On the 101st Anniversary of St. Pius X's Our Apostolic Mandate, A Refutation of French Revolutionary Ideas
Showing posts with label Encyclicals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Encyclicals. Show all posts
Monday, August 15, 2011
"The true friends of the people are neither revolutionaries, nor innovators: they are traditionalists"
On the 101st Anniversary of St. Pius X's Our Apostolic Mandate, A Refutation of French Revolutionary Ideas
Sunday, July 03, 2011
Modernism in 65 Concise Propositions
On the 104rd Anniversary of Pope St. Pius X's Syllabus of Errors
The Holy Roman and Universal Inquisition, Syllabus Condemning the Errors of Modernism (Lamentabili sane), Approved by Pope St. Pius X, 4 July 1907:
With truly lamentable results, our age, casting aside all restraint in its search for the ultimate causes of things, frequently pursues novelties so ardently that it rejects the legacy of the human race. Thus it falls into very serious errors, which are even more serious when they concern sacred authority, the interpretation of Sacred Scripture, and the principal mysteries of Faith. The fact that many Catholic writers also go beyond the limits determined by the Fathers and the Church herself is extremely regrettable. In the name of higher knowledge and historical research (they say), they are looking for that progress of dogmas which is, in reality, nothing but the corruption of dogmas.
These errors are being daily spread among the faithful. Lest they captivate the faithful's minds and corrupt the purity of their faith, His Holiness, Pius X, by Divine Providence, Pope, has decided that the chief errors should be noted and condemned by the Office of this Holy Roman and Universal Inquisition.
Therefore, after a very diligent investigation and consultation with the Reverend Consultors, the Most Eminent and Reverend Lord Cardinals, the General Inquisitors in matters of faith and morals have judged the following propositions to be condemned and proscribed. In fact, by this general decree, they are condemned and proscribed.
1. The ecclesiastical law which prescribes that books concerning the Divine Scriptures are subject to previous examination does not apply to critical scholars and students of scientific exegesis of the Old and New Testament.
2. The Church's interpretation of the Sacred Books is by no means to be rejected; nevertheless, it is subject to the more accurate judgment and correction of the exegetes.
3. From the ecclesiastical judgments and censures passed against free and more scientific exegesis, one can conclude that the Faith the Church proposes contradicts history and that Catholic teaching cannot really be reconciled with the true origins of the Christian religion.
4. Even by dogmatic definitions the Church's magisterium cannot determine the genuine sense of the Sacred Scriptures.
5. Since the deposit of Faith contains only revealed truths, the Church has no right to pass judgment on the assertions of the human sciences.
6. The "Church learning" and the "Church teaching" collaborate in such a way in defining truths that it only remains for the "Church teaching" to sanction the opinions of the "Church learning."
7. In proscribing errors, the Church cannot demand any internal assent from the faithful by which the judgments she issues are to be embraced.
8. They are free from all blame who treat lightly the condemnations passed by the Sacred Congregation of the Index or by the Roman Congregations.
9. They display excessive simplicity or ignorance who believe that God is really the author of the Sacred Scriptures.
10. The inspiration of the books of the Old Testament consists in this: The Israelite writers handed down religious doctrines under a peculiar aspect which was either little or not at all known to the Gentiles.
11. Divine inspiration does not extend to all of Sacred Scriptures so that it renders its parts, each and every one, free from every error.
12. If he wishes to apply himself usefully to Biblical studies, the exegete must first put aside all preconceived opinions about the supernatural origin of Sacred Scripture and interpret it the same as any other merely human document.
13. The Evangelists themselves, as well as the Christians of the second and third generation, artificially arranged the evangelical parables. In such a way they explained the scanty fruit of the preaching of Christ among the Jews.
14. In many narrations the Evangelists recorded, not so much things that are true, as things which, even though false, they judged to be more profitable for their readers.
15. Until the time the canon was defined and constituted, the Gospels were increased by additions and corrections. Therefore there remained in them only a faint and uncertain trace of the doctrine of Christ.
16. The narrations of John are not properly history, but a mystical contemplation of the Gospel. The discourses contained in his Gospel are theological meditations, lacking historical truth concerning the mystery of salvation.
17. The fourth Gospel exaggerated miracles not only in order that the extraordinary might stand out but also in order that it might become more suitable for showing forth the work and glory of the Word lncarnate.
18. John claims for himself the quality of witness concerning Christ. In reality, however, he is only a distinguished witness of the Christian life, or of the life of Christ in the Church at the close of the first century.
19. Heterodox exegetes have expressed the true sense of the Scriptures more faithfully than Catholic exegetes.
20. Revelation could be nothing else than the consciousness man acquired of his revelation to God.
21. Revelation, constituting the object of the Catholic faith, was not completed with the Apostles.
22. The dogmas the Church holds out as revealed are not truths which have fallen from heaven. They are an interpretation of religious facts which the human mind has acquired by laborious effort.
23. Opposition may, and actually does, exist between the facts narrated in Sacred Scripture and the Church's dogmas which rest on them. Thus the critic may reject as false facts the Church holds as most certain.
24. The exegete who constructs premises from which it follows that dogmas are historically false or doubtful is not to be reproved as long as he does not directly deny the dogmas themselves .
25. The assent of faith ultimately rests on a mass of probabilities .
26. The dogmas of the Faith are to be held only according to their practical sense; that is to say, as preceptive norms of conduct and not as norms of believing.
27. The divinity of Jesus Christ is not proved from the Gospels. It is a dogma which the Christian conscience has derived from the notion of the Messias.
28. While He was exercising His ministry, Jesus did not speak with the object of teaching He was the Messias, nor did His miracles tend to prove it.
29. It is permissible to grant that the Christ of history is far inferior to the Christ Who is the object of faith.
30. In all the evangelical texts the name "Son of God'' is equivalent only to that of "Messias." It does not in the least way signify that Christ is the true and natural Son of God.
