What Is Liberalism? - Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany (1899 - Imprimatur) - Chapters XXI - XXXIII

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Chapter XXI - Personal Polemics and Liberalism
- Liberals and those tainted with Liberalism have hurled it at our heads, they imagine that we are overwhelmed by the charge. But they deceive themselves. We are not so easily thrust into the background. We have reason—and substantial reason—on our side.
- The authors and propagators of heretical doctrines are soldiers with poisoned weapons in their bands. Their arms are the book, the journal, the lecture, their personal influence. Is it sufficient to dodge their blows? Not at all; the first thing necessary is to demolish the combatant himself.
- It is thus lawful, in certain cases, to expose the infamy of a Liberal opponent, to bring his habits into contempt and to drag his name in the mire...The only restriction is not to employ a lie in the service of justice. This never.
- The Fathers of the Church support this thesis. The very titles of their works clearly show that, in their contests with heresy, their first blows were at the heresiarchs.
- Whence do the Liberals derive their power to impose upon us the new obligation of fighting error only in the abstract and of lavishing smiles and flattery upon them? We, the Ultramontanes, will fight our battles according to Christian tradition and defend the Faith as it has always been defended in the Church of God...This is the only real and efficacious means of waging war.

Chapter XXII - A Liberal Objection to Ultramontane Methods
- The Liberals tell us that our violent methods of warfare against them are not in conformity with the Pope's counsels to moderation and charity. Has he not exhorted Catholic writers to a love of peace and union, to avoid harsh, aggressive and personal polemics?
- There is no doubt that the Pope here makes no allusion to the incessant battles between Catholics and Liberals, for the simple reason that Catholicity is truth and Liberalism heresy, between which there can be no peace, but only war to the death. By consequence, therefore, it is certain that the Pope intends his counsels to apply to our "family quarrels" unhappily much too frequent, and that by no means does he seek to forbid us from waging an unrelenting strife with the eternal enemies of the Church...
- Therefore, there can be no contradiction between the doctrine we expound and that of the briefs and allocutions of the Holy Father on the subject...how can we interpret the words of the Holy Father in any other way?
- How could we suppose the Pope to be in contradiction with all Catholic tradition from Jesus Christ to our own times? Is it for a moment admissible that the style and method of most of the celebrated Catholic polemists and apologists from St. Paul to St. Francis de Sales should be condemned by a stroke of the pen? Clearly not...
- Common sense itself shows this. Imagine a general in the midst of a raging battle, issuing an order to his soldiers not to injure the enemy too severely!
- Pius IX has given us an explanation of the proper meaning of his words. On a memorable occasion he calls the sectaries of the Commune demons; and worse than demons the sectaries of Liberalism.
- the Pope recommends moderation and charity to Catholic writers as a means of preserving peace and mutual union. Clearly, this peace and union is between Catholics and not between Catholics and their enemies...Would it not be absurd to imagine that there could be any union between truth and error, therefore between the advocates of truth on the one side and error on the other? Irreconcilable opposites never unite. One or the other must disappear.
(Freemasons vs. Catholics)

Chapter XXIII - The "Civilta Cattolica's" Charity to Liberals
- Lest our competence to judge in so important a matter be called into question, we will cite as authority on this subject the foremost religious journal of the world, the Civilta Cattolica, founded by Pius IX...
- "The Church and the Pope have never asked anything but truth and justice for their cause. On the other hand, the Liberals, no doubt on account of the horror they naturally entertain for truth, and above all, for justice, are always demanding charity...They beseech us not to give them over to the ridicule of their neighbors, not to expose to an inspection so detailed, so minute, their sublime writings, not to be so obstinate in subjecting their glorious exploits to such a strong search-light, to close our eyes and our ears to their blunders, their solecisms [inconsistencies], their lies, their calumnies, their obscurities, in a word, to let them live in peace."
- "After having shown (according to the measure of their means) by their acts and their writings that they have a love for charity equal to the devil's for holy water, when they hear it spoken of, they suddenly remember that there exists in the world a thing called charity, which might on certain occasions prove very profitable to them..."
- "'What obliges you to enter into these quarrels?" they confidentially say to us. 'Have you not enough enemies already? Be tolerant and your adversaries will be so with you. What do you gain by following this wretched occupation, like a dog spending his life barking at robbers?
- It will be in fact a great charity, not such indeed as the Liberals beg of us, but one truly very meritorious, the charity of listening to them with patience for the hundredth time.

