Even though the dogmas which come
into being over the course of time are not really new in themselves, they may
still be new to the Church of those times in which their form is evolving. For
one does experience as new that is implicit in what one already holds, as long
as one has not yet become aware of the implication. (John Henry Newman, On
the Development of Catholic Dogma, in Roman Catholic Writings On
Doctrinal Development by John Henry Newman, ed. James Gaffney [Kansas City:
Sheed and Ward, 1997], 24, emphasis added)
“It is clear that the famous
saying of Vincent of Lerins, ‘What always &c’ should be understood only in
what is called a positive sense. That is, ‘What always &c’ could not fail
to be true or to derive from apostolic tradition. But it should not be
understood in a negative sense, as meaning that anything that was not ‘always
&c’ believed, or at least explicitly believed, should not be regarded as
true or certain. Otherwise that would have applied to the authenticity and
canonicity of all the deuterocanonical writings, which is plainly absurd.”
(Perron. de Ver. Rel. p. 245 nota 1) (Newman, “Thesis One,” in ibid., 28)
Moreover, there are many matters
about which the holy Fathers could never have spoken as they did if they had
already learned from the Church truths which are nowadays inculcated either in
express terms or as implied in rituals and forms of worship. If the gifts and
privileges of the Blessed Virgin Mary familiar to modern believes have been
established as dogma, transmitted by the Eastern, Egyptian, and Gallican
churches of the third and fourth centuries, how could Origen have said that
Mary sinned during the Passion? (Chrysostom, in Matth. Hom. 44) How could he
have called her “ambitious,” saying that she wanted to show the people how she
controlled and exercised authority over her son, because her own imagination
had not envisaged for him anything very great.” Indeed, if she found herself
pregnant without understanding what was happening, she “would probably have
taken her own life rather than be trapped under an unbearable burden of
disgrace” (as Petavius puts it). According to Cyril, the Mother of the Lord was
almost distraught at her son’s unanticipated suffering, to the point of saying
‘The one I gave birth to is now being mocked upon a cross. Perhaps he was,
after all, deluded in claiming to be the son of Him who rules all things.’” And
Cyril goes on to say that there is nothing astonishing in this, since this
suffering had to be endured by “the impressionable mind of a mere woman.”
(Newman, “Treatise Two,” in ibid., 31)
The most important of these norms
is that whatever additions are made to the deposit of faith are not really new,
but evolved out of what is already there. So Christian dogma really grows,
rather than accumulates; there is no new beginning of truth, but the
continuance of a real tradition.
“We say it is one thing to believe
something repugnant to the dogmas and doctrines preached by the Apostles. It is
quite another thing to believe something by way of addition to the doctrine the
Apostles preached, something not expressly declared by them, or at least not demonstrated
to have been so declared.” (Suarez. 1. c. #3)
“Paul did not tell Timothy, I. 6
simply that novelties must be avoided, but ‘profane novelties of language.’”
For, as St. Thomas remarks on that same text, not every novelty is
objectionable, for the Lord did say, I give you a new commandment,’ John 13,
but only profane novelty, that is, novelty that opposes divine and sacred
realities. Earlier, that had been Augustine’s view, in Tract. 97 on John, near
the end, One finds almost the same thing in Vincent of Lerins, c. 37 asking
‘What is “profane”? that which has nothing of a sacred, of a religious
character, completely alien to the inner depths of the Church which is God’s
temple, etc. Profane novelties of language, that is of dogmas, matters thoughts
which are contrary to the antiquity.’ By the same token, what are not contrary,
but rather serve or a better understanding of antiquity, cannot be called
profane novelties. Indeed, they should not be called novelties at all, for they
were contained in antiquity, and virtually, or as they say, implicitly,
believed. When, later on, they are delivered in more explicit form, they should
be characterized not as new things, but as old things newly expressed.” (Ibid.
#5)
Consider also those testimonies
already presented arguing the first thesis. For a general example, take the
Church’s faith concerning the Blessed Virgin Mary. The longer and the more
closely Catholics mediated on the dogma of the Incarnation, the more apparent
it became that esteem for the Son was involved in esteem for his Mother, to
such an extent that loving and honoring the Son was not possible without loving
and honoring the Mother as well. What is more, they found it an indispensable
sign of right faith in the Incarnation of the word to extol her through whom it
came to pass. Thus the dogma of the dignity of the Mother of God arose not
out od substantive tradition, but out of meditation. In treating a certain
proposition of faith, Perrone observed that certain “Popes present clear
statements of the Fathers, and examples of the saints collected by Bellarmine
which, although not strictly conclusive, show nevertheless the Church’s spirit,
and the seed of this dogma in tradition which was later to evolve.”
(de Matrim p. 285) Here we see the dogma of faith, not in its fully matured
form, but germinally, committed to tradition. Consider also de Eccles, p. 17,
where treating matters of dogma, he writes as follows: “Over the course of the
ages the Church progressively evolves the principles and seeds
implanted by Christ in its very foundation as already authorized by the
Apostles.” He establishes that the post-Apostolic Church adopted a
similar explanation of its own dogmas as though received from the living
Apostles. See also p. 509, where he asserts that the Church had already
possessed certain rights, even before actually exercizing them. (Newman,
“Thesis Four,” in ibid., 35-36, emphasis in bold added)
. . . acts simply unjustifiable
such as the real betrayals of the truth on the part of Liberius and Honorius,
become intelligible, and cease to be shocking, if we consider that those Popes
felt themselves to be head rulers of Christendom and their first duty, as such,
to be that of securing its peace, union and consolidation. The personal want of
firmness or of clear-sightedness in the matter of doctrine, which each of them
in his own day evidenced, may have arisen out of his keen sense of being the
Ecumenical Bishop and one Pastor of Christ’s flock, of the scandal caused by
its internal dissensions, and of his responsibility, should it retrograde in
health and strength in his day.
The principle, on which these two
Peoples may be supposed to have acted, not unsound in itself, through by them
wrong applied, I conceive to be this—that no act could be theologically an
error, which was absolutely and undeniably necessary for the unity, sanctity,
and peace of the Church; for falsehood never could be necessary for those
blessings, and truth alone can be, If one could be sure of this necessity, the
principle itself may be granted, though, from the difficulty of rightly
applying it, it can only be allowed on such grace occasions, with so luminous a
tradition, in its favour, and by such high authorities, as make it safe. If it
was wrongly used by the Popes whom I have named, it has been rightly and
successfully used by others, in whose decision, in their respective cases, no
Catholic has any difficulty in concurring. (Newman, “Preface to the Third
Edition of the Via Media,” in ibid., 116-17)
