TRACT IV. FIDES ET RATIO. OR; A VINDICATION.

[thesmellypocket 1859]

TRACTS FOR THE TIMES. 

Tract IV. A Vindication of the Usage of Natural Reason in Religious and Philosophical Matters and a Prediction of the Coming Age of Unreason.

In response to the recent letter sent by the Holy Pontiff, James II, whose blessed Seat is worthy of all reverence, and whose character of all admiration.

 

BY FATHER PIUS OF SUTICA, FSSCT. 

 

A REQUEST. The author of this Tract regrets that he is the last active Tractarian. The readers of this Tract are therefore entreated to pray for Fr. Seraphim and Fr. Griffith, who were the other two main proponents of this movement, and in whose unending memory this Tract is dedicated. All of our writings issue from the same school and spirit.

 

THE BLESSED PONTIFF was right to identify the error of the so-called Rationalists. However, I fear he has fallen into an opposite imbalance, which I may call Fide-ism. This a worldview that calls it futile to know God through reason, that pre-supposes Faith, and that renders dialogue with heathens all-but impossible. Unfortunately, as I will demonstrate, it is a worldview that is also self-evidently incoherent (refuting itself by nature), cannot be supported from the Scriptures, and is actively disdained by historical Church teaching. The purpose of this Tract is to demonstrate that Faith and reason are not, in fact, incompatible or in any way contrary, but are, as I wrote in a letter to this same Pontiff: “The two wings on which we soar ever upward to the contemplation of truth.” To concede the high ground of reason to the sinister snake oil salesmen of error and the furious firebrands of atheistic and anarchistic thinking, is to underestimate our power. 

 

Point I. That I Am Not Dissenting from Church Teaching, But Upholding It.

 

I.No doubt, opponents of Pontifical Infallibility, of which I have been a proponent, may well laugh with a savage irony. But they have no cause. The Pontiff’s recent letter does not fulfil any of the conditions of infallibility. First of all, it is an essay. The Pontiff did not use his seal, or list his titles. Second of all, it was not run past the Synod. Finally, it does not invoke Infalliblity or proclaim these truths as essentially de fide. It is a letter by James II to his Church, not a teaching of the Church. On no account is it to be a teaching which a Canonist is required to embrace, or is not allowed to be dissented from.

 

II.Certainly we are due to give what he has written the highest reverence and consideration, but it is not due the submission that is given to the faith of the Church alone. And as we will see, the present Pontiff’s teaching is one that squarely contradicts teachings that do gush forth from the bosom of Holy Mother Church, that is, the authoritative teaching of Saint Pontiff Everard. Therefore I declare with a pure conscience that I am not a dissenter or a rebel; I think the Pontiff is wrong in the same way he may be wrong about who will win a joust, but he remains the chief dispenser and sole steward of  our Faith, and I pray that all the creatures of the earth may be subject to his spiritual authority, for when they are, there is no danger of embracing untruth.

 

III.Nor is the letter, The Age of Reason, entirely wrong. I confess that there are things really good in it. Certainly to make an idol of reason is a grave error; and to conflate reason with rejecting immaterial truths is very contrary to reason. My prediction is that the Age of Reason will give way to the Age of Unreason. Having abandoned static, immaterial concepts like Truth, Justice, Goodness, Objective Morality, etc. (All things rooted in the Supreme Goodness, God) they will think themselves silly, go insane, and give up reason altogether. The error of the Modernists will give way to the error of what may be called the Post-Modernists. The first step is Modernism, to reject immaterial truth, and the second is Post-Modernism, to reject truth altogether, for they will have to be honest themselves and see that objective and supreme Truth cannot be achieved separate from God. To reject immaterial or supernatural truths ex nihilo is itself unreasonable. Therefore, do not credit them with the name of “Rationalist” – no, call them what they are – Modernists! They worship Modernity and that is why they reject religion.

 

Point II. That A Written Revelation Pre-Supposes the Use of Reason.

 

I.The very fact that God came to us with a written Revelation and did not just imprint the truths of Faith in our minds without difficulty, proves the necessity of Reason, and that God desires us to use it.

