What is interesting about the “legend” that has grown up
around Pope John Paul I is the claim that he somehow favored or leaned toward a
socialist interpretation of Catholic social teaching. Nothing could be further from the truth. His father was an ardent socialist, but his
mother refused to marry his father until he promised he would not interfere in any way
with their children’s religious upbringing — and he kept that promise,
eventually renouncing socialism and becoming reconciled to the Catholic Church.
John Paul I had a great love for all
people, but very carefully refused to give the socialists an inch, being
advised by the future Pope John Paul II that they would take a mile.
And if that was not sufficient warning, John
Paul I had the example of how Pope Pius IX’s reputation was destroyed by
disappointed liberals, radicals, socialists, modernists, and New Agers trying
to leverage authentic reforms into the “new things” they were so anxious to
implement to replace traditional religion and government. As we noted in the previous posting in this series, Pius IX
was far from being the reactionary, conservative monster that liberal
legend created out of its own desperate need for a villain. The notorious “Pio No-No” is, in fact, an
imaginary being who to every suggestion or proposal that smacked of liberalism
of any kind just shook his head and said, “No, no.” The real Pius IX was a liberal . . . but the
American kind, not the European variety. |
| Alexis de Tocqueville |
To reiterate the difference, American-style liberalism
which found its expression in the democracy that Alexis de Tocqueville
chronicled in Democracy in America
was based on the sovereignty of the individual human person. According to de Tocqueville, in America “the
People” is not an abstraction, but the consciously organized political body,
each member of which possesses inalienable rights.
Some political rights (never inalienable rights such as
life, liberty, and private property) are necessarily delegated to the group,
especially those, the “social virtues,” that can only be exercised by members
of groups. These, however, can never be
exercised absolutely. All rights, even natural
rights that are held absolutely, are necessarily limited in their exercise, the
most important limit being that no one is to be harmed by the exercise of a
right, including the right-holder, other individuals, groups, or the common
good as a whole.
European-style liberalism, however, assumes as a given
that all rights come from the collective; people don’t delegate rights to an
abstraction, an abstraction hands out rights to people. Swept under the rug and ignored is the
fundamental contradiction in European liberalism: that refusal to accept that human
beings create the abstraction of the collective; the abstraction of the
collective does not and cannot create human beings.
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| Pope Pius IX |
Still, although a liberal, Pius XI was unable to act on it
due to the attacks on the Papal States from within and without by
European-style liberals and radicals.
These were intent upon bringing Church and State up to date and conform
them to the “new things” of socialism, modernism, and the New Age.
Nevertheless, it is one of the supreme ironies of history
that the very thing intended to undermine, even abolish the papacy — the
conquest of the Papal States by Sardinia — only resulted in making it a
stronger and more powerful force in the world than ever before. Freed from the necessity of governing as a
civil ruler Pius IX was able to devote himself almost exclusively to the needs
of the Universal Church.
It is easy to see the Hand of Providence (or at least to
believe one has seen it) in the fact that Pius IX had the longest pontificate
in history to date at the very time when a change in leadership would have been
most dangerous. Almost by chance it
seemed to many that the Catholic Church had a leader with a clear vision and
sound principles just when society was dissolving in chaos before the onslaught
of the “new things.”
Although it is a tribute to the effectiveness of
socialist, modernist, and New Age propaganda, the fact that so few even in the
Catholic Church are aware of Pius IX’s accomplishments is a disgrace
approaching the magnitude of a scandal. Dismissed
as a political reactionary by superficial commentators themselves pushing a
(European) liberal agenda, religiously and politically the Catholic Church made
immense gains during his pontificate.
 |
| Queen Victoria |
From a tactical point of view, the head of a Church with
no political aspirations other than recovery of its own territory (which could
be ignored) was in a much better bargaining position with a sovereign nation than,
say, the head of the Church of England. Queen
Victoria’s religious position was necessarily secondary to her political role
as titular head of the British Empire, and political considerations were always
a factor in virtually any decision made by the Church of England’s de facto head, the Archbishop of
Canterbury. No longer could governments
discriminate against Catholics on the rather specious grounds that they were
foreigners and subjects of an Italian princeling who planned on overthrowing
the government.
Pius IX concluded concordats with many countries and gave
strong support to the Central Party in Prussia and the Catholic Verein movement
in Germany. He reestablished the
hierarchy in England and the Netherlands and restored the Catholic Patriarchate
of Jerusalem. Mostly in the United
States and the British Empire he founded more than two hundred new dioceses and
vicariates apostolic.
 |
| Hill of Martyrs, Nagasaki |
One of the most significant events during his pontificate,
which Pius IX himself described as a “miracle,” was the discovery that
Christianity had survived in Japan for almost a quarter of a millennium after Catholic
priests and all other foreigners were expelled in the seventeenth century. In 1865, some years after missionaries were
allowed back into the country (but forbidden to proselytize), a group of people
from Urakami village near Nagasaki visited the new Ōura Church.
