Anti-democratic authoritarianism, not faith, drove clerical popularity in France

Evidence

The Catholic Church then owed its popularity to the widespread popular skepticism which saw in the republic and in democracy the loss of all order, security, and political will. To many the hierarchic system of the Church seemed the only escape from chaos. Indeed, it was this, rather than any religious revivalism, which caused the clergy to be held in respect. As a matter of fact, the staunchest supporters of the Church at that period were the exponents of that so-called “cerebral” Catholicism, the “Catholics without faith,” who were henceforth to dominate the entire monarchist and extreme nationalist movement. Without believing in their other-worldly basis, these “Catholics” clamored for more power to all authoritarian institutions. This, indeed, had been the line first laid down by Drumont and later endorsed by Maurras. — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 299

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines ‘cerebral Catholicism’ / ‘Catholics without faith’ — authoritarianism used as a secular ideology for order, later a transferable concept for how reactionary movements borrow religion’s prestige without its belief.
• SEED: Angle: reactionary movements that instrumentalize religious institutions purely for their disciplinary function — a recurring pattern (cf. Christian nationalism debates today).
• XREF: Connects to Gramscian hegemony and the ‘common sense’ of order that right-authoritarian movements mobilize; also foreshadows Arendt’s later analysis of totalitarian mobilizations.