 

II.Words are mental concepts. They are achieved by placing symbols, called letters of the alphabet, together. And as each letter denotes a pronunciation, so the combination of these letters causes our mind to put them together, and to relate these words to their spoken names. Is this not itself a use of reason? Therefore, it is impossible to understand the Revelation or submit to it in Faith, without reason, for the very concept of a written Revelation, or even a spoken one, necessitates that God desired it to be rationally intelligible, and therefore rationally discussable, rationally provable; rationally knowable. Numbers are used in the Scrolls, such as Seven. Numbers are immaterial truths, knowable only through logic. This is not a truth that exists in our minds, as 3+4 equalled 7 long before we lived, and would still remain 7 even if all sentient minds perished and no one believed it. It is impossible to comprehend or practice the Canon without very basic logic and the recognition of objective truth before we assent to Faith, and the very fact that God has given us a Revelation in writing proves He wishes it to be this way. “But our God is in heaven: He hath done all things, whatsoever He would.” (Ven. Humbert, Pontifical Office.) 

 

III.Indeed, is it not written: “And you shall give your peers the abundance of the spirit, which is My word?” (Virtue 2:8.) God is to be understood, by what? By His word. It is a word that is above human reason, yes, but it is expressed in a way that can be understood by and through it, and, in fact, presupposes it.

 

 

Point III. That Reason is Used in the Scrolls.

 

I.Furthermore, God Himself uses reason in this Scroll when addressing Horen. Does He not invoke all the creation He has made to justify His commands? “I created the seed and the chaff” (Virtue 4:4), viz. you can see Me through the material things which I have made, just as the skill of a painter can be known from the painting. Do you not see how God does not start with the obedience of Faith, but first uses Horen’s empirical senses to speak to him? God does not pre-suppose Faith from the first man, so why should the Church pre-suppose Faith from the greater part of the world? Rather, the material world is a common ground that we all share, and it is coherent only through the immaterial truths of logic. And from this common ground we can “give our peers the abundance of the spirit” (Virtue 2:8) by imitating the way God first addressed man, making His word known, adored and loved in all the tabernacles of the world.

 

II.It is evident, then, that God wished to make Himself known through the things which He has made. And thus it is possible to know God through these things. Thus the idea that we begin with the obedience of Faith and then work outward, is not one that is in the plan of God. God rather pre-supposed self-evident material creation and reason, whereof to know He had given mankind the capacities, and from this worked to make Himself known.

 

III.And how do we imitate God in this regard? Our example is the Holy Prophet, Owyn. “Shall I worship the strong man? Shall you worship the tallest among you? No, for the glory of GOD is not in mere magnitude, but in His fullness and His perfection.” (Spirit 1:15-17.)” Owyn does not start with the admonishment, but first uses rhetorical questions to make the Godwinites think. What he writes is very reasonable. Why would any man seek to worship something base, material and passing like tallness or strength? These things whither in no time at all and themselves prove exceedingly weak. Rather, turn your worship to the immaterial and supreme goodness, who is not merely very tall, very strong or very wise; but is Transcendent Goodness Himself, and from whom all tallness, all strength and all wisdom derive. If Owyn expected the obedience of Faith from these persons before reason, he would not have used a rational argument or a rhetorical device. 

 

IV.To suppose that no man can entertain reasoned arguments about the Scrolls, and is obliged to start with the obedience of Faith, then, is one that therefore runs directly contrary to the concept of Scrolls themselves, as well as the content of them. For the Scrolls themselves entertained reasoned argument within themselves, and work from this common ground to the obedience of Faith. These passages pre-suppose that the existence of God can be known with certainty by the things which He has made.

 

Point IV. That Reason has been Used by the Holy Doctors.

 

I.My interpretation is not a novel one, speaking not from my own intelligence, which is lesser than that of the Pontiff’s nor do I speak on my own authority, which is certainly lesser than that of the Pontiff’s. Ironically, it is actually the High Pontiff’s opinion that is a novel innovation borne of his own thinking: it is the position I hold to which has always been held by the greatest teachers of the Faith. 

