In the Catechism of the Catholic Church (paragraphs 56–58), the Church teaches something that many people today find uncomfortable: the division of the human race into different nations is not a pure accident or a pure evil. It is part of God’s providential plan after the Fall.
After sin shattered the original unity of humanity, God did not abandon us. He began to save mankind “part by part.” The covenant with Noah established an order for the nations — “according to their lands, each with its own language, by their families, in their nations” (Genesis 10:5). This plurality of nations is described by the Catechism as a cosmic, social, and religious order.
Its purpose was to limit the pride of fallen humanity. When people are united in their wickedness, they try to rebuild unity by their own power, “after the manner of Babel” (CCC 57). The confusion of languages and the dispersion of peoples was God’s way of restraining that pride. It prevents any single group from imposing a total, forced uniformity on the whole world.
This order is provisional. It lasts “as long as the nations endure” until the Gospel is proclaimed to all peoples. Ultimately, Christ came to gather the scattered children of God into one (John 11:52). Until then, the diversity of nations remains a protection given by God.
This teaching has very practical consequences today. You cannot move to another country and demand that it cease to be itself in order to become a copy of your culture, your religion, or your way of life. That demand is a modern form of the same pride that built the Tower of Babel. It refuses to accept the legitimate differences that God Himself permitted for the good of mankind.
A nation has the right to preserve its language, its laws, its customs, its historical memory, and the religious and moral foundations that shaped it. Expecting the host country to transform itself according to the culture of newcomers is not justice — it is an attempt to erase the very plurality that God established as a safeguard against human arrogance.
When a group wants to dominate all peoples and eliminate or subjugate those who do not think like them, this is precisely the pride of Babel.
We see a clear example of this danger in radical Islamism. It is important to distinguish two things: Islam, the religion practiced by about 1.8–2 billion people, and Islamism, a political ideology that wants Islamic law — Sharia — to be the law of every society and, in its radical form, of the entire world.
To put it clearly:
- Not every Muslim is an Islamist.
- Every Islamist relies on Islam to legitimize his political project.
- The distinction exists, but it is not a complete separation: Islamism feeds on sources and interpretations that are found within the Islamic tradition itself.
Radical Islamism (groups such as Al-Qaeda, Islamic State, Hamas, Boko Haram, and certain branches of the Taliban) openly advocates the global imposition of Islam and considers it legitimate to kill or subjugate those who refuse to convert or to live under Sharia. These groups base themselves on classical Islamic texts: verses of the Quran that order fighting against non-Muslims until they pay the tax (jizya) or submit (for example, Surah 9:29 and 9:5); Hadiths and classical jurisprudence that prescribe the death penalty for apostasy (leaving Islam) and, in many cases, for blasphemy; and the historical doctrine that divides the world into Dar al-Islam (the territory of Islam) and Dar al-Harb (the territory of war).
Surveys by the Pew Research Center (2013, still the most comprehensive available) show that in several Muslim-majority countries — especially in the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia — majorities or large minorities support Sharia as the official law of the country, the death penalty for those who leave Islam, and the severe corporal punishments prescribed by Sharia.
This does not mean that every Muslim wants to kill those who do not believe. The majority of Muslims in the world reject terrorism against civilians. But the classical texts and tradition allow and, in certain contexts, require the use of force to expand or defend Islamic dominance. When this tradition is taken in a political and global form — that is, as Islamism — the result is exactly the attempt to eliminate the plurality of nations and religions by force.
Of course, every immigrant must be treated with human dignity. Charity and justice require this. But charity does not mean that the receiving nation must dissolve its own identity. True integration means the newcomer adapts to the legitimate order of the country that welcomed him, not the other way around.
The Catechism (n. 57) warns precisely against this danger: the plurality of nations exists to limit the pride of a humanity that, “united in its perversity,” tries to rebuild unity by itself. Any project — whether Islamist, communist, extreme nationalist, or any other — that wants to erase the differences of peoples, languages, and beliefs by force falls into the same error of Babel.
The division of nations can itself be corrupted by sin, through polytheism or the idolatry of the nation and its leader. Yet the opposite error is just as dangerous: the attempt to abolish all national differences by force or pressure in the name of a new, man-made unity.
For this reason the Church sees the division of nations not as something definitive, but as a provisional protection until Christ gathers everyone freely into the unity of faith — and not by the sword.
Only Christ can truly unite the nations. Until He does so fully, the divisions remain, and they remain for a reason. We do well to respect them.
Official title of the research:
“The World’s Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society” (published on April 30, 2013). – Full report in PDF format (recommended): assets.pewresearch.org/