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Author Topic: The Theologians  (Read 4315 times)

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Offline Augustinus

The Theologians
« on: November 22, 2017, 12:22:12 AM »
How doe those who deny BoD and BoB understand Tuas Libenter by Pope Pius IX?

Denzinger- 1684 But, since it is a matter of that subjection by which in conscience all those Catholics are bound who work in the speculative sciences, in order that they may bring new advantages to the Church by their writings, on that account, then, the men of that same convention should recognize that it is not sufficient for learned Catholics to accept and revere the aforesaid dogmas of the Church, but that it is also necessary to subject themselves to the decisions pertaining to doctrine which are issued by the Pontifical Congregations, and also to those forms of doctrine which are held by the common and constant consent of Catholics as theological truths and conclusions, so certain that opinions opposed to these same forms of doctrine, although they cannot be called heretical, nevertheless deserve some theological censure.

I would like to know how this is dealt with in spite of the fact that the theologians since St. Thomas generally affirm the reality of BoD. 

I hope for something a little more substantive than merely ignoring it. Thanks ahead of time! 8)
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Offline Augustinus

Re: The Theologians
« Reply #1 on: November 22, 2017, 10:31:48 AM »
So all the theologians who say to
Deny BoD is a mortal sin, you get around this...how?
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Offline Ladislaus

  • Supporter
Re: The Theologians
« Reply #2 on: November 22, 2017, 10:49:52 AM »
Quote from: Augustinus on November 22, 2017, 10:31:48 AM
So all the theologians who say to
Deny BoD is a mortal sin, you get around this...how?

By saying that they're wrong .. that they get the theological note wrong.  St. Augustine's teaching on the fate of unbaptized infants was held unanimously and unchallenged for about 700 years before being overturned by the Church [read the citation from "An even Seven"].  Widespread theological consensus on a speculative theological matter is not the same as the universal teaching of the Church.  According to Vatican I's definition of the Ordinary Universal Magisterium, this comes into play when the Church unanimously teaches that something has been "divinely revealed".  Only one or two theologians even hold that BoD is de fide ... and this stems from St. Alphonsus' exaggeration regarding the authority of a private letter written by a pope.
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Offline Ladislaus

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Re: The Theologians
« Reply #3 on: November 22, 2017, 11:10:06 AM »
Everyone should read that article on Limbo in The Catholic Encyclopedia:

Quote
Besides the professed advocates of Augustinianism, the principal theologians who belonged to the first party were Bellarmine, Petavius, and Bossuet, and the chief ground of their opposition to the previously prevalent Scholastic view was that its acceptance seemed to compromise the very principle of the authority of tradition. As students of history, they felt bound to admit that, in excluding unbaptized children from any place or state even of natural happiness and condemning them to the fire of Hell, St. Augustine, the Council of Carthage, and later African Fathers, like Fulgentius (De fide ad Petrum, 27), intended to teach no mere private opinion, but a doctrine of Catholic Faith; nor could they be satisfied with what Scholastics, like St. Bonaventure and Duns Scotus, said in reply to this difficulty, namely that St. Augustine had simply been guilty of exaggeration ("respondit Bonaventura dicens quod Augustinus excessive loquitur de illis poenis, sicut frequenter faciunt sancti" — Scots, In Sent., II, xxxiii, 2).
...
As to the difficulties against this view which possessed such weight in the eyes of the eminent theologians we have mentioned, it is to be observed:

Modern theologians make the same mistake that Bellarmine et al. did ... thinking wrongly that the speculative theology on BoD "intended to teach no mere private opinion, but a doctrine of Catholic faith".

AND ... the Council of Florence definition is easily reconcilable.  Limbo is in fact, strictly speaking, part of hell ... and the "widely different penalties" does not rule out that some could receive no such penalties whatsoever. 
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Offline Augustinus

Re: The Theologians
« Reply #4 on: November 22, 2017, 11:38:42 AM »
I think it's significant what Fr. Fenton writes in his article on the weight of the theological manuals:

http://www.catholicapologetics.info/modernproblems/vatican2/Manuals.htm


"What seems to displease Father Baum is the fact that the unanimous teaching of the scholastic theologians in any area relating to faith or morals is the teaching of the ordinary and universal magisterium of the Church. The manuals, like those to which we have referred, are books actually used in the instruction of candidates for the priesthood. They are written by men who actually teach in the Church's own approved schools, under the direction of the Catholic hierarchy, and ultimately, through the activity of the Congregation of Seminaries and Universities, under the direction of the Sovereign Pontiff himself. The common or morally unanimous teaching of the manuals in this field is definitely a part of Catholic doctrine.
It is quite obvious that the individual opinions of individual authors do not constitute Catholic doctrine, and could not be set forth as such. But there is a fund of common teaching (like that which tells us that there are truths which the Church proposes to us as revealed by God, and which are not contained in any way within the inspired books of Holy Scripture), which is the unanimous doctrine of the manuals, and which is the doctrine of the Catholic Church. The unanimous teaching of the scholastic theologians has always been recognized as a norm of Catholic doctrine. It is unfortunate that today there should be some attempt to mislead people into imagining that it has ceased to be such a norm in the twentieth century."
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