Syllabus

A comment on the SSPX

Elliot Milco has a very good, very lengthy reflection on the current situation of the Society of St. Pius X, especially the events of 1975-1976. (A fuller history of these events may be found, of course, in Michael Davies’s Apologia pro Marcel Lefebvre, which is still freely available on the internet.) Milco observes:

Lefebvre loved the Pope, but he rejected the changes he saw destroying the Church he had served all his life.  He embraced the authoritative teaching of Vatican II, but rejected its ambiguous expressions and inversions, which he believed paved the way for abuse and error.  Ultimately he loved Christ and the Truth, and would (like any good missionary) have rather died than abandon either.  Despite all these virtues, a decade and more of ostracism, injustice, and (occasionally) outright dishonesty from Vatican officials left Lefebvre extremely distrustful of the Vatican.  While a million abuses and heresies were permitted and even encouraged throughout the Church, Lefebvre’s little seminary was being targeted and suppressed.

(Emphasis supplied.) Of course, the events of 1975-1976 were overshadowed by the events of June 1988, and one could be excused for thinking that 1988 was the sole relevant year for relations between the Society and Rome.

However, it is perhaps providential that Pope Francis is reigning on the fortieth anniversary of the initial conflict between Lefebvre and Rome. The Holy Father has made the resolution of the SSPX a major priority for his pontificate, and he has been willing to overlook technical issues in favor of dialogue and reconciliation. Recently, in an interview with La Croix, the Holy Father observed:

In Buenos Aires, I often spoke with them. They greeted me, asked me on their knees for a blessing. They say they are Catholic. They love the Church.

Bishop Fellay is a man with whom one can dialogue. That is not the case for other elements who are a little strange, such as Bishop Williamson or others who have been radicalized. Leaving this aside, I believe, as I said in Argentina, that they are Catholics on the way to full communion.

During this year of mercy, I felt that I needed to authorize their confessors to pardon the sin of abortion. They thanked me for this gesture. Previously, Benedict XVI, whom they greatly respect, had liberalized the use of the Tridentine rite mass. So good dialogue and good work are taking place.

(Emphasis supplied.) For his part, Bishop Bernard Fellay, superior-general of the Society, in a lengthy and wide-ranging interview with Edward Pentin of the National Catholic Register, noted:

The Pope’s harshest criticism always tends to be directed to the “doctors of the law” and whom he views as pharisaical. Some would argue that he’s talking about, among others, the Society. What do you say to that, that he seems to be most angry towards people like yourselves?

I asked some people in Rome, who is he aiming at? They didn’t know, they didn’t know what to say. They said “maybe you, but…”. The answer I most got was: “Conservative Americans”! So really, frankly, I don’t know. He definitely dislikes people who are too ideological. That’s very clear. And I think he knows us enough from Argentina to see that we care about people. Yes, we may have a very strong position on the doctrine, but we care. So we show a genuine, so to say, action following this doctrine and I think what he’s reproaching is not that. Certainly he doesn’t agree with us on these points on the Council which we are attacking. Definitely he doesn’t. But for him, as the doctrine is not so important, man, the people, are important, and there we have given enough proof that we are Catholics. That’s the approach that he has.

(Question in italics and emphasis supplied.)

When one thinks on the events of 1975 and 1976—the disastrous “meetings” of February 21 and March 3, 1975, the peremptory decision of the Commission of Cardinals of May 6, 1975, and the Bishop of Lausanne’s irregular suppression of the Society itself—the attitude of the Holy Father is astonishing. Recall the clever technical maneuvers of the Commission of Cardinals and Cardinal Villot, then the Secretary of State, which were anything but clear. Were the meetings between Lefebvre and the Commission mere discussions or a canonical trial? Did the Bishop of Lausanne have the authority of the Holy See to suppress the Society? Did the Holy Father approve the acts of the Commission in forma specifica? If so, when?  Were some of the Commission’s actions, in fact, reviewable by the Apostolic Signatura? Pope Francis, on the other hand, makes his distaste for such lawyerly straining at gnats clear: dialogue is the important thing, not technicalities, and he is willing to make concrete gestures to further this dialogue. He meets with Bishop Fellay at Casa Santa Marta, he concedes the Society faculties for the Jubilee Year, and he makes it clear that the Society is on the path to full communion.

It is, in a sense, the exact reversal of the attitude of the Roman authorities in 1975-1976.

Countering the consensus against St. Joseph the Workman

At Opus Publicum, Gabriel Sanchez has an interesting comment about the feast of St. Joseph the Workman, which begins, in relevant part:

The author’s latest target is the Latin feast of St. Joseph the Worker (San Giuseppe Comunista!), a mid-1950s invention which most traditional Catholics today regard as either imprudent or unnecessary. Those who have been exposed to the Gregorian hymns for this occasion know full well that they fall pretty darn short of “the mark” when it comes to the beauty and richness of the Roman Rite and some of the propers are not exactly inspiring. However, to howl on about the feast being a “modernist invention” is a bridge too far, particularly when one understands that the primary intent and purpose behind the feast was to dislodge May Day as an exclusively secularist (and communistic) holiday. Did it work? Well, of course not, but not because the liturgical texts themselves are riddled with theological error or bumped the feast Ss. Phillip and James (a feast many Catholics have all but forgotten about). Let’s not forget, however, that the feast was introduced during a period of time when the great 19th and 20th century popes took it upon themselves to speak forcefully on matters concerning labor, economics, and society, with stern reminders being issued by the likes of Leo XIII, St. Pius X, and Pius XI on the justice due to laborers. In fact, this teaching is captured nicely in the feast’s introit: “Wisdom rendered to the just the wages of their labors, and conducted them in a wonderful way: and she was to them for a covert by day, and for the light of stars by night, allelúja, allelúja.”

