John Henry Newman's
“An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine”
Condemned by Pius X
“Syllabus of Modernist Errors” (Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907)
adapted July 13 2009
feast of St. Henry
Cardinal Newman is one of the most respected converts to the Catholic Church in recent times and is now up for beatification. While we appreciate his devotional books and apologies, we strongly object to making his book on the "Development of Christian Doctrine" as a tome equal to the heights of Aquinas or other Doctors of the Church, which is not only overstated but dangerous to the Faith. Newman has been raised to the height of Venerable and soon to be Beatified but this can not be assumed as an endorsement of all his writings.
While St. Pius X Syllabus of Modernist Errors appeared many years after Newman's original book, St. Pius X Syllabus supports our opinion that Newman's "An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine" should be considered heretical in its over all thesis and application. Again we make no judgment on his sincerity in writing this book and may have been a very holy man but he is not infallible and even Church Fathers have error in judgment.
Newman's "Development of Christian Doctrine" appears to have been designed to indicate the process by which its gifted author passed from Anglicanism to Catholicism, and he seemed to want to offer it to help others and to remove the principal objections to the Catholic Church, which he himself had raised in his previous publications.
It is evident, from the first page of the work, that the author has made up his mind; that he is writing under the full conviction that he must seek admission into the Roman Catholic communion; and that, in his judgment, the theory he is putting forth in justification of this step.
He accepts, and in some instances elaborately defends, principal dogmas of the Catholic Church, and especially those which are in general the most offensive to Protestants; but he has little suspicion of the unsoundness of his theory of developments, so orthodox does he hold it, that he does not scruple, even after his conversion, to publish it to the world. Please remember he was still a Protestant while writing it, and in the grip of its way of thinking.
Newman is not a clear thinker, at least in this book, as even those who admire him must admit. All of his vision is confused. He seldom defines terms and when he does we are left even more confused than before. He stumbles at every step and stammers at every word. Giving us learned and elaborate theories to explain facts, which he later shows are not facts, — he uses ingenious speculations, where all we need is a plain yes or no.
From first to last, he labors with genius, talent, learning, sincerity, and earnestness, which no one can refuse to admire, to develop Protestantism into Catholicism. The work is all that he could have reasonably been expected to produce based on his false premise and while still in the holds of a Protestant mentality. We find his work to be heretical but do not imply distrust of the sincerity of his conversion, or of his desire to be orthodox.
His theory is not Catholic, its principle a Catholic may never accept! The fact that the author comes to Catholic conclusions, and then he enters the Catholic communion, does not necessarily confirm his means to those ends. Saul was on his way to kill Christians when he was converted; does that show that persecuting the Church is a good way to enter the Church? Conversion is a grace not a method. He puts forth his theory expressly for the purpose of removing the obstacles for others which is laudable. He hoped others may find his theory helpful in following his example of becoming a Catholic. But a Protestant reviewer could easily hold up his theory as a condemnation of the “Romanist” theory; or, as they express themselves, 'as the ground on which modern Rome seeks to defend her manifest corruptions of Christian doctrine.'
We critique “An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine” with the highest respect for Newman's education and sincerity, and with warm admiration for the beauty, and force of many of the details of his work, — But his theory is essentially anti-Catholic.
An example of his confused thinking is that Newman mixes up in the same category : Christian-- doctrine, theology, and discipline, — matters by their nature are distinct, and never confused by Catholic doctors, — this is why it is difficult to use expressed quotations to determine his exact meaning.
Newman's false premise is: Explaining the differences of doctrine which the Catholic Church presents today, from the doctrine presented by the primitive Church. He does not anywhere draw up a list or give us a formal statement of these variations and differences; but assumes there has been.
He assumes that there is a need to explain changes in doctrine and dogma by his theory of "developments." Remember his book is not "Development of Christian Theology" or " Development of Christian Discipline" but "Development of Christian Doctrine", that a doctrine or dogma can change from one meaning to another was condemned by Pope Pius IX, in the First Vatican Council, Sess. 3, Chap. 2 on Revelation, 1870, ex cathedra: “Hence, also, that understanding of its sacred dogmas must be perpetually retained, which Holy Mother Church has once declared; and there must never be a recession from that meaning under the specious name of a deeper understanding.”
