Religious Freedom for the Church of Christ

THE ISSUE OF RELIGIOUS FREEDOM is cleft into two. There is the religious freedom and freedom of conscience that is part and parcel of the natural man who seeks the truth, the homo quaerens Deum. But there is also the religious freedom and freedom of conscience that arises out of the Deus quarens in homine hominem, that is to say the God who seeks man in man, God Incarnate, Jesus Christ, and the Church which he founded.

The Church was founded by Jesus Christ, and so we have to focus on who this Jesus Christ was, and what authority in heaven and earth was given him in order to understand what authority in heaven and on earth was given to the Church. As the Declaration of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith puts it in Dominus Iesus, "The Lord Jesus, before ascending into heaven, commanded his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to the whole world and to baptize all nations . . . . The Church's universal mission is born from the command of Jesus Christ and is fulfilled in the course of the centuries in the proclamation of the mystery of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and the mystery of the incarnation of the Son, as saving event for all humanity." DI, 1. We have here two realities: Jesus and the Church. We shall briefly treat of who Jesus is, and then what the Church Jesus established sees herself to be.*

This reflection will take us directly into what the Protestant theologian Gerhard Kittel, in Mysterium Christi, called "das Ärgernis der Einmaligkeit," which been translated as "the scandal of particularity," the scandal of particularity of Christ.** Because of the Catholic Church's doctrine that there is a unity between Christ and his Church, the "scandal of particularity" also includes the Church. The "scandal of particularity" wholly rejects a religious indifferentism, and this "scandal of particularity" has a great effect upon the Church's understanding of her freedom as against the various States.

The Church firmly believes "that, in the mystery of Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Son of God, who is 'the way, the truth, and the life' (Jn 14:6), the full revelation of divine truth is given." DI, 5. She is convinced that in the revelation of God in Jesus, "the deepest truth about God and the salvation of man shines forth," as he is "at the same time the mediator and the fullness of all revelation." DI, 5. Jesus ushered into the history of man a new dispensation, a Christian dispensation, and this is "the new and definitive covenant," one which "will never pass away," and one which expects "no further new public revelation before the glorious manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ." God's revelation to man is fully completed in Christ. There is for man no other Savior. There is for man no other Way.

There is only one salvific economy of the One and Triune God, realized in the mystery of the incarnation, death, and resurrection of the Son of God, actualized with the cooperation of the Holy Spirit, and extended in its salvific value to all humanity and to the entire universe: "No one, therefore, can enter into communion with God except through Christ, by the working of the Holy Spirit."

DI, 12 (quoting John Paul II, Redemptoris missio, 5)

"The Lord Jesus, the only Savior," continues Dominus Iesus, "did not only establish a simple community of disciples, but constituted the Church as a salvific mystery: he himself is in the Church and the Church is in him (cf. Jn 15:1ff.; Gal 3:28; Eph 4:15-16; Acts 9:5). Therefore, the fullness of Christ's salvific mystery belongs also to the Church, inseparably united to her Lord." In short, just as there is one mediator, there is one Church. "[T]herefore, there exists a single Church of Christ, which subsists in the Catholic Church, governed by the Successor of Peter and by the Bishops in communion with him."* DI, 17.

The Church was given a mission by the God who revealed himself in Christ. "With the coming of the Savior Jesus Christ, God has willed that the Church founded by him be the instrument for the salvation of all humanity (cf. Acts 17:30-31)." DI, 22 (citing VII, Lumen gentium, 17; JP II, Redemptoris missio, 11). "The mission of the Church is 'to proclaim and establish among all peoples the kingdom of Christ and of God, and she is on earth, the seed and the beginning of that kingdom." DI, 18 (quoting VII, Lumen gentium, 5) She has been divinely appointed to proclaim and to establish, to say and to do.

What rights, then do Jesus and his Church have against civil society, in particular against the political community which orders civil society? Those answer to that question is briefly treated in sections 424-27 of the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church.

Like the State, the Church manifests itself in a "visible organizational structure." It is, along with the State, a "perfect society" with all the means at its disposal for its function. (Compendium, No. 445) To be sure, the "organizational structures . . . are by nature different because of their configuration and because of the ends they pursue." (Compendium, No. 424). Their respective ends principally determine their spheres, although, since societies and the men which compose them are one and not divided, they may be some overlap. "The Second Vatican Council," the Compendium states, "solemnly reaffirmed that, 'in their proper spheres, the political community and the Church are mutually independent and self-governing.'

The Church is organized in ways that are suitable to meet the spiritual needs of the faithful, while the different political communities give rise to relationships and institutions that are at the service of everything that is part of the temporal common good. The autonomy and independence of these two realities is particularly evident with regards to their ends.

(Compendium, No. 424)

The State must not only respect the religious freedom of its citizens and of the religious bodies in which they, as demanded by the natural moral law which impels those of good will to seek truth, to accept it once recognized, and to live their life in accordance with their well-formed conscience as they travel--knowingly or in ignorance--to the one True God. The State must in particular respect the religious freedom of the Church, as a perfect society, one whose constitution and function is by divine warrant. With respect to the Church, "[t]he duty to respect religious freedom requires that the political community guarantee the Church the space needed to carry out her mission." (Compendium, No. 424) Failure to do so is against the will of God.

It should be noted that though the State and the Church have their separate spheres, this separation does not exclude overlap, nor does it exclude cooperation. In those areas that are the States, the Church has no role, but in those areas of overlap, the Church does have say, even in democratically-organized societies:

"The Church respects the legitimate autonomy of the democratic order and is not entitled to express preferences for this or that institutional or constitutional solution." nor does it belong to her to enter into questions of the merit of political programs, except as concerns their religious or moral implications.

(Compendium, No. 424 (quoting JP II, Centesimus annus, 47)

In a well-ordered society, the political community and the Church will not be at odds, but will cooperate for the benefit of the common good and salvation of souls:

The mutual autonomy of the Church and the political community does not entail a separation that excludes cooperation. Both of them, although by different titles, serve the personal and social vocation of the same human beings. The Church and the political community, in fact, express themselves in organized structures that are not ends in themselves but are intended for the service of man, to help him to exercise his rights fully, those inherent in his reality as a citizen and a Christian, and to fulfill correctly his corresponding duties. The Church and the political community can more effectively render this service "for the good of all if each works better for wholesome mutual cooperation in a way suitable to the circumstances of time and place."