(Emphasis supplied and quotation marks reformatted.) And the author Sanchez discusses is not the only author to criticize at great length the feast of St. Joseph the Workman. Fr. John Hunwicke, for example, has had several lengthy posts in the last couple of weeks, mostly directed to the fact that the new feast of St. Joseph the Workman replaced the feast of Ss. Phillip and James. (Or, more precisely, displaced, since Phillip and James were moved to May 11.) And Fr. Hunwicke is not alone in his distaste for St. Joseph the Workman. Part of the low regard in which the feast is held is, we think, a function of the fact that a broader sense is emerging that the liturgical reform that culminated in the Novus Ordo really began in earnest under Pius XII. (Though that attitude fails to take into account that the Breviary was reformed almost constantly from the moment Quod a nobis was signed.) And St. Joseph the Workman is seen as part and parcel of that reform.

But Sanchez makes a point that—we confess—had not occurred to us before; that is, the feast of St. Joseph the Workman fits into the broader context of the great pronouncements of Leo XIII and Pius XI on social-justice issues. And, aside from the twin pillars of Rerum novarum and Quadragesimo anno, these issues were very much in the Church’s mind in the first half of the twentieth century, the two world wars notwithstanding. The Church’s developing social teaching was very much present in Pius X’s Notre Charge Apostolique, though that encyclical was directed to more concrete circumstances in France. And, of course, Pius XII himself made significant contributions to the Church’s social teaching with his radio address, La solennità della Pentecoste, some of which found its way into his document on migrants, Exsul Familia Nazarethana. All of this is to say that the question of workers and justice for workers was very much a live question for the Church in the first half of the twentieth century. And, certainly, one cannot remove Pius XII from this context. And, therefore, it makes sense, as Sanchez suggests, that Pius XII would introduce a major feast addressing in a liturgical way the issues that he and his immediate predecessor had grappled with.

Now, it is an open question whether the implementation of St. Joseph the Workman was well done. One of the comboxers at Sanchez’s site points out that the readings at Matins are not uniformly hugely edifying. And it is true that one of the three nocturns consists of the acta of Pius XII regarding the implementation of the feast, though the other two nocturns seem more or less okay, especially the readings from Genesis. But, setting that to one side, is the office of St. Joseph the Workman worse in any objective sense than the offices of any of the important saints whose third-class feasts consist of the psalms and antiphons of the day, the usual hymns, chapters, and antiphons from the common, and one reading at Matins unique to the saint (with the bulk of Matins being given over to the occurring readings)? We have a hard time seeing that it is, especially since, when one gets into a long run of confessors-not-bishops as one is apt to do in tempus per annum, the offices blend together. One does not necessarily excuse the other, of course, but let us not, out of condemnatory zeal, act as though St. Joseph the Workman is a blight on an otherwise traditional Breviary. By 1960 the trajectory toward Pope Paul’s Liturgia Horarum, with its horror of repetition and its strong (almost unalterable) presumption in favor of the occurring psalmody, was largely marked out.

With the chummy relations between the Holy See and the Society of St. Pius X, we are, of course, hopeful that full canonical regularity will be established, ideally in the form of a personal prelature or some other juridical structure that preserves, insofar as possible and desirable, the independence of the SSPX. But one of the issues that will have to be addressed at some point is the question of the liturgical books. Lefebvre’s choice of the 1960/1962 books was not necessarily a deeply ideological decision, as we understand it, and there may well be little reason to cling to them once the SSPX is regularized. Perhaps at that time, with so much in the air, a complete overhaul of the calendar would be in order. The differences between the 1960/1962 calendar and the current calendar are especially acute on this subject: St. Joseph the Workman is not a solemnity in the new calendar (having been drastically downgraded to an optional memorial), and Ss. Phillip and James are no longer celebrated on May 11, but May 3.

Read Sanchez’s whole post. A couple parts we did not quote are well worth thinking about.

 

A problem confronting the builder of bridges

News has broken in the last several days that Fr. Franz Schmidberger, former superior general of the Society of St. Pius X and rector of the Society’s “Herz Jesu” seminary in Zaitzkofen, Germany, has written a lengthy memorandum for the consideration of other Society leaders regarding the (increasingly likely) prospect of full regularity in its relations with Rome. (We say “full regularity” for lack of a more euphonious term: it is plain that the Holy Father does not view the SSPX as schismatic, though he acknowledges some canonical irregularity.) Richard Chonak, at New Liturgical Movement, has prepared a translation of Fr. Schmidberger’s memorandum. While Fr. Schmidberger’s memorandum was originally prepared as a private brief, Chonak’s translation has been approved by Fr. Schmidberger. Rorate Caeli has provided the French original.

