Religous Liberty,: Catholic Doctrin, Or Protestant Error

[jim111]

55. The Church ought to be separated from the State, and the State from the Church. -- Allocution "Acerbissimum," Sept. 27, 1852.
77. In the present day it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State, to the exclusion of all other forms of worship. -- Allocution "Nemo vestrum," July 26, 1855.
78. Hence it has been wisely decided by law, in some Catholic countries, that persons coming to reside therein shall enjoy the public exercise of their own peculiar worship. -- Allocution "Acerbissimum," Sept. 27, 1852.
79. Moreover, it is false that the civil liberty of every form of worship, 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 minds of the people, and to propagate the pest of indifferentism. -- Allocution "Nunquam fore," Dec. 15, 1856.
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius09/p9syll.htm

The above statements are condemned as heretical in the syllabus of Pius IX. The syllabus is also Ex-cathedra which means it is infallible and binding on all Catholics under punishment of ipso facto excommunication.
 

"9. Therefore, faithfully adhering to the tradition received from the beginning of the Christian faith, to the glory of God our savior, for the exaltation of the Catholic religion and for the salvation of the Christian people, with the approval of the Sacred Council, we teach and define as a divinely revealed dogma that when the Roman Pontiff speaks EX CATHEDRA, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church, he possesses, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer willed his Church to enjoy in defining doctrine concerning faith or morals. Therefore, such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are of themselves, and not by the consent of the Church, irreformable." Vatican I, Ch 4

Your friends paper stated the syllabus must be understood in the context of its time. I will prove that the teaching of the separation of church and state did not begin and end with Pius IX but has been a consistent teaching of the popes, understood to mean exactly as it sounds.

The encyclicals Immortale Dei and Libertas Praestantissimum by his successor, Leo XIII, are devoted almost entirely to the Catholic Church's teaching on the right ordering of state and society. The authority of Immortale Dei is particularly high. While falling short of an ex cathedra definition, Leo XIII intended for it to be definitive, for he summarizes his teaching as follows: "This, then, is the teaching of the Catholic Church concerning the constitution and government of the State." ¹⁶

In Libertas, the Pontiff insists that the State is not only obligated to protect the temporal and physical well-being of the people, it is obligated to protect their spiritual well-being as well:

There are [those] . . . who affirm that the morality of individuals is to be guided by the divine law, but not the morality of the State, for that in public affairs the commands of God may be passed over, and may be entirely disregarded in the framing of laws. Hence follows the fatal theory of the need of separation between Church and State. But the absurdity of such a position is manifest. Nature herself proclaims the necessity of the State providing means and opportunities whereby the community may be enabled to live properly, that is to say, according to the laws of God. For, since God is the source of all goodness and justice, it is absolutely ridiculous that the State should pay no attention to these laws or render them abortive by contrary enactments. Besides, those who are in authority owe it to the commonwealth not only to provide for its external well-being and the conveniences of life, but still more to consult the welfare of men's souls in the wisdom of their legislation. Libertas

And there is no lack of condemnation of the principle of the separation of Church and State in the writings of Leo XIII's successors. For example, Pope St. Pius X wrote:

That the State must be separated from the Church is a thesis absolutely false, a most pernicious error. . . . Hence the Roman Pontiffs have never ceased, as circumstances required, to refute and condemn the doctrine of the separation of Church and State. Vehementer Nos, St. Pius X

The claim that the State has nothing to do with the spiritual well-being of its citizens inverts the order of things, wrongfully elevating the natural good of the nation above the supernatural good of its citizens. As St. Pius stated:

Besides, this thesis is an obvious negation of the supernatural order. It limits the action of the State to the pursuit of public prosperity during this life only, which is but the proximate object of political societies; and it occupies itself in no fashion (on the plea that this is foreign to it) with their ultimate object which is man's eternal happiness after this short life shall have run its course. But as the present order of things is temporary and subordinated to the conquest of man's supreme and absolute welfare, it follows that the civil power must not only place no obstacle in the way of this conquest, but must aid us in effecting it. Vehementer Nos, St. Pius X

Pope St. Pius X insists that to have the Church and the State separated, with the State failing to acknowledge the Catholic Faith as the true religion-as it is in the United States-amounts to a grave injustice to God:

[By adopting] the principle that the State must not recognize any religious cult, it is in the first place guilty of a great injustice to God; for the Creator of man is also the Founder of human societies, and preserves their existence as He preserves our own. We owe Him, therefore, not only a private cult, but a public and social worship to honor Him. Vehementer Nos, St. Pius X

