fore, supreme over constitutional limitations in the Church, if any exist. His power is analogous to that of the President of the United States if the powers of Congress and of the Supreme Court were blended with the executive power. It is, as has been said, independent of constitutional restraint through the membership of the Church, because the power of the Pope is derived in theory not from the people but from God.48

Limitations to such a power are imaginary, not real, and the sovereignty of the Pope is, in substance, absolute. To it, the Roman Church requires that its members shall assent, in matters belonging to morals, as an integral part of their religious faith, and such assent is as much a part of the Roman Catholic profession of faith as the belief in Jesus Christ Himself as Son of God.44

By this sovereignty the Church of Rome is distinguished from other churches. The latter impart their instruction to members as opinion.44a The instruction of the Pope is imparted to Roman Catholics as law, according to an article of faith. The instruction in the

43 The teaching in Roman Catholic schools of the Christian Brothers (cf. p. 29, note 26) is, as we have seen: "In things of ecclesiastical right, there is nothing that the Pope may not do when necessity demands it. . . . The Pope has no superior here below; he is subject to God alone."

44 Cf. chap. IV, infra p. 75.

44 The use of the word "opinion" here has been unjustifiably criticized. It refers to current instruction or discipline not to dogma nor to natural or divine law. In the Roman Church such instruction is divine law-the emanation of sovereignty in divine right. In other religious bodies such instruction or discipline is opinion. They claim no sovereignty. Their instruction and discipline are the emanation of the collective will of the society itself and are changed from time to time by that will.

one case is human opinion; in the other it is sovereign and divine law de fide. Herein is the point of conflict between the Roman Church and the modern State: in the Roman Church, absolute monarchy de fide, the mind and the will of one; in the State, democracy, a synthesis of free wills, government by the consent of the governed, with the right of ultimate appeal to the community. Thus in the modern State two sovereignties exist, that of the State and that of the Roman Church, claiming jurisdiction in certain points over the same matters. We quote Mr. Belloc again:

"The (Roman) Catholic Church is in its root principle at issue with the Civic definition both of freedom and of authority. For the purpose of the State, religion is either a universally admitted system, or a matter of individual choice. But by the definition which is the very soul of (Roman) Catholicism, religion must be for the (Roman) Catholic First, a supreme authority superior to any claims of the State

45 The Contrast, p. 160,

9945

CHAPTER III

THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH IN THE MODERN STATE

THE subjects of Papal sovereignty exist in every State, and, in virtue of the Church sovereignty to which they owe obedience de fide, they form a Roman Catholic solidarity in every State that may, under the electoral system, come into sharp conflict with the membership of the community not included in such solidarity. The conditions are such that on any given question of moral interest the free synthesis of all minds in the State or community may be prevented by the obedience owed de fide by the Roman Catholic solidarity to the Pope.1 Cardinal Gibbons in 1909, in his much discussed essay, said:

66 .. Many Protestants say, 'we obey our conscience, you obey the Pope.' Yes; we obey the Pope, for our conscience tells us that we ought to obey the spiritual authority of the Pope in everything except what is sinful. 'But,' they reply, 'we do not believe that any human power should come between the human conscience and duty.' Neither do we; but while you believe in private judgment, we believe in a religion of authority which our conscience tells us is our lawful guide and teacher in its own sphere. You say that you believe in religious freedom. Do you, however, interpret this free

1 This has repeatedly occurred in the older States of Europe in instances to which we refer. (cf. pp. 209, 214, 245, 250–257).

dom to apply only to yourselves; or are you willing to concede that to others likewise is to be left the freedom to follow their consciences? You can conceive a State passing laws that would violate your conscientious convictions. Would you accept these laws, or would you resist them as your fellow religionists in England recently resisted an education law of which they did not approve?" 2

3

The Cardinal was wrong if he believed that only a Roman Catholic would resist a law that violated conscience. The right to resist such a law is quite universal in enlightened governments, and was recognized by the Fathers of this Republic as harmonious in its political order. But the resistance, to be justified, must be in virtue of a free conscience and not in virtue of a conscience under a law of obedience to any sovereignty. In the latter case the conscience and will of a sovereignty is substituted for that of the citizen contrary to the State's constitutional order, which is immediately challenged; the revolt in the right of conscience becomes conspiracy and sedition.

The Cardinal seems to admit our contention that Roman Catholics must, in their moral activities, obey, under the penalty of damnation, the spiritual authority of the Pope. He distinguishes Roman Catholics from those who obey their own consciences. As matters in which obedience is to be rendered must often include

2 Cardinal Gibbons, "The Church and the Republic," North American Review, March, 1909, pp. 321-336.

3 A. Hamilton in The Federalist, No. 28, p. 165. "If the representatives of the people betray their constituents there is ... no resource left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defence which is paramount to all positive forms of government."

moral questions of civic interest, all that we contend for is granted; the authority of the Pope may at any time determine, through a Roman Catholic majority, civic policies and interests.

We speak of the modern State as a reality, but it is really a category. Our mental conception of it is as something apart from and sovereign over the people within it. Really the State is, in modern theory and fact, the people within it. In its simplest and essential aspect it is the community organized for government. It functions through majorities and minorities. Its citizens organize into societies, associations, parties or corporate groups according to their opinions and convictions. These all rest on the consent of the membership, as the modern State rests on the consent of the governed. There is an exception: the Church which owes obedience in morals as part of its essential belief to the sovereignty of the Pope.5 In a conflict of opinion in matters belonging to morals the members of that Church cannot, without a violation of their religious allegiance, enter into that free synthesis of living wills that is essential to the safety and welfare 4 H. J. Laski, The Foundations of Sovereignty and other Essays,

p. 248.

5 “All sects, denominations, confessions, schools of thought, and associations of any kind have a more or less comprehensive set of tenets on the acceptance of which membership depends. In the (Roman) Catholic Church this natural law has received the sanction of Divine promulgation, as appears from the teaching of Christ and the Apostles . . . Freedom of thought extending to the essential beliefs of a Church is in itself a contradiction; for, by accepting membership, the members accept the essential beliefs and renounce their freedom of thought so far as these are concerned." C. E., vol. vii, p. 259 c.