-- but later this was more clearly condemned by Pope Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907, # 21: Revelation, constituting the object of the Catholic faith, was not completed with the Apostles. --condemned.
A hypothesis to explain these "developments" or as many Fundamentalist Protestants call them, "corruptions" or "Roman Inventions" added to the pure revelation of the Bible, he thinks it is necessary; and the hypothesis he suggests he calls “The Theory of Developments.” It is the purpose of his essay,
1. To explain his theory
2. To furnish the tests by which development may be distinguished from corruption
3. To establish the probability, of development of doctrine in Christianity-- remember this was condemned by Pope Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907, # 21: Revelation, constituting the object of the Catholic faith, was not completed with the Apostles. --condemned.
4. By an elaborate historical application of the theory to the successive ages of the church, to show that it meets and explains the principal facts in the case.
Such is the general design of his work. We waive, here, all considerations of his theory so far as it is intended to apply to Christian discipline and theology, where we admit developments. We confine ourselves solely as applied to Christian doctrine and dogma.
Newman begins his work by telling us that “It [Christianity] may legitimately be made the subject-matter of theories: what is its moral and political excellence, what its place in the range of ideas or of facts which we possess, whether it be divine or human, whether it be original or eclectic or both at once, how far favorable to civilization or to literature, whether a religion for all ages or for a particular state of society, — these are questions upon the fact or professed solutions of the fact, and belong to the province of opinion.” (pg.1) But he must be mistaken. Whether Christianity be divine or human is not a question of opinion, but a question of fact, and so it is with all the questions he enumerates.
Christianity is a fact in the world’s history; this is a fact. But is Christianity what it professes to be? Is this a question of opinion, to be answered only by a theory? or is it a question of fact, to be taken up and settled, one way or the other, as a fact? If it is a matter of opinion, and if it is answerable only by a theory, what foundation is there or can there be for faith!
Christianity is a fact, not only in the world’s history, but in itself, or it is not true. If it is a fact, it cannot legitimately be made the subject-matter of theories, any more than may be the fact that it is a fact in world history. Christianity, if received at all, must be received, not as a theory, but as a revealed fact; and when we have established it as a revealed fact, no theory is needed or admissible, for we must then believe the fact precisely as it proposes itself to be.
But even if a theory might be introduced, Newman’s would not satisfy us. We are not satisfied with his tests of a true development. He gives seven tests:
1. Preservation of type or idea; (cf. pg.64)
2. Continuity of principles; (cf. pg.66)
3. Power of assimilation; (cf. pg. 73)
4. Early anticipation; (cf. pg. 77)
5. Logical sequence; (cf. pg. 80)
6. Preservative additions; (cf. pg. 86)
7. Chronic continuance. (cf. pg. 90)
Numbers 1, 2, and 6 are all resolvable into one, which means the simple preservation of the original type or idea.
Number 3, the power of assimilation, which implies a development by assimilation or accumulation, which is fatal to the sufficiency of the original revelation, by necessarily implying that the developed idea contains what was not in the idea as originally given.
Number 4, early anticipation, as far as it goes, is proof positive against development.
Number 5, logical sequence, is in itself no proof at all of development.
Finally, number 7, chronic continuance, is as applicable to corruptions as much as it is to true "developments". Also, Newman fails entirely to show that corruptions are short-lived and transitory, as he alleges. Some writers date the origin of the Pelagian heresy, which is as rife as ever it was, as far back as the garden of Eden; and Newman himself admits that it remains to be seen whether Mohammedanism external to Christendom and the Greek Church within it are not yet living, and capable of chronic continuance and activity.
Furthermore, before we can proceed to apply tests to determine whether this or that is a development or a corruption of Christian doctrine, we must have a clear, distinct, and adequate knowledge of Christian doctrine itself. How can we say the original type or idea is preserved, if we do not know what it is?! If we do know what it is, what is the use of the tests or their application? The whole process of the historical application of the tests is, then, at best, regarded as an argument, a mere paralogism, a plain circular argument. His theory just doesn't make sense.
