Regina Apostolorum University Department of Philosophy

Dei Filius and the Fides et Ratio Problem

Defining the boundaries for Contemporary Christian Philosophy

Rogrio Tadeu Mesquita Marques, BA, PhB

Table of Contents

Introduction ......................................................................................................................................3 Chapter I...........................................................................................................................................5 The battle between Faith and Reason ..............................................................................................5 1. Anathema sit Defending the faith against Philosophy ........................................5 2. Multorum mens in pantheismi, materialismi, atheismi prolapsa barathrum- Reason tries to rescind faith ........................................................................................................6 3. Dogmata errores damnati atque cohibiti Faith assures the Truth by Dogmas.........7 Chapter II .......................................................................................................................................10 Faith also seeks the Truth ..............................................................................................................10 1. De Revelatione The role of Revelation in the quest for the Truth ........................10 2. De Fide The nature of faith in the light of reason .................................................11 Chapter III ......................................................................................................................................12 The Conciliation: De Fide et ratione Faith and Reason together towards the Truth ...............12 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................................14 Bibliography .................................................................................................................................15

Introduction
During the Council of Trent the Church was obliged to defend the role of reason united to faith, affirming that faith cannot contradict reason at all, while Protestants were defending the sovereignty of faith alone. Although it is clear that the Tradition of the Church and its Magisterium have been always struggling to unite both ways of achieving the fullness of the truth, until the 19th century, after many Revolutions and the Enlightenment, the Magisterium of the Church had not spoken out on the union of faith and reason as a major concern as the unity of the Church, the primacy of the Pope and the formation of the clergy were. This happened just after the so called Age of Reason, during which faith was disregarded as secondary and that could not be attained with certainty because of its incapacity of being certificated by the empirical senses or by positive sciences that were hailed at the center stage. Therefore the Church, which has as its main mission the defense of the faith, had to secure its position from the perspective of modern philosophers that were rejecting the role of faith in human knowledge towards the truth and achieve it based on reason alone. As the first fruit of the First Vatican Council, on April 24th 1870 it was published the Dogmatic Constitution Dei Filius developing the union between faith and reason with basis on Pius IXs first Encyclical Qui pluribus and latter in Quanta Cura, in which he developed in addition with the Syllabus Errorum the position of the Church in relation to the errors of certain Philosophical systems that menaced the Christian faith and, therefore, would not lead to the truth.
In order to easily mislead the people into making errors, deceiving particularly the imprudent and the inexperienced, they pretend that they alone know the ways to prosperity. They claim for themselves without hesitation the name of philosophers. They feel as if philosophy, which is wholly concerned with the search for the truth in nature, ought to reject those truths which God Himself, the supreme and merciful creator of nature, has deigned to make plain to men as a special gift. With these truths, mankind can gain true happiness and salvation. So, by means of an obviously ridiculous and extremely specious kind of argumentation, these enemies never stop invoking the power and excellence of human reason; they raise it up against the most holy faith of Christ, and they blather with great foolhardiness that this faith is opposed to human reason.1

PIUS IX, Qui pluribus, 5.

It is clearly expressed by the word choice that the Pope had in mind the defense of the Depositum Fidei as his main purpose also taking into account the reality of the Catholic Church in the 19th Century. Then little by little his successors started developing this topic with a more philosophical approach, defending the faith philosophically, more than theologically.
For, since it is in the very nature of man to follow the guide of reason in his actions, if his intellect sins at all his will soon follows; and thus it happens that false opinions, whose seat is in the understanding, influence human actions and pervert them.2

LEO XIII, Aeterni Patris, 2.

Chapter I The battle between Faith and Reason

1. Anathema sit Ways of defending the Truth If anyone preach to you a gospel, besides that you have received, let him be anathema (Gal., I, 9). The tradition of anathematizing comes from the times of the apostles and has been used in dogmatic pronunciations of the Magisterium to make the statement clear for the sake of preserving the purity of the faith in contrast to the false doctrine proposed by the condemned heresies. Following this tradition the Vatican Council ends Dei Filius with a list of anathemas, like Pius IX had done before with the Syllabus Errorum. This might be the reason why the reading of this decree is so little spread among philosophers, because it is not as polite as the ones written after Vatican II, as Fides et Ratio. Although this might express the change of times, Mons. Francesco Valiante, doctor in Church History, assures that the Magisterium does not contradict past teachings, even more it confirms them.3 It is a fact that Dei Filius ends with a list of 18 articles that clearly condemn any form of Philosophy contrary to the faith calling each one of them heretical. From this point on the Magisterium shows a more clear awareness of preserving the faith not only by its own sake but above all for truth sake, appealing to the philosophers as a vocation that the Church shares with them geared to the fullness of the truth.
Crescat igitur et multum vehementerque proficiat, tam singulorum, quam omnium, tam unius hominis, quam totius Ecclesiae, aetatum ac saeculorum gradibus, intelligentia, scientia, sapientia; sed in suo dumtaxat genere, in eodem scilicet dogmate, eodem sensu, eademque sententia.4

