Does a Catholic country have justification to ban proselytizing by members of other religions?

[Barricade]

Suppose we have a country that is both vast majority Catholic in terms of its population, and gives the Catholic faith a privileged position in government as its laws are rooted in a Catholic understanding of morality.

Would such a state have a moral justification for prohibiting members of other religions from proselytizing publicly?

According to Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae the following is stated:

1. This Vatican Council declares that the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits.

The council further declares that the right to religious freedom has its foundation in the very dignity of the human person as this dignity is known through the revealed word of God and by reason itself.(2) This right of the human person to religious freedom is to be recognized in the constitutional law whereby society is governed and thus it is to become a civil right.

vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decl_19651207_dignitatis-humanae_en.html

Now suppose there are people in this society that are adherents to a heretical sect of Christianity, or a different religion such as Islam where they feel they have a religious obligation to spread the message of their religion. Would preventing such people from proselytizing be a violation of their religious liberty under Dignitatis Humanae?

 

[Michael96]

Personally I’d never want to live in any country that doesn’t allow freedom of expression of religion and speech. I’m very happy for Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, etc., to have freedom in telling other people about their faith. So long as no one is trying to coerce another into faith then I’m happy.

What does it say about conviction in our own faith if we are scared of having alternative views expressed?

God bless+

Michael

 

[Barricade]

Personally I’d never want to live in any country that doesn’t allow freedom of expression of religion and speech. I’m very happy for Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, etc., to have freedom in telling other people about their faith. So long as no one is trying to coerce another into faith then I’m happy.

What does it say about conviction in our own faith if we are scared of having alternative views expressed?

God bless+

Michael

What I don’t fully understand though is the status given to beliefs classified as “religious” versus other beliefs when it comes to varying degrees of immunity from coercion by the state.

So let’s say a heretical group that identifies as Christian was spreading their message that the resurrection never literally happened. Under the Catholic faith this is false, this is inaccurate, this is untrue, so what moral precept prevents a state (one rooted in the Catholic faith) from suppressing the spread of such a falsehood?

States suppress falsehood all of the time in other circumstances, holocaust deniers sincerely believe the holocaust didn’t happen, this belief is not only absurd, but it is false and on the basis of this belief being false many states have laws against holocaust denial. *If *a state is allowed to suppress the spread of a falsehood in this context, why would it not be permitted to do so when the idea is religious in nature, even if that religious idea poses a greater threat to the faithful and a Catholic society such as the propagation of the belief that the resurrection didn’t happen?

I guess this can get confusing because it also involves freedom of speech issues, which I’m not that familiar with in terms of Catholic teaching. We obviously don’t have a moral right to lie, but how far is a state permitted to go in suppressing falsehood even if the person propagating the falsehood sincerely believes it to be true?

 

[Michael96]

Hi Barricade

I wouldn’t want to trust any state to be guardians of ‘truth’.

I don’t think, using one of your examples, that holocaust denial should be dealt with by state censorship of such views but rather by an open rebuttal of such claims with clear evidence presented by good historians. Let the holocaust deniers have their say - and then let good historians show people why they are wrong. And for me that’s the same for any group that wishes to deny Christianity - let them have their say and then let the Christian side present the arguments for why they are wrong.

But that’s just my view I very happily live in a multicultural society.

 

[Della]

I think a Catholic country ought not to ban evangelizing by other faiths, but it ought to have a constitution that bans changing laws that support Catholic teaching, so that even if the another faith should gain the majority in her lawmakers, she cannot be forced to inflict social ills on her citizens in the name of being tolerant. Of course, Ireland has such a constitution, but she’s violated it again and again in recent years, but it was because apostates got into positions of power. There’s no perfect form of government among men, I’m afraid.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Hi Barricade

I wouldn’t want to trust any state to be guardians of ‘truth’.

I don’t think, using one of your examples, that holocaust denial should be dealt with by state censorship of such views but rather by an open rebuttal of such claims with clear evidence presented by good historians. Let the holocaust deniers have their say - and then let good historians show people why they are wrong. And for me that’s the same for any group that wishes to deny Christianity - let them have their say and then let the Christian side present the arguments for why they are wrong.

But that’s just my view I very happily live in a multicultural society.

Any state, whether Catholic or secular, has the moral obligation to ensure the physical and emotional well-being of its citizens. This is a condition for the legitimacy of the state. The state has a right to impose, as obligatory for all citizens, sound basic ethical principles such as the value of human life.

Where states, including religious ones, get themselves into trouble is when they lose sight of those basic moral principles that should ground any and all laws.