One woman approached Father Bernard Thadee Petitjean and
(according to most sources) asked how his wife was. On being told that he was celibate, she then
asked who was pope. When informed on
this point, she asked (depending again on the source) either to see his Rosary
or the statue of the Blessed Virgin in the church (possibly both). Satisfied that the three key questions had
been answered correctly, she told Father Petitjean that they were “Kirishitan.”
It turned out that there were tens of thousands
Kirishitan, mostly around Nagasaki. When
the persecutions finally ended in 1873, most returned to the Church, although a
significant minority continued to practice a corrupt version of Catholicism, “Hanare
Kirishitan,” mixed in with Shinto, Buddhist, and animist elements down to the
present day.
 |
| First Vatican Council |
With respect to Catholic social teaching, however, the
crowning achievement of Pius IX’s pontificate was the First Vatican
Council. Most people are familiar with
the fact that it was during this council that the Church formally defined the
infallibility of the teaching office of the pope in matters of faith and
morals. Since many socialists,
modernists, and New Agers claimed to have special revelations or dispensations
straight from God the Father, Jesus, or the Holy Spirit, this was a critical
“weapon” in the ongoing struggle against New Christianity/Neo-Catholicism.
Admittedly, even many Catholics today do not understand
papal infallibility. This is despite the
fact that the title of the document defining it was changed from De Romani Pontificis Infallibilitate,
“On the Infallibility of the Roman Pontiff,” to De Romani Pontificis Infallibili Magisterio, “On the Infallible
Teaching Office of the Roman Pontiff.” This
change was made due to the fear that people would think that the pope cannot
make a human error or can somehow create truth out of nothing.
 |
| Pope Honorius I |
No, papal infallibility only means that through the
guidance of the Holy Spirit and under certain conditions when the question
involves a matter purely of faith or morals, the pope can declare something not
merely true as has always been believed, but infallibly true. Science of
any kind — including theology and philosophy! — does not apply in such
instances; scientific proof is necessarily lacking in matters of faith and
morals. Most simply put, infallibility
means that the pope can say infallibly that something is true, but he cannot
make something true by saying it.
Once infallibility is correctly understood, it explains
why the philosophical or theological errors made by a number of popes, such as Pope
Leo XII when he approved the collectivist “theory of certitude” of de Lamennais
(a theory later condemned as heretical), or Pope Honorius I in the early
seventh century when he ratified monothelytism as orthodox, are not really an
issue. These and other questions, such
as the opinion of Pope John XXII regarding the Beatific Vision, are
philosophical and theological — scientific — in nature, things to which reason
is properly applied, not faith, and no pope is infallible in his reasoning.
 |
| De Lamennais |
If, on the other hand, a pope started teaching that God is
not a Trinity, or that the Eucharist is not the Body and Blood of Christ —
matters of pure faith — or that abortion is allowable (morals), then papal infallibility
would be open to question, but not otherwise, according to Catholic belief. Given that the New Christian/Neo-Catholic
movement invariably based its “new things” on some personal revelation, such as
the divinity of human society, the non-existence of God, denial of the natural
law (especially private property), and so on — that is, assertions based on
faith (albeit a personal faith misapplied to matters of science) that cannot be
proven by reason — papal infallibility was a powerful tool in the struggle to
restore orthodoxy.
Surprising many people — especially Catholics — the other
important doctrine defined during the First Vatican Council was the primacy of
reason. Reason is the essential
foundation of faith. This is because
while matters of faith cannot be proved by reason, neither can they go contrary
to it. Thus, as the Council Fathers
declared,
If anyone says that the one, true God, our creator and lord,
cannot be known with certainty from the things that have been made [by the
empirical evidence of the senses], by the natural light of human reason [by the human intellect]: let him be anathema. (Vatican I, Canon 2.1)
 |
| Pope Pius XII |
Thus, as Pope Pius XII would reiterate in § 2 of his
encyclical Humani Generis in 1950, “absolutely speaking, human
reason by its own natural force and light can arrive at a true and certain
knowledge of the one personal God, Who by His providence watches over and
governs the world, and also of the natural law, which the Creator has written in
our hearts.”
A
key element in Pius IX’s struggle against the “new things,” then, was to
restore the primacy of reason and the legitimate role of faith. This was critical because the New
Christianity always based its reasoning
on faith instead of its faith on reason, leading inevitably to rejecting reason
altogether . . . paradoxically maintaining in most instances that the
innovative doctrines were wholly reasonable because they were consistent with
the new revelation.
Armed in this way with orthodox faith and sound reason,
the Catholic Church was now prepared to counter the inroads made by the “new
things” of the modern world that had wreaked such havoc around the globe. All that was needed was the right leader . .
. and that was the one thing both liberals and conservatives inside and outside
the Church were determined the world was not going to get, come what may.
#30#