In 1832, Pope Gregory XVI recalled how greatly the peace of both Church and society was disturbed by various rebellious sects, "the Waldensians, the Beghards, the Wycliffites, and other such sons of Belial, who were the sores and disgrace of the human race."  He insisted that the modern clamor for the separation of Church and State would fare no better:

Nor can We predict happier times for religion and government from the plans of those who desire vehemently to separate the Church from the state, and to break the mutual concord between temporal authority and the priesthood. It is certain that that concord which always was favorable and beneficial for the sacred and the civil order is feared by the shameless lovers of liberty. Mirari Vos

The State in the affairs of the Church does indeed serve the Church well. This is upheld by Pope Leo XIII in his encyclical letter to the hierarchy of the United States:

Thanks are due to the equity of the laws which obtain in America and to the customs of the well-ordered Republic. 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. Longinqua

But this is only part-and certainly not the most important part-of the story. The Pontiff continues:

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, or that it would be universally lawful or expedient for State and Church to be, as in America, dissevered and divorced. The fact that Catholicity with you is in good condition, nay, is even enjoying a prosperous growth, is by all means to be attributed to the fecundity with which God has endowed His Church, in virtue of which unless men or circumstances interfere, she spontaneously expands and propagates herself; but she 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. Longinqua

 

Pope Pius XI noted that this refusal on the part of the State to give Jesus Christ and the Church He founded due public recognition is very far from a matter of indifference:

Not only private individuals but also rulers and princes are bound to give public honor and obedience to Christ. . . . 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. Quas Primas

 

[GMMF]

Hi I'm new here but I thought this might be a good place to jump in!  I’m assuming your answer to the debate question in the title of the thread is that religious liberty is not a Catholic doctrine.
 
If so, I think you’re confusing a couple points.  Most of your quotes do not address the question of whether religious liberty is a Catholic doctrine, but rather deal with the ideal relationship that there should be between the state and the Catholic Church and/or Catholic religion.  This is somewhat related, but doesn’t really get to the heart of the question up for debate.  Let’s assume for the sake of argument that all States must abide by and enforce all Catholic doctrines.  If religious liberty were a Catholic doctrine, then Catholic states would have to follow it.  If it were not a Catholic doctrine, then Catholic states would not have to follow it. So really, there are two questions here: (1)is religious liberty a Catholic doctrine?, and (2) what is the proper relationship between the State and the Catholic Church and/or its faith.  Since question (1) is the question up for debate, I will focus on that and if after that you want to move on to the second question, we can also do that.
 
First, we should define what is meant by “religious liberty.”  I will assert that religious liberty is a doctrine of the Church if it is defined as the right ofa person to freedom from civil coercion in religious matters, within the limits of the common good and the objective moral order.  It is not a right to err nor does this same right extend to the person's relationship with ecclesiastical authority.  This definition of mine is drawn from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
 
 
 

2106 "Nobody may be forced to act against his convictions, nor is anyone to be restrained from acting in accordance with his conscience in religious matters in private or in public, alone or in association with others, within due limits."³⁴ This right is based on the very nature of the human person, whose dignity enables him freely to assent to the divine truth which transcends the temporal order. For this reason it "continues to exist even in those who do not live up to their obligation of seeking the truth and adhering to it."³⁵
 
2107 "If because of the circumstances of a particular people special civil recognition is given to one religious community in the constitutional organization of a state, the right of all citizens and religious communities to religious freedom must be recognized and respected as well."³⁶
 
2108 The right to religious liberty is neither a moral license to adhere to error, nor a supposed right to error,³⁷ but rather a natural right of the human person to civil liberty, i.e., immunity, within just limits, from external constraint in religious matters by political authorities. This natural right ought to be acknowledged in the juridical order of society in such a way that it constitutes a civil right.³⁸
 
2109 The right to religious liberty can of itself be neither unlimited nor limited only by a "public order" conceived in a positivist or naturalist manner.³⁹ The "due limits" which are inherent in it must be determined for each social situation by political prudence, according to the requirements of the common good, and ratified by the civil authority in accordance with "legal principles which are in conformity with the objective moral order."⁴⁰
 

 
I am going to begin by focusing on the two propositions you quoted from the Syllabus that do go directly to the debate topic, 78 and 79.  55 and 77 go more to the relationship between Church and State and how religious liberty fits in that relationship will depend on whether it is a Catholic doctrine.
 