31. The doctrine concerning Christ taught by Paul, John, and the Councils of Nicea, Ephesus and Chalcedon is not that which Jesus taught but that which the Christian conscience conceived concerning Jesus.
32. It is impossible to reconcile the natural sense of the Gospel texts with the sense taught by our theologians concerning the conscience and the infallible knowledge of Jesus Christ.
33. Everyone who is not led by preconceived opinions can readily see that either Jesus professed an error concerning the immediate Messianic coming or the greater part of His doctrine as contained in the Gospels is destitute of authenticity.
34. The critics can ascribe to Christ a knowledge without limits only on a hypothesis which cannot be historically conceived and which is repugnant to the moral sense. That hypothesis is that Christ as man possessed the knowledge of God and yet was unwilling to communicate the knowledge of a great many things to His disciples and posterity.
35. Christ did not always possess the consciousness of His Messianic dignity.
36. The Resurrection of the Savior is not properly a fact of the historical order. It is a fact of merely the supernatural order (neither demonstrated nor demonstrable) which the Christian conscience gradually derived from other facts.
37. In the beginning, faith in the Resurrection of Christ was not so much in the fact itself of the Resurrection as in the immortal life of Christ with God.
38. The doctrine of the expiatory death of Christ is Pauline and not evangelical.
39. The opinions concerning the origin of the Sacraments which the Fathers of Trent held and which certainly influenced their dogmatic canons are very different from those which now rightly exist among historians who examine Christianity .
40. The Sacraments have their origin in the fact that the Apostles and their successors, swayed and moved by circumstances and events, interpreted some idea and intention of Christ.
41. The Sacraments are intended merely to recall to man's mind the ever-beneficent presence of the Creator.
42. The Christian community imposed the necessity of Baptism, adopted it as a necessary rite, and added to it the obligation of the Christian profession.
43. The practice of administering Baptism to infants was a disciplinary evolution, which became one of the causes why the Sacrament was divided into two, namely, Baptism and Penance.
44. There is nothing to prove that the rite of the Sacrament of Confirmation was employed by the Apostles. The formal distinction of the two Sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation does not pertain to the history of primitive Christianity.
45. Not everything which Paul narrates concerning the institution of the Eucharist (I Cor. 11:23-25) is to be taken historically.
46. In the primitive Church the concept of the Christian sinner reconciled by the authority of the Church did not exist. Only very slowly did the Church accustom herself to this concept. As a matter of fact, even after Penance was recognized as an institution of the Church, it was not called a Sacrament since it would be held as a disgraceful Sacrament.
47. The words of the Lord, "Receive the Holy Spirit; whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven them; and whose sins you shall retain, they are retained'' (John 20:22-23), in no way refer to the Sacrament of Penance, in spite of what it pleased the Fathers of Trent to say.
48. In his Epistle (Ch. 5:14-15) James did not intend to promulgate a Sacrament of Christ but only commend a pious custom. If in this custom he happens to distinguish a means of grace, it is not in that rigorous manner in which it was taken by the theologians who laid down the notion and number of the Sacraments.
49. When the Christian supper gradually assumed the nature of a liturgical action those who customarily presided over the supper acquired the sacerdotal character.
50. The elders who fulfilled the office of watching over the gatherings of the faithful were instituted by the Apostles as priests or bishops to provide for the necessary ordering of the increasing communities and not properly for the perpetuation of the Apostolic mission and power.
51. It is impossible that Matrimony could have become a Sacrament of the new law until later in the Church since it was necessary that a full theological explication of the doctrine of grace and the Sacraments should first take place before Matrimony should be held as a Sacrament.
52. It was far from the mind of Christ to found a Church as a society which would continue on earth for a long course of centuries. On the contrary, in the mind of Christ the kingdom of heaven together with the end of the world was about to come immediately.
53. The organic constitution of the Church is not immutable. Like human society, Christian society is subject to a perpetual evolution.
54. Dogmas, Sacraments and hierarchy, both their notion and reality, are only interpretations and evolutions of the Christian intelligence which have increased and perfected by an external series of additions the little germ latent in the Gospel.
55. Simon Peter never even suspected that Christ entrusted the primacy in the Church to him.
56. The Roman Church became the head of all the churches, not through the ordinance of Divine Providence, but merely through political conditions.
57. The Church has shown that she is hostile to the progress of the natural and theological sciences.
58. Truth is no more immutable than man himself, since it evolved with him, in him, and through him.
59. Christ did not teach a determined body of doctrine applicable to all times and all men, but rather inaugurated a religious movement adapted or to be adapted to different times and places.
60. Christian Doctrine was originally Judaic. Through successive evolutions it became first Pauline, then Joannine, finally Hellenic and Catholic.
61. It may be said without paradox that there is no chapter of Scripture, from the first of Genesis to the last of the Apocalypse, which contains a doctrine absolutely identical with that which the Church teaches on the same matter. For the same reason, therefore, no chapter of Scripture has the same sense for the critic and the theologian.
62. The chief articles of the Apostles' Creed did not have the same sense for the Christians of the first ages as they have for the Christians of our time.
63. The Church shows that she is incapable of effectively maintaining evangelical ethics since she obstinately clings to immutable doctrines which cannot be reconciled with modern progress.
64. Scientific progress demands that the concepts of Christian doctrine concerning God, creation, revelation, the Person of the Incarnate Word, and Redemption be re-adjusted.
65. Modern Catholicism can be reconciled with true science only if it is transformed into a non-dogmatic Christianity; that is to say, into a broad and liberal Protestantism.
The following Thursday, the fourth day of the same month and year, all these matters were accurately reported to our Most Holy Lord, Pope Pius X. His Holiness approved and confirmed the decree of the Most Eminent Fathers and ordered that each and every one of the above-listed propositions be held by all as condemned and proscribed.
PETER PALOMBELLI, Notary of the Holy Roman and Universal Inquisition.
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Does Distributism Hold Up to Rerum novarum and Quadragesimo anno?
And the 80th Anniversary of Pope Pius XI's Quadragesimo anno.
