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英国assignment代写|Church State Relations

浏览: 日期:2020-06-10

Church-State Relations and Secularization
Throughout history there has developed a variety of relationships between Christian churches and governments, sometimes harmonious and sometimes conflictual. The major forms of relationships between Christian churches and governments are in large measure grounded in various perspectives in the Christian Bible. The Christian Bible is not a single book, but a collection of books written over more than a millennium and containing very diverse perspectives on religion and government.
One perspective, represented by the Psalms, which were hymns sung in the Temple in Jerusalem, exalts the king to an almost divine position, sitting at the right hand of God (Ps 110:1) and receiving the nations of the earth for an inheritance (Ps 2:8). Coronation hymns celebrate the king’s special relationship to God. This perspective dominates the self-understanding of the kings of Judah, the southern part of ancient Israel.
In sharp contrast, the prophet Samuel denounces kings as crooks and oppressors who are allowed by God only as a concession to human sinfulness. Samuel warns the tribes of Israel that if they choose to have a king, the king will draft their young men into his army and put the young women to work in his service. In this trajectory, prophets, armed only with the conviction that they have been called by God to proclaim the Word of God, repeatedly stand up to the kings of ancient Israel and denounce their sinfulness. Thus Samuel condemns Saul, Nathan condemns David, and later prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah condemn the kings of their times.
Meanwhile, in the Gospel of John, Jesus tells the Roman governor Pontius Pilate that his kingdom does not belong to this world (Jn 18:36). This suggests a separation of responsibilities between civil governance and religious leadership. Repeatedly in the gospels, when people want to make Jesus a king, he slips through their midst and escapes. His mission is to proclaim the reign of God, not to establish a worldly kingdom.
There are also various covenants that set forth the relationship of God and God’s people (Gen 9:8-17; 15:18-21; Ex 20; Deut 5); a covenant in the ancient Middle East was a solemn agreement that bound both parties to observe certain obligations. The covenant with Noah was made by God with all of creation. The covenant with Abraham initiated a relationship with Abraham and his descendants forever. The covenant made with Moses at Mt. Sinai became the central framework for the relationship of the people of Israel to God. The Book of Deuteronomy renews and reflects upon this covenant a generation later, as Moses is at the end of his life.
These four options would shape, respectively, later Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Lutheran, and Calvinist views of the proper relation between church and state. The political theologies of the later Christian tradition consist in large measure of a series of conflicting appropriations of these perspectives. One can read the major political options taken by later Christian communions as developing one or more of the biblical trajectories. The Byzantine Orthodox tradition and some aspects of the Roman Catholic tradition continue the tradition of sacred kingship. Later strands of the Roman Catholic tradition view earthly rulers as prone to corruption and in need of repeated rebuke by religious leaders, such as popes. The Lutheran tradition focuses on Jesus’s statement to Pilate that his kingdom is not of this world and concludes that there are two kingdoms: the kingdom of God, which is ruled by the gospel, and the kingdom of this world, which is ruled by civil governments. The Calvinist tradition focused on covenant in a way that none of the earlier traditions had done, placing covenant at the center of relationships both with God and with other human beings. In this lecture, I will not discuss the original biblical texts themselves, but I would like to explore the way in biblical perspectives have guided later Christian political theologies.
Divine Kingship
The ideology of the Judean monarchy, with its lofty view of the monarch as favored by God and called to mediate divine justice in the world would shape the Byzantine Orthodox tradition’s view of the Emperor as a sacred figure with responsibility for the empire and the church together. Psalm 110 proclaims: “The Lord said to my Lord: Sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool” (110:1). That is, God says to the king: be enthroned beside me. This strand of the Bible sees God as entrusting a special responsibility to the king, which included particular care for the rights of widows and orphans, who were usually the most vulnerable persons in the ancient world. In this perspective, kings are divinely chosen beings with both rights and responsibilities of proper rule.
This perspective would influence later Eastern Christian views of church-state relations. For example, after Constantine had unified the Roman Empire in the early fourth century and made Christianity legal, the fourth-century bishop Eusebius of Caesarea in Palestine described the Emperor who was formally only a candidate for reception into the church, as receiving, “as it were, a transcript of divine sovereignty” from God and directing the administration of the entire world, including the church, in imitation of God (Life of Constantine). That is, Constantine had a divinely given responsibility to govern not only the Roman Empire but also the Church. This view of a sacred emperor would shape the self-understanding of Byzantine Emperors until the fall of Constantinople in 1453 and the self-understanding of the Russian Czars until 1917. All of the first seven ecumenical councils—meetings of bishops from throughout the world--acknowledged by the Byzantine Orthodox and Catholics were called by Roman Emperors and were presided over by them or their legates. If the pope did not wish to have a council, pressure would be applied. In the sixth century CE, the Byzantine Emperor Justinian wanted to call a council, but Pope Vigilius disagreed with him. Justinian had Vigilius kidnapped by the Byzantine police while he was saying Mass and held until he agreed to the council. Then the council was held in Constantinople, where Justinian wanted it, not in Sicily, where Pope Vigilius wanted it. At the end of the council Vigilius did not like the idea of condemning men who had died two centuries earlier in communion with the church. Justinian applied further pressure to the Latin clergy, and Vigilius eventually accepted the Condemnation of various bishops from two hundred years earlier.
The model of sacred kingship would also dominate early medieval Western views of kings and emperors from the eighth to the eleventh centuries. During the first millennium of Christian history, lay rulers, inspired by the ideology of the Judean monarchy, regularly called bishops and popes to account for their misdeeds and had recognized authority to depose unworthy ecclesiastical leaders and appoint new ones. In one year alone, 1046, Emperor Henry III, imbued with the divinely given mission of sacred kingship, deposed three popes (Sylvester III, Benedict IX, and Gregory VI) and appointed a new pope, Clement II. Before his death in 1056, Henry would appoint three more popes. There is certainly the danger of abuse of power here, but there was also a genuine concern that the papacy not be dominated by corrupt Roman nobility. This tradition leaves a heritage that challenges Christian political leaders to accountability to God for the way they enforce justice in this world and charges them with responsibility for good governance of the Church. During the first millennium popes from Gelasius I onward would insist on a distinction between sacred and secular authority in order to limit the role of Emperors in the church.
