Papal Idolatry on the Eve of the First Vatican Council (1870)

Source: History of the Church, Vol. VIII (“The Church in the Age of Liberalism”), edited by Fathers Hubert Jedin and John P. Dolan, Crossroads Publishing Company, New York, 1981, pp. 312.

 

 

As all other movements, ultramontanism also was not able to avoid excesses. Thoughtful ultramontanes clearly recognized the weaknesses of Gallicanism. More clearly than their opponents they realized that the development of ecclesiastical institutions had not come to an end with the conclusion of the patristic period. They were of the opinion that Rome’s intervention in the affairs of the national Churches, which would be able to resist the encroachments of the governments only with difficulty, was justified. They desired a clear centralization, convinced that it was indispensable for the solution of religious problems on the only level where this was possible, namely on the supranational one. But they also often lacked moderation and occasionally a sense of the fitting in their methods and ideas. (Reference was already made above to the abusive practice of secret denunciations made with irresponsible frivolousness). After 1860 certain tendencies became clear which Wilfrid Ward and Dom Butler suggested be termed “neo-ultramontanism.” Some people wanted to see the role of the bishops reduced to an intolerable point; some portrayed the most extreme theses of medieval theocracy as divine law; others wished to extend the infallibility of the Pope to all of his pronouncements, even those which concerned religious policy, or they developed forms of papal veneration which amounted to “idolatry of the papacy.” The Pope was referred to as the “Vice-God of Mankind” and as the “Permanent Word Incarnate.” Monsignor Mermillod preached on the “three incarnations of the Son of God” in the womb of the Virgin Mary, in the Eucharist, and in “the old man in the Vatican.” The Civilta cattolica went so far as to write that “when the Pope meditates, it is God who is thinking through him.” All of these exaggerations and flatteries, to which Pius IX did not object, were splashed throughout the Catholic press, to the great disgust of those who were incapable of realizing that these unfortunate formulations were not merely thoughtless expressions emerging from the simple soul of the masses. They certainly did their part in fortifying the last remaining centers of resistance.