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Let your speech be “yes, yes: no, no”; whatever is beyond these comes from the evil one . (mt . 5:37)

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July 2009

Reprint #87

“I SHALL HARDEN PHARAO’S HEART” (EX. 7:3)

THE BLINDNESS
OF CATHOLICS

PART 2

AND THE SOCIAL KINGSHIP OF CHRIST
“Russia Will Spread Her Errors
in the World”: The Ostpolitik of
John XXIII and the Principle of
the New Concordats
The ground covered in the two preceding articles
[see the May 2009 issue of The Angelus] enabled us
to appreciate the growing rift separating the way of
Divine mercy and the way taken by Vatican diplomacy.
Not that the two ways are irreconcilable in theory, but
when man thinks his prudence superior to the proven
prudence of her who is called Virgo prudentissima, then
the two ways have parted. And they clearly lead to
different outcomes. Heaven’s way would have led to
a stable (though not definitive, as that will come only
in Paradise) peace founded on the rights of God and
His holy Mother; men’s way has, on the contrary, led
to the construction of an unstable peace threatening
to collapse at any moment, a peace like the menacing
atmosphere that precedes a violent storm.
With the pontificate of John XXIII, the utopia of a
peace outside the order established by God became a
reality.

The New Tack of the Vatican’s
Ostpolitik: John XXIII
With the accession of John XXIII there appeared a
tendency to a different understanding of the Communist
phenomenon even in those places where it had become the
regime; and at the same time there was a growing awareness of the depth of the developing changes which were
subsequently to affect the politics of the Holy See. But we
think that one development of utmost importance was Pope
Roncalli’s idea that international peace should be a priority
for the Church.1

In our opinion, the capital error of John XXIII’s
Ostpolitik is contained in this new priority. International
peace is surely a value in behalf of which the Church
has always deployed her diplomatic arms; however,
it is a value subordinate to the rights of God and
the Church. This hierarchy of values was literally
subverted by John XXIII, as we shall see in our threepoint analysis of the three key points of his politics in
dealing with the Eastern European countries: 1) The
Metz Accord, 2) Vatican II, and 3) the encyclical Pacem
in Terris.

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The Metz Accord
In 1959 John XXIII announced to the world
his intention to convoke an ecumenical council. He
made known his desire that representatives of other
Christian confessions also participate in this council.
The extension of this “invitation” to the Orthodox
Church certainly could not exclude the Patriarchate
of Moscow, which constitutes the largest part of the
Orthodox world. It immediately became evident that
this involved the problem of relations with the Soviet
State. The ambassador of the Russian Orthodox
Church—and thus of the Communist party, since
according to Article 126 of the USSR Constitution
promulgated by Stalin in 1936, all professional and
social organizations, including those of a religious
character, were directed and controlled by the party2—
was Msgr. Nikodim. In 1962 he obtained a meeting
at Metz with Cardinal Tisserant. News of the meeting
was only made known the following year thanks to a
conference Msgr. Schmitt, the bishop of Metz, granted
to journalists:
It was at Metz that Cardinal Tisserant met with Msgr.
Nikodim, the archbishop charged with the Russian Church’s
exterior relations, and it was there that the message taken by
Msgr. Willebrands to Moscow was prepared. Msgr. Nikodim,
who had come to Paris in the first fortnight of the month of
August [1962] had made known his desire to meet with the
Cardinal….Msgr. Nikodim agreed to someone’s going to
Moscow to bring an invitation [to participate in the Council]
on condition that guarantees be given concerning the Council’s apolitical attitude.3

The significance of these guarantees as to
the apolitical attitude of the Council is obvious:
Communism must not be mentioned, as indeed
happened; the arrangement was confirmed for us by Fr.
Wenger:
During the French bishops’ meeting at St-Louis, Cardinal
Feltin made a confidential intervention. The Pope asked him
to tell the bishops that he did not want any political allusions
in their interventions.…They should not talk about Communism either.4

Vatican Council II
During the Council, the order not to talk about
Communism was followed to the letter. John XXIII
prepared the ground with his famous opening
discourse, in which he announced that the Church
would no longer use the arm of severity, and that she
preferred the remedy of mercy: “We are to understand
that, emerging from the mist of a nebulous strategy,
the point was to initiate the particular policy of a
sudden ban on open anti-Communism.”5 And indeed,
from that moment on, every attempt to obtain the
Council’s condemnation of Communism was thwarted
by recourse to the orientation the Pope desired to
impart to the ecumenical assembly, an orientation the