- Just to get you into the debate: read the post, "Why are Distributist Leaders Misleading their Aduience about Capitalism?," by Patrick Odou (in TraditionInAction.org).*
- Have you ever studied these two encyclicals? If you haven't, can you think of a better time to do so than now?! I would recommend you read Quadragesimo anno first, then Rerum novarum. Reading them in this order might help you avoid some misunderstandings about the latter.
- An excellent summary of traditional Catholic social doctrine is Ryan and Boland's The Principles of Catholic Politics, available on pdf from ITOPL.
* N.B.: I should not have to point out--but a number of complaints force me to do so--that I do not subscribe to everything that is affirmed (and especially the way in which it is affirmed) in TraditionInAction.org. My approach to issues is a bit more careful and reserved. Nonetheless, I am able to discern some very incisive and interesting points in some of its posts, and I find that much of what they write resonates especially well with a thoroughly traditional Catholic way of looking at things. I particularly benefitted from this article.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Pope Leo XIII on the Church's Authority over the State in Marriage Legislation
On the 131st Anniversary of Pope Leo XIII's Encyclical Arcanum (On Christian Marriage, Feb. 10, 1880)
Lastly should be borne in mind the great weight and crucial test of history, by which it is plainly proved that the legislative and judicial authority of which We are speaking has been freely and constantly used by the Church, even in times when some foolishly suppose the head of the State either to have consented to it or connived at it. It would, for instance, be incredible and altogether absurd to assume that Christ our Lord condemned the long-standing practice of polygamy and divorce by authority delegated to Him by the procurator of the province, or the principal ruler of the Jews. And it would be equally extravagant to think that, when the Apostle Paul taught that divorces and incestuous marriages were not lawful, it was because Tiberius, Caligula, and Nero agreed with him or secretly commanded him so to teach. No man in his senses could ever be persuaded that the Church made so many laws about the holiness and indissolubility of marriage (34), and the marriages of slaves with the free-born (35), by power received from Roman emperors, most hostile to the Christian name, whose strongest desire was to destroy by violence and murder the rising Church of Christ. Still less could anyone believe this to be the case, when the law of the Church was sometimes so divergent from the civil law that Ignatius the Martyr (36), Justin (37), Athenagoras (38), and Tertullian (39) publicly denounced as unjust and adulterous certain marriages which had been sanctioned by imperial law.
22. Furthermore, after all power had devolved upon the Christian emperors, the supreme pontiffs and bishops assembled in council persisted with the same independence and consciousness of their right in commanding or forbidding in regard to marriage whatever they judged to be profitable or expedient for the time being, however much it might seem to be at variance with the laws of the State. It is well known that, with respect to the impediments arising from the marriage bond, through vow, disparity of worship, blood relationship, certain forms of crime, and from previously plighted troth, many decrees were issued by the rulers of the Church at the Councils of Granada (40), Arles (41), Chalcedon (42), the second of Milevum (43), and others, which were often widely different from the decrees sanctioned by the laws of the empire. Furthermore, so far were Christian princes from arrogating any power in the matter of Christian marriage that they on the contrary acknowledged and declared that it belonged exclusively in all its fullness to the Church. In fact, Honorius, the younger Theodosius, and Justinian (44), also, hesitated not to confess that the only power belonging to them in relation to marriage was that of acting as guardians and defenders of the holy canons. If at any time they enacted anything by their edicts concerning impediments of marriage, they voluntarily explained the reason, affirming that they took it upon themselves so to act, by leave and authority of the Church (45), whose judgment they were wont to appeal to and reverently to accept in all questions that concerned legitimacy (46) and divorce (47); as also in all those points which in any way have a necessary connection with the marriage bond (48). The Council of Trent, therefore, had the clearest right to define that it is in the Church's power "to establish diriment impediments of matrimony" (49), and that "matrimonial causes pertain to ecclesiastical judges" (50).
23. (= Denz. 1854) Let no one, then, be deceived by the distinction which some civil jurists have so strongly insisted upon - the distinction, namely, by virtue of which they sever the matrimonial contract from the sacrament, with intent to hand over the contract to the power and will of the rulers of the State, while reserving questions concerning the sacrament of the Church. A distinction, or rather severance, of this kind cannot be approved; for certain it is that in Christian marriage the contract is inseparable from the sacrament, and that, for this reason, the contract cannot be true and legitimate without being a sacrament as well. For Christ our Lord added to marriage the dignity of a sacrament; but marriage is the contract itself, whenever that contract is lawfully concluded....
--------------
Notes:
34. Canones Apostolorum, 16 17, 18, ed. Fr. Lauchert, J. C. B. Mohr (Leipzig, 1896) p. 3.
35. Philosophumena (Oxford, 1851), i.e., Hippolytus, Refutation of All Heresies, 9, 12 (PG 16 3386D-3387A).
36. Epistola ad Polycarpum, cap. 5 (PG 5, 723-724).
37. Apolog. Maj., 15 (PG 6, 349A, B).
38. Legal. pro Christian., 32, 33 (PG 6, 963-968).
39. De coron. milit., 13 (PL 2, 116).
40. De Aguirre, Conc. Hispan., Vol. 1, can. 11.
41. Harduin, Act. Conch., Vol. 1, can. 11.
42. Ibid., can. 16.
43. Ibid., can. 17.
44. Novel., 137 (Justinianus, Novellae, ed. C. E. Z. Lingenthal, Leipzig, 1881, Vol. 2, p. 206).
45. Fejer, Matrim. ex instit. Chris. (Pest, 1835).
46. Cap. 3, De ord. cogn. (Corpus juris canonici, ed. cit., Part 2, col. 276).
47. Cap. 3, De divort. (ed. cit., Part 2, col. 720).
48. Cap. 13, Qui filii sint legit. (ed. cit., Part 2, col. 716).
49. Trid., sess. xxiv, can. 4.
50. Ibid., can. 12.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Ven. Pius XII on the Old and New Liturgical Movements
From Ven. Pope Pius XII's Encyclical Mediator Dei
In the 63rd Anniversary of the Encyclical
4. You are of course familiar with the fact, Venerable Brethren, that a remarkably widespread revival of scholarly interest in the sacred liturgy took place towards the end of the last century and has continued through the early years of this one. The movement owed its rise to commendable private initiative and more particularly to the zealous and persistent labor of several monasteries within the distinguished Order of Saint Benedict. Thus there developed in this field among many European nations, and in lands beyond the seas as well, a rivalry as welcome as it was productive of results. Indeed, the salutary fruits of this rivalry among the scholars were plain for all to see, both in the sphere of the sacred sciences, where the liturgical rites of the Western and Eastern Church were made the object of extensive research and profound study, and in the spiritual life of considerable numbers of individual Christians.