Chapter XXIV - A Liberal Sophism and the Church's Diplomacy
- In the first place, we must remember that there are two ministrations in the Church of God: one which we may call apostolic, relative to the propagation of the Faith and the salvation of souls; the other, which we may very properly term diplomatic, having for its subject human relations with the powers of the world.
  The first is the most noble...The second is inferior and subordinate to the first, of which it is only the auxiliary. In the first, the Church is intolerant and uncompromising...When it is a question of divine rights and divine duties, neither attenuation nor compromise is possible.
  In the second ministration, the Church is condescending, benevolent and full of patience. She discusses, she solicits, she negotiates, she praises, that she may soften the hard; she is silent sometimes, that she may better succeed...
  When it is a question of mere human relations, she comports herself with a certain flexibility and admits the usage of special resources. In this domain, everything that is not declared bad and prohibited by the law common to the ordinary relations of men is lawful and proper.
- The Church is the home of good people (or of those who ought to be and desire to be), but she is surrounded by governments more or less perverted, or even entirely perverted. She says to her children: "Detest the maxims of these governments; combat these maxims; their doctrine is error; their laws are iniquitous." At the same time, in questions when her own and sometimes their interests are involved, she finds herself under the necessity of treating with the heads or the representatives of these governments, and in fact she does treat with them, accepts their compliments, and employs in their regard the formula of the polished diplomacy in usage in all countries; she negotiates with them in relation to matters of common interest, seeking to make the best of the situation in the midst of such neighbors.
- Does the Church sanction the Koran when she enters into negotiations, power to power, with the sectaries of the Koran? (NO!)
- It is a sophism to pretend that the Church authorizes by such acts what she has always condemned by other acts. Her diplomatic can never frustrate her apostolic ministration, and it is in this latter that we must seek the seeming contradictions of her diplomatic career.

Chapter XXV - How Catholics Fall into Liberalism
- Very often corruption of heart is a consequence of errors of the intellect, but more frequently still, errors of the intellect follow the corruption of the heart. The history of heresies very clearly shows this fact.
- Error nearly always has its origin, not in profound and laborious studies, but in the triple-headed monster which St. John describes and calls Concupiscentia carnis, concupiscentia oculorum, superbia vitae 'Concupiscence of the flesh, concupiscence of the eyes, the pride of life."
- 1. Men become Liberal on account of a natural desire for independence and for an easy life.
  Liberalism is emancipation from restraint; Catholicity the curb of the passions. Now, fallen man, by a very natural tendency, loves a system which legitimatizes and sanctifies his pride of intellect and the license of passion.
- 2. Men become Liberal by the desire for advancement in life. Liberalism is today the dominating idea; it reigns everywhere and especially in the sphere of public life. It is therefore a sure recommendation to public favor.
  On starting out in life, the young man looks around upon the various paths that lead to fortune, to fame, to glory, and sees that an almost indispensable condition of reaching the desired goal is, at least in our times, to become Liberal.
- 3. Men become Liberal out of avarice, or the love of money. To get along in the world, to succeed in business, is always a standing temptation of Liberalism. 
  Let him relax a little in his faith, Join a forbidden secret society, and lo, the bolts and bars are drawn; he possesses the "open sesame" to success!...Be Liberal, admit that there is no great difference between men's creeds, that at the bottom they are really the same after all. Proclaim your breadth of mind by admitting that other religious beliefs are just as good for other people as your faith is for you; they are...You will be extensively patronized, for Liberalism is very generous to a convert. "Falling down adore me, and I will give you all these things' " says Satan yet to Jesus Christ in the desert.

Chapter XXVI - Permanent Causes of Liberalism
- What then are the permanent causes of Liberalism?
- 1. Corruption of morals: The theater, literature, public and private morals are all saturated with obscenity and impurity. The result is inevitable; a corrupt generation necessarily begets a revolutionary generati .on. Liberalism is the program of naturalism. Free thought begets free morals, or immorality. Restraint is thrown off and a free rein given to the passions. WHOEVER THINKS WHAT HE PLEASES WILL DO WHAT HE PLEASES...Thus does Liberalism propagate immorality, and immorality Liberalism.
- 2. Journalism: Incalculable is the influence exercised without ceasing by the numerous publications which Liberalism spreads broadcast. In spite of themselves, by the ubiquity of the press, people are forced to live in a Liberal atmosphere.
UNLESS ONE IS ON HIS GUARD, HE FINDS HIMSELF THINKING, SPEAKING AND ACTING AS A LIBERAL...Poor people, by very reason of their simple good faith, absorb more easily the poison than anyone else.
- 3. General ignorance in matters of religion...For the past hundred years, Liberalism has striven to paralyze the action of the Church...The Liberals themselves have avowed this to be their aim: to destroy the religious life, to place every hindrance possible in the way of Catholic teaching, to ridicule the clergy and to deprive them of their prestige.

Freemasonry in Europe and South America are constantly seeking to bind her hand and foot, that she may be put at its satanic mercy. By open and secret means, this organization has sought to undermine her discipline in every country where it has obtained a footing. NATURALISM, THE DENIAL OF THE SUPERNATURAL, IT INCULCATES EVERYWHERE.
(United States founders [Jefferson, Washington, Franklin, etc.])
...civil marriage, by civil burial and divorce, by teaching the insidious doctrine that society as such has no religious relations or obligations and that man as a social and civil being is absolutely independent of God and His Church and that religion is a mere private opinion to be entertained or not entertained, as one pleases...