Like Samuel and other prophets who challenged the pretensions of biblical monarchs, Augustine rejected Eusebius’s exaltation of a Christian Roman Emperor and the entire model of sacred kingship. Like Samuel, Augustine thought earthly rulers were largely thieves and saw monarchy as a tragic necessity because of human sinfulness and not as directly willed by God. Augustine believed that no form of government could assure true justice in this world, and he questioned: “Justice removed, what are kingdoms but great bands of robbers? What are bands of robbers but little kingdoms?” Empires in principle are not Christian. This perspective would buttress the Gregorian Reform in the eleventh century, when a series of popes and reformers would reject the model of sacred kingship. Pope Gregory VII, echoing Samuel and Augustine, insisted that kings are largely thugs and oppressors who need to be called to accountability by religious leaders and who can be deposed by papal authority. The inability of either popes or emperors completely to dominate Europe would lead to new distinctions between secular and sacred in the twelfth century and in later medieval and early modern thought. From about the year 1100 on, emperors and pro-imperial apologists insist on a distinction between the sacred and the secular to limit the power of the papacy in politics. The suspicion of great empires as great robbers that need to be called to account by religious leaders would inform the battles of popes against emperors and kings for centuries and hovers in the background of Pope John Paul II’s challenge to the Soviet Empire on his trip to Poland in 1979 and his eloquent defense of human rights against oppressive governments around the world.
The claim of papal authority over kings and nations could manifest itself in dangerous ways as well. In Psalm 2, God promises the king: “I will give you the nations for an inheritance and the ends of the earth for your possession. You shall rule them with an iron rod; you shall shatter them like an earthen dish.” Even though never fulfilled in ancient times, that promise, buttressed by the conquest narratives of the Hebrew Bible, lived on in Christian memory, and fifteenth-century popes saw themselves as the trustees of this inheritance. In 1452, as the Portuguese were inaugurating their journeys of discovery and conquest, Pope Nicholas V granted to the king of Portugal the right to conquer and enslave the entire non-Christian world: “In the name of our apostolic authority, we grant to you the full and entire faculty of invading, conquering, expelling and reigning over all the kingdoms, the duchies . . . of the Saracens, of pagans and of all infidels, wherever they may be found; of reducing their inhabitants to perpetual slavery, of appropriating to yourself those kingdoms and all their possessions, for your own use and that of your successors” (Nicholas V, Dum Diversas, 1452; quoted in Peter Schineller, A Handbook of Inculturation, 34). In 1493 and again in 1494, shortly after the discovery of the New World, Pope Alexander VI drew a line on the map of the Americas, marking a partition between the areas that Spain and Portugal could dominate. The dream of empire, inspired by biblical promises, would shape centuries of modern colonial history.
Reformation
During the Reformation, the two major Protestant traditions rejected both the Byzantine Orthodox and the Roman Catholic models, but they drew sharply contrasting visions of politics from the Bible. Citing the Gospel of John, where Jesus denies that his kingdom belongs to this world, Martin Luther used the distinction between two kingdoms as a central principle structuring his theology. Luther insisted that God rules God’s own people by the Gospel and God rules those outside the church by the Law (“Secular Authority: To What Extent It Should be Obeyed,” in Dillenberger, 368). However, Christians remain sinners throughout their lives, and so God also rules Christians by the Law insofar as they are sinners and part of a sinful society. Luther shared Augustine’s and Samuel’s skepticism about earthly rulers, but he interpreted Paul’s Letter to the Romans (chapter 13) as calling the Christian to obey even rulers whose policies offend a Christian conscience. He insisted on freedom to preach the Word of God, but he generally trusted governmental authorities to rule the temporal realm. In the later history of Lutheranism, contrary to Luther’s intention, the Lutheran church was generally subservient to the state, and the state often supervised ecclesiastical governance.
In contrast to all the earlier models, John Calvin placed the covenant at the center of his political theology, with implications that would echo through much of European and American history. For Calvinists, covenants governed relations not only between God and Christians but also between earthly rulers and their subjects. In various countries the Calvinist tradition developed a forceful critique of monarchy based on the mutual obligations of each party. For Calvin, God alone is truly king, and all humans are radically fallen and subject to constant temptations to idolatry. No figure, whether pope or emperor or king or even a Protestant preacher, can claim infallible, final authority. Since rulers are forever tempted to rebel against God, all earthly power must be limited. Calvin distrusted democracy because a majority can be just as tyrannical as an individual, and he thought democracy could easily lead to sedition. He judged that in a fallen world, no single figure can be trusted, and thus all political powers must be checked by the self-interest of others. He advocated a mixture of aristocracy and democracy, a model that would be very influential on political developments in North America.
Calvinists often suffered attacks and persecutions. After the St. Bartholemew’s Day Massacre in France, when Roman Catholics murdered thousands of Protestants, Theodore Beza, Calvin’s most faithful disciple, proclaimed the sovereignty of the people, the right of revolution, and the binding nature of a constitution. Presbyterians in Scotland insisted on mutual responsibilities of the covenant as a way of limiting the powers of the Stuart monarchs. When Mary Stuart accused John Knox of grasping for power, he denied the charge and insisted: “My one aim is that Prince and people alike shall obey God.” (Ernst Troeltsch, The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches, vol. 2, p. 634). The rebellion against King Charles I began in Scotland with the proclamation of the National Covenant. Precisely because covenants spelled out mutual obligations for both ruler and the ruled, they could become the basis for rebellion and revolution when the terms were judged to have been violated. Through reflection on covenants in the Hebrew Bible and on natural law, Calvinists influenced early modern theories of government based upon a social contract and thus relying upon the consent of the governed.
Calvin saw the Gospel as a transformative social power, and there is a militant utopianism in Calvin’s vision of Christianity that would change the world. Geneva was to be the New Jerusalem. Puritans frustrated by the Stuart monarchs in England brought this energy and vision to New England, determined to build the city on the hill to inspire the world. Puritans understood themselves as the new Israelites fleeing slavery and coming to the Promised Land. As in earlier papal and imperial models, there was a negative side to the appropriation of biblical promises. Remembering that the ancient Israelites were instructed to destroy other tribes lest they tempt them to worship other gods, Puritan settlers viewed Native Americans as temptations to sin and sought to exterminate them or, at least, contain them in separate areas, reservations that were called “praying towns” (Richard Slotkin, Regeneration through Violence: The Mythology of the American Frontier 1600-1860, 40-42). When the Puritan Revolution in England failed in 1660, Puritans in America gave up hope for Europe and saw themselves as the millennial people, with a divine mission to convert the world after the failures in Europe.
Secularization and Religious Freedom in North America
Thus far we have seen the major models of church-state relations through the 17th century. Every pre-modern government with which I am familiar looked to religion for a source of legitimation. Emperors, kings, sultans, aristocrats all claimed to rule by the will of God. In China emperors ruled through the Confucian notion of the Mandate of Heaven. Buddhist kings cultivated harmonious relationships with Buddhist monasteries to demonstrate their devotion and piety. All this came under suspicion in early modern Europe.
