Yes, it has worked in the past. In the middle ages, the Church was the ultimate authority above all European rulers. It wasn’t a republic but it worked. Europe was thoroughly Catholic until Martin Luther and Ulrich Zwingle, et all, ended up starting their heresies.
I don’t think this would happen under a Catholic Republic. What makes you think it will?
I am not seeing how this is possible. Could you explain this?
Smells of the no-good-Scotsman fallacy. I don’t believe there is anything wrong with having a state religion in so as the religion isn’t mandatory (much in the same way that a country can have a state sport in so as playing the sport isn’t mandatory). If there is a constitutional vote in favor of having a Catholic society (66% + 1 votes) or if a country is formed with the intention of being a Catholic state, then sure.
This is why a thoroughly Catholic government would be best. Because we, as Catholics, KNOW that Holy Mother Church is the One True Church, everyone who chooses to live in Catholic-Land must agree to support and defend the Church or leave, but heresy within her borders will not be tolerated. It would be a government by Catholics for Catholics.
It was problematic because it was founded on sandy soil…Protestantism!
The morality of civil law depends on having Church and state making decisions based on canon law. I don’t see a problem there. We are not living in the dark ages when human rights and temperence were nonexistent. You participate in a gay pride march, you get a citation and pay a fine. You do it again, you go to jail. A law is a law. I believe, with the right Constitution and, thus, the right form of God-centered government, these issues could be dealt with humanely but sternly.
There will ALWAYS be too much government interference because our form of government is flawed. It separates Church and state. When the laws are secular in nature, it is only a matter of time before the land becomes secular.
That isn’t a fair comparison. Torture was considered an effective form of interrogation by all state governments from Roman times through the dark ages. It was considered a tool of the state. We are far more humane today…more so than at any time in human history. A Catholic government, if formed properly, would be unable to resort to torture and murder…oppression of heresies, certainly, but not the cruel and torturous methods of the dark ages. If you want to compare barbaristic societies, be sure to include early American treatment of the Native American tribes, women and slaves.
Are you calling for everyone who disagrees with you to be thrown out of the country? That’s radical (in a bad/extremely arrogant way).
Actually, cannon law tells us nothing infallibly about how to best run a society. The Magisterium is only infallible in matters of faith and morals.
Considering that popes with civil power became very corrupt when the Catholic Church had great temporal power, I’d say that separation of Church and state is a good thing.
I never mentioned, nor was thinking about torture in particular. You mentioned torture. There were lots of problems in those times other than torture.
I am not suggesting we throw anyone out. America is what it is, even if it is doomed. We can’t change that. But we are, after all, speaking hypothetically. So I am simply saying if there were an opportunity to start a new country in a new land and a new government for it, then Catholic-land would be my choice. There have been attempts to start entirely Catholic communities/towns here in the US but they have failed because they are bound by the laws of the United States, which are too permissive and incompatible with the Catholic faith. Please don’t get me wrong. I love my country. I just think it is fundamentally flawed.
You don’t sound very convinced of your faith. There is only one true faith and it is the Catholic faith. Not because I believe it, but because it simply is. Then doesn’t it follow that we should all be living according to that truth? You are advocating freedom of religion (or even no religion). I maintain that that notion is inherently dangerous to our souls and our society.
But it is faith and morals that informs our decisions about what should be law and what should not. The Supreme Court over the years have become more and more secular. Their only concern is equality and fairness, which is flawed, without faith and morals to inform them.
I disagree. I think that a Catholic monarchy with a an elected parliament would be much more successful than anything the Puritans put together because it’s charter/constitution would be founded on the faith and morals of the Catholic faith, which is INfallibly decided by the Magesterium of the Church.
The Church at that time had problems with it’s structure. In those times, the pope appointed kings. Bishops left their dioceses to their sons, who became bishops themselves by virtue of inheritence. Positions of church leadership were sold and bartered politically. All of these problems were corrected over time so that today the Church is a very different institution. We have learned from our mistakes. I believe that the Church today has far more virtue.
I got ahead of myself, I guess. I didn’t state that as clearly as I would have liked anyway as I was in a rush. It came out all wrong. Please allow me to withdraw those statements.
Not true in my opinion. The bad apples get all the historical opinion. If you look at the very long history of Catholic countries and then identify the bad cases, you will it is a fairly small percentage. Not that all the rest were good, but to say they have rarely woked out is absolutely false. BTW, outside of the papal states, I can think of no Catholic theocracies, catholic states in the form of monarchies are probably what you are referring to. Big difference.
