From Leo XIII to Leo XIV (Open Letter)
By treating borders and constitutions as sacred and untouchable, today’s Lebanese politics forget that these tools exist for one purpose: the well-being of the human person — the one Your Holiness came to listen to in their suffering.
Most Holy Father,
During your visit to Lebanon, a grand national scene will be prepared to show prosperity and joy, where the splendor of religious sites will outshine that of state institutions. But has Your Holiness come to see the life of palaces, or the life of a people worn down by fifty years of conflict, poverty and exodus, with no light on the horizon?
Allow us, Holy Father, to share words that you will not hear in official halls. Lebanon is exhausted. No society can survive endless wars and crises by treating only the symptoms without ever diagnosing the cause. There is, undoubtedly, corruption at the national level, and the expansionist ambitions of our neighbors at the regional level. But there is also a structural problem rooted in the very formation of our state.
Diversity
When Greater Lebanon chose to become, like France, a Jacobin republic, it denied the existence of its ethnic components. Turning away from the Mount Lebanon Constitution of 1864, Greater Lebanon misinterpreted in 1926 the Ottoman term millets (“nations”), translating it as “religious communities.” This removed the cultural dimension and erased the need for a governance model adapted to diversity.
From that moment on, the differences among Lebanon’s populations could only be described in terms of religion and ritual practice. Through a centralist Jacobin ideology, the state erased historical identities.
Confident that it respected belief and freedom of worship, the Lebanese state made no effort to legally recognize its cultural groups — their history, heritage, and allegiances. These groups, wrongly labeled “sectarian communities,” gradually turned toward foreign protectors in a race to control the central state, where both the national treasury and the definition of national identity are concentrated.
Minorities
Yet the Church and the international community recognize the right to diversity. The UN Declaration on the Rights of Minorities affirms the right of national, ethnic, religious and linguistic groups to exist, to preserve their identity, culture, and language. These are collective identities that must be protected — not dissolved in the name of false inclusivity.
The 1864 Constitution, written by Richard von Metternich and known as the “Organic Regulations,” described Lebanon’s groups as “nations.” Its governance model was based on demographic realities, not imported ideologies.
Inspired by this wisdom, Robert de Caix de Saint-Aymour later proposed a federal system adapted to Lebanon’s demography. But once millet had been translated as “religious confession,” the cultural dimension was lost.
The Teaching of Leo XIII
Federalism, which protects diversity, is rooted in the Church’s principle of subsidiarity, developed in Quadragesimo Anno under Pius XI in 1931.
But the first form of subsidiarity had already appeared forty years earlier in Rerum Novarum under Pope Leo XIII, who insisted on the importance of the individual and the family — values that must never be absorbed by the state.
Subsidiarity means governance built from the bottom up. This system protects every entity from abuses by higher authorities. It stands in clear contrast to the model of “enhanced administrative decentralization” promoted by the Taif Constitution, which is managed from the top of the state.
Coexistence
Subsidiarity and federalism do not contradict the values of coexistence. Under John Paul II, the Church warned against misusing the principle: denying subsidiarity in the name of equality or democratization, it said, destroys freedom and initiative.
The Church also notes that national borders often do not match ethnic borders, creating minority groups whose rights must be protected. Minorities, it adds, have the right to preserve their culture, language and religious convictions — and may legitimately seek greater autonomy or even independence.
Most Holy Father,
In a federal model rooted in respect for religious and cultural diversity, the struggle for control of the central government would likely diminish. Subsidiarity would help preserve national unity through flexible structures capable of adapting to regional diversity. It would also reduce the absurd gap between the “legal country” and the “real country.”
State structures must be flexible, built for human beings and centered on human dignity. Laws should serve human flourishing, not submission. No authentic solution can place borders and constitutions at the center of its mission. Their sacralization marginalizes real people — their needs, affinities, and identity.
Lebanese politics too often forgets that nations and constitutions exist for the well-being of the human person — the one Your Holiness came to hear in their pain. Any search for Lebanon’s future must place this truth at its core. The ultimate goal remains the human being, “autonomous, relational, and open to transcendence,” as the Church teaches.