Thomas E. Woods on the Catholic Church and Western Civilization. Some remarks on his aims, background, and methodology on the occasion of the Italian edition of How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization (Cantagalli:Siena 2007) Paolo L. Bernardini (ABRIDGED ENGLISH VERSION OF MY AFTERWORD TO THOMAS E. WOODS, COME LA CHIESA CATTOLICA HA COSTRUITO LA CIVILTÀ OCCIDENTALE, SIENA, CANTAGALLI, 2007, ITALIAN TRANSLATION BY LAURA ORSI). This book, written by Thomas E. Woods, Jr., represents one of the most recent and interesting aspects of a complex and intriguing subject, that is, the history of the Catholic Church, and of the ideas concerning it, in the United States, with special focus on the new generation of Catholic historians and theologians1. The United States not only were (unofficially) established as a Protestant nation, but also developed thanks to the often bitter dialectic among various Protestant groups. Indeed, some of these groups, such as William Penn’s Quakers (a model of libertarianism), leaned towards toleration, while others, such as the Puritans of Massachussetts, were withdrawn into their rigorous positions. Different doctrines were combined with a peculiar geographical distribution, which often prevented the religious conflicts from degenerating. The necessity of coexistence between several Protestant groups produced the ecumenical sensitivity, non-sectarian and basically theistic, of the American Constitution. Thus, Catholicism could fit into this way paved by the dialectic between the Protestant groups and could be more and more influent and pervading. Actually, the history of Catholicism in America was extremely interesting in the colonial period, above all in Spanish North America, that is, in California, more than in the thirteen colonies which founded the United States. American Catholicism was greatly enriched, as regards not only people but also ideas, only by the eighteenth-century significant immigrations, which became massive in the following century. Indistinct masses came from Italy, Ireland, Poland, and also from a several German regions where the Catholics were the majority, and these masses had the same faith in common, although this faith was not enough to guarantee their pacific coexistence. The age of the great migrations to America was also the age of secularization, characterized by civil as well as national religions. That age was the “lay” nineteenth century, which always had to adopt parareligious forms of ideology in order to support and justify itself by aping the enemy under which it was, as Michael Burleigh has recently pointed out in his Earthly Powers (2005). The nineteenth century had to adopt that sort of theology turned into a “dwarf in machina” (which was nevertheless a deus), that is, in a robot that plays chess and always lets ideologies win the game: this happens above all as regards materialistic ideologies, with which Walter Benjamin deals in the first of his Theses on the Philosophy of History. In that period, million immigrants, who constituted the lower classes, were characterized by a primordial religiousness, that is, a passionate and visceral Catholicism, which was much more deep-rooted than the sense of national belonging. In fact, their nations, that is the states, send most of them away, as their nations offered them nothing but hunger and death, if they stayed in their countries. Conversely, in the less sophisticated sense of faith, and above all regarding Catholic faith, God is universal, His country is heavenly and, hence, is not relevant to any place. The closeness of God is not diminished, whether one prays Him from Corleone or Manhattan, from Pittsburgh or Tagliacozzo. The importance of Catholicism among the 1 I wish to thank Dr. Laura Orsi (Boston University, now at Franklin College Switzerland), who carefully translated Woods’s book, as I could discuss several aspects of this work with her. I also thank Dr. Diego Lucci, who has expounded a number of interesting ideas and criticism about the work at issue. Finally, I thank Thomas E. Woods, Jr., for what he taught me through this book, and for what he let me know and understand by means of several letters and through his other daring writings. As Saint Bonaventure pointed out, it is helpful to learn from younger scholars, although this good thing is not much appreciated in Europe, which represents a gerontocratic civilization by now. 1 Italian migrants in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, not only in Latin America but also in North America, represents an intriguing matter, which still presents a number of aspects worthy of historical analysis. If we now consider North America in the present, in 2006, we ought to notice that the number of the Catholics is extremely significant: they are even more numerous in the United States than in Italy. In addition, we have to observe that the American Catholic Church has its own vitality, maybe fostered by the long distance from Rome; modern mass media constantly aim at dissolving this distance, but it nevertheless exists. In Italy, the perception of such a troubled, tense, ambiguous relationship as that between the Italian State and the Catholic Church, which are in a sort of forced coexistence, corrupts the relation of the Italian people and society to Catholicism. Additionally, as Catholicism is characterized by a sort of monopoly in Italy, due to the cultural history of Italy itself, Italian Catholicism is now facing a number of problems relating to its peculiar condition, such as the estrangement from religion. No wonder that most Italian Catholics are favourable to a more and more significant presence of Mahometans in Italy. Thus, Catholic doctrines and also faith, proded by a strong competitor, will