You first err by claiming that the propositions listed are defined ex cathedra by the Pope as “heretical.” Claiming these propositions are “heretical” means that their contradictory propositions are dogmas of the Catholic faith.  Nowhere does the Syllabus classify these propositions as “heretical.”  As the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the Syllabus describes, the commission that produced the Syllabus affirmatively decided not to provide such theological notes, but rather to point to the original documents cited:
 
 
 

The commission took the wording of the errors
to be condemned from the official declarations of Pius IX and appended to each of the eighty theses a reference indicating its content, so as to determine the true meaning and the theological value of the subjects treated.

 
Furthermore, there is nothing in the Syllabus to indicate that the Pope is personally condemning the propositions presented as chief shepherd, so it cannot be considered ex cathedra.  Compare the Syllabus with, say, a similar list of errors actually condemned by the Pope, Coelestis Pastor of Bl. Innocent XI.  Bl. John Henry Newman explains all of this well here: http://www.newmanreader.org/works/anglicans/volume2/gladstone/section7.html
 
As he notes, the value of the Syllabus is in its references, so let’s check the references.  Looking at Acerbissimum, it is a consistorial address by the Pope concerning the situation at the time in New Grenada—it is not universal in scope.  There you had a completely Catholic population where the government became anti-clerical, persecuted the Church, and encouraged other sects to come in and displace Catholics to break up the influence of the Church there.  In a situation where you have a country unified in the Catholic faith, encouraging the dissolution of that unity is contrary to the common good.  Therefore, this allocution does not contradict the Catholic doctrine on religious liberty defined in the Catechism.
 
The second one, Nunquam fore, addresses a similar situation in Mexico.  There the claim was made for an unlimited and absolute freedom in matters of religion and speech, no matter the content or the effect on the common good.  This caused much harm and ended up leading to persecution of Catholics who tried to profess the uniqueness and necessity of the Catholic faith (ironically, pastoral letters of bishops were forbidden to be published—so much for freedom of religion and speech!).  Again, this allocution also does not contradict the Catholic doctrine of religious liberty what was being condemned was an absolute liberty that did not take the common good into account.
 
The key to the Catholic doctrine on religious liberty is a synthesis of two concepts:  (1) the act of faith and embracing of the true religion must be done freely , which establishes the freedom of man from state coercion in religious matters and (2) the purpose of the state is to foster the common good and the common good includes the spiritual well-being of all (cf. Bl. John XXIII, Pacem in Terris 53-59), which establishes the right of the state to impose limits on religious activity, depending on the circumstances.
 
As the Popes you quote express, the ideal is for all men to be united in the true religion and to profess the faith individually and socially.  But this must ultimately happen through evangelization, not force  Where there are a significant number of people within one nation of various religions or no religion, the common good is often served by giving freedom to all (again, within due limits), as Pope Pius XII explained in his allocution, Ci Riesce:
 
 
 

Could God, although it would be possible and easy for Him to repress error and moral deviation, in some cases choose the "non impedire" without contradicting His infinite perfection? Could it be that in certain circumstances He would not give men any mandate, would not 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 not 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 (cf. Matt. 13:24-30). 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, toleration of error in order to promote a greater good.

 
As Pius XII notes, the state’s right to repress religious error is contingent on the needs of the common good.  That right is not communicated to the state where such action would harm the common good.  Framing this principle from the focal point of the person and his relationship to the state, the state may only repress his religious error if it is harmful to the common good. As such, the person has a right to be free from state coercion in religious matters, but only within the bounds of the common good.
 
If you want to discuss “separation of Church and State” too, let me know. Edited June 20, 2013 by GMMF

[GMMF]

sorry for the small font and weird formatting in places, my edit time ran out while I was trying to figure things out. :pinch:

[jim111]

Lets clarify my argument about religious liberty. Religious liberty at best, is the best of two evils, not a good in and of itself. A state is obligated by divine law to suppress error, which does not mean forcing noncatholics to convert. However it does mean the repression of public forms of worship by non-catholics, or non-catholic religious propaganda/media. As the popes have stated, there are times where it would cause greater evils to suppress the false religions, then to all them to exist, therefore the lesser evil should be chosen. Are we in agreement on this.

[GMMF]

Lets clarify my argument about religious liberty. Religious liberty at best, is the best of two evils, not a good in and of itself. A state is obligated by divine law to suppress error, which does not mean forcing noncatholics to convert. However it does mean the repression of public forms of worship by non-catholics, or non-catholic religious propaganda/media. As the popes have stated, there are times where it would cause greater evils to suppress the false religions, then to all them to exist, therefore the lesser evil should be chosen. Are we in agreement on this.

