Truths Guaranteed Prudentially

Two conditions are required in order that a truth, whether representing a doctrine or a fact, shall be an object of divine faith. First, it must be really included in the revealed deposit, and in addition to this it must be proposed absolutely and irreformably by the Church. But there is a vast field of truths lacking the second or even the first of these conditions, and yet so closely connected with the truths of the faith that human thought cannot refuse them without the more or less immediate and more or less grave danger of misappreciating the truths of the faith itself. There then is a new class of truths. They are not of divine faith. They represent the fourth degree of Catholic doctrine.

1. The first are included in the revealed deposit, but have not yet been irreformably defined.

Examples may be found in any and every theological conclusion—if, that is to say, the content of a genuine theological conclusion is to be regarded as homogeneous and identical "quoad se" with the revealed datum, and distinct from it only conceptually, "quoad nos".[787] In the measure in which they are taught by the best and most enlightened servants of the Church, or received by the Christian sense of the faithful, these theological conclusions are clothed with a prudential authority which, without ever becoming equivalent to an irreformable definition, confirms the correctness of the deductive process that gave them birth, brings them to the notice of our filial piety, and makes them still more worthy of our acceptance. Occasionally the Roman Congregations may intervene to declare in some more official way the imprudence of rejecting some one or other of them. Thus a decree of the Holy Office of the 5th June 1918, condemned as unsafe, and therefore as imprudent, the doctrine that hesitates to recognize that Christ, in the course of His mortal life, had all the knowledge of the blessed in His soul, was ignorant of nothing, knew from the beginning in the Word all things past, present and future, and possessed a knowledge that was not limited but universal.[788] In pronouncing on the prudence or imprudence of teaching a doctrine, in view of the need for preserving the revealed deposit—clearly a matter of practical or prudential truth—the jurisdictional power does not yet intend to define or condemn irrevocably the speculative content of this doctrine; but it is also clear that it is not here guided by considerations of mere expediency, that it intends to approve as prudent what is really true and conformable to the revealed deposit, and to reprove as imprudent what is really false and contrary to the deposit; and, in a word, it does not intend to confine itself to a purely exterior and disciplinary measure, but to pass a magisterial judgment. Hence the genuinely speculative and intrinsic value of these decrees, although they are not irreformable.

Turning from the order of doctrine to that of facts, we may cite as an example of those truths which, though not yet defined, may one day be so, the judgment passed on a servant of God in the process of his beatification. It is not a definitive judgment on his sanctity; it amounts directly to no more than a permission to pay him a cultus. When the Church grants this practical permission, she is, in the view of the best theologians, infallible, "errare practice non potest". This means that at the moment things appear in such a light that she certainly does not sin against prudence. That the person in question is in heaven however, and definitively worthy of cultus is, no doubt, already certain, but only with a prudential and reformable certitude, not yet absolutely and irrevocably.[789] This certitude is much greater than that which an historian obtains by purely scientific research.

2. Some truths belonging to this fourth category are not even included in the revealed deposit, but are connected with it more or less loosely.

Thus, in the doctrinal order, "the philosophy of St. Thomas is not a dogma; the Church can define as a truth de fide only what is contained at least implicitly, in the divine deposit of revelation. Any particular truth professed by the Thomist philosophy may very well be so defined one day (if the Church considers that it was contained in the deposit of faith, and cases have in fact already arisen)—but never the whole philosophy, the whole corpus of Thomist doctrine". And yet the Church "orders her masters to teach the philosophy of St. Thomas; by that very fact she recommends the faithful to adhere to it, she throws every possible light on that philosophy, makes use of every kind of signal, cries out: there you will find the running waters ! She exercises no compulsion, forces nobody to go".[790] Such a recommendation sets up a presumption in favour of the truth of the Thomist philosophy, which is, for the faithful, of great weight.

In the order of facts numerous assertions concerning the authenticity of miracles, of private revelations, of apparitions, or of the relics of canonized saints, can be put into this fourth category.[791]

That the doctrinal magisterium, over and above its primary mission, which is to define certain truths with absolute authority and irrevocably, has a secondary mission, which is to teach other truths with a prudential authority and not irrevocably, is a point of doctrine that is certain.

