{"id":2152,"asset_id":"2464","title":"The Last Pope Leo Had Some Great Takes on Socialism -\u00a0By Dominic Pino -\u00a0May 9, 2025 6:42 AM","alias":"the-last-pope-leo-had-some-great-takes-on-socialism-by-dominic-pino-may-9-2025-6-42-am","introtext":"<h1>The Last Pope Leo Had Some Great Takes on Socialism -&nbsp;By Dominic Pino -&nbsp;May 9, 2025 <span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">6:42 AM<\/span><br \/><img src=\"images\/pope_leo_xiii.jpg\" alt=\"pope leo xiii\" width=\"222\" height=\"297\" style=\"float: left;\" hspace=\"10\/\" \/><\/h1>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">The new pope is taking the regnal name Leo XIV. The last Pope Leo was in office from 1878 to 1903. Perhaps his most famous written work is Rerum novarum, an 1891 encyclical \u201con capital and labor\u201d that is often described as charting a third way between capitalism and socialism for Catholic teaching. This description is incomplete, if not entirely wrong, as Rerum novarum is very clear that socialism is evil, and markets and private property are essential to human flourishing. And Leo XIII composed some of the strongest denunciations of socialism ever written. It was a major theme of his papacy from beginning to end.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Rerum novarum<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Let\u2019s start, though, with Rerum novarum, since it has been so much more influential than his other works. Writing in 1891, Leo XIII said:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">The socialists, working on the poor man\u2019s envy of the rich, are striving to do away with private property, and contend that individual possessions should become the common property of all, to be administered by the State or by municipal bodies. They hold that by thus transferring property from private individuals to the community, the present mischievous state of things will be set to rights, inasmuch as each citizen will then get his fair share of whatever there is to enjoy. But their contentions are so clearly powerless to end the controversy that were they carried into effect the working man himself would be among the first to suffer. They are, moreover, emphatically unjust, for they would rob the lawful possessor, distort the functions of the State, and create utter confusion in the community.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cSocialists, therefore, by endeavoring to transfer the possessions of individuals to the community at large, strike at the interests of every wage-earner, since they would deprive him of the liberty of disposing of his wages, and thereby of all hope and possibility of increasing his resources and of bettering his condition in life,\u201d the encyclical says. \u201cEvery man has by nature the right to possess property as his own.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cThe socialists, therefore, in setting aside the parent and setting up a State supervision, act against natural justice, and destroy the structure of the home,\u201d Leo XIII wrote. He goes on:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">And in addition to injustice, it is only too evident what an upset and disturbance there would be in all classes, and to how intolerable and hateful a slavery citizens would be subjected. The door would be thrown open to envy, to mutual invective, and to discord; the sources of wealth themselves would run dry, for no one would have any interest in exerting his talents or his industry; and that ideal equality about which they entertain pleasant dreams would be in reality the levelling down of all to a like condition of misery and degradation. Hence, it is clear that the main tenet of socialism, community of goods, must be utterly rejected, since it only injures those whom it would seem meant to benefit, is directly contrary to the natural rights of mankind, and would introduce confusion and disorder into the commonweal. The first and most fundamental principle, therefore, if one would undertake to alleviate the condition of the masses, must be the inviolability of private property.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">No wiggle room there. Private property is God-ordained and fundamental to human life. Leo XIII\u2019s criticism of capitalism is much more nuanced and restrained. He saw a greater role for organized labor than the U.S. has typically had, and the working classes in Europe were genuinely in worse shape in the late 1800s than they are today. Part of the solution, he believed, was not greater government control but rather more private ownership, and he wrote that government policy \u201cshould be to induce as many as possible of the people to become owners.\u201d<\/div>\r\n","fulltext":"\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Quod apostolici muneris<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Now, back to the start. Leo XIII devoted his entire second encyclical, 1878\u2019s Quod apostolici muneris, to the subject of socialism. In the first paragraph, he wrote, \u201cYou understand, venerable brethren, that We speak of that sect of men who, under various and almost barbarous names, are called socialists, communists, or nihilists, and who, spread over all the world, and bound together by the closest ties in a wicked confederacy, no longer seek the shelter of secret meetings, but, openly and boldly marching forth in the light of day, strive to bring to a head what they have long been planning \u2013 the overthrow of all civil society whatsoever.