You must consider carefully that the imperial power was not given to you for the
direction of things of this world, but especially for the defense of the Church; so that,
punishing criminal audacities, you defend the established order and restore true peace
where it is disturbed, putting aside the usurpers of another’s rights and bringing back the
See of Alexandria to our ancient faith. (Sr. Leo the Great)21’

It is our duty, with the help of divine grace, to defend everywhere by force of arms the
holy Church of Christ against the outside attacks of the pagans and the ravages of the
infidels; and in the inside, to fortify it with the knowledge of the Catholic
212
faith. (Charlemagne to Pope Leo III)

55
 Even though the infidels may not be constrained to the faith, since they are left in their
free will, and for the conversion only God’s grace must act... nevertheless, the pope can
order the infidels to admit missionaries of the Gospel in the lands under their
jurisdicrion...and if they do not obey, they must be forced by the secular arm and a war be
undertaken against them at the request of the pope. (Innocent IV)215

sos Bk. XVI, 5,1, Sept. 1, 326, p.450.

209 Ibid, 8, 1, Oct. 18, 315, p.467.

i”' Ibid, 7, 1, May 2, 381, p.465.

211 To the Emperor Leo concerning the See of Alexandria usurped by heretics;

PL 54, 1129,1130.
212 Fr. Lo Grasso, Ecclesia et Status, fonres selecti Editions Gregorian, 1952).
213
De voto et voti redemptione, IX, Lo Grasso 436.
Offenses and insults against the pope, either by actions or in writing, within the Italian
territory will be punished like offenses and insults against the king. (Concordar between
the Holy See and Italy)2’4

Italy.. .wherever necessary will grant ecclesiasrics, for the exercise of spiritual ministry,
the protection of the authorities. (Concordat between the Holy See and Italy)215

In spire of unjust plots and insidious campaigns against this Catholic nation by those
who boasted of denying God, the Spanish leader [Francisco Franco] maintains Spain by
his words, his wise dispositions, and his edifying personal example, faithful to the doctrine
that the Apostles James and Paul came here to preach. As always, truth will find a way and
triumph over error day after day. It is just, then, that we thank the Spanish leader for the
great service he rendered to the Motherland. (Msgr. Riberi, nuncio in Spain under John
XXIII)216

CONCLUSION: We invite the reader to read again the five points of immutable Catholic
doctrine which we have just proposed; immutable doctrine, we must insist, even if it is more
and more seldom applicable in its entirety because of the apostasy of nations.
But that is precisely the point: nor to transform the aposrasy of nations into the new
doctrine of the Church.
Let us add this: the State does not claim a usurped right when it intervenes in religious
affairs for the protection of Catholic souls and the defense of the Church. Furthermore, the
State owes that service to the Church by reason of the ministerial function of the temporal
order towards the spiritual. More particularly: “... civil authority can, of itself, regulate and
arbitrate the public manifestations of other religions and protect irs citizens against the
propagation of false doctrines which, in the judgement of the Church, endanger their eternal
salvation.”217

214 February 11, 1929, art. 8; Actes, V, 24.

215 Ibid, p.43.
216 Speech at Tarragona, 1963.

56
2~7 Schema.
RELATIONS BETWEEN CHURCH AND STATE

After having recalled the doctrine of the Church on the role of the State in religious
matters, at the service of the common good and at the service of the Church, we must
consider now what are those relations which the Church considers normal between the two
societies, the temporal society and the supernatural society.
Now, there is a Catholic doctrine on the relations between Church and State, with its
invariable principles, which must be differentiated from the very diverse applications which
depend on specific religious situations in the nations: totally Catholic nation or almost,
pluralistic nation, pagan, atheistic, etc.

1) The Church as charged with the spiritual and supernatural good and the State as
charged with the temporal common good are two perfect societies completely distinct from
each other, both having exclusive competence in their respective domains (differentiation of
powers), except for the indirect subordination of the Stare to the Church and all which that
implies.2”'

2) Differentiation does not mean separation between these two societies which frequently
deal with the same subjects: Christians and citizens; and the same matters: education,
marriage, etc. Therefore, the union between Church and State, that is, “mutual concord” and
“unanimity in action,” are eminently desirable.