- 4. Secular education: To gain the child is to secure the man. To educate a generation apart from God and the Church is to feed the fires of Liberalism to repletion. When religion is divorced from the school, Liberalism becomes its paramour. Secularism is naturalism, the denial of the supernatural....Liberalism has realized the terrific power of education and with satanic energy is now striving, the world over, for the possession of the child. With what success we have only to look around us to realize...Snatch the soul of the child from the breast of its mother the Church," says Liberalism, "and I will conquer the world."

Chapter XXVII - How to Avoid Liberalism
- How may Catholics, who are perpetually surrounded by the snares of Liberalism, guard themselves securely against its dangers?
- 1. By the organization of all good Catholics, be their number great or small...have a nucleus of Catholic men of action. Such an organization will attract the undecided, give courage to the hesitating and counteract the influence of hostile or indifferent surroundings...Thus united, be your number ever so small, lift on high the banner of a sound, pure and uncompromising doctrine, without disguise, without attenuation, yielding not an inch to the enemy.
(Knights of Columbus, or what they should be/used to be)

Above all, give good example, give good example always. What you preach, do...Proselytes will be forthcoming.
- 2. Good journals...Read it; but not content with that, give it to others to read; explain it; comment on it, let it be your basis of operations...Encourage the reluctant to take it; The Holy Father has said that "a Catholic paper is a perpetual mission in every parish."
- 3. The Catholic school: The Catholic school has become in this age the only secure bridge of the Faith from generation to generation.While we protest against the wrong and never cease demanding our right, our clear and peremptory duty is to provide the best possible schools of our own, where our children may be educated in the full and only true sense of the word. Where Catholic schools are needed, build them, build them, build them! "The foundation of the parish church is the schoolhouse'"
The spiritual life of a parish without a school is tepid, neither hot nor cold. Let the school be the best possible...Speak out fearlessly on this matter of education. Say squarely and frankly that irreligious education leads to the devil. An irreligious school is the school of Satan.

Chapter XXVIII - How to Distinguish Catholic from Liberal Works
- [Liberalism] is usually very clever and cautious in concealing its real meaning in various disguises...There should therefore be some easy and popular criterion to distinguish, at every instant, the Catholic cry from the infernal birdcall of Liberalism.
- It often happens that some project or enterprise is put on foot, some sort of a work is undertaken, whose bearings Catholics cannot promptly or easily apprehend. It may appear indifferent or even innocent enough, and yet it may have its roots in error...It may speak the language of charity, appealing to us from the tenderest side, and ask us to associate ourselves with it in the name of a common humanity. "Sink all differences of creed and let us fraternize on the broader plane of brotherly love" is often its most insidious appeal.
(Religious Indifferentism)
- ...all this may be for God or the devil; or what is worse, it may be evil cloaked in the garb of holy things. How shall we guide ourselves in such a labyrinth?
1. Observe carefully what class of people are the projectors of the affair. Such is the first rule of prudence and common sense. It is based on that maxim of Our Lord: "A bad tree cannot bring forth good fruit."
(Pope Leo XIII, Custodi di Quella Fede, 1892, #15 - Everyone should avoid familiarity or friendship with anyone suspected of belonging to masonry or to affiliated groups. Know them by their fruits and avoid them. Every familiarity should be avoided, not only with those impious libertines who openly promote the character of the sect, but also with those who hide under the mask of universal tolerance, respect for all religions, and the craving to reconcile the maxims of the Gospel with those of the revolution. These men seek to reconcile Christ and Belial, the Church of God and the state without God.)
If they are such that you cannot have entire confidence in their doctrines, be on your guard against their enterprises. Do not disapprove immediately, for it is an axiom of theology that not all the works of infidels are sinful, and this axiom can be applied to the works of Liberals. But be careful not to take them immediately for good; mistrust them, submit them to examination, await their results.
- 2. Observe the kind of people who praise the work in question. This is an even surer rule than the preceding...See if the Liberal current approves, recommends and accounts them its own. If yes, the book and the project are judged: they belong to Liberalism.
Repudiate, then, whatever Liberals praise or vaunt...Certain scruples of charity and the habit of thinking well of our neighbor sometimes blind good people to such an extent as to lead them to attribute good intentions where unhappily they do not exist.
- It seems to us that these two rules of common sense, which we can call rules of good Christian sense, suffice—if not to enable us to judge definitively every question—at least to keep us from perpetually stumbling over the roughness of the uneven soil which we daily tread and where the combat is always taking place...these secret societies are served even by those who detest their infernal work.

