Sect. 46Doctrine of the Vatican Council on the Understanding of FaithDoctrine of the Vatican Council on the Understanding of Faith

I. We have now to consider how far we can understand the supernatural truths or mysteries which we believe on the authority of God and the Church. Rationalists and Agnostics of all times have held that no understanding is possible of things beyond the sphere of natural reason. Abelard and some theologians of the thirteenth century, and in modern times Günther and Frohschammer, were of opinion that nothing is beyond the grasp of human reason, and, consequently, that supernatural truths can be demonstrated by reason, and that Faith can be replaced by knowledge. Other theologians allow the co-existence of Faith with knowledge, pretending that reason adds a new certitude to Faith.

II. Against these errors the Vatican Council teaches that some understanding of mysteries is possible, and it lays down its conditions and rules: “When Reason enlightened by Faith maketh diligent, pious, and sober inquiry, she attaineth, by God’s gift, most fruitful knowledge of mysteries, both from the analogy of things naturally known and from the relation of mysteries with one another and with the end of man.” Then the Council sets forth that this understanding is less clear and less perfect than our understanding of things natural: “Still she (Reason) is never rendered fit to perceive them in the same way as the truths which are her own proper object. For the Divine mysteries, by their very nature, so far surpass the created intellect that, even when conveyed by Revelation and received by Faith, they remain covered by the veil of the Faith and, as it were, hidden by a cloud, as long as in this mortal life we are absent from the Lord, for we walk by faith and not by sight” (sess. iii., chap. 4).

III. Faith, then, seeking after understanding (fides quærens intellectum) first adapts the natural notions of the mind to things Divine by determining the analogies or likenesses between the two orders. An understanding is thus obtained of the several mysteries varying in perfection with the perfection of the analogical conceptions. Further, comparing the mysteries with one another, and grouping them in the order determined by the principle of causality, the mind, enlightened by Faith, contemplates a magnificent cycle, beginning and ending with God, and constituted after the manner of a living organism. Unity is given to this noble cosmos of supernature by the terminus to which every part of it is directed—the glory of God in the Beatific Vision, which is also the last end of man.

Practical illustrations of this theory will be found in every chapter of the following treatises; for the harmony of the whole, see the Division of the work given at the end of the Introduction.

IV. The Understanding of Faith cannot lead to any independent certitude, nor can it afford any additional certitude to the certitude of Faith. Its only effect is to facilitate and strengthen the act of Faith by removing apparent difficulties, and by inducing the mind to accept truths so beautifully in harmony with one another and with the Nature of God and the nature of man. The Understanding of Faith has, therefore, a moral rather than a purely logical character, and corresponds with the pious dispositions of the will which incline to Faith. Its moral persuasiveness is felt more as regards the first principles of the supernatural order; its logical persuasiveness is more manifest in connection with inferred truths.