(Compendium, No. 425 (quoting VII, Gaudium et spes, 76)

The Church likewise claims rights, rights which every State is duty-bound to recognize, as it is God's will as reflected in the fullest revelation of that will in Christ the Lord. We might therefore craft a sort of "Bill of Rights" of the Church as summarized by the Compendium:

• The right to the legal recognition of her proper identity
  
• The right to express her moral judgment on "all of human reality," to the extent that it may be needful to "defend the fundamental rights of the person or for the salvation of souls."
• The right to freedom of expression
• The right to teach and to evangelize
• The right to worship God in a public manner
• The right to her own organization, her own internal government, without interference from the State, including the right to select, educate, name, and transfer ministers
• The right to construct religious buildings
• The right to acquire and possess sufficient goods for her activity
• The right to form associations not only for religious purposes, but also for educational, cultural, health case, and charitable purposes
  

This is the "elbow room" that is her right, by natural and divine law.***

The relationship between Church and State may be further ordered through agreements between them. As the Compendium concludes:

In order to prevent or attenuate possible conflicts between the Church and the political community, the juridical experience of the Church and the State have variously defined stable forms of contact and suitable instruments for guaranteeing harmonious relations. This experience is an essential reference point for all cases in which the State has the presumption to invade the Church's area of action, impairing the freedom of her activity to the point of openly persecuting her or, vice versa, for cases in which church organizations do not act properly with respect to the State.

(Compendium, No. 427)

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*I am dealing with the core reality of Jesus and his Church. I do not intend to address the more difficult issue of how other adherents of other religions and other Christian churches and ecclesial communions may relate to Christ and his Church and implicitly, and despite their various errors or deficiencies, may participate in a way known to God alone who desires the universal salvation of mankind, in the salvation of Christ which is to be found in his Church. See generally Dominus Iesus. These subsidiary issues, while important, do not change the central reality of Jesus and his Church which is what drives the Church's understanding of her particular religious freedom and freedom of conscience.
**The Oxford English Dictionary states (s.v. "scandal of particularity") the following:

scandal of particularity [tr. Ger. (see quots. 1930, 1936)], the difficulty of seeing the particular man, Jesus, as the universal Saviour. Cf. PARTICULARITY 1.
1930 tr. G. Kittel in Bell & Deissmann Mysterium Christi ii. 31 The scandal of particularity..is the problem of history. Can a particular historical happening be peculiar? Can it be significant sub specie aeternitatis? And above all, can this particular occurrence be either peculiar or significant? 1936 C. H. Dodd Apostolic Preaching & its Development iv. 219 ‘Like a strange people left on earth After a judgment day.’ This view of the historical status of the events comprised in the coming of Christ introduces us at once to what Professor Gerhard Kittel, in Mysterium Christi, calls ‘das Ärgernis der Einmaligkeit’, ‘the scandal of particularity’. 1961 Listener 9 Mar. 435/2 We do no service to religion by reducing either term of the problem, the total mystery of the Godhead or the scandal of particularity. 1979 C. F. D. Moule in M. D. Goulder Incarnation & Myth iv. 86 The ‘scandal of particularity’ is by no means a denial but rather a confirmation of the ubiquity and continuity of God's activity.

It should go without saying that by quoting this valuable concept, I abjure any of Kittel's anti-Semitism.
***Communist governments (e.g., China) and Islamic governments (e.g., Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Sudan, Afghanistan, Iran, etc.) grossly violate these rights, and so, in their laws which prevent the Church from exercising freely her mission, may be said to be acting manifestly against the will of God as revealed both in the natural moral law and in divine law as contained in the Gospels. Particularly offensive are the actions of the Islamic countries which, ostensibly in name of God act against the will of God.

Our Mission to the World

THE CHURCH PROCLAIMS man's fundamental freedom from every earthly good. This is a natural outcome of her message that man is a transcendent person. He is a person who is by nature and by grace called to eternal life with Christ in God. Her message is, of course, comprehensive. Yet it can be boiled down to St. Athanasius's shocking statement: "God became man so that man might become a god."*

Man has a transcendent destiny. He is called to eternal life. He is called to eternal communion with God, in what we call the beatific vision. This is the message of the Church to man who often wallows in mud of brothels, markets, or foxholes. You--her message is to each man, and to all men--are called to the Kingdom of God. As a result, the Church is "the sign and safeguard of the transcendent dimension of the human person." The Church is further a "kind of sacrament--a sign and instrument, that is, of communion with God and of unity among all men." (Compendium, No. 49)**

The Kingdom of God, "embraces all people," and the Church has been given the "mission of proclaiming and establishing among all peoples the Kingdom of Christ and of God, and she is, on earth, the seed and beginning of that Kingdom." (Compendium, No. 49)*** Naturally, as part of her mission, the Church promotes the values, the moral teachings, the rectitude of the Gospel. And, if allowed, these can have a potentially huge effect on civil society and its governance. They are, we may note, not always welcome. .

The Church's eternal message will affect, sometimes challenge the temporal. But it is important to note that the Church is separate from civil society and from any political system, and, in fact is independent and autonomous of the civil society and political system. "[T]he Church is ... not bound to any political system. In fact, the political community and the Church are autonomous and independent of each other in their own fields." (Compendium, No. 50) Of course, neither is independent of God. Both, in addition, are devoted "even if under different titles," "to the service of the personal and social vocation of the same human person." (Compendium, No. 50) They ought not be enemies, and, unless there is disorder, ought to work hand-in-hand.

In the West, and in particular in the United States, we take for granted (though we also frequently misunderstand) the notion of the "separation of Church and State." The distinction between secular and ecclesiastical spheres, which defends the rights of conscience and precludes State power from trampling over this sacred internal realm, is a unique contribution of Christianity to the world:

Indeed, it can be affirmed that the distinction between religion and politics and the principle of religious freedom constitute a specific achievement of Christianity and one of its fundamental historical and cultural contributions.