5. The majestic ceremonies of the sacrifice of the altar became better known, understood and appreciated. With more widespread and more frequent reception of the sacraments, with the beauty of the liturgical prayers more fully savored, the worship of the Eucharist came to be regarded for what it really is: the fountain-head of genuine Christian devotion. Bolder relief was given likewise to the fact that all the faithful make up a single and very compact body with Christ for its Head, and that the Christian community is in duty bound to participate in the liturgical rites according to their station.
6. You are surely well aware that this Apostolic See has always made careful provision for the schooling of the people committed to its charge in the correct spirit and practice of the liturgy; and that it has been no less careful to insist that the sacred rites should be performed with due external dignity. In this connection We ourselves, in the course of our traditional address to the Lenten preachers of this gracious city of Rome in 1943, urged them warmly to exhort their respective hearers to more faithful participation in the eucharistic sacrifice. Only a short while previously, with the design of rendering the prayers of the liturgy more correctly understood and their truth and unction more easy to perceive, We arranged to have the Book of Psalms, which forms such an important part of these prayers in the Catholic Church, translated again into Latin from their original text.[8]
7. But while We derive no little satisfaction from the wholesome results of the movement just described, duty obliges Us to give serious attention to this "revival" as it is advocated in some quarters, and to take proper steps to preserve it at the outset from excess or outright perversion.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Humani Generis: The Antidote against the New Theology (Nouvelle theologie)
From the text Ven. Pope Pius XII's encyclical:
11. Another danger is perceived which is all the more serious because it is more concealed beneath the mask of virtue. There are many who, deploring disagreement among men and intellectual confusion, through an imprudent zeal for souls, are urged by a great and ardent desire to do away with the barrier that divides good and honest men; these advocate a "pacifism" [i.e., ecumenism] according to which, by setting aside the questions which divide men, they aim not only at joining forces to repel the attacks of atheism, but also at reconciling things opposed to one another in the field of dogma.
And as in former times some questioned whether the traditional apologetics of the Church did not constitute an obstacle rather than a help to the winning of souls for Christ, so today some are presumptive enough to question seriously whether theology and theological methods, such as with the approval of ecclesiastical authority are found in our schools, should not only be perfected, but also completely reformed, in order to promote the more efficacious propagation of the kingdom of Christ everywhere throughout the world among men of every culture and religious opinion.
12. Now if these only aimed at adapting ecclesiastical teaching and methods to modern conditions and requirements, through the introduction of some new explanations, there would be scarcely any reason for alarm. But some through enthusiasm for an imprudent "pacifism" [i.e., ecumenism] seem to consider as an obstacle to the restoration of fraternal union, things founded on the laws and principles given by Christ and likewise on institutions founded by Him, or which are the defense and support of the integrity of the faith, and the removal of which would bring about the union of all, but only to their destruction.
13. These new opinions, whether they originate from a reprehensible desire of novelty or from a laudable motive, are not always advanced in the same degree, with equal clarity nor in the same terms, nor always with unanimous agreement of their authors. Theories that today are put forward rather covertly by some, not without cautions and distinctions, tomorrow are openly and without moderation proclaimed by others more audacious, causing scandal to many, especially among the young clergy and to the detriment of ecclesiastical authority. Though they are usually more cautious in their published works, they express themselves more openly in their writings intended for private circulation and in conferences and lectures. Moreover, these opinions are disseminated not only among members of the clergy and in seminaries and religious institutions, but also among the laity, and especially among those who are engaged in teaching youth.
[...]
27. Some say they are not bound by the doctrine, explained in Our Encyclical Letter of a few years ago, and based on the sources of revelation, which teaches that the Mystical Body of Christ and the Roman Catholic Church are one and the same thing [Cfr. Litt. Enc. Mystici Corporis Christi, A.A.S., vol. XXXV, p. 193 sq.]. Some reduce to a meaningless formula the necessity of belonging to the true Church in order to gain eternal salvation. Others finally belittle the reasonable character of the credibility of Christian faith.
28. These and like errors, it is clear, have crept in among certain of Our sons who are deceived by imprudent zeal for souls or by false science. To them We are compelled with grief to repeat once again truths already well known, and to point out with solicitude clear errors and dangers of error.
-------
Visitors, please comment on the following:
-Has post-conciliar theology contradicted the teachings of Humani generis (i.e., has it fallen into the very errors that it condemns)?
-If so, how is this possible that this Encyclical, published only 12 years before the opening of the Second Vatican Council, was so utterly ignored and even contradicted by the theologians of the age?
-What exactly was Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange's role in the writing of this encyclical?
-Which doctrines of Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange's article "Where is the New Theology Leading Us? are present in the text of the Encyclical?
See also: "A Short Catechism on the New Theology".