During the 16th and 17th centuries, European Christians, both Protestant and Catholic, fought a series of bitter and bloody wars of religion. Each side claimed to be fighting on behalf of God; each side assumed that an empire, a nation, or a smaller polity should be unified in its religious belief and practice. Only a small minority of Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries believed in religious freedom for each individual according to the person’s own conscience. Because religious convictions were so strong, and because religion was embedded in manifold political, social, and economic relations, the conflicts were relentless and merciless. The Thirty Years’ War in Germany, which raged from 1618 to 1648, began as a religious conflict among Catholics, Lutherans, and Calvinists. By the end the war was more political than religious, with Catholic France intervening on the side of the Protestants to weaken the Holy Roman Emperor; but the damage had been done. There were atrocities against civilian populations on all sides. This was the bloodiest war on the continent of Europe prior to World War I. Meanwhile, about the same time, England went through an extremely vicious, bloody civil war, which killed a higher percentage of the population of England than did World War I.
In the wake of these wars of religion, thinking people increasingly began to question whether religion could or should be trusted with the task of legitimating any form of government. Enlightenment thinkers began to reflect on the virtue of religious tolerance, of respecting the liberty of conscience of others in matters religious. They also began to reflect on the possibility of separating church from state.
About this same time, in the British colonies in North America, some began to question the wisdom of government regulation of religion. In New England Roger Williams surveyed the bitter history of religious conflicts in Europe since the time of Constantine and concluded that imposing religious loyalties was a violation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Williams interpreted Jesus’s parable of the wheat and the weeds as forbidding Christians to attack those with whom they disagreed. Williams daringly judged the Emperor Constantine, who legalized Christianity in the Roman Empire, to have been more of a danger than Nero, who had persecuted Christians. Under Nero, Christians had heroically suffered and died; with Constantine, Christians took power, became corrupted, and began to impose Christianity by governmental authority. Williams also argued that it was unjust for the King of England to pretend to have the right to give away lands where Native Americans had lived for centuries. For Williams, the fact that Native Americans had different religious practices did not deprive them of their right to their homeland.
In 1635 Williams was banished from Massachusetts as a dissenter. The following year he moved south, where he purchased land from Native American Indians and established a new community, Rhode Island, as a “haven for the cause of conscience,” founded on the principle of religious liberty for all. His ideal of religious freedom or, in his phrase, “soul liberty” was fiercely opposed by the Puritans in Massachusetts but would stand as a model for later generations.
About the same time, Lord Baltimore founded Maryland as a refuge for Catholics fleeing persecution in England. Purchasing land from Native American Indians, he intended the colony to be a home for followers of all Christian paths, and the charter founding the colony offered equal rights in religious freedom to all. In 1649 the Maryland Assembly passed a Toleration Act offering freedom of conscience to all Christians. The example of guaranteeing religious freedom spread to other colonies as well, with similar charters of religious liberty in New Jersey in 1664, in Carolina in 1665, and in Pennsylvania in 1682. There was increasing momentum in the colonies to end government interference in religious practice and to accept a variety of forms of faith.
The Americans who fought the Revolutionary war were struggling for religious liberty as well as for political liberty. The quest for religious freedom came from both the tradition of dissenting Protestantism and also Enlightenment ideals of religious toleration. Many of the founders of the United States of America were strongly influenced by the European Enlightenment, with its suspicion of Christianity, its critique of the wars of religion, its deist faith, and its doubts about any claims for supernatural revelation. Thomas Jefferson thought that the alliance of clergy and political officials inevitably led to tyranny, and he believed that clergymen should not be allowed to any hold political office. On occasion he excoriated them as “the real Anti-Christ.” In return, some New England preachers attacked Jefferson himself as the Anti-Christ and warned that if he were elected president, he would commandeer all Bibles and establish houses of prostitution in the churches. Jefferson and George Washington, like many of their contemporaries, were deists, for whom the natural religion of humankind provided the ultimate answer to the conflicts among particular religions. For both, religious freedom was indispensable for human progress. As military commander, Washington forbade the celebration of the English anti-Catholic feast, Pope’s Day, on November 5, 1775, at a time when he was seeking support from French-speaking Catholics in Canada. Ben Franklin was deeply influenced by Deism and is often considered a deist; but he shaped his own idiosyncratic view of natural religion, with a plurality of deities under the direction of one supreme deity. Franklin, Jefferson, and Washington would quietly attend Christian church services without believing traditional theology; more radical deists such as Thomas Paine, Ethan Allen, and Elihu Palmer, rejected Christianity more thoroughly, criticizing the Bible for its multiple contradictions and substituting a religion of nature for Christian practice.
While many of the founding fathers were deists of one form or another, American Protestants also contributed strongly to the revolution and interpreted the establishment of the new nation in religious terms. Indeed, the evangelical revival movement known as the First Great Awakening in the early eighteenth century did much to foster communication among the colonies, to establish awareness of a new shared American identity in contrast to the British, and also to arouse evangelical Protestant hostility to Anglican and Catholic forms of worship, thereby paving the way for revolt against the British king. The Puritan practice of interpreting the settlement in North America as a fulfillment of promises in the Book of Revelation was influential on supporters of the Revolution.
In Virginia the Church of the England was the established Church, and all other forms of worship were forbidden. The young James Madison was deeply shocked by the imprisonment of traveling Baptist preachers who openly expressed their religious beliefs in Virginia; he would later become one of the leaders in the quest for full religious liberty. Madison asserted, “Torrents of blood have been spilt in the old world, by vain attempts of the secular arm to extinguish religious discord. . . . Time has at length revealed the true remedy.” The remedy for Madison and his colleagues was full religious liberty and the separation of church and state.
The founders of the new nation resolved that the bitter religious wars of Europe should not be replicated on American soil. George Mason was the chief author of Virginia Declaration of Rights, which declared “all men should enjoy the fullest Toleration in the Exercise of Religion according to the Dictates of Conscience.” The Bill of Rights for the Commonwealth of Virginia, approved on June 12, 1776, was a landmark achievement, the first such list of rights in history.
On July 4, 1788, a parade in Philadelphia celebrated the ratification of the U.S. Constitution. Clergy from various Christian denominations marched together and with them, arm, in arm, a Jewish rabbi. One observer, Dr. Benjamin Rush, commented, “There could not have been a more happy emblem contrived, of the section of the new constitution, which opens all its powers and offices alike, not only to every sect of Christians, but to worthy men of every religion.” Two years later George Washington visited the Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, which still stands as the oldest synagogue in the United States. The Jewish community thanked him and the new government for “generously affording to all liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship”; Washington, in reply, affirmed that the U.S. government “gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance,” and he went on to distinguish the religious toleration granted by the British and other European governments (often on condition that Jews “improve”) from the American recognition of religious liberty as an inherent natural right. In principle, followers of all religious traditions were to be fully equal citizens in the United States of America.