(Compendium, No.50)

"Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar, and to God the things that are God's" (Matt.22:21). What a marvelous history have these words had, all stemming from the son of God who eyed the portrait (and the hubris) of his human rival on a Tiberius denarius who claimed, in opposition to Christ, to be God's high priest and the divine son of God!

It may have been the biggest power grab in history, as it was, at least inchoately, both a veiled challenge to, and a wresting from, the State any pretensions to divinity, to absoluteness. It was God's and the Church's declaration of independence from powers that man had arrogated, had usurped to himself. The State is not transcendent. Man, called to eternal life in Christ, is!†

TI CAESAR DIVI AUG F AUGUSTUS
(Tiberius Caesar Divi Augustus Fili Augustus)
trans: Tiberius Caesar, the worshipful son of the God Augustus.
PONTIFEX MAXIM
(Pontifex Maximus)
trans: High Priest

The Church in a way is a perpetual challenge to the non-Christian State. She is a bone stuck in the throat of any overweening modern State or State that rebels against the natural moral law:

[T]he Church offers an original and irreplaceable contribution with the concern that impels her to make the family of mankind and its history more human, prompting her to place herself as a bulwark against every totalitarian temptation, as she shows man his integral and definition vocation.

(Compendium, No. 51)

There will be tension between Church and State where there is a disordered social life. This is a necessary reality because Christ did not just redeem individual men and leave them where they were. "God, in Christ, redeems not only the individual person but also the social relations existing between men." (Compendium, No. 52) In an earlier installment, we distinguished between the "is" and the "is with," and Christ came to redeem both.

There is, to be sure, great adaptability and flexibility in the Gospel, though there are also some boundaries that are adamantine and inflexible as stone, specifically those "unchangeable principles of the natural law." (Compendium, No. 53) But, aside from the principles of natural law, the Gospel does not offer a ready-made recipe like Islam: a fixed code of Shari'a, which forces a one-size-fits-all law upon all societies, in a positivistic, unimaginative, and even tyrannous recipe:

The transformation of social relationships that responds to the demands of the Kingdom of God is not fixed within concrete boundaries once and for all. Rather, it is a task entrusted to the Christian community, which is to develop it and carry it out through reflection and practices inspired by the Gospel. It is the same Spirit of the Lord, leading the people of God while simultaneously permeating the universe, who from time to time inspires new and appropriate ways for humanity to exercise its creative responsibility. This inspiration is given to the community of Christians who are a part of the world and of history, and who are therefore open to dialogue with all people of good will in the common question for the seeds of truth and freedom sown in the vast field of humanity.

(Compendium, No. 53)

The superiority of the Christian Gospel is manifest in its driving force. It is not submission to a code, it is love that is the driving force, and it is love and not primarily submission that colors the view of Christian society. "Jesus Christ reveals to us that 'God is love' (1 Jn 4:8)," observes the Compendium, "and he teaches us that the 'fundamental law of human perfection, and consequently of the transformation of the world, is the new commandment of love." (Compendium, No. 54)†† The commandment of love is a law, the law "called to become the ultimate measure and rule . . . of the person, of social relations, of human activity in the world . . . " (Compendium, No. 54).

There is, in fact, a huge need for the Church to transform the world, for the Church to season the world with the salt of the Gospel. The modern world stands not unlike the time of the world at the time of Christ: in partibus infidelium, in the realm of the unbelievers. And the Church's evangelical role must strive to bring the world back to Christ. The Church's social doctrine is one of the tools she has to further the new evangelization to a world that has become old, but must become young again: indeed must become like a little child. (Cf. Matt. 18:3)

"For he must reign," St. Paul assures us (1 Cor. 15:25). It is time for the world to end its revolt, to slough off Satan's response: non serviam! I will not serve. In mud of brothels, markets, or foxholes, and wherever else man may be found, we must proclaim the Jeremiad:

For long ago I broke your yoke And tore off your bonds; But you said, 'I will not serve!' For on every high hill And under every green tree You have lain down as a harlot.

Jeremiah 2:20.

Time for the world to respond, like Mary the perfect Christian disciple, fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum. Be it done unto me according to your Word! (Luke 1:38)

But to respond, they must hear a message. And to hear a message, there must be a messenger with a message. Hence has the Church put together the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church. It is one of the take down moves in our repertoire as "we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places" (Eph. 6:12).

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*St. Athanasius, De Incarnatione 54:3 (Αυτός γαρ ενηνθρώπησεν, ίνα ημείς θεοποιηθώμεν), PG 25:192B; also Catechism of the Catholic Church § 460.
**Quoting VII, Gaudium et spes, 76 and Lumen gentium, 1.
***Quoting VII, Lumen gentium, 5.
†Interestingly, the Catechism of the Catholic Church refers to this incident to justify acts of civil disobedience or to limit the loyalty to the State in commanding wrongful acts.
††Quoting VII, Gaudium et spes, 38.

Leo XIII's Immortale Dei: What is Caesar's? What is God's? Part 4

IN THE EYES OF THE NEW LAW, the novus ius, the Church is demoted into a private association and has as much standing, and no more, than the Red Cross or Planned Parenthood or the Kiwanis Club. "[N]o 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." The Church is banished from the public square from law and by law. Where she ought to be held at least as equal to the State, and where she in fact ought to be preeminent in those matters assigned to her jurisdiction or where she shares jurisdiction, she is in fact subordinate. Her laws are superseded or ignored by the State, which claims preeminence if not de jure certainly de facto.

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.

ID, 27. The effect is most significantly seen in respect to marriage and family life and the civil laws that govern these institutions. In essentially ever Western nation, these, contrary to the natural law, allow for divorce and remarriage, in some cases even allow for homosexual marriages. These permit and encourage artificial contraception and even abortion. What kind of marriage and family life is promoted when the unity and indissolubility of marriage is derided in law? When the very purpose of conjugal relations is perverted or shunted? When the maternal authority allowed a mother over the child in her womb includes the power of execution of her child for no reason at all but inconvenience? The State purports to have jurisdiction over all marriages and over family life, even those of baptized Christians. It ignores the existence of any covenant that claims unity and indissolubility beause it refuses to enforce it (and though Leo XIII did not foresee it, even claims that the contract ought to be between a man and a woman).