At the same time, Pius IX calls upon their faith so that through revelation many philosophical errors may be avoided considering revelation and the proposed 18 points that

Io non conosco nessuna affermazione del Sillabo che contraddica apertamente il concilio Vaticano II: FRANCESCO M. VALIANTE, Fede e ragione nel pontificato di Mastai Ferretti, L'Osservatore Romano, 3 September, 2010 in http://www.vatican.va/news_services/or/or_quo/interviste/2010/202q08a1.html 4 VATICAN I, Dei Filius, De Fide et ratione, quoting VINCENTIUS LERINENSIS, Commonitorium primum,c.23 (PL 50, 668[A]).

Faith [may] free reason from all errors and wondrously enlighten, strengthen and perfect reason with the knowledge of divine matters5 fulfilling its own role in attaining the whole truth. 2. Multorum mens in pantheismi, materialismi, atheismi prolapsa barathrum- Reason tries to rescind faith The Age of Reason became like a Reformation by reason. Everything from the Church tradition, including philosophical, theological and scientific methods, was discarded. Obviously in a modern method that completely tried to avoid considering the millenary tradition of human thought shaped in the west by the Church, such intent would necessarily fall into mistakes which were dealt some centuries before and taken as errors. Now the Church already had a corpulent body of dogmas with which it could refer to with the certainty of achieving the truth, especially in Philosophical and Theological concepts, since that was its main occupation. But why did it take so long for the official Magisterium to pronounce clearly about the dogmatic relation between faith and reason? It seems that it was not necessary before. Everything looked under control, maybe with the help of the Inquisition. But in a revolutionary and reformed world little by little the Churchs position was being reduced to a trivial opinion, no more important than the philosophers in fashion. And the problem increased when the Congregation of the Holy Office started losing power in repressing such heresies. The world had begun its modernization and the Church was trying to catch up with it. Christendom was over.
It is not only in recent times that the Magisterium of the Church has intervened to make its mind known with regard to particular philosophical teachings. It is enough to recall, by way of example, the pronouncements made through the centuries concerning theories which argued in favor of the pre-existence of the soul, or concerning the different forms of idolatry and esoteric superstition found in astrological speculations, without forgetting the more systematic pronouncements against certain claims of Latin Averroism which were incompatible with the Christian faith.6

Certainly this was no novelty, but at the same time it was not having the same effect and that was a problem that made Pius IX start the tradition of dealing with it in his ordinary teaching. John Paul II justifies Pius position in the following number of Fides et Ratio:

5 6

PIUS IX, Qui pluribus, 6. JOHN PAUL II, Fides et Ratio, 52.

If the Magisterium has spoken out more frequently since the middle of the last century, it is because in that period not a few Catholics felt it their duty to counter various streams of modern thought with a philosophy of their own. At this point, the Magisterium of the Church was obliged to be vigilant lest these philosophies developed in ways which were themselves erroneous and negative. The censures were delivered even-handedly: on the one hand, fideism and radical traditionalism, for their distrust of reason's natural capacities, and, on the other, rationalism and ontologism because they attributed to natural reason a knowledge which only the light of faith could confer.7

Leo XIII, in Dei Filius, only highlights general erroneous tendencies of thought without labeling most of them, further on the Magisterium does not have any fear of connecting the points between condemned theories and actual philosophical theses. Pius X does that with Modernism and in numbers 53 and 54 of Fides et Ratio John Paul II confirms it with examples, basically using concepts from the anathema list of Dei Filius and calling each one by their own names.
In our own century too the Magisterium has revisited the theme on a number of occasions, warning against the lure of rationalism. Here the pronouncements of Pope Saint Pius X are pertinent, stressing as they did that at the basis of Modernism were philosophical claims which were phenomenist, agnostic and immanentist. Nor can the importance of the Catholic rejection of Marxist philosophy and atheistic Communism be forgotten. Later, in his Encyclical Letter Humani Generis, Pope Pius XII warned against mistaken interpretations linked to evolutionism, existentialism and historicism. He made it clear that these theories had not been proposed and developed by theologians, but had their origins outside the sheepfold of Christ. 8