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Pope Sixtus V makes St. Bonaventure the Seraphic Doctor
From the Encyclical Triumphantis Hierusalem (1588)
Online Source: www.franciscan-archive.org
Triumphant Jerusalem's sempiternal glory and the never withering crowns of the Saints, most happily reigning with Christ Holy Mother Church admiring these with joy, militant upon this earth, truly hastening to the same crown of justice, does not cease to preach that God is wonderful in His Saints. Nor truly do they alone celebrate with exceptional praises the distinguished victories and the very bright merits of the Saints, but the same Saints, whom God wonderfully honors, She Herself also piously venerates and cares for, established (as She is) upon their preaching and salutary docrine, founded upon their blood, instructed by their illustrious works of charity and their example, She is helped each day by their fervent prayers before God. Wherefore She greatly studies those things due to that celestial Hierarchy, where all are ordered in perfect charity, to conform Herself to that norm and image, indeed in as much as She is allowed in the exile of this passing world. For just as there are many mansions in that great house of the greatest Head of a household, heaping with all good things, and just as those blessed souls enjoy a certain wonderful variegated beatitude of one glory, so the Catholic Church, which is the effigy of that one celestial, arranged (as She is) as a battleline in a military camp, (and) having been illumined by a divine light, acknowleges and distinguishes those sacred orders in the veneration that must be exhibited to the Saints of God. And so while She praises the glorious chorus of Apostles, the laudible number of Prophets, the army of strongest Martyrs and offers honors to the other Saints in their place and order with due ceremony, in one spirit of charity and in a similar pious affection of devotion does She exult manifoldly. Truly among those most blessed choirs of Saints, whose memory is celebrated by all the faithful with a merited religious cult, there shines forth in distinguished splendor the order of holy Doctors eloquently ennumerated by Paul the Apostle, when he said, "And He gave some indeed as Apostles, others however as Prophets, others truly as Evangelists, others however as Pastors and Doctors," whom He constituted vigorous and faithful cultivators and workers in His vinyeard, "for the work of ministry, for the edification of the Body of Christ." (1 Cor. 12:28; Eph. 4:12) These are those, concerning whom divine Wisdom shouts: "They who make Me shine forth will have eternal life." (Eccli. 24:31). Concerning these the Angel spoke in the presence of Daniel: "Moreover they who are learned, will shine like the splendor of the firmament, and they who train many unto justice, will be as stars for perpetual eternities" (Dan. 12:13) Finally these the Savior Himself, Christ the Lord, decorates with that distinguishing eulogy: "He who does these things and teaches them, will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven." (Mt. 5:19) Since however at all times the study and doctrine of the sacred Doctors has been useful and salutary in the Church of God, this fact itself demonstrates that it is greatly fruitful and planely necessary, when, with the furor of the horibile name of Christian persecutors repressed, in the very peace of the Church there were roused up more vehemently the wars of heresy. For then the traps and fallacies of the heretics, who, with the devil instigating, did not discontinue to overseed tares in the field of the Lord, by the care and diligence of the Doctors in detecting, both the pestiferous and detestible errors were cut off by the sword of the spirit, and with the holy Doctors as attendants, the falsehood was laid low by the strength of Catholic truth. Wherefore by every right are the holy Doctors designated in the Church with the name of the stars Hyades, who, in the very frigid winter and with the long nights of infidelity completed and the storm of persecution calmed, they then shone more brightly upon holy Church, after the sun of truth grew warm among the hearts of the faithful, and as the year opened truly more lucidly with new faith.
§ 1. Truly already among these, whom the great Lord willed to fill with a spirit of intelligence, and whom each one has sent forth the utterance of his wisdom like a shower upon the Church of God, is St. Bonaventure numbered, as a Confessor, a Pontiff, and a exceptional Doctor in the same Catholic Church, he whom Our predecessor, Pope Sixtus IV, of happy remembrance, on account of the admirable sanctity of his life and very excellent doctrine inscribed among the number of the Saints.
§ 2. For having been born at Bagnoregio in Tuscany, so that he might satisfy the pious vow of his mother, he entered as an adolescent into the Religion of St. Francis, by means of whose still recent footsteps the new soldier of Christ progressing humbly and constantly, drank the most healthful observance of regular norms with such ardor of spirit and avidity of heart, that there appeard in him the highest sanctity, and with innocence and chastity of life, holy humility, patience, meekness, disdain of earthly things, desire for those heavenly, he was an example to and the admiration of all. Inflammed in such great sweetness and fervor of divine love, his spirit was so rapt in God, that already as one introduced into the wine cellar of the Spouse and drunk with the best wine of charity, he seemed to gaze everywhere upon Jesus Christ Crucified and Suffering, and to dwell in His wounds. Truly to this exceptional holiness of life did this man of God join the great praise of outstanding doctrine, with God so disposing, so that for His glory and the utility of the Church, he would not only make very great progress in example, but in word and erudition. And so when in the study of the Sacred Letters, the reading of the holy Fathers and in the very necessary disicipline of scholastic theology, having been employed most diligently by Alexander of Hales, the distinguished theologian of that era, for a brief space of time, with the goodness of surpassing genius, by assiduous labor, and what is chief of all, with the grace of the Holy Spirit, who molded him on all sides as a golden vessel for a chosen honor, he made such progress and arrived at such perfection of doctrine, that decorated in solemn custom with the distinctions of a Master in Theology in the frequented lecture hall of Paris, he taught sacred theology publicly in the same place.
§ 3. Truly did he attain such great praise in the gift of interpreting and in the science of all theology, that the most learned men admired his doctrine and erudition. And indeed there are extant many, moving and very bright writings of this holy man, which still are of great utility to the Church and are not mediocre, by the benifice of God, everyone of which both erudite men, of Our age and ages past, have read with much fruit and very entirely approved, so great was he in theology, that they delcare him sufficient. For he left those monuments of his divine genius to those who would come after him, by which questions, very difficult and involuted with many obscurities, are explained methodically and in order, straightforwardly and lucidly, with a great bounty of the best arguments, the truth of the Catholic Faith is illustrated, pernicious errors and profane heresies are overthrown, and the pious minds of the faithful are admirably inflammed to the love of God and the desire of the celestial fatherland. For there was in St. Bonaventure something preeminent and unique, so that he stood out not only in subtlety of arguing, in facility of teaching, in cleverness of defining, but he excelled in a certain divine strength of thoroughly stirring up souls. For in writing with the greatest erudition he so conjoined an equal ardor of piety, that he would move the reader by teaching and it would sink into the recesses of the soul, and then he would prick the heart with certain seraphic stings and it would pour forth with a wonderful sweetness of devotion; admiring which grace poured out upon his mouth and pen, Our precedessor the Pontiff Sixtus IV, had no doubts in saying, that the Holy Spirit seemed to have spoken in him.