I would agree that a multicultural society where freedom of speech is permitted is likely the best possible option for governance. Unfortunately, all of this depends upon the actual moral goodness of, at least, the majority of citizens. If the moral status of the citizenry degenerates, there is nothing to prevent the state itself from becoming degenerate or tyrannical in response or by the design of whatever powerful elite gains leadership.

 

[Michael96]

Peter

Thanks for sharing your opinion on my opinion

I am reminded of Churchill’s quip … ‘democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the other forms tried’.

Personally I’m thankful I live in the UK and live at this time. Our governmental system isn’t perfect, but it’s not bad. We *generally *seem to cope with being a multicultural society pretty well. There are tensions here and there, but overall I think we’re in a pretty decent place. I think a key question at the moment is how much autonomy groups within society should have - but there’s always some tension between local vs. national (or national vs. Europe is a key debate for us at the moment).

Power has always been a dreadful thing for the Church so I am very happy with the Catholic Church having absolutely no formal power in the UK (the Anglican Church has some representation in government, but it’s pretty minor).

God bless +

Michael

 

[FractalFire]

Simply put, no, not if the Catholic Church has a right to preach in 99% Muslim countries.

 

[St_Francis]

Suppose we have a country that is both vast majority Catholic in terms of its population, and gives the Catholic faith a privileged position in government as its laws are rooted in a Catholic understanding of morality.

Would such a state have a moral justification for prohibiting members of other religions from proselytizing publicly?

According to Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae the following is stated:

vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decl_19651207_dignitatis-humanae_en.html

Now suppose there are people in this society that are adherents to a heretical sect of Christianity, or a different religion such as Islam where they feel they have a religious obligation to spread the message of their religion. Would preventing such people from proselytizing be a violation of their religious liberty under Dignitatis Humanae?

This is an interesting question. I wonder if an historical analogy might not show a problem with this point of view…

In 1930, the Anglican Lambeth Coucil broke with all previous Christian teaching, and some natural law thinking too, and decided married couples could use abc.

Now, imagine a majority-Catholic nation in which there were someAnglicans, and the Anglicans started evangelizing and bringing up the acceptability of abc. This would create a conflict, no?

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

… I wonder if an historical analogy might not show a problem with this point of view.

In 1930, the Anglican Lambeth Council broke with all previous Christian teaching, and some natural law thinking too, and decided married couples could use abc.

Now, imagine a majority-Catholic nation in which there were some Anglicans, and the Anglicans started evangelizing and bringing up the acceptability of abc. This would create a conflict, no?

That was H. Vitae.

 

[St_Francis]

That was H. Vitae.

What was Humanae Vitae?

 

[exnihilo]

When we think of countries we tend to think of the modern nation states. But what if we were talking about a country that consists of one hundred Catholic families who founded the country to follow the Catholic Faith. Would such a country be obliged to allow other religions to come and proselytize? Would it be obliged to allow children born of the original families to proselytize for another faith?

 

[Michael96]

When we think of countries we tend to think of the modern nation states. But what if we were talking about a country that consists of one hundred Catholic families who founded the country to follow the Catholic Faith. Would such a country be obliged to allow other religions to come and proselytize? Would it be obliged to allow children born of the original families to proselytize for another faith?

I’d say that we must always allow children the same freedoms that we enjoy. We could reduce it to a single family - I would still allow my children to explore other faiths themselves and if they believe they have found good reason to believe that another faith is more true than the Catholic faith then I would certainly allow them to present their case, and I would listen.

But I don’t start with a presupposition that there is absolutely no possibility that the Catholic faith contains any error.

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

What was Humanae Vitae?

Different from Dignitatis, that was all (apologies if I’ve msiunderstood )

 

[Barricade]

Simply put, no, not if the Catholic Church has a right to preach in 99% Muslim countries.

But is there not a significant issue here considering we believe Catholicism to be the true religion and Islam to be a false religion? Are you insinuating that they should be treated as equals?

This is an interesting question. I wonder if an historical analogy might not show a problem with this point of view…

In 1930, the Anglican Lambeth Coucil broke with all previous Christian teaching, and some natural law thinking too, and decided married couples could use abc.

Now, imagine a majority-Catholic nation in which there were someAnglicans, and the Anglicans started evangelizing and bringing up the acceptability of abc. This would create a conflict, no?

This is an interesting analogy, and hugely relevant. It seems like a central question here is: how far can a state go in suppressing falsehood? If a falsehood happens to be a religious belief is the state suddenly shackled from suppressing its spread simply because it is religious? As I said before, the state suppresses falsehood all the time, perjury and libel have been made illegal in many countries, so does a false religion somehow get an ‘escape hatch’ and is allowed to go on preaching a false message simply because a particular belief is religious in nature?

