First Things RSS Feed - Thomas Pink https://www.firstthings.com/author/thomas-pink en-us Copyright 2025 First Things. All Rights Reserved. ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) Mon, 20 Jan 2025 16:55:39 -0500 https://d2201k5v4hmrsv.cloudfront.net/img/favicon-196.png First Things RSS Feed Image https://www.firstthings.com/rss/author/thomas-pink 60 Conscience and Coercion https://www.firstthings.com/article/2012/08/conscience-and-coercion https://www.firstthings.com/article/2012/08/conscience-and-coercion Wed, 01 Aug 2012 00:00:00 -0400 In the nineteenth century, in encyclicals from Gregory XVI’s Mirari Vos in 1832 to Leo XIII’s Libertas in 1888, the Catholic Church taught that the state should not only recognize Catholic Christianity as the true religion, but should use its coercive power to restrict the public practice of, and proselytization by, false religions—including Protestantism. Yet in its declaration on religious freedom, Dignitatis Humanae, the Second Vatican Council declared that the state should not use coercion to restrict religion—not even on behalf of the true faith. Such coercion would be a violation of people’s right to religious liberty.

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