In 1864, Pope Pius IX published the encyclical Quanta Cura and an accompanying Syllabus of Errors, which rejected religious freedom. In 1965 Vatican II published Dignitatis Humanae, which affirmed a declaration of religious freedom.
Marcel Lefebvre (d. 1991) said:
Read the Declaration on Religious Freedom and compare it with the Encyclical… Quanta cura of Pius IX, and you can recognize the contradiction almost word for word. (Letter, 3 September 1975)
Is there really a contradiction?
1. The Context of Quanta Cura and the Syllabus
The political context of Quanta Cura and the Syllabus is that of nineteenth-century European revolutions. In Italy, the Principality of Piedmont was trying to conquer the Papal States. (See Risorgimento.)
As part of the Piedmont strategy, they were appealing to “religious freedom.” They were proclaiming “a free Church in a free state,” while simultaneously attacking the Church. Pope Pius IX described their actions in 1862:
[They]… persist in saying that they wish for the Church to enjoy Her liberty, while with daring sacrilege they continually… despoil Her goods; and in every way harass and thrust into prison Her bishops and ecclesiastics. (Maxima Quidem)
The theological context of Quanta Cura and the Syllabus was an 1863 speech entitled “A Free Church in a Free State,’” by Charles Montalembert. He argued that the best way for the Church to avoid State interference was for the Church’s theology to embrace “religious freedom.”
This background has led some commentators (like John Courtney Murray in We Hold These Truths) to argue that nineteenth-century popes only rejected religious freedom, because it was being used as a contemporary form of oppression on the Church.
2. Interpreting Quanta Cura and the Syllabus
Quanta Cura was viewed as infallible prior to Vatican II, as well as by some modern commentators. (See “Integralism and the Infallibility of Quanta cura.”) This is because the document is teaching doctrine to the whole Church, when it says:
By our Apostolic authority, we reprobate, proscribe, and condemn all the… evil opinions and doctrines… mentioned in this letter, and… command that they be thoroughly held by all children of the Catholic Church as reprobated, proscribed and condemned. (Quanta Cura 6)
The status of the accompanying Syllabus of Errors is less clear. Even in its own day interpretations varied from seeing it as just a “rough” summary of Pius IX’s views (Cardinal Newman’s 1875 Letter to the Duke of Norfolk), to seeing it as infallible condemnations (William George Ward’s 1880 Essays on the Church’s Doctrinal Authority).
In what follows, nothing depends on taking either document as infallible or as not-infallible.
A more significant issue is raised by different styles of interpretation for Quanta Cura and the Syllabus. At one extreme figures like Louis Veuillot (d. 1883) insisted on a harsh intransigent (ultramontanist) interpretation, which shocked and outraged people across Europe. At the other extreme, figures like Bishop Félix Dupanloup (d. 1878) insisted on a softer (liberal Catholic) interpretation which made the documents seem so reasonable that it was difficult to see why anyone could be upset at them. (See his booklet: The Convention of the 15th September, and The Encyclic of the 8th December.)
Around 600 bishops wrote to thank Dupanloup for his booklet, including the current Pope Pius IX and his successor, the future Pope Leo XIII (d. 1903). (See “The Intervention of Mgr. Dupanloup.”) Pius IX’s support for Dupanloup’s booklet has implications for how to interpret Quanta Cura and the Syllabus.
3. Naturalism
When we come to the specific text of Quanta Cura, Pius IX began by situating religious freedom as an error which emerges from a deeper error. He stated:
At this time men are found… who, applying to civil society the impious and absurd principle of “naturalism,” … dare to teach that “the best constitution of public society and (also) civil progress altogether require that human society be conducted and governed without regard being had to religion any more than if it did not exist; or, at least, without any distinction being made between the true religion and false ones.” (Quanta Cura 3)
The reference to naturalism (also known as rationalism) is describing the view that people can acquire all religious and ethical truths through the use of their own natural reason. That view makes the Church (and Christianity) unnecessary.