§ 4. When therefore to the faithful servant so many and very bright talents have been entrusted by the Lord, that he increases these by exercising them for the utility of his brothers and by buying the treasures of heavenly grace, by divine counsel and with the greatest consent of his whole Order he was made, at Rome, the seventh Minister General after blessed Francis; in which duty of office he not only exhibited prudence, vigilence, and sollicitude, but he burned up with such ardor of fraternal charity and slaved for his brothers with such a self-abasement (demissio) of christian humility, that there was acknowledged in him that saying of the Lord: "Let him who is greater among you, be as your servant." (Mt. 20:26)
§ 5. Rather even Our Predecessor of pious memory, Pope Clement IV, who loved this holy man intensively and was delighted by his wonderful doctrine, obtained for him the distinguished Archepiscopate of York, so that so excellening in virtue and prudence he might run about in a broader field for the utility of the many. He truly, since he could not suffer to tear himself from the embrace of seraphic poverty, modestly and humbly, refused the offered dignity.
§ 6. Moreover when Gregory X, the Supreme Pontiff, on account of the most grave situation of the Christian republic had proclaimed the General Council of Lyons, and searched eagerly for men outstanding in sanctity, doctrine and wisdom, whose strong and faithful works he would use for managing and arranging of this greatest matter, he chose first of all two of the clearest lights of that age from the two most flourishing Orders, of Preachers and of Minors, Saints Thomas and Bonaventure, whom he commanded to come in person. But when the other had fallen sick on his journey and had happily flown forth to the crown of glory, St. Bonaventure, having arrived at Lyons, was greeted most curteously by the Roman Pontiff, Gregory, who used to repose thus in his virtue and wisdom, to determine properly the parts of directing and administering the Council to be assigned especially to him. For which reason from the public utility and necessity of the Church, so that he would not only take part in the things of the Council, but preside over them, he decided to place the burning and shining light upon the highest candlestick, so that it would greatly brighten the house of God.
§ 7. And so he immediately elected St. Bonaventure seeking no honors, but rather fleeing them, and indeed submitting to the Vicar of Christ and not refusing to undertake any labors for the Church just as in a theatre of the whole world he had (already) elected him to the Sacred College of Cardinals and to the order of Bishops; for he appointed him to the Church of Alba, the honor of which was accustomed to be given to the older Cardinal presbyters. He, who bore the fullest dignity, contributed at once to the glory of God and to utility of the Church. For indeed in the most ardous matters of the Council he performed the most uncommon tasks, defended the Catholic Faith most constantly, refuted depraved opinions most sharply, and by whose patience, doctrine, sanctity, and orations, the pastoral sollicitude of the Pontiff Gregory was so greatly aided, that with the disagreement of the schismatics removed by the mercy of God, Michael Palaeologus, the Emperor of the Greeks, and the oriental nations returned to the obedience, unity, and communion of the Apostolic See; and at last it was worthy to have him, whom in Greek they call Eutychius.
§ 8. Therefore deservedly, when a little before in the same Council the strongest athlete of Christ had migrated forth from the pilgrimage of this life to the celestial fatherland, all grieved over his death, all deplored the common loss, all decorated his burial with tears and praises, but one before all others most truly celebrated the most holy man's life conducted most uprightly his most proven morals, his very many labors undertaken for the Church, and his doctrine, esteemed in that Council itself with distinguished praise. This man was Peter, Cardinal of Tarantasia, of pious memory, a man outstanding in erudition and christian eloquence, who afterwards when raised up to the high rank of the pontificate, was named Pope Innocent V. Truly did the Supreme Pontiff Gregory X, himself, having lost a brother in the deepest affection of heart, greiving for his most faithful helper and counselor, testify openly with graver words, that the Catholic Church, which had received from the piety and doctrine of such a man the richest fruits, had lost greatly at his death. But truly has it been said by the Holy Spirit: "In eternal remembrance will be the just man." (Ps. 111: 6) For he who in life was illustrious, was long after death made more illustrious, with God, who is admirable and glorious in His Saints, much approving him with very many signs and prodiges and with the greastest distinguishing miracles.
§ 9. When the fame of whose miracles had gathered great strength among all men, the same Sixtus, Our predecessor, surveying them from the sublime watchtower of the Apostolic See, understood that the finger of the God, who alone works great wonders, was planely there. And so both on his own, and at the very many vehement requests of Frederick, Emperor of the Romans, of good memory, of kings, republics, dukes and cities, and the urgent demanding consent of nearly all the faithful, the Roman Pontiff had the worthy idea of registering that most outstanding man, the Cardinal Bishop, Bonaventure, among the Saints. Therefore with the greatest care and having examined both the exceptional sanctity of that diligent life and the truth of his miracles and having gathered these together, at last with all things, which pertained to this matter, duely and rightly accomplished, for the glory of God and the exaltation of the Catholic Church, in virtue of his own power and that bestowed upon him by God in blessed Peter the Apostle, he registered among the Saints the same blessed Bonaventure, with the consent of his brothers, the Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, and all the prelates, and he inscribed and aggregated him among the number of the Saintly Confessors, Pontiffs, and Doctors, and he commanded that his anniverary feast day be celebrated on the second Sunday of the month of July, and that an office be recited for him, just as for a Confessor, Pontiff, and Doctor throughout the universal Church, likewise with other decrees added, which are more fully contained in the letters of the same Sixtus.