Chapter XXIX - Liberalism and Journalism
- The press has grown so omnipresent nowadays that there is no escape from it.
(This is extremely amplified today...almost infinitely so it would seem)
it is clear that such journals as boast of their Liberalism have no claim to our confidence in matters that Liberalism touches on...we have to wage perpetual war...against [these] 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. They declare themselves Catholic and aver their detestation and abhorrence of Liberalism, at least if we credit their words. These journals are generally known as Liberal Catholic. This is the class which we should especially mistrust, and we should not permit ourselves to be duped by its pretended piety...He who places himself in the vortex of a maelstrom is sure in the end to be engulfed in it. The logic of the situation brings the inevitable conclusion.
- There is no room, therefore, for confidence in the Liberal Catholic press, especially in cases where it is difficult to form a judgment. Moreover, in such cases, its policy of compromise and conciliation hampers it from forming any decisive or absolute judgment, for the simple reason that its judgment has nothing decisive or radical in it...Opportunism is its guiding star. The truly Catholic press is altogether Catholic, that is to say, it defends Catholic doctrine in all its principles and applications; it opposes all false teaching (known as such) always and entirely, opposite per diametrum ["diametrically opposed"], as St. Ignatius says in that golden book of his exercises. Arrayed with unceasing vigilance against error, it places itself on the frontier, always face-to face with the enemy.
- [The truly Catholic Press] watches, guards, and resists at every point.
- Bad journals sometimes contain something good. What are we to think of the good thus imbedded with the bad in them? We must think that the good in them does not prevent them from being bad, if their doctrine or their character is intrinsically bad. In most cases this good is a mere artifice to recommend, or at least disguise, what in itself is essentially bad. An assassin and a thief are not good because they sometimes say a prayer or give alms to a beggar.
- On the other hand, it sometimes happens that a good journal falls into such or such an error or into an excess of passion in a good cause and so says something which we cannot altogether approve. Must we for this reason call it bad? Not at all, and for a reverse although analogous reason.
- That alone is bad which is bad with full knowledge, habitually and persistently. Catholic journalists are not angels; far from it; they too are fragile men and sinners. To wish to condemn them for such or such a failing, for this or that excess, is to entertain a pharisaical or Jansenistic opinion of virtue, which is not in accord with sound morality!
To conclude, there are good and bad journals; among the latter are to be ranked those whose doctrine is ambiguous or ill-defined.

Chapter XXX - Can Catholics and Liberals Ever Unite?
- "Should Catholics combine with the more moderate Liberals for the common end of resisting the advance of the revolutionists or extreme Liberals?"
- What should we think of these would-be unionists, we who wish above all things the well-being of our Holy Religion? In general, we should think such unions are neither good nor commendable. Liberalism, let its form be as moderated or as wheedling as possible, is by its very essence in direct and radical opposition to Catholicity.
- It is possible, however, in very rare cases, that a union on the part of Catholics with a Liberal group against the Radicals may prove useful under given conditions. Where such a union is really opportune, it must be established on the following basis:
- 1. The bond of union should never be neutrality or the conciliation of interests and principles essentially opposed, such as are the interests and principles of Catholics and Liberals. This neutrality or conciliation has been condemned by the Syllabus of Errors of Pope Pius IX and is, consequently, a false basis. Such a union would be a betrayal, an abandonment of the Catholic camp by those who are bound to defend it. An instance would be to compromise Catholic education with Secularism by banishing religious instruction and influences from the school room.
It can never be said, "Let us abstract from our differences of doctrine, etc." It would be the same as to say, "In spite of the radical and essential opposition of principles between us, we can, after all, agree in the practical application of these principles." This is simply an intolerable contradiction.
- 2. Much less could we accord to the Liberal group, with whom a temporary and accidental alliance is formed, the honor of enrolling ourselves under its banner...We can never assume their emblem under any circumstances. In other words, let them unite themselves to us; we can never unite ourselves to them.
- 3. We must never consider this alliance constant and normal...Such radical incompatibility would simply expose the undertaking to lamentable failure and would build upon contradictory opinions, whose only accord is accidental.
(United States & Pluralism; a failed system of ethics and a broken foundation)
- Outside of these conditions, not only should we hold that such a union with any group, for any enterprise whatever, would be unfavorable to Catholics, we should also hold that it would be actually detrimental.
- Without doubt, as the proverb runs, "Unhappy the one who walks alone." But there is another proverb equally true which says, "Better seek solitude than bad company."..If we have to sacrifice true unity for the sake of an artificial and forced union, not only is nothing gained, but much is lost.

Chapter XXXI - An Illusion of Liberal Catholics
- Amongst the illusions entertained by a certain class of Catholics, there is none more pitiable than the notion that the truth requires a great number of defenders and friends. To these people, numbers seem a synonym for force.
- To be content with an increase without consideration of the value of the increment is not only to accumulate fictitious force, but to expose to paralysis the powers which one does possess by the congestion of an unwieldy mass.
- If the defender, under the pretext of better defending the truth, begins to mutilate it, to minimize it, to attenuate it, then he is no longer defending the truth. He is simply defending his own invention, a mere human creation, more or less beautiful in appearance, but having no relation to truth, which is the daughter of Heaven.
Such is the delusion of which many of our brethren are the unconscious victims, through a detestable contact with Liberalism.
They imagine, with blinded good faith, that they are defending and propagating Catholicity. But by dint of accommodating it to their own narrow views and feeble courage, in order to make it, they say, more acceptable to the enemy whom they wish to overcome, they do not perceive that they are no longer defending Catholicity, but a thing of their own manufacture, which they naively call Catholicity, but which they ought to call by another name.
- The kind of soldiers we need [are ones who]...make no alliance, no compromise with a foe whose single aim, disguised or open, is the destruction of the truth.
- Catholic associations hampered in their onward march by such an alliance will find themselves so impeded that free action becomes impossible.
(HHS MANDATE! It has begun...)
- To bring an enemy into the camp is to betray the citadel.
(Non-Catholics have no place interjecting or proposing their thoughts at an ecumenical council)
This combination of the bad with the good cannot but end in evil results. It brings disorder, confusion, suspicion and uncertainty to distract and divide Catholics, and all this to the benefit of the enemy and to our own disaster.