But, waiving these considerations, we object to Newman’s theory, that it is a hypothesis brought forward to explain facts which are not facts. His problem is no problem for a true Catholic; for it presupposes what no Catholic can concede, which is : there have been real variations in Christian doctrine. There is no warrant in the facts for conceding this is true. Newman proceeds on this assumption: “On various grounds, then, it is certain,” he says, “that portions of the church system were held back in primitive times; and of course this fact goes some way to account for that apparent variation and growth of doctrine, which embarrasses us when we would consult history for the true idea of Christianity; yet it is not the key to the whole difficulty, for the obvious reason, that the variations continue beyond the time when it is conceivable the discipline (disciplina arcani ) was in force.” (pg.26) Catholics are not embarrassed by early Church doctrines but revel in them. Also in one breath he has mixed up doctrine and discipline. This work is full of such confusions. It is no wonder that liberals and conservatives can quote it equally to their own ends. And this is the confusion which reigns in his book throughout, he adds this,—
“That the increase and expansion of the Christian Creed and Ritual, and the variations which have attended the process in the case of individuals and churches, are necessary attendants on any philosophy or policy which takes possession of the intellect and heart, and has had any wide or extended dominion; that, from the nature of the human mind, time is necessary for the full comprehension and perfection of great ideas; and that the highest and most wonderful truths, though communicated once for all to the world by inspired teachers, could not be comprehended all at once by the recipients, but, as received by minds not inspired, and through media which were human, have required only thec longer time and the deeper thought for their full elucidation. This may be called the Theory of Developments .”(pg.27) Again he equates Creed and Ritual as the same, thus frustrating our ability to understand what he is talking about. While it is true we can explain certain doctrines better over time with theology that doesn't mean that the Apostles didn't believe that same doctrine, e.g. God is One and Triune. Otherwise why would the Church bother to defend all its doctrines as Apostolic, if the Apostles didn't believe it?
“We shall find ourselves unable,” he says again, “to fix an historical point at which the growth of doctrine ceased. Not on the day of Pentecost, for St. Peter had still to learn at Joppa about the baptism of Cornelius; not at Joppa and Caesarea, for St. Paul had to write his Epistles; not on the death of the last apostle,..."(pg.107) Sorry this is clearly heretical and should be enough to condemn his whole theory, because this is the essence of why he wrote his essay in the first place. Pope Pius X condemned his idea in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907-- #21: Revelation, constituting the object of the Catholic faith, was not completed with the Apostles. --condemned.
St. Pius again condemns his theory in the same syllabus:
#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.--condemned.
Let us continue his thought "...for St. Ignatius had to establish the doctrine of Episcopacy , not then, nor for many years after, for the canon of the New Testament was still undetermined; ..."(pg.107) The Bible is not a doctrine, it contains doctrine but is a product of the Catholic Church, which was written down. He seems to think the Church is an idea in Scripture, not an institute created by Christ himself.. Pope Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907,-- #53: The organic constitution of the Church is not immutable. Like human society, Christian society is subject to a perpetual evolution. --condemned.
and
#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 --- condemned
He continues:
"....not in the Creed , which is no collection of definitions, but a summary of certain credenda , an incomplete summary, and, like the Lord’s Prayer or the Decalogue, a mere sample of divine truths, especially of the more elementary. "(pg.107) Again Newman's idea was condemned by Pope Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907, # 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. --condemned. So , Pius X is saying that complete doctrine/dogma has fallen from heaven(#22) and was finished at the death of the last Apostle(#21). Do we need more to see his premise is not Catholic?
"No one doctrine can be named which starts omnibus numeris , at first, and gains nothing from the investigations of faith and the attacks of heresy."(107) He is establishing here a premise that heresy is necessary to know the True Faith given once and for all to the Apostles. Is true doctrine some kind of Hegelian dialectic with heresy as an essential service to the Church in enabling her to develop and fully understand the sacred deposit of faith? While it may be true that theology and apologetics develop so we may more clearly explain what we believe, but does truth need error to be true? Absurd. The Church defends the Truth from corruption and error; it is not welcomed! Pope Pius X condemned in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907, --- # 19. Heterodox exegetes have expressed the true sense of the Scriptures more faithfully than Catholic exegetes. -- condemned. Heresies may force us to defend some point of doctrine but the lose of souls to hell because of these damnable heresies can not be seen as a positive thing. If heretics are helping us to find truth and ahead of orthodoxy, then the Church should have been more tolerant of their “errors.”
