
The Church and Federalist Thought
Hello everyone,
The APROFED association is getting back to you this week regarding a stakeholder who has spoken very little publicly about the crisis currently facing New Caledonia, namely the Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church.
The association also questioned the Church’s position on the solutions proposed by our representatives, particularly that of federalism, which we advocate.
Although in his encyclical “Sapientiae Christianae” of 1890, Pope Leo XIII declared that it was not up to the Church to decide between the different forms and institutions of civil (earthly) governments (cf. Res Publica Christiana — Wikipedia ) and that the Catholic institution functions as a unitary State, like France, centralized around the Pope and the Curia (episcopal government) based in Rome, it is nonetheless true that many personalities attached to or belonging to the Church have throughout its history defended the notion of federalism both for the governments of men and the spiritual one of the Church.
In 1712, the Abbé de St-Pierre, of French origin, and his “Project of Perpetual Peace” aimed to establish a lasting and stable peace between nations, beyond simple truces or temporary treaties, around a main idea aimed at establishing a sort of confederation by creating a European society of States equipped with:
– a supranational tribunal to settle disputes between nations, without resorting to war,
– a permanent Congress bringing together the States,
– common laws and collective sanctions against war-mongering states.
His project anticipated certain modern ideas such as the League of Nations and the United Nations. It was notably taken up by Enlightenment thinkers, both French like Rousseau and German like Kant.
In 1776, Abbé Mably, also of French origin, in his work On Legislation or the Principle of Laws, considered the federal Republic to be “the highest degree of perfection to which politics can be raised” . The American Washington and his friends will remember this recommendation (see Historical References of Federalism – Le Taurillon ).
In the 20th century, Jacques Maritain, a Catholic philosopher, advocated a certain Christian federalism . He inspired post-1945 European thought. Denis de Rougemont, a Protestant thinker who was influential in Catholic circles, defended European federalism . He collaborated on the idea of a Christian federal Europe. He was one of the first leaders of the international association UEF (Union of European Federalists), founded in 1946, with which the APROFED association regularly exchanges views.
In 1965, Father Apollinaire Anova Ataba, a Kanak priest of the Catholic Church from the Moméa tribe, a descendant of refugees from the 1878 repression, whom some call the “first Kanak intellectual,” hoped in his second-year undergraduate thesis in social sciences at the Catholic Institute of Paris that the day would come when Oceania would see a federation of self-governing states (see Chappell David, The Kanak Awakening, The Rise of Nationalism in New Caledonia, UNC-Madrépores, 2013, p. 81), as proposed by the association in its solution no. 2. He sadly died of leukemia upon his return to Nouméa in 1966 at the age of 36 (Gasser and Mokaddem, 2005).
Closer to us, in 2009, Pope Benedict XVI in his encyclical Caritas in Veritate spoke of a subsidiary “world political authority,” emphasizing that powers must be exercised at the most appropriate level, neither too centralized nor too fragmented.
In 2011, Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson joined this vision in a note from the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace (see Note from the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, October 24, 2011 ) advocating global governance or even a world government (see World Government — Wikipedia ) operating on the principles of federalism as defended by the World Federalist Movement since 1947 (see World Federalist Movement — Wikipedia & A world federation to meet the challenges of the 21st century – Union of European Federalists, UEF-France) and the APROFED association (see UN: an institution to be reformed on the federal model – APROFED ) promoting a new world order around federated supranations dialoguing within a UN reformed accordingly and thus definitively turning the page on colonialism (see Integral Federalism — Wikipedia ).
During the French Revolution , the Church, having lost a large number of clergymen who supported the monarchy, decided de facto to rally to the revolutionary cause. Thus, Abbé Grégoire firmly opposed federalism, defending national unity and the establishment of a single and indivisible Republic. Federalism, during the Revolution, was associated with counter-revolutionary movements or regional uprisings (such as in Lyon, Marseille or Bordeaux in 1793) which challenged the central authority of the Parisian revolutionary government , notably during the National Convention . Abbé Grégoire supported a strong central authority to guarantee the equality of citizens throughout the territory and therefore firmly opposed the federalist insurrections that threatened Paris and the Convention in 1793. He saw federalism as a danger to the Revolution : a risk of dividing the country, of a return to the Ancien Régime, and a weakening of the Republic, going so far as to declare “federalism and civil war are the same thing.” For Grégoire, federalism is synonymous with disunity.
Thus the Church is not opposed to federalism per se, but to certain ideological or separatist uses of federalism, notably when it is used to weaken national or ecclesial unity (for example, certain independence movements which fragment solidarity).
We can thus understand why the Church does not want to get involved in human affairs and instead focuses on those of the mind, given the complexity of certain situations.
However, it seems that his silence in New Caledonia was poorly perceived by the Melanesian world, unlike his Protestant counterpart, which took a position for independence in 1979 (see The Protestant Church of Kanaky, New Caledonia, reaffirms its position for the “Yes” to independence ). This difference was notable during the 2024 uprising, where only Catholic churches were targeted and burned.
Some Kanaks remember, at the beginning of colonization, that in 1843, Marist missionaries disembarked from a French warship at Balade in the northeast of Grande Terre and exchanged gifts for land with the chiefs in order to be able to build a mission. Louis-Napoléon […] once elected president in 1848, his navy supported the Catholic missionaries, ensuring him footholds (cf. CHAPPELL David, The Kanak Awakening, The Rise of Nationalism in New Caledonia , UNC-Madrépores, 2013, p.45) In 1966, others believe that Christianity had turned many young Kanaks away […] from their traditions without, however, assimilating them to the West. (cf. CHAPPELL David, The Kanak Awakening, The Rise of Nationalism in New Caledonia, UNC-Madrépores, 2013, p. 82). In 1969, radical slogans appeared painted on the walls of public buildings, including: “The whites came with the Bible to civilize us. We had the land. Now they have the land and we still have the Bible” (cf. CHAPPELL David,The Kanak Awakening, The Rise of Nationalism in New Caledonia, UNC-Madrépores, 2013, p.106). In 1973, for the Red Scarves, French colonialism sought to spiritually assassinate the Kanak people through conversion to Christianity (cf. CHAPPELL David, The Kanak Awakening, The Rise of Nationalism in New Caledonia, UNC-Madrépores, 2013, p.147).
We wish you a good read and remind you that federalism is the only solution to reconcile unity in diversity.
The APROFED association