Catechism of the Crisis in the Church, Pt. 2
The Angelus continues the installments of Fr. Gaudron's Catechism of the Crisis in the Church with Part 2 on the nature of "faith." What is faith? What has happened to faith today? Is faith a sentiment? Can it change? Find the answers to these and other common questions in the next pages.
6) What is Faith?
Faith is a supernatural virtue through which, relying on the authority of God Himself and moved by His grace, we hold everything He has revealed as absolutely true.
l Does faith presuppose divine revelation? Yes, faith is the response of man to the revelation of God.
l How did God reveal Himself to men? God spoke to men through Moses, the prophets, and above all through His only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
l What are the truths that man knows thanks to divine Revelation? Thanks to Revelation, we know the attributes of God and His trinitary essence. We also know our own eternal destiny, which is the vision of God in heaven. Revelation shows us the path we must follow to arrive at this end: observance of the commandments of God and reception of the sacraments, the means of salvation instituted by God.
l Why is faith called supernatural? The truths revealed by God, which are the object of faith, exceed the natural capacity of our intelligence. It is thus not possible to adhere to them without the supernatural help of God, called grace.
l On what grounds do we adhere to the truths revealed by God? The reason for faith is nothing but the authority of God who reveals Himself. We believe the truths of the Faith because God has affirmed them and not because we could not have any knowledge of them through our own efforts. We believe, for example, in the Holy Trinity or the divinity of Jesus Christ, not because we have discovered those truths through our intelligence, but because God has revealed them to us.
7) How is the Faith communicated to us?
One source of the Faith is Sacred Scripture or the Bible. It is divided into two parts: the Old Testament, containing the Revelation of God to the Hebrews before the advent of Christ, and the New Testament, which explicitly transmits Christian Revelation.
l How is Sacred Scripture distinct from other religious writings? Sacred Scripture is inspired by the Holy Ghost. This means that it is not a merely human text, but that behind the human author stands God Himself, who has guided the men who composed it in a mysterious way. For this reason Sacred Scripture is really and truly the Word of God.
8) Is Sacred Scripture the only source of Revelation?
To say that Sacred Scripture is the only source of Revelation is a Protestant error. The teaching orally transmitted by the Apostles, called Apostolic Tradition, is also, next to Sacred Scripture, a true source of Revelation.
l Is there any mention in Sacred Scripture itself of another source of Revelation? Everything Jesus Christ said and ordained is not found in Sacred Scripture. Scripture itself says so:
But there are also many other things which Jesus did; which, if they were written every one, the world itself, I think, would not be able to contain the books that should be written (Jn. 21:25).
In those days, less was committed to writing than today, and thus oral tradition had a higher status.
l What other reason can be invoked to show the necessity of Tradition? It is only by Tradition that we know certain truths revealed by God, and notably what books belong to Sacred Scripture. There are in fact other "Gospels" and pretended letters of the Apostles which are not authentic Biblical writings. Protestants, who would recognize only the Bible as a source of Faith, are obliged to have recourse to Tradition at least in this respect, for it is their only basis for receiving Sacred Scripture.
l Which is the first of the two sources of Revelation, Sacred Scripture or Apostolic Tradition? Tradition is the first of the two sources of Revelation by virtue of its antiquity (the Apostles began by preaching), its fullness (being itself the source of Scripture, Tradition contains all the truths revealed by God) and by its sufficiency (Tradition has no need of Scripture as the basis of its divine authority; on the contrary, it is Tradition that gives us the list of the books inspired by God and which permits us to know its authentic meaning).
9) Who can authoritatively tell us what belongs to Revelation?
Only the Magisterium of the Church, which resides first of all in the pope, can tell us with certitude what is to be believed and what is erroneous in regard to disputed matters. It was to Peter and his successors that Christ said: "Thou are Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it" (Mt. 16:18). He likewise gave Peter the mission of confirming his brothers in the faith: "But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and thou, being once converted, confirm thy brethren" (Lk. 22:32).
A doctrine that the Church has defined as belonging definitively to divine Revelation is called a dogma.
l What does Sacred Scripture say about the manner in which it should be interpreted? St. Peter says in his second epistle:
...no prophecy of scripture is made by private interpretation. For prophecy came not by the will of man at any time: but the holy men of God spoke, inspired by the Holy Ghost" (II Pet. 1:20-21).
