Towards a Catholic(!) Understanding of Religious Liberty

The impetus of this post is the exchange of some very disturbing comments between another blogger and me earlier this week. I will not link you to the post, because the confusing comment section does not deserve even a single view, lest someone be confused.

What this post will serve to do, today, is to combat the falsities that this blogger was expressing over the term ‘Religious Liberty’, by presenting the Catholic Truth.

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It is first helpful, in light of this topic and the direction towards which this post will be moving, to maybe start with Psalm 116:

116 O praise the Lord, all ye nations: praise him, all ye people. ² For his mercy is confirmed upon us: and the truth of the Lord remaineth for ever.

Praise the Lord, all ye nations: praise Him, all ye people. Not some. All. Our Lord is God. He is not just Our God but rather God, full stop. Regardless of what someone subjectively feels towards faith does not change this fact. God is God, whether we like it or not. Full stop.

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In fact, from this psalm, we can really just stop the post — yet I continue. Pope Leo XIII in his document entitled, Annum sacrum (1899), writes:

This world-wide and solemn testimony of allegiance and piety is especially appropriate to Jesus Christ, who is the Head and Supreme Lord of the race. His empire extends not only over Catholic nations and those who, having been duly washed in the waters of holy baptism, belong of right to the Church, although erroneous opinions keep them astray, or dissent from her teaching cuts them off from her care; it comprises also all those who are deprived of the Christian faith, so that the whole human race is most truly under the power of Jesus Christ.

Again, at this point how much clearer can this be? The entire document Annum sacrum is a gem of the Catholic faith, and is very clear on this matter of the True definition of religious liberty. I certainly recommend it to anyone who remains confused or skeptical, after reading this piece.

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I don’t doubt that this blogger and others who stray from Catholic theology want to be the best Catholics they can be. I don’t doubt that they want to be Saints; I don’t believe they are intentionally picking and choosing dogma to satisfy and settle some personal conflict that is boiling inside of themselves. I am the same way. I do the best I can to live the Catholic life that is in keeping with the will of God. Unintentionally, either by ignorance or inability to articulate what I meant, I have spoken ideas that seem to make sense on the face of things but I later come to realize that they conflict with Catholic teaching. And I change my stance on them, because I learned the Truth. Holding onto a falsity because it satisfies a personal preference towards something, or because it is ‘more feasible’ or ‘more realistic’ is objectively wrong when it conflicts with Catholic teaching; but we can repent and embrace the Truth, just as Our Lord’s followers did. Remember – St. Paul rebukes His Holiness Pope St. Peter in Galatians 2. Both are obviously some of the greatest Saints the Church has ever produced.

But this misunderstanding of religious liberty almost certainly comes from the American idea of liberty. Liberty! That which the ‘founding fathers’ fought and died for – so that we can say and believe whatever we want without being killed…right?

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Sort of. Yes, that tends to be the American definition, but that is also conflicting with Church teaching on the matter. It is quite apparent on the face of it that if [=because] Jesus Christ is Our Lord and Our God, then we must honor His wishes publicly and privately.

The great apologist John Salza wrote a fantastic piece on this ‘New Age’ religious liberty that seems to have sprung from misunderstandings of the teachings of the Second Vatican Council. This wouldn’t be the first time that someone misunderstood the documents of the Council and wrongly believed because of it.

When dealing with matters of philosophy, it is always a safe bet to turn to Doctor of the Church, St. Thomas Aquinas, as Mr. Salza does. He writes:

In the Summa, St. Thomas Aquinas emphasizes this distinction between “toleration” and the moral faculty of “right” in his treatment of human law. St. Thomas says that human law is derived from the natural law, but “if in any point [the human law] deflects from the law of nature, it is no longer a law but a perversion of law” Q.95, Art. 2, I-II. As applied here, if a civil right (which gives a person a right to worship a false god and influence others to do so) deflects from the law of nature (which imposes upon a person the obligation to worship the true God and influence others to do so), then we have a perversion of the law. Thus, the civil right (and not mere toleration) to publicly profess error, and risk corrupting Catholics in the process, is a perversion of the law which [Dignitatis humanae] sanctions.

It is true that human law cannot forbid all vices. St. Thomas explains that the purpose of human law is to lead all men to virtue gradually, not suddenly. If human law required men to abstain from all evil, St. Thomas says that men would break into even greater evils, being unable to bear such stringent precepts. Q.96, Art. 2, I-II. However, St. Thomas never says that men have a “civil right” to engage in lesser evils. Instead, “human law rightly allows some vices, by not repressing them” (ibid). In other words, the State tolerates some evil to avoid greater evil. St. Augustine says, “The law which is framed for the government of states, allows and leaves unpunished many things that are punished by Divine Providence” (De. Lib. Arb. i.5). Thus, the focus of Sts. Thomas and Augustine is on the toleration of evil for a greater good, not elevating the evil to a “right,” civil or otherwise.

An absolutely fantastic piece from Mr. Salza, with a breath-taking explanation of the Catholic Truth. Did you miss it? Let me recap: St. Thomas Aquinas says that we must make the distinction between tolerating moral wrongs and calling them ‘rights’ (even civil rights).

For example, we all know that there is no salvation outside of the Catholic Church. But, as St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine both agree to: there can be greater evils from forcing someone to abstain from evil. So it is objectively right to be Catholic, but forcing someone to be Catholic might result in greater evils, so the state can tolerate its citizens not being Catholic.

With that said, as I noted, St. Thomas Aquinas clearly writes that it is never a right to be able to wrongly believe. Though the American Constitution establishes the idea that all men have the right to believe whichever religion they want, this idea is expressly condemned by St. Thomas Aquinas, and has been held by the Church for hundreds and thousands of years.

Careful, again, with that distinction: The state can tolerate its citizens choosing another religious tradition, but is is never a right of those citizens to do so.

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This is firmly in keeping with the doctrine of Christ the King, and Psalm 116. If [=Because] Jesus Christ is Our Lord, Our God, and Our King, for all nations, Catholic or not, Christian or not, all legitimate rights come from God. Rights cannot be wrong. Rights cannot contradict God’s teaching.

This is, again, firmly described in the Gospel, during Our Lord’s Passion. Consider John 19:

⁹ And he entered into the hall again, and he said to Jesus: Whence art thou? But Jesus gave him no answer.

¹⁰ Pilate therefore saith to him: Speakest thou not to me? knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and I have power to release thee?

¹¹ Jesus answered: Thou shouldst not have any power against me, unless it were given thee from above. Therefore, he that hath delivered me to thee, hath the greater sin.

Our teachings affirm Natural Law. All legitimate authority comes from God, so no rights can contradict Natural Law. Again, I refer you to the same quote of St. Thomas Aquinas:

I answer that, As Augustine says (De Lib. Arb. i, 5) “that which is not just seems to be no law at all”: wherefore the force of a law depends on the extent of its justice. Now in human affairs a thing is said to be just, from being right, according to the rule of reason. But the first rule of reason is the law of nature, as is clear from what has been stated above (91, 2, ad 2). Consequently every human law has just so much of the nature of law, as it is derived from the law of nature. But if in any point it deflects from the law of nature, it is no longer a law but a perversion of law.

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This might seem like a subtle distinction: toleration vs. rights; but in reality it is a much larger deal than what first meets the eye. For one thing, just about no Catholic believes this anymore, thanks in large part, I think, to a failure to explicitly affirm the teaching in an explicit and clear way in the Second Vatican Council. For another thing, when someone stops believing this, he in effect ceases to accept the doctrine of Christ the King. How can Christ be the King if His reign only applies to Catholics?

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