Secularization in the United States was not hostile to religion but allowed a free range of religious debate. One can read the history of the United States in terms of four Great Awakenings, each of which was linked to a movement of social or political reform. Alexis de Tocqueville would note the paradox that in Europe churches were established but languishing. In the United States, by contrast, no church was established, and all were flourishing. The free competition among Protestant churches called forth creativity and vitality.
France and the Papal Reaction
A few years after the American Revolution, another revolution began in France, which became far bloodier both in attacking established religion and also in devouring its own children. Because the Catholic Church was intimately intertwined with the ancien regime, the old way of life in France, the French Revolution targeted Catholic bishops, priests, nuns, churches and monasteries. Many Catholic leaders were killed, churches were turned into museums—as is the case with the Pantheon in Paris to the present day—monastery farmlands were confiscated by the French Republic and put up for sale to support the Revolution and its armies. The model of secularization in France was very, very different from that in the United States. Because the Catholic Church had been so powerfully established for centuries, the program of secularization aimed to eliminate the influence of the Catholic Church from the political sphere for the sake of laicité. This heritage lives on to the present day, continuing to shape relations between the French government and religions.
Catholic leaders in Europe saw the French Revolution as a direct attack upon the Catholic Church, and this prompted a profound suspicion of modernity and its newly proclaimed democratic ideals. Napoleon, after all, had humiliated Pope Pius VII, taking him as a virtual prisoner into France in 1808. Napoleon, in the presence of the pope, crowned himself emperor, thereby signaling that the pope had no role whatsoever to play. Many thought that this would be the end of the papacy. After the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo, the victorious European powers gathered at the Congress of Vienna to plan the future of Europe. The pope sided with the forces of reaction. It was commented that the victorious European leaders had “forgotten nothing and learned nothing.” In this context, the papacy returned to a position of prominence and renewed vigor, albeit on the side of the forces of reaction in Europe.
In this atmosphere, a French Catholic priest, Felicité Robert de Lamennais, sought to accept the ideals of democracy, separation of church and state, and freedom of speech, of the press and of religion into Catholicism. He argued against the interference of governments in religious matters and supported revolutions to transform society. Pope Gregory XVI vigorously condemned him and the ideals of modernity. Pope Gregory condemned democracy, freedom of religion, separation of church and state, and freedom of the press. In a wordplay on the French term for railroads, “chemins de fer” (roads of iron), he even condemned railroads as “chemins de l’enfer”—the roads of hell. His successor, Pope Pius IX, was originally more positively disposed toward the reform movements in Europe, but after the Revolution of 1848 killed his Priume Minister and forced him to flee Rome in disguise, Pope Pius turned vehemently against the ideals of the modern world. In 1864 Pope Pius IX issued the Syllabus of Errors, which repeated earlier papal condemnations of modern ideals, and concluding by a famous condemnation of the notion that “the Roman Pontiff can, and ought to, reconcile himself, and comes to terms with progress, liberalism, and modern civilization.”
During this time the Italian movement known as the Risorgimento was fighting to unify Italy into a modern nation. The pope had ruled the central portion of Italy, known as the Papal States, for centuries. By the time of the pontificate of Pius IX, this territory was reduced to the city of Rome, which was effectively defended by French troops. When in 1870 Prussia invaded France, the French troops were called home and the Italian General Garibaldi was able to capture Rome for the new Italian nation.
In protest, the pope declared himself a “prisoner of the Vatican” and refused to leave its precincts for the rest of his life. This precedent was followed for decades. The loss of temporal power profoundly transformed the papacy. For centuries popes had been not only spiritual leaders but also the temporal governors of Rome and central Italy. As such, they were involved in constant political squabbles and frequently papal armies fought in battles for land and power. Popes intervened on the side of their own families and were perceived as partisan political leaders. The papal states were long thought to be necessary to preserve the independence of the pope from domination by a temporal ruler.
In 1870 the worst nightmare of the popes came to pass. Pope Pius IX lost all the temporal possessions except for the Vatican itself. Pius refused any negotiations with the new Italian natgion. Finally, in 1929 Pope Pius XI would sign a Concordat with Benito Mussolini, officially establishing the relationship between the Holy See and the nation of Italy.
Paradoxically, however, the loss of the Papal States was one of the greatest possible blessings for the papacy. Once freed from the responsibilities of ruling the central portion of Italy, popes were eventually able to become respected moral and spiritual leaders on an unprecedented global level. This came to fruition in the middle and late 20th c. Pope John XXIII, who served as pope from 1958 to 1963, was beloved by many, many people beyond the borders of the Catholic Church. He was, in a sense, the grandfather to the world, a kindly, spiritual man who spoke vigorously for peace and the welfare of the poor. During the Cuban missile crisis in the fall of 1962, when the United States and the Soviet Union came the closest they ever did to nuclear war, Pope John XXIII served as an intermediary, passing messages between them. Pope John also called the Second Vatican Council, an ecumenical council of all the Catholic bishops from around the world, which met in Rome between 1962 and 1965.
It was at the Second Vatican Council that the Catholic Church rethought its relation to the modern world, to religious freedom, to governments, and to other religions, including Islam. Conservative bishops and Cardinals argued that the Catholic Church could not change the teachings of centuries. But on a number of important issues, the overwhelming majority of the bishops, supported first by Pope John XXIII and then, after his death, by his successor Pope Paul VI, disagreed. The Church issued the Declaration of Religious Freedom in 1965. It affirmed the right of every human being to follow his or her conscience in deciding which religious path to follow. It abandoned the earlier desire of the Catholic Church to be recognized as the one Church in a nation and sought only freedom to proclaim the gospel.
One of the most influential contributors to this declaration was an American priest, a member of the religious order known as the Society of Jesus, John Courtney Murray. He had earlier argued that Catholic moral theology, based on natural law, was in harmony with the ideals of the American Revolution. At the time of his writing, this was considered to be a dangerous opinion by authorities in the Vatican, and he was ordered not to write further on the topic. However, at the Second Vatican Council, Murray emerged as one of the most influential advisors to the bishops and an architect of the declaration.
Pope Paul VI, together with the Second Vatican Council, issued the Declaration of Religious Freedom in the fall of 1965. He emerged as a major world leader. He traveled to New York City in 1965, where he spoke eloquently at the United Nations. Pope Paul VI’s speech before the General Assembly of the United Nations has been hailed as the climax of his career. Pope Paul was also active in seeking peace around the world, including meetings with President Lyndon Johnson of the U.S. and the Secretary General of the UN, U Thant, working for an end to the war in Vietnam.
Archbishop Karol Wojtyla from Cracow, Poland, a participant in the Second Vatican Council, was also an enthusiastic supporter of the Declaration on Religious Freedom. He had long been involved in the tensions and difficulties of the Catholic Church with the Communist government in Poland. He welcomed the church’s demand not to be officially established but only for religious freedom. He would use the Church’s affirmation of human rights, including religious freedom, as an argument against the Communist rulers of Poland.