Chapter XXXII - Liberalism and Authority in Particular Cases
- When a good Catholic accuses anyone of Liberalism or attacks and unmasks Liberal sophisms, the accused immediately seeks refuge in a challenge of the accuser's authority: "And pray, who are you to charge me and my journal with Liberalism? Who made you a master in Israel to declare who is or who is not a good Catholic?...How then are we to answer this opposition?
- That we may accuse any person or writing of Liberalism, is it necessary to have recourse to a special judgment of the Church upon this particular person or this particular writing? By no means.
- The Church alone possesses supreme doctrinal magistery in fact and in right, juris et facti; her sovereign authority is personified in the Pope. To him alone belongs the right of pronouncing the final, decisive and solemn sentence. But this does not exclude other judgments less authoritative but very weighty...
- Faith dominates reason, which ought to be subordinated to faith in everything. But it is altogether false to pretend that reason can do nothing, that it has no function at all in matters of faith...
- It is thus by use of their reason that the faithful are enabled to suspect and measure the orthodoxy of any new doctrine presented to them, by comparing it with a doctrine already defined. If it be not in accord, they can combat it as bad, and justly stigmatize as bad the book or journal which sustains it.
- The faithful layman can do all this, and has done it at all times with the applause of the Church. Nor in so doing does he make himself the pastor of the flock, nor even its humblest attendant; he simply serves it as a watchdog who gives the alarm. Opportet allatrare canes "It behooves watchdogs to bark..."
- Of what use would be the rule of faith and morals if in every particular case the faithful could not of themselves make the immediate application...?
- Liberalism would like to see such crusaders disarmed and would prefer above all to succeed in getting the Church herself to do the disarming.

Chapter XXXIII - Liberalism as it is in this Country
- Its chief manifestation in the United States is in the form of what is popularly called NON-SECTARIANISM (aka Theosophy). It is a current fallacy, laid down as a fundamental truth that one religion is as good as another, that everyone has the right to believe what be pleases, that differences in creed are after all but differences in forms of expression, that everyone may select his own creed or sect according to his taste—or even altogether repudiate religious beliefs—and finally, that religion is a thing entirely apart from civic and social life. All this of course is SECULARISM in its various degrees—the denial of the supernatural.
- Civil marriage and divorce, mixed marriages and the consequent degeneration of family life, business standards and morality in general pitched on a low key, a vicious literature, a materialistic journalism catering to lax thinking and lax living, religion publicly mocked, scoffed, denied or held indifferently; all these things are coldly regarded as a matter of course, a necessary expedience, things to be condoned and applauded, all on the ground that they are the fruit of liberty...
- Secularism, with the instinct of a foe, has here most positively and triumphantly asserted its claim and, under the disguise of strict impartiality and even patriotism, has banished religion from the schoolroom.
- THE NATURAL TENDENCY IN HUMAN NATURE TO ESCAPE FRICTION AND AVOID ANTAGONISM IS UNHAPPILY IN MOST INSTANCES A READY FACTOR IN THE DIRECTION OF CONCESSION.
- This is especially true where Liberalism eschews aggressive action and with a cunning, either satanic or worldly wise, bases its treacherous tolerance upon a supposed generosity of mind or breadth of view. When the supernatural is vaguely identified with the superstitious, faith with credulity, firmness with fanaticism, the uncompromising with the intolerant, consistency with narrowness (for such is the current attitude of secularism around us), in these adjuncts it requires courage, fortitude and the consolation of the assured possession of truth to resist the insidious pressure of a false public opinion.
- Unless supernaturally fortified and enlightened, human nature under this moral oppression soon gives way to "human respect."
(Pope St. Pius X, Notre Charge Apostolique, 1910 - [Modernists/enemies of the Church] have a particular conception of human dignity, freedom, justice and brotherhood; and, in an attempt to justify their social dreams, they put forward the Gospel, but interpreted in their own way...We know well that they flatter themselves with the idea of raising human dignity and the discredited condition of the working class.)