This passage shows both the inspiration of Sacred Scripture by the Holy Ghost and the fact that we cannot interpret it as we please. This, however, is exactly what the Protestants do: everyone interprets the Bible and, naturally, everyone understands it in a different way.
l Can the existence of an infallible magisterium in the Church be proven in a different way? Simple reflection suffices to show the necessity of an infallible magisterium. Christ did not want to speak to His contemporaries in Palestine alone, but to all men of all times to come and of all regions of the earth. But His doctrine could not have been preserved unchanged over the course of centuries had he not instituted a competent authority to resolve the disputes that would arise. Thus this authority was established.
l Are there other indications of the necessity of this institution? The example of the Protestants shows in practice what we have just explained. Among them there is no magisterium, but each individual is in a certain way his own pope. This is why the Protestants are divided into a multitude of groupings, each believing differently from the others. The Catholic Church, on the contrary, has preserved intact the faith of the first Christians.
10) What is the consequence of denying a dogma?
Whoever denies a single dogma has lost the Faith, for he does not receive the Revelation of God but sets himself up as judge of what is to be believed.
l Can one not deny one dogma while continuing to believe in the others and thus conserve the Faith, at least partially? As we saw above, the Faith does not depend on our personal judgment, but on the authority of God who reveals Himself and Who can neither deceive nor be deceived. Thus it is necessary to receive everything that God has revealed and not take only that which seems good to us. Therefore someone who makes a choice about the revealed deposit of faith and does not want to accept it as a whole imposes a limit on God, for he lets his reason have the last word. He who acts in this way no longer has supernatural faith, but only a human faith, however numerous the points on which it may be in accord with supernatural faith.
l Can papal teachings be cited on this point? When Pope Pius IX defined the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary in 1854 he said:
Hence, if anyone shall dare–which God forbid!–to think otherwise than as has been defined by us, let him know and understand that he is condemned by his own judgment; that he has suffered shipwreck in the faith; that he has separated from the unity of the Church.
Leo XIII taught the same thing:
He who denies one of the truths of the faith, even in a single point, in reality loses the whole of the faith, for he refuses to respect God as supreme Truth and formal grounds of the faith.
The pope further cites St. Augustine who said, with regard to heretics:
They are in agreement with me on many things, and we disagree on but a few things. But because of those few things in which they are not in agreement with me, the many points of agreement are of no value to them.
l In matters of faith then, is it all or nothing? One cannot be 70 or 99% Catholic; one accepts the whole of Revelation or one does not, in which case one possesses only a human faith which one has fabricated for oneself. To choose some truths out of the ensemble of the truths of the Faith is called heresy (in Greek, choice).
l What should one make of the now popular slogan to the effect that, in our relations with "separated Christians," we should look to what unites rather than to what divides us? It is altogether false and contrary to the traditional teaching of the Church to say, with regard to non-Catholics, that one must look to what unites rather than to what divides us. This creates the impression that differences relate only to details without importance, when in fact the fullness of revealed truth is at stake.
11) Is not faith primarily a sentiment?
It is one of the errors of modernism, condemned by St. Pius X in 1907 in the Encyclical Pascendi, to say that faith is a sentiment issued from the subconscious, arising from some need for the divine. In fact, the act of faith is not a sentiment but a form of understanding, the conscious and voluntary reception of divine Revelation as it is has been presented to man in Sacred Scripture and Tradition.
l What is Revelation for the modernists? For the modernists revelation is created when the religious sentiment passes from the realm of the subconscious to the conscious mind. Faith would thus be something sentimental and subjective. Revelation would not come from the outside (from on high) but would arise from the interior of man.
l What then is the role of Christ in Revelation for the modernists? Modernists believe that, at the origins of Christianity, there was the religious experience of Jesus Christ (who, to be sure, is not thought of as true God). He shared His experience with others, who lived it themselves and communicated it to others in turn. From this need of the faithful to communicate their religious experiences to others and to form a community was born the Church. The Church is thus not a divine institution; she, like the sacraments, the papacy, the dogmas, is only the result of the religious needs of believers.
l Is is not true that man naturally has a religious sentiment? The natural religious sentiment must be carefully distinguished from the supernatural faith of the Catholic. There is certainly a need for God in the human heart, but if God does not really respond to this need, it remains an empty sentiment. Furthermore, like everything that is natural in us, the religious sentiment is wounded by original sin: it can easily lead to error and even to sin (superstition, idolatry, etc.).
l Is the Faith not linked to the religious sentiment all the same? It is true that a sentiment of security and well-being is linked to the Faith, but this is not the essence of the Faith. This sentiment, like all other sentiments, is changeable, sometimes waxing and sometimes waning; at times it can even disappear altogether. Great saints, like St. Vincent de Paul or St. Theresa of the Child Jesus, have sometimes been deprived of this sensible certainty, without however becoming hesitant in their belief in the truth and the certitude of the Faith.
l Where can one find the certain teaching of the Church on this matter? In the Anti-modernist Oath that, until 1967, all priests were obliged to pronounce before their ordination:
I hold with certainty and sincerely confess that faith is not a blind sentiment of religion welling up from the depths of the subconscious under the impulse of the heart and the motion of a will trained to morality; but faith is a genuine assent of the intellect to truth received by hearing from an external source. By this assent, because of the authority of the supremely truthful God, we believe to be true that which has been revealed and attested to by a personal God, our Creator and Lord.
