Religions and the European Union

By Philippe Guillaume

The author explains the bi-millenial religious trends that led to the founding of the European Union, culminating in Pope Pius XII’s christmas speech, 1944. After having saved a hundred thousand jews, the Pope used his speech to lay the foundations for what would one day be the European Union. He also changed an old Vatican rule and created christian democratic parties. It was these parties, with help from the reconciled socialists parties, that provided the forces that would go on to build the European Union: a supranational organisation that has brought seventy years of economic development and peace.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Feb 27, 2020
• ISBN: 9781728399256

Philippe Guillaume

Philippe Guillaume was born in 1934 to a family of Belgian diplomats. He entered the Belgian diplomatic service in 1960, joined the Belgian embassies in Kingston, Santo Domingo, Bonn, Warsaw, Paris, Tehran and returned to Brussels. He remains passionate about world politics.

Book preview

A DEFINITION OF

POWER AND RELIGION

Power

How can we define power, whether for an individual state or the European Union as a whole?

Power consists of three elements that can be found in the European Union:

• politics (legislative, executive, judiciary, and the press)

• the economy

• Religious power

These types of organisations existed individually in each state prior to the founding of the European Union, and it was upon these foundations that the European Union was built.

1. Politics

Montesquieu masterfully described politics in The Spirit of the Laws.

This book, which was published in Geneva in 1748 and criticised by the Jansenists, was closely followed by a Defence of the Spirit of the Laws, which Montesquieu published in 1750. The Vatican indexed the book in 1751. This book would then go on to be used in the drafting of the American Constitution, which adopted its principle of checks and balances, and the French Constitution of 1791, which adopted the idea of a separation of powers. Its fundamental characteristic was liberalism.

Montesquieu drew a distinction between three powers: legislative, the power to create laws and vote them in; executive, the power to manage the country by applying the laws passed by the legislature; and, finally, judiciary, the power to judge a dispute between civil parties or to convict those who break the law.

Since then, over the years, the role of the press has grown to a point where, nowadays, it can be classed as an important power.

Montesquieu, who observed the English parliamentary monarchy and lived in the absolutist French monarchy, also advocated for a limitation of powers: In order for us to avoid the abuse of power, society must be organised so that power can stop power.

In Montesquieu’s time, as in the time of the Roman and Greek empires, Western European society was quickly divided between the rich and the poor, the powerful and the less powerful. Thanks to this arbitrary, but very real, division, Montesquieu reached a diagnosis that reflected the relationships between the bourgeoisie and the rest of the population of the time.

Under the Ancien Régime, it was this bourgeoisie that commanded the peasants and governed the engineering of society. It was they who fashioned the rules society was governed by, but it was also they who were held accountable for maintaining and developing culture in the widest sense of the word.

The wise mind of Montesquieu described the way in which a society should function; the way in which his society should have functioned. But that was not the case, as his society was governed by an absolute ruler, a Parliament that was limited to registering royal decrees on the basis of whether they were compatible with existing legislation. When there was a dispute regarding a right of remonstrance, the defendant was forced into court, to appear before the king and a judicial system. The system formed judgements in the name of the sovereign, the legal system functioning as another branch of the sovereign’s power.

There was no separation of powers and a non-existent parliamentary system.

In France, under the Ancien Régime, the court of justice was a solemn sitting of Parliament by which the king ordered the assembly to record edicts and ordinances that the assembly would then challenge, the members using their right of remonstrance.

It was only in eighteenth-century England, which was followed by the United States and, finally, France, that these three powers began to function more independently. The eighteenth century also saw the rise of colonisation and the establishment of a new order to the European Constitution, established by the Treaties of Westphalia.

In the nineteenth century, a new Europe emerged, where the money brought about by the Industrial Revolution and colonisation would begin to challenge the arrogance of the old order. The twentieth century, in turn, would see this reshuffling of power structures questioned, with the rise of various socialisms during of the first half of the twentieth century: socialism, Communism, and Nazism.

A horizontal division was then added to these very vertical lines that divided society. Three layers can be seen very clearly.

The top layer is universal, present in every country: the fine layer of the upper middle class that includes the decision-makers, those who push forwards into the darkness of the future by rousing their people. A characteristic trait of this layer is their desire to shake up the present, in order to guarantee the future they strive towards. People who make up this layer include politicians, business leaders, religious leaders, scientific researchers, and those who are responsible for teaching (or exaggerating) the country’s cultural past. These people often have a unique outlook on life.

Above this layer is the head of state, who watches the lives of those in their country unfold, while standing at its highest peak.