 

II.I mentioned Owyn’s use of reason in his Epistles. This is, in fact, the interpretation of High Pontiff Saint Sixtus IV in his Enyclical, Iustitia Dei in nostra aetate, which actually discusses how to deal with heresy and the prevailing errors of the time. This Pontiff goes even further than I do. Faith and reason are not merely two wings in harmony, but are the ”Greatest defences of the Church manifested by the Flaming Sword of Owyn.” Faith and reason, therefore, are not even complementary wings, but from that same sword of Owyn which he wielded with such awesome purpose in his Epistles. The implication of this teaching is breath-taking. A Church which refuses to reason is not wielding the Sword of Owyn given her in admonishing error; therefore a Church which does not engage in reason is not fulfilling her duty, and members of the Church who despise reasonable first principles are failing in their duty.  Notice also how Sixtus does not even need to justify this point. To the Doctors of the Church, the force of reason is self-evident. This is why I call them wings: Faith is unintelligible without reason; reason is so led astray by human error without Faith, and, moreover, there are some truths simply too sublime for the intellect to do anything but submit and assent to them without understanding them. By refusing to accept the existence of such Mysteries, the Modernist tries to get the heavens into his head; the Canonist tries to get his head into the heavens. No surprise, then, that I have predicted the descent of the Modernists into misery; no surprise that their head cracks with the capacity. And no surprise that the voice of the Holy Doctors soured upwards gloriously, illumining the world by explaining and defending the Faith.

 

III.The Church has has always embraced reason. Blessed Daniel VI, Ven. Fabian and Ven. Humbert in more recent times have all used reason to refute religious error. Blessed Daniel VI quoted in his Catechism then-Msgr. Fabian’s essay The Nature of Evil, which gave a rational and coherent answer to an objection to the Faith. These two most eminent men of our times felt no need to justify the use of reason in overcoming this error, for it was to them, self-evident. I can give divers other examples, but I want to encourage you to read these authors for yourself. 

 

IV.But chief of all the Doctors is the Angelic Doctor himself, Saint Jude. I will quote from one of his theses. “Death, the unavoidable destiny of every mortal being. The future that every man, woman, child, and animal cannot hide from. Many fear it, many embrace it, many study it and all know of it. Many ask themselves and I have been asked this question to me; what happens after death? Where do we go? Will the Creator save us or are we all damned to an eternity of suffering? Well, in this thesis, I am here to answer all of these questions. First off, the most commonly asked question, what happens after death? Well, the Canon teaches us that after death we are to live a life with the Creator for all eternity. Also, It does not make any sense for the Creator, who created us out of love, to damn us to an eternity of darkness and pain. He created every being in order for us to love him and to embrace his love for us. We are meant to live with him for all of eternity after we are done serving our purpose in this life. Now, this does include sinners as well. God is a just being and loves all of his creation, even those brothers and sisters of humanity that do not agree or love him like those of the Canon do. These people can be redeemed, I believe this because God created and knows every one of us, and even though we may not know him as well as he knows and loves us all the same. We are all children under him and even those who chose freely not to follow him, still have a chance at redemption and eternal salvation. However, if one denies the chance to live with the creator for all eternity, then they are doomed to a life of pain and suffering, as well as the knowledge that they are separated from God.” Do you not see how the Angelic Doctor engages with questions that must have been asked him at the time? The question comes: how can God created man to be damned, how is that just? Answer: God does not create man to be damned, but to live, but man, with his free will, can choose to damn himself. 

 

V.Hence it is clear that all the ancient and modern Doctors of the Church have employed reason and have engaged criticisms of the Faith using reason. This has been taken for granted; no one has had to write a Tract like this until the present time, precisely because the Pontiff’s words represent an innovation. They do not come from the Doctors and the Scrolls, which inherently embrace reason but reject fideism and Modernism. (Although, obviously, the fideist is infinitely closer to the Truth than the Modernist.)

 

Point V. That To Reject Reason is Self-Refuting.

 

I.Have those that reject rational arguments for the Faith considered that this itself is self-refuting? For, I may ask, why should you reject reason? This itself has to be rationally explained. The reason you reject the use of our human intelligence in Faith is apparently because to subject an infinite thing to a finite mind is wrong, but this argument itself supposes reason and an idea that something can be wrong pre-emptively to Faith. Additionally, how are we to discern which Revelation is the one that has been vouchsafed to us by God without the use of reason? The differences between the Canonist and the Rashidun religion are rationally discernible, but both make the same fideist claims. Only when we use reason, and see that the Rashidun religion is logically incoherent, do we see that it is not the authentic one.

 

 Conclusion: The Via Media Between Modernism or “Rationalism” and Fideism.

