The necessity of clarifying the terms used in speech exists always but
particularly in tense and tormented periods. Otherwise, the same words
conceal meanings and attitudes which may be divergent and even opposed.
Take the case of religious liberty. When it is established that it is
not a question of doctrinal and moral relativism but of a civil right
not to be subjected to coercion or discrimination on the part of the
State in the name of a choice of faith, the problems do not all seem
solved. Is the subject of this right only the individual citizen, or
also the series of intermediate bodies which act in society and the
Christian community itself under the leadership of its pastors? Is the
autonomous decision to believe—or not—to be safeguarded and
facilitated only in its development within the depths of human
conscience, or also in its important sociological manifestations? And
are these manifestations to be limited to forms of worship and of
intra-ecclesial organization, or can they go beyond them, being
expressed also in projects and cultural realizations—cultural in the
significant sense of the term—within the context of the common good?
And is the common good identified necessarily with a State to the extent
that community religious expressions can be accepted only insofar as
they are considered "instrumenta regni''?
The questions do not seem exhausted. Underlying them is always a
general determinant question, which concerns the very structure of
religion and the concept of faith that justifies it.
The Catholic position takes for granted that the "confessional
State" (even more precisely, the "Christian State") is a
thing of the past. But yet it does not accept an "ideological
State". "Can a State"—Paul VI asks in his address to
the Diplomatic Corps on 14 January—"fruitfully call for entire
trust and collaboration while, by a kind of 'negative confessionalism',
it proclaims itself atheist, and, while declaring that it respects,
within a certain framework, individual beliefs, takes up position
against the faith of part of its citizens?" The question can be
repeated even if the State does not declare itself atheist, but in
actual fact hinders or does not accept public expression of the
religious convictions "both of individual persons and of
associations". The Declaration Dignitatis Humanae already
affirms: "There are forms of government under which, despite
constitutional recognition of the freedom of religious worship, the
public authorities themselves strive to deter the citizens from
professing their religion and make life particularly difficult and
dangerous for religious bodies" (n. 15). Further, it points out
that this liberty may be violated "either openly or covertly"
(n. 6) and also with psychological pressure (cf. n. 2).
It would perhaps be useful, at this point, to insist on clarifying
further the necessity that faith bears within it of being lived in a
community key and of assuming public expressions. The above-mentioned
conciliar Declaration does not limit itself to claiming the right of the
individual believer: it proposes, for example, also the right of the
family (cf. n. 5), of the school (ibidem), of intermediate groups (cf.
n. 4), of the eccelesial community itself (cf. nn. 13-14), to act freely
"in private or in public, alone or in associations with
others" (n. 2) in the name of a faith that does not oppose, but
promotes, an orderly civil society. As to the importance also of
external acts, reference is made to the fundamental principle according
to which "his own social nature requires that man give external
expression to these internal acts of religion, that he communicate with
others on religious matters, and profess his religion in community'' (n.
3).
Let these references be sufficient. Yet the fundamental problem
remains and returns: has not faith in itself the capacity and, in fact,
the necessity of making an impact also on the way of instituting a
culture and a civilization? Consequently, does not religious freedom
include also the right of influencing society to make it more human,
because more inspired by evangelical principles?
Do not fear a return to "integralism" or a kind of attempt
at a "theocracy" or "ecclesiocracy". Integralism
exists when the claim is made to exhaust the riches of the Christian
mystery in projects of culture and civilization which cannot but present
themselves as limited and precarious; or when the claim is made to find
or draw from revelation even the most detailed formulas to be applied to
the different situations regardless of the historical context; or when
"profane" areas of existence are unduly "sacralized"—instrumentalizing
them. And "theocracy" or "ecclesiocracy" could not
fail to appear, today, as a real sin against the divine gift of man's
freedom and of the independence of the creature.
But there is a vast difference between recognizing these facts and
setting aside the faith as a principle that saves and stimulates
the truest human values. It depends on whether or not one admits
that the religious choice possesses an originality of thought and of
life of its own, and that this originality—never to be imposed—has
within it the strength to react against all injustice and to stimulate
the construction of a more and more human society.