§ 10. And although this Doctor, St. Bonaventure, be glorious and most celebrated in the Catholic Church, and be greatly respendant in Heaven, where he is crowned with that crown, which God witholds for those who love Him, and although no human thing is lacking to him, who enjoys the good things with Christ, which neither the eye sees, nor the heart expects; nevertheless the charity of Christ and a burning affection of a certain devotion, by which for him We have been perpetually consumed from nearly Our first years, urges Us to consider how to rather propagate and explain his sanctity and to a greater extent his doctrine, as much as We are able with the help of the Lord. Indeed We are moved, that there is a part, of Our seraphic Religion, in holy communion with him, in which We have been educated and versed for many years, and for whom as a for a most worthy mother, We should manifest every honor of piety and gratitude of heart; but much more do the glory of God, the pastoral office which We bear, the so many labors undertaken by this most holy man on behalf of the Church of God, and his so many illustrious merits urge Us, so conjoined as they are with the Roman Church, in whose broadest ranks and Senate he sat with the highest praise. Finally the utility of the universal Church moves Us, which can be always more and more richly captivated by the erudition of such a Doctor, especially when the ambushes and the diabolical machinations of heretics, by which they oppose most vehemently in this sad age that sacred theology, which is called Scholastic, admonish Us greatly, that We should retain, explain, and propagate this same theology, as something which nothing can be more fruitful for the Church of God. For with the divine gift of Him, who alone gives the spirit of knowledge (scientia) and wisdom and understanding, and who furnishes His Church throughout the lifetimes of generations, as is needed, with new benifits, and who provides Her with new supports, there has been discovered by Our ancestors, most wise men, Scholastic theology, which by two Doctors glorious above all, the angelic Saint Thomas, and the seraphic Saint Bonaventure, the most brilliant professors in this capacity, and first among those, who have been registered among the number of the Saints, with excellent genius, assiduous study, great labors and vigils have refined and decorated it, and have passed it on, to those who would come after, optimally arranged and in many ways very clearly explained. And indeed such a salutary understanding and practice of this science, which spread abroad from the richest sources of divine letters, Roman Pontiffs, holy Fathers and Councils, could certainly always bring the greatest assistance to the Church, either to understand and interpret, truly and sensibly, the Scriptures themselves, or to read through and explain the Fathers more securely and usefully, or to detect and refute the various errors and heresies. Truly in these last days, in which already there has come those dangerous times described by the Apostle, and the blasphemous, proud, seductive men who advance to what is worse still, erring and sending others into error, this (kind of theology) is necessary to sensibly confirm the dogmas of the Catholic Faith and confute heresies. And the state of affairs is such, that the judges are the very enemies themselves of the truth, by whom Scholastic theology has become dreadful to the greatest degree, who scarcely understand, by that apt and inner connected coherence of things and causes, in that order and arrangment, as by the training of soldiers in fighting, with those lucid definitions and distinctions, by that firmness of arguments and the sharpest disputations, that light is distinguished from shadows, and the true from the false, and their mendacity, involuted with many deceptions and fallacies, like a vestment borne away, is brought to light and stripped bare. In as much as therefore as these men begin to fight and overturn this most fortified citadel of Scholastic theology, so much more does it befit us to defend this unconquered defense of the Faith, and both to conserve and keep safe the inheritance of Our fathers, and to embellish, as much as we can, the keenest defenders of the truth with merited honors.
§ 11. Wherefore, so that the erudition of the Seraphic Doctor may be diffused more broadly to the utility of the many, and so that from his books and works erudite and studious men may daily sieze more copious and more tastety fruit (which must not be doubted will add to the glory of this very Saint, though he is most blessed in heaven) We establish that indeed at first in Our kind City, in this basilica of the Twelve Holy Apostles, a college by the name of Saint Bonaventure, in which sacred theology especially from the works and commentaries of this exceptional and devout Doctor is to be publicly explained.
§ 12. Then also all his works, which can be found, whose editions are partly not yet carefully sought out nor even altogether evaluated under our authority, and partly already published, We are paying attention at the same time to them all in proper form, so that both what is most faultless be printed and that these be brough to light from Our Vatican press. However because from the very beginning of Our pontificate, with God, as We piously believe, inspiring, We have proposed constantly, to celebrate the name and merits of this holy Doctor among and for the sake of all men and to increase and amplify the faithful's veneration of him, and We have also been sensibly and not moderately stirred to do this by the example of Our predecessor, Pope Pius V, of holy memory, most worthy of the Christian republic, and whom as a father We still revere and honor.
§ 13. For he having been throroughly moved with religious piety and singular devotion, by which he was influenced in Saint Thomas of Aquinas' regard, the honor of his Order and the ornament of the Catholic Church, desiring in the same manner to addorn the same Saint with suitable honors on account of his most outstanding merits in the Catholic Church, besides these ordered and decreed this, that his feast day be forever celebrated each year as a rite of double office according to the likeness of the four holy Doctors of the Church; which equal honor We indeed estimate should be alloted to St. Bonaventure, an exceptional Doctor, since among these such a fine conjuction and similitude of virtues, holiness, doctrine, and merits intervenes. For these "are the two olive trees and two candlesticks" (Apoc. 11: 4) lighting the house of God, who both with the fat of charity and the light of science entirely illumine the whole Church; these two by the singular providence of God appeared at the same time rising forth as two stars from the brightest families of model Orders, which have always been prepared as things most useful to holy Church in defending the Catholic religion, and in undertaking all labors and dangers for the orthodox faith, from which, as from a fertile and well cultivated soil, daily by the grace of God fecund and fruitful plants are procreated, by this is meant those men outstanding in doctrine and sanctity, who energetically conduct the strong and faithful work of the bark of Peter, driven about by so many waves, and of the Roman Pontiff, holding (as he does) his key not without the greatest sollicitude. These two Saints, since they were contemporaries and given to the very same studies, students together, teachers at the same time, after they both had been summoned to the Council by Gregory X, the Supreme Pontiff, for similar reasons, honored, and in the pilgrimage of this life by fraternal charity, by spiritual familiarity, they have been very much conjoined in a fellowship of holy works, and at last migrating onward together with equal pace to the celestial fatherland, equally happy and glorious they enjoy to the full that sempiternal beatitude, where with the same affection of charity, as We piously believe, they pray for Us laboring in this vale of tears and implore the divine power of assistance, so that deservedly did the same Sixtus IV, acknowledging that these two Saints where thoroughly alike and almost twin brothers in Christ, establish, that Saint Bonaventure and St. Thomas must be adorned with a like perogative of veneration and honor.