12) Can the Faith change?
According to modernist doctrine the Faith can change, for dogmas are only the expression of a sentiment of interior faith and of a religious need. They thus need to be adapted and formulated in a new manner when religious sentiments and needs change.
If, however, as the Church teaches, dogmas express the truths of the Faith in an infallible manner, it is evident that they cannot be changed, for what was true yesterday cannot be false today and vice versa. As truth is immutable, so is the true Faith. Thus St. Paul writes: "But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema" (Gal. 1.8). "Jesus Christus heri et hodie ipse et in saecula–Jesus Christ yesterday, and today, and the same for ever" (Heb. 13:8).
l Is there not progress in the Faith? Progress of the doctrine of the Faith is possible only in the sense that the truths of the Faith are better understood and explicated. Such a development was predicted by Jesus Christ for His Church when He said:
But the Paraclete, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, He will teach you all things, and bring all things to your mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you (Jn. 14:26).
l Doesn't the Holy Ghost teach new truths to the Church? Revelation was finished with the death of the last Apostle. Since then, the Holy Ghost does not teach new truths, but rather makes the Church enter ever more profoundly into the truth brought by Christ. Thus revealed truths that at a certain period played only a secondary role in the life of the Church may assume a primary importance in another age. The controversies that opposed the Church to heretics also forced her to set forth the truths of the Faith in a more precise and clear manner, making explicit truths that up to then were implicitly held, but never adding to the deposit of faith (depositum fidei) as revealed to the Apostles.
l What are the rules of this development of the Faith? The development of doctrine can elaborate that which was taught in the past, but it can never contradict or modify it. There can be no opposition to what has been taught. Once a dogma has been defined it cannot later become false, void, or take on a new meaning.
l When she teaches a new dogma, does not the Church reveal new truths? When the Church defines a new dogma, she does not reveal new truths, but she explains and puts the accent in a new manner on that which, fundamentally, has always been believed. It is always "the same belief, in the same sense, with the same meaning." The First Vatican Council clearly teaches:
The Holy Ghost has not been promised to the successors of Peter that under His revelation they should reveal new doctrine, but that with His assistance they might in a holy manner guard and faithfully set forth Revelation as transmitted by the apostles, that is to say the deposit of the faith.
13) Can several religions possess the true Faith?
From the fact that different religions contradict themselves on fundamental points it follows that several of them cannot be true. Only one religion can be true, and that is the Catholic religion. God revealed Himself in Jesus Christ, not in Buddha or Mohammed; and Christ founded only one Church which must communicate His teaching and His grace until the end of the world. Faith in a trinitary God, in Christ and in the Church thus forms an indivisible unity.
l Do the different religions really contradict one another? God is either the Trinity, or He is not. If He is the Trinity, all non-Christian religions are false. But Christian confessions also contradict one another: some do not believe in the divinity of Christ, many do not believe in the real presence of the Body and Blood of Christ in the sacrament of the Eucharist, etc. Such opposite beliefs are not compatible.
14) How can we recognize that the Catholic Faith is true?
Christ proved the truth of His mission by the miracles that He worked. This is why He says: "Believe you not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? Otherwise believe me for the very works' sake" (Jn. 14:11-12). The Apostles also established themselves by their miracles: "But they going forth preached everywhere: the Lord working withal, and confirming the word with signs that followed" (Mk. 16:20). Miracles are the proof of the divine mission of the Church.
l Can we be sure of the existence of miracles? There have always been miracles in the Church. In fact, the existence of these miracles has never been more certain than today when, thanks to scientific knowledge and tools of investigation, we can rule out natural explanations more easily than in the past. Self-suggestion and hallucination have no place here. The multiplication of food observed by numerous persons who have in no way been influenced in advance, the resurrection of a dead man, or the sudden cure of an organ which has been almost completely destroyed can scarcely be explained in this way. The Church never recognizes a miracle so long as the slightest possibility of a natural explanation exists.