be strengthened. In fact, for the first time in the history of Italy, it is possible to observe the noticeable progress of such a formidable religious competitor as Islam, which is more and more increasing. Such a significant event had never happened before. As it always happens when a monopoly is endangered or treathened, this situation could greatly strengthen the non-nominal adhesions to Catholicism. As for the conditions of Catholicism, the American situation is most different from the Italian one. In America, Catholicism openly competes with its “worse enemy” ever, Protestantism, that is, all the Protestant Churches, which are the majority. However, there are also a number of representatives of several Eastern religions, including Buddhism: in fact, there is also a Buddhist university, and all these religious groups are seriously engaged in proselytism. This situation makes Catholicism very viable in America. Furthermore, the American system of higher education, dominated by private institutions, gives the Catholic universities, more or less “traditionalist”, the opportunity to establish themselves. Thus, there are such important universities as Notre Dame in Indiana, which is among the major research centers in the world, the Catholic University and Georgetown in Washington DC, Fordham and Boston College, which are two Gestuitic universities respectively based in Bronx and Boston, and even promising “new entries”, such as Ave Maria University in Florida, which was established by a patron of Irish extraction, Thomas Monaghan, and is the first founded Catholic university after fifty years in the United States. It is based in the pleasant town of Naples, Florida, a marine paradise whose beauty is completely different from the beauty of Naples, Italy, and is almost complementary to the latter. This university is strongly connected with a “gated community”, in which the families who wish to live there are required to respect the Catholic faith and worship. In addition, there are the so-called Catholic think tanks, that is, theologians and historians of the Church, extremely gifted intellectuals such as George Weigel, who is also the biographer of a great pope, John Paul II. Briefly, this is a very variegated milieu. Besides Woods’s book, it would be advisable to read Weigel’s work entitled The Cube and the Cathedral, which concerns the clash between secularism and the Christian religion and will be soon published in Italy too. In fact, Woods’s book supports Weigel’s one as well as the latter’s theories on the moral superiority of the religious perspective, in comparison with the lay one, in both the present and the future. No wonder, hence, that this innovative work by Thomas Woods, a historian who is a little over thirty and is also the author of a number of books well-known worldwide, comes from America. Woods’s work is a description of the fundamental contribution of the Catholic Church to Western civilization. After reading this writing, one would like to define Europe as “Christianitas”, as it happened in the Middle Ages, when the concept of Europe and the word “Europe” itself were still uncertain (this was a matter for cartographers), and as it happened when this concept was discovered and reformulated by several Romantic writers, especially by Novalis, in their “Catholic phase”. And this phase announced the conversion of various Romantic intellectuals, such as 2 Friedrich Schlegel, to Catholicism. Woods ‘s writing is a captivating narration, which deals with science2, charity works, philosophy, political as well as economic thought, arts, architecture, canon law, international law, in order to highlight what every European has been able to notice forever, although every European has often been taught to think differently, from the age of the French Revolution to the present exalter of secularism. The contribution of the Church was fundamental regarding all those fields. Woods rightly criticizes the abominable and trite historiographical myth of the Middle Ages as a time of darkness. Furthermore, Woods realizes a wonderful historical mosaic, which has the Holy Rood in its center. Woods’s work is not for a specialist audience. Thus, many specialists will easily attack several details of this work. Woods had to organize a large number of materials by dealing with various disciplines, such as arts and economy, which are often inconsistent with each other as regards their methodologies and linguistic styles. However, Woods has been successful. One could blame him for some details. For instance, he has too easily approved Jaki’s thesis on the condition of inferiority of science, or rather, of the inclination towards science, in Islamic civilization and in the Babylonian world, while this thesis contrasts with the Koranic assumption according to which “science/knowledge” and “devotion” have the same value for the believers. Moreover, one could criticize Woods for having disregarded a number of important studies (such as William Shea’s works on Galileo), but the composition is valid. This well-grounded apology of the Catholic Church is admirable in a period in which the Church, on the one hand, is attacked, but on the other is finally given due consideration in the conscience of the international community. This work is admirable especially in comparison with the mass of opposite works that bitterly attack the Church. No other institution, in human history, can provoke such different moral as well as historiographical judgements – maybe because the Catholic Church is the greatest institution in the world; hence, its history is extremely complex, long lasting, and continually developing. In fact, the Catholic Church is not only the greatest, but also the most long-lived institution in the world. If