- But we are in duty bound to resist their fatal contagion with all the powers of our soul. If we hope to preserve our faith intact, to keep it pure and bright in our souls, to save ourselves from the malign influence of a deadly heresy which is daily leading thousands to perdition...
- We require to be on our guard in a twofold way: first, by means of a life lived in the state of grace, second, by means of an enlightened reason, which may shine out over our path as a guide to ourselves and a beacon to others.
- Liberalism pretends to be the champion and guardian of natural reason, laying its snares to entrap the unwary and the ignorant. Not in violence but in a treacherous friendliness on the part of Liberalism does the danger lie.
- Ultramontanism is the only conquering legion in this sort of warfare.
- His task is doubly difficult; be must conquer an enemy who appears his dearest friend.



Jesus grant me the grace to defend your faith with my whole being and every fiber and, if necessary, to give my life for it.
Mary, mother of God, pray for us.
Sts. Peter & St. Paul, pray for us.
St. Joseph, pray for us.
St. John the Baptist, pray for us.
St. Athanasius defender of the faith, pray for us.
St. Pius X warrior of truth, pray for us.

What Is Liberalism? - Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany (1899 - Imprimatur) - Chapters VIII - XIV

Chapter VIII - Shadow and Penumbra
- When we retrospect the field of history...the various heresies that have from time to time appeared, seem clearly and distinctly marked off from the environment of the orthodox faith...But in this we are deceived; it is an illusion caused by distance. The distinction appears so clear, so definite only because we stand on the eminence of the present...A closer study, placing us in the intellectual contact with these epochs, enables us to observe taht never, in any period of history, were the dividing lines between truth and error defined with such geometrical exactness.
- In our own times Liberalism has its Semi-Liberalism, which is nothing else than Catholic Liberalism. This is what the Syllabus [of Errors] terms modern Liberalism...Liberalism is the baneful twilight of the truth beginning to be obscured in their intelligence, or heresy which has not yet taken complete possession.
- We should not fail to note that there are those who are just emerging from the darkness of error into the twilight of truth. This class has not fully penetrated into the domain of truth. That they will ever enter the city of light depends on their own sincerity and honesty. If they earnestly desire to know the truth in its fullness and seek it with sincere purpose, God's grace will not fail them...but on the border land between the realms of light and darkness the Devil is most active and ingenious in detaining those who seem about to escape his snares, and spares nothing to retain in his service a great number of people who would truly detest his infernal machinations if they only perceived them. His method in the instance of persons infected with Liberalism is to suffer them to place one foot within the domain of truth provided they keep the other inside the camp of error.
- It is because [the Liberal] has no real solid knowledge of the principles of truth and error that he is so easily deluded into the belief of his own intellectual superiority. 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.

Chapter IX - Two Kinds of Liberalism
- Philosophy and theology teach that there are two kinds of atheism, doctrinal or speculative, and practical. The first consists in the open and direct denial of the existence of God; the second consists in acting and living without denying the existence of God,  but yet as if He did not really exist...the latter are more numerous. It is the same with Liberalism and Liberals.
- Practical Liberalists are by far in the greater majority. Like a flock of sheep, with closed eyes, they follow their leaders. They know nothing in truth of principles and systems, and, did they perceive the perversity of their instructors, would perhaps detest the. But deceived by a false cry or shibboleth, they troop docilely after their false guides.
- Amongst Catholic Liberals, many of them go to Mass, even make novenas, and yet when they come in contact with the world lead lives of Practical Liberals. They make it a rule "to live up to the times," as they call it. The Church they believe to be somewhat out-of-date, and old fogy; that she is held back by a certain set of reactionaries, ultramontanes; but they have hopes that she will in the course of time catch up with the modern spirit of progress, of which they are the van. The barnacles of medievalism still encumber the bark of Peter...
- Then will a new theology be developed more in conformity with the needs of the times, more in harmony with the modern spirit which makes such large demands upon our "intellectual liberty."
(This is indeed the foundation of the Traditionalist argument - that Vatican II promoted a new theology: "Novus Ordo" (New Order), New Evangelization, etc. And we have certainly seen it repeated that the entire foundation of the council was to update the Church for these modern times and have even heard the analogy used of stripping the barnacles off of the ark)