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following pope, Paul VI, was to approve fully. During
the Council several petitions were rejected, or rather—
what is worse—allowed to sink into oblivion: Bishop
Sigaud’s petition, signed by 213 Fathers, for a schema
on Catholic social doctrine and the condemnation
of Marxism, socialism, and Communism; a second
petition by the same bishop signed by 510 prelates to
obtain the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate
Heart of Mary, as the Virgin had requested at Fatima;
and a letter drafted by Msgr. Carli with 332 signatures
(ultimately 454) demanding the condemnation of
Communism.
The last initiative met with unbelievable obstruc­
tion.
Archbishop Lefebvre submitted the petition and the
332 original signatures in person at the Council Secretariat
on November 9 when there was sufficient time for it to be
considered. He was given a receipt acknowledging that the
document had been received.
The result? On November 13 the new version of the
schema made no reference to the wishes of the petition.
Communism was still not named. Thus, Bishop Carli made a
protest on the same day to the Council Presidency and lodged
a complaint with the administrative tribunal. Moreover, he
decided to make the request once more in the form of an
amendment, and at the same time proposed a debate specifically on the topic….on November 15, the vigorous protest of
Archbishop Sigaud shook the Council. But it was all in vain.
Nevertheless, Cardinal Tisserant ordered an inquiry that
revealed…that the petition had unfortunately been “lost” in
a drawer. In fact Msgr. Achille Glorieux, secretary for the relevant commission, received the petition but had not passed
it on to the commission. Archbishop Garrone apologized
publicly for Msgr. Glorieux’s “forgetfulness,” but there was
nothing that could be done. Time had been made for a paragraph on Communism to be added, but it had now passed.6

And so the Council, which ought to have been
pastoral, attentive to mankind and contemporary
society, scandalously did not mention Communism:
Communism was undoubtedly the most imposing, longlasting, overwhelming historical phenomenon of the 20th
century; and yet the Council, which had proposed a Constitution on the Church and the Modern World, does not speak
of it. By midcentury, Communism…had caused the deaths
of tens of millions, the victims of mass terror and the most
inhuman repression; and the Council does not speak of it.
Communism…had in practice imposed atheism on its subject
populations…; and the Council, which expatiated on the case
of atheists, does not speak of it. During the years the ecumenical assembly was sitting, the Communist prisons were still
places of unspeakable sufferings and humiliations inflicted
on numerous “witnesses of the Faith” (bishops, priests, convinced laymen believing in Christ); and the Council does
not speak of it.7

The Encyclical Pacem in Terris
On April 11, 1963, while the Council was in
session, John XXIII published the encyclical Pacem
in Terris, which “will prove to be a precious source
for the elaboration of the document Gaudium et Spes”;
and indeed this encyclical determined the Council’s

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line of conduct in regard to Communism, which line
of conduct was, as we have seen, one of scandalous
silence.
Pacem in Terris literally overturned Divini
Redemptoris of Pius XI, especially by the principles
posited in paragraphs 158-160:
§158: It is always perfectly justifiable to distinguish
between error as such and the person who falls into error—
even in the case of men who err regarding the truth or are led
astray as a result of their inadequate knowledge, in matters
either of religion or of the highest ethical standards.

The principle is correct, but dangerously incomplete.
Cardinal Biffi writes:
While reflecting upon this statement, I was unable to
forget that the historical wisdom of the Church has never
reduced the condemnation of error to a pure and ineffectual abstraction. The Christian people must be warned and
defended against someone sowing error without our ceasing
to seek that person’s true good….In this regard, Jesus gave
the heads of the Church a precise directive: someone who
gives scandal by his conduct and teaching and does not allow
himself to be persuaded either by personal admonitions nor
by the more solemn reprobation of the ecclesia, ‘let him be to
thee as the heathen and the publican’ (Mt. 18:17); thus foreseeing and prescribing the institution of excommunication.8
§159: Again it is perfectly legitimate to make a clear distinction between a false philosophy of the nature, origin and
purpose of men and the world, and economic, social, cultural,
and political undertakings, even when such undertakings
draw their origin and inspiration from that philosophy. True,
the philosophic formula does not change once it has been set
down in precise terms, but the undertakings clearly cannot
avoid being influenced to a certain extent by the changing
conditions in which they have to operate. Besides, who
can deny the possible existence of good and commendable
elements in these undertakings, elements which do indeed
conform to the dictates of right reason, and are an expression
of man’s lawful aspirations?