l Are all miracles of a physical nature? Next to so-called "physical" miracles (facts that cannot be physically explained by natural processes alone) there are also what can be called "moral" miracles (facts that cannot be morally explained by the forces of nature alone.)
l Give some examples of moral miracles. The diffusion of Christianity is a moral miracle, for no natural explanation can account for the fact that 12 uninstructed fishermen lacking any influence could convert a great part of the world in a short period of time, notwithstanding the opposition of the rich and powerful. The multifaceted sanctity that has flourished uninterruptedly in the Church for the last 2,000 years is also a moral miracle.
l Do miracles prove the truths of the Faith? Miracles cannot directly prove the truths of the Faith, nor oblige anyone to believe, for then it would no longer be faith but science. They nevertheless show that faith is not blind confidence lacking foundation, that it is not opposed to reason, and that on the contrary it is unreasonable not to believe!
l Apart from the proofs of the truth of Catholicism, are there direct proofs on the basis of the falsehood of Protestantism? The fact that the Protestant factions of Christianity cannot be true derives from the simple fact that they are relatively recent separations from the Church of Christ. Luther did not reform the Church, as he pretended, but on the contrary invented new doctrines opposed to those that Christians had always believed up to then. Christians have always been convinced, for example, that the Eucharist can only be celebrated by a man ordained a priest and that the holy Mass is a true sacrifice: how can one in truth all at once pretend otherwise, after 1,500 years? How can the Anglican Church be the true Church, when it owes its very existence to the adultery of Henry VIII?
l Is it thus easy to find the true religion? As Pope Leo XIII observed:
To recognize what is the true religion is not difficult for whomever would judge the matter in prudence and sincerity. In fact very numerous and striking proofs, the truth of the prophecies, the multitude of miracles, the prodigious speed of the propagation of the Faith, even amongst its enemies and in spite of the greatest obstacles, the testimony of the martyrs and other similar arguments prove clearly that the only true religion is that which Jesus Christ Himself instituted, and which He charged the Church to guard and propagate.
l If it is easy to find the true religion, how is it that so many people do not find it? If so many people are unaware of the true religion, it is above all because so many sin out of negligence in this regard. They are unconcerned to know the truth about God but content themselves with the pleasures of this world, or with the habits and superstitions of where they live, which suffice to satisfy their religious sentiment. They lack thirst for the truth. Furthermore, many foresee that the true religion would demand sacrifices of them, which they do not want to make. Lastly, man is by nature a social animal: he needs help in every domain (physical, technical, intellectual, and moral) and depends a great deal on the society where he lives. If that society is Islamic or atheist (like our own), if school and the media turn him away from Christianity (and even stupefy him so as to keep him from thinking) it will be very difficult for him to swim against the tide.
15) Is faith necessary for salvation?
Sacred Scripture teaches that faith is absolutely necessary to obtain eternal salvation. "He that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved: but he that believeth not shall be condemned" (Mk. 16:16). St. Paul teaches: "But without faith it is impossible to please God" (Heb. 11:6).
l What faith is necessary for salvation? The faith necessary for salvation is not any faith whatsoever, but the true faith, which adheres in a supernatural manner to the true doctrine revealed by God.
l Is the necessity of true doctrine apparent in Sacred Scripture? The necessity of keeping true doctrine is manifest in the repeated warnings of the Apostles in regard to heretics and disbelievers:
For there shall be a time, when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: And will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables (II Tim. 4:3-4).
l Are those who, through no fault of their own, do not adhere to revealed truths necessarily damned? God gives every man the possibility of saving himself. He who is ignorant of the truths of the Faith without any fault on his part will obtain from God, at one time or another, if he does everything possible to live well, the possibility of receiving sanctifying grace. But it is evident that anyone who does not profess the true religion by his own fault will be eternally damned.
l Is the true Faith thus of sovereign importance? Indeed it is. This is not a matter of vain controversy among theologians, but of the eternal salvation or misery of immortal souls.
Translated exclusively for Angelus Press from Katholischer Katechismus zur kirchlichen Kriese by Fr. Matthias Gaudron, professor at the Herz Jesu Seminary of the Society of St. Pius X in Zaitzkofen, Germany. The original was published in 1997 by Rex Regum Press, with a preface by the District Superior of Germany, Fr. Franz Schmidberger. This translation is based on the second edition published in 1999 by Rex Regum Verlag, Schloß Jaidhof, Austria. Subdivisions and slight revisions made by the Dominican Fathers of Avrillé have been incorporated into the translation.
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