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Of socialists, Leo XIII wrote:<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Surely these are they who, as the sacred Scriptures testify, \u201cDefile the flesh, despise dominion and blaspheme majesty.\u201d They leave nothing untouched or whole which by both human and divine laws has been wisely decreed for the health and beauty of life. They refuse obedience to the higher powers, to whom, according to the admonition of the Apostle, every soul ought to be subject, and who derive the right of governing from God; and they proclaim the absolute equality of all men in rights and duties. They debase the natural union of man and woman, which is held sacred even among barbarous peoples; and its bond, by which the family is chiefly held together, they weaken, or even deliver up to lust. Lured, in fine, by the greed of present goods, which is \u201cthe root of all evils, which some coveting have erred from the faith,\u201d they assail the right of property sanctioned by natural law; and by a scheme of horrible wickedness, while they seem desirous of caring for the needs and satisfying the desires of all men, they strive to seize and hold in common whatever has been acquired either by title of lawful inheritance, or by labor of brain and hands, or by thrift in one\u2019s mode of life. These are the startling theories they utter in their meetings, set forth in their pamphlets, and scatter abroad in a cloud of journals and tracts. Wherefore, the revered majesty and power of kings has won such fierce hatred from their seditious people that disloyal traitors, impatient of all restraint, have more than once within a short period raised their arms in impious attempt against the lives of their own sovereigns.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Tell us what you really think!<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cBut the boldness of these bad men, which day by day more and more threatens civil society with destruction, and strikes the souls of all with anxiety and fear, finds its cause and origin in those poisonous doctrines which, spread abroad in former times among the people, like evil seed bore in due time such fatal fruit,\u201d Leo XIII continued. He saw the church as a source of \u201cdoctrines and precepts whose special object is the safety and peace of society and the uprooting of the evil growth of socialism.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">He accused socialists of \u201cstealing the very Gospel itself\u201d and said they would \u201cstrive almost completely to dissolve\u201d the bonds of family. He concluded, \u201cAnd since they know that the Church of Christ has such power to ward off the plague of socialism as cannot be found in human laws, in the mandates of magistrates, or in the force of armies, let them restore that Church to the condition and liberty in which she may exert her healing force for the benefit of all society.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Diuturnum<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">This encyclical is about the \u201corigin of civil power.\u201d It also mentions socialism, in a paragraph that begins by noting that \u201cthe doctrines on political power invented by late writers have already produced great ills amongst men, and it is to be feared that they will cause the very greatest disasters to posterity.\u201d Leo wrote, \u201cFor an unwillingness to attribute the right of ruling to God, as its Author, is not less than a willingness to blot out the greatest splendor of political power and to destroy its force.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>He continued:<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">We have reached the limit of horrors, to wit, communism, socialism, nihilism, hideous deformities of the civil society of men and almost its ruin. And yet too many attempt to enlarge the scope of these evils, and under the pretext of helping the multitude, already have fanned no small flames of misery.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">He didn\u2019t know how right he would turn out to be. Writing in 1881, he didn\u2019t know anything about the Soviet Union, North Korea, Cuba, China, or any of the other communist horrors of the century to come.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Licet multa<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">This 1881 encyclical is about Catholics in Belgium, but Leo XIII felt it necessary to mention socialism in contrast with Christian society.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Most assuredly we, more than any one, ought heartily to desire that human society should be governed in a Christian manner, and that the divine influence of Christ should penetrate and completely impregnate all orders of the State. From the commencement of our Pontificate we manifested, without delay, that such was our settled opinion; and that by public documents, and especially by the Encyclical Letters we published against the errors of Socialism, and, quite recently, upon the Civil Power.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Auspicato concessum<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Writing about St. Francis of Assisi in 1882, Leo XIII mentioned that focusing on his institutes would develop Christian virtue and defend against socialism. \u201cThan this disposition of mind nothing is more efficacious to extinguish utterly every vice of this kind, whether violence, injuries, desire for revolution, hatred among the different ranks of society, in all which vices the beginnings and the weapons of socialism are found.