With this we have the contrary of common sense and
the statements of Pius XI: given the intrinsic wrongness
of Communism, no one may collaborate with it in
anything whatsoever.
§160: It may sometimes happen, therefore, that meetings
arranged for some practical end—though hitherto they were
thought to be altogether useless—may in fact be fruitful at the
present time, or at least offer prospects of success.

Behold the Church caught in the Bolshevik snare:
Lenin and Company expected no more. John XXIII
misunderstood the true nature of Communism,
which—as we have seen—completely resides, not in its
theory, but in its praxis; the first is at the service of the
second, and not the reverse. Reality is but matter and
dialectical movement. Madiran profoundly perceived
the problem:
The Church is not expected to align her doctrine with
Marxism-Leninism, but only to stop keeping the faithful from
joint action with the Communist party: thus she needs must
refrain from opposing Communism; and since she cannot
avoid criticizing it when she speaks of it, she need only and
she needs must stop speaking of it.9

The Communist objective is to push the Church to
silence and Catholics to collaboration, even partial.
The Church thereby finds herself co-opted in the
Communist cause.

Open Doors to
International Communism
The Catholic hierarchy opted for the noncondemnation of Communism by its refusal to
consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart as by
its rejection during the Council of the proposal to
condemn Communism. Presented with these more than
conciliatory choices, the Communists agreed to change
their tone, but certainly not to change their objectives.
To the contrary, the groundwork for implementing
Marxist dialectic at the beginning of the 1980s was
readier than ever. The Italian deputy Longo, Togliatti’s
successor, clearly depicted the Italian Communist
party’s strategy:
We affirm that we are not in favor of an effectively and
absolutely secular State: that, as we are against the confessional State, we are also against atheism of the State; that we
are for the absolute respect of religious freedom, of freedom
of conscience, for believers and non-believers, Christians and
non-Christians. We are thus against the State’s attributing
any kind of privilege to an ideology, a religious belief, or a
cultural and artistic current to the detriment of the others.10

The State atheism practised in the Soviet Union
was nothing else than the momentary antithesis to
oppose the confessional Catholic State (the thesis); just
as the persecution that flowed from it served as the
“bait” to draw the Holy See into dealings and induce
it to accept a solution that would ultimately be the
abandonment of the Catholic social order, because this
order, and only it, was radically opposed to the integral
Communist revolution. The Concordat from the
Catholic perspective constituted an impassable barrier
to the achievement of the real revolution. Gramsci
clearly understood this when he wrote:
The concordats essentially attack the autonomous and
sovereign nature of the modern State. Does the State gain
in return? Yes, but it gains it on its own territory in matters
concerning its own subjects….the capitulation of the State
consists in its accepting in fact the tutelage of an external
sovereignty whose superiority it recognizes in practice.11

In the “classic” concordat, the State recognizes the
Catholic Church in itself, with its superior mission, and
it recognizes its indirect authority over the civil power.
The Catholic Church thus has a juridical importance,
and in virtue of this importance coherent laws are
promulgated. It was thus necessary to eliminate this
“juridical obstruction” but without falling into the error
of declaring an open war on the Church. The solution
takes shape in the principle of the secular State; in it,
the Church is taken into account as a phenomenon in

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that it exists de facto, as other ideologies, confessions,
etc., also exist. It may enjoy a greater respect inasmuch
as Catholicism is a religion belonging to the historical
roots of a nation, or because it is still (somewhat…)
professed by the majority of the citizens of the State. It
matters little. The point is that the Church is no longer
considered for what it is in truth. Senator Mancion,
who in 1984 was the head of the Christian Democrats
in the Italian Senate, explicitly stated about the new
concordat signed by Cardinal Casaroli and Craxi: “as
several acknowledged legal experts, we understand
the Catholic religion as the religion of the majority of
the Italian people, and not as the religion of State”12–a
statement of phenomenological importance. Such
is the fundamental principle the men of the Church
will adopt henceforth; it is not only a question of a
pragmatic agreement seeking to obtain as much as
possible in a particularly unfavorable situation. No;
it is a question of revolution in principle, as the vicepresident of the Italian Episcopal Conference, Msgr.
Fagiolo, admitted at the time:
We are obliged to recognize that it was no longer possible to maintain or to make others maintain the principle
according to which the Catholic religion is the sole religion
of the Italian State. Honestly, this principle could no longer
be defended.13