Chapter X - Liberalism of all Shades Condemned by the Church
- Liberalism stands under the formal ban of the Church, which is sufficient for all faithful Catholics. It would be impossible for an error so widespread and so radical to escape condemnation. Upon its appearance in France, the famous Declaration of the Rights of Man, which contains in germ all the follies of Liberalism, was condemned by Pius VI.
(Pope Leo XIII famously said, "The world has heard enough of the so-called "rights of man." Let it hear something of the rights of God"; the controversy is certainly stirred by Dignitatis Humanae declaring many of the so called rights previously condemned by Pius VI, Leo XIII and others as fundamental rights of man)
- Gregory XVI, in his Encyclical Mirari Vos, explicitly condemned Liberalism...[then] God raised up to his Church Pius IX, who justly passed into history as the Scourge of Liberalism. Liberal error under all its forms, shapes and shades has been unmasked by this Pope.
- Numerous briefs and allocutions by Pius IX have clearly shown to Christian peoples what this baneful heresy is, and the Syllabus has put on the final seal of condemnation...Pius IX spoke thus: "Atheism in legislation, indifference in matters of religion and the pernicious maxims which go under the name of Liberal Catholicism are the true causes of the destruction of States; they have been the ruin in France...I have always condemned Liberal Catholicism and I will condemn it again forty times over if necessary."
- In 1873, St. Ambrose of Milan, the Sovereign Pontiff thus expresses himself: "People are not wanting who pretend to form an alliance between light and darkness, and to associate justice with iniquity in favor of those doctrines called Liberal Catholicism, which, based on the most pernicious principles, show themselves favorable to the intrusion of secular power upon the domain of spirituals; they lead their partisans to esteem, or, at least to tolerate iniquitous laws, as if it were not written that no one can serve two masters...Without being warned of it, perhaps without being conscious of it, they second the projects of wicked men, but also because keeping with certain limits, they show themselves with some appearance of probity and sound doctrine. They thus deceive the indiscreet friends of conciliation and seduce honest people who otherwise have strenuously combatted a declared error."
- The same said, "In truth you will extirpate the fatal root of discord and you will efficaciously contribute to unite and strengthen the minds of all in so combating this insidious error, much more dangerous than an open enemy because it hides itself under the specious veil of zeal and of charity."
- "It exhausts itself in interpreting the traditions and teachings of the Church by running them through the mold of its own private opinions."

Chapter XI - The Solemn Condemnation of Liberalism by the Syllabus
- Liberalism is always strategically cunning. It rejected these very plain condemnations on the ground that they had all been made to private persons, that they were, therefore, of an entirely private character, by no means ex cathedra, and, of course, not binding...A solemn official public document of a general character and universally promulgated would sweep away the cobwebs with which Liberal Catholics had endeavored to bind the authority of the Sovereign Pontiff...it was The Syllabus of Errors, December 8, 1864. All faithful Catholics hailed it with an enthusiasm...Liberal Catholics thought it more prudent to strike at it covertly by overwhelming it with artificial interpretations.
- The Syllabus crystallizes all these errors and stamps them with the seal of the explicit and formal condemnation of the Church...Let us briefly enumerate them.
Condemnation of liberty of worship (propositions 15, 77 and 78); of the place of governments (propositions 20 and 28); of the absolute supremacy of the State (proposition 38); of the secularization of public education (proposition 45, 40 and 48); of the absolute separation of Church and State (proposition 15); of the absolute right to legislate without regard to God (proposition 56); of the principle of non-intervention (proposition 62); of the right of insurrection (proposition 63); of civil marriage (proposition 73 and others); of the liberty (license) of the press (proposition 79); of universal suffrage as the source of authority (proposition 60); of even the name of Liberalism (proposition 88).
- Liberals regard the Syllabus of Errors as their most detestable enemy, as the complete symbol of what they term Clericalism, Ultramontanism and Reaction, we may rest assured that it has been well interpreted in that quarter. Satan, bad as he is, is not a fool, and sees clearly enough where the blow falls with most effect...What he most abhors and defames possesses an unimpeachable guaranty of its truth.

Chapter XII - Like Liberalism but not Liberalism, Liberalism but not Like It
- To effect a confusion of ideas is an old scheme of the devil. Not to understand clearly and precisely is generally the source of intellectual error.
- Every heresy in the Church bears testimony to Satan's success in deceiving the human intellect by obscuring and perverting the meaning of words.
- For some, Liberalism consists in certain political forms; for others, in a certain tolerant and generous spirit opposed to despotism and tyranny; for others again it means simply civil equality; for many it becomes a vague and uncertain sentiment, which shapes itself into opposition to all arbitrary government.
(This is important to note, that some are well-intentioned but ignorant of truth to the effect that their own judgment - well-intentioned as it may be - is wrong).
- Their essence consists in the civil authority by virtue of which they govern, whether that authority be in form republican, democratic, aristocratic, monarchical; it may be an elective, hereditary, mixed or absolute monarchy. These various forms of themselves have nothing to do with Liberalism...if they acknowledge as the basis of public right the supreme morality of the Church and her absolute right in all things within her own competency, they are truly Catholic governments.
(It doesn't matter what style of government, it can still either be in union with God & the Church or divorced from it and therefore doomed to perdition)
- To believe that monarchies are of themselves (ex se) more religious than republics is an ignorant prejudice...A government, whatever be its form, is Catholic if its constitution, its legislation, and its politics are based on Catholic principles; it is Liberal if it bases its constitution, its legislation, and its politics on rationalistic principles.
- Let us suppose that the constitution and the legislation of this monarchy or of this government is based upon the principle of the absolute and free will of the king or upon the equally unrestricted will of the conservative majority, in place of being based on the principles of Catholic right...then, this monarchy and this conservative government would be thoroughly Liberal and anti-Catholic.