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Humanum genus<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">This encyclical is against Freemasonry. In passing, it mentions the \u201cmonstrous doctrines of the socialists and communists.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Quod multum<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Leo XIII wrote this encyclical in 1886, addressed to the bishops of Hungary. He wrote that the church is an \u201ceffective means of restraining socialism.\u201d He sees Christianity and socialism as necessarily opposed to one another:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Nevertheless to restrain the danger of socialism there is only one genuinely effective means, in the absence of which the fear of punishment has little weight to discourage offenders. It is that citizens should be thoroughly educated in religion, and restrained by respect for and love of the Church. For the Church as parent and teacher is the holy guardian of religion, moral integrity, and virtue. All who follow the precepts of the Gospel religiously and entirely are, by this very fact, far from the suspicion of socialism. For religion commands us to worship and fear God and to submit to and obey legitimate authority. It forbids anyone to act seditiously and demands for everyone the security of his possessions and rights. It furthermore commands those who have wealth to come graciously to the aid of the poor. Religion aids the needy with all the works of charity and consoles those who suffer loss, enkindling in them the hope of the greatest eternal blessings which will be in proportion to the labor endured and the length of that labor. Therefore those who rule the states will do nothing wiser and more opportune than to recognize that religion influences the people despite all obstacles and recalls them to virtue and uprightness of character through her teachings. To distrust the Church or hold it suspect is, in the first place, unjust, and in the second, profits no one except the enemies of civil discipline and those bent on destruction.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Libertas<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">As the name suggests, this encyclical from 1888 is about the nature of liberty. Leo XIII mentions socialism as an example of a doctrine that perverts true human liberty, because it is based on revolution and envy:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">With ambitious designs on sovereignty, tumult and sedition will be common amongst the people; and when duty and conscience cease to appeal to them, there will be nothing to hold them back but force, which of itself alone is powerless to keep their covetousness in check. Of this we have almost daily evidence in the conflict with socialists and members of other seditious societies, who labor unceasingly to bring about revolution. It is for those, then, who are capable of forming a just estimate of things to decide whether such doctrines promote that true liberty which alone is worthy of man, or rather, pervert and destroy it.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Exeunte iam anno<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Written in 1888, this encyclical is about \u201cthe right ordering of a Christian life.\u201d Leo XIII mentions socialism in a list of evils that result from ignoring Christian religion:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">In this way We daily see the numerous ills which afflict all classes of men. These poisonous doctrines have utterly corrupted both public and private life; rationalism, materialism, atheism, have begotten socialism, communism, nihilism evil principles which it was not only fitting should have sprung from such parentage but were its necessary offspring. In truth, if the Catholic religion is wilfully rejected, whose divine origin is made clear by such unmistakable signs, what reason is there why every form of religion should not be rejected, not upheld, by such criteria of truth? If the soul is one with the body, and if therefore no hope of a happy eternity remains when the body dies, what reason is there for men to undertake toil and suffering here in subjecting the appetites to right reason?<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Solzhenitsyn said that the best explanation for the evils of the Soviet Union might best be summed up with the sentence: \u201cMen have forgotten God.\u201d Leo XIII was foreshadowing that here.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Dall\u2019alto dell\u2019Apostolico seggio<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Another encyclical about Freemasonry, this one focuses on Italy and was written in 1890. Leo XIII devoted an entire section to the dangers of socialism. It begins thus:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Moreover, one of the greatest and most formidable dangers of society at the present day, is the agitation of the Socialists, who threaten to uplift it from its foundations. From this great danger Italy is not free; and although other nations may be more infested than Italy by this spirit of subversion and disorder, it is not therefore less true that even here this spirit is widely spreading and increasing every day in strength. So criminal is its nature, so great the power of its organisation and the audacity of its designs, that there is need of uniting all conservative forces, if we are to arrest its progress and successfully to prevent its triumph.