There has already been some media coverage of Fr. Schmidberger’s memorandum. At the National Catholic Register, a news story notes that Fr. Schmidberger’s memorandum comes in the wake of Archbishop Guido Pozzo’s extraordinary recent interview, in which the secretary of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei suggested in very strong terms that complete acceptance of the various documents of the Second Vatican Council was not a precondition for full union. And, of course, Bishop Fellay recently met privately with the Holy Father in Rome. Plainly, things are happening.

For our part, the collapse of negotiations in 2012 was a bitter event, not least since full union—or full regularity—between Rome and the Society was plainly a project of immense personal significance to Benedict XVI. However, it certainly appears that Pope Francis has picked up where his predecessor left off, and made a commitment this time to take concrete steps to regularize the Society one way or another.

We were particularly struck by a couple of points that Fr. Schmidberger made, which seems especially apt in the wake of Amoris laetitia, and the reactions in some quarters to some responses to that exhortation. First, Fr. Schmidberger emphasizes the distinction between the papacy as a divinely ordained institution and any particular pope:

The Church is infallible in her divine nature, but she is led by human beings who can go astray and also be burdened with failings. An office should be distinguished from the person in it at a given moment. The latter holds office for a certain time and then steps down—either through death or through other circumstances; the office remains. Today Pope Francis is the holder of the papal office with the power of the primacy. At some hour that we do not know, he will step down and another Pope will be elected. As long as he occupies the papal throne, we recognize him as such and pray for him. We are not saying that he is a good Pope. On the contrary, through his liberal ideas and his administration he causes much confusion in the Church. But when Christ established the papacy, He foresaw the whole line of popes throughout Church history, including Pope Francis. And nonetheless He permitted the latter’s ascent to the papal throne. Analogously, the Lord instituted the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Altar with the Real Presence, although He foresaw many sacrileges over the course of history.

(Emphasis supplied.) Setting to one side the tricky question of the extent to which the Holy Spirit participates in the selection of a particular man as pope at a particular time, Fr. Schmidberger’s second point there (or the second point we emphasized) is something that traditionally minded Catholics should repeat to themselves whenever they are troubled by this or that coming out of Rome. Fr. Schmidberger went on to note:

We have already pointed out the necessary distinction between office and officeholder. No doubt the current Pope has the God-given task of showing everyone plainly what the Council really was and what its ultimate consequences are doing to the Church: confusion, the dictatorship of relativism, setting pastoral concerns above doctrine, friendship with the enemies of God and the opponents of Christianity. But precisely because of this, people here and there are coming to understand the errors of the Council and to infer the cause from the effects. Furthermore, those who relied too much on Benedict XVI personally, instead of putting the papal office first and its holder second, were left out in the rain by the resignation of the Pope emeritus. Let us not make the same mistake again of relying too much on the specific person, instead of on the divine institution! Maybe, too, Pope Francis is precisely the one who, with his unpredictability and improvisation, is capable of taking this step. The mass media may forgive him for this expedient, whereas they would never ever have forgiven Benedict XVI. In his authoritarian, not to mention tyrannical style of governance, he would probably be capable of carrying out such a measure even against opposition.

(Emphasis supplied.) This, too, is a point that ought to be considered very seriously, especially as traditionally minded Catholics seem to be looking to other prelates than the Holy Father for guidance and reassurance.

Cardinal Müller’s new book-length interview

Gerhard Ludwig Cardinal Müller, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, has a forthcoming book-length interview with the Spanish publisher Carlos Granados. For now, the book will be in Spanish, but translations are apparently forthcoming. Sandro Magister has several lengthy excerpts at his website. One passage, translated for Magister by Matthew Sherry, touches upon the reformation festivities forthcoming, no doubt, next year:

Strictly speaking, we Catholics have no reason to celebrate October 31, 1517, the date that is considered the beginning of the Reformation that would lead to the rupture of Western Christianity.

If we are convinced that divine revelation is preserved whole and unchanged through Scripture and Tradition, in the doctrine of the faith, in the sacraments, in the hierarchical constitution of the Church by divine right, founded on the sacrament of holy orders, we cannot accept that there exist sufficient reasons to separate from the Church.

The members of the Protestant ecclesial communities look at this event from a different perspective, because they think that it is the opportune moment to celebrate the rediscovery of the “pure Word of God,” which they presume to have been disfigured throughout history by merely human traditions. The Protestant reformers arrived at the conclusion, five hundred years ago, that some Church hierarchs were not only morally corrupt, but had also distorted the Gospel and, as a result, had blocked the path of salvation for believers toward Jesus Christ. To justify the separation they accused the pope, the presumed head of this system, of being the Antichrist.

How can the ecumenical dialogue with the evangelical communities be carried forward today in a realistic way? The theologian Karl-Heinz Menke is speaking the truth when he asserts that the relativization of the truth and the acritical adoption of modern ideologies are the principal obstacle toward union in the truth.

In this sense, a Protestantization of the Catholic Church on the basis of a secular vision without reference to transcendence not only cannot reconcile us with the Protestants, but also cannot allow an encounter with the mystery of Christ, because in Him we are repositories of a supernatural revelation to which all of us owe total obedience of intellect and will (cf. “Dei Verbum,” 5).