Thirteen years after the Second Vatican Council ended, Karol Wojtyla was elected pope and chose the name Pope John Paul II. Pope John Paul II extended the spiritual and moral influence of the papacy to a truly global outreach. His first trip to Poland as pope in 1979 was a turning point in the history not only of Poland, but of Eastern Europe and the world. At the time, I read and saved an article by Jaroslav Pelikan, who was then a Lutheran theologian and who would later convert to the Byzantine Orthodox Church. Pelikan in 1979 predicted that Pope John Paul’s visit to Poland was a harbinger of the end of the Communist era. Pelikan noted that hundreds and hundreds of thousands of Poles had waited for hours to see the pope and to participate in the outdoor Eucharist that he celebrated. Pelikan further noted that every Communist ruler in Eastern Europe knew that not one of them could evoke such spontaneous loyalty, devotion, and affection. Ten years before the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, Pelikan had already spotted one of the central dynamics at work.
Later Pope John Paul would travel all around the world. Again and again he would tell crowds, “Be not afraid!!” The title of his book of personal reflections in response to questions from an Italian journalist would be: Crossing the Threshold of Hope. In his last years, when he was elderly and ailing, he still loved to meet with young people. When they would express anxieties and concerns to him about the future, he would tell them: The Pope is a very old man; he has seen many things come and go, including the Nazis and the Communists. Always have hope.
Even though the loss of the Papal States and the secularization of the nation of Italy contradicted all the stated wishes and desires of nineteenth-century popes, these developments made possible the international outreach of the popes of the middle and late 20th century. If Pope John XXIII, Pope Paul VI, and Pope John Paul II had been responsible for the political and economic policies of the central section of Italy, they would have been perceived as European politicians with the interests of their own region at heart. Freed from such cares, they were able to intervene on the global scale as respected moral, religious, and spiritual leaders
As we have seen, for decades, popes condemned the American political system of separation of church and state. More recently, even so conservative a pope as Benedict XVI has spoken of his admiration for the United States, noting that the separation of church and state allowed Catholics who at one time had been a downtrodden minority among a Protestant elite, to become central to national life. Pope Benedict, like the 19th-century French observer Alexis de Tocqueville, noted that generally America is a place, unlike increasingly secular Europe, where religion is allowed a careful place in the political sphere.