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Compare those words with these, from the mission statement for National Review:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">The century\u2019s most blatant force of satanic utopianism is communism. We consider \u201ccoexistence\u201d with communism neither desirable nor possible, nor honorable; we find ourselves irrevocably at war with communism and shall oppose any substitute for victory.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Buckley was a Catholic, after all.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Permoti nos<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Another encyclical about Belgium, written in 1895, exhorts Belgian Catholics to stand strong against socialism. Leo XIII specifically references Rerum novarum as one of his greatest efforts to warn against the evils of socialism:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Let them rather act in the closest concert in order to oppose all their plans and strength to the wickedness of Socialism, which very clearly will cause evils and great losses. For it is constantly and in every way exerting itself violently against religion and the state; it is striving every day to throw both divine and human laws into confusion and to destroy the good works of evangelical providence. Our voice has been raised often and vehemently against this great calamity, as the commands and warnings which We gave in the Letter Rerum Novarum sufficiently testify. So to this purpose all good men should direct their minds to the exclusion of factional interests. They should uphold the sacred order of God and of their country without doubt, in their legitimate fight on behalf of Christian truth, justice, and charity. For it is from this order that public safety and happiness spring.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Spesse volte<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Leo XIII wrote to address the suppression of Catholic institutions in Italy in 1898. It bemoans the \u201cprogress of socialism and anarchy\u201d and \u201cthe endless evil to which they expose the nation.\u201d He wrote that the Catholic associations and charities that were being suppressed were a \u201cbulwark against the subversive theories of socialism and anarchy\u201d and that they would help the people of Italy by \u201cshielding them from the perils of socialism and anarchy.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Graves de communi re<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Leo XIII opens this encyclical as follows:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">The grave discussions on economical questions which for same time past have disturbed the peace of several countries of the world are growing in frequency and intensity to such a degree that the minds of thoughtful men are filled, and rightly so, with worry and alarm. These discussions take their rise in the bad philosophical and ethical teaching which is now widespread among the people. The changes, also, which the mechanical inventions of the age have introduced, the rapidity of communication between places, and the devices of every kind for diminishing labor and increasing gain, all add bitterness to the strife; and, lastly, matters have been brought to such a pass by the struggle between capital and labor, fomented as it is by professional agitators, that the countries where these disturbances most frequently occur find themselves confronted with ruin and disaster.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">That was written 1901, but in many respects it could just as easily have been written in 2025.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Leo XIII wrote that he viewed it as his duty to \u201cwarn Catholics, in unmistakable language, how great the error was which was lurking in the utterances of socialism, and how great the danger was that threatened not only their temporal possessions, but also their morality and religion.\u201d He said that was why he wrote Quod apolostici muneris almost immediately upon assuming the papacy, and again referenced Rerum novarum as a warning against socialism.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">He then contrasted social democracy with Christian democracy. He saw social democracy as a stepping stone to socialism, because it is based on the same rejection of God and embrace of materialism. He wrote that social democracy,&nbsp;with due consideration to the greater or less intemperance of its utterance, is carried to such an excess by many as to maintain that there is really nothing existing above the natural order of things, and that the acquirement and enjoyment of corporal and external goods constitute man\u2019s happiness. It aims at putting all government in the hands of the masses, reducing all ranks to the same level, abolishing all distinction of class, and finally introducing community of goods. Hence, the right to own private property is to be abrogated, and whatever property a man possesses, or whatever means of livelihood he has, is to be common to all.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cIt is clear, therefore, that there in nothing in common between Social and Christian Democracy,\u201d Leo XIII concluded. \u201cThey differ from each other as much as the sect of socialism differs from the profession of Christianity.