The middle layer is the one that maintains the country’s daily operations. It’s in the middle and amongst the petite bourgeoisie that the liberal professions can be found (doctors, architects, lawyers, pharmacists, teachers, and professors), as well as entrepreneurs.

If this section of the population is underdeveloped, it will seek to agree with the top layer. This will lead to the latter living in a society that, in time, will look more and more like a dictatorship.

If, on the contrary, this layer grows—and it can sometimes comprise to up to 80 percent of the population—it then becomes greater than the critical mass necessary to exert some level of power. It then feels it is important and necessary for the country to function well. In other words, it has the power to influence the upper class and inject life into a political democracy.

During the second half of the twentieth century, Western Europe succeeded in having a petite and medium bourgeoisie that encompassed up to 85 percent of the population, thus becoming the remarkable engines that drove all-important economic and scientific development.

Finally, there are those who are not lucky enough to have high-quality schooling and who resign themselves to doing what is asked of them by the petite and middle bourgeoisie. In the nineteenth century, they could be found in large numbers, but thanks to education being made compulsory in the twentieth century, as well as mechanisation and the digital revolution, their numbers can be seen falling sharply (an example being a 35 percent decrease in agricultural workers at the beginning of the twentieth century, which had only fallen by 2 percent for the length of the 1960s).

These divisions may mainly appear to fall within the confines of civil society, but on the contrary, it is in the religious sphere that they find their origins.

Let’s go back to Léo Moulin, who claimed to be an atheist: For me, to be an atheist is to have the strength to live without faith. His analysis of the success of the political and constitutional regime of religious orders is particularly relevant. This analysis, however, also sheds light on the problems that have since become recurrent in European democracies:

First observation: if we keep exclusively to a sociological approach, we will be able to observe that mankind’s vision of the political and constitutional regime of the religious orders and of the Church is realistic, concrete and free from illusion, far removed, in any case, from the vision propagated under the philosophy of enlightenment. The toxins discussed above (i.e. malfunctions of democracy) have fewer opportunities to act: when man is not believed to be the measure of all things, in other words, when there is a transcendental idealism that exists outside humanity, humanistic values—freedom, equality and the rest—are less likely to go awry and to become excessive (although history proves that this has not always been the case; far from it).

Second observation: never have orders, let alone the Church, sacralised the power of superiors, or made them absolute—obedience is never unconditional, as it would be for an SS soldier or extremist Communist. A monk who receives an order that he believes to be impossible to execute has the right to produce the reasons for his powerlessness. The same goes for the Jesuits: if blind obedience is requested of them, they have the right to object, and, in any case, obedience is limited by an unwillingness to sin.

On the other hand, neither electoral techniques nor the majority are the bearer of the truth. The Vox Populi, Vox Dei is not clerical. We are far from J-J. Rousseau.

Third observation: never have orders, let alone the Church, adopted a form of government that is conducted through assemblies, a practice which is particularly damaging to democratic regimes. It is not paradoxical to affirm that, in a way, they have experienced a mixed political regime, where, as per the orders, democratic, aristocratic and monarchical elements can all be found in variable but balanced proportions. These words have clearly been interpreted to have a somewhat different meaning to what they meant Traditionally. In my view, the most traditional model in this regard is contained within the Constitutions of the Order of the Friars Preachers: a cathedral of constitutional law.

Fourth observation: The religious orders, as well as the Church, obviously never thought to write a rule or constitutions using the guiding light of the one and only truth. Scripture, past experiences and writings (the Rule of Saint Benedict), reflection and the founder’s personal vision are all produced from texts that are both inspired by tradition, and original. Explained in terms of the history of political doctrines, we refer to Burke, and not Sieyes.

Final observation: in writing from the foregoing, the sociologist does not consider reducing faith to the dimensions of a functional and, therefore, effective means of government. What he wishes to emphasise is that faith, and the values it conveys, are like blood that circulates through veins: it inspires, leads, controls and balances (in theory). It’s a powerful, active, invasive feeling. In terms of secular regimes, the only equivalent would be the (religiously) civic spirit that could have been observed in the cities of Greece or Rome, in Swiss, Flemish or Italian communes, during the French Revolution of October 1917, in the republicanism of the French Third Republic, or the patriotism of the 1914–1918 war.

According to European tradition, the head of state is a monarch who gains power through inheritance. They are considered the supreme leader; the only exception is in Belgium, where the king is the king of the Belgians, and not Belgium itself. Monarchs hold their position for life and provide a long-term overview.

It should be noted that in the ethical debates that have taken place in recent years, new approaches have been accepted more easily in kingdoms than countries that do not have a monarchy. This may be because the monarch’s approval does not imply a dictated choice by a political party.