The foundations upon which Christian society
was built up for centuries and the rampart that had
defended it from arrogant political power were
definitively suppressed. The way was clear for
International Communism, which could more freely
“spread its errors in the world.”

“They Shut Their Eyes”
Blindness: such is the terrible consequence for
those who refuse the grace of God. There is not much
more to add: the Church’s doctrine on the social
kingship of Jesus Christ, the only true solution to the
manifold evils that afflict our society, is before the eyes
of any who have eyes to see. The “first” Maritain wrote
in 1927:

This doctrine is unchangeable. It may have been presented under different aspects: it has not altered in essentials
throughout the centuries....Anyone paying sufficient attention
to the substance of things underlying the various incidents of
history, will perceive that one same teaching is imparted by
Boniface VIII in the Bull Unam Sanctam and by Leo XIII in
the Encyclical Immortale Dei.14

The idea of the secular State, however it may be
declined, has never been accepted by the Church;
it has been, however, the instrument willed by
Communism for the annihilation of the Catholic State
and Christian society. And the events prove it day after
day.
Though they have eyes, they cannot see, and though they
have ears, they cannot hear or understand….You will listen
and listen, but for you there is no understanding; you will
watch and watch, but for you there is no perceiving. The
heart of this people has become dull, their ears are slow to
listen, and they keep their eyes shut, so that they may never
see with those eyes, or hear with those ears, or understand
with that heart, and turn back to me, and win healing from
me. (Mt. 13:14 [Knox version])

But that is not the Lord’s only saying, for He told
Sister Lucy: “It will never be too late to have recourse
to Jesus and Mary.” The faults committed can still
be repaired; the Holy Father, in union with all the
bishops, can still publicly and explicitly consecrate
Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Translated from Courrier de Rome, December 2008, pp.5-7.
G. Barberini, The Holy See’s Ostpolitik: A Long and Wearying Dialogue [Italian]
(Bologna, 2007), p.56.
2
Cf. Jean Madiran, La vieillesse du monde: Essai sur le communisme (Jarzé, 1975), p.
5ff.
3
Jean Madiran, L’accord de Metz ou pourquoi notre Mère fut muette (Versailles, 2006),
pp.28-29.
4
Ibid., p.31.
5
Ibid., p.34.
6
Bernard Tissier de Mallerais, Marcel Lefebvre, tr. Brian Sudlow (2002; Kansas City:
Angelus Press, 2004), p.301.
7
Giacomo Biffi, Memories and Digressions of an Italian Cardinal [Italian] (Sienna,
2007), pp.184-185.
8
Ibid., p.179.
9
Madiran, L’accord de Metz, p.26.
10
L. Longo, “Summary of the Introduction to the XIth National Congress of the PCI” in
R. De Mattei, Catholic Italy and the New Concordat [Italian] (Rome, 1985), p.131.
11
A. Gramsci, Notebooks from Prison, 1929-1935 [Italian], C. 16, §11.
12
Quoted in De Mattei, Catholic Italy, p.105.
13
Ibid., p.96
14
Jacques Maritain, Primauté du spirituel (Paris, 1927), pp.28-29. [English version: The
Things That Are Not Caesar’s, tr. J. F. Scanlan (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons,
1930), p.13.]
1

Political Modernism: The Negation
of the Kingship of Jesus Christ
Political modernism seeks the separation of
Church and State in opposition to the teaching of the
Church on the social kingship of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Political modernism would limit God’s relationship

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with men to individual members of humanity. The
Church, to the contrary, teaches that man, by nature a
social animal, must, among other duties, offer public
worship to God, and that society (a union of many

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families), a “moral creature” of God, owes Him public
worship and adoration. Unfortunately, Vatican II (in
Dignitatis Humanae) denied the social dimension of
the confessional Catholic State. The last trip of Pope
Benedict XVI to the United States (April 2008) was
the epitome of this error, for he presented as the ideal
and model separation between the State and the true
religion.

