That’s what Fr. Robert Siricio of the Acton Institute is saying.
What does he mean by the provocative statement?
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Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live."
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I think he means that the Pope is a classical liberal along the lines of Locke, the Founding Fathers, etc. Goodness, I hope not.
Benedict is aligned with (if not a “member” of) the Ressourcement & Communio schools/circles of theology, groups which tend to be critical of liberalism, even as broadly understood by Fr. Sirico.
I find it interesting that both Fr. Sirico and Michael Novak are trying pretty hard of late to make Benedict a colleague in their own take on Catholic social thought; I find this to be extremely curious, considering that it was a related comment by Ratzinger about American culture as bourgeois around 1984 that sparked a long debate between David Schindler (editor of the American edition of Communio) and Fr. Neuhaus, Michael Novak, and George Weigel, with Schinder defending Ratzinger’s comment.
This is why I have long thought that the word “liberal” should be stricken from our vocabulary: it can mean too many things, even in the merely economic context. Fr. Sirico means by it someone who holds (at least some of) the tenets of laissez-faire capitalism. Most of us Americans mean someone who holds (at least most of) the tenets of state socialism. Don’t you just love words that can mean their opposite?
Goodness, I Sirico/Novak are right. I’m pretty tired of religious leaders supporting the failed economic policies of the left.
To point out the deep metaphysical/ontological errors of one economic system is not to necessarily endorse another system with even deeper errors.
I find this to be extremely curious, considering that it was a related comment by Ratzinger about American culture as bourgeois around 1984 that sparked a long debate between David Schindler (editor of the American edition of Communio) and Fr. Neuhaus, Michael Novak, and George Weigel, with Schinder defending Ratzinger’s comment.
I had not thought of applying this word (“bourgeois”) to American culture, but it seems to me (just by looking at the dictionary definition of the word) that it fits perfectly.
If memory serves, then-Fr. Ratzinger was one of the founders of Communio.
Fr. Sirico means by it [“liberal”] someone who holds (at least some of) the tenets of laissez-faire capitalism.
It also seems that he means someone who believes in liberty of conscience and even, perhaps, one who believes in the separation of Church and State.
If memory serves, then-Fr. Ratzinger was one of the founders of Communio.
Yep… I should have made the connection between him and the journal clearer.
I’ve heard this song. The same old song and dance was said about JPII.
My opinion on the matter is that this is more a hope of American capitalists than anything based in reality. The only comparable hope is that of liberals for the normalizing of contraceptives.
The simple truth is that the Church does not see American capitalism as a model to be followed. In my readings, this has been a constant struggle between Rome and the American episcopate. The most visable export of this country is decadence. The day Rome starts valuing this is the day the world ends.
Cardinal George was never truer when he said that the great forces working against Catholicism are idealouges of the left and right in this country. Cardinal George’s Ad Limina remarks.
M.Z. Forrest writes:
My opinion on the matter is that this is more a hope of American capitalists than anything based in reality. The only comparable hope is that of liberals for the normalizing of contraceptives.
Acton describes JPII’s position by quoting his own encyclicals such as Centesimus Annus. Consider his words here:
By intervening directly and depriving society of its responsibility, the Social Assistance State leads to a loss of human energies and an inordinate increase of public agencies, which are dominated more by bureaucratic ways of thinking than by concern for serving their clients, and which are accompanied by an enormous increase in spending. In fact, it would appear that needs are best understood and satisfied by people who are closest to them and who act as neighbours to those in need. It should be added that certain kinds of demands often call for a response which is not simply material but which is capable of perceiving the deeper human need. One thinks of the condition of refugees, immigrants, the elderly, the sick, and all those in circumstances which call for assistance, such as drug abusers: all these people can be helped effectively only by those who offer them genuine fraternal support, in addition to the necessary care.
How can this not be taken as a criticism of the Welfare State? What statements directly from JPII are pro-contraception people using to support their arguments?
But Bill, fierce criticism of the Welfare State does not logically necessitate endorsement of American-style capitalism.
I’ve often found much in Fr. Sirico with which I agree — but have also often found much in him with which I cannot agree. I get the impression that he is a tad too American and a tad less Catholic than he needs to be. I was also appalled, no horrified, when I found him trying to make a case that one could use nuclear weapons during wartime in a manner that fits with the Church’s just war doctrine.
Anyway, I certainly hope Pope Benedict XVI is no liberal, especially not as Thomas Storck discusses the term, or as it was mercilessly critiqued in the old Spanish essay Liberalismo es Pecado.
Re: Bill
One needn’t be for the welfare state and against American capitalism. JPII rejected the false dichotomy of Capitalism and Socialism. I would add Chesterton, Belloc, and Leo XIII to that company.
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Y’know…don’t even try to assign modern political terms to Catholic beliefs…it just doesn’t work…you can’t say that Catholics can be conservitive or Liberal…you believe the truth (the fullness thereof) or you aren’t really Catholic…
Yeah…Catholiscism is pretty liberal…
Nooo….you’re ascribing your new system to an age-old religion…doesn’t work.
Catholiscism is NOT liberal OR conservative…it is the Truth. Period. End of statement.
SO!
Fr. Robert Siricio I repeat what I said.
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