§ 14. Therefore because by Us both the charity of the seraphic Order, and the magnitude of the merits of Saint Bonaventure, and the utility and edification of the Catholic Church, whose helms have been committed by God to Us, though undeservedly, require, with the mature deliberation of Our venerable brothers, the Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, having been heard, from the counsel and unanimous consent of the same and from Our certain knowledge and the fullness of Apostolic power bestowed upon Us, by this Our perpetually valid constitution, that the doctrine of this very Saint Bonaventure, praised by Our abovesaid precedessors, Clement IV, Gregory X, and Sixtus IV, greatly approved in the Council of Lyons, employed also at the Council of Florence to explain difficult matters, testified to and commended by the authority of the gravest of men and worthy of an exceptional Doctor of the Church, We also greatly praise and commend in the Lord, and also the letters of the same Sixtus IV, which We want to be considered expressly at this moment, excepting the arrangement for celebrating the feast day of St. Bonaventure on the second Sunday of July, approving and renewing by the tenor of these (letters), We determine and declare, that St. Bonaventure himself, lawfully inscribed and ennumerated together with the company of the holy Doctors by the same Sixtus IV, by Apostolic authority with the tenor of these present letters, must be held and venerated among the preeminent and primary (Doctors), who excel in the guidance of theological ability.
§ 15. And on account of that We, hoping in the Lord, that the nightly study of the Seraphic Doctor in doctrine and devotion, which We greatly desire to shine and burn among the clergy and Christian people, will be the greatest help, We determine and will that his books, commentaries, smaller works, and in short all his works, be cited, published, and when it is demanded, employed, in the manner in which they have been most faultlessly published by Our Vatican press, as has been said above, just as are those of the other Doctors of the Church, who are exceptional, not only in private, but publicly, in lecture halls, academies, schools, colleges, in lectures, disputations, interpretations, addresses, sermons and in all other ecclesiatical studies and christian practices.
§ 16. And nevertheless, so that a glorious remembrance of this wisest Doctor, if not for the sake of his own dignity, at least for the sake of human refinement, be refostered on account of his vast merits with more ardent study, We, induced by the example of Our precedessor, Pope Boniface VII, of happy remembrance, who gave instructions concerning the four holy Doctors, and that of Pope Pius V, concerning the aforesaid same St. Thomas, do precept, that his office be celebrated by all persons ecclesiastical, secular, and regular of whatever Orders as much in public as in private on the day before the Ides of July (with the aforesaid arrangement of Sixtus IV, concerning the second Sunday of the said month, not withstanding) and so that this should be explained and printed in the Calendars, with the name of the Doctor and the addition of "festum duplex", even if in the reforms of the most recent breviaries and of the Roman Missal it had been arranged otherwise, and We determine that it cannot be judged nor interpreted otherwise than as had been ordained by Us above, by whomsoever endowed with whatever authority.
§ 17. Exorting all the faithful of Christ, of both sexes, in the city of Bagnoregio, which gave forth this most bright light, and those of the diocese, that they abstain on this same feast day from servile works, according to the custom of the Church: however so that the devotion of Christ's faithful be enkindled to honor the feast day of this Doctor and to piously implore his power of assitance, more than it is, on which they might perceive themselves to be refreshed by this gift of celestial grace, by the mercy of the omnipotent God and entrusted with His authority to blessed Peter and Paul, the Apostles, We mercifully concede and grant in the Lord a plenary indulgence and remission of all sins, to all Christ's faithful, of both sexes, who, gathered together as much in the said city and diocese of Bagnoregio, as in the very bright city of Lyons, where he fought the good fight lawfully, where with the race finished, the faith kept, he happlily migrated from this calamitous age to the reward and crown of his merits in Heaven, and in Our kind city, where in that Basilica of the Twelve Holy Apostles, a college had been erected by Us, as We have already said, devoutly honoring his very feast, as other festivities are usually observed according to the precept of the Church, truly penitent and having made a sacramental confession of their sins, would on the same day receive the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist. To those who would truly visit the churches of the Friars Minor of St. Francis on the very day of the feast, from the first vespers until sunset on the day proper, pouring forth prayers there to God, as their own devotion might suggest, We remit ten years and as many forty-days of those penances enjoined upon them, or owed in any other manner whatsoever, by means of these present letters that will endure perpetually, which We do not want to be included under whatever revocations or limitations of indulgences.
§ 18. Wherefore We command your fraternity and discretion by means of these Apostolic writings, to procure that whatsoever is contained in them be published solemnly in whatever of your provinces, cities, churches, and dioceses, and that by all persons ecclesiastical, secular, and regular of whatever Order, of whatever place and nation, they be observed perpetually inviolable.
§ 19. Moreover We will, that to the copies of these present letters, even those printed, signed by the hand of any public notary, and endowed with the seal of any person constituted in ecclesiastical dignity, there be exhibited everywhere that same straightforward faith, which would be exhibited to these present letters, if they were displayed or show to them.
§ 20. To entirely no man therefore be it licit to infringe, or with rash daring to contravene, this page of Our approbation, renewal, decrees, declaration, determinations, precept, concession, grant, remission and command. If anyone however would presume to attempt this, he will know himself to have incurred the indignation of the omnipotent God and of His Apostles, Peter and Paul.
Given at Rome in the Basilica of the Twelve Holy Apostles, in the year of the Incarnation of the Lord, one thousand five hundred and eighty-eighth, one the day before the Ides of March, in the third year of Our Pontificate.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)