3. Dogmata errores damnati atque cohibiti Dogmas coming to the aid of Philosophy
In these late days, when those dangerous times described by the Apostle are already upon us, when the blasphemers, the proud, and the seducers go from bad to worse, erring themselves and causing others to err, there is surely a very great need of confirming the dogmas of Catholic faith and confuting heresies.9

One may ask considering the position of the Churchs teaching: Why dogmas? Or at least why dogmas about reason? Although it may sound contradictory, or like an intend of manipulating reason by faith, what the Popes want ultimately is to defend the faith of the Church based on the premise that reason cannot contradict faith and vice-versa, since both come from the same source of truth.

7 8

Ibid. JOHN PAUL II, Fides et Ratio, 54. 9 LEO XIII, Aeterni Patris, 15.

Verum etsi fides sit supra rationem, nulla tamen umquam inter fidem et rationem vera dissensio esse potest: cum idem Deus, qui mysteria revelat et fidem infundit, animo humano rationis lumen indiderit; Deus autem negare seipsum non possit, nec verum vero umquam contradicere.Inanis autem huius contraditionis species inde potissimum oritur, quod vel fidei dogmata ad mentem Ecclesiae intellecta et exposita non fuerint, vel opinionum commenta pro rationis effatis habeantur.10

According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church11, dogma is not only some truths from Revelation but also other truths that have necessary connection with them. Philosophical truths are part of the latter group without which the sure contents of the faith may be jeopardized. The tradition of the Church does not only condemn philosophical errors in an ex cathedra argument, but it especially highlights the flaws in such doctrines also by use of reason. In this way the Church uses philosophical inquiry from early times to understand better certain thought trends and judging accordingly may adopt good points and obligatorily condemn heretical parts of it.
Nor did Irenaeus, the invincible martyr and Bishop of Lyons, win less glory in the same cause when, forcibly refuting the perverse opinions of the Orientals, the work of the Gnostics, scattered broadcast over the territories of the Roman Empire, he explained (according to Jerome) the origin of each heresy and in what philosophic source it took its rise.12

It is also a great concern of the Magisterium to protect the Church flock against the real traps that some common ideas preach and are generally accepted by the crowd as good. Though they do not seem like philosophical treatises, certainly there are wrong philosophical principles behind them and some heretical minority manipulating their propaganda and confusing the faithful with their mistaken truths. It is well known how moral issues are contrasted by nonCatholics with such ideas and the official teaching of the church goes rightly against them expressing with clarity and precision its position on the defense of the dignity of the person, considering the principle of Christian anthropology and not a merely utilitarian, reductionist one, so common in todays society.
To be preserved, guarded and interpreted, still the duty that is incumbent on the faithful to flee also those errors which more or less approach heresy, and accordingly to keep also the
10 11

VATICAN I, Dei Filius, De Fide et ratione. Ecclesiae Magisterium auctoritatem a Christo receptam plene adhibet, cum dogmata definit, id est, cum, modo populum christianum ad adhaesionem fidei irrevocabilem vinculante, veritates proponit in Revelatione divina contentas, vel etiam cum veritates cum his conexionem necessariam habentes modo proponit definitive.: Catechism of the Catholic Church, 88. 12 LEO XIII, Aeterni Patris, 12.

constitutions and decrees by which such evil opinions are proscribed and forbidden by the Holy See, is sometimes as little known as if it did not exist.13

13

PIUS XII, Humani Generis, 18.

Chapter II Faith also seeks the Truth

1. De Revelatione The role of Revelation in the quest for the Truth If the philosopher does not forget his main goal in making his philosophy, i.e., the quest for the truth, revelation is the most valuable thing that someone can receive. It is the truth without any possibility of error that, like milestones, marks its path as certain and has it as points of reference towards which he can contrast all other truths acquiring the truest knowledge.
Those, therefore, who to the study of philosophy unite obedience to the Christian faith, are philosophizing in the best possible way; for the splendor of the divine truths, received into the mind, helps the understanding, and not only detracts in nowise from its dignity, but adds greatly to its nobility, keenness, and stability. For surely that is a worthy and most useful exercise of reason when men give their minds to disproving those things which are repugnant to faith and proving the things which conform to faith.14

