The once Christian culture of the West has forgotten its roots, Archbishop Charles Chaput said Friday, warning that basic principles of human dignity and freedom are now at risk.
The leader of the Philadelphia archdiocese told an April 12 gathering of priests, seminarians, and lay people at the Immaculate Heart of Mary Seminary in Winona, Minn., that it is the sacred responsibility of the Church to be actors in history, steering society back to the path toward God.
“We need to understand that, increasingly, the main moral principles of the Declaration of Independence – things about which the Founders could say, ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident’ -- are not at all self-evident or permanent to many of our intellectual and political leaders,” Chaput said, while he received the 2019 Immaculate Heart of Mary Award at the seminary's annual Bishops and Rector Dinner.