And, what is still more important, and what We have more than once pointed out, although
the civil authority has not the same proximate end as the spiritual, nor proceeds on the
same lines, nevertheless in the exercise of their separate powers they must occasionally
meet. For their subjects are the same, and nor infrequently they deal with the same objects,
though in different ways. ‘Whenever this occurs, since a state of conflict is absurd and
manifestly repugnant to the most wise ordinance of God, there must necessarily exist some
order or mode of procedure to remove the occasions of difference and contention, and to
secure harmony in all things. This harmony has been not inaptly compared to that which
exists between the body and the soul for the well-being of both one and the other, the
separation of which

210 Cf. Leo XIII, Immortale Dei, p.lO7; Libertas, p.l8, §18; and Sapientiae
Christianae, January 10, 1890, p.180.
brings irremediable harm to the body, since it extinguishes its very life. (Leo XIII)219

There must, accordingly, exist, between these two powers, a certain orderly connection,
which may be compared to the union of the soul and the body in man. (Leo XIII)2”

Based on natural law, these fundamental human prerogatives, guaranteed by your

constitution to all the citizens of Ireland within the limits of order and morality, could not
find a more ample and surer guarantee against the atheistic forces of subversion and the
spirit of division and violence than in the mutual trust between the authorities of the
Church and of the Stare, each independent in its own sphere, but allied for the common
good, on the bases of the principles of the faith and of the Catholic doctrine. (Pius XII)22’

3) The union of Church and State implies that the Catholic faith be considered as the
State’s religion. The Church considers such union as the normal state of affairs. Union of
Church and State, however, does not prevent the granting of a prudent tolerance of other
religions in specific circumstances.

57
 You know well, venerable Brethren.. the treaty We signed in 1851 with our very dear
daughter in Christ, Mary-Isabelle [Isabel II], Catholic queen of Spain, a treaty solemnly
sanctioned and promulgated as the law of State in this kingdom. You do know also that in
this treaty, together with many things regulated for the protection of the Catholic faith, it
was established before anything else that this august religion will continue, to the
exclusion of all other religions, to be the only religion of the Spanish nation, and
maintained, as before, in all the kingdoms of Spain, with all its rights and prerogatives
which it must enjoy by the law of God and canonical laws; that the instruction in all
schools, public and private, must conform to the Catholic doctrine. (Pius IX)222

In the present day it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the
only religion of the Stare, to the

219 Libertas, p.18, §18.

220 ImmortaleDei, p.115.
221 Allocution to the prime minister of Ireland, October 4, 1957; Documents
1957, p. 566, or PIN 1271.
222 Allocution of July 26, 1855, which concluded with the solemn

condemnation of the violation of the concordat; Receuil, p.35O.

elusion of all other forms of worship. (Pius IX, condemned proposition 77)223

The Roman, Catholic, and Apostolic religion is the religion of the nation; the
authorities will protect it and will make sure it is respected as an essential element of social
order. It is understood that the Catholic Church is not, nor will it be, official, and that it
will keep its independence... .Public education will be organized and directed in
accordance with the Catholic religion.224

But, moreover. . . thanks are due to the equity of the laws which obtain in America.. ..For
the Church amongst you, unopposed by the Constitution and government of your nation,
fettered by no hostile legislation, protected against violence by the common laws and the
impartiality of the tribunals, is free to live and act without hindrance. Yet, though all this is
true, it would be very erroneous to draw the conclusion that in America is to be sought the
type of the most desirable status of the Church,225 or that it would be universally lawful or
expedient for State and Church to be, as in America, dissevered and divorced.... But she
[the Church] would bring forth more abundant fruits if, in addition to liberty, she enjoyed
the favor of the laws and the patronage of the public authority. (Leo XIII)226

Historians must not forget that if the Church and the State did have hours or years of
struggle there were, from Constantine the Great even to this day, periods of tranquillity,
often long, in which they cooperated, with full comprehension, in the education of the
same persons. The Church does not hide the fact that it considers, in principle, this
cooperation as normal and that it sees as an ideal the unity of the people in the true religion
and the unanimity in action between her and the State. (Pius XII)227

Syllabus, p.28.
224 Articles 38 and 41 of the [former; translator’s note] Colombian

constsrution. Colombia had an overwhelming majority of Catholics. The

ambiguous expression “is not, nor will it be official” should have been clarified. The
concordat, concluded in 1887 and ratified in 1888, did specify that the Church, represented
by its legitimate authorities, was recognized as a juridical entity. [Note from the second

58
 French edition.
Translator’s note.]
229 Conclusion unfortunately drawn even then by some American bishops— e.g.,
Bishop John Ireland—and now by many more, if not all. See the very good articles on
Americanism by Dr. Justin Walsh in The Angelus, Jan., Feb., Apr., June, July, Aug., Sept.,
and Oct. 2000. [Translator’s note.]
226
Longin qua Oceani, January 6, 1895; “A Light in the Heavens,” pp.323-324.
All citations to Longin qua Oceani are to this source.
It is, however, true that Pius XII went on to say:

