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IV. Considerations
regarding particular aspects
7. In recent years,
there have been cases within some organizations founded on Catholic principles,
in which support has been given to political forces or movements with positions
contrary to the moral and social teaching of the Church on fundamental ethical
questions. Such activities, in contradiction to basic principles of
Christian conscience, are not compatible with membership in organizations or
associations which define themselves as Catholic. Similarly, some Catholic
periodicals in certain countries have expressed perspectives on political
choices that have been ambiguous or incorrect, by misinterpreting the idea of
the political autonomy enjoyed by Catholics and by not taking into
consideration the principles mentioned above.
Faith in Jesus Christ,
who is «the way, the truth, and the life»(Jn 14:6), calls Christians to exert a greater effort
in building a culture which, inspired by the Gospel, will reclaim the values
and contents of the Catholic Tradition. The presentation of the fruits of
the spiritual, intellectual and moral heritage of Catholicism in terms
understandable to modern culture is a task of great urgency today, in order to
avoid also a kind of Catholic cultural diaspora. Furthermore,
the cultural achievements and mature experience of Catholics in political life
in various countries, especially since the Second World War, do not permit any
kind of ‘inferiority complex’ in comparison with political programs which
recent history has revealed to be weak or totally ruinous. It is
insufficient and reductive to think that the commitment of Catholics in society
can be limited to a simple transformation of structures, because if at the
basic level there is no culture capable of receiving, justifying and putting
into practice positions deriving from faith and morals, the changes will always
rest on a weak foundation.
Christian faith has
never presumed to impose a rigid framework on social and political questions,
conscious that the historical dimension requires men and women to live in
imperfect situations, which are also susceptible to rapid change. For this
reason, Christians must reject political positions and activities inspired by a
utopian perspective which, turning the tradition of Biblical faith into a kind
of prophetic vision without God, makes ill use of
religion by directing consciences towards a hope which is merely earthly and
which empties or reinterprets the Christian striving towards eternal
life.
At the same time, the
Church teaches that authentic freedom does not exist without the truth. «Truth
and freedom either go together hand in hand or together they perish in misery».27
In a society in which truth is neither mentioned nor sought, every form
of authentic exercise of freedom will be weakened, opening the way to libertine
and individualistic distortions and undermining the protection of the good of
the human person and of the entire society.
8. In this regard, it
is helpful to recall a truth which today is often not perceived or formulated
correctly in public opinion: the right to freedom of conscience and, in a
special way, to religious freedom, taught in the Declaration Dignitatis humanae of the
Second Vatican Council, is based on the ontological dignity of the human person
and not on a non-existent equality among religions or cultural systems of human
creation. 28 Reflecting on this question,
Paul VI taught that «in no way does the Council base this right to religious
freedom on the fact that all religions and all teachings, including those that
are erroneous, would have more or less equal value; it is based rather on the
dignity of the human person, which demands that he not be subjected to external
limitations which tend to constrain the conscience in its search for the true
religion or in adhering to it».29 The
teaching on freedom of conscience and on religious freedom does not therefore
contradict the condemnation of indifferentism and religious relativism by
Catholic doctrine; 30 on the contrary, it is fully in accord with
it.
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