The State is not satisfied with dabbling in marriage and family life. It wishes to stand in loco parentis, and gains a practical monopoly on the education of youth; it restricts the Church, and restricts even any mention of philosophies that speak of God.* The State also enters into health care and into scientific research (e.g., stem cell research) entirely oblivious to the moral law in certain particulars. There is virtually no area where the State is not overweening in its power, in exercising its muscle. At times, the State, particularly in Europe and in Central and South America at one time, even denied the Church the right to own property and suppresses religious orders. Though that has not been the case in the United States, any attempt which directly or even indirectly favors the Church will immediately draw forth "men," well-trained by the existing Zeitgeist, who "forthwith begin to cry out that matters affecting the Church must be separated from those of the State." ID, 27. All these efforts by the monolithic State, a state inspired by a secularist philosophy, "aim to this one end-to paralyze the action of Christian institutions, to cramp to the utmost the freedom of the Catholic Church, and to curtail her ever single prerogative." ID, 29.

This novus ius, this new law, where the constitution of things is that the State is independent from God and His Church, and the Church is fenced away as if some sort of bad neighbor, is contrary to reason:

Now, natural reason itself proves convincingly that such concepts of the government of a State are wholly at variance with the truth. Nature itself bears witness that all power, of every kind, has its origin from God, who is its chief and most august source. The sovereignty of the people, however, and this without any reference to God, is held to reside in the multitude . . . lacks all reasonable proof . . . . To hold, therefore, that there is no difference in matters of religion between forms that are unlike each other, and even contrary to each other, most clearly leads in the end to the rejection of all religion in both theory and practice. And this is the same thing as atheism, however it may differ from it in name. So, too, the liberty of thinking, and of publishing, whatsoever each one likes, without any hindrance, is not in itself an advantage over which society can wisely rejoice. . . . Liberty is a power perfecting man, and hence should have truth and goodness for its object. . . . Whatever, therefore, is opposed to virtue and truth may not rightly be brought temptingly before the eye of man, much less sanctioned by the favor and protection of the law.

ID, 30, 31, 32. We have, by and large, chosen or at least consented to live in this manner, to suffer a constitution of state that is practically atheistic in its religious indifferentism. It is the fruit of a sinful rebellion started long ago by a German Augustinian monk whose private thoughts and privates chafed under his habit, perhaps initially engendered by our own sins, and then imitated by a host of other clerics, philosophers, statesmen, and then finally peoples. But in doing so we have painted ourselves into a moral cul-de-sac. And we have not the means to extricate ourselves from the tyranny of relativism into which we have fallen. It all stems from the "grave and fatal error," the original sin of modern politics in the West, and error of which we must repent:

To exclude the Church, founded by God Himself, from life, from laws, from the education of youth, from domestic society is a grave and fatal error. A State from which religion is banished can never be well regulated; and already perhaps more than is desirable is known of the nature and tendency of the so-called civil philosophy of life and morals. The Church of Christ is the true and sole teacher of virtue and guardian of morals. She it is who preserves in their purity the principles from which duties flow, and, by setting forth most urgent reasons for virtuous life, bids us not only to turn away from wicked deeds, but even to curb all movements of the mind that are opposed to reason, even though they be not carried out in action.

ID, 32.

Pope Leo XIII reflects on the teaching of his predecessors, and then recapitulates:

[I]t is evident that the origin of public power is to be sought for in God Himself, and not in the multitude, and that it is repugnant to reason to allow free scope for sedition. Again, that it is not lawful for the State, any more than for the individual, either to disregard all religious duties or to hold in equal favour different kinds of religion; that the unrestrained freedom of thinking and of openly making known one's thoughts is not inherent in the rights of citizens, and is by no means to be reckoned worthy of favour and support. In like manner it is to be understood that the Church no less than the State itself is a society perfect in its own nature and its own right, and that those who exercise sovereignty ought not so to act as to compel the Church to become subservient or subject to them, or to hamper her liberty in the management of her own affairs, or to despoil her in any way of the other privileges conferred upon her by Jesus Christ. In matters, however, of mixed jurisdiction, it is in the highest degree consonant to nature, as also to the designs of God, that so far from one of the powers separating itself from the other, or still less coming into conflict with it, complete harmony, such as is suited to the end for which each power exists, should be preserved between them. . . .

This, then, is the teaching of the Catholic Church concerning the constitution and government of the State.

ID, 34-35. Between Church and State: harmony, not disharmony; communion, not separation; complementarity, not subordination. With respect to the "wall of separation" between Church and State which has brought us practical atheism in governance, we might say, were we to follow Leo XIII in the quest of true freedom and liberty instead of Thomas Jefferson who has been co-opted by secularists: "Mr. Chief Justice . . . tear down this wall."

"Tear Down this Wall!"

It is apparent, however, how far our culture is from ever practically doing this. "Our eyes are not closed to the spirit of the times." ID, 40. "All this, though so reasonable and full of counsel," rued Leo XIII, "finds little favour nowadays when States not only refuse to conform to the rules of Christian wisdom, but seem even anxious to recede from them further and further on each successive day." ID, 40. The people do not want yet want it, though there are signs that they are tired of liberalism being poured down their throats, and the New Evangelization has not yet borne its fruit in overcoming the neo-paganism under which we labor. We are unquestionably in that area more than ever before where "for the sake of securing some great good or of hindering some great evil," we must "allow patiently custom or usage to be a kind of sanction for each kind of religion," including liberalism, "having its place in the State." ID, 36. And to be sure, matters could be worse:

If there really exist anywhere, or if we in imagination conceive, a State, waging wanton and tyrannical war against Christianity, and if we compare with it the modern form of government just described, this latter may seem the more endurable of the two. Yet, undoubtedly, the principles on which such a government is grounded are, as We have said, of a nature which no one can approve.

ID, 42. But while we must be tolerant, we must not be passive and sit idly by. We must take care of our own household, and then "swarm and crowd" and pray.