I think that the Catholic principles of ecumenism, as they were proposed and developed by the decree of Vatican Council II, are still entirely valid (cf. “Unitatis Redintegratio,” 2-4). On the other hand, I am convinced that the document of the congregation for the doctrine of the faith “Dominus Iesus,” of the holy year of 2000, not understood by many and unjustly rejected by others, is without a doubt the magna carta against the Christological and ecclesiological relativism of this time of such confusion.

(Emphases added.) Good medicine. And there’s more of it in the post, touching upon some of the other flashpoint issues of the present day. Some sources have already picked up on Cardinal Müller’s comments about the forthcoming celebration of the reformation.

It remains to be seen, of course, what the Holy Father says in Sweden when he attends an ecumenical service commemorating the reformation. However, it seems to us that Cardinal Müller is fundamentally right, not merely that there are not valid reasons for separating from communion with Christ’s Church, though that is certainly true, but also that western Christianity and, indeed, the west as a whole has been injured by the reformation. There has been an impoverishment of western Christianity in the intervening 500 years that was scarcely conceivable with the first protestants struck out very much on their own. And one even wonders whether the complete inversion of man’s relationship to God, which Pope Emeritus Benedict has discussed fairly recently, would have happened in the absence of the wounds in the Body of Christ caused by the reformation. But such speculation is probably not entirely helpful at the moment. So we will say this: we look forward very much to reading Cardinal Müller’s thoughts on these matters.

For our part, we imagine that, on October 31, 1517, we will remember in a special way the souls of those who departed this life outside of full communion with Christ’s Church and his vicar, the Roman Pontiff.

Hunwicke on Tissier’s biography of Lefebvre

Fr. John Hunwicke has a very lengthy, very interesting post, ostensibly recommending Bishop Tissier’s definitive life of Marcel Lefebvre, and arriving at some broader reflections. (It is worth noting that the Holy Father is reputed to be a fan of Tissier’s book, having read it twice, according to reports. One wonders whether the Holy Father’s evident sympathy for the SSPX is rooted in sympathy for its founder.) A selection:

But is it true that Marcel Lefebvre was faced with a situation of grave disorder? I think we can avoid just loudly shouting at each other about our own individual subjective judgements; instead we can simply consider objective, Magisterial  decisions. Summorum Pontificum confirmed juridically that the Latin Church had lived for some four decades under the dominion of … yes … a lie. The Vetus Ordo had not been lawfully prohibited. Much persecution of devout priests and layfolk that took place during those decades is therefore now … officially … seen to have been vis sine lege. For this so long to have been so true with regard to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which lies at the heart of the Church’s life, argues a profound illness deep within the Latin Church. And that Big Lie was reinforced by multitudes of Little Lies … that the Council mandated reordered Sanctuaries … that the Council mandated exclusive use of the vernacular …

So, I suggest, we can read Bishop Tissier’s book as a narrative of how a good, but very often puzzled, man coped with the incomprehensible. And we can do this to our own benefit. Many Catholics find our present situation incomprehensible. As in the situations which Lefebvre faced, some Catholics may naturally feel inclined to act as though the rule-book does still apply (and so to treat the Church’s current office-holders with the same obsequium as if we were still in the pontificate of S Pius X); on the other hand, others may discern the dysfunctions and ask their consciences what God expects of them by way of resistance, as many did during the Arian crisis and the Great Western Schism.

(Formatting in original.) Read the whole thing there.

Pentin assesses papal appointments three years in

We note, briefly, that Edward Pentin has, at the National Catholic Register, kicked off a three-part examination of the Holy Father’s various appointments. The first installment deals primarily with Francis’s diocesan appointments throughout the world. A brief selection:

Father Goyret thinks these choices are a consequence of placing at the center what the Pope considers overriding pastoral concerns, rather than safeguarding doctrine. The Pope, he believes, is “neither conservative nor progressive,” stressing he doesn’t like to use such labels for a pope. Nor is he “against traditional theology or doctrine,” he said. “He just skips these categories and wants pastoral and missionary bishops.”

After Benedict XVI paid close attention to sound doctrine, Francis is trying, at some risk, to “find a different way because he believes that evangelization has to change,” Father Goyret said. “He says we’ve been worried too much about sound doctrine, but that does not mean he goes against sound doctrine.”

But even if the Pope’s appointments may be doctrinally solid, the change of emphasis is having other consequences. A senior Church source in Italy told the Register on condition of anonymity that although recent appointments in the country have been “good parish priests,” they don’t have the “personal gravity to be bishop.”

He said many of the new Italian bishops are “great at the fatherly gestures, hugging, kissing babies, but they are not teachers of the faith, they’re not prepared for that.” He added that the bishop has to be “a strong and courageous pastor and be able to govern the Church,” and that failing to appoint those “willing to make hard decisions makes the flock ill provided for.”

(Emphasis supplied.) Read the whole thing there.

We will be following this series with interest, especially when Pentin turns his eye toward the Curial appointments.

