THE JESUIT
commended to God's mercy, i,t seems to me that it is your belief that
is put in question, and not our faith.
"In other countries, Catholicism may be bolder, or intellectually
more refined, but it is in Italy that it is most concrete, that it is deepest
in social life.
It
is in Italy that 'Christian' is synonymous with 'man.'
The Church is very much like the family, or the native village, for
us Italians: not an idea, but an attachment that cannot be broken,
because nobody can get away from his memory. You intellectuals
have gotten into the habit of damning your own people for that,
saying that Italy is a wretched country because she didn't have a
religious reformation, or a social revolution.
As
for me, I admire
God's work in Ital¥: how lasting, successful, on the whole, Christian
Catholicism has been in civilizing the Italians, i.e., in taming the
beast in them.
If,
as you say so often, Fascism is bringing Italy to
her ruin, then I am confident that in the hour of trial, between Italy
and ruin, there the Church will stand."
I soon learned to listen to Father Martelli without arguing,
simply to instruct myself in the Catholic mentality and logic, much
as I would read
Civilta Cattolica,
the Italian Jesuit monthly, or
L'Os–
servatore Romano.
Outside Italy, intellectuals are inclined to think
that modern science, modern philosophy, modern civilization give
them the right to be through once and for all with the Catholic
question. In Italy, Catholic ambiguity is an ever-present fact. Neither
sound logic nor stark political power seem quite to the point in com–
bating it. One discovers Catholic casuistry just below the surface
of Croce's neo-Hegelianism, while the space of the afterlife, even
when no longer populated by angels and devils, is still an efficient
cause of everyday conduct, accounting for much that is inert in
Italian life, but also for much that is gentle and humane. As for
politics in Italy, the liberal State failed entirely to establish on any–
thing like clear intellectual and juridical grounds the supposedly clear
principle of the separation of Church and State. Fascism saw the
point. But, even more significant than Fascist appeasement of the
Vatican, was the fact that the atheist Mussolini was no sooner in
power than he found himself flanked by a spiritual adviser in the
person of Father Tacchi-Venturi, S.J., the ''Black Eminence."
Confronted with such a state of affairs, a non-Catholic Italian
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