 

I think we're very close.  A couple points though:  According to the allocution from Pius XII I quoted earlier, the state is not always obligated by divine law to suppress error, nor is it even given the right to suppress error in some circumstances: 

 

"Could it be that in certain circumstances He would not give men any mandate, would not 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."

 

Second, I think it's wrong to call the Catholic doctrine on religious liberty the "best of two evils." Granting religious liberty is not an evil since the granting of it is not contrary to divine law (even if a person is not being impeded from violating divine law as a result).  This is the point Pius XII was making when he said God is all good, yet He does not always impede evil, nor has he given a universal command to impede evil.  

 

The issue is therefore not a difference between two evils, but between an ideal good and a another good that approaches the ideal to a degree.  I want to expand on this last point, but I'm pressed for time now.  More to come.

 

 

Edited June 21, 2013 by GMMF

[GMMF]

Ok, to pick up where I left off I would like make a distinction between "thesis" and hypothesis.  The thesis is the ideal and the hypothesis is an application of universal principles to particular circumstances to achieve the highest good. We both agree that in the abstract, the ideal (the "thesis") is for the whole society to be united in the one true faith. Another ideal or thesis is that all profess the fullness of the faith in private and public of their own free choice as the result of preaching, teaching, and persuasion--in other words, ideally, religious error is repressed by means of evangelization, as Our Lord commanded. I think we can both agree to this ideal as well.

 

A "hyothesis" in this context is the application of universal principles to particular circumstances to bring about the greatest good, which, while falling short of the ideal, is still good. This is generally done when reaching the ideal might harm other goods. The dichotomy that there is the ideal and there is evil is a false one. For example, the Church holds consecrated religious life, celibacy, and poverty as the height of Christian perfection--it is the ideal.  But the Church also holds married life or the possession of property to be a goods also.  In fact, if all embrace the ideal, the human race would end—so the hypothesis is it is good for their to be both consecrated religious and married lay people.  However, if someone were to assert that married life is the thesis, the ideal, the Church would likely condemn it as an evil thesis. 

 

The problem in the 19th and early 20th centuries is that certain revolutionaries attempted to absolutize hypotheses, and to deconstruct societies which closely approached the true thesis.  For example, take proposition 77 from the Syllabus.  This allocution, Nemo vestrum, refers to the situation at the time in Spain. There, you had a completely Catholic country where the Church and state had pretty much the ideal relationship, working together for the common good in mutual concord.  There would be no reason to move to a hypothesis farther away from the thesis as certain revolutionaries were trying to force on the people (St. Anthony Mary Claret’s autobiography describes these times well from a first-hand perspective).

 

But that doesn’t mean there can’t be a good hypothesis when the thesis expressed in the contrary to proposition 77cannot be reached without harm to other principles, as Leo XIII noted in Immortale Dei 36.

 

"No one has any legitimate ground for accusing the Church of being the enemy of either just tolerance or healthy and justifiable liberty.  While the Church considers that it is not right to put the various forms of worship on the same footing as the true religion, it does not follow that she condemns heads of States who, with a view to acheiving good or preventing evil, in practice allow these various creeds each to have their own place in the State.  It is indeed the custom of the Church to take the greatest care to ensure that no one shall be forced to embrace the Catholic faith against his will, for, as St. Augustine wisely observes, a man can believe only of his own free will."

 

(note, here Pope Leo notes the free act of faith as something that could be harmed if the thesis were forced in the wrong circumstances).

 

Again, in a quote you provided earlier, St. Pius X expressly condemns  as a “thesis” the separation of Church and State, but that doesn’t mean that there can’t be circumstances where it wouldn’t be a good hypothesis.  In his September 7, 1955 radio address to historians, Pius XII explicitly affirms this as the “ideal,” but then notes that changing circumstances can lead to other acceptable forms, giving the situation in the USA at the time as an example of set-up that allowed the Church to flourish as much as it was flourishing in places with a more ideal Church- state relationship.