 

 

A notable new book on the Church’s social teaching

At The Distributist Review, Thomas Storck reviews Daniel Schwindt’s new book, Catholic Social Teaching: A New Synthesis. Storck’s review is, in the main, positive, and we have ourselves added Schwindt’s book to the list of books we want to buy. (An ever-expanding list that is, we admit, more aspirational than anything else!) We encourage you to check it out, and if we get around to buying it and reading it, we will be sure to share our impressions. We note particularly a couple of points that Storck makes that encourage us greatly.

First, Storck observes that:

Following these preliminary points, the author discusses what he calls “permanent principles,” which are: the common good, the universal destination of goods, private property, solidarity and subsidiarity, freedom and justice. The inclusion of freedom in this list raises some questions, however. The freedom of choice with which man is endowed accompanies him everywhere, indeed is inseparable from his nature, regardless of his political or even penal situation. In the Anglo-American tradition, however, it is not this inherent freedom which preoccupies us but freedom in the political order, which is widely seen as the chief political good. But this is surely incorrect. Rather it is justice which is the chief political good, and it is justice which rules and determines the other principles listed here, such as property, solidarity and subsidiarity. Obviously political freedom is good to a degree, but it is subordinate to both justice and the common good.

(Emphasis added.) This seems to us to be a very good capsule summary of much of what is wrong with modern America, economically and otherwise. And it seems to us further to be a really very good way of summarizing the fundamental disagreement between those who are faithful to the whole of the Church’s social teaching and those who part ways with the Church. Obviously, there is nothing incompatible with justice and freedom necessarily, provided that both are understood properly. However, when freedom becomes disordered and ossifies into liberalism, it is indeed often flatly incompatible with justice. Now, this might not be the end of the discussion, but it seems to us that it’s a fine elevator pitch.

Second:

Although, as he notes, the popes have called for cooperation and just dealings between capitalist owners and workers, still “the Christian aversion to the concentration of ownership and wealth has ancient roots.” If ownership and work are not divorced, it is more difficult for such concentrations of wealth to arise. Schwindt quotes Leo XIII pointedly, the “law … should favor ownership, and its policy should be to induce as many as possible of the people to become owners.” This, of course, is exactly what Distributism aims at—the widest diffusion of productive property, in large part to prevent that fatal separation of ownership and work which leads to so many evils, both societal and even personal. Also worthy of note is Schwindt’s discussion of guilds. The guild system, suitably updated to take account of contemporary conditions, is one of the foundations of Catholic social thought, for it avoids the twin rocks of state control of the economy and the injustices and chaos produced by competitive capitalism.

(Emphasis added.) This is, of course, very interesting, since guilds (or syndicates or trade unions or what-have-you) featured heavily in the popes’ early social teaching, especially Quadragesimo anno. Indeed, one could argue that subsidiary function is most functional in  an environment where there are robust guilds and similar organizations. However, this line of the Church’s teaching has sort of fallen into disuse, if not outright oblivion. It will be interesting to see Schwindt’s treatment and whether he makes any concrete proposals for reinvigorating the notion of guilds.

Finally:

I call attention also to Schwindt’s discussion of taxation, and in particular of progressive taxation. He quotes Pius XI’s encyclical Divini Redemptoris that “the wealthy classes must be induced to assume those burdens without which human society cannot be saved nor they themselves remain secure.” As Schwindt notes, “the exact application of this principle could take various forms, but one can say without much risk of error that the system known as the ‘progressive tax’ is a fairly straightforward and appropriate means of realizing this goal.” In the last few decades in the United States conservative politicians have somehow persuaded large numbers of people that a flat tax is more fair than a progressive tax, even though it should be obvious that a rich man has much more disposable income than a poorer man, and hence can rightly afford to give up a larger percentage of his income in taxation. Despite what some people claim, there is absolutely nothing in Catholic teaching or tradition that would prohibit a progressive income tax.

(Emphasis added.) Enough said.

If you have any impressions that you’d like to share with us—and we note that correspondence received will likely be anonymized and published here—feel free to drop us a line at our email address or on Twitter.

But you gave away the things you loved

We have previously considered whether Catholics can vote for a self-professed socialist or a candidate on the basis of his stance on religious freedom. It is, of course, perhaps a comment on the 2016 presidential election that we have considered those questions at all. However, one question has been rolling around in our mind for several weeks, becoming especially insistent in the last several days: must a Catholic vote at all?

At the outset, we note once more that we are not attempting to propose a course of conduct or, indeed, to dissuade you, dear reader, from a course of conduct. However, as we noted above, we ourselves have had some questions in recent days about the permissibility of staying home, as it were, on Election Day in our jurisdiction. Indeed, we readily admit that the notion of a contest in November between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton is not hugely appetizing. It would be, in fact, a very hard pill to swallow. Consequently, we have pondered simply abstaining from voting this fall. However, acknowledging that even our political decisions have a moral dimension, we have undertaken to find out what the moral dimension of that decision would be. And it has been an interesting effort.

We also acknowledge briefly that we have looked at this problem from another angle: Catholics have participated, more or less enthusiastically, in the political process for some time. And many doctrinally aware Catholics take voting for one party practically as a requirement of Pastor aeternus or Munificentissimus Deus. Yet, it seems to us that Catholics have not gotten much—anything?—in exchange for this political participation. If anything, Catholic social and moral teaching seems to recede further and further from the scene. Wheeled out, if at all, every two or four years to be mentioned in passing and then returned to the shelf when it comes time to govern. It seems to us that a very reasonable response to such a disastrous bargain would be to stay home.