He states that the Church didn't have fully the Gospel:
"The church went forth from the world in haste , as the Israelites from Egypt, ‘with their dough before it was leavened, their kneading-troughs being bound up in their clothes upon their shoulders.’...”(pg. 107)
“...Thus we see how, as time went on, the doctrine of Purgatory was opened upon the apprehension of the church , as a portion or form of penance due for sins committed after baptism: and thus the belief in this doctrine and the practice of infant baptism would grow into general reception together.”(pg. 417) Can any Catholic agree with this heresy that Purgatory is not of Apostolic in origin? Can a Catholic agree that infant baptism is not from the Apostles? Did the practice of infant baptism just gradually dawn in the Church? St. Pius X again condemns these in his syllabus of Modernist Errors --Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907--- Infant Baptism:
#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. -- condemned
Pius X condemned Newman's whole premise of his theory of "development" in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907---
#54. Dogmas, Sacraments and hierarchy, both their notion and reality, are only interpretations and evolutions [read: developments] of the Christian intelligence which have increased and perfected by an external series of additions the little germ [read: seed] latent in the Gospel. --condemned
St. Pius X, September 1, 1910, "The Oath Against Modernism"
"Fourthly, I sincerely hold that the doctrine of faith was
handed down to us from the apostles through the orthodox Fathers in exactly the
same meaning and always in the same purport. Therefore, I entirely reject the
heretical' misrepresentation that dogmas evolve and change from one meaning to
another different from the one which the Church held previously.
I also condemn
every error according to which, in place of the divine deposit which has been
given to the spouse of Christ to be carefully guarded by her, there is put a
philosophical figment or product of a human conscience that has gradually been
developed by human effort and WILL CONTINUE TO DEVELOP INDEFINITELY."
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius10/p10moath.htm
Newman's passages do not appear in their full strength, detached, as they are, from the context; but we think there is no mistaking the doctrine they inculcate. They prove clearly that Newman does not mean simply that there has been a growth in theological science, a variation or expansion of outward discipline, but that there have been in the teachings of the Church herself real variations of doctrine , an increase and expansion of the Christian creed, — a real progress of the Church in her own sacred deposit of faith committed to her charge by Christ and the Apostles, and which she received the command to teach all nations even unto the consummation of the world. He assert, She (the Church) went forth in haste, her “dough unleavened,” her creed incomplete, in regard to every article of faith, which she was authorized to teach.
He thinks new definitions are new doctrines, and indicates that more of Christian truth is opened upon the apprehension of the Church. Before She defines an article, as if She herself does not clearly and distinctly apprehend what, on the point to be defined, is not the revelation she originally received, completed at the death of the last Apostle.
As if she had only a confused notion, only an intense feeling, and no distinct apprehension of the consubstantiality of the Son to the Father when she drew up the symbol, and not till she defined it against Arius at Nicaea; and when she defined the “two natures in one person” against Nestorius, she had not yet fully learned the “one person in two distinct natures,” which she asserted shortly after against Eutyches. She never knew the Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist until the Council of Trent defined it? He says all may have been implied in the original revelation, but she knew it not; and it is only as time goes on, as mind acts on mind, as controversies arise, as urgent necessities press, that she gradually develops it, and fixes it in her definitions. Thus in her understanding there is a perpetual growth, or a continued increase and expansion of Christian doctrine.
Again remember this principle was condemned so we repeat it by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907---#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.--- condemned
The decision of the rule of faith, Newman tells us, “has been left to time, to the influence of mind upon mind, the issues of controversy and the growth of opinion,” and remains, he supposes, even to this day, “more or less undeveloped, or at least undefined by the church.”(pg. 99) Infant baptism was 'unprovided for by the revelation, as originally given.' It is left undecided, “unless by development or growth” of revelation, what is the resource of those who sin after baptism, and the doctrine of Purgatory appears to have been a late development. The condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907--
Regarding Purgatory and Sacraments could be applied here:
#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 . --condemned.
