Anti-Clericalism and Anti-Semitism

One of the features of the new concordat between the Vatican and the Italian state is a regulation concerning religious instruction in the public schools, from kindergarten through the baccalaureate. Until the time of Mussolini, religion was not part of the public-school curriculum in Italy. Il Duce was originally a Socialist (as was his father, who had him baptized after Benito Juárez, the Mexican republican who had Emperor Maximilian executed), but he was also a nationalist in the best Garibaldian tradition. He believed that Italians should belong to the “Italian religion”—i.e., Roman Catholicism and so he decided to introduce religious instruction in the Kingdom of Italy.

The new concordat, signed in 1984, provides for religious instruction to continue, but on a voluntary basis, with parents deciding for children under 14 while those over 14 are to decide for themselves. The extreme Left hoped that a sizable number would choose “the road to freedom,“ and those foreigners who scoff at Italian religiosity were of the same opinion. Was not Italy the cradle of anticlericalism? Only a few years ago a wildly satirical weekly called Don Basilio was devoted entirely to anti-clericalism in a manner that could be compared to the gross Jew-baiting of the German National Socialist weekly Der Stürmer.

EK

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Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn

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One of the features of the new concordat between the Vatican and the Italian state is a regulation concerning religious instruction in the public schools, from kindergarten through the baccalaureate. Until the time of Mussolini, religion was not part of the public-school curriculum in Italy. Il Duce was originally a Socialist (as was his father, who had him baptized after Benito Juárez, the Mexican republican who had Emperor Maximilian executed), but he was also a nationalist in the best Garibaldian tradition. He believed that Italians should belong to the “Italian religion”—i.e., Roman Catholicism and so he decided to introduce religious instruction in the Kingdom of Italy.

The new concordat, signed in 1984, provides for religious instruction to continue, but on a voluntary basis, with parents deciding for children under 14 while those over 14 are to decide for themselves. The extreme Left hoped that a sizable number would choose “the road to freedom,“ and those foreigners who scoff at Italian religiosity were of the same opinion. Was not Italy the cradle of anticlericalism? Only a few years ago a wildly satirical weekly called Don Basilio was devoted entirely to anti-clericalism in a manner that could be compared to the gross Jew-baiting of the German National Socialist weekly Der Stürmer.