the great question of our time, the social question, whose solution is dependent on faith, reason, revelation, and natural and Christian morality...
Fr. Dehon and “The Social Question” (Part 4 - last in series)
 with Harmel in Rome
After the Catholics' disastrous defeat in the general elections of 1898, radicals and Socialists in France gained power, and the six year “détente” between Church and State was over. Manzoni describes the clergy as having for the most part two reactions: “Some refused to give up their bellicose plans for overthrowing the Republicans, Jews and Masons. Others turned inward, anguished and discouraged… and took refuge in their ministry.” He also notes that “many of them were totally lacking in sensitivity to the social question, not from selfishness but from ingrained habit,” and that Dehon “suffered greatly” from their apathy and misunderstanding."
In 1895, in Dehon's introduction to Part II of the Christian Social Manual, he had written to his fellow priests, “We must go to the people! …those are the words of Leo XIII.” He insisted that they |
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cannot remain
shut up in their churches and rectories….
It is not enough to bring the people words of instruction and
consolation; we must also attend to their temporal interests and help them to
organize institutions that can replace the guilds which are no more…. We must act without wasting time in sterile
discussions.
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He continues
with a critique of a contemporary manual for priests which assumed that the men
of the day were past saving and encouraged a focus on women and children:
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That
fainthearted generation changed Christ for us.
He was no longer the Christ of the workers, the Christ who carried out
His incessant apostolate among fishermen, tax collectors, people of the
world…. The Lion of Judah was
transformed into a timid sheep. Our
Christ… was changed into a fearful and weak human being, who spoke only to
women and children and sick people.
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 Pope Pius X
There were, however, growing numbers of young priests who welcomed Rerum Novarum and wanted to “go to the people” and spread Pope Leo’s message. These “abbés democratés” (democratic priests) were not an organized body, but individually they had influence as journalists, public speakers, editors of periodicals, and in a few cases as members of parliament. Dehon is often mentioned as among their number. But the divisions between right-wing and left-wing Catholics deepened. Etienne Lamy, whom the pope had named (against Dehon’s and Harmel’s advice) to oversee the federation of Republican and Monarchist Catholics, was not a great leader, but Dehon steadfastly supported him nonetheless. Eventually, though, the failure of the factions to unite in the 1898 elections and an ill-advised intervention by the pope led to Lamy’s resignation and the federation collapsed.
Leo XIII’s 1901 encyclical Graves de Communi disavowed Christian Democracy’s role in the political arena, saying it was wrong to give the movement “a political meaning.” This was deeply disappointing to the Christian Democrats and many of the abbés democratés, but Dehon himself was reassured. “This direction was necessary,” he wrote. He felt that many of the democratic priests had been too compromised by politics. “Their generosity and love for the workers were admirable and their social analysis correct, but many of their methods were inappropriate or even wrong.” That same year, the social studies meetings for priests and seminarians at Val-des-Bois, having aroused strong opposition in some quarters, were discontinued. Fr. Dehon was present at the last one, on August 18-25, 1901. Though their closing was a “victory” for their adversaries, these social congresses had sensitized hundreds of young priests to the social question and brought them out of their sacristies and to the people. The year before, in 1900, Dehon published Christian Social Renewal, based on lectures he had given in Rome to audiences of hundreds, including many bishops and cardinals. The first five lectures expand upon The Christian Social Manual. He notes that a group of Catholics "most faithful to the papal directives and the most zealous supporters of Christian social action" were going by the name "Christian Democrats." Asking whether the word is "well-chosen," he proceeds to explain that Christian Democracy "is not pure or absolute democracy. We do not want to exclude all royalty nor even any aristocracy... we are not calling for the suppression of the employers or the proletariat." He notes that Rerum Novarum called "socially... for laws and institutions that are favorable to workers" and "politically... for a progressive rise through the ranks by the people and their increasing participation in public administration." The Christian Democrats are "not unaware" of some model employers like Harmel, but they are "not so naïve as to believe that employers will become excellent without the help of the law and action on the part of the unions." He adds that Christian Democracy does not go as far as pure democracy, which "excludes all class privileges," but that it "condemns the aberrations of capitalism" just as it "rejects the illusions of socialism." With the death of Leo XIII in July of 1903, Fr. Dehon's social apostolate, at least in its public aspects, greatly diminished. Dehon's source of papal social directives "dried up," as Manzoni puts it. Pius X was much more concerned with defending the Church’s religious interests than rapprochement with the Third Republic. He felt that Catholics should not be given more freedom in the secular sphere but instead take their direction solely from the hierarchy. The influence of the intransigents in the Vatican grew. In November 1903, Dehon decided to stop publication of his magazine The Reign of the Sacred Heart in Souls and Societies, which he had begun twelve years earlier. Afterwards, he contributed to other social journals, his longest association being with La Chronique du Sud-Est (the Southeast Chronicle). From 1898 through 1903, it carried a piece by him every month, and occasionally from 1904 to 1908. After 1908, his social apostolate was essentially finished. Why did Fr. Dehon so suddenly move from such intensive to so little engagement with the social question at this point? Manzoni says there is no proof that it was because of “orders from above,” as was alleged by Fr. Luigi Sturzo, an Italian priest active in the Christian Democratic movement in the 20’s. If Dehon had received a directive from the Vatican to “cease and desist,” Manzoni argues, he would not have continued relationships with those in the Catholic social movement, nor presented Marc Sangnier, whose “Sillon” movement revitalized the Christian democracy movement, to the Roman public in 1907, nor have had several political articles published, including his last major work, “Freemasonry in Italy and France” (1908), and never engaged in his 1910 re-working of the Christian Social Manual. Manzoni suggests "more plausible" reasons for Dehon’s cutting back on his social apostolate: |
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On the eve of his 69th birthday in March of 1912, Dehon wrote a long letter to his religious, known under the title “Souvenirs.” Recalling his many social works - his numerous works at St. Quentin, the congresses in which he participated, and his social writings and lectures - he tells them, “I wanted to contribute to the uplifting of the lower classes, with the advent of justice and Christian charity.” He concludes: “in this area, too, the work must continue. The masses are not yet convinced that the Church alone possesses the true and practical answers to all social questions.”
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Fr. Dehon in the last year of his life