And Infant Baptism:
#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. -- condemned
Now, in regard to all this, we simply ask, does the Church herself take this view? Does she teach that she at first received no formal revelation, — that the revelation was given as “unleavened dough,” to be leavened, kneaded, made up into loaves of convenient size, baked and prepared for use by her, after her mission began, and she had commenced the work of evangelizing the nations? Does she admit her original creed was incomplete, that it has increased and expanded, that there have been variation and progress in her understanding of the revelation she originally received, and that she now understands it better, and can more readily define what it is than she could at first? Most assuredly not. She asserts that there has been no progress, no increase, no variation of faith; that what she believes and teaches now is precisely what she has always and everywhere believed and taught from the first. She denies that she has ever added a new article to the primitive creed; and affirms, as Newman himself proves in his account of the Council of Chalcedon, that the new definition is not a new development, a better understanding of the faith, but simply a new definition, against the “novel expressions” invented by the enemies of religion, of what, on the point defined, had always and everywhere been her precise faith.
In this she is right, or she is wrong. If right we must abandon Newman's theory of developments; if wrong, she is a false witness for God, and Newman's theory of developments cannot make her worthy of confidence. If you do not believe her, you are no Catholic. This is sufficient to show that Newman cannot urge his theory as a Catholic, whatever he might do as a Protestant.
Newman proceeds on the assumption, that the revelation committed to the charge of the church was not a distinct, formal revelation, but a vague, loose, obscure revelation, which she at first only imperfectly apprehended. This is evident from the extracts we have made, and also from what he says when pointing out an error in a passage which he quotes from one of his previous publications. “The writer considers the growth of the doctrine [of Purgatory] an instance of the action of private judgment; whereas I should now call it an instance of the mind of the church working out dogmatic truth from implicit feelings , under secret supernatural guidance.”(pg.417) This is a pregnant passage, and may be regarded as a key to Newman’s doctrine of development, and also to his view of the teaching authority of the Church.
The development, as is evident from the context, is not the formal definition of the faith against a novel error, but is a slow, painful, and laborious working out, by the church herself, of dogmatic truth from implicit feelings, — though what kind of feeling an implicit feeling is, we are unable to say. “Thus St. Justin or St. Irenaeus might be without any digested idea of Purgatory, or Original Sin, yet have an intense feeling , which they had not defined or located, both of the fault of our first nature and of the liabilities of our nature regenerate.” (pg.83) It is obvious from the whole course of Newman’s reasoning, that he would predicate of the church, in their time, what he here predicates of St. Justin and St. Irenaeus. The church had a vague yet intense feeling of the truth, but had not digested it into formal propositions or definite articles. She had a blind instinct, which, under secret supernatural guidance, enabled her to avoid error and to pursue the regular course of development.
It is also absurd that the Purgatory and Original sin were not part of Catholic belief from the very beginning. This shows how steeped Newman was in Protestant Legend. Here is an excerpt from the
Catholic Encyclopedia:
“It is not true that the doctrine of original sin does not appear in the works of the pre-Augustinian Fathers. On the contrary, their testimony is found in special works on the subject. Nor can it be said, as Harnack maintains, that St. Augustine himself acknowledges the absence of this doctrine in the writings of the Fathers. St. Augustine invokes the testimony of eleven Fathers, Greek as well as Latin (Contra Jul., II, x, 33). Baseless also is the assertion that before St. Augustine this doctrine was unknown to the Jews and to the Christians; as we have already shown, it was taught by St. Paul. It is found in the fourth Book of Esdras, a work written by a Jew in the first century after Christ and widely read by the Christians. This book represents Adam as the author of the fall of the human race (vii, 48), as having transmitted to all his posterity the permanent infirmity, the malignity, the bad seed of sin (iii, 21, 22; iv, 30). Protestants themselves admit the doctrine of original sin in this book and others of the same period (see Sanday, "The International Critical Commentary: Romans", 134, 137; Hastings, "A Dictionary of the Bible", I, 841). It is therefore impossible to make St. Augustine, who is of a much later date, the inventor of original sin.
