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In a recent sermon, Fr. Pfeiffer referred to the 13th century as the highest point of Christianity, the summit of the glorious age of the Church, when the Faith was blossoming in fullest development.  Many of the greatest saints in the Church lived at the time, such as St. Dominic, St. Francis of Assisi, St. Anthony of Padua, St. Thomas Aquinas, Dr. (d. 1274), and St. Bonaventure, Doctor of the Church (d. 1274).  The list below came near the end of this great century, and therefore the list is "a good reflection of the intellectual climate" of the greatest age of the Church.

Rather than keep you in suspense, here is Dr. Trasancos' list of condemned propositions (Okay, it's not really infallible, but maybe it should have been!):






In 1277, Étienne Tempier, the Bishop of Paris, issued a list of 219 condemned propositions relating to details of Aristotelian texts that were irreconcilable with the Christian worldview. These propositions were not binding on Christians, but served as a guide for the scholars at the University of Paris. The decree largely dealt with the eternity of the world and creation.


The Condemned Propositions

 
The propositions are often referenced by historians of science, and their intent and effects are disputed. It is instructive to review them as they are (in translation) and consider them on their own merit. Below is a list of some of the propositions condemned at the University of Paris by Tempier.1

Note, the quoted material is a condemned error, not an assertion.


    Proposition 31 rejected that the heavens are divine. “That there are three principles for celestial things: the subject of eternal motion, the soul of the celestial body, and the first mover, [which moves things] insofar as [it is] desired. This is an error with respect to the first two.”

    Proposition 32 rejected that the world is an organism. “That the eternal principles are two, namely, the body of the heaven and its soul.”

    Proposition 66 said that rectilinear motion is possible for planets and stars. “That God could not move the heaven in a straight line, the reason being that He would then leave a vacuum.”

    Proposition 73 essentially condemned pantheism. “That the heavenly bodies are moved by an intrinsic principle which is the soul, and that they are moved by a soul and an appetitive power, like an animal. For just as an animal is moved by desiring, so also is the heaven.”

    Proposition 75 also condemned the animistic view of the universe as if the heavens are made of organs. “That the celestial soul is an intelligence, and the celestial spheres are not instruments of intelligences but rather [their] organs, as the ear and the eye are the organs of a sensitive power.”

   Proposition 83 safeguarded the doctrine of creation. “That the world, although it was made from nothing, was not newly-made, and although it passed from nonbeing to being, the nonbeing did not precede in duration but only in nature.”

    Proposition 84 condemned the error that the physical world is eternal. “That the world is eternal because that which has a nature by which it is able to exist for the whole future has a nature by which it was able to exist in the whole past.”

    Proposition 85 also guarded against an eternal worldview. “That the world is eternal as regards all the species contained in it, and that time, motion, matter, agent, and receiver are eternal, because the world comes from the infinite power of God and it is impossible that there be something new in the effect without there being something new in the cause.”

    Proposition 86 protected the reality of time and eternity. “That eternity and time have no existence in reality but only in the mind.”

    Proposition 87 guarded the absolute beginning and end of time. “That nothing is eternal from the standpoint of its end that is not eternal from the standpoint of its beginning.”

    Proposition 88 rejected that time is infinite. “That time is infinite at both ends. For even though it is impossible for an infinitude [of things] to have been traversed, some one of which had to be traversed, nevertheless it is not impossible for an infinitude [of things] to have been traversed, none of which had to be traversed.”

    Proposition 89 declared that it is possible to refute arguments of Aristotle if his arguments for an eternal universe contradict revelation. “That it is impossible to refute the arguments of the Philosopher [Aristotle] concerning the eternity of the world unless we say that the will of the first being embraces incompatibles.”

    Proposition 90 carefully noted a distinction between Creator and creation. “That the universe cannot stop, because the first agent has [the ability] to transmute in succession eternally, now into this form, now into that one. And likewise, matter is naturally apt to be transmuted.”

    Proposition 91 asserted the beginning of the universe. “That there has already been an infinite number of revolutions of the heaven, which it is impossible for the created intellect but not for the first cause to comprehend.”

    Proposition 92 condemned the doctrine of the Great Year. “That with all the heavenly bodies coming back to the same point after a period of thirty-six thousand years, the same effects as now exist will reappear.”



Historians still study the writings of contemporaries of this time to ascertain the extent of the drama involved, but these condemnations demonstrate, incontrovertibly and like any other writing produced by Christian scholars, that faith guided the reasoning process. The Condemnations of 1277 are a good reflection of the intellectual climate of the times.


Notes:

 1.   Athur Hyman, James J. Walsh, and Thomas Williams, ed. Philosophy in the Middle Ages: The Christian, Islamic, and Jєωιѕн Tradition. Third Edition (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., 2010), 541-549. ↩

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The scientist who formulated the Big Bang hypothesis said that it was as if someone said, "Let there be light." I fail to understand how the Church could object.  

I beg your forgiveness in advance, Neil Obstat, but I will steal that comment and make use of it in appropriate situations. It is magnificent.