But she [the Church] knows also that since some time ago events evolve more in an
opposite direction, that is, towards a plurality of religions and concepts of life within a
same national community in which the Catholics constitute a more or less strong minority.
It may be interesting, and perhaps even surprising, for history to find in the United States
of America an example among others on how the Church managed to flourish in the most
diverse situations.22”

But this does not change anything regarding what the Church considers as “normal” and
“ideal” in comparison with the exceptions due to “particular circumstances.”
A factual situation which is becoming more and more contrary to what is
right does not change what is right. Pius XII simply observed the
progressive and general secularization of nations where Christ was
recognized in fact and in law, and that, paradoxically, in certain countries in
which Christ was never acknowledged as the King according to Catholic
doctrine the Church nevertheless managed to flourish. The relative success
of the Church in these countries—which twenty years later229 seems rather
short-lived, especially after the Council;23” since the Council, on the
contrary, an astonishing reduction of conversions to the Catholic Faith has
taken place— does not invalidate in any way the Catholic doctrine, nor is it
invalidated by the religious failure of former Catholic nations, fallen under
the concerted and constant onslaught of the forces of the Counter-Church,
more noticeably of Freemasonry and inrerna23i
tional communism.
Concerning the tolerance exercised towards false religions in a Catholic State, we refer
the reader to Leo XIII’s Libertas, Pius XII’s Ci Riesce, etc., which will be commented on
later.

227 Allocution to the tenth International Congress of Historical Sciences, September 7,

1955; Documents 1955, pp.293-294.
228 Ibid.
229 More like forty-five years now. [Translator’s note.]

Vatican II. [Translator’s note.]

231 Cf. “Mgr. Lefebvre et le Saint-Office,” Itinéraires 233, May 1979, pp.54-55.
4) On the contrary, the Church always condemned the separation of Church and State and
its application in a Catholic State. In effect:

• It puts the true religion, the Immaculate Spouse of Christ, on a level with false

59
 religions.

• It relegates unjustly the Church to the level common to all other associations within the
State and thus encroaches on the public right of the Church.

• It is, on the part of the State, an official profession of indif ferentism—which is

equivalent to atheism; which is a position contrary to the duty of the State to recognize
Christ and contrary in practice to the national reality of a Catholic nation.

• Finally, it unavoidably leads families and individuals to indifferentism and atheism.232

[The State] believes that it is not obliged to make public profession of any religion; or to
inquire which of the very many religions is the only one true; or to prefer one religion to
all the rest; or to show to any form of religion special favor; but, on the contrary, is bound
to grant equal rights to every creed, so that public order may not be disturbed....
Now when the State rests on foundations like those just named—and for the time being
they are greatly in favor—it readily appears into what and how unrightful a position the
Church is driven. For when the management of public business is in harmony with
doctrines of such a kind, the Catholic religion is allowed a standing in civil society equal
only, or inferior, to societies alien from it; no regard is paid to the laws of the Church, and
she who, by the order and commission of Jesus Christ, has the duty of teaching all nations,
finds herself forbidden to take any part in the instruction of the people. With reference to
matters that are of twofold jurisdiction, they who administer the civil power lay down the
law at their own will, and in matters that appertain to religion defiantly put aside the most
sacred decrees of the Church. They claim jurisdiction over the marriages of Catholics,
even over the bond as well as the uniry and the indissolubility of matrimony. They lay
hands on the goods of the clergy, contending that the Church cannot possess

232 Cf. condemned proposition 79, Sr. Pius IX’s Syllabus.

property. Lastly, they treat the Church with such arrogance that, rejecting entirely her title
to the nature and rights of a perfect society, they hold that she differs in no respect from
other societies in the State, and for this reason possesses no right nor any legal power of
action, save that which she holds by the concession and favor of the government. (Leo
XIII)253

Such freedom [of worship]. ..esrablishes a deplorable and deadly separation between
human society and its creator, God. It ends in the sad consequences that are the
indifferentism of the State in religious matters, or, what amounts to the same, its atheism.
(Leo XIII)234

