Starting in the late eighteenth century, and rapidly expanding in the nineteenth, Freemasonry became polarized over the issue of whether the discussion of religion and politics was appropriate in lodges.
If that were not enough to ensure enmity, it called for concordats, secular education, public cemeteries, abolition of regular clergy and Jesuits, political liberty, etc.
He stated in an interview with a Spanish journalist that; "In my opinion, Freemasonry, with all its international influence, is the organization principally responsible for the political ruin of Spain..."[10] According to historian Stanley G. Payne, members of the Masonic lodges played a major role in the rise of Portuguese liberalism and anticlericalism.
After the triumph of constitutionalism, however, Portuguese Freemasonry split into more radical and more conservative groups, and by the 1860s it had ceased to play a catalytic role in politics.
[11] The Papal encyclical Etsi multa of Pope Pius IX in 1873 claimed that Freemasonry was the motivating force behind the Kulturkampf: "Some of you may perchance wonder that the war against the Catholic Church extends so widely.
When he compares them with the nature, purpose, and amplitude of the conflict waged nearly everywhere against the Church, he cannot doubt but that the present calamity must be attributed to their deceits and machinations for the most part.
[14] In the Papal constitution Ecclesiam a Jesu Christo (1821) Pope Pius VII linked the anticlerical Italian secret society, the Carbonari to Freemasonry.
The Papal Encyclical Etsi Nos,[16] complained about the way in which post-unification Italy denigrated the role of the church,[17] which the Vatican blamed primarily on Freemasonry.
[18] Benito Mussolini decreed in 1924 that every member of his Fascist Party who was a Mason must abandon either one or the other organization, and in 1925, he dissolved Freemasonry in Italy, claiming that it was a political organisation with anti-religious influence.
[21] In 2007 Italian politicians in the Union of Christian and Centre Democrats and Forza Italia accused “radical and Masonic” groups of being behind a threatened investigation by the European Commission of whether or not the tax-exempt status of the Church's hospitals, schools, and other social service organizations should be withdrawn.
[22] The Mexican Revolution was seen by Cardinal William Henry O'Connell in 1914 as part of a "Masonic conspiracy" in conjunction with the North American Protestants.
Part of the animosity García Moreno generated was because of his friendship toward the Society of Jesus, and during a period of their exile, he helped a group of displaced Jesuits find refuge in Ecuador.
"[31] García Moreno replied that he had already received similar warnings and after calm reflection concluded that the only measure he could take was to prepare himself to appear before God.