政教关系与世俗化
纵观历史,已开发出多种基督教教会和政府,有时和谐,有时冲突之间的关系。基督教教会和政府之间的关系的主要形式是在很大程度上植根于不同的角度在基督教圣经。基督教圣经不是一本书,而是一个收集的书籍,写了超过一千年,含有非常多样的宗教和政府的观点。
一个角度来看,代表的诗篇,这是在耶路撒冷圣殿的赞美诗,高举王几乎是神圣的位置,坐在神的右边(诗110:1 ) ,并接受国家的地球的继承(诗2:8 ) 。加冕圣歌庆祝国王的神的特殊关系。此观点占主导地位的自我理解犹大的君王,古代以色列南部的部分。
形成鲜明对比的是,先知撒母耳谴责国王只有上帝允许人类的罪恶作为让步的骗子和压迫者。塞缪尔警告以色列支派的,如果他们选择有一个国王,国王将起草年轻男子进入他的军队,并把年轻女性在他的服务工作。在这个轨迹,先知,只配备了信念,即他们被称为神宣讲神的话语,反复站起古代以色列的君王,并谴责他们的罪。因此,塞缪尔谴责扫罗,弥敦道谴责大卫,后来的先知,如以赛亚和耶利米谴责他们那个时代的君王。
同时,在约翰福音中,耶稣告诉罗马总督本丢彼拉多,他的王国不属于这个世界(约18:36 ) 。这表明民间治理和宗教领袖之间职责分离。多次在福音,当人们想使耶稣王,他滑倒通过他们中间逃逸。他的使命是传扬神的统治,而不是建立一个世俗的王国​​。
也有各种各样的契约所载的关系,上帝和上帝的人(创9:8-17 ; 15:18-21 ;出20 ;申5 ) ;立约,在古代中东是一个庄严的协议,同时约束各方遵守一定的义务。所有的创造,是由上帝与挪亚立约。与亚伯拉罕立约,发起了一个与亚伯拉罕和他的后裔,直到永远。该公约与摩西在Mt 。西奈半岛成为以色列神的人的关系的中心框架。在这约书申命记更新,反映了一代人以后,摩西是在他生命的尽头。
将塑造这四个选项,分别后来的希腊东正教,罗马天主教,路德和加尔文主义的观点,教会与国家之间的正确关系。后来的基督教传统的政治神学包括大量拨款的这些观点冲突的一系列措施。人们可以阅读后来的基督教圣餐开发圣经中的一个或多个轨迹主要采取的政治选择。拜占庭的东正教传统和罗马天主教的传统的某些方面继续神圣王权的传统。后来缕缕罗马天主教的传统尘世统治者腐败现象易发多发,需要反复斥责宗教领袖,如教皇。路德传统的重点耶稣的声明彼拉多那里去,他的王国是不属于这个世界,并得出结论,有2王国:神的国度,这是统治的福音,和这个世界的王国​​,由民间政府的统治。加尔文主义的传统,专注于较早的传统没有做过的方式,将与神与其他人类的关系的中心约约。在这次讲座中,我不会讨论的原始经文本身,而是在圣经的观点,我想探讨的方式引导后来的基督教政治神学。
王权
的思想犹太君主制,其崇高的君主鉴于作为青睐由上帝和叫做调解在世界的神圣的正义将塑造的拜占庭东正教传统的皇帝作为一个神圣的数字与责任帝国和教会一起。诗篇110篇宣称: “耶和华对我主说: ”坐在我的右边,等我把你仇敌作你的脚凳“ ( 110:1 ) 。也就是说,神王说:我旁边坐床。这股“圣经” ,看到神王,其中包括特别照顾寡妇和孤儿,他们通常是最脆弱的人在古代世界的权利,负有特殊的责任委托。从这个角度来看,国王被神选择的众生与适当的规则,双方的权利和责任。
这种观点会影响后来的东方基督教政教关系的看法。例如,君士坦丁统一罗马帝国在第四世纪初,并描述第四世纪的基督教法律,凯撒利亚主教优西比乌在巴勒斯坦正式接收到教会只有候选人的皇帝是谁,接收, “它是“从神的神圣主权,成绩单整个世界的管理和指导,包括教堂,在模仿神(生命君士坦丁) 。也就是说,君士坦丁有一个神圣的责任治理不仅是罗马帝国,但也教会。这种观点将塑造一个神圣的皇帝拜占庭皇帝的自我理解,直到在1453年君士坦丁堡陷落,直到1917年的俄罗斯沙皇的自我理解。第7合一议会会议的主教,来自世界各地的 - 承认拜占庭东正教和天主教被称为是由罗马帝国皇帝,他们或他们的使节主持。如果教皇不希望有一个会,压力就会被应用。在公元六世纪,拜占庭皇帝查士丁尼想叫一个议会,但教皇Vigilius他不同意。查士丁尼Vigilius由拜占庭警察绑架,而他所说的质量和举行,直到他同意到议会。该局在君士坦丁堡,在那里查士丁尼想举行,而不是在西西里岛,在教皇Vigilius想。在年底的议会Vigilius不喜欢谴责男人的想法,谁死了两个世纪前在与教会的共融。查士丁尼施加进一步的压力到拉丁神职人员,和Vigilius最终接受了各种主教从200年前的谴责。
神圣王权的模型也从第八到第十一世纪帝王称霸中世纪早期的西方观点。在基督教历史上的第一个千年,世俗统治者,灵感来自犹太君主制的意识形态,经常被称为主教和教皇交代他们的劣迹,并公认的权威,废黜不配教会的领袖,并任命新的。 1046,仅在一年时间里,英皇亨利三世,充溢着神圣的使命神圣的王权,废黜三个教皇西尔维斯特三世(本笃九,和格雷戈里VI ) ,并任命了新的教皇克莱门特II 。他于1056去世之前,亨利将委任三名教皇。滥用权力在这里当然是有危险,但也有一个真正关心教皇不被腐败的罗马贵族为主。这个传统留下的遗产挑战基督教政治领导人问责神强制执行的方式,他们在这个世界上正义和收费良好的治理教会的责任。第一个千年教皇格拉西我以后的期间将坚持神圣和世俗权力之间的区别,以限制皇帝在教会的作用。
奥古斯丁像萨穆埃尔和先知,谁质疑圣经君主的自命不凡,拒绝尤西比乌斯的基督教罗马帝国皇帝和整个模型的神圣王权的提高。像萨穆埃尔,奥古斯丁认为地上的统治者大多盗贼看到君主制作为一个悲剧性的,必要的,因为人类的罪恶,而不是直接由神的意志。奥古斯丁认为,任何形式的政府可以保证在这个世界上真正的正义,他质疑:“司法删除,什么是强盗的王国​​,但是伟大的乐队吗?劫匪,但小王国乐队是什么? “原则的帝国是不是基督徒。此观点支撑阳历的改革在11世纪时,教皇和改革者一系列拒绝神圣王权的模型。 ,呼应萨穆埃尔和奥古斯丁,教皇格列高利七世国王坚持认为在很大程度上是暴徒和压迫者,谁需要被称为问责制,由宗教领袖,谁可以被废黜罗马教皇的权威。任教皇或皇帝完全称霸欧洲无力,会导致新的世俗和神圣之间的区别,在12世纪,并在后来的中世纪和早期现代思想。大约从1100年,皇帝亲帝国主义辩护士坚持之间的神圣和世俗限制权力的教皇在政治上的区别。伟大的帝国需要到被称为帐户由宗教领袖,作为伟大的劫匪怀疑会告知教皇的战斗对帝王世纪以来徘徊教皇约翰保罗II的挑战苏联帝国在后台他前往波兰在1979年和他的雄辩的辩护反对压迫世界各国政府的人权。
