Thought for the Day, 28 March 2008

Catherine Pepinster

When Nicolas Sarkozy arrived in Britain on Wednesday he announced that he wanted to see a brotherhood between France and this country. The notion of brotherhood certainly seemed an appropriate one for a president of the French republic which takes as its motto liberty, equality and fraternity. This trio of values came together through the work of the French Enlightenment philosophers who so profoundly influenced the French revolution. Liberty consisted of the free exercise of natural rights. Equality demanded that the law should be the same for all. But fraternity was different, focusing on moral obligations rather than rights, and community rather than individuals. It emphasised that people instead of being autonomous individuals had to come together to achieve progress. It's a commonly held belief that the French philosophers and revolutionaries were antagonistic towards religion: after all, Diderot called Voltaire "the dear anti-Christ". Certainly these French eighteenth century thinkers wanted to see a new era of reason where religious superstition would be rejected and liberty, equality and fraternity would be the new supreme virtues. And yet fraternity has undoubtedly strong roots in European Judeo-Christian thinking. Fraternity, the sense of a brotherhood, a fellowship of people, strongly mirrors the Christian admonition to love one's neighbour as oneself. It is also reflected in a strong strand of Catholic social teaching which highlights the importance of solidarity. Solidarity expresses the desire for a more just social order that enables everyone to enjoy the good life, for God wills that we should need one another and under him form a brotherhood. Not long before he was elected Pope Benedict XVI, the then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger published in Italy a book called Senza Radici - Without roots - in which he warned of the dangers of Europe losing its Christian heritage and values. Nicolas Sarkozy's urge to fraternity not only reminds us of Europe's debt to the Enlightenment but also to Christianity. And just how steeped the continent is in this Christian belief in fraternity is evident in the European Union's choice of anthem, based on Beethoven's ninth symphony and the incorporation into its fourth movement of Schiller's Ode to Joy, with its refrain: "All men shall be brothers". Like Monsieur Sarkozy it reminds us that fraternity rather than the cult of individualism is Europe's abiding sentiment.