What's this? A priest in favor of freedom?

Regular readers of this blog (Are their truly such creatures?) will know that I'm a paragon of "everything bad that begins with an 'A'" and yet I have this respect and affection for a classical-liberal Catholic priest in the tradition of Lord "absolute power corrupts absolutely" Acton.

Don Jim says:

[G]overnment should be as small as possible and regulate only what is absolutely necessary for the basic functioning of society. Other than that, it should butt out.

And also:

Perhaps I'm biased, being both a Catholic and a Southerner, but it's always seemed to me that the traditional Southern approach to life and humanity is particularly congenial to Roman Catholicism, and that congregational Protestantism holds sway here only because (a) that's the type of religion that historically spread here first and (b) anti-Catholicism is instilled in people while they're young. The Southern character, though, is eminently suited to Catholicism. I'm thinking especially of the South's sectional mythology, our old notions of aristocracy and kinship, our comfortable tolerance for what is strange and eccentric, our respect for tradition, our general freedom from the Protestant work ethic, and the darker recognition (confirmed by the loss of the War) that man is fallen and that he is not promised victory in this life. All of which has long made me think that the Southland is the closest thing in the world to Spain.