Christopher Ferrara

Christopher A. Ferrara is an author, attorney, and president of the American Catholic Lawyers Association,[1] as well as a writer at the orthodox Catholic newspaper The Remnant.

## Liberty, the God That Failed[edit]

One of Ferrara's more well known books, Ferrara argues that Liberty is not a political ideal but a rival faith, incompatible with Catholicism.[2] Ferrara argues that the Founders were "of ruined intellect and corrupt heart",[3] who forced Liberty upon a people who did not want it.[4]

According to Ferrara, "the claim that the Framers created a 'limited government' of 'checks and balances' borders on the ridiculous".[5]

Conversely, a reviewer notes that Ferrara overlooks the fact that the mores in place at the time of the founding were consistently encouraged by the Founders. Many of these mores came from once-Catholic Europe, from countries where the bedrock Catholicism has been abandoned, something Ferrara admits.[6]

Ferrara explained:

> This is one of the more controversial points in the book, monarchy has never left us. You have to be in a coma not to realize that the modern imperial presidency is a remnant of the monarchy, just as the anti-federalists said from the start. This monarch, the monarchical presidency, isn’t hemmed in by any traditional customs or limitations, and certainly not by anything as lofty as divine and natural law. That’s the foundation of my critique. The problem with liberty, its failure, the rampant nation-state that engulfs us today is not one of structure. It isn’t a question of this or that political remedy, nullification, secession, getting back to the Constitution. It’s fundamentally a moral and spiritual problem. It isn’t one of form; it’s one of substance. The Western world essentially has turned its back on God and his law. When that happens, no form of government is going to save us. That’s the essence of the critique.[7]

## Works[edit]

* The Secret Still Hidden, 2000
* The Great Façade: Vatican II and the Regime of Novelty in the Catholic Church, 2002
* The New Rosary, 2005
* EWTN: A Network Gone Wrong, 2008
* The Church and the Libertarian: A Defense of the Catholic Church's Teaching on Man, Economy, and State, 2010
* Liberty, the God That Failed: Policing the Sacred and Constructing the Myths of the Secular State, from Locke to Obama', 2012

## References[edit]

1. ↑ Pro-Life Girls Shackled, Strip Searched Now Settle Lawsuit
2. ↑ A Declaration of Catholic Independence
3. ↑ Liberty, the God That Failed
4. ↑ Liberty, the God That Failed
5. ↑ Liberty, the God That Failed: Policing the Sacred and Constructing the Myths of the Secular State, from Locke to Obama, p. 180
6. ↑ Review of Christopher Ferrara’s "Liberty: The God That Failed"
7. ↑ Liberty, the God That Failed - Part 1, Interview with Christopher Ferrara