The Cause of the Evil Enveloping
the Modern World: Laicism
On December 11, 1925, Pius XI promulgated the
Encyclical Quas Primas on the social reign of our Lord
Jesus Christ; this document brought the social kingship
of Christ into the universal liturgy (Feast of Christ the
King) and into the category of truths declared by the
ecclesiastical Magisterium.
I. On March 24, 1960, the Italian episcopate,
under the presidency of Cardinal Siri, wrote an
interesting Pastoral Letter on “Laicism” which well
explained its nature and malice. Etymologically, the
Greek word laòs, whence comes the word laicism,
designates the faithful and, in the language of the New
Testament, the Christian and the saint; but the term
laicism in the 19th century, as the suffix “ism” denotes,
took on a purely negative anticlerical and antireligious
connotation. Laicism, in effect, is “a complex state of
mind…however it is possible to discern a constant
line…a mentality of systematic and alarmist opposition
to any influence that might be exercised over men and
institutions by the Catholic religion and hierarchy”
(Pastoral Letter on Laicism).
Laicism can be either radical or moderate: it is
radical when it completely abstracts from Revelation
and grace; it is moderate when it considers the Faith as
something private and individual in such wise that the
Church ought not to intervene in public life. Moderate
laicism is also anti-Catholic: it is Liberal Catholicism,
which Pius IX judged more dangerous than the “Paris
Commune.”
One of the causes of laicism may be “the
shortcomings of some members of the clergy, whose
attitude of excessive authoritarianism and distrust
of the laity…can lead to reciprocal defiance and
opposition” (ibid.). Priests, to the contrary, should
instruct the laity, give them spiritual direction, and
provide them with the means of grace, and the laity
should then bring Jesus and the spirit of the Church
into their social circles and workplaces.
St. Pius X reiterated that in order to restore all
things in Christ–“instaurare omnia in Christo” [Eph.
1:10]–it was necessary to have good laymen who, in a
collaboration subordinate to the clergy, would carry
the Gospel into secularized society and rechristianize
the world. L’Ami du Clergé of January 20, 1921,
reported a dialogue between St. Pius X and a group
of cardinals:

“What is most needed today,” asked the Pope, “for the
salvation of society?”
“Founding Catholic schools?” answered one.
“No.”
“Building churches,” replied another.
“Not that either.”
“Promoting vocations,” said a third.
“No,” replied St. Pius X. “What is most needed today is
that every parish should have a group of laymen who are
very virtuous, well-informed, resolute, and real apostles.”

Christ Is King
Christ is king, Pope Pius XI states, and then asks
what the nature of His kingship is. As God, the Son
is consubstantial with the Father; He is king of the
universe like the Father and the Holy Ghost. As man,
He is king by birthright, His humanity belonging to
the person of the divine Word (the hypostatic union);
He is king by acquired right, having redeemed the
human race from sin with His blood. Consequently,
Christ as man also has power over all creatures, which
must adore and obey Him. This royalty residing
in Christ’s human nature is the subject of Pius XI’s
encyclical.
As king, Christ has a primacy of honor, or
excellence, and of domination. He thus possesses
the triple power legislative (He promulgates the Ten
Commandments), judicial (particular and universal
judgment), and executive (He rewards and punishes in
this life and in the next).
In Holy Scripture, the kingship of Christ is
announced several times in both the Old and the New
Testament. In the New Testament, the Angel of the
Annunciation tells Mary: “And his reign will have no
end”; and on Good Friday Jesus tells Pilate, who asked
“Are you then a king?” “I am.”
Christ’s reign is by nature essentially and
principally spiritual, but without excluding its
extension to temporal things; it is also social and not
only individual. The kingship of our Lord Jesus Christ
is principally spiritual: He governs souls and leads
them towards Paradise. Yet “whoever would take from
Christ, God and man, power over all things temporal
would be sorely mistaken,” wrote St. Pius X.
As God, He has an absolute right over all created
things. But Christ did not and does not desire to
exercise His kingship over things temporal; He leaves
it to human authority. He communicates this power
in the same terms to the Church in the person of the
Pope: direct and exercised power in matters spiritual;
direct but unexercised power in things temporal,
which the Pope, like Christ, leaves to princes, only
exercising his power insofar as temporal things hamper
or hinder man in the pursuit of his final spiritual end
(ratione peccati).1