One of the problems with naturalism is that people disagree about what is rational. So rationalism leads to “liberalism,” which typically involves legislative majorities or public opinion determining what should count as morality. As Pius IX put it:
Thence it appears why it is that some, utterly neglecting and disregarding the surest principles of sound reason, dare to proclaim that “the people’s will, manifested by what is called public opinion or in some other way, constitutes a supreme law.” (Quanta Cura 4)
Once people have adopted that kind of “liberalism,” it makes religion almost completely irrelevant. It amounts to a de facto separation of Church and State, as it is imposing a religious freedom which is a freedom FROM religion.
Vatican II rejected the separation of Church and State. (See “Did Vatican II Change Doctrine About the Separation of Church and State?”) It also rejected the idea of liberalism. (See “Did Vatican II Accept Liberalism?”) The Council insisted that the Gospel (i.e., not naturalism or public opinion) must always inform human rights. It said:
The Church… proclaims the rights of man… and greatly esteems the… movements of today by which these rights are everywhere fostered. Yet these movements must be penetrated by the spirit of the Gospel. (Gaudium et Spes 41)
What this all means is that Vatican II did not share the intellectual error of naturalism and so it did not commit itself to the thinking which Pius IX rebuked above. Ultimately, he was rejecting a naturalism which involved a freedom FROM religion, while Vatican II affirmed a freedom FOR religion.
4. Public Order
Continuing from the text cited in the previous section, Pius IX went on to say:
And against… doctrine… they… assert that “[it]… is the best condition of civil society, in which no duty is recognized as attached to the civil power, of restraining by enacted penalties, offenders against the Catholic religion, except so far as public peace may require.” (Quanta Cura 3)
A contextual reading of that text might see Pius IX condemning those who say that states (like Piedmont) have no duty to prevent offenders (like state officials) from imprisoning bishops and robbing the Church, unless it leads to violence which infringes public peace.
A doctrinal reading of the text might see it rejecting a principle of the French Revolution’s 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man, which insisted that a state’s duties to religion are limited by the need to keep public order (article 10), or “peace” as Pius IX expressed it above.
Read in that doctrinal way, an appearance of contradiction can arise, as Vatican II stated in 1965:
This Vatican Council declares that the human person has a right to religious freedom… and the exercise of this right is not to be impeded, provided that just public order be observed. (Dignitatis Humanae 2, emphasis added)
Superficially, Vatican II seems to be saying that the only limit to religious freedom is “public order,” which is what the French Revolution claimed, and what Pius IX rejected (above).
However, that reading of Vatican II makes a mistaken assumption that “public order” means ONLY being peaceful and avoiding violence. But Vatican II states its understanding of “public peace” as involving considerably more. It said:
[Government’s] action is to be controlled by juridical norms… These norms arise out of the need for an adequate care of genuine public peace… and… out of the need for a proper guardianship of public morality… These matters constitute the basic component of the common welfare: they are what is meant by public order. (Dignitatis Humanae 7)
The reference to morality shows that it is not ONLY peace that is a criteria for government actions towards religion, as there is also a need for government to ensure public morality. This means that Vatican II is in full agreement with Pius IX’s text above, by rejecting the idea that “peace” is the ONLY criterion limiting government actions towards religion.
We can see the difference between what Pius IX is rejecting and what Vatican II is affirming if we consider the moral issue of contraception. Contraception is a religious issue, as the 1930 Lambeth Conference approved its use for Anglicans, while the 1930 encyclical Casti Connubii rejected its use by Catholics. When Pope Paul VI re-rejected the morality of contraception in 1968, he called upon rulers to implement his decision, saying:
Do not tolerate any legislation which would introduce into the family those practices which are opposed to the natural law of God [i.e., contraception]. (Humanae Vitae 23)
Contraception is not typically an issue of public peace. So banning it at the request of a religious leader would not fall within the scope of “public order,” on the view which Pius IX rejected (above). Yet, Pope Paul VI clearly thinks that banning it does fall within the scope of Vatican II’s “public order” (even though that would also involve ignoring the religious freedom of Anglicans who have approved of its use).
This example shows that Vatican II’s understanding of “public order” is very different to that of the French Revolution. And so it is different to Pius IX’s references to “peace.” That means that there is no inconsistency in Pius IX rejecting one version of the idea, while Vatican II approved a different version of the concept.