We began, as many do, by consulting readily available sources on the internet. One of those sources points to the Catechism of the Catholic Church. In the Latin typical edition, approved by St. John Paul II in Laetamur magnopere, we read:

Civium officium est cum potestatibus civilibus ad bonum societatis collaborare spiritu veritatis, iustitiae, solidarietatis et libertatis. Amor et servitium patriae ex officio oriuntur gratitudinis et ex ordine caritatis. Submissio auctoritatibus legitimis et servitium boni communis exigunt a civibus ut suum in communitatis politicae vita exerceant munus.

Submissio auctoritati et corresponsabilitas boni communis moraliter exigunt tributorum solutionem, exercitium iuris suffragii, defensionem nationis […]

(Emphasis supplied.) In the Vatican’s English translation, this is rendered:

It is the duty of citizens to contribute along with the civil authorities to the good of society in a spirit of truth, justice, solidarity, and freedom. The love and service of one’s country follow from the duty of gratitude and belong to the order of charity. Submission to legitimate authorities and service of the common good require citizens to fulfill their roles in the life of the political community.

Submission to authority and co-responsibility for the common good make it morally obligatory to pay taxes, to exercise the right to vote, and to defend one’s country […]

(Emphasis supplied.) This is, perhaps, simple enough: It is “morally obligatory” “to exercise the right to vote.” But the interesting thing for us is that voting is obligatory as a consequence of “submission to authority and co-responsibility for the common good.” This, of course, opens the door to questions of legitimacy in authority and what pursues the common good, both of which are complicated, to say the least. However, it seems to us that this provides a reasonable framework for understanding the obligation to vote. That is to say: we’re required to vote because we’re individually responsible for the common good (considering our stations in life), not because voting is per se endowed with some strong moral component.

When we have a doctrinal question, while we might stop by the Catechism, we rarely stop at the Catechism. And, in this case, we did not. One of the other sources we consulted pointed to a series of statements in the mid-1940s by Pius XII. We certainly encourage you to read that source, consisting of old articles from The Angelus closely. It has, as you’ll see, informed our thinking strongly, and not just by pointing out sources for consideration. (Don’t be put off by the fact that it’s The Angelus.) This got our attention, naturally, since Pius XII was, like his predecessor, the great Papa Ratti, a visionary pope in many regards. (Don’t believe us? Read Exsul Familia when you’ve got an idle hour.) And we have found the several statements identified by the article hugely interesting, not least because it collects the sources conveniently.

The first statement, a March 1946 address to the parish priests of Rome, included this statement:

L’esercizio del diritto di voto è un atto di grave responsabilità morale, per lo meno quando si tratta di eleggere coloro che sono chiamati a dare al Paese la sua costituzione e le sue leggi, quelle in particolare che toccano, per esempio, la santificazione delle feste, il matrimonio, la famiglia, la scuola, il regolamento secondo giustizia ed equità delle molteplici condizioni sociali. Spetta perciò alla Chiesa di spiegare ai fedeli i doveri morali, che da quel diritto elettorale derivano.

(Emphasis supplied.) The Angelus rendered this passage thus:

The exercise of the right to vote is an act of grave moral responsibility, at least with respect to the electing of those who are called to give to a country its constitution and its laws, and in particular those that affect the sanctification of holy days of obligation, marriage, the family, schools and the just and equitable regulation of many social questions. It is the Church’s duty to explain to the faithful the moral duties that flow from this electoral right.

(Emphasis supplied.) This is an important point: Catholics have a grave moral responsibility to vote for legislators who can “affect the sanctification of holy days of obligation, marriage, the family, schools, and the just and equitable regulation of many social questions.” This gives us immediate pause. For one thing, the American constitutional order has largely completely excluded these issues from legislative action. Indeed, issues relating to “marriage, the family, schools, and the just and equitable regulation of many social questions” have largely been taken over by the federal judiciary, which would likely prevent legislators at any level from enacting truly Catholic laws. Moreover, the Constitution itself takes some of these issues off the table. Finally, on a variety of issues, neither American political party is apt to support “the just and equitable regulation of many social questions.” And we shall pass over, in relative silence, the extent to which protestant legislators are apt to give God his true rights and God’s Church hers. All of this is to say: a Catholic probably could not find a candidate that she could vote for under Pius’s criteria.

