February 2008 Print

Fr. Francis Knittel

 

"Christians and Muslims, we have many things in common, as believers and as human beings....We believe in the same God, the one God, the living God, the God who created the world and brings His creatures to their perfection."¹

These were the words of Pope John Paul II to young Moroccans in August 1985. He was but repeating the substance of his address to the Hebrew community in Mainz concerning Judeo-Catholic dialogue: "First of all, it is a question of a dialogue between two religions which–together with Islam–were able to give to the world the faith in one ineffable God who speaks to us and whom we want to serve in the name of the whole world.^"2

According to the Pontiff, it would seem that Christianity, Judaism, and Islam adore the same God. Can we infer from this that all religions adore the same God? The practice of interreligious peace meetings (the first such meeting was organized in Assisi in October 1986) would seem to give credit to this idea. Doubtless such a doctrine, supported by so conclusive a practice, would, at first sight, seem attractive for our contemporaries. Yet can it withstand the examination of common sense and of the Catholic Faith? This is what we will examine first, before answering some objections.

Common Sense

Because of their desire for unity and in order to bring to an end the endless fight between truth and errors, many of our contemporaries have made for themselves a notion of truth which suits them. No one could ever possess the whole truth. In fact, each would have only one aspect of the truth. In the religious realm, this is expressed in the following manner: all religions tell us about God, but from different and complementary viewpoints.

The Negation of the Principle of Non-Contradiction

Now, to admit this opinion is tantamount to abolishing both the use of intelligence and of speech. For either these truths are partial and non-contradictory truths and complement one another to give us a more profound knowledge of reality; or they are contradictory, and then one is false.

Two affirmations about the same object considered from two different viewpoints can be simultaneously true. On the contrary, two diametrically opposed affirmations about the same object and from the same viewpoint cannot both be true: one is certainly false.

Let us take a concrete example. If I state that my car is blue and the person I am talking to tells me it is a Cadillac, we may both be right. On the contrary, if I affirm that my car is blue and the other person denies it, one of us is certainly wrong.

Religions in General

Now, what do we observe between the various religions? They are mutually contradictory on essential points of their respective doctrines. Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange made this very simple observation:

There are between the various religions numerous contrarieties and contradictions:

a) As to the truths to believe: between polytheism, pantheism, and monotheism; likewise also inasmuch as Christianity admits the divinity of Jesus Christ, which is denied by Judaism and Islam; likewise according as the infallibility of the Church is acknowledged or rejected by Protestants.

b) As to the precepts: polygamy and divorce are allowed by many religions and forbidden by others and cannot be under the same circumstances both licit and illicit.

c) As to the worship: some are pure and honest, others are in themselves inhuman and shameful. It is injurious to say that God would consider with equanimity all religions when one teaches the truth while the other teaches falsehood, when one promises the good and the other evil. To say this would be to affirm that God would be indifferent to good and evil, to what is honest or shameful.³

Simple reflection and common sense show that religions have fundamental dogmas that are contradictory and irreconcilable. We must now consider this more specifically for Islam and Judaism.

Islam

What does Islam think regarding some of the fundamental points of the Catholic faith?⁴

• The Trinity: "Certainly they disbelieve who say: Surely Allah is the third (person) of the three."⁵ "Say not, Three. Allah is only one God; far be It from His glory that He should have a son."⁶

• The Incarnation: "Surely the likeness of Jesus is with Allah as the likeness of Adam; He created him from dust, then said to him, Be, and he was."⁷ "The heavens may almost be rent thereat, and the earth cleave asunder, and the mountains fall down in pieces, that they ascribe a son to the Beneficent God."⁸

• The Crucifixion and Redemption: "And their saying: Surely we have killed the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, the apostle of Allah; and they did not kill him nor did they crucify him. But they substituted another man who looked like him."⁹

Such doctrines are altogether opposed to the Catholic Faith. How could they lead us to adore one and the same God? Professor Roger Arnaldez underlines this when, speaking of monotheism, he writes:

Under the name of monotheism, we mix everything. That there is only one God, they are many to believe it. The fundamental question, which as a rule is forgotten because we persuade ourselves that unicity covers everything, is to know who is this one God. Then monotheism breaks up, and means nothing more than a label under which we classify anything.

Let us suppose that a man is convinced that such a standing stone is the one God and addresses it in his prayers. What right would we have to refuse to acknowledge him as a monotheist? And what about the theists? Christian theologians have always considered them as enemies, and yet they believe in one God: Voltaire was a monotheist.