5. Religious Freedom
Pius IX’s argument in Quanta Cura continued from the issues of naturalism (section 3) and public order (section 4) to then deal with the topic of religious freedom (or “liberty of conscience” as he called it). He said:
From which totally false idea[s]… they do not fear to foster that erroneous opinion… called by Our Predecessor, Gregory XVI, an “insanity,” viz., that “liberty of conscience and worship is each man’s personal right… which should be restrained by no authority… whereby they may be able openly and publicly to manifest and declare any of their ideas whatever.” (Quanta Cura 3)
On the reference to Pope Gregory XVI (d. 1846), see “Does Vatican II’s Religious Freedom Contradict Pope Gregory XVI’s Mirari Vos?”
What Pius IX is rejecting in the text above, is an EXTREME version of religious freedom which enabled people to manifest “any of their ideas whatever” (quoscumque, see Latin text).
Vatican II approved of a LIMITED version of religious freedom, as it spoke of people having religious freedom “within due limits” (Dignitatis Humanae 2). This shows that Pius IX and Vatican II are dealing with two different versions of religious freedom. What the one rejects is NOT what the other approves.
We can see the difference clearly if we consider a specific example. Imagine a pregnant woman were to say that God told her to have an abortion, and so her religious freedom entitles her to an abortion. Arguably she might have a case under the EXTREME religious freedom which Pius IX rejected, as it allows for any expression “whatever” of religious freedom.
But Vatican II’s version of LIMITED religious freedom cannot confer a religious right to abortion. This is because Vatican II insists that religious freedom is LIMITED by:
the need for a proper guardianship of public morality. (Dignitatis Humanae 7)
Vatican II said that abortion was immoral (see Gaudium et Spes 27). So a “guardianship of public morality” rules out giving permission for abortion, even if a person claims that their religious freedom should entitle them to have access to abortion.
This example shows that the religious freedom rejected by Pius IX is not the religious freedom approved by Vatican II. So Pius IX’s rejection of religious freedom is not contradicted by Vatican II’s approval of (a different version of) religious freedom.
6. Syllabus Claim #15
Moving on to consider the Syllabus of Errors, one of the rejected claims is that:
Every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true. (Syllabus 15)
The Syllabus cites two documents which explain the origin and contextual content of that claim: Maxima Quidem (9 June 1862) and Multiplices Inter (10 June 1851).
In Maxima Quidem, Pius IX criticized adherents of atheistic naturalism. He rebuked their claims that they could use natural reason to determine all morality and religion, and their claim that consequently they had no need for God or for the Church.
In Multiplices Inter Pius IX criticized adherents of naturalism who claimed that the Church did not have the authority to determine what is the true religion, so people were entitled to make their own decisions based on the light of reason alone.
Those texts show that what the Syllabus is rejecting above is an assertion of naturalism (i.e., not an assertion of religious freedom). We have already seen that Vatican II did not accept naturalism. (See section 3.) So, there is no conflict between what this text rejects and what Vatican II affirms.
7. Syllabus Claim #77
The Syllabus rejected the following claim:
In the present day it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State, to the exclusion of all other forms of worship. (Syllabus 77)
The Syllabus refers to Nemo Vestrum (26 July 1855) to provide the origin and contextual content for that claim. That document is a detailed criticism of the situation in Spain, where the government had unilaterally broken the promises it made in a concordat. The document states that:
[the Catholic]… religion, with the exclusion of any other cult, is to be the sole religion of the Spanish nation. (Nemo Vestrum)
If the Syllabus claim above is interpreted as a UNIVERSAL doctrinal principle about what should be the case always and everywhere, then it can indeed seem to be contradicted by Vatican II.
But that interpretation is problematic, as Bishop Dupanloup highlighted. (See section 2.) It would involve Pius IX condemning himself, as at the very time that this Syllabus claim was promulgated, the pope was deeming it expedient to allow Protestant worship in Rome, at the Porta del Popolo.