 

I.Friends, the way to bring a man to the Truth is not to say he is all wrong about everything. He has a deep-seated view; men rarely reject views they have regarded as self-evident for their entire lives merely because you tell them. Owyn did not begin his Epistles like that. Firstly, he told them what was right, and then exposed where the error was, in order to bring them to the Truth. The fact that Owyn writes to the Godwinites about their “virtue” (Spirit 1:4) pre-supposes a common ground – they have some idea of what virtue is. It should not be a surprise to us that we see that non-Canonists get a good deal of things right. They have virtue, they have truth, they have goodness and love. For God has planted all these things in the hearts of all the descendants. (Virtue 1:7) But they do not have these things in perfection, which can only be found in God. Therefore we ought to imitate Owyn and use our common ground with the world, using their lower case 'l' lovs to draw them to that transcendent Love, their lower case 'b' beauty to draw them to that unutterable Beauty, and using their lower case 'g' goodness to draw them to that Supreme Goodness. This is the model that the Church has given us. Faith is not a blind sentiment. I am a very unfeeling and stony man but I have come to believe with certainty. Faith is, put simply, the assent of the will and intellect to divinely revealed truth.

 

II.What I have been preaching to you is essentially a Via Media, between Modernism and Fideism. It is this:

 

i)the existence of God and some eternal truths are knowable with certainty by the natural light of human reason from the things that He has made. The Scrolls themselves vindicate this.

ii)The Revelation God has given us is unintelligible without man’s capacity for reason; He gave us reason so that we could love and know Him with it.

iii)Some truths are above reason, which is why we have Divine Revelation. Thus reason cannot pull herself by her own bootstraps to Supreme Truth, but has to be lifted up by that same Truth. It is an error to subject these truths to human reason, but it is not an error to partly understand or explain them using it. 

iv)Man’s natural pride and error often cause his reason to become clouded. So Divine Revelation allows him to know, with certainty, even those things which can be known by reason, but are not acknowledged by everyone.

v)Reason is a necessary tool to defend and explain the Faith and has always been considered such.

vi)Faith and reason are the two wings on which man soars upward to the contemplation of Truth, to which the Scrolls themselves bear witness.

vii)We ought to use the common ground we have with unbelievers to draw them to contemplation of the eternal truths of God.

 

May the blessing of Almighty God rain down upon you, and remain with you, forever and ever. Amen!

[VIROS 2915]

James II responds in a letter, which is made available to those who seek out The Age of Reason or this Tract in the pontifical library.

 

“Fr. Pius,

 

I thank you for your swift response, which bears witness once again to your abiding concern that our brothers not be led into error. I say first that everything you have said here is true and of much better substance than my essay. I did not speak infallibly on the behalf of the Church in The Age of Reason because, when applied as a general or universal rule, it is most fallible. My recent essay is a polemic against the times--against a certain kind of attitude, which is the worship of Reason over Truth. It is not doctrine, but one man’s limited and tentative perspective on this matter, and I weep to think that anyone may be led into error because of it. Admonished, I will correct myself, and perhaps help our readers.

 

Throughout the essay I endeavored to speak critically only of Reason but not of reason. I make this distinction because I fear the current attitude, which I believe worships reason and thereby converts it into Reason. I believe this attitude, leaving aside the idolatry of it, risks atheism; if we are told not to believe anything our minds cannot explain, it ends in disbelief in God, who the Epistle to the Magi calls the Most Unknowable. He has created a world bound up by logic for our own good--but while reason may help us along the path to God, only in desiring Truth will we find Him. Reason may lead us to the path, but only if we believe that there is Truth at the end will we take that path. We must despise any argument, no matter what logic it invokes, that leads us away from faith. I say this not for your sake, but for those who I have read my essay and risk error because of it.

 

Despising the worship of Reason becomes, if we are injudicious, a kind of antirationalism whose only consequence is madness. This attitude can easily become despising reason itself, which I reject entirely. The Exalted did not act on instinct, merely believing that they felt God welling up inside them and submitting to their desires without further examination. We each bear a little of light of wisdom that He put into us; this wisdom, clarified through the lens of worldly reason, is one of many tools He gives us to ensure we do not sin. If we do not use that light or that lens, we may fall victim to deception and consequent error, as Malin did in accepting Iblees’ false promises. Thus I apologize to anyone who reads The Age of Reason and by it comes to despise reason itself. This error is wholly my responsibility and so I beg of any reader not to fall into it. I will say now that only through careful inquiry into our faith can we ensure it is free of error: that careful inquiry is called reason. I confidently assert that reason is a vital part of the Church.