\u201d He later contrasted \u201cChristian sentiments\u201d with \u201cthe contamination of socialism which threatens them.\u201d<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Leo XIII again sounds prophetic about the evils of socialism that would be coming. Again, this was written in 1901, 16 years before the Bolshevik Revolution:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">The condition of things at present proclaims, and proclaims vehemently, that there is need for a union of brave minds with all the resources they can command. The harvest of misery is before our eyes, and the dreadful projects of the most disastrous national upheavals are threatening us from the growing power of the socialistic movement. They have insidiously worked their way into the very heart of the community, and in the darkness of their secret gatherings, and in the open light of day, in their writings and their harangues, they are urging the masses onward to sedition; they fling aside religious discipline; they scorn duties; they clamor only for rights; they are working incessantly on the multitudes of the needy which daily grow greater, and which, because of their poverty are easily deluded and led into error. It is equally the concern of the State and of religion, and all good men should deem it a sacred duty to preserve and guard both in the honor which is their due.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Fin dal principio<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">In the penultimate encyclical of his pontificate, Leo XIII wrote about the education of Catholic clergy. He stressed the same message about the dangers of socialism and its opposition to the Christian faith, with emphasis on how priests should be educated to support Christian democracy and stay far away from any socialist causes:<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">We repeat again, and still more warmly, that the clergy go to a Christian people tempted on every side, and with every kind of fallacious promise offered by Socialism to apostatize from the true faith. They must therefore submit all their actions to the authority of those whom the Holy Spirit has constituted Bishops, to rule the Church of God, without which would follow confusion and the most grave disorders to the detriment even of the cause they have at heart to defend and promote. It is for this end that we desire that the candidates for the priesthood, on the conclusion of their education in the seminary, should be suitably instructed in the pontifical documents relating to the social question, and the Christian democracy, abstaining, however, as we have already said, from taking any part whatever in the external movement.<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>Conclusion<\/strong><\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">&nbsp;<\/div>\r\n<div dir=\"auto\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">Leo XIII believed socialism was based on the sin of envy, contrary to God\u2019s justice, bad for the poor, destructive of the family and of communities, and detrimental to the incentives to work, which is part of God\u2019s design for mankind. He said socialists pervert Scripture and reject God\u2019s authority. He used words like \u201cevil,\u201d \u201cwicked,\u201d \u201cplague,\u201d \u201cmonstrous,\u201d and \u201chideous\u201d to describe socialism, words he never used to reference markets or private property. On the contrary, he said private property is a bedrock part of God\u2019s natural order for the world, and it must be protected, not undermined, by the state, and that true Christian teaching is a defense against socialism. If Leo XIV was inspired by Leo XIII\u2019s legacy in choosing his regnal name, it would be great to see a resurgence in Catholic teaching on the evils of socialism.<\/div>","state":1,"catid":"8","created":"2025-05-13 00:01:19","created_by":"873","created_by_alias":"","modified":"2025-05-13 00:07:39","modified_by":"873","checked_out":"873","checked_out_time":"2025-05-13 00:01:19","publish_up":"2025-05-13 00:01:19","publish_down":"0000-00-00 00:00:00","images":"{\"image_intro\":\"\",\"float_intro\":\"\",\"image_intro_alt\":\"\",\"image_intro_caption\":\"\",\"image_fulltext\":\"\",\"float_fulltext\":\"\",\"image_fulltext_alt\":\"\",\"image_fulltext_caption\":\"\"}","urls":"{\"urla\":false,\"urlatext\":\"\",\"targeta\":\"\",\"urlb\":false,\"urlbtext\":\"\",\"targetb\":\"\",\"urlc\":false,\"urlctext\":\"\",\"targetc\":\"\"}","attribs":"{\"article_layout\":\"\",\"show_title\":\"\",\"link_titles\":\"\",\"show_tags\":\"\",\"show_intro\":\"\",\"info_block_position\":\"\",\"info_block_show_title\":\"\",\"show_category\":\"\",\"link_category\":\"\",\"show_parent_category\":\"\",\"link_parent_category\":\"\",\"show_associations\":\"\",\"show_author\":\"\",\"link_author\":\"\",\"show_create_date\":\"\",\"show_modify_date\":\"\",\"show_publish_date\":\"\",\"show_item_navigation\":\"\",\"show_icons\":\"\",\"show_print_icon\":\"\",\"show_email_icon\":\"\",\"show_vote\":\"\",\"show_hits\":\"\",\"show_noauth\":\"\",\"urls_position\":\"\",\"alternative_readmore\":\"\",\"article_page_title\":\"\",\"show_publishing_options\":\"\",\"show_article_options\":\"\",\"show_urls_images_backend\":\"\",\"show_urls_images_frontend\":\"\"}","version":2,"ordering":"0","metakey":"","metadesc":"","access":"1","hits":"0","metadata":"{\"robots\":\"\",\"author\":\"\",\"rights\":\"\",\"xreference\":\"\"}","featured":"1","language":"*","xreference":"","note":""}