Chapter XIII - The Name Liberalism
- It cannot be said that we describe the situation in exaggerated terms...Liberalism and Catholic Liberalism have been explicitly condemned by Pius IX...the Liberalist current in Europe and America is anti-Catholic and rationalistic.
- Do they not regard as their sole and most potent enemy what they contemptuously term "Clericalism" "Ultramontanism" and do they not describe the Church as medieval, reactionary, the opponent of progress and the nurse of superstition? When then the term is so intimately associated with a Rationalism so radically opposed to the Church, how may Catholics use it with any hope of separating it from its current meaning?
- Rationalism is the toadstool that flourishes in its dark shades...[its advocates] place [themselves] in the ranks of the enemies of Jesus Christ!
-  There is in our day a sect which calls itself "The Old Catholics' " Suppose that we, who are in the true sense of the word "old Catholics" "for our Catholicity dates from Calvary and the cenacle of Jerusalem" (which are proofs of its antiquity)...But could it not be properly objected that this is a false-sounding title, inasmuch as it is in our day the cunning device of a schismatical sect? Certainly it would give occasion to well-informed Catholics to believe that we were schismatic and to the schismatics, who style themselves "Old Catholics" occasion to welcome us as new comrades in their rebellion against the Church.
(What he is saying here is that there was a group at the time who CLAIMED to be holding to ancient Traditions but which actually had perverted those Traditions and was being condemned for its behaviors by the Pope for being schismatic; this is interesting to note because what we have today are Traditionalist Catholics claiming to hold to true Tradition while post-conciliar Novus Ordo Catholics also claim a "ressourcement" return to the roots of Tradition...and they take turns calling each other schismatic).
- It may be said that words are of little importance—why quibble in this way over the meaning of a term? We protest; words are of paramount importance, especially in our own day, when intellectual confusion so obscures fundamental truths in the modern mind. Words represent ideas. That is their value and their use. Modern error largely owes its success to its use of terms of an ambiguous character.
(In 1969 Cardinal Ottaviani submitted a formal denouncement of the Liturgical Reforms from the Novus Ordo Missae; among his chief complaints was that they had redefined the mass no longer as a sacrifice but instead as a general supper...Protestantizing the definition of the mass. He was dismissed and told that their definition of the mass in the general instruction was not a definition but rather a "description." He was effectively told it was all semantics and not to get hung up on words.)
- Agnosticism and Positivism have thus retained a Christian phraseology without the Christian meaning. They speak of God and sanctity and holiness and duty and freedom, but they have eviscerated the Christian meaning. Still these terms, with their former meanings, pass current in the public mind and so half-disguise the fatalism and paganism of the agnostic and positivist schools. Socialism has adopted the terms "liberty," "equality" and "fraternity" as its watchwords, where in reality they mean "revolution "destruction" and "despotism '" Yet it deceives the simple by thus disguising its real intent.
(The three words of the French Revolution denounced so many times as a false banner by former Pontiffs...Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness are the same variation of those former three perniciously deceptive words).
- St. Paul exhorts Timothy to be on his guard, not only against false science, but also against profane novelties of words ...It is a question of truth and salvation. No, you cannot be a Liberal Catholic; incompatibles cannot be reconciled. You cannot assume this reprobated name, although you may be able by subtle sophisms to discover some secret way of reconciling it with your faith.
(Pope Pius XII, On the Ecumenical Movement, 1949, #II They shall also be on guard lest, on the false pretext that more attention should be paid to the points on which we agree than to those on which we differ, a dangerous indifferentism be encouraged)
- Christian charity will not defend you, although you may repeatedly invoke it and would make it synonymous with the toleration of error. The first condition of charity is not to violate the truth, and charity cannot be the snare with which to surprise faith into the support of error. While we may admit the sincerity of those who are not Catholic, their error must always be held up to reprobation. We may pity them in their darkness, but we can never abet their error by ignoring it or tolerating it.
- Most to be feared, however, is not he who openly boasts his Liberalism, but he who eschews the name and, vehemently denying it, is yet steeped to the lips in it and continually speaks and acts under its inspiration. And if such a man be a Catholic by profession, all the more dangerous is he to the faith of others, for he is the hidden enemy sowing tares amidst the wheat.

Chapter XIV - Liberalism and Free-Thought
- Persons, societies, books, governments which reject, in matters of faith and morals, the only and exclusive criterion—that of the Catholic Church—are Liberals.
- THERE IS NO TRUE SPIRITUAL LIFE WHERE JESUS CHRIST IS NOT
(This applies to Jews, Muslims, pagans, etc.
Pope Eugene IV, Council of Florence, Session 11, 1442 It firmly believes, professes and preaches that all those who are outside the catholic church, not only pagans but also Jews or heretics and schismatics, cannot share in eternal life and will go into the everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels, unless they are joined to the catholic church before the end of their lives)
- How much do perverse Catholics serve the devil by obstinately clinging to such associations and participating in their works! In the folly of their ignorance, which they assert against the wisdom of the Church, they harden their consciences to the practical guidance of the Holy See and blindly enlist in the service of an enemy whose cunning deludes them into the slavery of Hell—under the disguise of freedom! They forget that the Truth alone makes them free...Ultramontanism will never cause you to lose your soul; Liberalism is a broad road to the infernal abyss.

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