See Americanism (disambiguation) for other meanings.

Americanism is a term for a heresy, or rather a series of related heresies, that were thought to have been held by many members of the Roman Catholic church in the United States of America around the turn of the 20th century. In essence, the label was mainly applied to American bishops by bishops and popes from other countries.

Dogmatic/Theological aspect

The Americanist heresy is defined as the endorsement instead of mere tolerance of what were thought to be anti-Catholic principles embraced by the United States: freedom of religion, freedom of speech, separation of church and state, etc. These were condemned by the popes of the time. The most notable and concise condemnation was in the Syllabus of Errors of Pope Pius IX.

Social aspect

The Irish potato famine caused a mass exodus of Irish Catholics to the United States, causing Catholicism to become the United States' largest Christian denomination. The discrimination against the Irish led them to seek assimilation into U.S. culture. At the time the Catholic church in the United States was divided along ethnic lines, so that Irish Catholics had Irish bishops, Germans had German bishops, etc.

The Irish Americans formed the majority of Catholics, and therefore had the most bishops, who almost unanimously shared the view that freedom of religion is a good thing, because they felt conditions were better for them in the United States, which was relatively free, than it was in Ireland, where Catholics had been oppressed by the British state. This almost inevitably led to their supporting the separation of Church and State.

This issue was brought forcefully to the attention of European Catholics by the translation of a book about Isaac Thomas Hecker, who was admired by the U.S. bishops, into French. Father Hecker supported the Americanist ideals, but the translation and introductions to his book made it sound much more radical than it had been in English. This caused his book to be condemned by Leo XIII.

See also

Testem benevolentiae