It ends up being a gift and a responsibility for the one who does accept revelation. A gift, because he is able through revelation to attain truths that human reason could never reach by itself; and a responsibility, because he is impelled to give reasons of his faith through his philosophy, convincing unbelievers of the truth.
We do not, indeed, attribute such force and authority to philosophy as to esteem it equal to the task of combating and rooting out all errors; for, when the Christian religion was first constituted, it came upon earth to restore it to its primeval dignity by the admirable light of faith, diffused not by persuasive words of human wisdom, but in the manifestation of spirit and of power, so also at the present time we look above all things to the powerful help of Almighty God to bring back to a right understanding the minds of man and dispel the darkness of error. But the natural helps with which the grace of the divine wisdom, strongly and sweetly disposing all things, has supplied the human race are neither to be despised nor neglected, chief among which is evidently the right use of philosophy.15

In the part about revelation in Dei Filius the Council Fathers anathematize the ones who preached that it is impossible to know God, creator and Lord, by natural

14 15

LEO XIII, Aeterni Patris, 9. LEO XIII, Aeterni Patris, 2.

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reason,16 or by divine revelation, or even to attain supernatural knowledge and perfection through Gods will. 2. De Fide The nature of faith in the light of reason For a philosopher to start considering the relation between faith and its understanding of the world, he first needs to know the boundaries of faith and its proper role in the quest for the truth.
Hanc vero fide () non propter intrinsecam rerum veritatem naturali rationis lumine perspectam, sed propter auctoritatem ipsius Dei revelantis, qui nec falli nec fallere potest. Est enim fides, testante Apostolo, sperandarum substantia rerum, argumentum non apparentium.17

Therefore faith does not rely on reason for being confirmed, although it cannot contradict it, faith leads reason and will to assent to divine truths that are beyond the rational ambit. It helps the faithful to adhere to the revelation and to live accordingly without any arguments, mainly because the created reason cedes to the uncreated Truth by the bond of faith.
Verum etsi fides sit supra rationem, nulla tamen umquam inter fidem et rationem vera dissensio esse potest: cum idem Deus, qui mysteria revelat et fidem infundit, animo humano rationis lumen indiderit; Deus autem negare seipsum non possit, nec verum vero umquam contradicere.18

At the end of Dei Filius the Canons about faith urge that any doctrine that denies the dependence of reason on faith, or that denies that it is necessary to believe in revelation being divine, that external signs about the faith are credible and faith does not rely only in internal experiences; it also condemned the denial of miracles, divine manifestation and freely acceptance of the faith, without any imposition by God. It also affirmed that faith does not need scientific demonstration and credibility. All these anathemas help philosophers to understand better the nature of the faith and set aside anything that end up being only straw-man arguments against the faith and its key role in dialogue with reason.

16

Deum, rerum omnium principium et finem, naturali humanae rationis lumine e rebus creatis certo cognosci posse: VATICAN I, Dei Filius, De Revelatione. 17 I VATICAN COUNCIL, Dogmatic Constitution Dei Filius, De Fide. 18 I VATICAN COUNCIL, Dogmatic Constitution Dei Filius, De Fide et Ratione.

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Chapter III The Conciliation: De Fide et ratione Faith and Reason together towards the Truth
And as the climax towards which the document has been building up, finally the Council reach the point of dealing with the problem of faith and reason for the first time to such an extent in the Magisterium of the Church. Interesting enough, there is no development on what reason would imply, as it is a supposed premise. Rather here they try to define the boundaries between both, so that following their own methods, principles and objects they may fulfill their own roles in attaining the truth with maximum certainty.
Hoc quoque perpetuus Ecclesiae catholicae consensus tenuit et tenet, duplicem esse ordinem cognitionis, non solum principio,sed obiecto etiam distinctum: principio quidem, quia in altero naturali ratione, in altero fide divina cognoscimus obiecto autem, quia praeter ea, ad quae naturalis ratio pertingere potest, credenda nobis proponuntur mysteria in Deo abscondita, quae nisi revelata divinitus, innotescere non possunt.19

From the Early Church there was the tradition of using reason to defend the faith, by apologetics; little by little reason became a greater tool to develop the Christian doctrine, especially in the scholastic method and in its main representative, Thomas Aquinas. Leo XIII followed the trend left by Dei Filius and wrote about the thomistic philosophical method as the standard of how to make Christian Philosophy.
Again, clearly distinguishing, as is fitting, reason from faith, while happily associating the one with the other, he both preserved the rights and had regard for the dignity of each; so much so, indeed, that reason, borne on the wings of Thomas to its human height, can scarcely rise higher, while faith could scarcely expect more or stronger aids from reason than those which she has already obtained through Thomas.20

Thomas used reason in such way that his main Theological work was held as a philosophical treatise. In Thomas, philosophy developed in many ways by means of the principles of Christian faith. This is the best example of a Christian philosopher and how truly faith and reason are, more than a problem, the two wings on which the human spirit rises to the

19 20

Ibid. LEO XIII, Aeterni Patris, 18.