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The reign of our Lord Jesus Christ is not only a
reign over individuals but also over society. Society is
a grouping of families and individuals by natural right,
and as Christ is the king of individuals, He is also the
king of nations, which owe Him their adoration and
submission. The State, moreover, must co-operate
with the Church by means of good laws so that its
citizens may attain eternal happiness, in keeping with
the proper subordination of ends: the temporal good is
inferior to the spiritual good, thus it is subordinate to
it.
The negation of the social kingship of Christ has
catastrophic consequences because it leads to anarchy
and totalitarianism. If authority does not come from
God but man, the question arises: why should some
men obey and others command? This is the principle
of revolution and anarchy. In another connection, if
the citizens refuse to obey an authority which they
perceive as purely human, the State has no other
means than force to compel obedience—and that is
totalitarianism. But if the principle that authority
comes from God is widely accepted, the citizens will
be more obedient because they realize that by obeying
human authorities, they obey God; and the leaders, in
turn, will be more just, seeing in the kingship of Christ
the model they must strive to imitate.
The failure to take into account Christ’s kingship
results in the destruction of civil society by making it
alternate between anarchy and the police state, which,
in order to make its authority respected, must inspire
terror and crush all opposition.

Humanity Needs Christ the King
The world, in disarray after World War I, was
looking for a king of peace. In 1925, the Pope pointed
him out to everyone, saying: Jesus Christ is the Princeps
pacifer.
All men need someone to govern or guide them
(a rector or rex, from regere, that is, to direct someone
towards a goal) just as a ship needs someone to steer
it (helm = gubernaculum; helmsman = gubernator). This
king is Christ, and men must be disposed to observe
His laws and commands in order to make their way
to port, that is, the Law that, if observed with the help
of grace, will lead them to heaven. If men, being free,
refuse, they will be bereft of their final end, which is
eternal life.
Moreover, man is a social animal, and every
society needs an authority to maintain its unity and
to govern it towards its end: ubi non est gubernator,
populus corruet. The world that issued from the First
World War felt the need of a guide to shelter it from
the consequences of that massacre and looked for a
king; the Pope showed Him to it, but the world did not
want Christ to reign over it, and so there was a second
world war even more terrible, at the end of which the

24

last “empire” still standing in Europe, encircled on the
east and the west, was the Roman Church with Pope
Pius XII for pastor, who once more pointed out the
only remedy to so many evils: a return to Christ the
King. The world again did not want to obey, and so we
find ourselves on the brink of a terrifying era of chaos,
disorder, and anarchy.

Christ the King
of Minds and Hearts
The king of minds is Christ, who alone reveals
the fulness of truth. He is also the king of hearts
because He is the infinite Sovereign Good, the only
one capable of satisfying the infinite aspirations of the
human soul. Man has need of a king of his intellect to
enlighten him and lead him to the gate of truth and to
keep him from erring. That king is Christ, who said: “I
am the Way, the Truth, and the Life”; and who warned
us: “Neither be ye called masters, for one is your
master, Christ” (Mt. 23:10).
Man is also made to love, but he can find
no creature able to satisfy his heart’s desires. St.
Augustine said: “Thou hast made us for Thyself, O
God, and our heart is restless until it rests in Thee.”
This is something we experience daily. But our heart
is also “pravum et inscrutabile,” as Jeremias teaches
(17:9), and it can turn its back on God and prefer to
Him creatures whom he shall have to leave one day
whether he wishes or not.
That is why the human heart (nutantia corda, the
liturgy says) needs a remedy from a doctor; a sure
guide, to be preserved from procrastination. Only
Jesus, true God and true Man, has the power to heal
our reluctant hearts, and He tells us: “Come to me,
all you that labour and are burdened; I will give you
rest….learn from me; I am gentle and humble of heart;
and you shall find rest for your souls” (Mt. 11:28-29).
Such is the only true remedy for the evils afflicting
man and threatening to make him lose his way.

