In 1901, Emilia Pardo Bazán took a trip to Belgium in order to familiarize herself with Belgian social Catholicism; the result was an essay, Por la Europa católica. In this article we will try to answer the following questions: did the author interview relevant personalities, did she document herself with trustworthy sources and did she provide a faithful image of the Belgian socio-political reality to her Spanish readers? First we will offer data about the publication of the texts, second we will sketch the context of the social role of the Church in Belgium and Spain at the turn of the century, and then we will analyse the chapters on social policy in the essay. We may conclude that Pardo Bazán interviewed Catholic figures of the highest level and visited important social works supervised by the Church, but she made no contact with the early Christian democracy. Her main source of information on the socialist movement is Le socialisme en Belgique, still a historical reference work. Although she knew about the tensions in the Catholic party and the huge social antagonisms, in her book she tends to present a too idyllic image of Belgium, probably in order to be able to present the country’s social Catholicism as an example for Spain. ; En 1901, Emilia Pardo Bazán realizó un viaje a Bélgica para conocer desde dentro el catolicismo social belga. Nos preguntamos en este artículo si la autora entrevistó las figuras realmente relevantes, si se documentó en las fuentes importantes y si da una imagen fiable de la situación sociopolítica belga al lector español. En primer lugar ofrecemos datos sobre la publicación de los textos, luego esbozamos el contexto del papel social de la Iglesia en Bélgica y en España y analizamos los capítulos sobre política social de Por la Europa católica. Podemos concluir que la autora entrevistó figuras intelectuales de pro entre el clero y visitó obras sociales enmarcadas por la Iglesia, pero no contactó con la incipiente democracia cristiana. Sobre el socialismo se documenta en Le ...