La recezione della formula montalembertiana in Amari e D'Ondes Reggio

Abstract

The paper, whose analysis focuses on a lapse of time up to 1870, year of the death of Montalembert and Amari, highlights the influence that the French Earl had on the liberal Catholic Sicilians Amari and D'Ondes Reggio. Particularly, this influence is more evident in the relationship between the Church and the State, crystallized by Montalembert in the well-known principle “a Free Church in a free State”, and explained in his letters to Cavour, in the speeches given by Malines in 1863 and published even in the liberal journal of Catholic inspiration, Le Correspondant. The written contributions of the liberal Palermitans and the brief, but important, correspondence between D'Ondes Reggio and Montalembert, testify that they shared issues concerning the relationship between the Church and the State and, particularly, the refusal of any State interference on Religion. Furthermore, Molambert and Amari shared the idea that there was no link between absolutism and Catholic principles, that all administrative and social freedoms could be guaranteed and that the Church could interact with modern world.