A few months later, Pius gave a speech to the leadership of Catholic Action, in which he stated:

Il popolo è chiamato a prendere una parte sempre più importante nella vita pubblica della Nazione. Questa partecipazione porta con sé gravi responsabilità. Donde la necessità per i fedeli di avere cognizioni nette, solide, precise intorno ai loro doveri di ordine morale e religioso nell’esercizio dei diritti civili, in modo particolare del diritto di voto. Su questi argomenti Noi abbiamo dato nella Nostra allocuzione di quest’anno ai parroci e ai quaresimalisti di Roma norme concrete, che valgono sostanzialmente anche per l’Azione cattolica. Questa, beninteso, non è un partito politico e sta al di sopra della politica di partito. Ma appunto perciò essa deve tanto più, in queste settimane e in questi mesi, illuminare i cattolici sugl’interessi religiosi che sono presentemente in serio pericolo e persuaderli, non solo in pubblico, ma altresì in privato, uomini e donne, a uno a uno, dell’importanza e della gravità dell’obbligo, che come cristiani, li stringe alla retta osservanza dei loro doveri politici. — In egual modo anche per l’Azione cattolica vale il dettame di non chiudere l’orecchio alle lezioni e agli avvertimenti della storia. Questa non presenta fino ai nostri tempi alcun esempio di un popolo o di un Paese che, dopo di essersi staccato dalla Chiesa e dalla cultura cattolica, vi sia ritornato integralmente. Coloro che le rimasero fedeli hanno ben potuto lottare coraggiosamente, eroicamente; ma, una volta consumata la catastrofe e compiuto il passo fatale, non si è mai avuta finora una completa riparazione e reintegrazione.

(Emphasis supplied.) Once again, The Angelus provides a partial translation. (But not a complete one. While we have, for some time, tried to avoid quoting large passages of untranslated foreign languages, we will make an exception here.)

The people are called on to take an always larger part in the public life of the nation. This participation brings with it grave responsibilities. Hence the necessity for the faithful to have clear, solid, precise knowledge of their duties in the moral and religious domain with respect to their exercise of their civil rights, and in particular of the right to vote.

(Emphasis supplied.)

It seems to us that, at the risk of running afoul of the prohibitions in Leo XIII’s great letter to Cardinal Gibbons, Testem benevolentiae nostrae, the march of time may have changed the calculus behind Pius’s teaching on this point. For example, the modes of communication and dissemination of opinion have changed enormously since the spring of 1946 when Pius addressed the Roman clergy and the Catholic Action leadership. As a consequence, the way in which people take “an always larger part in the public life of the nation” has changed. It seems to us that one can participate as meaningfully in the life of the nation by blogging, tweeting, or otherwise expressing and sharing opinions with like-minded individuals as by choosing between two candidates, neither of whom have platforms that are uniformly consistent with Catholic teaching. Indeed, one may have more impact on the life of a nation with a tweet than with a vote. However, we acknowledge that a vote has formal, legal consequences that a tweet does not (usually) have.

In this same vein, we note that the little-known-and-little-loved Vatican II decree Inter mirifica addressed social communications back in 1963, making this point:

Praecipuum morale officium quoad rectum instrumentorum communicationis socialis usum respicit diurnarios, scriptores, actores, scaenarum artifices, effectores, diribitores, distributores, exercentes et venditores, criticos ceterosque qui quocumque modo in communicationibus efficiendis et transmittendis partem habeant; omnino enim patet quae et quam gravis momenti officia iis omnibus sint tribuenda in hodiernis hominum condicionibus, cum ipsi, informando atque incitando, humanum genus recte vel pessum ducere possint.

Eorum itaque erit oeconomicas, vel politicas, vel artis rationes ita componere ut eaedem bono communi numquam adversentur; quod ut expeditius obtineant, ipsi laudabiliter nomen consociationibus dent ad suam professionem spectantibus, quae suis membris – etiam, si opus fuerit, inito foedere de codice morali recte servando – legum moralium reverentiam in suae artis negotiis et officiis imponant.

(Emphasis supplied.) In the Vatican’s English translation, this passage is rendered:

The principle moral responsibility for the proper use of the media of social communication falls on newsmen, writers, actors, designers, producers, displayers, distributors, operators and sellers, as well as critics and all others who play any part in the production and transmission of mass presentations. It is quite evident what gravely important responsibilities they have in the present day when they are in a position to lead the human race to good or to evil by informing or arousing mankind.

Thus, they must adjust their economic, political or artistic and technical aspects so as never to oppose the common good. For the purpose of better achieving this goal, they are to be commended when they join professional associations, which-even under a code, if necessary, of sound moral practice-oblige their members to show respect for morality in the duties and tasks of their craft.

(Emphasis supplied.) Thus, it seems to us that there is some basis for believing that communications can affect the common good. And when every man, woman, and child with an internet connection can broadcast news and opinion to the world, it seems to us that every man, woman, and child is “in a position to lead the human race to good or to evil by informing or arousing mankind,” as it says in Inter mirifica. And this might be the crucial point in our meandering analysis; every Catholic has numerous mechanisms by which he or she can affect the common good by advancing the cause of Christ and Christ’s Church. Suffrage is an option, but it is not the only option.

This comment seems to track back, furthermore, to the teaching in the Catechism. Recall that the Catechism holds that we are obligated to vote as a function of our shared responsibility for the common good. Pius, it seems, held a similar view: we are called upon to take an always larger part in the public life of the nation. And this participation includes the obligation to exercise our right to vote. (Though, as we say, it seems possible that one can participate meaningfully in the life of the nation without voting.)

Finally, The Angelus article cited a 1948 address by Pius to, once again, the clergy of Rome. Pius said,

1. Che, nelle presenti circostanze, è stretto obbligo per quanti ne hanno il diritto, uomini e donne, di prender parte alle elezioni. Chi se ne astiene, specialmente per indolenza o per viltà, commette in sé un peccato grave, una colpa mortale.