Yet, will you tell me, he attacked Christian teaching: so does the Koran, which denies the three essential mysteries of Christianity: the Trinity, the Incarnation, and the Redemption.¹⁰

Speaking more specifically of Islam, the same author continues his reflections:

It is obvious that if God is one and not triune, it is wrong to affirm the Trinity: but conversely, if God is one and triune, it is wrong to say that He is one and not triune. It is logically inadmissible that the one and triune God be identical with the one and non-triune God. Now, the Koran, the Word of God, attacks the Trinity. The one God which attacks the Trinity cannot merge with the God Who is one and triune.¹¹

Hence we must conclude that what Islam believes is not identical with the Catholic Faith. Objectively speaking, Catholics do not have the same God as Muslims.

Judaism

What are we now to think of Judaism?

It is true that the Judaism of the Old Testament prepared the world for the coming of Christ. This is the reason why God safeguarded the Jewish people from polytheism and kept it in monotheism. But the Gospel will reveal to us that there are unsuspected riches in this one God: the Trinity of the persons. The mystery of the Trinity is the development and the achievement willed by God of the mystery of His unicity. Consequently, we must say that the One God of the Old Testament and the God-Trinity of the New Testament are identical.

Doubtless it will be objected that the God who revealed Himself to the Sons of Israel did not make Himself known as triune. This is exact, yet it does not prevent Him from being the God of the Christians, first because the Bible, unlike the Koran, and for a very good reason, does not teach that God is not triune; next, because the Bible revelation, through a biblical pedagogy easily discernible, leads directly to its fulfillment in the Christian revelation.¹²

The God to which the Jews pray today is a God who is one, but He is most of all anti-trinitarian. Indeed, if Catholic dogma defines the mystery of the Trinity as "the mystery of one God in three equal and distinct persons," the Jews could define their doctrine on God: "the mystery of one God in one person." So, is it one or three persons? In reality, the two doctrines are irreconcilable.

The opposition between Catholicism and Judaism crystallizes especially around the person of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Is He the Son of God and God Himself? Yes, answer the Catholics. No, retort the Jews. So, is He God or not? We must choose: these two affirmations cannot be simultaneously true.¹³

This opposition about Our Lord Jesus Christ is felt as such by the Jews themselves. Albert Memmi, a Jew from Tunisia, wrote the following in 1962:

Do the Christians always realize what the name of Jesus, their God, can mean for a Jew? For a Jew who has never ceased to believe and to practice his own religion, Christianity is the greatest theological and metaphysical usurpation of his history; it is a blasphemy, a spiritual scandal, and a subversion.

For every Jew, even atheists, the name of Jesus is the symbol of a threat, of this great threat that has been hanging over their heads for centuries and which could burst into catastrophes, without their knowing why nor how to prevent them. This name is part and parcel of the absurd and crazy accusation of a frightful cruelty, which makes their social life hardly bearable. This name has eventually become for them one of the signs, one of the names of the great machinery that surrounds, condemns, and excludes them.

May our Christian friends forgive me; but that they may better catch my meaning and to use their own language, I would say that for the Jews their [Christian] God is, as it were, the devil, if, as they say, the devil is the symbol and the summary of all that is evil, iniquitous, and almighty, incomprehensible on earth, and obstinately trying to crush bewildered human beings....¹⁴

The reaction of Edith Stein's mother after her daughter's conversion to Catholicism is also symptomatic of the attitude of today's Jews towards Jesus Christ: "I have nothing against him....He may have been a good man....But why did he make himself like unto God?"¹⁵

This negation of the divinity of Christ is the cement that bonds today's Jews among themselves and with all of those who had the Messiah condemned to death:

It is clear to anyone who reads the Gospels that Jesus was condemned by the Sanhedrin for a religious reason: the accusation of blasphemy. A man who introduces himself as the Messiah and the Son of God without really being so is a blasphemer worthy of death. Now, subsequent generations of Jews deny that Jesus be the Messiah and the Son of God. With this negation, they logically subscribe in principle to the judgment which motivated Jesus' condemnation by the Sanhedrin, even if, in fact, they do not pronounce a death sentence, and, most of the time, do not think of it.¹⁶

From what has been said above, we must conclude that the God adored by the Catholics and that to whom contemporary Jews pay homage is not the same.

Knowledge of God: Complete or Inexistent?

By way of conclusion, let us return to the current conviction according to which all religions speak to us of God, but from different and complementary viewpoints. The question is, can we have a partial knowledge of God?

St. Thomas answers in the negative, because partial error in the knowledge of a reality as simple as God is no knowledge at all:

If they [pagans] had some speculative knowledge of God, it was mixed with many errors: some deprived Him of His providence over all things, others make of Him the soul of the world, others still adored several gods at the same time. For this reason, we say that they did not know God.

