Year of Grace Series: Faith and Reason Chapter 6: The Interaction between Philosophy and Theology (Part 1)

The Knowledge of Faith and the demands of philosophical reason.

The word of God is addressed to all people everywhere.  Theology must have regard to the philosophies developed through the Ages in order to understand God’s word in the light of faith.  The Pope desires to recall some specific tasks of theology, which, by the very nature of the revealed word, demand recourse to philosophical enquiry.

Theology has two methodological principles to follow, viz

1. To absorb the content of Revelation, Sacred Tradition, Sacred Scripture and the Church’s Magisterium. 
2. To respond to the specific demands of disciplined thought. With regard to (1), philosophy helps theology in the study of the structure of knowledge and personal communication including forms and functioning of languages.  The theologians are also required to explain the Church’s teachings and the philosophical underpinnings of those teachings so that they are correctly interpreted.

With regard to (2), theology must grasp the logical and conceptual structure of the Church’s teachings which are designed to provide salvation for the individual and for humanity.  This culminates in the person of Jesus Christ and in his Pascal Mystery.  Believers then share in this mystery by their assent of faith.

Theology comprises:

• Dogmatic Theology.
• Fundamental Theology.
• Moral Theology.
  
  

A brief description of each follows:

Dogmatic theology must be able through concepts formed critically and understood universally, to make clear the universal meaning of God and men’s salvation by way of argument.  Without philosophy’s contribution this would nigh be impossible.  The believer must acquire a true knowledge of created realities of the world and man, whilst dogmatic theology implies a philosophy of the human being, who can recognise objective truth as its foundation.

Fundamental theology is required to justify and expound the relationship between faith and philosophical thought.  It should show how, in the light of the knowledge conferred by faith, there emerge certain truths which reason from its own independent enquiry, already perceives.

Revelation makes these truths clearer and more meaningful.  There is a natural knowledge of God, and divine Revelation can be distinguished from other phenomena so that the mind can accept Revelation without in any way compromising the principles and autonomy of the mind itself.  Faith, which is a gift from God, is not based on reason, although reason needs to be reinforced by faith to discover other truths which it cannot reach on its own.

Moral theology requires a sound philosophical vision of human nature and society, including being able to make ethical decision when needed.  Christians receive from the Gospel and other Apostolic writing God’s teaching as to how to lead a good life by exercising their conscience and power of their reason.

There is some objection to theologians having to rely solely on philosophy, when they are other avenues such as history, sciences, people’s traditions and cultural pluralism available to guide them.

There is some truth in these objections, but to reject a typical philosophical and critical thinking of a universal nature would be naive, because it is truth alone and not different worldviews that can help theology.

From the time the Gospel was first preached, it was realised that different cultures created difficulties in passing on the universality of its message.

But once the Gentiles embrace the faith they were transformed and the different cultures which they followed collapsed.  Jesus destroyed the walls of division and created unity in a new and unsurpassed way through sharing in his mystery. People became saints and members of the household of God.  Faith’s encounter with different cultures has created something new.

Cultures of people share their history and human life experiences.  Such cultures require communication of values, but need to be open to receive new experiences.  Lying deep in every culture there is a need for fulfillment so as to receive divine Revelation.

To every culture Christians bring the unchanging truth of God, which He reveals in the history and culture of a people.  The proclamation of the Gospel in different cultures allows people to preserve their own cultural identity, without creating division amongst the baptised.

No one culture can claim to be pre-eminent to the exclusion of all other cultures, as regards the truth of God’s revelation.  The Gospel is not opposed to any culture, but rather thinks believers bring a genuine liberation from all the disorder caused by sin, and at the same, time, a call to the fullness of truth.  Cultures are improved by the Gospel’s truth and develop in new ways.

The Church nowadays has problems regarding inculturation which the first centuries did not encounter.

The Pope referred to India as a case in point where there are rich heritages to be tapped.  The Council’s Declaration  ‘Nostra Aetate’ provides certain criteria to be kept in mind when dealing with disparate cultures.  These, in brief, are:

• Universality of the Human spirit.
• Basic needs are similar to most other cultures.
• The Church must not reject the heritage derived from the Greco-Latin thought when first dealing with Indian cultures and other Eastern Cultures.
• This approach is valid for every age both now and in the future.
• It would be wrong for the Indian cultural tradition to remain closed to any other tradition.  The same applies to cultural traditions in China, Japan, Asian countries and Africa.
  
  

The relationship between theology and philosophy is like a circle.  Theology starts from the word of God revealed in history.  God’s word is truth as God cannot lie.  Philosophy helps people to understand God’s word better, by requiring men and women to use their powers of reason to gain further insights into the search for truth and to avoid paths which would lead it to stray from revealed Truth.  Reason discovers new and unsuspected horizons because it is enhanced by philosophy in understanding God’s Truth.

This relationship has been confirmed over the years by many distinguished philosophers such as Saint Gregory of Naziagus, Saint Augustine, Saint Anselm, Saint Bonaventure, Saint Thomas Aquinas, John Henry Newman, Antonio Rossmine, Jacques Maritain, Etienne Gilson, Edith Stein (now a Saint), Vladimir Soloviev, Pavel A Florensky, Petr Chaadaev, and Vladimir P Lossky.

The Pope’s hope was that the work inspired by such people would encourage others to search for truth and to apply their results to the service of humanity, whilst using the philosophical and theological tradition in the process.