That this doctrine existed in Christian tradition before St. Augustine's time is shown by the practice of the Church in the baptism of children... Catholics argued, too, from the ceremonies of baptism, which suppose the child to be under the power of evil, i.e., exorcisms, abjuration of Satan made by the sponsor in the name of the child [Augustine, loc. cit., xxxiv, 63; Denz., n. 140 (96)].” http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11312a.htm#IV
This is what Newman believes: What in one age is a feeling in a succeeding age becomes an opinion, and an article of faith in a still later age. This new article gives rise to a new intense feeling, which, in its turn, in a subsequent age becomes opinion, to be finally, in a later age yet, imposed as dogmatic truth. This is, so far as we can understand it, Newman’s doctrine of development, and what he means by “working out dogmatic truth from implicit feelings.”(pg. 417) Again Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907--- #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. -- condemned
#21. Revelation, constituting the object of the Catholic faith, was not completed with the Apostles.-- condemned
By the “mind” of the church which works out this dogmatic truth, Newman does not mean, strictly speaking, the constituted authority of the church, but the internal sense, very nearly what Moehler calls the “internal tradition,” of the collective body of the faithful. When he speaks of the recipients of the revelation, he seems always to have in his mind the ecclesia credens (learning Church), and to forget the ecclesia docens (teaching Church). This was also condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907-- #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." --condemned
He does not appear to have ever heard that Almighty God gave his revelation to pastors and teachers qualified from the first to teach it in its purity and integrity, clearly and distinctly, but that he threw it upon the great concourse of believers for them to receive and make the most of. “The time at length came when these recipients ceased to be inspired; and on these recipients the revealed truths would fall at first vaguely and generally, and would afterwards be completed by developments.”(pg 95) This view, reduces the office of the Magisterium, the church teaching, to that of defining, from time to time, the dogmatic truth which the “church learning” has gradually and slowly worked out from her implicit feelings.
As said above this was condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907-- #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." --condemned
Or take your pick of condemnations:
This was condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907--
#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. --- condemned
#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. --condemned
Newman evidently proceeds on the assumption, that Christianity can be abstracted from the Church, and be considered apart from the institution which concretes it, as if the Church were accidental and not essential in our holy religion. “Christianity,” he says, “though spoken of in prophecy as a kingdom, came into the world as an idea rather than an institution, and has had to wrap itself in clothing, and fit itself with armor of its own providing, and form the instruments and methods of its own prosperity and warfare.”(pg.116) If he does not consider the Church necessary, all he says on the development of ideas in general, can have no relation to the subject of the Church. This was condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907-- #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.--condemned. Newman claims the divine Author sent Christianity into the world as a naked and unarmed idea not as a Church, i.e. institution.
Assuming that Christianity came into the world originally as an idea, and not as an institution, then by seizing it anew, abstracting it from the institution with which it has clothed itself, we might organize a new institution, a new church, better than the old one. We could strip it of all these unnecessary paganisms it has absorbed over the centuries. How would this be wrong, if it be assumed that Christianity was originally given us as a naked and unarmed idea?
Moreover, if you assume Christianity as only an idea, and to have been developed only by the action of the human mind on it, the institutions with which it is subsequently clothed, the authorities established in its name, the dogmas imposed, the precepts enjoined, and the rites prescribed are all really the products of the human mind. The church would be divine only in the sense philosophy or civil government is divine. Again this was condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907--
#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.--- condemned
and
#53. The organic constitution of the Church is not immutable. Like human society, Christian society is subject to a perpetual evolution.--- condemned
Newman is typical of confused modernist thinking: "Nor can it fairly be made a difficulty, that thus to treat Christianity is to level it in some sort to sects and doctrines of the world, and to impute to it the imperfections which characterize the productions of man. Certainly it is a degradation of a divine work to consider it under an earthly form; but it is no irreverence, since the Lord himself, its author and owner, bore one also. Christianity differs from other religions and philosophies in what it has in addition to them; not in kind, but in origin; not in its nature, but in its personal characteristics; being informed and quickened by what is more than intellect, by a divine Spirit. It is externally what the apostle calls an 'earthly vessel,' being the religion of men . And considered as such, it grows 'in wisdom and stature'; but the powers which it wields, and the words which proceed out of its mouth, attest its miraculous nativity." (pg. 96) Newman mistakes the analogy on which he relies. Undoubtedly the Church has its human side as well as its divine side; but it is not a correct view of Christianity to assume that its whole body, doctrines and institution, is human, and a production of man, simply quickened and informed by the Divine Spirit. In Christianity, doctrine represents the divine, not the human, — doctrine is not the "earthly vessel," but that which was deposited in the vessel; for nothing can be regarded as Christian doctrine but what was originally revealed. We think It is good to quote again Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907-#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 .--- condemned
Our difficulties are not diminished when we take up Newman’s definition of idea. An idea, according to him, "is the habitual judgment which the mind forms of that which comes before it : These habitual judgments often go by the name of ideas, and shall be called so here.”(pg. 30) He claims Christianity came into the world as an idea, therefore as an habitual judgment formed by the mind. This, if construed strictly, makes Christianity purely human; for, if it be an habitual judgment formed by the human mind, it has no existence outside of the human mind, and could have had none before being formed in it. This is a conclusion from which every believer must recoil with horror.