In private and in domestic life, we must do all we can to counter this secularizing tendency, to conform our life and conduct to the precepts of the Gospel, and to be obedient children to the Church our Mother, solicitous for her welfare and rights.

In public affairs, Catholics with public responsibility have a significant burden to discharge:

[T]hey assume not nor should they assume the responsibility of approving what is blameworthy in the actual methods of government, but seek to turn these very methods, so far as is possible, to the genuine and true public good, and to use their best endeavours at the same time to infuse, as it were, into all the veins of the State the healthy sap and blood of Christian wisdom and virtue. The morals and ambitions of the heathens differed widely from those of the Gospel, yet Christians were to be seen living undefiled everywhere in the midst of pagan superstition, and, while always true to themselves, coming to the front boldly wherever an opening was presented. Models of loyalty to their rulers, submissive, so far as was permitted, to the sovereign power, they shed around them on every side a halo of sanctity; they strove to be helpful to their brethren, and to attract others to the wisdom of Jesus Christ, yet were bravely ready to withdraw from public life, nay, even to lay down their life, if they could not without loss of virtue retain honours, dignities, and offices.

ID, 45. This is the duty of all Catholics holding public office, though few seem to recognize it:

First and foremost, it is the duty of all Catholics worthy of the name and wishful to be known as most loving children of the Church, to reject without swerving whatever is inconsistent with so fair a title; to make use of popular institutions, so far as can honestly be done, for the advancement of truth and righteousness; to strive that liberty of action shall not transgress the bounds marked out by nature and the law of God; to endeavour to bring back all civil society to the pattern and form of Christianity which We have described. It is barely possible to lay down any fixed method by which such purposes are to be attained, because the means adopted must suit places and times widely differing from one another.

ID, 46. The New Evangelization, which is nothing less than the Real Conservatism, is "but of yesterday," but to the liberal, relativist, secularist, we must hope to one day say with Tertullian, "yet we swarm in all your institutions, we crowd your cities, islands, villages, towns, assemblies, the army itself, your wards and corporations, the palace, the senate, and the law courts." ID, 45.** The temples of the secularists, we leave to them; in them their idols, which are really disguised phalluses or sweetened Mammon, we shall not worship. There is a vacuum in public life, and someone needs to fill it. If we don't swarm and crowd, someone else will. Muslims swarm and crowd their governments; it's time that Christians swarm and crowd theirs.

"[T]he integrity of Catholic faith cannot be reconciled with opinions verging on naturalism or rationalism, the essence of which is utterly to do away with Christian institutions and to install in society the supremacy of man to the exclusion of God." ID, 47. A compartmentalization is to be rejected: "[I]t is unlawful to follow one line of conduct in private life and another in public, respecting privately the authority of the Church, but publicly rejecting it; for this would amount to joining together good and evil, and to putting man in conflict with himself; whereas he ought always to be consistent, and never in the least point nor in any condition of life to swerve from Christian virtue." ID, 47.

Tolerance of error and the exercise of great charity while we "swarm and crowd" is the best we can hope for while we strive for a renewal of hearts and a public will to reject past, deep-seated errors of political philosophy, practical politics, and customary nostrums. We must remember and hope that, "since truth when brought to light is wont, of its own nature, to spread itself far and wide, and gradually take possession of the minds of men," there may be a time when matters shall be different, when we will accept the Gospel truth in all its fullness, and reach that perfect freedom that is given to the children of God.

Until then, tolerance of error, charity, suffering, swarming and crowding, and prayer.

Indeed, a Veni Sancte Spiritus may be appropriate:

VENI, Sancte Spiritus,
reple tuorum corda fidelium,
et tui amoris in eis ignem accende.
V. Emitte Spiritum tuum et creabuntur;
R. Et renovabis faciem terrae et Civitatium Foederatarum Americae.

COME, Holy Spirit,
fill the hearts of Thy faithful
and kindle in them the fire of Thy love.
V. Send forth Thy Spirit and they shall be created
R. And Thou shalt renew the face of the earth and of the United States of America.

Let us work towards repealing the "new law," the novum ius.
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*I know this from experience. My daughter's public school would not allow any philosophical teachings of Plato or Aristotle because they referred to God as first cause.

**Leo XIII quotes Tertullian's Apologeticum, 37 (in the Vatican English translation mistakenly stated as Chapter 27): "Hesterni sumus, et vestra omnia implevimus, urbes, insulas, castella, municipia, conciliabula, castra ipsa, tribus, decurias, palatium, senatum, forum . . . ."

Leo XIII's Immortale Dei: What is Caesar's? What is God's? Part 2

THE CHURCH IS AN INSTITUTION DIRECTLY FOUNDED BY GOD made flesh, Jesus. Her authority does not rely upon the State or civil society, and it is by God's express design "plainly meant to be unfettered," though it has been "so long assailed by a philosophy that truckles to the State." As a result of a "singular disposition of God's providence," the Church was provided with "a civil sovereignty," a potestas principatu civili, which assures her independence from civil authority so as better to accomplish her divine mission. ID, 12.

It is then the will of God that there be two authorities over baptized Christians. Authority and power is to be--from the foundation of the Church by the Lord until the end of time--split. What God has rent asunder, man ought not to join.

The Almighty, therefore, has given the charge of the human race to two powers, the ecclesiastical and the civil, the one being set over divine, and the other over human, things. Each in its kind is supreme, each has fixed limits within which it is contained, limits which are defined by the nature and special object of the province of each, so that there is, we may say, an orbit traced out within which the action of each is brought into play by its own native right.

ID, 13. But while the civil and ecclesiastical jurisdictions may have been split, those over whom the jurisdictions govern are not. Church and State are two; however, man, over whom "The condition of the commonwealth depends on the religion with which God is worshiped; and between one and the other there exists an intimate and abiding connection."
--Pope Leo XIII, Immortale Dei, 19the Church and State exercise their authority, is one. And so it follows that "one and the same thing--related differently, but still remaining one and the same thing--might belong to the jurisdiction and determination of both." What, then, is the rule set out by God for handling these areas of overlapping jurisdiction? It cannot be the intention of God to have the two powers command two different and contrary things, both of them binding, and so putting the subject to a Morton's Fork, a double bind, where "it would be a dereliction of duty to disobey either of the two." ID, 13. "There must, accordingly, exist between these two powers a certain orderly connection, which may be compared to the union of the soul and body in man." ID, 14.

