It was rather as one had supposed. The massive show of solidarity with the CDU in the last election presented by German Catholicism in all its shapes and forms was the last outing before being trundled into the Church History Museum. Much has happened between the General Election last October and the local North-Rhine Westphalian elections in July. Rumour had it that an anonymous article which appeared in the March number of Wort und Wahrheit was written by none other than Bernard Hanssler. Wort und Wahrheit is a periodical that tends to reflect episcopal opinion; Bernard Hanssler is the priest in charge of the Central Committee of German Catholicism; the article was entitled ‘The end of political Catholicism’.

Dr Günther Schreiber has recently suggested that catholic authorities have recognised that some basic re-thinking of the official political attitudes of German Catholicism was necessary. His analysis of the situation raises considerable doubts about the motives behind this reappraisal. It has been much more a defensive reaction to the inevitable break-up of the Adenauer ideology than a genuine attempt to think out for instance, the implications of the Second Vatican Council; much more a withdrawal from a position that was distasteful to democratic opinion, than a realisation of what the church’s presence in a modern society might mean. The North-Rhine Westphalian elections were heralded by a pastoral letter stressing the neutrality of the church towards the political parties.

Some three years ago I was asked to write an introduction to a new journal of radical catholic opinion. I sent along, to what proved to be Slant, what seemed to me at the time a slightly rash note of welcome, and was much impressed, when the first number appeared, to find that I had been understood as cautious, suspicious, and even vaguely minatory. Such ambivalences will doubtless recur. The Slant position, if we are to believe Catholics and the Left, is now well established. It has already been honoured by an attack in the Spectator, and I suppose it is just another mark of its success that it must now face the rigour of its friends.

The Slant manifesto, which is what Catholics and the Left amounts to, is very uneven: not so much in quality as in level. Its first part, Christians against Capitalism, by Adrian Cunningham and Terry Eagleton,is a vigorous piece of pamphleteering, of a properly manifest kind. I hope I do not wrong it when I say that it seems to me the best short statement that I have read of the general position of the New Left. Its Christian interpretation of community, which is inevitably its starting point, is unforced and organic, and it gains in specificity by being able to talk frankly (as in other traditions is not always possible) about loving relationships as the heart of community. At the same time it is powerful in negative criticism: the chapter on Liberalism is especially astringent and wholly convincing.

The gradual abandonment of the purely theological basis for religious persecution in favour of a secular posture, based on social and political stability, inevitably led to the emergence of the basic modern premise of freedom of religious worship. The outcome of this long and painful interlude in the history of man becomes apparent when we look at certain recent developments in international law. The unfolding of the modern conception of human rights owes much to the philosophy of such men as Locke. The natural law rights of states produced their distinct natural law echo in the fundamental rights of man. Such ideas played a large part in American and French revolutionary thinking. The right to believe and worship as one likes is now based on natural law conceptions derived from a purely fictitious state of nature and reason. We are prone to say with Sir Henry Maine that natural law theories gave us international law. It is a legitimate extension to go on and say that 18th century natural law theories gave us the idea of fundamental human rights. Among these came, ultimately, freedom in the exercise of religion. It is this parentage that accounts for the provision in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution of 1776: ‘Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof’. A like idea translated into law appears in the French Declaration of the Rights of Man of 1789 in providing for freedom from harassment on account of one’s religious opinions.

It is, by now, a truism to state that one of the major problems in the traditional forms of religious life is that they tend to attract and conserve immature personalities. So does marriage, of course. In both cases the state of life entered upon is not viewed objectively in all its stark reality, but as offering an immediate assuagement of the craving to be loved. It is an effort, not to give love, but – without necessarily earning it – to get love and, through it, an assurance of personal value which, for one reason or another, was denied in the earliest formative years.

Whatever names psychologists give to the various compensations and defence mechanisms which the ego develops in reaction to primary experiences, the trouble is always born of fear out of devaluation. Whatever ideal self-image the individual sets up, and for which he seeks recognition and affirmation, the burning question in every relationship is always, at bottom, ‘Do you love me, accept me, value me . . . ?’ When the proffered ‘me’ is not the actual person but a ‘persona’, a construct based on who knows what borrowed notions, the quest is bound to be a disappointment for all concerned.

A mature person is one who is free from the compulsion to play a part, who is content to be himself to the best of his ability and who is, therefore, free to pour himself out in love of others, and of another in particular. Maturity is developed by accepting and exercising responsibility.

The central Christian tradition has always carried the teaching that men are, before God, equal: that the differences due to social rank, class or race are only of accidental importance compared with the fundamental truth that each human being, as made in the image of God, may not, without sin, be deprived of his dignity or proper freedom. Though this is a statement about what is most real in man, a statement about his meaning as a being created by God, it none the less wears a very abstract character. Each generation of Christians must find for it its historical verification, and the pious mind, being prone to dwell in the world of aspiration and ideal, is only too often content, in the name of subjective peace, to refuse to come to grips with concrete circumstances. The result is that the cynic often seems to have justice on his side when he says that it is a nice bit of rationalisation that is never allowed to influence the structure of society, or our social motivation. Excessive stress on the ‘before God’ leads either to the view that what happens in history is irrelevant to salvation, which is a heresy, or to the attitude that after all it is a personal matter between the individual and God. This implies a very naive view of the influence of environment and society on the individual.

A few years ago, it would have sounded unthinkably liberal to say that a priest should not let a week go by without spending an evening socially with laymen. To many maybe it still does. But the point is obvious enough; there is no better way for a priest to cut through platitudes and pat answers and learn to address himself directly to realities than through candid and honest conversation with lay friends, on a level of social parity and about matters of common human interest, and not merely those of a professional, ecclesiastical nature. Such exchanges would benefit particularly the young priest and help him overcome the brash and insensitive enthusiasm which is so often the product of much education and little experience. This would appear to be what Vatican II’s Decree on the Ministry and Life of Priests means in its statement that ‘the Word of God ought not to be explained in a general and abstract way, but rather by applying the lasting truth of the Gospel to the particular circumstances of life.’ In its first chapter this decree states that, although priests are taken from among men and ordained for men, they are nevertheless to ‘live on earth with other men as brothers,’ and in a manner which is marked by such human virtues as affability and sincerity. ‘They are not to be separated from the people of God or from any other person.’ The reason for this is quite clear: ‘They cannot be of service to men if they remain strangers to the life and conditions of men.’