WM Review – Pope Pius XII’s ‘sana laicità’ speech is not about French ‘laïcité’ – it’s more about ‘blood and soil’

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Following Leo XIV’s comments about ‘authentic laïcté’, some pointed to this speech in which Pope Pius XII appears to use the same terms. But it’s a very different speech to what you might expect…

Editor’s Notes

In the process of preparing some further material on laïcité and Leo XIV’s recent comments in France, I translated the following discourse of Pope Pius XII, delivered on 23 March 1958 – just a few months before his death.In this discourse, delivered to the men of the Italian Marches living in Rome, Pope Pius XII appears to use a phrase very similar to that of Leo XIV – that of a “legitimate and sound secularity” (legittima sana laicità). The word laicità is, of course, very similar to laïcité – but as we shall see in due course, this is a case of linguistic “false friends” (when words in two languages look or sound the same, but have different meanings or nuances).


Originally published in The WM Review. Read original article