The Totalitarian State.

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 75, 21 December 1935, Page 30

The Totalitarian State.

"The totalitarian States can indeed point to very striking results. The passionate and self-sacrificing enthusiasm of the young Communists; Fascists or Nazis must move to admiration even those who most deeply deplore the causes which evoke it. They have the zeal and self-surrender of the evangelists and martyrs of a new Gospel.

"Equally impressive are some of the material results which have been won by these States; any engineer or economist who knows the facts will witness to the remarkable industrial and economic achievements of Russia. Germany also lias gained a unity which Bismarck at his strongest failed to create.

"But these results have been obtained at an immense cost, viz., the loss of freedom .and the degradation of personality, and frequently the aims and methods of these Stall's have given rise to grave . conflict with Christianity. Christianity has never been pledged to any one form of government; it has flourished under empires, monarchies, republics and democracies, but when any of these have become totalitarian, conflict between Christianity aud the State is inevitable.

“They arc separated from each other by fundamental principles which compel the Church to resist the all-inclusivo claims of the State, which then, angered by opposition, becomes the bitter and relentless foe of the Church.” —Dr. Garbutt, Bishop of Winchester, in “A Call to Christians.”