35. The Papacy and Liberalism

The calm tone of objective debate that characterizes Leo XIII's encyclicals also stems from this attitude of the Pope. He not only condemned modern beliefs, he examined them and sought to refute them objectively. For Catholicism, this changed method of struggle is a great advantage, but for modern culture it is an equally significant disadvantage. The voluntary rejection of all modern cultural achievements and the closure to the trends of the time would have enabled the latter to progress more quickly. If there had been nothing at all of the ideas of the present in the church and only narrow-minded dogmatism, then everything that is called spirit would have had to be expelled from it of its own accord.