Is Catholicism Good?

"By the questions alone, simply by the miracle of their appearance, one can see that one is dealing with a mind not human and transient but eternal and absolute." - Ivan Fyodorovich Karamazov

Dostoevsky’s Critique of Catholicism

The Grand Inquisitor, which is a story within a story in Dostoevsky’s novel The Brothers Karamazov, is prefaced by a meeting between two brothers.¹ One is Ivan, an erudite atheist. The other is Alexei (affectionately Alyosha) Karamazov, who is a novice monk at a Russian Orthodox monastery. While Ivan is cunning and intelligent, Alyosha, who is the youngest of the titular three Brothers Karamazov, is wise and thoughtful. I suspect most people would love Alyosha but relate most to Ivan, who is tortured 1. by the possibility that God exists and 2. the possibility that God does not exist.

While talking with Alyosha, Ivan presents a fascinating story (he calls it a poem), the Grand Inquisitor.

I recommend reading it for yourself, but the gist is this: Christ returns to earth in 16th-century Seville, Spain, during the Spanish Inquisition. While the people adore Him, the Cardinal Grand Inquisitor has Him arrested and confined in a prison. The Grand Inquisitor then interrogates and condemns Jesus.

The Excesses of the Clergy

In the background of this story is one of the worst chapters of Catholic Church history, the so-called Spanish Inquisition. While technically ordered by Spanish monarchs, Spanish Church officials carried out this (particular) Inquisition, and executed thousands.²

Back to the story, where the Grand Inquisitor explains to the imprisoned Jesus that the Church does not need Him, and that in fact the Church has only just managed to fix the damage Christ has caused on Earth. Specifically, the Inquisitor says, “Was it not you who so often said then: ‘I want to make you free?’ But now you have seen these ‘free’ men.”

In other words, giving human beings free will was a mistake.

To illustrate his point, the Inquisitor raises the three temptations Jesus experienced in the desert at the hands of the devil before starting his public ministry. According to the Inquisitor, “[I]n these three questions…three images are revealed that will take in all the insoluble contradictions of human nature over all the earth.”

The Meaning of Jesus’s Temptations

These three temptations, which the Grand Inquisitor believes capture the contradictions inherent to the human experience, are as follows³:

• Turning stone into bread

• Throwing His body from the highest point of the Temple to see if angels catch Him

• Worship Satan in exchange for earthly political power

These temptations are important because they mirror the temptations that Satan offers men—relying on material comfort instead of the Word of God, testing God/asking God to prove himself, and storing up our treasure on Earth instead of Heaven.⁴

As we know, Jesus rejected Satan’s temptations. But the Inquisitor thinks men are too weak to do the same.

According to the Inquisitor, “Instead of taking over man’s freedom, you increased it and forever burdened the kingdom of the human soul with its torments…[t]hus you yourself laid the foundation for the destruction of your own kingdom, and do not blame anyone else for it.”

In other words, Jesus asks too much of humanity. He cannot expect fallen human beings to resist temptation because we are too weak.

The Inquisitor explains: “Do you know that centuries will pass and mankind will proclaim with the mouth of its wisdom and science that there is no crime, and therefore no sin, but only hungry men?” (Haven’t we heard politicians express this exact sentiment?!)

The Inquisitor continues: “No science will give them bread as long as they remain free, but in the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us: ‘Better that you enslave us, but feed us.’ They will finally understand that freedom and earthly bread in plenty are inconceivable together, for never, never will they be able to share among themselves.”

To wit, Jesus has doomed humanity via the “gift” of free will, and the Catholic Church is stepping in to preserve order. The leaders of the Catholic Church are, in this view, absorbing the burden of freedom by consolidating authority and presiding over weak-hearted men. After all, the Inquisitor argues, “he alone can take over the freedom of men who takes over their conscience…give man bread and he will bow down to you, for there is nothing more indisputable than bread.”

The Inquisitor goes on to explain that the Catholic Church is based on “miracle, mystery, and authority.” The Grand Inquisitor is saying that the Catholic Church is founded upon Satan’s values—offering material comfort and worshipping earthly power. As the Inquisitor proclaims, “Listen, then: we are not with you, but with him, that is our secret!…[W]e took from him what you so indignantly rejected” (i.e. political power).

The Inquisitor proceeds in this vein before announcing that he will burn Jesus at the stake the following day.

Jesus does not argue with the Inquisitor. Instead, long after the Inquisitor finishes his diatribe, Jesus leans over and kisses him on the lips. The Inquisitor, unnerved, releases Jesus into the night, but not before telling him to never return.

As Ivan concludes his story, Alyosha picks up on the twist—that the Inquisitor, as a leader of the Catholic Church, does not believe in God.