If the answer to the question is affirmative—albeit with all the
difficulty of determining the content and the method of implementation
of Christian originality—then consequences of considerable importance
can be drawn.
There is derived from it, for example, the right of the ecclesial
community to carry out the mission which it believes Christ has
entrusted to it, and to have at its disposal the means suitable for this
purpose within the limits of common good (cf. Dignitatis Humanae,
nn. 13-14; the last Synod of Bishops laid great stress on this subject).
This is not all: there is derived from it the right of the ecclesial
community to establish and run forms of human aggregations which, though
not being directly forms of worship, are in some way connected with
religious life for example, culture, the school welfare, recreation,
etc. Unless the State decides aprioristically that the Christian faith
must be a private fact or a phenomenon to be shut up within the walls of
temples!
It is a question of the freedom of Catholic institutions, recently
affirmed again by the Italian bishops. The conciliar Declaration speaks
of the right of the community to "promote institutions in which
members may work together to organize their own lives according to their
religious principles" (n. 4).
A quotation from the communiqué of the Presidency of the Conference
of Bishops of Italy CEI on 27 January may be illuminating: "We wish
to say a word as regards the tendency in progress in our country to
centralize, albeit at various levels, a political power which leaves no
freedom for persons, families, intermediate bodies, the plurality of
experiences and institutions, and the presence of the Church. A
hegemonic and totalitarian planning of education, of the schools, of
culture and its expressions, of free time, of public welfare, of medical
care, of the economy, can do nothing but diminish responsibility and
create the dangerous premises of a collectivity that loses man,
suppressing his fundamental rights and his free capacities of
expression". It will be noted that what is at stake is not so much
the believer. It is man as such: the man of whatever outlook and of
whatever behaviour who does not tyrannize others.
It goes without saying, however, that this right does not exhaust
religious liberty (even if it shows in an outstanding way its innovative
and creative impulse, also in human matters). Even before this comes the
right of the believer to be able to express his own originality in the
social context—a "lay" one—in which he finds himself
living: not in order to "ecclesialize" structures which must
remain independent of a religious view but to make them more and more
correspond to the indispensable dimensions of the person and of civil
society. This is confirmed by Paul VI in the address to the Diplomatic
Corps: "On our side, we have always encouraged Pastors and faithful
to show persevering patience, to be loyal to the legitimate authorities,
and to commit themselves generously in the civil and social field in
everything that serves the good of their country". The
emphases—ours—also explain a critical attitude of believers where
man's fundamental rights are violated. Similarly, they explain a
constant commitment of Catholics who receive precisely from their faith
the ultimate reason of their responsibility to construct a more human
history. Here the address that the Pope delivered at the General
Audience on Wednesday 1 February should be re-read entirely:
"Christian life is a social vocation... man needs others, and is
bound by the great commandment of love... We must beware of the
temptations of anti-sociality, which real life may bring forth even in
those who set themselves an honest programme of social life, but defend
themselves from the disturbances and obligations that the
community relationship may bring with it... There is danger of a
"strike" of good citizens, who merely submit passively to
being members of the collectivity, while seeking silently to evade those
burdens which conflict with their own interest, their own habits and
their own ideas... The Christian, even if the social framework tends to
reduce him to silence, to make him a mere unit in the mass, to
extinguish in him the spark of his faith and his love, always possesses
in himself an original principle of goodness and action, which often, as
the example of the Saints and of the good teaches us, has succeeded in
drawing from the contrast of the times the idea and the strength to bear
witness to itself in a new form, salutary for everyone... Take heart,
then ...".
Take heart, yes—and a thank you to the Pope—since it is not a
question just of affirming a view of faith that is not disincarnate or
of claiming a civil right that is perhaps contested. It is a question of
working for religious liberty in the whole range of its expressions and
applications: with imagination, with wisdom and with serenity.
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