How to Restore the
Social Reign of Christ
Cardinal Pie wrote a great deal on the social
kingship of Christ, and gave wise advice for restoring
it. Let us listen to his counsel.
The faithful must make Christ reign in their minds
and then in their hearts (nihil volitum nisi praecognitum)
by religious instruction: “The only hope of social
regeneration depends on the study of our religion….
The first step towards a return to peace and happiness
will be the return to the knowledge of Christianity.”3
Letting one’s mind drift away from truth and
becoming indifferent to it is, according to Cardinal
Pie, the crime God will punish the most severely and
the most justly. The religious instruction of the faithful
must be solid and nourish in them an integral faith
which confesses not only the divinity and the humanity

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of Jesus Christ, but also His social kingship. The
Catholic, if he wishes to be such fully, must believe
that Jesus has the right to reign over social institutions.
The faithful will manifest their integral faith especially
by practising the Catholic Faith without human
respect: “The Christian religion is a public religion,
and the faithful have a duty to practise it publicly,
whence the duty to offer to Christ the pubic worship of
the Church.”4
We must not be ashamed of Christ in front of
men, and we must not give in if the culture in which
we live and work is anti-Christian; this would be an
aggravating, not mitigating, circumstance, for in the
general apostasy in which we live, we must declare
our faith out loud and be an example. If anyone
is ashamed of Jesus before men, then Jesus will be
ashamed of him when He comes to judge the living
and the dead: “Since today the God of heaven and
earth has become unpopular and you stand a fair
chance of being despised like Him by a corrupt
generation, you consider yourselves free from any
public duty towards Him….On the contrary! If we are
faithful to Him, we shall reign with Him; if we disown
Him, He will disown us.”5
Priests must devote their lives to the cause of
the social reign of Christ. Since the first obstacle to
its restoration is religious ignorance, “the priest’s
principal duty is to instruct….it is his mission….If the
priest is a man of doctrine, this program will be carried
out; he must know how to give to the faithful and to
magistrates the Church’s complete teaching on the
social kingship of Christ.”6
But who will realize and put into practice the
doctrinal teaching given by priests, the Cardinal
wonders; and he answers: the intellectual class and the
ruling class.

The Common Duties of
Intellectuals and Rulers
The laity, who are neither “laicists” nor
anticlericalists since the word “lay” designates the
faithful who do not belong to the clergy, must have a
solid, complete, and superior instruction: “They should
follow a course of Thomist philosophy, natural ethics,
Catholic social doctrine, and ecclesiastical public law;
so doing, the nation will be transformed.”7
Teachers, who have the delicate mission of forming
the intellects and moral conscience of youth, have
the particular duty of teaching them the principles of
Christianity and the necessity of the social kingship of
Jesus Christ, in opposition to the intellectuals of the
Enlightenment, who took advantage of their role to
create a vacuum round Christ, to discredit the Church
and the clergy, thus estranging the masses from Jesus.
It is also necessary that public officials take
part officially and sincerely in the Church’s public
worship. The return en masse of the people to the
liturgy and the Christian life will never be able to

happen if the intellectual and political leadership does
not give the example: the intellectual elite [le savoir]
must give a completely Catholic teaching, and the
political elite [le pouvoir] must strive to realize in the
political domain an integrally Christian platform.
We must not forget what St. Pius X said:
Civiliza­tion is not something yet to be found, nor is the New
City to be built on hazy notions; it has been in existence and
still is: it is Christian civilization, it is the Catholic City. It has
only to be set up and restored continually against the unremitting attacks of insane dreamers, rebels and miscreants.8

Leo XIII described Christian society, or medieval
Christendom, in these terms:
There was once a time when States were governed by the
philosophy of the Gospel. Then it was that the power and
divine virtue of Christian wisdom had diffused itself throughout the laws, institutions, and morals of the people….Then,
too, the religion instituted by Jesus Christ…flourished everywhere, by the favour of princes and the legitimate protection
of magistrates; and Church and State were happily united
in concord and friendly interchange of good offices. The
State, constituted in this wise, bore fruits important beyond
all expectation, whose remembrance is still, and always will
be, in renown, witnessed to as they are by countless proofs
which can never be blotted out or ever obscured by any
craft of any enemies.9