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contemplation of truth.21 The invitation of the Magisterium is not to fly only with the wing of faith but to take up both and like Thomas to get as high as possible towards God who is the Truth sought by every human heart.
But it is most fitting to turn these truths, which have been discovered by the pagan sages even, to the use and purposes of revealed doctrine, in order to show that both human wisdom and the very testimony of our adversaries serve to support the Christian faith-a method which is not of recent introduction, but of established use, and has often been adopted by the holy Fathers of the Church.22

In the canons about faith and reason the thought that there is no mystery in revelation is condemned, and also that all dogmas may be demonstrated and proved, that human subjects may be true when they go against revelation and that it is possible for the Church to change dogmas according to scientific progress. All these three clearly delineate the role of reason in faith so that it does not make it rationalistic, making faith lose its essence.

21 22

JOHN PAUL II, Fides et Ratio, Introduction. LEO XIII, Aeterni Patris, 4.

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Conclusion
The Magisteriums pronouncements have been concerned less with individual philosophical theses than with the need for rational and hence ultimately philosophical knowledge for the understanding of faith. In synthesizing and solemnly reaffirming the teachings constantly proposed to the faithful by the ordinary Papal Magisterium, the First Vatican Council showed how inseparable and at the same time how distinct were faith and reason, Revelation and natural knowledge of God. The Council began with the basic criterion, presupposed by Revelation itself, of the natural knowability of the existence of God, the beginning and end of all things, and concluded with the solemn assertion quoted earlier: There are two orders of knowledge, distinct not only in their point of departure, but also in their object. Against all forms of rationalism, then, there was a need to affirm the distinction between the mysteries of faith and the findings of philosophy, and the transcendence and precedence of the mysteries of faith over the findings of philosophy. Against the temptations of fideism, however, it was necessary to stress the unity of truth and thus the positive contribution which rational knowledge can and must make to faith's knowledge: Even if faith is superior to reason there can never be a true divergence between faith and reason, since the same God who reveals the mysteries and bestows the gift of faith has also placed in the human spirit the light of reason. This God could not deny himself, nor could the truth ever contradict the truth.23

In the text above John Paul II recognizes the primacy of Dei Filius in Church Magisterium regarding the necessary relationship between faith and reason. When someone studies the social doctrine of the Church he necessarily must start with Rerum Novarum; although Caritas in Veritate may give more modern inputs the principles that Pope Benedict uses are based in Leo XIIIs encyclical with the whole tradition developed by his successors; likewise in matters of life issues and sexuality it is obligatory to start with Humanae Vitae, though Evangelium Vitae and some recent documents of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith may give more useful explanations. In a clear parallel Christian Philosophers must be acquainted with Dei Filius, even if its anathema sit may scare some. This is the beginning of the clear contribution of the Magisterium to modern philosophical inquiry. It does not intend to cut off the freedom of the philosopher, but totally the opposite, like the Decalogue its main purpose is to set the thinker free from errors and help him to attain, with Thomas and more than Thomas, to unthinkable heights of the truth.

23

JOHN PAUL II, Fides et Ratio, 53.

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Bibliography
I VATICAN COUNCIL, Dogmatic Constitution Dei Filius, ASS 05 (1869-70), 481-493. Catechism of the Catholic Church, Libreria Editrice Vaticana,Vatican City, 1993. FRANCESCO M. VALIANTE, Fede e ragione nel pontificato di Mastai Ferretti, L'Osservatore Romano, 3 September 2010 in http://www.vatican.va/news_services/or/or_quo/interviste/2010/ 202q08a1.html. JOHN PAUL II, Fides et Ratio, AAS 91 (1999), 5-88. LEO XIII, Aeterni Patris, ASS 12 (1879), 97-115. PIUS IX, Qui Pluribus, DS 2775-2786. PIUS XII, Humani Generis, AAS 42 (1950), 561-578.

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