The papacy follows a regime that is somewhere between a kingdom and republic, with a sovereign—the pope—being elected by an electoral college formed by the cardinals and appointed for life.

The head of state may also be a president; it was only after the American Revolution that the Europeans began to investigate the notion of republic. A constitution serves as the legal basis for this new form of government. Heads of state are the leader of a majority, and like any other politician, they must run in order to be re-elected. Presidents are impartial leaders who dedicate their lives to their country.

France was a pioneer of this system, and since the French Revolution, it has oscillated between republican and royalist regimes, as well as two empires.

Gradually (only after the First World War), the European states started to form republics, the main ones being France, where the republic dates back further in time, followed by Russia, Germany, Ireland, Portugal, and Poland.

Whether they are monarchs or presidents, all heads of state hold a position that touches upon religion. The clearest position is that of the British ruler as the head of the Anglican Church, followed by sovereigns who are crowned, and then by the king of the Belgians, and finally by the presidents: when they attend a religious ceremony, as heads of state, they are placed at the very centre of events.

At its very beginnings, the European Union was formed by three monarchies and three republics.

Legislative power is held by one or two chambers, the members of which are usually elected by the population every four or five years. It’s up to them to vote on the laws. There are some exceptions, the best known of which is the House of Lords in England, which includes hereditary members, Lords Spiritual of the Church of England, and lords who are appointed for life. The Lords of Appeal in Ordinary were taken straight out of the House of Lords.

In most states, legislative duties are, de facto, divided between the parliament and the government. As a matter of fact, governments are generally formed from a parliamentary majority, and very often, parliament only records the government’s proposals. There are few important debates.

Executive power is formed by the government, who are held responsible for their actions by parliament. This government is in charge of the daily management of the country and is appointed by the head of state. However, a posteriori, the Court of Auditors, which is made up of specialised civil servants, is responsible for vetting the state’s expenditure. The report, which is then published, never generates much discussion, even if it contains evidence of unnecessary or bizarre spending.

Judicial power is formed by the collective of presiding judges and prosecutors. There is a hierarchy among judges and courts of justice that allows for an appeal to be made against a decision. It should be noted that few judicial bodies are completely independent; the executive power often applies pressure tactics of various natures that can lead to the decisions of the courts being altered.

The political and economic press has no status with regard to the state’s duties, although it does possess a significant form of power, it being protected by freedom of expression, a fundamental European freedom as expressed in Article 11 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union.

Article 11 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union:

Freedom of expression and information

1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers.

2. The freedom and pluralism of the media shall be respected.

The freedom of speech that the press often invokes is their right to publish an uncensored opinion. However, when journalists use their freedom of speech to attack a minister, the latter often takes action by simply refusing to answer questions or limiting the journalist’s access to additional information. Other ministers use this right to influence journalists, by providing them with better access to information in return for being written about more favourably. Journalists try to maintain their impartiality by attempting to impose their right to information. This right, however, is not legally recognised.

I have had personal experiences that resembled this turn of events whilst living outside Europe, in countries whose cultures contrast greatly with those of the European Union (developing nations, Communist lands, and even capitalist countries), and when I came back to Western Europe, I realised that Western Europe does not allow us to have real freedom of thought.

The way of thinking that falls under the European tradition accepts no other way of thinking. The grammar attributed to this thought pattern is frozen; the vocabulary shaped by centuries of lives lived under the same circumstances. The weave of the story written in the Rule of Saint Benedict forms the foundation of everything, and we can’t even imagine being able to reason otherwise. When we come across a different way of reasoning, our immediate reflex is to translate it into Western reasoning. That being said, there is a positive element to all this: In theory, we are not punishable by imprisonment for expressing these ideas. Political correctness reigns supreme, with no fixed limits. It actively oppresses our freedom of thought. And even so, Europeans believe, with all their hearts, that it is they who have freedom of thought.

2. The Economy

The way in which Europe is organised in economic terms is closely linked to social policy.

The European economy is, to this day, capitalist. To define capitalism, I would like to take inspiration from Max Weber. For him, capitalism is dominated by the freedom of work, which excludes slavery and serfdom. Employer and employee must be able to calculate the respective benefits they receive by participating in any given company.

This results in mobility, migration, and innovation. Capitalism is linked to urbanisation and breaks with agricultural, tribal, and nomadic social frameworks. Capitalism is rational, organised down to the last detail in order to optimise production. It is not a succession of isolated blows; it is a long-term effort. Mistakes and lax management are quickly punished.

