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Entry: The Neocons and Charles Maurras Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/leo_strauss_the_neocons_and_charles_maurras#6691 Post contents: Mr. Cundiff: The following statements (in brackets) that you authored earlier are nonsense(I mean nothing personal here, please): <<For the record: St. Pius X’s Notre Charge Apostolique against the Sillon movement is not be found on the official Vatican website for Pius X, suggesting that it may have been has been repudiated or deemphasized.>> COMMENT: The document appears in most major compendia of papal political teaching, including the very authoritative DOCTRINA PONTIFICIA (vol II), (B.A.C., 1958), and numerous other compendia. That it does not appear on the Vatican website proves nothing. That you, who strike me as an intelligent Catholic layman, could suggest that it has been repudiated, sadly, indicates that you have a faulty comprehension of Catholic doctrine and how Catholic doctrine develops over the centuries. Indeed, St. Pius X's NOTRE CHARGE APOSTOLIQUE is very firmly in the tradition that includes Leo XIII's condemnation of aspects of Christian Democracy (GRAVES DE COMMUNI) and that pope's very lucid instruction regarding authority and rights. St. Pius X reflects profoundly those teachings in his condemnation of Le Sillon and Christian Democracy. Go back, if you will, and read Leo XIII's DIUTURNUM on the transmission of authority. While the Church does not officially endorse any particular FORM of government (although the Angelic Doctor finds a "tempered" or mixed Monarchy preferable), she does teach, and consistently, that authority never resides in the people, and that the people do NOT confer authority on the sovereign. Authority comes directly from God. In a republic (or mixed monarchy) the citizens or electors may, through a representational process (whether voting directly or through corporative bodies) designate who receives that authority, but they do not confer that authority, which comes from God. Most modern Christian Democracies, even if paying lip service to that constant teaching of the Church, never posited that principle. Rather, they accepted, either implicitly or explicitly, in the case of modern Christian Democratic Germany, the formally condemned princples of Lamennnais. <<It appears that the Pius X’s concern was more about Sillon’s seeming embrace of Socialism – a movement which was at the Pius X’s concern was more about Sillon’s seeming embrace of Socialism – a movement which was at that time anti-Catholic and mostly Marxist.>> COMMENT: St. Pius X does indeed cite the dangers posed by the socialist temptation, but his major concern is the acceptance by Le Sillon of the democratist idea, earlier stated by Lamennais, in which authority now would reside in the people, and in which the society becomes, essentially, neutral towards the Church and its teachings. This is completely unacceptable in Catholic doctrine. Only in special cases, where the faithful are a minority or suffer extreme persecution, does either Leo XIII or St. Pius X even permit, and ONLY in practice (never in doctrine) what would become known as the "hypothesis" (as opposed to the "thesis" where the teachings of the Church find their way fully into the laws and public regulations of the nation/state). <<Pius X was good against the Modernists and good about liturgical music. Catholic social teaching and politics were not his strong suit.>> COMMENT: You do set yourself up on a mighty high pedestal, M. Cundiff, to judge this saint, do you not? Indeed, St.Pius X's acute understanding of the political sphere is quite remarkable and accurate, as witness the total unravelling of what was once know in Europe as Christian Democracy post-World War II. From hopeful beginnings with Gasperri and Adenauer, Italy and Germany moved steadily left, and mostly abetted by the very Christian Democrats you praise. Indeed, the post-war constitutions of those nations, since they do not include sufficient safeguards, inclined those nations almost immediately towards the Left and secularism. The results of Christian Democracy in Europe are the disastrous EU products we see now, with persons like Chancellor Merkel (a proud CDU leader) leading the charge....but she could not have succeeded without the earlier CDU leaders and their disastrous policies (e.g. Kiesinger, etc.) <<Leo XIII did better, and his social teaching is tradition is the Church’s today, much to the alarm of Clerical Fascists.>> COMMENT: Anytime you disagree with a Catholic traditionalist, M. Cundiff, you use your ad hominem argument; you call them names, like "clerical fascist." This enables you to escape inconvenient arguments that do not fit into you preconceived scheme of things, and really remind me, strikingly, of just how the neo-conservatives operate. One last point, you posit that the chief goal in society is ecomonic prosperity, and that democratic capitalism (thank you, Irving Kristol!) is so much superior in satisfying this goal. Yet, surely you must know that the primary goal of a Catholic society is the salvation of souls. Your error here is the classic error of the 19th century liberals, who were condemned by all popes from Gregory XVI to Pius XII, to suggest materialism as the chief object of society. They were dead wrong. Sent at: 2008 05 16