But according to the author, we must say that Christianity came into the world as an habitual judgment, for it came as an idea. Then it is nothing but an habitual judgment which the world forms. This must be admitted, because he says expressly, “To know what it is, we must seek it in the world, and hear the world’s witness of it.”(pg. 2) But it is an habitual judgment which the world forms of — what? Of Christian doctrine, of the revelation supernaturally made and committed to the church? Newman cannot say, because this would make Christianity the object of the judgment, whereas he tells us that it is the judgment itself. Of what, then, is Christianity the habitual judgment which the world forms? We can conceive no answer that Newman can give which will not involve naked deism, or, at best, mere Quakerism.
Newman tells us again that ideas sometimes represent facts, and sometimes do not. Does Christianity represent facts, or does it not? He doubtless intends to teach that it does. But what is the evidence? What is the criteria by which to distinguish an idea which represents a fact from one which does not? He answers: —
“When one and the same idea is held by persons who are independent of each other, and variously circumstanced, and have possessed themselves of it by different ways under very different aspects, without losing its substantial unity and its identity, and when it is thus variously presented, and yet recommended to persons similarly circumstanced; and when it is presented to persons variously circumstanced, under aspects discordant at first sight, but reconcilable after such explanations as their respective states of mind require; then it seems to have a claim to be considered the representative of objective truth.”(pg. 31-32)
This is pure Lamennaisism which makes the consensus hominum the criterion of truth. It would also authorize us to infer, that, if Christianity, as at its first promulgation, be embraced only by a few, and these mutually connected and similarly circumstanced, and if, at the same time these all receive it by the same way and under the same aspect, or agree among themselves in their views of it, it would have no “claim to be considered the representative of objective truth.”(pg.32) The faith of the Blessed Virgin, the twelve apostles, and the seventy disciples, must, then, have labored under very serious disadvantages. Moreover, if all the world should be converted, all gathered into the same communion, become of “one mind,” as well as of “one heart,” there would be room to question whether Christianity represents a fact or a no-fact. Is this Catholic teaching?
It is plain from this that Newman means to teach that the Church, in order to attain to an adequate expression of the Christian idea or of Christian doctrine, must institute and carry on the precise process of development which he has predicated of ideas generally; for he contends, and he told us as much in the beginning, that she is forced to do so by the nature of the human mind itself. The revelation is not and cannot be taken in all at once. The Church can neither learn nor teach it, except under particular aspects, none of which, he says, can go the depth of the idea, — that is, we presume, of the fact or no-fact which the idea represents; for it is hardly to be supposed that a judgment cannot go the depth of itself; and it is only by collecting and adjusting these particular aspects, that she can attain to an adequate expression of Christian doctrine. This is naked eclecticism, not in philosophy only, but even in faith.
But this development is effected only gradually, and 'after a sufficient time.' Some centuries elapse, and the doctrine of Purgatory is “opened upon the apprehension of the church.”(pg. 417) Can we say a church like this could defend itself in all ages? We are defending as authoritative and infallible, that the Apostoles received the formal commission to teach all nations all things whatsoever our Lord commanded! In plain words, was the Church able to teach truly and infallibly in the age of Saints Clement and Polycarp, or of Saints Justin and Irenaeus, the whole Catholic faith, or was she not? If she was, then there can have been no development of doctrine as Newman proposes it. If she was not, she was not then competent to discharge the commission she received? Is not what was then sufficient, all that is really necessary now?
