Leo XIII: “Without Faith, Liberty Degenerates into License”

by Anthony Esolen

The good and wise Pope Leo XIII never condemned an error

without commending a truth.

In this series on Catholic Social Teaching, then, I believe I should follow the Holy Father’s example.
It’s easy to inveigh against what Leo condemns; more rewarding, though, to reveal the beauty of what he commends.
In this essay, then, prescinding from his affirmation, in Aeterni patris (1879), of the principle that grace perfects our nature, his defense of Christian marriage inArcanum divinae (1880), and his condemnation of a radically secular state in Humanum genus(1884), I’d like to take a few small steps toward recovering what it means even to have a society, let alone a Catholic one.
To this end, behold the famous painting by Jean-Francois Millet, The Angelus.
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