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Page 17
These implicit truths are deduced from the original revelation, very
much as any other consequence from its premisses. For example. It is a
truth directly revealed, that the _Holy Ghost is God_. But, since God
is to be adored: the further proposition:--_the Holy Ghost is to be
adored_; is also contained, though only implicitly, in revelation;
and is therefore, equally, of faith. So again; that Christ is man, is
a fact of revelation; but the further proposition--Christ has a true
body--though not explicitly stated, is implicitly affirmed in the
first proposition. All consequences, such as the above, which are seen
immediately and evidently to be contained in the words of revelation,
must be accepted as of faith. Other consequences, which are equally
contained in the original deposit, but which are not so readily
detected and deduced, _must be explicitly_ accepted as of faith, only
so soon as the Church has publicly and authoritatively declared them
to be so contained; but not before. Thus, to take an illustration, the
Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin is a fact contained from
the beginning, implicitly locked up, as it were, in the deposit of
faith, left by the Apostles. Were it not so it never could have been
defined; for the Church does not invent doctrines. She only transmits
them. Yet, this doctrine is not so clearly and so self-evidently
included, and lies not so luminously and unmistakably on the very
surface of revelation as to be at once perceptible to all. Hence,
before its actual definition, a Catholic might deny it, or suspend his
judgment, without censure; whereas, to do either the one or the other,
after the Church has solemnly declared the doctrine to be contained in
the teaching of Christ and the Apostles, would be nothing short of
heresy.
"The Infallibility, whether of the Church or of the Pope," says
Cardinal Newman, "acts principally or solely in two channels, (_a_) in
direct statement of truth, and (_b_) in the condemnation of error. The
former takes the shape of doctrinal definitions, the latter
stigmatises propositions as 'heretical,' 'next to heresy,'
'erroneous,' and the like" (p. 136).
The gift of Infallibility, observes Cardinal Manning, "extends
_directly_ to the whole matter of divine truth, and _indirectly_ to
all truths which, though not revealed, are in such contact with
revelation that the deposit of faith and morals cannot be guarded,
expounded, and defended, without an infallible discernment of such
unrevealed truths" (_Vatican Decrees_, p. 167).
8. To sum up: Persons who refuse to assent to doctrines which they
know to be directly revealed and defined, or which are universally
held by the Church as of Catholic Faith, become by that very act
guilty of heresy, and cut themselves adrift from the mystical Body of
Christ, and are no longer His members. If, on the other hand, their
assent is refused only to doctrines closely connected with these
dogmatic utterances, and which, as such, are proposed for their
acceptance, they become guilty, if not of actual heresy, then of
something perilously akin to it, and are, at all events, guilty of
serious sin.
We may observe, in conclusion, that the Infallibility of Pontifical
definitions, as Father Humphrey so pertinently reminds us, does not
depend upon the reigning Pontiff's possession of any real knowledge of
ancient Church history or theology, or philosophy or science, but
_simply_ and solely upon the assistance of God the Holy Ghost,
guaranteed to him in his exercise of his function of Chief Pastor, in
feeding with divine doctrine the entire flock of God. Our Anglican
friends seem penetrated with the utterly false notion of justification
by scholarship alone; which is as untrue as it is unscriptural.
Indeed, their justification by scholarship is likely to lead to very
undesirable and deplorable results.
In the foregoing chapter we have considered especially the Pope's
Infallible authority, and the assent and obedience due to it. In our
next it remains for us to consider the proper attitude of a loyal
Catholic towards the Sovereign Pontiff as the supreme ruler and
governor of the Church of God, even when not speaking _ex cathedr�_.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 7: The word _soma_, observes Mgr. Capel, is never used in
Greek to express _mere_ association or aggregation (_Catholic_, p.
13).]
[Footnote 8: From a Pastoral of the Swiss Bishops, which _received the
Pope's approbation_.]
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