要求教皇权威的国王和国家可能以危险的方式表现出来。在诗篇2 ,神应许王: “我会给你的国家为你的身上的继承和天涯海角。您应排除他们用铁棒你要粉碎他们喜欢的土菜。 “即使在古代从未履行这一承诺,挟着征服的希伯来文圣经叙述,住在基督教内存,和十五世纪教皇看到自己作为受托人,此继承。 1452年,葡萄牙人开创自己的发现和征服的旅程,教皇尼古拉五世授予葡萄牙国王的征服和奴役整个非基督教世界:“在我们使徒权威的名称,我们授予您充分和整个教师侵略,征服所有的王国,公国,驱逐和卫冕。 。 。撒拉逊人,异教徒和所有的异教徒,他们可能的地方被发现,减少居民永久的奴役,挪用给自己的王国,他们所有的财产,供自己使用,你的接班人“ (尼古拉五世, DUM Diversas ,1452报价在彼得Schineller ,文化融入手册, 34) 。不久,在1493年和1494年再次发现了新大陆后,罗马教皇亚历山大六世的美洲地图上画了一条线,这标志着一个分区之间的地区,西班牙和葡萄牙可以主宰。帝国的梦想,灵感来自圣经的承诺,塑造百年现代化的殖民地历史。
改革
在改革过程中,这两个主要的新教传统拒绝拜占庭东正教和罗马天主教车型,但他们吸引了尖锐对立的政治愿景,从“圣经” 。马丁·路德·引用约翰福音,耶稣否认他的王国属于这个世界,用他的神学为中心的原则构建的两个王国之间的区别。路德坚持认为神规则上帝的福音和神的人掌管这些教堂外的法“ ( ”世俗权力:在何种程度上应遵守“ 368迪伦贝格尔) 。然而,基督徒仍然在其整个生命的罪人,所以上帝也掌管法的基督徒,只要他们是罪人,一个罪恶的社会的一部分。路德共享奥古斯丁和萨穆埃尔的怀疑地上的统治者,但他解释保罗致罗马人书(第13章)呼吁基督徒甚至服从统治者的政策得罪了基督徒的良心。他坚持宣讲神的话语的自由,但他普遍信任政府当局统治的时空境界。在后来的历史路德教,路德的意图相反,路德教会普遍服从于国家和国家的经常监督教会治理。
在所有早期型号相比,约翰·加尔文在他的政治神学的中心,放置约响彻欧洲和美国的历史影响。加尔文主义者,管辖契约不仅神和基督徒之间,但也尘世统治者和他们的臣民之间的关系。在世界各国的加尔文主义传统君主制的基础上,每一方的相互义务,制定了有力的批判。对于加尔文,只有上帝是真正的国王,和所有人类都彻底堕落,不断诱惑偶像崇拜。没有数字,教皇或皇帝或国王,甚至是新教牧师,是否可以要求犯错,最终的权威。由于统治者的反抗神永远的诱惑,所有世俗权力必须加以限制。加尔文不信任民主,因为多数可以是只是强横作为一个单独的,他认为民主很容易导致煽动叛乱罪。他判断,在一个堕落的世界中,没有一个单一的数字可以信任,因此一切政治权力必须检查自身利益他人。他主张贵族和民主的模式,那将是非常有影响力的政治发展在北美的混合物。
加尔文主义者经常遭受攻击和迫害。后圣Bartholemew的大屠杀在法国,当罗马天主教徒,新教徒,杀害数千伯撒,卡尔文最忠实的弟子,宣布主权的人,革命的权利,以及宪法的约束性。长老会在苏格兰坚持相互责任的约斯图亚特王朝的君主权力的限制的一种方式。当玛丽斯图尔特指责约翰·诺克斯的权力抓,他否认指控,坚持说:“我的目标之一是,王子和人民都应当服从上帝。 ” (恩斯特特勒尔奇,基督教教会的社会训导,第2条,第634) 。我开始反抗国王查尔斯在苏格兰宣布全国公约“ 。正是因为契约阐明相互义务为统治者与被统治者,他们可能会成为叛乱和革命的基础的条款时,已被判定为违反。通过反思,在希伯来文圣经和自然法上的契约,加尔文主义影响早期现代政府根据社会契约理论,从而依靠统治者的同意。
卡尔文作为一个变革的社会力量,看到了福音,有一个激进的乌托邦在加尔文的愿景基督教,将改变世界。日内瓦是新耶路撒冷。英国斯图亚特王朝的君主在沮丧的清教徒把这个精力和远见,新英格兰地区,立志打造城市在山上激励世界。清教徒明白自己作为新的以色列人逃离奴役和未来的应许之地。至于早期的罗马教皇和帝国模型,有消极的一面, “圣经”的承诺的拨款。记住,古代的以色列人被指示以免破坏其他部落,他们引诱他们敬拜别神,清教徒移居观看土著美国人罪的诱惑,试图消灭他们,或者至少,他们在不同的领域,包含保留被称为“祈祷的城镇“ (理查德·斯洛特金,通过暴力再生: 40-42 1600-1800年,美国边境的神话) 。当英格兰的清教徒革命失败,在1660年,在美国的清教徒放弃了欧洲的希望,看到自己千年的人,一个神圣的使命,转换后的世界在欧洲的失败。
在北美的世俗和宗教的自由
到目前为止,我们已经看到了17世纪主要政教关系模式,通过。看着我熟悉每一个前现代的政府宗教合法性的来源。皇帝,国王,苏丹,贵族都自称为神的旨意统治。在中国皇帝统治通过儒家的天命。培养佛教国王与佛教寺院的和谐关系,以证明他们的奉献和虔诚。这一切也受到怀疑,在近代早期欧洲的。
在16世纪和17世纪,欧洲的基督徒,新教和天主教,打了一系列的残酷,血腥的宗教战争。每一方都声称是代表神的战斗,每边假设,一个帝国,一个民族,或一个较小的政体应该是统一的,在其宗教的信仰和实践。在16世纪和17世纪的新教徒只有少数信奉宗教自由为每个人的自己的良心。因为宗教信念这么强,和因为宗教嵌入歧管政治,社会和经济关系中,冲突是无情的,无情的。三十年战争肆虐1618年至1648年,在德国,开始作为一个宗教天主教,路德和加尔文主义之间的冲突。年底,战争是政治不是宗教,法国天主教干预侧面削弱神圣罗马帝国皇帝的新教徒,但损失已经造成了。有双方所有对平民的暴行。这是欧洲大陆上最血腥的战争到第一次世界大战之前,同时,大约在同一时间,英国经历了一个极其恶毒的,血腥的内战,其中死亡的比例更高英格兰的人口比第一次世界大战
这些宗教战争之后,思维越来越多的人开始质疑宗教是否可以或应该信任与任何形式的政府合法化的任务。启蒙思想家们开始反思对宗教宽容的美德,尊重其他事宜宗教良心的自由。他们也开始反思教会从国家分离的可能性。
大约在同一时期,在英国在北美的殖民地,有些人开始质疑政府监管智慧的宗教。罗杰·威廉姆斯在新英格兰调查了惨痛的历史在欧洲的宗教冲突自君士坦丁时间和结论,雄伟的宗教的忠诚,是违反了耶稣基督的福音。威廉姆斯解释耶稣的比喻,小麦和杂草禁止基督徒攻击那些与他们不同意的。威廉姆斯大胆判断皇帝君士坦丁,基督教在罗马帝国合法化,更多的危险比尼禄,受迫害的基督徒。根据尼禄,基督徒英勇遭受痛苦和死亡;基督徒君士坦丁上台,成为损坏,并开始征收基督教政府机关。威廉姆斯也认为,这是不公正的英国国王假装有权利放弃原住民美国人曾在此居住了几百年的土地。对于威廉姆斯来说,土著美国人的事实,有不同的宗教习俗,并没有剥夺他们自己的家园的权利。
1635年,来自马萨诸塞州的威廉姆斯被驱逐作为一个持不同政见者。次年,他南移,在那里他购买了从美国土著印第安人的土地,并建立一个新的社区,罗德岛,作为“避风港良心事业, ”建立在宗教信仰自由的原则。他的理想的宗教信仰自由,在他的那句, “灵魂的自由”强烈反对由清教徒在马萨诸塞州,但会站在后人的典范。
大约在同一时间,马里兰巴尔的摩勋爵创办,为逃避迫害的天主教徒在英国避难。采购从美国土著印第安人的土地,他打算殖民地为所有基督教路径的追随者,是一个家,创立了殖民地的包机提供了平等的权利,宗教自由所有。 1649年马里兰州议会通过了一项宽容法案“ ,提供所有基督徒的良心自由。保证宗教自由以及蔓延到其他殖民地,于1664年在新泽西州的宗教自由类似的包机,在1665年在北卡罗来纳州,并在1682年在宾夕法尼亚州的例子。有增长的势头在殖民地结束政府干预宗教活动和接受各种形式的信仰。