In the treatise De Locis Theologicis, theologians unanimously distinguish on the one hand those organs by which the magisterium can, when it acts "suprema intensione" (Franzelin's term), speak with absolute authority and irrevocably—the Sovereign Pontiff teaching alone (solemn magisterium not communicable to the Roman Congregations), the Sovereign Pontiff teaching conjointly with the bishops assembled in General Council (solemn magisterium), the Sovereign Pontiff teaching conjointly with the bishops dispersed through the world (ordinary magisterium)—and, on the other hand, the organs by which the magisterium can speak only with a prudential authority and in a non-definitive way—and here we have either the Roman Congregations, or the Fathers, Doctors and theologians in the measure in which they have the confidence of the Church, since it is from her that they have their authority.[792] Hence the division of theological sources or organs that set out the revealed deposit into absolute or decisive on the one hand, and "probable "or claiming our assent on the other.

To come down to detail, the authority of doctrinal decisions put out by the canonical power has been the subject of express declarations. In the apostolic letter Tuas Libenter addressed on the 21st December 1863 to the Archbishop of Munich, Pius IX drew attention to the duty of (Catholic scholars to recognize both the teaching of the pontifical congregations and the common teaching of theologians: "It is not enough for Catholic scholars to accept and venerate the dogmas of the Church, they ought further to submit themselves both to the doctrinal decisions of the pontifical congregations, and to points of doctrine which by common and constant consent are held in the Church to be truths and theological conclusions so certain that the contrary opinions, although they cannot be qualified as heretical, yet deserve some other note of theological censure."[793] As Franzelin remarks, there is question here not of doctrinal censures formulated in an irrevocable judgment of the Church and to be believed as of divine faith,[794] but of common and constant theological truths which all Catholics should gladly receive. The Vatican Council, in its turn, proclaimed at the end of the constitution Dei Filius, the authority of all the decisions of the Holy See: "Since to avoid heretical perversion we must be careful to turn our backs on errors that more or less approximate to it, we draw attention to the duty that lies upon all to observe also the constitutions and decrees by which those nefarious doctrines, not expressly mentioned here, have been proscribed and condemned by the Holy See."[795] The whole of this passage is reproduced in the Code of Canon Law (can. 1324). Here we might cite also the seventh and eighth propositions condemned by the decree Lamentabili of the 3rd July 1907: "The Church, when condemning errors, cannot ask the faithful to give an interior assent to the judgment passed"; "Those who take no notice of condemnations put out by the Sacred Congregation of the Index, or by the other Roman Congregations, are to be held to be guiltless of all fault"[796]; there is also the passage in the Motu Proprio of the 18th November of the same year, in which Pius X declares that "all, without exception, are bound in conscience to obey the doctrinal decisions of the pontifical Biblical Commission, both those already issued and those to be issued, in the same way as they are bound to obey the decrees of the Sacred Congregations approved by the Sovereign Pontiff".[797]

Thus then, God has not left us without guidance in the immense accumulation of ideas bearing on the speculative life, on private, economic and political morality, on artistic activity, in the spheres into which the full light of revelation has not yet descended and in which nevertheless convictions are formed, syntheses elaborated and decisive choices taken which may either open or obstruct the road to the fullness of the faith. He helps us through His Church to whom He entrusts a new mission, no longer that of irrevocably defining the data of the faith, but that of prudentially marking the truths which point towards the things of faith or the errors that turn men away from it, that of ratifying or rejecting certain suggestions of the theologians and the philosophers and certain beliefs of popular piety.

In this sphere the Church acts no longer in virtue of her declaratory power, as a simple messenger or mandatory for utterances of divine origin. She acts now in virtue of her canonical power, as promulgator of what can fittingly be taught and believed if the minds of the faithful are to be kept from the dangers that threaten their faith. It is this magisterial authority of the canonical power that Franzelin proposes to call an "authority of universal ecclesiastical providence".[798]

In these matters the Church no longer acts merely to condition assent, as in matters of divine faith; she is herself the immediate basis of an assent (the mediate basis being God, who rules the Church) which on this account may be called ecclesiastical obedience, ecclesiastical faith, religious assent, pious assent.[799]

It is our duty to recognize divine authority not only in itself, but also in the teachers it has pleased it to give us. He whom we bow before is, in both cases, God, although the submission is not, in both cases, of the same species. Obedience based immediately on the uncreated Truth is of the theological order; that given to the master appointed us is of the moral order. And this obedience will be so much the better as the magisterium is the higher and the more sacred. If the magisterium be natural, the obedience will be, in itself, natural. If the magisterium is realized analogically and supernaturally, the virtue of docility and obedience will be realized analogically and supernaturally. Consequently, since the magisterium of the canonical power is supernatural, the intellectual and interior obedience due to it in conscience belongs also to the supernatural order. Ecclesiastical faith, thus understood, is a supernatural moral virtue, a supernatural obedience.