The rule or connection is found by reference to the nature of the civil authority and the ecclesiastical authority:

The nature and scope of that connection can be determined only . . . by having regard to the nature of each power, and by taking account of the relative excellence and nobleness of their purpose. One of the two has for its proximate and chief object the well-being of this mortal life; the other, the everlasting joys of heaven. Whatever, therefore in things human is of a sacred character, whatever belongs either of its own nature or by reason of the end to which it is referred, to the salvation of souls, or to the worship of God, is subject to the power and judgment of the Church. Whatever is to be ranged under the civil and political order is rightly subject to the civil authority. Jesus Christ has Himself given command that what is Caesar's is to be rendered to Caesar, and that what belongs to God is to be rendered to God.

ID, 14.

Emperor Otto III and Pope Gregory V
(Unknown Artist, ca. 1450)

It is only when there is mutual co-ordination of the two authorities that one approaches perfection in government. That is to say, to have civil authority without ecclesiastical authority yields moral chaos;* to have ecclesiastical authority without civil authority yields civil chaos. In a Christian state, "divine and human things are equitably shared; the rights of citizens assured to them, and fenced round by divine, by natural, and by human law; the duties incumbent on each one being wisely marked out, and their fulfillment fittingly insured." ID, 17.

Man as pilgrim, the homo viator, has an "uncertain and toilsome journey to the everlasting city." The State must not forget that each of its subjects, from the youngest to the oldest, is, in fact, a pilgrim of the Absolute, on journey to God and eternal life. The Church and the State both, then, are to see that these citizen-pilgrims "have safe guides and helpers on their way," and the Church and State both are "are conscious that others have charge to protect their persons alike and their possessions, and to obtain or preserve for them everything essential for their present life." ID, 17.

In a sense, this separation of Church and State is broader than structures of civil government at their highest. There is a separation that trickles down to that most basic of civil and natural institutions, the institution of the family, the domestic society:

[D]omestic society acquires that firmness and solidity so needful to it from the holiness of marriage, one and indissoluble, wherein the rights and duties of husband and wife are controlled with wise justice and equity; due honour is assured to the woman; the authority of the husband is conformed to the pattern afforded by the authority of God; the power of the father is tempered by a due regard for the dignity of the mother and her offspring; and the best possible provision is made for the guardianship, welfare, and education of the children.

ID, 17. The power of the paterfamilias, like the power of the State, is not absolute: the father and husband must recognize that, in exercising his care over his wife and children, he also must render to God that which is God's. The Church has authority over the institution of marriage and family, for God is present everywhere, in study, dining room, playroom, and bedroom, even in the most intimate place and intimate time between man and wife. The bedroom is not outside the pale of the law. It is not a lawless place. When the lights are turned off, the light of the law remains. There is, in fact, government in the bedroom, government in the orgasm, even government in the womb, for the moral law reaches into the tiniest crevices of human life, ordering in all to the good.

If the State is properly configured, then positive laws will be framed with reference to the common good, not neglecting truth and justice, and, they will not be detracted from these essentials by reference to anything else. If some law is proposed that is contrary to these, whether it be to assuage desires of private interests or even the will of the majority, it will be rejected as outside the bounds of civil authority:

In political affairs, and all matters civil, the laws aim at securing the common good, and are not framed according to the delusive caprices and opinions of the mass of the people, but by truth and by justice; the ruling powers are invested with a sacredness more than human, and are withheld from deviating from the path of duty, and from overstepping the bounds of rightful authority; and the obedience is not the servitude of man to man, but submission to the will of God, exercising His sovereignty through the medium of men.

ID, 18.

(continued)

_____________________________________
*Later in the encyclical (No. 20), Pope Leo XIII quotes extensively from St. Augustine's De moribus ecclesiae [I.30.63; PL 32, 1336] on the Catholic Church's function. In reading this, ask yourself the question: If the Church is not doing this task, then who is?

Thou dost teach and train children with much tenderness, young men with much vigour, old men with much gentleness; as the age not of the body alone, but of the mind of each requires. Women thou dost subject to their husbands in chaste and faithful obedience, not for the gratifying of their lust, but for bringing forth children, and for having a share in the family concerns. Thou dost set husbands over their wives, not that they may play false to the weaker sex, but according to the requirements of sincere affection. Thou dost subject children to their parents in a kind of free service, and dost establish parents over their children with a benign rule. . . Thou joinest together, not in society only, but in a sort of brotherhood, citizen with citizen, nation with nation, and the whole race of men, by reminding them of their common parentage. Thou teachest kings to look to the interests of their people, and dost admonish the people to be submissive to their kings. With all care dost thou teach all to whom honour is due, and affection, and reverence, and fear, consolation, and admonition and exhortation, and discipline, and reproach, and punishment. Thou showest that all these are not equally incumbent on all, but that charity is owing to all, and wrongdoing to none.

Tu pueriliter pueros, fortiter iuvenes, quiete senes, prout cuiusque non corporis tantum, sed et animi aetas est, exerces ac doces. Tu feminas viris suis non ad explendam libidinem, sed ad propagandam prolem, et ad rei familiaris societatem, casta et fideli obedientia subiicis. Tu viros conjugibus, non ad illudendum imbecilliorem sexum, sed sinceri amoris legibus praeficis. Tu parentibus filios libera quadam servitute subiungis, parentes filiis pia dominatione praeponis . . . Tu cives civibus, tn gentes gentibus, et prorsus homines primorum parentum recordatione, non societate tantum, sed quadam etiam fraternitate coniungis. Doces reges prospicere populis, mones populos se subdere regibus. Quibus honor debeatur, quibus affectus, quibus reverentia, quibus timor, quibus consolatio, quibus admonitio, quibus cohortatio, quibus disciplina, quibus objurgatio, quibus supplicium, sedulo doces; ostendens quemadmodum et non omnibus omnia, et omnibus caritas, et nulli debeatur injuria.