Here are some further quotations from Dignitatis Humanae (emphasis mine):

Religious communities also have the right not to be hindered in their public teaching and witness to their faith, whether by the spoken or by the written word. However, in spreading religious faith and in introducing religious practices everyone ought at all times to refrain from any manner of action which might seem to carry a hint of coercion or of a kind of persuasion that would be dishonorable or unworthy, especially when dealing with poor or uneducated people. Such a manner of action would have to be considered an abuse of one’s right and a violation of the right of others.

In addition, it comes within the meaning of religious freedom that **religious communities should not be prohibited from freely undertaking to show the special value of their doctrine in what concerns the organization of society and the inspiration of the whole of human activity. **Finally, the social nature of man and the very nature of religion afford the foundation of the right of men freely to hold meetings and to establish educational, cultural, charitable and social organizations, under the impulse of their own religious sense.

From my reading of the text, this seems pretty airtight, it seems there is very little wiggle room for states to suppress the spread of false religious beliefs and I don’t understand why. How is it unjust for a state to suppress the dissemination of false propaganda that seeks to pull people away from the truth?

 

[St_Francis]

Different from Dignitatis, that was all (apologies if I’ve msiunderstood )

OH, I’m glad you understood what I meant; when I checked just now I realized it did look like what I meant.

Yes, I was considering a situation which could be detrimental to the Catholicity of the nation.

 

[Della]

I’d say that we must always allow children the same freedoms that we enjoy. We could reduce it to a single family - I would still allow my children to explore other faiths themselves and if they believe they have found good reason to believe that another faith is more true than the Catholic faith then I would certainly allow them to present their case, and I would listen.

It’s fine to be open-minded with this regard, but it presupposes, for Catholics, that the children have been well-formed in their Catholic faith and received the initiation sacraments of the Church so that in their exploration of other faiths, they have the grace of God to discern what is true in them and what isn’t.

But I don’t start with a presupposition that there is absolutely no possibility that the Catholic faith contains any error.

But you should. The Church doesn’t claim to have all truths about everything–that’s not her God-given charism, but she does claim that the fullness of truth necessary for our salvation subsists within her. There is a big difference between the two concepts. Not all faith beliefs and practices are equal. Those given by Christ to the Church he founded are right, true and good for all mankind.

 

[Michael96]

Hi Della

I wouldn’t start with any presupposition that any given proposition (be it Catholicism or something else) must necessarily be true. Such a position is never open to correction - it becomes a position that walls itself in simply by repeatedly saying ‘I am right because I am right’. You end up in fundamentalism.

God bless +

Michael

 

[Della]

Hi Della

I wouldn’t start with any presupposition that any given proposition (be it Catholicism or something else) must necessarily be true. Such a position is never open to correction - it becomes a position that walls itself in simply by repeatedly saying ‘I am right because I am right’. You end up in fundamentalism.

God bless +

Michael

That’s only true if there is no certain truth in any religion. But there is. As I wrote, the Church has not spoken on every subject nor made pronouncements on things outside her sphere of authority, because that’s not what Christ commissioned her to do. He commissioned her to teach what he taught her. If we accept that Christ is what he claimed to be: the Truth, then we ought to accept that his Church is right about what she was commissioned to teach. It’s not a matter of excluding anything, for anything that is true is in line with Christ and his Church no matter the source that teaches or demonstrates that truth. It’s matter of trusting that Christ is who he claimed to be and trust that his Church has that truth, as he promised she would have.

There is much that is right, just and true in many other faiths and isms, but what we need for salvation subsists within the Church, so if we obey the Church, we are obeying Christ, and can be assured that we are pleasing him. And what does the Church teach us but to love God with all we have and are, and to love others as Christ loved us. If we do these things we have the truth and cannot be lost or at a loss in life. Where is the stricture in that? How is that being fundamentalist? It isn’t, it’s realizing that God is God, we are not, and that living as he commanded us to live will bring us the greatest happiness in this life and in the next.

If you haven’t read G. K. Chesterton I highly recommend him to you. He once wrote that the purpose of having an open mind, as in having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid. Indifferentism sounds intellectually appealing, since one who follows it doesn’t have to decide anything, but in the end it leaves us empty and purposeless. I don’t think you want that for your children or for yourself.

 

[Della]

Yes, sad to say. They rejected their heritage for a “mess of pottage.”