St. Pius X averred:
“To restore all things in Christ” has always been the
Church’s motto….“To restore all things”–not in any haphazard fashion, but “in Christ”….“To restore all things in Christ”
includes not only what properly pertains to the divine mission of the Church, namely, leading souls to God, but also
what We have already explained as flowing from that divine
mission, namely, Christian civilization in each and every one
of the elements composing it.10
To restore all things in Christ, above all it is necessary to
know the doctrine of Jesus Christ, not by reading the great
books destined for intellectuals, but by reading a little book
that, beneath a humble aspect, contains all the wisdom dispersed in the great books: the Catechism.11

Finally, Pope Pius XII observed:
There is a whole world to be rebuilt from its very foundations, the universal order to be re-established. The material
order, the intellectual order, the moral order, the social
order, and the international order: everything has to be
remade and restored in a constant, regular movement. The
rebirth and continuation of the tranquility of order, which
is peace, the only true peace, can only happen on condition
that human society be made to rest upon Christ, and so
regather, recapitulate, and reconjugate everything in Him:
instaurare omnia in Christo.12

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The Peril Hanging
over Humanity

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The world is becoming more and more
dechristianized. Today there no longer exists a single
nation in which Christ reigns publicly; indeed,
everything is being done to efface every trace of His
reign. Humanly speaking, the contest is unequal. If
anyone should entertain the thought of winning by
purely human means, let him heed what St. Pius X
teaches:

5-10 days

2-4 days

He is everywhere and amongst all; he knows how to be violent or sly. Throughout the course of recent centuries, he has
attempted to achieve the intellectual, moral, and social disaggregation of the unity in the mysterious organism of Christ.
He desiderated nature without grace; reason without faith;
freedom without authority, and sometimes authority without
freedom. This enemy takes a more and more concrete form,
and his lack of basic principles leaves one flabbergasted:
Christ, yes; the Church, no. Then: God, yes; Christ, no. Finally
the impious cry: God is dead; and even, God never existed.
And now comes the attempt to construct a global framework
on foundations...which are the very ones chiefly responsible

26

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There are many, We are well aware, who, in their yearning
for peace, that is for the tranquility of order, band themselves
into societies and parties, which they style parties of order.
Hope and labor lost. For there is but one party of order capable
of restoring peace in the midst of all this turmoil, and that is
the party of God.13

But the arm of God has not lost its strength, and
“omnia quaecumque voluit, fecit,” even though the enemy
of the Christian social order has been advancing in
giant steps from Renaissance humanism to the present
day, reaching its apex in Italy with the Risorgimento
and becoming a mass phenomenon with Christian
Democracy. This enemy is admirably described by St.
Pius X:

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for the menace imperilling humanity: an economy without
God, law without God, politics without God.14
Translated from Courrier de Rome, January 2009, pp.1-4.
P. Parente, A. Piolanti, S. Garofalo, Dictionary of Dogmatic Theology, 4th ed. (Rome:
Studium, 1957).
2
Cf. T. de Saint-Just, La royauté sociale de Notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ (Chiré-enMontreuil: Ed. de Chiré, 1988), pp.23-42; J. de Monléon, O.S.B., Le Christ Roi (Paris:
Téqui, 1933); F. Sarda y Salvany, Le libéralisme est un péché (Paris: Nouvelle Aurore,
1975), pp. 239-245; J. Ousset, Pour qu’Il Règne (Paris: Office, 1970), pp.11-30.
3
H. Oudin and J. Leday, Oeuvres sacerdotales (Paris, 1891), I, 137.
4
Saint-Just, p. 87.
5
L. Pie, Instruction pastorale sur l’obligation de confesser publiquement la foi chrétienne (Lent 1874) (Paris: H. Oudin-J. Ledday, 1891).
6
Saint-Just, p. 94.
7
Ibid., p.103
8
Letter on the Sillon “Our Apostolic Mandate,” August 25, 1910.
9
Immortale Dei, November 1, 1885.
10
Encyclical Il Fermo Proposito, June 11, 1905.
11
Allocution to Tuscan Pilgrims, October 12, 1908.
12
Exhortation to the Faithful of Rome, February 10, 1952.
13
E Supremi Apostolatus, October 4, 1903, §7.
14
Nel contemplare.
1

The ANgelus • July 2009 www.angeluspress.org