Truly, the Church's moral teaching, "if duly acted up to, is the very mainstay of the commonwealth," si obtemperetur, salutem esse reipublicae. ID, 20 (quoting St. Augustine's Epistle 138 to Marcellinum, 2:15 (PL 33, 532)).

Leo XIII's Immortale Dei: What is Caesar's? What is God's? Part 1

A SO-CALLED "NEW LAW" WAS AT LARGE, and this caused Pope Leo XIII to issue his encyclical Immortale Dei on November 1, 1885. In this encyclical, Leo XIII addressed the Christian doctrine of the State and the relationship between Church and State, and he opposed himself to this "new, so-called, law" which sought to aggrandize the State at the expense of the Church. "[W]herever the Church has set her foot," the pope notes, "she has straightway changed the face of things, and has attempered the moral tone of the people with a new civilization and with virtues before unknown." To attemper --to make less harsh, severe, extreme, to refine . . . to imbue with urbanity, civility . . . ita et nova urbanite imbuit. "All nations which have yielded to her sway," Pope Leo XIII claims, "have become eminent by their gentleness, their sense of justice, and the glory of their high deeds." But he recognized efforts of a number of political philosophies which shared in a common desire to have the State to separate itself from any transcendent value, specifically God and His Church, or, what is perhaps the same thing in effect if not in intention, to make itself transcendent: to bring Caesar and Christ together by getting rid of Christ. The rupture was justified by those who were self-anointed as the Enlightened in politics, promulgators of a "new law," or at least a new conception of fundamental law where Christ and His Church were excluded from the public forum. The problem of what is Caesar's and what is Christ's is solved, sort of like Alexander solved the problem of the Gordian knot, by cutting out Christ, leaving only Caesar.

It is an old saw--the propaganda of unbelievers as deep and as meritless as the Leyenda negra* against the Spaniards--that the Church is opposed to the common good, to development of peoples, or to real advancement, to real freedom, and enlightenment. "From the very beginning Christians were harassed by slanderous accusations of this nature." ID, 2. Like Socrates, they were branded enemies of the State, corruptors of morals, even atheists relative to the civil gods manufactured by Roman hands, borrowed by them from their neighbors, or created by divinizing their emperors. Enemies of the Imperium, of the Senatus Populusque Romanum. Enemies of the Revolution. Enemies of the Know Nothing Party. Enemies of the Third Reich. Écrasez l'infâme, or something similar to it, has been said in more languages than French and in many before and after the 18th century. Even modernly, John Paul II has suggested that Christians have come to be viewed by advocates of secular democracy as "unreliable citizens."** And the false accusations, in fact calumnies againsdt Christ and his faithful, have drawn responses from St. Justin Martyr's Apologias to St. Augustine's De civitate Dei to Pope Leo XIII's Immortale Dei.

But there was something more than the old prejudice that bothered Leo XIII. There was something new in the air, or, if not in the air, in the chambers of the legislatures or the ratifiers of Constitutions: "in these latter days," Leo XIII sensed, "a novel conception of law has begun here and there to gain increase," a so-called "novum jus." This "new, so called, law" is the result, according to its propagandists, of "an age arrived at full stature," the "result of progressive liberty," SC, 2, but in reality it is nothing less than a shrugging off of the Gospel and of the natural law.

Pope Pius II (Enea Silvio Piccolomini) and Emperor Frederick III
Representing Church and State

The Gospel teaching, which is that of the natural law, can be succinctly stated by Pope Leo XIII:

Man's natural instinct moves him to live in civil society [Insitum homini natura est, ut in civili societate vivat], for he cannot, if dwelling apart, provide himself with the necessary requirements of life, nor procure the means of developing his mental and moral faculties. Hence, it is divinely ordained that he should lead his life-be it family, or civil-with his fellow men, amongst whom alone his several wants can be adequately supplied. But, as no society can hold together unless some one be over all, directing all to strive earnestly for the common good, every body politic must have a ruling authority, and this authority, no less than society itself, has its source in nature, and has, consequently, God for its Author [a natura proptereaque a Deo ipso oriatur auctore]. Hence, it follows that all public power must proceed from God. For God alone is the true and supreme Lord of the world. Everything, without exception, must be subject to Him, and must serve him, so that whosoever holds the right to govern holds it from one sole and single source, namely, God, the sovereign Ruler of all. "There is no power but from God." [Rom. 13:1]

ID, 3.

The Church is indifferent to the mode or form of government, as it should adapt to the needs of the people and their cultures and their legitimate wishes. But there is a limit, a proviso. Whatever government's form, it must conform to the "nature" of government; namely, the agents of government "must ever bear in mind that God is the paramount ruler of the world, and must set Him before themselves as their exemplar and law in the administration of the State." ID, 4.

There are certain qualities that government, to be true to its nature, must have according to Christian philosophy of the State:

1. It must dispense evenhanded justice [imperium iustum];
2. It must paternal and tempered rather than dominating and severe [neque herile, sed quas paternum];
3. It must exist for the well-being of its citizens, that is, the common good [gerendum vero est ad utilitatem civium . . . ad commune omnium bonum constituta sit];
4. It must not be set up for the advantage of an individual or a group [neqe ullo pacto committendum, unius ut, vel paucorum commodo serviat civilis auctoritas]; and
5. It must recognize God as the paramount ruler of the world and as exemplar and law in the administration of the State [in societate civili voluit esse principatum, quem qui gererent, ii imaginem quamdam divinae in genus humanum potestatis divinaeque providentiae referrent].
   

If these requirements are met, then "will the majesty of the law meet with the dutiful and willing homage of the people," for both should recognize their duty to God who is the dispenser of justice, both in the exercise of power for the common good and for justice and in the submission or obedience to that power. As important as it is for the ruler to recognize that power comes from God, so it is for the citizen to recognize it. ID, 5.