The offense inflicted upon the Church and upon Us a while ago is so grave and so
violent that We cannot ignore it... .You can guess, venerable Brethren, that We are talking
about this absolutely iniquitous [law], hatched for the ruin of Catholicism, which has just
been promulgated in France for the separation of the State from the Church. Our recent
encyclical [Vehementer Nos] addressed to the bishops, the clergy, and the French people
has shown clearly how detestable and contrary to the rights of God and of the Church is
that law... .We solemnly pronounce...Our sentence on this law. In virtue of the supreme au-
thority which is Ours as Vicar of Christ on earth, We condemn and reprove it as most
injurious to our good and great God, contrary to the divine constitution of the Church,
cause of schism, hostile to Our authority as well as that of the legitimate pastors,
spoliarory of the goods of the Church, opposed to the right of the people, enemy of the
Apostolic See and of Our self, deadly to the bishops, the clergy, and the Catholics of
France; We pronounce and We declare that this law will never have, in any circumstance,

60
 any value against the perpetual rights of the Church. (St. Pius X)235

CONCLUSION: The apostasy of nations, which is a fact in the actual world, does not
eliminate the permanent and immutable value of this point of Catholic doctrine, that is, that
the normal state ofaffairs is the union of Church and State, unavoidable consequence of the
Catholic dogma of the social Kingship of Christ over temporal societies.
We can therefore legitimately question:

233 Immortale Dei, pp.l21-l22.

234 Letter E Giunto to the emperor of Brazil, July 19, 1889; PIN 235.
235 Allocurion, February 21, 1906; AAS, II, 155-159, or P1N390405.
• Can a conciliar declaration which affirms that the normal state of affairs is the
separation236 be considered really as a magisterial act or a true doctrinal teaching?

• Can a policy carried out by the Holy See which, through its nuncios, put pressure on
Catholic governments to abrogate from their constitutions the articles which recognize
the Catholic Church as the religion of State be considered a Catholic policy?

• Must we now think that the sense of history forces Christ not to reign and the Church
to uncrown Him?

RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE

We could have explained in the preceding chapter the philosophical principles of

tolerance in general, keeping for this chapter the theological principles for religious tolerance.
We choose instead to regroup here everything that has to do with tolerance in general
(philosophical principles) and with religious tolerance in particular (theological principles).
Furthermore, the theological doctrine will be explained in all its fullness, that is, in function
of what the Church considers as being “normal” within a society; namely, a Catholic society
and a Catholic State. Even if this doctrine cannot be applied to pluralistic or non-Catholic
societies it still remains Catholic doctrine.
The question with which we are confronted concerns the tolerance of evil (moral evil or
religious error).
‘With that in mind, three possible scenarios present themselves:

• very frequently tolerance is a fact of nature;

• sometimes evil must not be tolerated;

• sometimes, on the contrary, evil must be tolerated.

236 L e., separation of Church and State. [Translator’s note.]

1) Tolerance: a fact of nature

It seems that evil ought never to be tolerated, since it is opposed to what is good, not only
in individuals but also in society and in the Church.
Nonetheless, it would be to go against the divine government and it would make human

61
life impossible, if we were to attempt to always prevent evil, even if only on those occasions
on which it seems to us possible to do so.
Therefore, very frequently tolerance is unavoidable to man by the very nature of things:
tolerance is then a fact of nature.
It is important to note that tolerating evil can never mean to be approving of it.

God Himself in his Providence, although infinitely good and almighty, does permit,
nevertheless, some evil in the world, either to permit a greater good or to avoid a worse
evil. It is fitting, in the government of nations, to imitate the One who governs the world.
Furthermore, being powerless to stop all particular evils, the authorities of man must allow
many things to go unpunished which will be, and justly so, reached by the vengeance of
divine Providence. (Sr. Augustine)237

But if, in such circumstances, for the sake of the common good (and this is the only
legitimate reason), human law may or even should tolerate evil, it may not and should not
approve or desire evil for its own sake; for evil of itself, being a privation of good, is
opposed to the common welfare which every legislator is bound to desire and defend to
the best of his ability. In this, human law must endeavor to imitate God, Who, as Sr.
Thomas teaches, in allowing evil to exist in the world, “neither wills evil to be done, nor
wills it not to be done, but wills only to permit it to be done, and this is good.” This saying
of the Angelic Docrot contains briefly the whole doctrine of the permission of evil. (Leo
XIII)23”

Likewise, Pius XII, to the question of whether “the positive repression of evil is not
always a duty,” answered thus:

237 De Libero Arbitrio, bk. 1, ch. 6. [i.e., on free will. Translator was unable to cross-
reference this quotation to any known English translation. Translator’s note.]
238 Libertas, p.28, §33.
We have just adduced the authority of God. Could God, although it would be possible
and easy for Him to repress error and moral deviation, in some cases choose the non
impedire239 without contradicting His infinite perfection? Could it be that in certain
circumstances He would nor give men any mandate, would nor impose any duty, and
would not even communicate the right to impede or to repress what is erroneous and false?
A look at things as they are gives an affirmative answer. Reality shows that error and sin
are in the world in great measure. God reprobates them, but He permits them to exist.
Hence the affirmation: religious and moral error must always be impeded, when it is
possible, because toleration of them is in itself immoral, is nor valid absolutely and
unconditionally.
Moreover, God has not given even to human authority such an absolute and universal
command in matters of faith and morality. Such a command is unknown to the common
convictions of mankind, to Christian conscience, to the sources of revelation and to the
practice of the Church. To omit here other Scriptural texts which are adduced in support of
this argument, Christ in the parable of the cockle gives the following advice:.., let the
cockle grow in the field of the world together with the good seed in view of the harvest
(ef. Mart. 13:24-30). The duty of repressing moral and religious error cannot therefore be
an ultimate
240
norm of action. (Pius XII)

In his last sentence, the pope meant that the duty of repressing evil is subordinate to a

62
higher principle, which is the promotion and conservation of goodness, and, in society, the
common good. This principle, as we will see, can justify tolerance.

2) The duty of non-tolerance (or repression)

a) ‘Which should be more important: tolerance or repression?

The consequence of all we have seen so far is that the duty of repressing evil does not
apply in general but, rather, in particular circumstances.
On the other hand, as we will explain further, the duty of tolerance also applies in
particular circumstances. Does this mean that the principle of repression and the principle of
tolerance are at the same level in the hierarchy of principles?

239 L e., “to nor impede or prohibit” [Translator’s note].

240
CiRiesce, p.311, §V.
Nor at all, as the following precise details, drawn from metaphysics, will demonstrate:
Faced with moral evil (or error), the attitude that suggests itself is repression (even if it is
not a general duty or a supreme principle), whereas tolerance, as a duty, is suggested only
accidental-
The reason for this is simple: evil always is evil in itself, that is, in itself a privation of
good and consequently not something to be desired but to be avoided or repressed if possible;
it is only accidentally that the evil is a lesser evil, becoming thus a “good,” comparatively and
relatively speaking, with the greater evil to be avoided by tolerating this lesser evil.
Therefore, it is only accidentally that an evil is the object, if not of desire at least of tolerance.

Li) Circumstances in which repression is a duty

In which cases and by whose authority must evil be repressed?

• ‘Within the family the repression of evil is the duty of the parents for the education of
children when it is a question of making truth or virtue known. However, with adoles-
cence a successful education must become preparation for the use of liberty which,
more than the use of repression, rather does suggest a call to self-discipline.

• ‘Within the Church, non-tolerance is required any time the faith or the life of grace of
the faithful is endangered.

• Finally, in civil society repression of moral evil is the duty of the State if, by such
repression, it can better insure the common good; the repression of religious error is
also the duty of the State, either because of the common good to be pursued or because
of its ministerial function towards the Church, so as to promote the good of society or
the good of the Church and of the souls respectively.

3) The duty of tolerance, especially that of religious tolerance

a) The principle: the State may, or must, tolerate evil or error any time such tolerance
concurs with or promotes a greater good.

The duty of repressing moral and religious error cannot therefore be an ultimate norm of
action. It must be subordinate to

24~ I.e., per accidens. [Translator’s note.]

63
 higher and more general norms which in some circumstances permit, and even perhaps
seem to indicate as the better policy, rol-
242
erarson of error in order to promote a greater good (Pius XII)

Li) The authority of using tolerance belongs to the State by means of civil law; but “in
that which concerns religion and morality he will also ask for the judgement of the
Church”243 which in the first place is interested in such measures since they concern the
safeguard of the True Faith in the nation in question as well as the good of the whole
Church.

c) Particular circumstances in which tolerance is justified: tolerance is justified in cases in

which it can promote a greater good or avoid a greater evil, either within the Church or for
civil society.