Double-entry bookkeeping (invented by Franciscan friar, Luca Pacioli, in the fifteenth century) has been a vital element in the development of capitalism, especially when coupled with a separation that took place between the home and the workplace, which stood in stark contrast to the previously seen agrarian, feudal, and family economy. This new, impersonal approach to work allowed for production to be expanded to the many, rather than being retained for the privileged few. It was then necessary to insert this methodical production into a set of laws.

This can be considered a founding element of the capitalist economy.

However, these theories reflect the economic situation of the time. As a matter of fact, by excluding the feudal practice of agriculture as non-capitalist, Weber proves that he was born well before the European Union’s revolution of the agricultural sector, which converted the European agricultural population to capitalism. Having previously spanned about one-third of the total population, it was reduced to between 1 and 3 percent, while production increased (thanks to Sicco Mansholt’s plan).

European capitalism has developed a singular social policy based on a system of social security that is funded by all its members. Contributions are therefore not a tax that is payable to the state or to another public entity, but instead acts as a contribution to this solidarity. Workers helping each other has become a state-level system of helping each other, based on the solidarity of its members. The main circumstances covered by social security are illness, accidents in the workplace, disability, unemployment, and pensions.

In order to try and reframe European economic thinking using the thought patterns that can be observed in other continents, I think it is useful to quote the opinion of professor and politician Paulin J. Hountondji of the University of Benin, in his article Stubborn Hope: Everyday Life in a Peripheral Country:

To choose the right paths, making important turns by avoiding skidding, articulating, in an intelligent and responsible way, what is old and what is new. Such seems to be the historical challenge assigned to the third world.

The Beninese and African experience requires us to question the state, its legitimacy, the conditions and the limits of this legitimacy, the inseparable issue of the freedom of its citizens; the relationship a society has with time, the instructions on how to use and manage this resource, which we have so little awareness of, where it cannot be stretched forever, where it is a limited, non-renewable resource; belief in the supernatural, the practice of casting spells and protecting oneself from curses, and the multiple consequences these actions have on the social, economic, political and even cultural plains; the widespread nature of corruption, which calls for a reflection on morality and economic policy; scientific and technological development which, far from being reduced to the much-echoed idea of a transfer of knowledge, refers to the more general question of developing inventions, and therefore ways and means of appropriating the collective knowledge present in today’s peripheral societies.

In order to illustrate this point, let’s compare the everyday life of a farming family to that of an industrial worker.

The transition from agricultural family life to that of an employee could not have happened without provoking a fundamental psychological change, both in individuals and in the organisation of both the micro and the macro economies.

The following story illustrates the shift that would have to take place.

Imagine a young man who lives on a farm. His father tells him what to do, and he works the hours he needs to, to get the work done. He doesn’t get paid, but he always has a meal waiting for him on the table, thanks to his mother, who also provides him with clothes to work in. Imagine a girl who lives on a farm with the same constraints as her brother. Both of them lead a life that is most certainly poor and difficult, but harmonious.

A businessman comes along one day to hire the young man. He tells him how many hours he expects him to work.

The boy replies, Why is there a set time to start and end work? What’s the point? I’ll do the work when it needs to be done.

The businessman tells the boy how much he will earn.

The boy replies, Why would I get a salary? What would I use it for?

Well, let’s see, to pay for housing.

Oh? You have to pay for that?

To pay for food and clothes.

But I have always been fed and dressed without ever needing money.

You’ll follow a manager’s instructions.

Why would I need a manager? I do what I’m told without needing to be managed.

On Sunday you can rest.

How would I do that? What if there’s work to be done?

No, work stops on Sundays so that you can see your family, provided you have enough money for the bus fare.

So I have to pay to see my parents?

These young people were therefore transported into a society that differed in every way from the one they had once known, one in which the values held dear were not the omnipresent strength of God and their families. The upheaval was absolute.

It is easy to understand how these young people grouped together and were sensitive to this new religion: socialism. Catholicism paid very little mind to this element of society, because at the time of Christ, life was essentially geared towards agriculture and family life. We would have to wait for Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical, Rerum Novarum, for the church to even begin thinking about these problems.

Leo XIII

The son of a count, Leo XIII, who was brilliantly intelligent, had a fast-progressing career. Working throughout Italy, he started dealing with social problems from an early age, participating in providing low-interest loans. Appointed Apostolic Nuncio to Belgium, he entered into discussions with Count Ferdinand de Meeûs, Governor of the Société Générale de Belgique and a devoted Christian. The powerful, intelligent banker would make him understand the necessity for the church to take an interest in new industries and the working poor. Had he and his family created the Société du Crédit de la Charité themselves?

