Does intolerance come from fear?

Pope St Pius V. Thursday 30th April 2020.

I discovered it was the feast day of St Pius almost by serendipity. It happened that I pressed the wrong key on my iPad and it came up. I had a short look at his biography and was sorely unimpressed. He was the Pope who among other things excommunicated Queen Elizabeth 1 of England.

Cardinal Henry Newman wrote of him :

"St Pius was stern and severe..yet such energy and vigour as his were necessary for the times. He was a soldier for Christ in a time of insurrection and rebellion, when in a spiritual sense, martial law was proclaimed." There was for me a plethora of moral, human and spiritual themes to unpick and question in Pius's life and Newman's comment.

Out of the wrongly pressed key has come reflection on tolerance. Before addressing it directly I asked myself those major questions.

What would I give my life for?

For what would I be prepared to be a prisoner of conscience?

For what would I kill?

For what or against what would I protest?

For what principles would I be prepared to foresake my family, my friends, my country, my way of life?

They sound dramatic questions and are but ultimately we must most surely have some inalienable principles or do we simply blow with the wind, accept the status quo, refuse to be discomforted, look after just ourselves? 

Persecution and subjugation are rife. One could name myriads of prisoners of conscience, myriads of beliefs and life choices made illegal and myriads of people deprived of various freedoms. I could name many acts and lifestyles which are legal yet with which I fundamentally disagree and even consider morally wrong. Some might consider my beliefs wrong and some of my actions and principles immoral.

How do we live together? In countries we have laws. Here it is illegal to murder yet a sanctioned justified war allows killing. It is illegal to steal yet would any of us condemn a parent who stole to feed their hungry children? We have laws we can protest against if we feel them unjust, immoral so long as we are prepared to take the consequences of our protest. If I lived under a dictatorship, shall we say China, and was an Uighur corralled for the purposes of reeducation would I be justified not only in protest but civil disobedience and more? If a Ukranian could I resist to the point of fighting and killing an invasion by Russian forces? 

There are some actions, beliefs that should not be tolerated and the principles on which that intolerance is based must be firmly proven to be sound. Theodore Roosevelt at a Conference in Paris noted: " To be successful (as a Republic) we must learn to combine intensity of conviction with a broad tolerance of conviction." He went on to contrast conviction with fanaticism, the latter a sign of bigotry and not to be tolerated. 

Here we need to note that times and laws and acceptable beliefs change. Thus Newman and Pius. In Roosevelt's time, women did not have the vote, homosexuality was illegal. Such would not be tolerated in the West today yet are elsewhere. 

Robert Green Ingersoll wrote : 'Tolerance is giving to every other human being every right you claim yourself.' Voltaire took it a step higher: 'Discord is the great ill of mankind, and tolerance is the only remedy.' I sit stunned at what I consider evil wrongful acts of governments, societies, individuals happening today. Yazidis and Zoroastrians come to mind and it is not so long ago that Concentration Camps were liberated in Europe, yet they exist elsewhere still. Slavery of various forms also still continues as does abuse on all levels and of many types. I simply cannot accept or tolerate such. Yet do I cross the road when I see violence or turn away when I hear of injustice? 

I judge myself on these questions. I judge myself most harshly when I see my own prejudices in action yet also when I see my inaction on issues of moral matters. 

Recently I quoted St Catherine of Sienna: 'Proclaim the truth and do not be silent through fear.'

Does intolerance come from fear?

If so cast it out.

#henrynewman #popepius #yazidis #robertgreeningersoll #voltaire #roosevelt #quotes