A decade ago the present speaker of the Italian parliament, Gianfranco Fini, declared that Benito Mussolini was "the greatest statesman of the 20th century". Since then, Fini has recanted, but his senior partner in the present regime, Berlusconi, makes even more extravagant claims for himself: "I am by far the best prime minister Italy has had in its 150-year history!" Astonishingly, his poll ratings, at the time of writing, still hover around 50 per cent. Contempt still seems balanced by a sneaking admiration for his sexual braggadocio. To be fair, such admiration is not unique to Italy: witness Disraeli's (probably apocryphal) comment on the septuagenarian Lord Palmerston's affairs: "If he could prove evidence of his potency in his electoral address he'd sweep the country." But Palmerston was a doughty defender of English liberties, while Berlusconi has squandered every opportunity to liberate his people. After a century in which its ancient civilisation has been hollowed out, Italy is nothing but a republic without virtue, living under the heel of a clapped-out Casanova.
Why should we care about the degradation of Italy, a land that Prince Metternich, in conversation with Palmerston, dismissed as "a geographical expression", and which today seems heading for demographic and cultural extinction too? Because Italy is a microcosm of Europe: if democracy and the rule of law die there, the writing is on the wall for the rest of us.
It may seem paradoxical to suggest that the Church might be the saviour of Italy, but that was its role during the Cold War, when John Paul II inspired first Poland and then Eastern Europe to resist communism. Nobody knows this better than Pope Benedict XVI, who grew up in an anti-Nazi family under the Third Reich and was John Paul's closest adviser throughout his pontificate. It would cost Benedict dear to break with a prime minister who makes much of his pro-life credentials. But he might recall one of his greatest predecessors, Gregory VII. Nearly 1,000 years ago, in the name of the libertas ecclesiae (liberty of the Church), Gregory broke with the Emperor Henry IV and began what the great medievalist Karl Leyser called "the first European revolution". Gregory's last words were: "I have loved justice and hated iniquity: therefore I die in exile." There are worse epitaphs for a Pope.