Assuming Pius IX did not intend to condemn himself, then that means that it is more plausible to interpret this Syllabus claim as a CONTEXTUAL claim that there are times and places (such as 1864 Spain) where it was not expedient to allow non-Catholic worship.
Vatican II does not contradict a CONTEXTUAL interpretation of this Syllabus claim. Vatican II was talking about what was appropriate in 1965, and it makes no comment about what was or was not appropriate in other eras or contexts. (See “Did Vatican II Reject Leo XIII’s Doctrine of Religious Freedom?”)
8. Syllabus Claim #78
The Syllabus rejected the claim that:
it has been wisely decided by law, in some Catholic countries, that persons coming to reside therein shall enjoy the public exercise of their own peculiar worship. (Syllabus 78)
The Syllabus cites Acerbissimum (27 September 1852) as providing the origin and contextual content of this claim. That document is a detailed criticism of the way that the Church was being oppressed by the government of New Grenada (in South America).
This Syllabus claim raises all the same issues as the previous Syllabus claim 77 (see section 7). If it is read as a UNIVERSAL doctrinal principle, then it once again involves Pius IX condemning himself (as well as potentially contradicting the Church’s doctrine of Tolerance).
So, a more plausible reading of this claim is that it is making the CONTEXTUAL claim that there are (or have been) some times and/or some places where it is (or was) inappropriate to allow some immigrants to practice some elements of their own religion. Presumably that would have been especially the case if the religion in question involved elements which might fall under the EXTREME version of religious freedom. (See section 5.)
Once the text is read CONTEXTUALLY, then it clearly does not contradict Vatican II.
9. Syllabus claim #79
The Syllabus also rejected the claim that:
it is false that the civil liberty of every form of worship, and the full power, given to all, of overtly and publicly manifesting any opinions whatsoever and thoughts, conduce more easily to corrupt the morals and minds of the people, and to propagate the pest of indifferentism. (Syllabus 79)
The Syllabus cites Numquam Fore (15 December 1856) as the origin and contextual explanation of this claim. That document is a detailed criticism of the way that the Mexican Republic was oppressing the Church.
This Syllabus claim refers to “manifesting any opinions whatsoever.” So it is rejecting the EXTREME version of religious freedom. We have already seen that Vatican II also rejected that version of religious freedom, as it affirmed a LIMITED version of religious freedom. (See section 5.)
This text also mentions indifferentism. We know that Vatican II did not accept that idea. (See “Did Vatican II Endorse Indifferentism?”)
So, there is no contradiction between this Syllabus claim and the teaching of Vatican II.
10. Conclusion
We have looked at seven texts from Pius IX’s Quanta Cura and the Syllabus of Errors. We have seen that there is no contradiction between those texts and the texts of Vatican II.
It is only possible to generate the appearance of a contradiction if Pius IX’s texts are misunderstood. Misunderstandings can include mixing up different concepts of “public order” (section 4), failing to distinguish the different EXTREME and LIMITED versions of religious freedom (section 5), or misinterpreting CONTEXTUAL Syllabus claims as if they are UNIVERSAL claims (sections 8 and 9).
Perhaps some people will find this conclusion difficult to accept? Perhaps they will insist that there must (somehow) still be a contradiction. If so, then that insistence generates a disagreement about whether there is a contradiction. And that in turn raises the further question of how members of the Church should go about resolving disagreements, especially when they concern serious theological issues which can imperil the unity of the Church.
Pius IX himself had to deal with serious theological disagreements, especially when some members of the Church rejected Vatican I in 1870, and accused it of contradicting tradition by declaring papal infallibility. As Pius IX was a member of the Church, he followed the Church’s traditional methodology of the living magisterium, which provides the mechanism for resolving theological disagreements in a way which preserves Church unity. Speaking at the beginning of his pontificate, in 1846, he explained what that involved:
God Himself has set up a living authority… [which] judges… all disputes which concern matters of faith and morals, lest the faithful be swirled around by every wind of doctrine… And this living… authority is active… where Peter is, and Peter speaks in the Roman Pontiff, living at all times in his successors and making judgment, providing the truth of the faith to those who seek it. (Qui Pluribus 10)