While the declaratory magisterium is assisted in an absolute manner, the simply canonical magisterium is assisted only in a relative or prudential manner. This latter magisterium pronounces directly on the prudential character of a teaching, of a proposition. What it says is that it is prudent to adhere interiorly to such and such a teaching and rash to refuse to do so. And undoubtedly an interior adhesion to a teaching will appear to be prudent only when this teaching seems to be intrinsically true; and there are strong reasons why a teaching which has once seemed to be true to a providentially assisted magisterium should continue to seem true afterwards and always. Nevertheless, the speculative content of this teaching remains reformable. It is guaranteed only in a practical and prudential manner, by way of consequence and indirectly.

How are we to understand the assistance, divine, but relative and prudential, promised to the magisterium when it teaches truths of the fourth degree? Is it infallible, and are we sure that the magisterium will never pronounce without prudence in any one of its teachings? Or will it be, on the contrary, fallible, and can the magisterium sin against prudence in a given case? Either situation can arise.

If it is a question of teachings universally and constantly proposed to the faithful and often recalled by the Church; if, more generally, it is a case of teachings in which the Church intends fully to engage the prudential authority she has to feed Christ's sheep, to determine what is apt to bring minds nearer to or turn them away from the faith, we shall not hesitate to say that the magisterium proposes them in virtue of a practical prudential assistance which is truly and properly infallible, so that we can be sure of the prudence of each of these teachings, and in consequence practically sure of their intrinsic and speculative truth. To adopt a phrase of Franzelin's, if there is as yet no infallible irrevocable truth, "veritas infallibilis", there is nevertheless an infallible assurance, "infallibilis securitas". Such, for example, are the prescriptions recalling that Sacred Scripture should be interpreted in the light of the Fathers and Doctors; the law of the Code ordering professors in seminaries to teach philosophy and theology conformably with the method, doctrine and principles of the Angelic Doctor; the judgment by which a servant of God is declared blessed, etc.[800]

If, on the contrary, there is question of teachings proposed without this universality and this constancy, of solutions of recent problems not yet generalized by the Church, in which she does not intend fully to engage her prudential authority, then we shall say that the magisterium proposes them only in a fallible manner.[801] If there is infallible assistance here, it is infallible only in the improper sense, and that means that the magisterium is assisted, not for each determinate case, singillatim, divisive, but for the generality of cases, in commune, collective. It is certain, for example, that the decisions of the Biblical Commission, taken as a whole, defend the authentic meaning of the Bible and its divine character, with assured prudence.

787 That is the thesis presented by Marin-Sola as truly traditional. The rationally apprehended minor in the theological syllogism is considered as playing a purely instrumental part and as simply developing the content of the revealed major. However, this work of unfolding, being human, remains fallible in so far as it is not guaranteed by an irreformable definition of the Church.

788 If it is revealed that Christ was a perfect Man—if, in other words, He is to be recognized as having all the perfections demanded on the one hand by His personal union with the Word, and on the other by His redemptive mission—it must be concluded that He had beatifying knowledge, i. e., that from the outset His soul enjoyed that unclouded vision of God by which alone He could have had a perfect awareness of His own being, and to which moreover He was to lead not only mankind in general, but each particular man.

789 Concerning the manner in which the authority of the Church is engaged in beatification, John of St. Thomas offers a solution for which some modern theologians still seem to be searching: "Nihilominus, supposita sententia supra probata quod beatificatio non sit judicium de sanctitate alicujus, sed solum permissio ut possit publice coli et venerari, existimo, pontificem practice errare non posse in tali beatificatione, ita quod esset temerarius et scandalosus, qui talem celebrationem negaret, aut talem cultum non esse exhibendum [affirmaret]. Speculative autem, circa veritatem sanctitatis talis personae, existimo quod ex vi solius beatificationis id non excedit latitudinem certitudinis moralis et probabilitatis maximae, ita quod oppositum non esset censura dignum. Et dico 'ex vi beatificationis praecise" quia ex alio capite, verbi gratia si accedat assensus totius Ecclesiae, aut majoris partis fidelium, multitudo miraculorum facta in confirmationem ejus sanctitatis, et hoc longo tempore sit continuatum, ex parte fiet longe certius, et qui negaret sanctitatem talis personae cum his circumstantiis, esset censura temeritatis dignus" (II-II, q. 1-7; disp. 3, a. 2, no. 19, vol. VII, p. 302 ) A little earlier in the same work (no. 2, p. 293), John of St. Thomas poses the question, whether canonization and beatification are distinguished in such a way that the first is a judgment and the second a permission on the part of the Sovereign Pontiff, and upholds the view that beatification is in fact not an irrevocable judgment, judicium determinativum, but a simple permission. However, a permissive judgment is still a judgment, and John of St. Thomas has just affirmed that here the Sovereign Pontiff acts without error in the practical sphere. We may then say that beatification is indeed a judgment on the part of the Sovereign Pontiff, not indeed definitive and irrevocable, but prudential and reformable.

