JOHN COURTNEY MURRAY, S. J. Initial reflections uncertain key accents in Pope John's Things Old and New latest encyclical to serve as guidelines for a fnl/£1' Ill ''Pacem in Terris" understanding of its 1neaning

An adequate interpretation of the encyclical Pacem Pope should quiet the fears and win the sympathies_~[ in T erris must wait on lengthy study, because the those to whom the phrase "natural law" is uncongenia · reach of the Pope's words, in its breadth and depth, In dealing with the problem of political order, ~~pe is greatly extensive. What follows are some comments John XXIII represents a development of the tradition. on certain salient points of the encyclical, on the quali­ He leaves behind the predominantly ethical concept ty of the Pope's thought and its major accents. of the society-state which was characteristic of Leo 1 It is obvious, in the first instance, that the Pope XIII. He adopts the more juridical conception of t! ~ here offers a shining example of everything that he state that was characteri~tic of Pius XII, and he carries means by his own word, aggiomamenlo. He situates this conception ~o new lengths. For instance, he clearly himself squarely in the year 1963. There is not the accepts the distinction that seems to be missing fro[ll slightest note of nostalgia, nor of lament over the past Leo XIII, namely, the distinction between society_an~ course of history or over the current situation that the state. His general conception of the political idea history has evoked here on earth. The Pope confronts is fundamentally that of St. Thomas, "the free rnan all the facts of political, social, economic and cultural under a limited government." The Pope states, with a change that have been the product of the modern era. new firmness of accent, the three principles that con­ Generously and ungrudgingly, he accepts those ele­ stitute this ideal. The first is that society must a1foThuman rights and duties whose roots which is presented in certain older textbooks on ethics. are in the human person as situated in the contempo­ His "man" is the man of today, that is to say, the human rary world. person upon whose structured nature history too has One of the most striking aspects of the encyclical_is left its mark. This strongly personalist accent of the the generosity, the breadth and the contemporaneity of the Pope's statement with regard to the rights and duties of the human person. An outstanding instance ru. MUHHAY, professor of theology at Woodstock Co!,lege, i~. 1\laryland, was recently named by the Holy See a_ peritus of his full acceptance of modern progress is his affirm~­ 10 ( official theologian ) of the Second Vatican Council. tion of the place of woman in society as conceived

America I April 27, l963 612 ~~ World of tod lllsistcnee on ~Y- Even more important is his strong animated these movements. The basis of the distinc­ In th racial eguaHty. tion is tlle fact that "tllose movements, insofar as tlley . e past, pa I social ord pa pronouncements on political and conform to the dictates of right reason and are inter­ f er 11ave a] b roin three ways een suspended, a. .. it were, preters of tl1e lawful aspirations of the human person, 1hese th great words-truth, ;ustice and charity. contain elements tllat are positive and deserving of a d ree great, d n the d vor s are repeated in this encyclical approval." It is therefore possible to divorce these B emands of h ' Ut a fourth . eac are car efully particularized. movements, in all that is of practical merit in tllem, new at the worcl_ 1s added, with an insistence that is from the erroneous doctrines with which they were '"ord free same hme that it is traditional. I mean the historically aJlied. F com.1 reedom . I am not sure just what "historical movement" tJ1e also the '~ _a basic principle of political order- it is Pope chiefly had in mind. I suspect that it was Conti­ po1 1ticaJ d ' encyclical . . t1 metI 1 0 . The whole burden of the nental socialism, whose primitive inspiration was largely 15 World is 1 k. lat the order for which the postmodern atheist. Perhaps the Pope's distinction has some rele­ f Orce oo mg c·annot b e an order that is imposed by vance to the whole Marxist movement, but here its ,vh· , Or sustained b . 1ch is th Y coercion, or based on fear- application would have carefully to be made. In any to bear on e most coercive force that can be brought case, I should think that the distinction may be given B man Y sharp) a. . . full application in regard of the 18th- and 19th-century takes sicl Y ccenting this theme the Pope clearly movements toward political freedom. So applied, the that WouJecls against movements on ' the march today distinction dissolves the whole problematic of Leo it· on th b orga. m·ze t h e world' and create an order in XIII, whose great conflict was with Continental, sec­ Ptinciplee ah~is of force and not on the basis of the tarian Liberalism. In his time, he was not able to draw , ,v 1ch , as Christia I ve are proud to call American as well a distinction between the animating principle of this be the fo n, t lat the ordering forces in the world must movement, which was tllat of the "outlaw conscience" rces of "f f teedorn d reedom under law." These forces of that recognized no authority higher than itself and no the hurnaan for freedom emerge from the depths of law that was not of its own making, and the free politi- end is LI n persoq, which in the cal institutions of which this man an- 1e. creaf ive fo rce in hu- movement was tl1e protagonist. 11a1rs The sum· . . At his distance from the 19th­ thought . _mation of the Pope's century state of the question, is in the asserts ti sentence which which is now outworn, Pope John fJUal;c- dlat all order, if it is to be u1e as XXIII is able boldly to make this man reasonable and hu- important distinction. The signi­ bujJ; must he "founded on truth ficance of its making wiJI I think accordin t . . , and inte g O Justice, vivified be felt particularly in r;gard of Pllt into gr:ted. by charity, and an urgent problem that continues Elsewh P actice in freedom." to face us, namely, the problem th ere the p k at fr d ope ma es clear of an organic development of the "r eeli om is the method for traditional principles touching ea zaa ,, f man aff . on o order in hu- the relations of Church and State tlie ord ai~s as well as a goal of in such wise that we may come l er itself. into possession of what we still ma;if another respect the Pope lack- a complete and unitary b ests his I e gu·c11 c ear intention to Catholic doctrine capable of pru­ axiom b ed by the traditional dent application in the political likew· Y which L eo XIII was and religious conditions of our ise guided " t hat tL C , vetera novis a1toere" the principle own time. A further welcome contribution to this end ••e ath 1· . . . b , .. tradition ° ic tradition 1s a growing tradition, a is the Pope's unprecedentedly broad affirmation of the things'' beof progress, which requires that the "old "right to worship God publicly and privately" as a st are corn I con antly affirmed at the same time they "right conscience" dictates. by "newpthe~ed and complemented in organic fashion I should say a word about the Pope's thought with mgs." l refer h regard to the constitution of a world community. He between "h~re t? the distinction tllat the Pope draws is clearly in the tradition of Pius XII, whose insistence 1st0 SOciaJ, cu] n cal ~1~vements that have economic, on the need for a juridical organization of the inter­ sophical tural. or politica] ends" and the "false philo­ national community is well known. John XXIII seems destiny · ;eachmg~ regarding the nature, origin and to develop the tllought of Pius XII by his call for "a 0 the universe and of man" which originally public authority, having world-wide power and en- ~mer; ca I April 27, 1963 613

614 America I April 21, 1963