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Dostoevsky’s Insight—and Its Limitations

Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor makes an extraordinary claim—that the Catholic Church is operating according to the principles of Satan instead of Jesus.

While this story does not capture the fullness of Dostoevsky’s somewhat more nuanced view of Catholicism, it’s clear he has some serious problems with the Church.⁵ His view of Protestantism was also dim, as he saw it as a mere reaction to Catholicism rather than an independent theology, and believed it would ultimately lead to nihilism.⁶

Yikes! For what it’s worth, I obviously don’t agree with Dostoevsky’s opinions about Roman Catholicism (or Protestantism), which were influenced by his conviction of the absolute moral superiority of the Russian nation/culture/people.⁷ As others have noted, Dostoevsky was in some respects a “lamentably poor prophet”⁸ who failed to predict, among other events, the Bolshevik revolution. (In fact, The Grand Inquisitor is arguably a more relevant critique of Marxist-Leninist thought than of Catholicism, but that’s a post for another day).

Nevertheless, this story is useful, at least to an extent, for Catholics. Dostoevsky frames humanity’s worst impulses and demonstrates how a misguided sense of holiness leads us to embrace greed and violence instead of Jesus. In a way, Dostoevsky anticipated the rise of the prosperity gospel, Christian nationalism, and similar movements, and he anticipated why these movements would grow—because people usually value security over sincerity.

Dostoevsky also highlighted an issue that, while not unique to Catholicism, is at least a serious issue for most Catholics—the tendency to superstition. As Catholics, how many of us have wondered if we need to say a daily rosary to “earn” Heaven? Why are Catholic forums full of questions about whether we should wear a brown scapular at all times, even in the shower?⁹ And I’m sure most of us Catholics have wondered what would happen if we somehow died on the way to confessing a mortal sin. In other words, Catholics are prone to superstition, and Dostoevsky understood that. This doesn’t mean Dostoevsky’s wholesale condemnation of Catholicism is valid, but it does mean that Catholics should examine our motives. When we pray a rosary or put on a scapular, are we trying to glorify God, or are we trying to protect ourselves?

On a more optimistic note, Dostoevsky also accomplishes something momentous for all Christians with this story. Through The Grand Inquisitor, he illustrates how an all-loving, all-knowing God could allow suffering.

Dostoevsky answers the Problem of Evil with a meek and merciful kiss from Jesus. In other words, Dostoevsky somehow illustrates the mystery of Divine Love. Dostoevsky isn’t exactly saying that the ways of God are a mystery, or at least, he isn’t only saying that. He’s telling us that we can’t unravel the mystery of God through debate or philosophy, but only through love.

With all that being said, to answer the question I posed in the title of this post, is Catholicism good?

I believe that it is. While governed by imperfect men (the Spanish Inquisition being a prime example of such imperfection), the Church is the institution founded by Jesus Christ, and it has endured against all earthly odds for more than two thousand years. The Church represents the fullness of Christian truth, including the crucial doctrine of the Real Presence, the concept of Apostolic Succession, and the indispensable three-pronged approach to understanding Jesus: sacred Scripture, sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium. And while Dostoevsky understood human nature, and therefore Catholicism, in an incisive way, he is ultimately wrong about the nature of Catholicism. I believe that history has confirmed this many times.

I hope this is a useful introduction to Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor. Next time, I want to discuss the idea of political power within Christianity, the meaning of the Vatican, and why Catholics should care about these issues.

1. I read this version. Not an ad, just my preference.

2. The Editors of The Encyclopaedia Brittanica, The Spanish Inquisition. The Encyclopedia Brittanica, https://www.britannica.com/summary/Spanish-Inquisition-Key-Facts#:~:text=The%20Spanish%20Inquisition%20was%20a,the%20newly%20unified%20Spanish%20kingdom.

3. Matthew 4:1—11, https://bible.usccb.org/bible/matthew/4.

4. Matthew 6:19—21, https://bible.usccb.org/bible/matthew/6#:~:text=19*%20%E2%80%9CDo%20not%20store%20up,also%20will%20your%20heart%20be.

5. Dostoevsky seemed to particularly abhor Jesuits—Alyosha essentially describes them as the worst of the worst Catholic extremists in response to this story. This will be hilarious for contemporary Catholics, given why the Jesuits are usually controversial today.

6. Richard John Neuhaus, Dostoevsky and the Fiery Word, First Things, March 2003, https://www.firstthings.com/article/2003/03/dostoevsky-and-the-fiery-word.

7. One wonders what Dostoevsky would have thought of Fatima!

8. Id.

9. For non-Catholics: Catholics believe wearing a brown scapular can confer graces at the time of death, and the worry here is that if you die in the shower while you aren’t wearing a scapular, you might not receive its attendant graces.