790 J. Maritain, St. Thomas Aquinas, trans. J. F. Scanlan, London 1930, pp. 1689. cf. God. Jur. Can. can. 1366, 2.

791 "Canonization is one thing, miracles, private revelations, apparitions, historical happenings, or the authenticity of relics, are another. When the Church approves the miracles of a saint during the process of canonization, or inserts them in the breviary lessons, when she institutes a special feast in honour of the apparition of a saint—e. g. the apparition of the Virgin at Lourdes or that of St. Michael the Archangel, the translation of the Holy House of Loretto, etc.—when she approves the private revelations of a saint—e. g. those of St. Brigid—or the authenticity and cultus of their relics, it is a very common opinion that these miracles, apparitions, revelations, historical facts, approbations of relics, are not infallibly defined although they deserve that pious adhesion and respect due to all the teachings, even fallible, of the Church" (F. Marin-Sola, O. P., L'Evolution homogene du dogme catholique, vol. 1, p. 482). The author here cites Pere Bainvel, S. J., De Magisterio Vivo et Traditione, no. 107 : "Cum Ecclesia inquirit aut pronuntiat de revelationibus, apparitionibus, miraculis, non intendit habere nisi probabilitatem aut certitudinem humanam, eaque practicam, quae scilicet satis sit ad fovendum cultum. Item cum de authenticitate reliquiarum." On the presentation of Our Lady in the Temple he cites the words of Benedict XIV: "Alia vero sic ad religionem pertinent, ut sine culpabili arrogantia rejici minime possint, ex gr., quod beatissima Virgo fuerit in Templo praesentata. Atque his quidem Ecclesia non tribuit gradum veritatis indubitatae, quamvis aliter, saltem publice, docere non liceat: in his quippe requiritur solum practice veritatis ratio, congruentia videlicet cum praescriptione prudentis rationis" (De Servorum Dei Beatificatione, lib. I, cap. xl III). At the end of the Encyclical Pascendi Pius X touches on the question of the authenticity of relics, of pious traditions, apparitions and private revelations. Concerning relics, the Pope refers to the earlier rule of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences: "Ancient relics ought to be kept in all the veneration given them heretofore, unless perhaps in some particular case there are convincing reasons for holding them to be spurious." Concerning pious traditions, the Pope observes that "The Church gives no guarantee of the truth of fact; she simply refrains from forbidding belief when some motives for human faith are not wanting". On the subject of apparitions and particular revelations he cites a reply of the Sacred Congregation of Rites dated 12th May 1877 that "These apparitions or revelations [at Lourdes, La Salette, etc.] have neither been approved nor condemned by the Apostolic See, which has merely permitted them to be believed with purely human faith, as corroborated by witnesses and monuments worthy of credence". The Pope goes on to remark that "whoever holds this doctrine is safe. For the cultus directed to any of these apparitions, in so far as it looks to the fact itself, is relative and always implies the truth of the fact as its condition; but in so far as it is addressed to the very person of the saints honoured, it is absolute and cannot but be well-founded. The same may be said of relics".

792 "Quia et ipsa doctrina catholicorum doctorum ab Ecclesia auctoritatem habet. Unde magis standum est auctoritati Ecclesiae quam auctoritati vel Augustini, vel Hieronymi, vel cujuscumque doctoris" (St. Thomas, II-II, q. 10, a. 12).

793 Denz. 1684. Cf. His Holiness Pope Pius XII, encyclical Humani Generis, 12 August 1950: "It is not to be believed that what is set forth in encyclicals does not in itself claim assent..." (A. A. S., 1950, p. 568).