The Church, indeed, deems it unlawful to place the various forms of divine worship on the
same footing as the true religion, but does nor, on that account, condemn those rulers who,
for the sake of securing some great good or of hindering some great evil, allow
parienrly...for each kind of religion having its place in
244
the Stare. (Leo XIII)

Yet, with the discernment of a true mother, the Church weighs the great burden of
human weakness, and well knows the course down which the minds and actions of men
are in this our age being borne. For this reason, while nor conceding any right to anything
save what is true and honest, she does not forbid public authority to tolerate what is at
variance with truth and justice, for the sake of avoiding some greater evil, or of obtaining
245
or preserving some greater good. (Leo XIII)

The duty of repressing moral and religious error cannot therefore be an ultimate norm of
action. It must be subordinate to higher and more general norms which in some
circumstances permit, and even perhaps seem to indicate as the better policy, rob erarson
of error in order to promote a greater good. (Pius XII)

242
CiRiesce, p.311, §V
243 Ibid, p.3l2, §V.

244 Immortale Dei, p.1 27.

245 Libertas, p.28, §33.
246
CiRiesce, p.311, §V.
The following specific examples can be given of “greater evil” to be avoided or “greater
good” to be obtained by religious tolerance:

• “Greater evil”: scandal of the faithful on seeing the persecution of dissidents; civil war;
obstacle to the conversion of the misguided to the true faith. (These difficulties do not
always appear, nor do they necessarily appear together.)

64
 • “Greater good”: civil cooperation and peaceful coexistence of citizens of different
religions when it can be effectively obtained, and with the understanding that it is only
a relative good half-way between religious unanimity in society and civil unrest; a
greater liberty for the Church in the accomplishment of her supernatural mission in
special circumstances where the Church will act more efficaciously without the
State’s intervention. (‘We insist on “special circumsrances” because in itself the
Church has a right to the support of the State, and this support is beneficial; it is only
accidentally that the support of the State could become an obstacle to the mission of
the Church.)

d) Limits of the duty of tolerance: tolerance loses its reason for being if it brings more evil
than good.

But, to judge rightly, we must acknowledge that, the more a Stare is driven to tolerate
evil, the further is it from perfection; and that the tolerance of evil which is dictated by
political prudence should be strictly confined to the limits which its justifying cause, the
public welfare, requires. Wherefore, if such tolerance would be injurious to the public
welfare, and entail greater evils on the State, it would nor be lawful; for in such case the
motive of good is wanting. (Leo XIII)247

Tolerance could be good for a time and then become bad.

And although in the extraordinary condition of these times the Church usually acquiesces
in certain modern liberties, nor because she prefers them in themselves, but because she
judges it expedient to permit them, she would in happier times exercise her own liberty;
and, by persuasion, exhortation, and entreaty would endeavor, as she is bound, to fulfill
the duty assigned to

247 Libertas, pp.28-29, §34.

her by God of providing for the eternal salvation of mankind.
248
(Leo XIII)

If private tolerance is sufficient, there is no reason to grant public tolerance, and even less
a liberty of propaganda for moral or religious error. Here is an example of limited tolerance
for the external pri vate forum, taken from article 6 of the Fuero de los Españoles, the
fundamental charter of the rights and duties of the Spanish citizen (in force until its
suppression in application of Dignitatis Humanae) :249

The profession and the practice of the Catholic faith, which is the religion of the
Spanish Stare, will be officially protected.
Nobody will be disturbed because of his religious beliefs, nor in the private exercise of
his religion.
Religious ceremonies and public manifestations other than the religion of the State
shall never be permitted.

e) There is no right to tolerance: tolerance, when it has become a duty, has become so for
politicalprudential reasons, for the protection of the common welfare as well as the duty of
charity towards religious dissidents, but in no case whatsoever can it become a duty of justice
towards wrongdoers.

the tolerance of evil which is dictated by political prudence should be strictly confined.
(Leo XIII)25”

65
 In safeguarding the true faith, we must proceed according to the demands of Christian
charity and of prudence: so that, on one hand, heretics may not be driven from the Church
by terror, but rather attracted to her; and, on the other hand, that neither the State nor the
Church be damaged. Therefore, both the good of the Church and the good of the State
must always be considered.25’

It must be emphasized again that the duty of tolerance, when duty there is indeed, is not a
duty ofjustice (distributive justice) towards those in error. Justice must be differentiated from
prudence and charity. Consequently, the duty of tolerance in those

249 The Spanish government was virtually forced by the Vatican to eliminate it.
[Translator’s note.]
256 Libertas, p.29, §34.
251 Schema.
being tolerated does not create any right to be tolerated since a right supposes, on the
authority granting such right, a duty ofj us-rice.252 In any case, a “right to tolerance” is
obviously absurd since it is the same as the right not to be restrained from adhering to error,
which, as we have previously demonstrated, is completely absurd. Error, moral evil, and
adherence to either, do not have objectively any right, neither affirmative nor negative, as we
have shown. Here is on this subject again a very clear quotation from Leo XIII:

We estimate worthy of praise the rectitude and the frankness with which you expose,
explain, and defend the true principles, and with which you condemn anything contrary to
these principles in the civil laws, with which also you teach constantly that if the
circumstances demand it, tolerance to the deviation from the rules, when it is introduced to
avoid greater evils, without ele vating it to the dzgnity of a right since there can be no
rights against the eternal laws of justice.
May it please God that these truths could be understood by those who pride themselves
on being Catholics, all the while they obstinately adhere to the liberty of consciences and
of worship, to the liberty of the press and other liberties of the same sort promulgated at
the end of the last century by revolutionaries and constantly condemned by the Church;
by those who adhere to these liberties, not only as a possible tolerance, but as if they must
be considered as rights to be favored, and to defend them as necessary for the present
conditions and forprogress, as if everything that is opposed to the true religion,
everything that grants man autonomy from divine authority, everything that opened wide
the way to all errors, and to the corruption of morals, could give to the people prosperity,
progress, and glory.253

J) Legislative expression of religious tolerance: Can any legislative text express the
fundamental moral and theological distinction between the public right of the true religion
and a tolerance eventually granted by the State to other religions? How is this distinction to
be expressed?
The two questions are answered by the following constitutional texts and by a document
of Pius XI.

252 To ensure said right. [Translator’s note.]

253 Letter to Mr. Charles Perrin, February 1, 1875; PIN3O1O-3011.
• Fuero de los Españoles, article 6, still in force at the time of Vatican II:

66
 The profession and the practice of the Catholic faith, which is the religion of the
Spanish Stare, will be officially protected.
Nobody will be disturbed because of his religious beliefs, nor in the private exercise of
his religion.
Religious ceremonies and public manifestations other than the religion of the State
shall never be permitted.

• Italian Constitution of March 4, 1848:

It is affirmed by article 1 that the Catholic religion will be considered as the only
religion of the State. Other religions will only be tolerated.

• Italian Law of June 24, 1929:

A particular juridical place being granted, as is just, to the Catholic religion, which is
the religion of the State, liberty must be granted, in the name of the principle of liberty of
conscience which no modern State wishes to repudiate, to all the religions whose doctrine
and rites are nor contrary to public order and morality.254

• Document of Pius XI:

Religions “tolerated, permitted, admitted”: it is nor We who will question the wording.
The question has been resolved in any case, nor without a certain elegance, by a
distinction between the statutory text and the purely legislative text—the former, in itself
more doctrinal and theoretical where the word “tolerated” is more suited; the latter, with a
practical aim and in which we can leave the words “permitted or admitted” so long as we
have an honorable understanding on the matter, so long as it is clearly and honorably
understood that the Catholic religion, and only the Catholic religion, is, according to the
Constitution and the treaties, the religion of State with all the logical and juridical
consequences implied by this situation of constitutional right, especially in matters
regarding propaganda, and so long also as it is no less clearly understood that Catholic
worship is nor just purely and simply another permitted religion but more, as the letter and
the spirit of the Concordar expresses.255

254 Text quoted by Cardinal Orraviani in his book Institutiones Juris Publici

Ecclesiastici, II, 71, but without his having indicated whether it was an exact quote of the
law or an authoritative commentary.
With the exception of the sentence of the third text—”in the name of the principle of
liberty of conscience”—which is inadmissible to the Church, these texts express juridically
the distinction in question, with nuances susceptible of different interpretations on the part of
the Church.

CONCLUSIONS ON RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE:

• Tolerance of false religions can be a duty of the State not in itself and in a general
manner but accidentally due to particular circumstances.

Special attention must be given to the expression “particular circumstances” which Leo
XIII uses in Libertas, in E Giunto, and in his letter to Mr. Charles Perrin, and which Pius XII
takes up under the form of “certain circumstances” and “some circumstances” in Ci Riesce.
Leo XIII 256 and Pius XII 257 did see that the “particular circumstances” had a tendency
to become the general rule because of the apostasy of Catholic nations. They, however, kept

67
the expression “certain circumstances” because at the level of principles, at the level of the
doctrine of the Church, the duty of tolerance remains intrinsically something accidental and
exceptional—which we think we clearly demonstrated in the preceding pages by
metaphysical, therefore unchangeable, reasons.

• To tolerate a false religion can never be the granting ofa right to its adepts; again, Leo
XIII (E Giunto, letter to Mr. Charles Perrin) and Pius XII (Ci Riesce) reach explicitly
this doctrine and justify it by a permanent principle.