2. Ognuno ha da votare secondo il dettame della propria coscienza. Ora è evidente che la voce della coscienza impone ad ogni sincero cattolico di dare il proprio voto a quei candidati o a quelle liste di candidati, che offrono garanzie veramente sufficienti per la tutela dei diritti di Dio e delle anime, per il vero bene dei singoli, delle famiglie e della società, secondo la legge di Dio e la dottrina morale cristiana.

(Emphasis supplied.) And, once more, our source provides for us an English translation of this passage:

1. In the present circumstances, it is a strict obligation for all those who have the right to vote, men and women, to take part in the elections. Whoever abstains from doing so, in particular by indolence or weakness, commits a sin grave in itself, a mortal fault.

2. Each one must follow the dictate of his own conscience. However, it is obvious that the voice of conscience imposes on every Catholic to give his vote to the candidates who offer truly sufficient guarantees for the protection of the rights of God and of souls, for the true good of individuals, families and of society, according to the love of God and Catholic moral teaching.

(Emphasis supplied, and reformatted to match Italian text.) Once again, this brings us back to the point we made a little earlier: a Catholic probably could not find a candidate that she could vote for under Pius’s criteria. (We also have some qualms about “in the present circumstances,” though we’ll pass over that for now.) Even so-called conservative candidates are unlikely to “offer truly sufficient guarantees for the protection of the rights of God and of souls, for the true good of individuals, families and of society, according to the love of God and Catholic moral teaching.” Indeed, it would surprise us very much if a candidate understood even what is meant by “the rights of God and of souls,” much less the finer points of Catholic moral teaching.

Thus, it seems that there is a consistent sense—insofar as the sources we have quoted represent continuous teaching—that we have a moral obligation to vote. However, that obligation comes from our shared responsibility for the common good. And it seems to us that, when the common good would be dissolved by any candidate in an election, then it may well be permissible to refrain from voting. Likewise, while a Catholic is certainly morally required to vote for candidates who will govern according to the teachings of Christ and Christ’s Church, if no candidate in an election will so govern, it seems to us that a Catholic could simply stay home and have a “Social Kingship of Christ” party.

A very interesting new essay

Pater Edmund Waldstein, O.Cist., no stranger to readers of Semiduplex, has, at The Josias, a very lengthy, very interesting essay, “Integralism and Gelasian Dyarchy.” We have not yet processed it sufficiently to be able to formulate our own thoughts about it,  but we wanted to point it out to you, dear readers, so that you can add it to your reading list. And you should do that. It’s important stuff.

Piloting towards an unknown shore through shoals

It is plain by now that the Holy Father has a soft spot for the Society of St. Pius X. It was, of course, a great disappointment when negotiations broke down between the Holy See and the SSPX back in 2012, not least because it was clear that Benedict XVI desired greatly to see the SSPX return to full communion with Peter. And, as disappointing as that was, it has been just as extraordinary to see the Holy Father get things back on track and moving in a positive direction. The unilateral grant of faculties for confession to priests of the SSPX as part of the Year of Mercy was a wonderful gesture from the Holy Father, and one that could scarcely have been imagined under John Paul or Benedict. And it seems that things are once again moving.

Bishop de Galarreta, one of the three remaining SSPX bishops, recently gave a conference in Versailles, and during his conference he discussed the status of negotiations:

“I think, and this is the other aspect of things, that this pope who tells anyone who will listen that we are Catholic, who says and repeats that the Society is Catholic, that we are Catholic, will never condemn us, and that he wants our ‘case’ taken care of. I think– and he has already started down this path – that when he sees that we cannot agree with the Congregation of the Faith, I think that he will overreach any doctrinal, theoretical, practical condition, or any condition whatsoever… He is going to take his own steps towards recognizing the Society. He has already begun; he is simply going to continue. And I am not saying what I desire but what I foresee. I foresee, I think that the pope will lean towards a one-sided recognition of the Society, and that by acts rather than by a legal or canonical approach.”

Bishop de Galarreta admitted that “this de facto recognition would have a good, a beneficial effect: it is a rather extraordinary apostolic opening, and it would have an extraordinary effect.” But he adds that there would then be two risks: that of creating an internal division and that of conditioning our preaching in certain circumstances. And he wondered: “It would take an extraordinary wisdom and prudence, a very great firmness and clarity. Are we capable of this?”

(Emphasis supplied.) More excerpts of the conference are available at the DICI website.

We also read at Zenit a new interview with Archbishop Guido Pozzo, secretary of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei, discussing the status of negotiations with the SSPX. (It is in Italian, so we will not quote from it here. However, the translation we obtained for ourselves from Google Translate was very readable.) It is especially interesting, since we think it gives one a good idea of Rome’s position with respect to the Second Vatican Council. Obviously, a unilateral canonical recognition of the SSPX, which seems to be what Bishop de Galarreta anticipates, would limit the necessity of a careful understanding of the Conciliar decrees and their relative weights.

It’s really very interesting to see these developments under the Holy Father. Remember what they said about Nixon?