Chapter 10. Ecumenism. In this confusion of ideas, in which some Catholics now seem to be

quite at ease, there is a tendency especially dangerous to the faith, the more so because it

masquerades as charity. The word, which appeared in 1927 during a Congress held at Lausanne, Switzerland,

would have put Catholics on their guard if they had consulted their dictionaries.

Ecumenism, a movement toward reunion of all Christian churches in a single church.

Now it is clear that we cannot combine contradictory

principles. We cannot unite truth and error so as to form one thing, except by adopting the error

and rejecting all or part of the truth. Ecumenism is self-condemnatory. The expression has become so fashionable

since the last council that it has slipped into everyday speech. We speak of universal ecumenism,

of exploratory ecumenism, and whatever else to express a taste or a preference for diversity and eclecticism.

In religious language, ecumenism has recently been extended to non-Christian religions and translated straightway into action.

A newspaper in Western France gives us a perfect example of the way this evolutionary

process works. In a small parish near Cherbourg, the Catholic population showed concern for

the welfare of the Muslim workers who had arrived to work on a building site. For this charitable

action, they can only be praised.

In the next stage, however, the Muslims asked for a place to celebrate the fast of Ramadan,

and the Christians offered them the basement of their church. Then a Quranic school opened.

After a couple of years, the Christians invited the Muslims to celebrate

Christmas with them around a common prayer made up of extracts from the Quran and verses from

the Gospels. Misplaced charity had led these Christians to come to terms with error. In Leal, the Dominicans have offered the Muslims

a chapel to be turned into a mosque. In Versailles, collections have been taken up in the churches

for the purchase of a place of worship for the Muslims. Two other chapels have been handed over,

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