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En general, interpretaciones de Rerum Novariun acuerdan que fue un momento decisivo en el desarrollo del pensamiento social del catolicismo en vísperas del siglo XX. Este artículo ofrece una evaluación de la influencia de Rerum Novarum como una manera de comparar la historia de las relaciones entre la Iglesia y el Estado en México y Quebec. La hace por un bosquejo histórico de la encíclica, y de relaciones Iglesia-Estado en México y Quebec. Sigue una descripción comparativa de los programas sociales y una interpretación tentativa del impacto de Rerum Novarum en México y Quebec.
Abstract
Interpretations of Rerum Novarum generally agree that it was a defining moment in the development of Catholic social thought on the eve of the twentieth century. This article attempts to evaluate the influence of Rerum Novarum as one approach to a broader comparative history of church-state relations in Mexico and Quebec. It does so by briefly outlining the historical context of the encyclical, and of church-state relations in Mexico and Quebec. This is followed by a comparative description of Catholic social programs, and a preliminary interpretation of the impact of Rerum Novarum in Mexico and Quebec.
Rerum Novarwn offers a useful point of departure for analyzing the comparative history of Mexico and Quebec in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The encyclical, promulgated by Leo XIII in May 1891, signalled a new engagement of the Roman Catholic Church with the economic and political changes that swept through Western Europe and the Americas in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Rerum Novarum, despite the controversies surrounding it, helped to focus attention on the social issues that sprang from the industrial and political changes of the times. For the history of Mexico and Quebec it illustrates the complex interactions between religion and politics in two deeply Catholic cultures.
This article outlines a comparative approach to studying Rerum Novarum. It is an exploratory essay that suggests the value of four lines of inquiry. First, it briefly evaluates characteristics of liberalism and of selected papal encyclicals important as background to understanding the nineteenth-century political process. second, it traces the history of church-state relations in an attempt to explain the political environment that greeted Rerum Novarum in the 189Os. Third, it discusses...