a Venusian came to Earth, and if he were interested in this matter, and if he were in a library where there are only Woods’s book and, for instance, the extremely critical writings on the Catholic Church written by Avro Manhattan, or Karlheinz Deschner’s mighty work, Christianity’s Criminal History, then this Venusian would be faced with two opposite, inconsistent views of the Church. Hence, he could rightly ask whether the above said authors actually deal with the same topic. In addition, according to a long lasting Protestant tradition, which was inaugurated by Luther and is still flourishing in the present, the attack on the Catholic Church is not only considered honourable, but is also regarded as a necessary element of the legitimation of both the Protestant churches and, above all, the Protestant states. In order to understand Woods’s work, and also to understand why it was written by a young American scholar, it is necessary to connect it not only with the peculiar vigour of American Catholicism, but also with the libertarian and anarco-capitalist thought, with which Woods agrees. According to this cultural tradition, which attacks the state and defends individual freedom, the Church is regarded as a sort of free, and liberal, association. Conversely, in Italy, since the nineteenth century, liberalism has improperly been linked to secularism and statalism, and has become a parody of itself. Hence, in Italy it is difficult to view the Church as a source of freedom, 2 I would like to remember my dear master, Salvatore Rotta (1926-2001), who was professor of Modern European History at the University of Genoa and the author of a number of very important works concerning the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Catholic scientists. Unfortunately, italica non leguntur; hence, although Professor Rotta’s works would deserve a large diffusion, they are not widespread yeat. A complete bibliography of Professor Rotta’s writings is in the internet: http://www.eliohs.unifi.it/testi/900/rotta/rotta_bibliografia.html . Anyway, a number of important historians of science, such as Heilbron, whom Woods often refers to, knew and quoted Rotta’s works. It is to be hoped that, in the future, Rotta’s writings concerning the history of science will be translated into English; the series “Studies in Early Modern European Culture” (Peter Lang Publishing Group), edited by Laura Orsi and myself, is interested in supporting this project. 3 that is, as a creator and a defender of freedom. But Woods aims at highlighting this important function of the Church, as he follows the great American libertarian tradition, especially Murray N. Rothbard – who, nevertheless, did not believe in God but deeply trusted individuals and individual freedom, in a way that only a few others did in the twentieth century. In addition, the Catholic Church is an institution that, unlike the states, does not compel anybody to join it. The Catholic Church does not exact any sort of taxation, it does not require anybody to renounce freedom. It does not misappropriate anything; rather, it enriches a number of things. It does not limit anybody; rather, it helps people to grow up. It formulates moral laws, but, at the same time, it proposes God’s court, along with human conscience, as the place of reckoning, disregarding human courts, which are wrong by now. The Church lets us konw what is evil and what is good. It does not enjoy anything but voluntary donations, which allow it to sustain itself. Nevertheless, the Church is flourishing more than several states, or rather, than every state, if we consider its global dimension. The Church, in its millenarian history, saw a number of empires, which were founded, then developed, and finally finished. If we asserted that the Church is a wholly positive institution, we would be in bad faith. In fact, it is an institution inspired by God, by made by men. Nonetheless, there is a negative view of the Church that originated in the vicissitudes of Giordano Bruno and that has mesmerized many generations in Italy, and not only in Italy; this view represents a Protestant myth, which, on the other hand, is not devoid of an element of truth. If we let us be fascinated by this myth, we would misunderstand the significance – which cannot be but positive – of an institution characterized by the delicate, admirable and, in the meanwhile, fragile equilibrium between the individual on the one hand, and God on the other. This equlibrium is endangered by “uncertainty and risk”, as the German philosopher Peter Wust pointed out, and is unfairly forgotten, although it is extremely significant, and although no other institution is characterized, and will ever be characterized, by it. Maybe, in order to give sense to the works of bitter enemies of the Church, such as Deschner, and in order to maintain that they, unlike many people, are in good faith, we should understand why and when the Church has acted according to some alien logic, that is, according to the state’s logic, but not properly to a logic typical of the State of the Church, as one could immediately suppose. In other words, we should understand why and when the Church has neglected the original sense of the Christian doctrine and has rather attempted to imitate the state, that is, an institution that can be properly regarded as an “opus diaboli”, according to Deschner’s famous definition. The Church, which was always extremely important in the history of mankind, will be as much or even more important in the future, when the United States, which are the monstrous fruits of modernity, will dissolve, and the individual will get his lost freedom again. And the peoples will consider the Church as a stronghold of freedom. Paolo Bernardini, Padua, April 2006. 4