Pope Pius XI, however, claimed, During the nineteenth century, the Church lost its working class.

According to L’Osservatore Romano, the encyclical Rerum novarum represented the church gaining awareness of a new social reality, and the new, and very serious, problems brought by the world of work, in light of the scriptures and the Christian tradition. The solutions it proposed were not intended to introduce a new political order or to reverse the balance of power between social classes. However, Leo XIII’s words carried great innovative force and were written in a language that had never been used in the church’s annals.

Multinationals and Globalisation

Standing in stark contrast to the state capitalism present in the countries that made up the Soviet bloc, the economy of the European Union is, essentially, capitalist, built upon the four foundational values of private ownership of means of production, entrepreneurial freedom, free trade, and competition.

State intervention, via laws and regulations contained within treaties, makes it a mixed economic regime, with varying degrees of market freedom granted in accordance with the numerous regulations, particularly in terms of the level of competition, but which is also influenced by an important social aspect that affects the way in which work is organised and profits distributed.

An international component has also been added to this framework with the emergence of multinationals, which have formed as a result of the globalisation of the economy and labour forces.

Today, capitalism has become a complex concept, both in terms of the way in which it operates and the way in which it is perceived. The principle of freedom brought by this form of leadership is often criticised, accused of inducing social injustice. Damage caused to the environment, pollution, and climate change are all also closely linked to an abuse of capitalist operations.

This industrial economy flourished in the nineteenth century, when many small industries were created. Later, in the twentieth century, industries went on to regroup, creating multinationals.

Ernest Solvay

Ernest Solvay created a company that would become the biggest chemical company in the world before World War I. It then became the second largest and oldest multinational in the world. The two world wars heavily influenced the pace at which it could conduct business. In 1950, it began expanding again by taking a sidestep into plastics. The oil crisis (1973–1983) was hard and took a toll on the company due to higher oil prices. A period of globalisation would follow, and with the war in Kuwait (1990), the price of oil would rise again. Around the world, streets and squares have been named after Solvay. A meteorite and a mountain in Antarctica also bear his name. Mr Solvay founded a business school in Brussels that would run physics, chemistry, and biology courses with the intention of giving future business leaders a better understanding of their business. He also created the Solvay conferences (which are also known as Solvay councils, Solvay congresses, or Solvay committees), scientific conferences in the areas of physics and chemistry that have been held since 1911. These councils were organised at the beginning of the twentieth century, thanks to sponsorship fees Solvay paid. They still meet today, alternating on a yearly basis between physics and chemistry. The conferences bring together the greatest scientists, allowing for major advances to take place in quantum physics, the introduction of neutrons into the scientific community, and other such breakthroughs.

National economies are gradually being dominated by European, American, Chinese, and Japanese multinationals and should take inspiration from the Anglo-American Atlantic Charter of 14th August 1941.

This document was not signed but was created as a framework for Western economic policy after the war.

Among the achievements that gave great impetus to the impressive development of global economies is the Bretton Woods Agreement (1944). The agreement would go on to reshape the international monetary system by making the US dollar the pillar of the new economic framework for global reconstruction, taking on its new position overnight once the war was over.

Two transport vectors that make this traffic much easier to navigate are the internet, in order to transport ideas and communications, and shipping containers with standardised measurements (a twenty-foot equivalent unit, or TEU), which allows for goods to be transported quickly by ship, barge, train, or lorry.

This economy comprised of great economic powers has come to be dominant in Europe nowadays, as well as in the Americas, in Japan, and, increasingly, in China.

For the European Union, it is safe to say that economic democracy is abysmal and almost fraudulent. The European Union has regulated some aspects and seeks to make them applicable throughout the European Union, but it has not yet succeeded in introducing the notion of economic democracy.

It is astonishing to note how few national leaders seek to establish an economic democracy. A recent case, that of the agreement between the European Union and Canada (2018), is perfect to illustrate this negligence. In a response to a letter I wrote him, Mr Magnette, head of the Regional Government of Wallonia, very clearly explained the position taken by his government (his being the only government to do so), which led to a refusal of this agreement.

Here is the letter I received from him, followed by my response:

Dear Sir,

I received the kind letter you wrote me and wanted to take the time to write to you to thank you, and to explain the position taken by Walloon authorities throughout these negotiations.

First of all, I want to tell you that the many letters I received that expressed the people’s trust in me, and sympathy for me, were a powerful contribution to strengthening my position, and that of the Walloon Government, at this important time. They were a driving force and gave me the strength I needed to go through with this