If composite realities can be partially known and partially unknown: on the contrary, simple things are not known as soon as they are not completely known. Hence, if some err even a little in their knowledge of God, they are said to have no knowledge of Him at all.¹⁷

Not knowing who God is, those who do not know Him cannot adore Him. The opinion according to which all religions adore the same God is unacceptable merely from the viewpoint of common sense in which all men share. What is more, for Catholics this opinion is a blasphemy because it is equivalent to considering Christ as an impostor and His teachings as so many lies.

The Catholic Faith

When we address Catholics, we must change our method of arguing. Indeed, for our argument to bear fruit, it must rest on common principles: reason alone when we discuss with pagans, the Old Testament in our disputations with the Jews, the whole Bible if we address heretics, schismatics, or Catholics.¹⁸

Now, what do Catholics read in the New Testament? All of Christ's teaching insists on the necessity of going through Him to reach the Father. The knowledge of Jesus Christ and obedience to His precepts are not optional: they are essential. The following quotes call for no comment:

"I am the way, and the truth, and the life" (Jn. 14:6).

"I am the door" (Jn. 10:7).

"I am the good Shepherd." (Jn. 10:14).

"I am the light of the world" (Jn. 8:12).

"That whosoever believeth in the Son, may not perish, but may have life everlasting" (Jn. 3:16).

"If you believe not that I am he, you shall die in your sin" (Jn. 8:24).

"He who honoureth not the Son, honoureth not the Father, who hath sent him" (Jn. 5:23).

"He that is not with me, is against me" (Mt. 12:30).

"For there is no other name under heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved" (Acts 4:12).

"Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father. He that confesseth the Son, hath the Father also" (I Jn. 2:23).

When they read these texts, how can Catholics still believe that all religions adore the same God, since, apart from Catholicism, all religions refuse to go through the only mediator acceptable to God, Jesus Christ? How much they have lost the Faith those "Catholics" who no longer even believe the words of Christ!

Objections

Yet, some will say, could we not consider false religions as stepping stones, useful to pass progressively from partial truths on to the complete truth? Certainly, any error always contains a part of truth. Yet let us beware of this illusion, which Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., exposed: "In a globally false doctrine, truth is not the soul of the doctrine, but the slave of error."¹⁹

And Louis Jugnet, a philosophy professor, expanded on this as follows:

Catholic theologians do not at all mean to deny that some truths can be found in Protestantism, Judaism, or Brahmanism. But such is not the question; it is to know whether those truths are, as it were, at ease, free, and "at home" in opposing doctrines. Now, what we think, is that these truths play only a partial, fragmentary, and incomplete role. They are wrapped up in blatant errors which warp them and distort their true meaning, and thus, what predominates in a false doctrine, and what causes it to run the risk of being really disastrous, is the spirit of error and of negation.

For instance: Judaism and Islam always insist on God's unity (which is a truth), yet they do it intentionally and unilaterally so as to exclude the dogma of the Trinity. Luther lays stress on the fact that grace alone justifies, and taken at its face value, this formula is true: but for him, it excludes the Catholic economy of the sacraments, and so on. Likewise Kant does see that knowledge is an act, but he conceives this activity as blind and creative, and not capable of attaining Being. Marx does see the role, too often ignored, of the economic factor, but he gives it an exclusive and unacceptable extent, and so on.

In these doctrines, all is not false in details, but the spirit of error contaminates everything. If partial truths are acceptable and assimilable it is only on condition of being taken away from the false doctrines (hence, there must first be a criticism of the error) and, as it were, "baptized" and re-thought in another perspective.²⁰

But would it not be better to leave non-Catholics in invincible ignorance? It would be sufficient to lead them to heaven, since such ignorance is supposed to be non-culpable. On the contrary, if they knew the true religion and refused it, their refusal would be culpable and would lead them to damnation.

This way of reckoning is hardly supernatural, and not at all respectful of the human mind created to know and love God. It also forgets that the boundary between invincible and culpable ignorance is God's secret for every man in particular. How could we thus play poker with the eternal salvation of our neighbor? Lastly, it passes over in silence the pressing advice of Pope Pius XII to those who are not yet visible members of the Church. He urged them to seek to withdraw from that state in which they cannot be sure of their salvation. For even though by an unconscious desire and longing they have a certain relationship with the Mystical Body of the Redeemer, they still remain deprived of those many heavenly gifts and helps which can only be enjoyed in the Catholic Church.²¹

Conclusion

Hence, it is an error contrary to reason and to the Catholic Faith to let Catholics and non-Catholics believe that we all adore the same God. It is a lack of charity for those who have gone astray because it keeps them in error. It is a lack of charity towards Catholics, because it places them in danger of losing the Catholic Faith. So what are we to do?

