...But isn't that exactly why
a nation's bishops must have a heart for the national culture and tradition and
values and respect for the workings of the society itself in which we are
attempting to evangelize?
The American tradition
comes out of a commitment to freedom of speech, freedom of thought and
democratic participation in the political process, which, admittedly, the
Vatican has always suspected; indeed, has never liked. To ask Americans to take
on not simply a European or Eastern European or Asian or African approach to
"obedience" or governance or women, but a medieval one at that, is
asking for what no law can provide. It is easy, of course, to force obedience;
but, never doubt, it is impossible to force belief.
The effects here are
beginning to show, as they did in Pacelli's Europe. The second-largest
religious denomination in the United States, after Catholic, is now
ex-Catholic....
.
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