Pope Benedict XVI's words on the relationship between liberalism and Catholicism

Criticisms of liberalism periodically arise from Catholic circles, sometimes making categorical statements about it.

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Of course, I find it perfectly respectable for a Catholic to criticize an ideology, a political regime, or an economic system, whatever it may be, at least as long as they do so with rigor and consistency with their faith. After all, being Catholic doesn't imply endorsing a particular ideology. Catholicism is a religion, not a political program, even though its doctrine also has implications in the debate on political ideas.

The problem always arises when some people try to appropriate Catholicism to put it at the service of questionable political positions, presenting these positions as the only ones compatible with the Catholic faith and condemning any other position, even some that are entirely legitimate. In this sense, it is common to see anti-liberals saying that liberalism is a "sin," even though the Catechism of the Catholic Church makes no such statement and even though no explicit and unequivocal condemnations have been issued against this ideology, unlike those issued against totalitarian ideologies such as communism and nazism.

I am Catholic and a liberal-conservative. The former is my religion, and the latter is my ideological position within the broad margins Catholics have to choose one political solution or another. This is what some people fail to grasp. Regarding the relationship between liberalism and Catholicism, there are prestigious Catholic authors who have made observations worth reading, or at least far more worthwhile than anything I could write. One of them was Joseph Ratzinger, who, in addition to being a great Pope under the name of Benedict XVI, was also an excellent intellectual whose works I recommend to anyone who wants to enjoy brilliant arguments.

In 2008, Benedict XVI sent a letter to the Italian philosopher and politician Marcello Pera, which was published as the introduction to Pera's book entitled "Perché dobbiamo dirci cristiani. Il liberalismo, l’Europa, l’etica" (Why We Must Call Ourselves Christians: Liberalism, Europe, Ethics). This letter was published by Zenit on December 2, 2008. In it, Benedict XVI stated:

"With superb knowledge of the sources and compelling logic, you analyze the essence of liberalism from its foundations, showing that at the heart of liberalism lies its rootedness in the Christian image of God: its relationship with God, in whose image man is made and from whom we have received the gift of freedom. With impeccable logic, you show how liberalism loses its foundation and destroys itself if it abandons this foundation. I was also impressed by your analysis of freedom and multiculturalism, in which you demonstrate the internal contradiction of this concept and, therefore, its political and cultural impossibility. Of fundamental importance is your analysis of what Europe and a European Constitution can be, one in which Europe does not transform into a cosmopolitan reality, but rather finds its own identity based on its Christian-liberal foundation."

Later, the German Pope added the following:

"As regards the contribution on the meaning of all this for the contemporary crisis of ethics, I consider important what you say about the parable of liberal ethics. You show that liberalism, without ceasing to be liberalism, rather, in order to be itself, can refer to a doctrine of the good, in particular the Christian one, with which it is familiar, thus truly offering a contribution to overcoming the crisis."

In these words of Benedict XVI we find a very different attitude from that adopted by anti-liberal Catholics. As we can see, Pope Ratzinger did not simply reject liberalism or show the door of the Church to any Catholic who called himself liberal, but rather established conditions so that liberalism could be compatible with the faith and not betray itself, thus Benedict XVI not only exhibited a concept more open to different political positions than that of the anti-liberals, but also demonstrated a faithful knowledge of the liberal tradition.

Obviously, not all liberal positions are the same, just as not all positions presented with conservative, Christian Democratic, or traditionalist labels are the same, to give a few examples. Much of the French liberalism that sparked the Revolution of 1789 was openly anti-Christian, a militancy often combined with membership in a branch of Freemasonry—the French branch—which has historically been atheist and very hostile to religion. In contrast, the liberalism of the American Revolution of 1776 was very different: it was strongly driven by Christianity.

That distinction also existed in Spain, where there was a liberalism openly hostile to Catholicism, but there were also many Catholic liberals. In fact, the Cortes of Cádiz, which promulgated Spain's first liberal constitution in 1812, were made up of 307 deputies, of whom 97 were clergymen. This was reflected in the aforementioned constitution, which began as follows: "In the name of God Almighty, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, author and supreme legislator of society." Its Article 12 stated:

"The religion of the Spanish Nation is and will perpetually be the Catholic, Apostolic, Roman, the only true religion. The Nation protects it with wise and just laws and prohibits the practice of any other."

This statement was fully in line with the positions then defended by the Catholic Church, which ended up accepting religious freedom in its declaration "Dignitatis humanae", approved by the Second Vatican Council on December 7, 1965. It did so with a brilliant declaration that fit perfectly within the liberal tradition:

"This Vatican Council declares that the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits. The council further declares that the right to religious freedom has its foundation in the very dignity of the human person as this dignity is known through the revealed word of God and by reason itself. This right of the human person to religious freedom is to be recognized in the constitutional law whereby society is governed and thus it is to become a civil right."

What we have just read is a paragraph that any liberal would gladly endorse, or at least those liberals who defend religious freedom. The question that arises is: when some anti-liberals reject this concept of freedom as the absence of coercion, believing that by doing so they are excluding many liberal Catholics from the church, don't they realize that they are also rejecting what the Church itself affirms?

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Photo: WDKrause. Benedict XVI during his visit to Berlin on September 22, 2011.