Is it inevitable? Today's ``liberals''' ideas are almost a complete refutation of the Locke's et al. Now, that doesn't mean that Catholics should accept Hume, Licke et al.
That's a good question, and it's the one that occupies the minds of "conservatives" (those that have minds). Was it inevitable that the enlightenment experiment (of which America is unquestionably the preeminent example) would degenerate into the decadence we see today? Or could we have maintained certain enlightenment principles if we had taken a different path in 1861, in 1901, in 1917, in 1931, etc.
The question being raised by these critics, however, is very different from that which would occur to "classical liberals." They are asking instead whether the "inevitability" question is just an intra-necine affair among fellow descendants of the French Revolution, and whether Catholics should stay totally out of the fray because we don't accept ANY of those principles.
Hume was a radical skeptic after all. From a Catholic perspective, is it possible to build any kind of Catholic civilization whatsoever upon that kind of foundation? Hasn't there always been an oil/water incompatibility between enlightenment thought and Catholicism?
At least up through WWII the Church always maintained that there was. But starting with JXXIII and Vatican II, the Church suddenly decided that being opposed to enlightenment principles put you on the losing side of history, and that it was time to jump on the bandwagon. But seeing in hindsight what has happened to Western civilization in the 40 years since then, it looks very much like "buying into the top of the bubble."