 

Again, the circumstances may call for the state to suppress false religious activity lest it do harm to the common good. For this reason, Bl. Pius IX in the encyclical Quanta Cura condemned the absolutist claim that all countries must admit an absolute freedom of worship in all circumstances.  He does not, however, affirm that all countries must forcibly suppress all public false religious activity.  Newman explains this well here (elsewhere, Newman claims the Pope was speaking ex cathedra when condemning the errors in quotation marks in Quanta Cura):

http://www.newmanreader.org/works/anglicans/volume2/gladstone/section6.html

 

It should also be noted that Vatican II’s decree on religious liberty calls for very broad freedom, but the relatio (an official explanation given to the voting fathers) explicitly states it is not advancing a thesis in the abstract, but rather it is “pastoral” (pastoral theology is the application of doctrine to specific circumstances and practical life—in other words it is often about hypotheses):

 

 

“Our decree, since it is pastoral, tries to treat the present matter especially from the practical point of view and, after the manner of John XXIII, will carefully strive to remove the whole question from that world of abstractions which was so dear to the nineteenth century. The question is put therefore regarding real man in his real dealings with other men, in contemporary human and civil societies.”

 

 

Pope Benedict XVI affirmed this same understanding of the decree on religious liberty in his famous “hermeneutic of continuity” address to the Roman Curia in December 2005.  As an aside, much of Gaudium et Spes (specifically called a “pastoral constitution”) also deals in hypotheses, as its first footnote points out (saying some things in it are contingent on the circumstances).

 

So in conclusion, because of all this, the Church, when enunciating her doctrine on religious liberty, notes that it is something that will be heavily tied to the circumstances (CCC 2109), because the right of the state to do so is heavily tied to the circumstances.

 

To sum it all up, it seems to me that you are asserting that everything not the ideal is a degree of evil, rather than a degree of good, and I think that is why I cannot agree fully with your last post.

 

 

Edited June 21, 2013 by GMMF

[Ice_nine]

is this real life?

[Aloysius]

GMMF, very good explanation.  kudos.

[Lil Red]

is this real life?

 

is this just fantasy? 

[Guest]

Catholic or die...

[jim111]

Ok, to pick up where I left off I would like make a distinction between "thesis" and hypothesis.  The thesis is the ideal and the hypothesis is an application of universal principles to particular circumstances to achieve the highest good. We both agree that in the abstract, the ideal (the "thesis") is for the whole society to be united in the one true faith. Another ideal or thesis is that all profess the fullness of the faith in private and public of their own free choice as the result of preaching, teaching, and persuasion--in other words, ideally, religious error is repressed by means of evangelization, as Our Lord comman...

 

 

sorry i think my wording was bad. Divine law does not mandate one to repress error, but it error is always an evil. The reason I say religous toleration is an evil is because Pius XII stated it was.

 

"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 (cf. <Matt.> 13:24-30). 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, toleration of error in order to promote a <greater good.>

Thus the two principles are clarified to which recourse must be had in concrete cases for the answer to the serious question concerning the attitude which the jurist, the statesman and the sovereign Catholic state is to adopt in consideration of the community of nations in regard to a formula of religious and moral toleration as described above. First: 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. Secondly: failure to impede this with civil laws and coercive measures can nevertheless be justified in the interests of a higher and more general good." CI RIESCE Pope Pius XII

Edited June 25, 2013 by jim111

[Apotheoun]

is this just fantasy? 

It's the matrix.

[GMMF]

Jim,

 

I agree that error is an evil, but I don't see where the Pope says therefore toleration of it is an evil.  If tolerance were an evil, Leo XIII in Immortale Dei could not speak of a "just tolerance" because evils are not just.  Furthermore, as Pius XII notes, God does not Himself impede all error.  God is not doing evil by choosing not to impede error--that would be blasphemy to suggest so.  In the allocution you quote, in the paragraph preceding what you provide, Pius XII answers in the affirmative the question as to whether there are times when God does not even provide the right to impede error (it is never evil to refrain from doing something you have no right to do). Pius XII further says the duty to repress error (which we all have generally) is subordinate to other principles  (not all of us can use any means to suppress error all the time: the Church can do so by coercive means over the baptized only and by preaching to others, the state may use coercive means when the common good requires it, we all, with permission of the Church, can use preaching and persuasion, and most of all, we can all repress error by good example).

 

Van Noort's Dogmatic Theology (Vol. II), a favorite scholastic manual of traditionalists, lists the following as other goods the state must take into account:

 

"The Church has not just one principle to keep in mind – man’s obligation as a social being to make social profession of his religion – there are other Catholic principles: that individual persons are obliged to follow their consciences, even erroneous consciences; that no man may be constrained to accept Catholicism; and finally, that the State has the obligation to provide for the common welfare of all, not simply its Catholic citizens."

 

Catholic teaching on religious liberty takes all of these things into account.

 

 

***to tie this back to the original question, if the state does not have the right to coerce a person in particular circumstances, then that person therefore has a right to be free from the coercion of the state in those circumstances--this is the Catholic idea of the "right to religious liberty."