Until very recently Christian theology has never been much concerned with social equality. It would be true to say that, on the contrary, a well-developed theology of inequality has been characteristic of Christianity for most of its history. Before I develop this theme it could be well to define what kind of equality I am talking about. I am concerned with social equality of the kind that is demanded by many contemporary civil-rights movements. It may be called ‘equality of consideration’ by which I mean the presumption against treating human beings differently in any respect until grounds for the distinction have been shown which are relevent to the distinction we propose to make. According to such a principle we consider that to judge an individual not on his merits relevant to the case but on the supposed merits of some class to which he belongs is a fundamental injustice. The onus of proof that membership of some class of human beings disqualifies an individual from equality of consideration in some respect always lies with one who wishes to make or to perpetuate the disqualification.

A principle of equality of this kind is not a natural Christian growth. It can be developed without any reference to Christianity but it is likely to be more vigorous if it comes about by the cross-fertilisation of Christian inspiration and humanist ideas. If Christianity has contributed anything to the development of the equality principle in society it is not so much by way of formal Christian ideas as by way of a certain humanitarian impulse at work in a suitable ideological environment.

One often hears it said, and it is even more often accepted, that it is right to despise the masses. The majority of mankind, it is argued, are subject to a basic shortness of vision and a fundamental inertia which make it necessary for someone else—a dictator, a power elite, a superior—to administer their affairs. On this view the passivity of the mass of people has to be offset, if man is to advance, by being manipulated by the competent, talented few. Progress in history and the growth of civilisation are the work of an oligarchy, while the people constitute merely the raw material out of which history is made.

On the other side a number of thinkers have espoused the cause of the polloi. History is the vicissitudes of common folk, and nothing nobler can be contemplated than the numberless multitudes who shape the world’s destiny.

It would seem difficult for a Christian to adopt either of these views for his understanding of the Church. If, on the one hand, the Church is thought to consist primarily in the clerical elite, it is hard to see why Christ took such pains to identify himself with the unspectacular masses. If, on the other hand, the Church’s history is seen as the development of the sensus omnium fidelium, it is not easy to explain the cult of exceptional members who are thought to have advanced the spread of Christianity more significantly than any others, and it is even less easy to explain the emphasis placed on the role of the hierarchy in the preservation of God’s truth.

Every culture has its images of evil and its personifications of wickedness. The English-speaking world possesses a literature and dramatic tradition rich in devils. There are deceivers, troublemakers, outlaws, corrupters, traitors, chiselers, killers, monsters, parasites, criminal masterminds, and endless other variations of human wickedness and malice.

The Anglo-Saxon world’s literature and drama is also rich in foreign devils. Among the foreign devils the Italian villain is the perennial favourite. From the Age of Elizabeth to the present, the Italians have supplied the drama and literature of the English-speaking world with more foreign devils than any other people. Other nations have supplied foreign devils; however, no nation has supplied them as consistently as Italy.

The Italian devils possess that mixture of qualities which enable us to recognize them as both descendants of Lucifer and precursors of The Godfather. Sinning against God and society, they are in conflict with their origins. They display an awesome satanic grandeur in their fiendish attempts to control or to destroy the lives of others.

The Italian devils are an essential part of the English-speaking world’s centuries-old image-making of Italy. The literary and dramatic tradition of the Italian devil has undoubtedly preconditioned the English-speaking world’s relations with Italians, clerics and laymen. The Italian devil of the criminal monk tradition, affirmed from the Age of Elizabeth to the Age of Victoria and the present, continues to cast his sinister shadow over the Vatican.

To indicate the subject of this essay two popular expressions, which everybody uses and professes to understand, have been deliberately chosen. Through this constant use the significance of the words has evaporated, and one is left with little more than a vague indication of goodwill and low-level understanding. Yet a closer study of both terms is rewarding since it leads straight into the mystery of human— and Divine—communication.

For all time the word ‘dialogue’ is linked to the name of Plato, who used this literary form to demonstrate his master’s method of enquiry and develop his own philosophy. For both philosophers the aim is the apprehension of truth. However, this is not handed over to the pupil in a packet to be passively accepted and absorbed. Socrates is conscious that he knows nothing. If he leads his disciples into making contradictory statements, he does not do so in order to overwhelm them at the end with a ready-made solution in the maimer of a deus ex machina. He shares his own thought processes with them, teaching them to examine their preconceived ideas. If the disciple takes this seriously he will learn to think for himself and acquire a sensible approach to philosophical problems. It is fascinating to follow the argument in a dialogue as superficially simple as Euthyphro. Twice the disciple is forced to admit that ‘piety’ is ‘piety’ because it is beloved by the gods, though he has previously agreed to the opposite statement and granted that ‘piety’ had a special excellence which makes it ‘pious’ and consequently beloved by the gods.

In his article ‘Professor Geach and the Future’ (New Blackfriars, Vol. 54, No. 642, Nov. 1973), Patrick McGrath depicts what any non-academically inclined Christian must read as a bleak situation. He says that ‘if God knows everything that will happen, there is no room for free will. If he does not, he cannot be infinite and unchanging’. The upshot of this is that ‘a great deal of hard thinking on the character of the divine attributes is required from theologians, philosophers and scripture scholars’. What are the implications of this, and ought they to be accepted?

Clearly McGrath has his finger on some problems. To say that God is omniscient, and to maintain at the same time that he is changeless, looks on the face of it like a contradiction. It may, at least, appear to be something approaching one. To affirm that God comes to know things and to add that he is changeless seems likewise open to objection. Furthermore, it goes against the grain for thinking people, and, because of special reasons, for Catholics in particular, to deny the need for research, discussion and debate in religion. Unless we are prepared to refuse tolerantly to consider the fruits of experience and scholarship, or unless we are prepared to abandon the notion of an historical, teaching Church, so much seems a sine qua non. McGrath’s article is, however, disturbing. For, assuming (as seems natural) that most Christians are committed to the belief that, on certain occasions at least, human actions can be free and that God is immutable and omniscient, it reflects a regrettable tendency which many must now recognize as perennial. The tendency in question leans towards the view that the average theist or Christian needs to wait on the findings of certain academics for the right to give his complete assent to certain beliefs about God.