Liberalism Is a Sin

The same judgement, however, cannot be passed on the other work by D. Moreover his injurious manner of speaking cannot be approved, for he inveighs rather against the person of D. Sarda, than against the latter's supposed errors. Therefore the Sacred Congregation has commanded D. In communicating to you this order of the Sacred Congregation of the Index, that you may be able to make it known to the illustrious priest of your diocese, D.

Sarda, for his peace of mind, I pray God to grant you all happiness and prosperity and subscribe myself with great respect, Your most obedient servant, Fr. Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of the Index. The following short chapters on Liberalism are mainly and substantially Dr. Sarda's book, put into English, and adapted to our American conditions. Their need and their use will be best understood and appreciated by their perusal. Numbers in parenthesis throughout the text are the page numbers of the original reprint in The press has grown so omnipresent nowadays that there is no escape from it.

It is therefore important to know exactly how to steer our course amidst the many perils that beset Catholics on this score. How then are we to distinguish between journals that merit or do not merit our confidence? Or rather, what kind of journals ought to inspire us with very little and what with no confidence?

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In the first place it is clear that such journals as boast of their liberalism have no claim to our confidence in matters that Liberalism touches on. These are precisely the enemies against whom we have constantly to be on guard, against whom we have to wage perpetual war. This point then is outside of our present consideration. All those who, in our times claim the title of Liberalism, in the specific sense in which we always use the term, become our declared enemies and the enemies of the Church of God.

But there is another class of journals less prompt to unmask and proclaim themselves, who love to live amidst ambiguities in an undefined and indefinite region of compromise.

Dr. Don Felix Sarda Y Salvany

They declare themselves Catholic and saver their detestation and abhorrence of Liberalism, at least if we credit their words. The liberal Catholic recognizes no dependence of the State upon God, and will likely reason that the State and God have nothing to do with each other. Because the State must not have any formal alliance with religion, even though individuals may have religious freedom, the upper hand is given to atheists in positions of power and governance.

It is through secular education that liberalism seizes upon the future and breeds atheism in the hearts of the coming generations. To be called intolerant, illiberal, narrow, ultramontane, reactionist, is gall and wormwood to his little soul.

Is Liberalism a Sin?

Under this epithetical fire he gives way and surrenders his birthright of faith and reason for a mess of Liberal pottage. In brief, The liberal Catholic has adopted the position of the Protestant: It is not the Church that is infallible, but rather each person who judges by the so-called liberty of conscience. He is in a mental haze — a fog which hides from him the abyss into which his vanity and pride, cunningly played upon by Satan, are invariably drawing him.

Sarda reasoned that there are two kinds of atheists, those who say they believe that God does not exist, and those who believe that God exists but live as though He did not exist the latter, called practical atheists , are by far the more numerous. There are also two kinds of liberals: Of all the Liberal reptiles, these are the most venomous.

Indeed, how is it even possible that Pope Francis recently had to chastise the Belgian Brothers of Charity for offering euthanasia to psychiatric patients in their fifteen hospitals across Belgium?

Next Sarda rips into Catholic journalists for their liberal propensities: To assume to be Liberal and then endeavour to appear Catholic is to belie his faith; and although in his own heart he may imagine that he is as Catholic as the Pope as several Liberals vaunt themselves , there is not the least doubt that his influence on current ideas and the march of events is thrown in favor of the enemy; and, in spite of himself, he becomes a satellite forced to move in the general orbit described by Liberalism….

Most readers know the word [Liberal] in its common usage and class all things Liberal in a lump. When they see an ostensibly Catholic journal practically making common cause with the Liberal creed by sanctioning its name, they are easily led into the dangerous belief that Liberalism has some affinity with their faith, and this once grafted in their minds, they become ready adepts of Rationalism. The literature of liberalism Sarda recognized to be everywhere and therefore immensely dangerous to those unaware of its open or subtle presence and power to persuade. But the advantage for the Catholic is that he is not obliged, if he knows the thrust of that literature, to succumb to its logic or to its charms, no matter how forceful and elegant they may be.

There is a tendency among fair-minded people, not a vice in itself, to be impartial to works we know to be opposed to our own philosophy, to praise them for certain admirable qualities. Indeed, many Catholic readers and writers will praise out of a perverse desire to please those with whom they disagree, as if this would bring Liberals around to a more positive disposition to Catholic thought.

But Sarda asks us to consider whether such impartiality and praise would come from Liberals when you might expect them to find something praiseworthy in the Gospels, for example. They are either going to ignore the Gospels entirely or they are going to find something ugly to say about them.

Sarda is perfectly aware of the unfair charges brought by Liberals against Catholics, that they are supposedly uncharitable because they oppose liberalism and the values that are dear to Liberals. It is a never-ending charge intended to show that Catholic love has its limits, and that the hatred Catholics have for liberalism has no limits. But Sarda insists this is a wrong-headed ruse intended to make Catholics wonder if indeed they have lost the sense of charity that they have always preached was at the heart of their religion.

Sarda is blunt in his answer to such criticism. The physician cauterizing his patient or cutting off his gangrened limb may nonetheless love him. When we correct the wicked by restraining or punishing them, we do nonetheless love them.

See a Problem?

This is charity — and perfect charity…. In short, the wolf has always been called the wolf; and in so calling the wolf a wolf, no one has ever believed that wrong was done to the flock and the shepherd. Everywhere he is surrounded by a liberal press, a liberal educational establishment, and liberal celebrities who are models of success. Refutes every aspect of the deadly error that one religion is as good as another and that a person has a moral right to choose whichever religion suits him best.

Cuts through the foggy religious thinking rampant today!

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. The Portable Enlightenment Reader. God and the State Illustrated Edition. Documents of the Christian Church. John Henry Cardinal Newman. From Shame to Sin. Political Thought in England from Locke to Bentham. The Primacy of the Political. Rise of the Feudal University. The Unity Of Civilization.

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The Just War Tradition. The Restoration of Christian Culture. A Collection of Magisterial Texts. Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. Desiring a Better Country. Towards The Great Peace. The Three Marks of Manhood. A History of Freedom of Thought Illustrated. The Purpose Of The Papacy. The Mind in the Making. Cautio Criminalis, or a Book on Witch Trials.