794 Franzelin says "Fidei immediate vel mediate divinae" (Tractatus de divina traditione et Scriptura, p. 142), this mediately divine faith being that which others—Billot, for example—call "ecclesiastical faith".

795 Denz. 1820. This text presupposes, as Vacant notes, "that the Sovereign Pontiff can exercise at least a part of his doctrinal authority through the tribunals he establishes, and in particular through the Roman Congregations. The text, in fact, does not lay down that we are bound to keep the constitutions and decrees of the Sovereign Pontiff, but those of the Holy See. Now the decrees that emanate from the Roman Congregations are very certainly to be reckoned among those of the Holy See. It is clear how wide is the scope of this declaration on submission to all the doctrinal decisions of the Holy See" (Etudes theologiques sur les constitutions du concile du Vatican, Paris 1895, vol. II, p. 334).

798 This authority of universal ecclesiastical and doctrinal providence, which resides in the Sovereign Pontiff, is distinguished from the authority of particular providence held by the bishops "to preach and defend the doctrine already proposed by an express definition, or by the consent of the Church, or by the decisions of the universal ecclesiastical providence, but not for settling questions freely debated amongst Catholics" (Franzelin, op. cit., pp. 128 and 153).

799 "With no claim to a divine or infallible faith the pontifical teachings not expressly put forth as infallible nevertheless always deserve a human faith, and an internal and assured human faith, whenever it is not evident (and it very seldom is so) that the Church is in fact deceived. It is this human faith accorded to the non-infallible teachings of the Church, and in our days called pious assent, which should be named ecclesiastical faith, just as the human and variable laws of the Church are called ecclesiastical laws to distinguish them from laws that are really divine and unchangeable" (F. Marin-Sola, L'Evolution homogene du dogme catholique, vol. I, p. 429; cf. p. 479, note 1). I therefore distinguish only two species of assent: divine faith, and ecclesiastical faith (or pious assent). Many make it three: divine faith, ecclesiastical or mediately divine faith, and pious assent. In this triple division the intermediate category should, in my opinion, be included in the first

800 We have drawn attention already to the opinion of John of St. Thomas: "Existimo pontificem practice errare non posse in tali beatificatione."

801 A celebrated example may be cited to show that the Church intends to guarantee only in a fallible prudential manner the speculative truth of these pronouncements. On the 13th January 1897, the Congregation of the Inquisition, having been asked whether "The authenticity of 1 John v. 7, could be safely denied or doubted", replied in the negative. On the 2nd January 1927 the same Congregation published officially a private declaration, given, it said, at the outset and often since repeated, by the terms of which "The preceding decree was issued to reprove the audacity of private teachers who arrogated to themselves the right to reject absolutely, or to throw grave doubts on, the authenticity of the passage of St. John. But it did not in any way intend to prevent Catholic writers from studying the question more thoroughly nor, after carefully weighing the arguments for and against, from inclining, with all the moderation and modesty called for by the gravity of the matter, towards the opinion unfavourable to its genuineness, provided they declared themselves ready to obey the judgment of the Church, to whom has been entrusted the duty not only of interpreting but also of faithfully guarding the sacred Epistles" (Enchiridion Biblicum, Rome 1927, p. 47). The reply of the Inquisition on this point of exegesis did not represent a universal and constant teaching of the Church. Moreover a decision of the Roman Congregations is powerless, as such and of itself alone, fully to engage, were this only in a purely prudential manner, the authority of the Church. The still more celebrated difficulty occasioned by the condemnation of Galileo must be resolved in the same way: the sentence of excommunication was certainly doctrinal, but it was clear enough, even to contemporaries, that it came from a fallible authority. cf Excursus IV which follows below.

if, more generally, it is a case of teachings in which the Church intends fully to engage the prudential authority she has to feed Christ's sheep, to determine what is apt to bring minds nearer to or turn them away from the faith, we shall not hesitate to say that the magisterium proposes them in virtue of a practical prudential assistance which is truly and properly infallible, so that we can be sure of the prudence of each of these teachings, and in consequence practically sure of their intrinsic and speculative truth.

... If there is infallible assistance here, it is infallible only in the improper sense, and that means that the magisterium is assisted, not for each determinate case, singillatim, divisive, but for the generality of cases, in commune, collective. It is certain, for example, that the decisions of the Biblical Commission, taken as a whole, defend the authentic meaning of the Bible and its divine character, with assured prudence.

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