... since there can be no rights against the eternal laws of justice. . . . (Leo XIII)25”

255 Handwritten letter to Pierro Cardinal Gasparri, May 30, 1929, concerning treaties
between the Holy See and the kingdom of Italy; Actes, V, 128.
256 In Longin qua Oceani.
257 In his allocurion to the tenth International Congress of Historical Sciences,

September 7, 1955.
258 Letter to Mr. Charles Perrin; PIN 3010.
... that which does nor correspond to truth or to the norm of morality objectively has no
right to exist, to be spread, or to be activated. (Pius XII)259

• Thus we can see how to judge these theses according to which tolerance of false
religions will be, on the one hand, a duty by principle of the State and, on the other
hand, a right of the adepts of these false religions; or the more sweeping thesis, which
includes the preceding one, according to which the State must in principle recognize
total liberty to any religion whatsoever: these theses are in contradiction with the
Magisterium of the Church on tolerance, a teaching which merits the qualifying
theological note of Catholic doctrine.

LIMITS OF RELIGIOUS LIBERTY

1) Limits cannot be assigned to religious liberty as long as it remains a subjective right to

worship God, since it is on the level of principles.

But when considering a concrete application in the social order, as an objective faculty to
action in religious matters or as the simple faculty nor to be refrained from acting, then it
must receive limits from the State.
The question arises whether a system of limitations can be found, unique and accepted by
all States as a universal rule of the limitations of religious liberty while satisfying Catholic
doctrine. This was “the problem of limits” which confronted Vatican II.

2) In order to define those limitations, two criteria, which needed to be evaluated,

presented themselves: common good on the one hand and public order on the other.

a) The common good did seem at first glance the best criterion since it is the end of the
State and it must favor religion (Leo XIII). But, as noted, common good is an analogical
concept which encompasses a whole range of different, sometimes even opposed, realities.
What relation, indeed, is there between the

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259
CiRiesce, p.311, §V.
true and perfect common good of a Catholic society entirely centered on God and Our Lord
Jesus Christ and the apparent common good, perverted if not non-existent, of a communist
society centered entirely on “the party”? Not to mention the common good within Islamic
society, which forbids any proselytism from the true religion, etc.
Consequently, to take as a general rule for religious liberty the common good as it
happened to be in reality within the nations in question may be the right rule in a Catholic
society and a temporarily acceptable rule in a Christian but non-Catholic society or a
pluralistic one; but it will be surrendering the true religion and its members to the
capriciousness and persecutions of its enemies in Islamic or communist societies, for
instance.
Moreover, it was out of the question for a non-Catholic society to accept the criterion of
the perfect and true common good of a Catholic society since the judgment on moral truth
and the religious truth from which the former is deduced was not embraced by non-Catholics.
‘We are left, thus, with the other criterion: public order.

Li) Public order, which is only part of the common good, comprises the safeguard of the
rights of the citizen, maintaining public peace and the protection of public morality. This
public morality was often called “objective moral order” without any further specification.
‘Was it natural morality in its integrity restored by Our Lord or an undefined minimal ethic?
In any case, it was a “public morality” with no reference to the truth of one religion or anoth-
er.
It is precisely because of this that this criterion was insufficient for a Catholic society, in
which such lack of reference to the truth of the true religion in the framing of its legislation
on religions is evidence of a pure juridical positivism, which ultimately resulted in an
agnostic and indifferentist legislation.

3) Since neither of these criteria proved to be adequate, it was undeniable that articulating
the limitations of religious liberty in a single formula, accepted by all the States, was
impossible. To try it, as Vatican II did anyway, was the equivalent of trying to square
the circle. It was like hoping to reconcile the exigencies of truth with the exigencies of error.
The very simple and yet profound reason for such an impossibility lies in the fact that
religious liberty understood as the objective faculty to act
(or, to be precise, the faculty not to be restrained from
acting) cannot abstract itself from religious truth. Only
that which is true has rights. That which does nor corre-
260
spond to truth has no rights (Pius XII). We have emphasized
that this principle applies to both the affirmative right (right to do) and the negative right
(right not to be stopped from doing).

4) Consequently, if we want to define a religious liberty which abstracts from the truth,
we can only define a subjective right to worship God.
That is exactly what Pius XI and Pius XII did when they proclaimed the “fundamental
right of man to worship God.” It was enough against totalitarian regimes.
As we mentioned before, this subjective right to worship God “in general” includes
implicitly the objective right to the true worship of God. That is more than satisfactory for a
Catholic mind and acceptable to non-Catholics.

CONCLUSION: The “problem of limitations” of religious liberty is a false problem. In

attempting to solve it as we have outlined, but without perceiving its radical vice as an
illegitimate passage from the subject to the object of a right, could Vatican II do otherwise but

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end up at an impasse?

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