Church and Society: The Laurence J. McGinley Lectures, 1988-2007

25. Religious Freedom—a Developing Doctrine: March 21, 2001

25 Religious Freedom— a Developing Doctrine March ,  A ccording to John Henry Newman, whose two hundredth birthday we celebrated exactly a month ago, Christianity came into the world as a single idea, but time was necessary for believers to perceive its multiple aspects and spell out their meaning. The Christian idea has gradually taken possession of minds and hearts in such a way that its significance is more precisely grasped as the centuries pass.1 For this reason the doctrine of the faith undergoes a process of development through time. The Second Vatican Council, endorsing the insights of Newman, devoted an important paragraph of its Constitution on Divine Revelation to the Church’s growth in understanding the tradition handed down from the apostles (DV 8). One of the most striking developments in twentieth-century Catholicism is the doctrine of religious freedom set forth by the Second Vatican Council. The Declaration on Religious Freedom, known by its Latin title Dignitatis humanae, took up two very sensitive questions, the one dealing with the right of individual persons and groups to religious freedom; the other, with the duties of the State toward religion. Regarding the first point, the council taught that all human persons have by nature an inherent right to be free in seeking religious truth, in living and worshiping according to their religious convictions, and in bearing witness to their beliefs without hindrance from any human power. This principle was theologically grounded in the fact that God, respecting the dignity of the 348 Religious Freedom: A Developing Doctrine 兩 349 human person, invites a voluntary and uncoerced adherence to religious truth. The act of faith, being free by its very nature, cannot be compelled. Regarding the second point, the council taught that the State has an obligation to protect the inviolable rights of all citizens, including that of religious freedom (DH 6). It did not teach that the State was obliged to give legal privileges to Christianity or Catholicism, although it did not rule out such arrangements. It did deny that civil government had the authority to command or prohibit religious acts (DH 3). If Dignitatis is compared with earlier Catholic official teaching, it represents an undeniable, even a dramatic, shift. The question must therefore be asked: Was the Declaration a homogeneous development within the Catholic tradition, or was it a repudiation of previous Church doctrine? Although the question could be put much more broadly, the controversy has centered chiefly on the teachings of three popes: Gregory XVI (1831– 46), Pius IX (1846–78), and Leo XIII (1878–1903). I shall accordingly take these three popes as the point of comparison or contrast. The question is of some importance. At the council itself some conservative bishops, including Marcel Lefebvre, held that Dignitatis was contrary to established Catholic teaching and could not be adopted without violence to the Catholic faith. When the Declaration was approved by an overwhelming majority of the council fathers (2308 to 70) notwithstanding his protests, Lefebvre founded a traditionalist movement that ended in schism from Rome.2 The case for reversal is defended at the other end of the spectrum by theological revisionists who applaud Dignitatis. Vatican II’s repudiation of earlier Catholic teaching on religious freedom, they argue, makes it likely that other Catholic doctrines, such as that of Paul VI on contraception , may someday be overturned.3 Thus Archbishop Lefebvre and the revisionists, for very different reasons , agreed that Dignitatis was a reversal of earlier Catholic teaching. Their thesis, however, receives no support from the document itself, which declares explicitly that it ‘‘leaves intact the traditional Catholic teaching on the moral obligation of individuals and societies toward the true religion and the one Church of Christ’’ (DH 1). It also claims to be speaking in harmony with the tradition and doctrine of the Church and to be developing the doctrine of recent popes on the inviolable rights of the human person and on the constitutional order of society (ibid.). 350 兩 Church and Society During the council, Bishop Émile De Smedt of Bruges, as the official spokesman (relator) for the commission that composed the document, defended its compatibility with earlier Catholic teaching.4 A series of other cardinals and bishops, including Archbishop Gabriel-Marie Garrone of Toulouse5 and Archbishop Lawrence Shehan of Baltimore,6 spoke in support of De Smedt’s position. During and after the council theologians such as Roger...