[42] He is not the elect of the
people, but the interpreter, vicar and representative of Jesus Christ.
III. The Church today.
Existing Catholicism and its distinctive traits. - Authority, its
prestige and supports. - Rites, the priest, the Pope. - The Catholic
Church and the modern State. - Difficulties in France born out of
their respective constitutions. -
Such is the Catholic Church of to-day, a State constructed after the
type of the old Roman empire, independent and autonomous, monarchical
and centralized, with a domain not of territory but of souls and
therefore international, under an absolute and cosmopolite sovereign
whose subjects are simultaneously subjects of other non-religious
rulers. Hence, for the Catholic Church a situation apart in every
country, more difficult than for Greek, Slavic or Protestant churches;
these difficulties vary in each country according to the character of
the State and with the form which the Catholic Church has received in
them.[43] In France, since the Concordat, these difficulties are of
greater gravity than elsewhere.
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