https://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/answer-to-catholic-critics-american-founding/
Locke, in his argument that government is established by a contract among the people, is often seen as breaking from the traditional view that political authority comes from God. That is inaccurate, Reilly argues. In fact, he explains that the Catholic political theorists of the medieval tradition said that political power comes from God through the people. That traditional understanding went into partial eclipse with the Reformation, when Protestant theorists invoked the “divine right” of kings. In fact Sir Robert Filmer, the chief target of Locke’s political treatises, explicitly charged that the belief in self-government and self-determination was a Catholic plot. He wrote in Patriarcha:
“’Mankind is naturally endowed and born with freedom from all subjection, and at liberty to choose what form of government it please…’ This tenet was first hatched in the Schools, and hath been fostered by all succeeding papists for good divinity.
In America on Trial Reilly draws a contrast between the older Catholic tradition and the deformation known as “voluntarism”—the notion that all reality is ultimately governed by will rather than by truth. That notion, Reilly reminds us, is foreign to Catholic thinking. It was also foreign to American thinkers at the time of the Founding.
By Phil Lawler ( bio – articles – email ) | Jul 21, 2020