 

My essay’s intent was not to discourage anyone from reading or seeking to understand The Holy Scrolls or God, though I confess your tract demonstrates how this is its effect. I do not forbid anyone from the use of reason in spiritual matters. Though we can never truly understand God as only He does, it is our striving for Him that is Faith. Proper use of reason can hone our faith, as you have demonstrated better than I could. It is only when we use it improperly, when we worship it as an end rather than using it as a means to achieve an end, that we will stray into the worship of Reason I so criticize. That distinction is made more clear here. I have seen to it that my essay, your response and tract, and this letter, be cross-referenced with each other in the Pontifical Library.

 

I thank you for your interest in my work and your dedication to preserving me and those who listen to me from error; I thank you for continuing to act as an example of humility whom I wish to emulate and a teacher to whom I submit.

 

May He remain with you,

James II”

[thesmellypocket 1859]

9 minutes ago, VIROS said:

James II responds in a letter, which is made available to those who seek out The Age of Reason or this Tract in the pontifical library.

 

“Fr. Pius,

 

I thank you for your swift response, which bears witness once again to your abiding concern that our brothers not be led into error. I say first that everything you have said here is true and of much better substance than my essay. I did not speak infallibly on the behalf of the Church in The Age of Reason because, when applied as a general or universal rule, it is most fallible. My recent essay is a polemic against the times--against a certain kind of attitude, which is the worship of Reason over Truth. It is not doctrine, but one man’s limited and tentative perspective on this matter, and I weep to think that anyone may be led into error because of it. Admonished, I will correct myself, and perhaps help our readers.

 

Throughout the essay I endeavored to speak critically only of Reason but not of reason. I make this distinction because I fear the current attitude, which I believe worships reason and thereby converts it into Reason. I believe this attitude, leaving aside the idolatry of it, risks atheism; if we are told not to believe anything our minds cannot explain, it ends in disbelief in God, who the Epistle to the Magi calls the Most Unknowable. He has created a world bound up by logic for our own good--but while reason may help us along the path to God, only in desiring Truth will we find Him. Reason may lead us to the path, but only if we believe that there is Truth at the end will we take that path. We must despise any argument, no matter what logic it invokes, that leads us away from faith. I say this not for your sake, but for those who I have read my essay and risk error because of it.

 

Despising the worship of Reason becomes, if we are injudicious, a kind of antirationalism whose only consequence is madness. This attitude can easily become despising reason itself, which I reject entirely. The Exalted did not act on instinct, merely believing that they felt God welling up inside them and submitting to their desires without further examination. We each bear a little of light of wisdom that He put into us; this wisdom, clarified through the lens of worldly reason, is one of many tools He gives us to ensure we do not sin. If we do not use that light or that lens, we may fall victim to deception and consequent error, as Malin did in accepting Iblees’ false promises. Thus I apologize to anyone who reads The Age of Reason and by it comes to despise reason itself. This error is wholly my responsibility and so I beg of any reader not to fall into it. I will say now that only through careful inquiry into our faith can we ensure it is free of error: that careful inquiry is called reason. I confidently assert that reason is a vital part of the Church.

 

My essay’s intent was not to discourage anyone from reading or seeking to understand The Holy Scrolls or God, though I confess your tract demonstrates how this is its effect. I do not forbid anyone from the use of reason in spiritual matters. Though we can never truly understand God as only He does, it is our striving for Him that is Faith. Proper use of reason can hone our faith, as you have demonstrated better than I could. It is only when we use it improperly, when we worship it as an end rather than using it as a means to achieve an end, that we will stray into the worship of Reason I so criticize. That distinction is made more clear here. I have seen to it that my essay, your response and tract, and this letter, be cross-referenced with each other in the Pontifical Library.

 

I thank you for your interest in my work and your dedication to preserving me and those who listen to me from error; I thank you for continuing to act as an example of humility whom I wish to emulate and a teacher to whom I submit.

 

May He remain with you,

James II”

"Holy Pontiff,

 

I was very delighted to read your recent response to my Tract. It is good to see we largely agree on this matter in fact and in principle: you can be sure that in the fight against the errors of today, I  am among your most zealous allies. 

 

The loving interest you have taken in my work during my public life says more of your benevolent, fatherly spirit in reading than any ability I have in writing. 

 

I will continue with that project I have been enjoined upon these late few yeas.  Do pray for me as, you can be assured, I will for you.

 

Your humble servant,

 

Father Pius, FSSCT."