Integralism, integrationism or integrism (French: intégrisme) is an interpretation of Catholic social teaching that argues the principle that the Catholic faith should be the basis of public law and public policy within civil society, wherever the preponderance of Catholics within that society makes this possible. Integralism opposes pluralism, seeking the Catholic faith to be dominant in civil and religious matters. Integralists uphold the 1864 definition of Pope Pius IX in Quanta cura that the religious neutrality of the civil power cannot be embraced as an ideal situation and the doctrine of Leo XIII in Immortale Dei on the religious obligations of states. In December 1965, the Second Vatican Council approved and Pope Paul VI promulgated the document Dignitatis humanae – the council's "Declaration on Religious Freedom" – which states that it "leaves untouched traditional Catholic doctrine on the moral duty of men and societies toward the true religion and toward the one Church of Christ". However, they have simultaneously declared "that the human person has a right to religious freedom," a move that some traditionalist Catholics argue is at odds with previous doctrinal pronouncements. The term is sometimes used more loosely and in non-Catholic contexts to refer to a set of theoretical concepts and practical policies that advocate a fully integrated social and political order based on a comprehensive doctrine of human nature. In this generic sense some forms of integralism are focused purely on achieving political and social integration, others national or ethnic unity, while others were more focused on achieving religious and cultural uniformity. Integralism has, thus, also been used to describe non-Catholic religious movements, such as Protestant fundamentalism or Islamism. In the political and social history of the 19th and 20th centuries, the term integralism was often applied to traditionalist conservatism and similar political movements on the right wing of a political spectrum, but it was also adopted by various centrist movements as a tool of political, national and cultural integration. As a distinct intellectual and political movement, integralism emerged during the 19th and early 20th century polemics within the Catholic Church, especially in France. The term was used as an epithet to describe those who opposed the modernists, who had sought to create a synthesis between Christian theology and the liberal philosophy of secular modernity. Proponents of integralism taught that all social and political action ought to be based on the Catholic Faith. They rejected the separation of church and state, arguing that Catholicism should be the proclaimed religion of the state.
Catholic integralism
History
The first polity that formally embraced Christianity was Armenia under Tiridates III. However, the establishment of the civil order upheld by integralists is generally thought of as beginning with the conversion of Roman Emperor Constantine I in 312. While Constantine personally embraced Christianity, it was only in 380 that Theodosius I formally adopted Nicene Christianity as the religion of the empire by the Edict of Thessalonica. What R. W. Southern called the identification of the Church with the whole of organised society was intensified by the legal reforms of Justinian in the 6th century. The climactic stage in the identification began in the Latin West with the papal transference of Translatio imperii to Charlemagne in 800. The Constantinian age began to decline with the Reformation and is generally treated as ending with the French Revolution. In 1950, Pius XII identified the Dominican friar and prophet Savonarola as an early pioneer of integralism in the face of the "neo-pagan" influences of the Renaissance: "Savonarola shows us the strong conscience of the ascetic and an apostle who has a lively sense of things divine and eternal, who takes a stand against rampant paganism, who remains faithful to the evangelical and Pauline ideal of integral Christianity, put into action in public life as well and animating all institutions. This is why he started preaching, prompted by an interior voice and inspired by God."
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