Newman seems to think new developments are needed; for he mentions several fundamental matters, which he says he supposes “remain more or less undeveloped, or at least undefined, by the church.”(pg. 368) He equates doctrine with a constant continual evolution of doctrine. Of course this was condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907-
# 53: The organic constitution of the Church is not immutable. Like human society, Christian society is subject to a perpetual evolution. --- condemned
and
#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. --- condemned
Whoever glances at Newman’s application of his “tests” cannot fail to perceive that he regards heresies as having been of essential service to the church in enabling her to develop and fully understand the sacred deposit of faith; and that he sees no peculiar sin in them, but in their anticipating the church, and bringing out and insisting upon a particular aspect of truth, before her hour has come, before she has reached it in the regular course of development. They are too impatient; they cannot wait the slow course of time, but would precipitate the growth of the church. “Montanism is a remarkable anticipation or presage of developments which soon began to show themselves in the church, though they were not perfected for centuries after.” “The doctrinal determinations and ecclesiastical usages of the middle ages are only the true fulfilment of its self-willed and abortive attempts at precipitating the growth of the church.” “While the prophets of the Montanists prefigure the church’s doctors, and their inspiration her infallibility, and their revelations her developments, and the heresiarch himself is the unsightly anticipation of St. Francis, in Novatian again we see the aspiration of nature after such creations of grace as St. Benedict or St. Bruno.” (pg. 352) This requires no comment but yes it was condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili Sane, July 3, 1907-#19. Heterodox exegetes have expressed the true sense of the Scriptures more faithfully than Catholic exegetes. -- condemned
If heretics are necessary and go before the church, and develop truth before she is ready for it, and yet a truth she subsequently accepts, we think she should treat them with a little more indulgence, and that we should rather lament her tardiness than censure their precipitancy.
Newman, strange as it may seem, regards the heretic as generally in advance of the orthodox doctor, and appears to maintain that orthodoxy is formed out of the “raw material” supplied by heretics. “The theology of the church,” he says, “is the diligent, patient working out of one doctrine from many materials. The conduct of popes, councils, fathers, betokens the slow, painful, anxious taking up of new elements into an existing body of belief .”(pg. 353) It is singular that it never occurred to Newman, that possibly the heretical views which he seems to admire so much were simply corruptions of doctrines which the church had taught before them, and that heresy is the corruption of orthodoxy, and not its raw material. As a matter of fact, we suspect, in all cases of coincidence, the orthodox doctor is older than the heretical teacher, as the Church is older than any of the sects.
It is plain to the Catholic reader, that Newman errs in consequence of his neglect to distinguish in his own mind, —or, if not in his own mind, in his book, — on the one hand, between Christian doctrine, that is, divine revelation, and Christian theology and discipline; and, on the other, between what the church teaches as of divine revelation, and the speculations of individual fathers and doctors. to some extent taken place. But these theories must always be subject to the doctrine given by the Jeus himself completed at the death of the last Apostle.
Newman forgets that the Church sprung into existence full grown, and armed at all points; and that she is withdrawn from the ordinary law of human systems and institutions by her supernatural origin, nature, character, and protection. If he had left out the Church, and entitled his book, “An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine --when withdrawn from the Authority and Supervision of the Church” , he would have written, with slight modifications, a great and valuable book.
It would then have been a sort of natural history of sectarism, and been substantially true. But applying his theory to the Catholic Church, and thus subjecting Her to the law which presides over all human systems and institutions, he has, unintentionally, struck at her divine and supernatural character. The Church has no natural history, for she is not in the order of nature, but of grace. Or, if he had simply distinguished between Christian doctrine, in which there is no development, and confined his remarks to theology as a human science deduced from supernatural doctrines, to the variations of external discipline and worship, and to the greater or less predominance of this or that Christian principle in the practice of individual Christians in different ages of the church, much that he has said might be accepted, and no very grave error would be taught.
The best method of defence has hardly been reserved for us to discover; and perhaps it is a sufficient reason for distrusting any method, that it is new, that it is a discovery of our own making and not God's. The Catholic Church is not here to follow the spirit of the age, but to control and direct it, often to struggle against it!
editor--All quotes of Cardinal Newman are from “An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine” by John Henry Newman, LONDON :JAMES TOOVEY, 192, PICCADILLY. M.DCCC.XLV. http://books.google.com/books