When you said, “everyone who chooses to live in Catholic-Land must agree to support and defend the Church or leave,” (post 11) it seemed to me that you were calling for everyone who disagrees with your religion to be thrown out.
You’re saying that freedom of religion is dangerous to souls and our society!? Did I understand the right?
The biggest question about laws are “what is the effect?”
One of the things I’ve been trying to say, but I guess you didn’t understand, is that only a few major teachings of the Catholic Church fall under papal infallibility. Specific criteria were listed for the condition of papal infallibility to be meet when papal infallibility was formally defined by the Catholic Church in 1870. To see these criteria from the actual Catholic Church document yourself, see session 4, chapter 4, number 9 (near bottom of page) at the following link:
Did you consider the possibility that individuals in the Catholic Church hierarchy are more virtuous now because of the lack of civil power and the separation of Church and state?
Allowing other religions in Catholic-land would ultimately lead to more division and heresies. There must be some way to restrict or minimize them without resorting to violence. Perhaps other religions would allowed to practice. However, fines and/or denial of tax exempt status would be a good place to start to keep heresy from flourishing. There are probably other methods.
In the last decade there was an attempt by a very well meaning philanthropist billionaire to create an all Catholic society. He funded and built an entirely Catholic town in Florida. A place where Catholics and their children could begin feel safe from the salacious siren call of society. He very quickly ran into outcries from the media when he tried to prevent town merchants from carrying birth control/prevention products. He was unable to enforce placing Christ at the center and Mary as the Mother of the public school. There was no way to prevent other religions from setting up shop and proselytizing. He ran into many other problems but you see the situation.
You understand me correctly. Without a doubt I believe freedom of religion is one of the root causes for the decay of our morals and faith as well as hate and bigotry in this country. As I have stated before, human beings, on the whole, are incapable of discerning between destructive freedom and the freedom Christ gave us to love Him with all of our hearts, all of our minds and all of our soul. It is our hearts yearning to know the truth so we can follow it, otherwise people wouldn’t be religious at all. There is only one Truth and it is the Catholic Church, founded by Christ, who intended for us all to be one as He and Father are One.
But that’s the crux of the problem. We have the moral responsibility to search out and follow God. How would we know if we are following a malformed and ill-conceived conscience? If a young girl becomes pregnant, her conscience (possibly formed by well intentioned but incorrect protestant teaching) may direct her to destroy the life within her at an abortion clinic. Our flawed system of laws allows abortion clinics to facilitate this girl’s wrong-headed decision. If our laws banned all forms of abortion according to Church teaching, this child would be able to live and the girl wouldn’t have to live the rest of her life with the guilt of murder as her constant companion. Our conscience can be very deceiving depending on what influences were allowed to form it.
That’s wonderful. I hope this “right-wing” Catholic school is living up to it’s namesake. You are truly blessed to be able to afford and pursue this calling you have. Perhaps we can enlighten each other. I, too, am on a quest for knowledge. But mine is through my own part-time study of Scripture, the Churches teachings, the Church Fathers and history. But I am humble enough to admit when I am wrong.
Prohibition was another misguided notion. It was fueled by fundamentalist sentiment, not Catholic virtue.
These laws merely serve the purpose of keeping the peace and they just happen to coincide with Christian virtues, not because of them.
I understand what you are saying. What I am proposing is a charter/constitution that defines the Catholic Faith as it’s moral basis. Laws cannot be enacted which would violate the traditional teachings of the Church and Canon Law. Canon law contains a firm enough foundation to set boundaries for those who would establish laws. The problem with America is that there are no moral boundaries because the Constitution doesn’t protect any morals. Catholic-Land would have a firm “line in the sand” that cannot be moved by elected officials or public opinion.
I have considered this. I don’t think it is because of the separation of church and state at all. But it was the civil power that they wielded in times past that was the problem. I advocate that Church leaders NOT be endowed with civil powers, only that elected government and government bodies (Supreme Court, FCC, Dept of Education, etc…) must be bound by Church teaching. Society and commerce would behave much as today but a far cleaner and more virtuous landscape absent abortion clinics, homosexual lobbies, gay pride parades (those things are monstrous), nudity and sexual innuendo on television. We would see a crucifix in every classroom, public or private and even national holidays for important feast days of the Church.