The State, therefore, cannot be oblivious to its duties to God and to religion:

As a consequence, the State, constituted as it is, is clearly bound to act up to the manifold and weighty duties linking it to God, by the public profession of religion. Nature and reason, which command every individual devoutly to worship God in holiness, because we belong to Him and must return to Him, since from Him we came, bind also the civil community by a like law. For, men living together in society are under the power of God no less than individuals are, and society, no 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 reaching 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 for the State not to have care for religion as a something beyond its scope, or as of no practical benefit; or out 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.

ID, 6. By natural law, the State has the same obligation to God as the individual.

To what religion, out of the many that may be chosen, must, by the natural law, the State be inclined?

Now, it cannot be difficult to find out which is the true religion, if only it be sought with an earnest and unbiased mind; for proofs are abundant and striking. We have, for example, the fulfillment of prophecies, miracles in great numbers, the rapid spread of the faith in the midst of enemies and in face of overwhelming obstacles, the witness of the martyrs, and the like. From all these it is evident that the only true religion is the one established by Jesus Christ Himself, and which He committed to His Church to protect and to propagate.

For the only-begotten Son of God established on earth a society which is called the Church, and to it He handed over the exalted and divine office which He had received from His Father, to be continued through the ages to come. "As the Father hath sent Me, I also send you."' "Behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world." [Matt. 28:20] Consequently, as Jesus Christ came into the world that men "might have life and have it more abundantly," [John 10:10] so also has the Church for its aim and end the eternal salvation of souls, and hence it is so constituted as to open wide its arms to all mankind, unhampered by any limit of either time or place. "Preach ye the Gospel to every creature." [Mark 16:15]

ID, 7-8.

The Church is a perfect society, just as civil society, one founded on divine right, and natural right enlightened by Grace:

This society [the Church] is made up of men, just as civil society is, and yet is supernatural and spiritual, on account of the end for which it was founded, and of the means by which it aims at attaining that end. Hence, it is distinguished and differs from civil society, and, what is of highest moment, it is a society chartered as of right divine, perfect in its nature and in its title, to possess in itself and by itself, through the will and loving kindness of its Founder, all needful provision for its maintenance and action. And just as the end at which the Church aims is by far the noblest of ends, so is its authority the most exalted of all authority, nor can it be looked upon as inferior to the civil power, or in any manner dependent upon it. . . . it is the Church, and not the State, that is to be man's guide to heaven. It is to the Church that God has assigned the charge of seeing to, and legislating for, all that concerns religion; of teaching all nations; of spreading the Christian faith as widely as possible; in short, of administering freely and without hindrance, in accordance with her own judgment, all matters that fall within its competence.

ID, 10, 11.

Christ has transformed the world. First, by coming. Second, by His rejection of the temptation of political power, the power of the State, of the kingdoms of this world.*** (cf. Matthew 4:10) Second, by founding His Church upon Peter. Third, by giving her His authority and jurisdiction. Fourth, by separating the functions of civil society and its organ of government, the State, and the functions of this religious society, the Church. "Render unto Caesar . . . ." "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me . . . ." "And I assign to you, as my Father assigned to me, a kingdom . . . ." (Mark 12:17, Matthew 28:18, Luke 22:29)

(continued)

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*"La Leyenda negra," or the "black legend," is the negative animus and bias frequently found in histories of Spain, especially, but not exclusively, in the works of English Protestant historians. The reader is referred to the work by Philip Wayne Powell entitled Tree of Hate: Propaganda and Prejudices Affecting United States Relations with the Hispanic World (New York: Basic Books, 1971). In his book, Inquisition (Berkely: University of California Press, 1989), 131, Edward Peters describes the "black legend" as "[a]n image of Spain circulated through late sixteenth-century Europe, borne by means of political and religious propaganda that blackened the characters of Spaniards and their ruler to such an extent that Spain became the symbol of all forces of repression, brutality, religious and political intolerance, and intellectual and artistic backwardness for the next four centuries. Spaniards . . . have termed this process and the image that resulted from it as ‘The Black Legend,’ la leyenda negra." The term was apparently first used by the Spanish historian Julián Juderías in his 1914 book La Leyenda Negra.
**"Those who are convinced that they know the truth and firmly adhere to it are considered unreliable from a democratic point of view, since they do not accept that truth is determined by the majority, or that it is subject to variation according to different political trends." Centesimus Annus, No. 46.
***The Satanic-inspired temptation to assume political power was clearly rejected by Christ. This temptation was not, however, rejected by Muhammad who succumbed to its blandishments, and so political and religious authority were both grasped by him, and we find them both unified thereafter in traditional Islam, particularly in its notion of the caliphate. As explained by Bernard Lewis in his The Political Language of Islam (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), 2:

In classical Islam there was no distinction between Church and state. In Christendom the existence of two authorities goes back to the founder, who enjoined his followers to render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's and to God the things which are God's. Throughout the history of Christendom there have been two powers: God and Caesar, represented in this world by sacerdotium and regnum, or, in modern terms, church and state. They may be associated, they may be separated; they may be in harmony, they may be in conflict; one may dominate, the other may dominate; one may interfere, the other may protest, as we are now learning again. But always there are two, the spiritual and the temporal powers, each with its own laws and jurisdictions, its own structure and hierarchy. In pre-westernized Islam, there were not two powers but one, and the question of separation, therefore, could not arise. . . . At the present time, the very notion of a secular jurisdiction and authority--of a so-to-speak unsanctified part of life that lies outside the scope of religious law and those who uphold it--is seen as an impiety, indeed as the ultimate betrayal of Islam. The righting of this wrong is the principal aim of Islamic revolutionaries and, in general, of those described as Islamic fundamentalists.

The conception of "Church" and "State" is as foreign to traditional Islam (though for different reasons) as it was foreign to Caesar of the Romans or even to the Protestants and Secularists who, through various doctrines or practices, subordinate the Church to the State [E.g., Luther's doctrine of "two kingdoms" and "one sword," and rejection of the Gelasian doctrine of "two swords." Calvin's notion of a "theocratic" state in Geneva. King Henry VIII's assumption of headship of the Church. Thomas Erastus and his Erastian doctrine that the church was under the dominion of the civil government. John Rawls's efforts to remove any references to "comprehensive doctrines" in public political discourse. ]