Catholic doctrine tells us that the primary duty of charity does not lie in the toleration of false ideas, however sincere they may be, nor in the theoretical or practical indifference towards the errors and vices in which we see our brethren plunged....Further, whilst Jesus was kind to sinners and to those who went astray, He did not respect their false ideas, however sincere they might have appeared. He loved them all, but He instructed them in order to convert them and save them.²²

Fr. François Knittel was ordained for the Society of Saint Pius X in 1989. He served as District Superior of Mexico for several years, and is now head of a priory in France.

 

This is reprinted with permission from Christendom, No.14, the bimonthly magazine of the SSPX's international news bureau DICI (www.dici.org).

 

¹ Pope John Paul II, Meeting with Young Muslims in the Stadium of Casablanca, August 19, 1985. Unless otherwise specified, papal documents are taken from www.vatican.va.

² Translation ours.

³ "Adest inter diversas religiones contrarietes et contradictio multipliciter: a) quoad veritates credendas, inter polytheismum, pantheismum, monotheismum; item prout admittitur in christianismo divinitas Jesu Christi quae rejicitur a judaismo et islamismo; item prout agnoscitur infallibilitas Ecclesiae catholicae aut e contra rejicitur a protestantibus; b) quoad praecepta, polygamia et divortium, quae in multis religionibus permittuntur, et in aliis prohibentur, non possunt esse simul licita et illicita in iisdem circumstantiis; c) quoad cultum, alii cultus sunt puri et honesti, alii vero secundum se inhumani et libidinosi. Injuriosum est Deo dicere, Deum aequo animo respicere omnes religiones, quarum una verum, alterafalsum edocet, quarum una bonum, altera malum promovet. Hoc est dicere, Deum indifferenter se habere ad verum et falsum, ad honestum et inhonestum" (Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., De Revelatione [Paris: Gabalda, 1921], II, 437).

⁴ Cf. SiSiNoNo, No. 326, June, 1992, pp. 1-7 (French edition).

⁵ The Koran, 5, 73.

⁶ The Koran 4, 171.

⁷ The Koran 3, 59.

⁸ The Koran 19, 90-91.

⁹ The Koran 4, 157.

¹⁰ Roger Arnaldez, "Réflexion sur le Dieu du Coran du point de vue de la logique formelle," in Annie Laurent et al., Vivre avec l'Islam? (Versailles: Editions St. Paul, 1997), pp. 130-31.

¹¹ Ibid., p. 132.

¹² Ibid.

¹³ Cf. SiSiNoNo, No. 319, November 1991, pp. 1-5 (French edition).

¹⁴ Albert Memmi, Portrait d'un Juif (1962), quoted in Archbishop Lefebvre's The Mystery of Jesus.

¹⁵ Joachim Bouflet, Edith Stein, philosophe crucifiée (Paris: Presses de la Renaissance, 1998), p. 208.

¹⁶ Ansgar Santogrossi, L'Evangile prêché à  Israël (Clovis, 2002), p. 48.

¹⁷ Sed si quid speculativa cognitione de Deo cognoscebant, hoc erat cum admixtione multorum errorum, dum quidam subtraherent omnium rerum providentiam; quidam diceret eum esse animam mundi; quidam simul cum eo multos alios deos colerent. Unde dicuntur Deum ignorare. Licet enim in compositis possit partim sciri et partim ignorari; in simplicibus tamen dum non attinguntur totaliter, ignorantur. Unde etsi in minimo errent circa Dei cognitionem, dicuntur eum totaliter ignorare. (Super Joannem, c. 17, lect. 6, No. 2265).

¹⁸ "Some of them, as Mohammedans and Pagans, do not agree with us in recognizing the authority of any scripture, available for their conviction, as we can argue against the Jews from the Old Testament, and against heretics from the New. But these receive neither" (Summa Contra Gentiles, Book I, Ch. 2).

¹⁹ "In doctrina simpliciter falsa, veritas non est una anima doctrinae, sed serva erroris" (Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., De Revelatione, II, 436).

²⁰ Quoted in SiSiNoNo, No. 283, June 1988, p.8 (French edition).

²¹ Encyclical Mystici Corporis, §103 (June 29, 1943).

²²Pope St. Pius X, Encyclical Notre Charge Apostolique (Our Apostolic Mandate), August 25, 1910.