革命战争战斗的美国人谁挣扎宗教的自由,以及政治自由。宗教信仰自由的追求来自反对新教的传统和启蒙理想的宗教宽容。许多创始人美利坚合众国欧洲启蒙运动的强烈影响,与基督教的怀疑,批判的宗教战争,自然神论者的信心,并怀疑任何超自然的启示索赔。托马斯·杰斐逊认为神职人员和政治联盟的官员必然导致暴政,他认为,不应该允许任何担任政治职务的神职人员。有时,他痛斥他们为“真正的反基督”。作为回报,一些新英格兰的传教士攻击杰斐逊本人作为反基督,并警告说,如果他当选总统,他将征用所有的“圣经” ,并建立妓院教堂。杰弗森和乔治·华盛顿,他们像许多同时代的自然神论者,对他们来说,人类的自然宗教,特别是宗教之间的冲突提供最终的答案。对于这两个人类的进步,宗教信仰自由是必不可少的。军事指挥官,华盛顿11月5日, 1775年,禁止英语反天主教盛宴庆祝,教皇节,在这个时候,他正在寻求从加拿大法语为母语的天主教徒的支持。深深影响富兰克林自然神论和经常被认为是自然神论者,但他塑造了他自己特有的自然宗教观,神明有多个方向的下一个至高无上的神。富兰克林,杰斐逊,华盛顿会静静不相信传统神学参加基督教教会服务,更激进的自然神论者,如托马斯·潘恩,伊森艾伦和伊莱休·帕尔默,更彻底地拒绝了基督教,批评其多重矛盾,而代以“圣经”的宗教性质为基督徒做法。
虽然许多开国元勋的一种或另一种形式的自然神论者,美国新教徒也带来强烈的革命和建立新的民族宗教条款的解释。事实上,早在18世纪被称为第一次大觉醒的福音复兴运动做了很多促进殖民地之间的沟通,建立一个新的共享美国人的身份意识,在英国,同时也引起福音派新教敌意英国国教天主教形式的崇拜,从而铺平了道路,为反抗英国国王。清教徒在北美作为履行承诺,在启示录解释解决实践上有影响力的革命的支持者。
在弗吉尼亚的英格兰教会是建立教会,和所有其他形式的崇拜被禁止。年轻的詹姆斯·麦迪逊行驶浸会传教士谁公开表达他们的宗教信仰在弗吉尼亚州的监禁;被深深地震撼了,他以后会成为追求充分的宗教信仰自由的领导人之一。麦迪逊断言, “春潮血已经溅在旧世界,世俗臂妄图扑灭宗教不和谐。 。 。 。时间长度已经揭示了真正的补救措施。“麦迪逊和他的同事们的补救措施是充分的宗教信仰自由和教会与国家分离。
这个新国家的缔造者解决欧洲的宗教战争,苦不应该被复制在美国的土地上。乔治·梅森是弗吉尼亚人权宣言“的主要作者,宣布”所有的人应该享有充分的宽容,宗教行使根据良心的命令。 “弗吉尼亚联邦权利法案” , 6月12日批准, 1776年,是一个具有里程碑意义的成就,权利在历史上的第一个这样的列表。
于1788年7月4日,在费城游行庆祝美国宪法的批准。基督教各教派的神职人员一起游行,并与他们,手臂,胳膊,一个犹太拉比。一名观察员,本杰明·拉什博士评论说,“不可能是一个更幸福的会徽做作,部分新宪法,这将打开其所有的权力和办公室的一致好评,不仅给每一个教派的基督徒,但值得每一种宗教的人。 “两年后,乔治·华盛顿访问Touro犹太教堂在罗得岛纽波特,仍然屹立在美国最古老的犹太教堂。犹太社区感谢他和新政府的“慷慨地给予所有自由公民”的良知和豁免;答辩,华盛顿肯定,美国政府“给偏执任何制裁,迫害任何援助,”他去区分宗教宽容授予由英国和其他欧洲国家政府(通常对犹太人“改进”的情况下) ,从固有的自然权利的美国人承认宗教自由。原则上,所有的宗教传统的追随者在美利坚合众国是完全平等的公民。
在美国的世俗化是不敌视宗教,但允许自由范围内的宗教辩论。在四个大觉醒,人们可以阅读美国的历史,其中每个被链接到社会或政治改革运动。托克维尔会注意到,在欧洲教堂成立,但含情脉脉的悖论。相比之下,在美国,没有教会成立,全部是一片繁荣景象。新教教会的自由竞争,提出了所谓的创造力和活力。
法国和罗马教皇的反应
几年美国革命后,在法国开始的另一场革命,无论是在进攻建立的宗教,并在吞噬着自己的孩子变得血腥。因为天主教教会的旧制度,旧的方式在法国的生活是密切联系在一起的,法国大革命针对性的天主教主教,神父,修女,教堂和修道院。许多天主教领导人被打死,教堂被辟为博物馆,是由法国共和国至今修道院农田被没收的情况下,在巴黎先贤祠,并推售,以支持革命和它的军队。法国世俗化的模型是非常,非常不同,在美国。因为天主教教会已经如此强大了几个世纪,建立旨在消除从政治领域的影响力的天主教教会为了政教分离的世俗化方案。这一遗产住到目前的一天,继续塑造法国政府和宗教之间的关系。
作为直接攻击天主教教会,天主教领袖在欧洲看到法国大革命和现代性及其新近宣布的民主理想,这促使了深刻的怀疑。拿破仑,毕竟,侮辱教皇庇护七世,他于1808年进入法国作为一个虚拟的囚犯。拿破仑,在教皇的存在,自立为皇帝,以此暗示,教皇有没有发挥任何作用。许多人认为,这将是教皇结束。拿破仑在滑铁卢战败后,胜利的欧洲列强聚集在维也纳的国会规划欧洲的未来。教皇站在反动势力。有人评论说,胜利的欧洲领导人已经“遗忘什么,什么也没学到。 ”在这种情况下,教皇返回到一个突出的位置,重新焕发了活力,尽管在旁边的势力在欧洲的反应。
在这种氛围中,法国天主教神父, FELICITE罗伯特· Lamennais ,寻求,接受民主,教会与国家分离,言论自由,新闻和宗教为天主教的理想。他反对在宗教事务方面的干扰政府支持的革命,改造社会。教皇格里高利十六世强烈谴责他和现代化的理想。罗马教皇格雷戈里谴责民主,宗教自由,教会与国家分离,新闻自由。铁路在法国长期在一个双关语, “ CHEMINS德转移” (铁道路) ,他甚至谴责铁路“ CHEMINS DE L' enfer ”地狱的道路。教皇庇护九世,他的继任者,原本是更积极朝着改革运动在欧洲出售,但1848年革命后杀害他Priume部长,并迫使他逃离罗马变相, ,教皇庇护转身强烈反对现代世界的理想。在1864年,罗马教皇庇护九世颁布教学大纲的错误,反复早期教皇谴责现代理想,最后由著名谴责的概念,“罗马教皇,应该释怀,并涉及到与进步,自由主义和现代文明。 “
在这段时间内意大利运动复兴运动被称为是意大利统一成一个现代化国家而战。教皇统治的中央部分,被称为教皇国,意大利几个世纪。教皇庇护九世的时候,这片领土被减少到罗马城的有效辩护,这是由法国军队。当在1870年普鲁士入侵法国,法国军队被称为家庭和,意大利加里波第能够捕捉到罗马的意大利新国家。
抗议,教宗宣布自己是一个“囚徒的梵蒂冈” ,并拒绝离开其院内的余生。几十年来遵循这个先例。世俗权力的丧失,深刻地改变了教皇。几个世纪以来,教皇已经不仅是精神领袖,但罗马和意大利中部的时空省长。因此,他们在不断的政治争吵,并经常罗马教皇的军队转战土地和权力的斗争。教皇干预方自己的家庭被视为党派政治领袖。