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Redemptor hominis - Pope John Paul II
19. The Church as responsible for truth
In the light of the sacred teaching of the Second Vatican Council, the
Church thus appears before us as the social subject of responsibility for
divine truth. With deep emotion we hear Christ himself saying: "The word
which you hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me"141. In
this affirmation by our Master do we not notice responsibility for the revealed
truth, which is the "property" of God himself, since even he,
"the only Son", who lives "in the bosom of the
Father"142, when transmitting that truth as a prophet and teacher,
feels the need to stress that he is acting in full fidelity to its divine
source? The same fidelity must be a constitutive quality of the Church's faith,
both when she is teaching it and when she is professing it. Faith as a specific
supernatural virtue infused into the human spirit makes us sharers in knowledge
of God as a response to his revealed word. Therefore it is required, when the
Church professes and teaches the faith, that she should adhere strictly to divine
truth143, and should translate it into living attitudes of
"obedience in harmony with reason"144. Christ himself,
concerned for this fidelity to divine truth, promised the Church the special
assistance of the Spirit of truth, gave the gift of infallibility145 to
those whom he entrusted with the mandate of transmitting and teaching that
truth146-as has besides been clearly defined by the First Vatican
Council147 and has then been repeated by the Second Vatican Council148-and
he furthermore endowed the whole of the People of God with a special sense of
the faith149.
Consequently, we have become sharers in this mission of the prophet Christ,
and in virtue of that mission we together with him are serving divine truth in
the Church. Being responsible for that truth also means loving it and seeking
the most exact understanding of it, in order to bring it closer to ourselves
and others in all its saving power, its splendour and its profundity joined with
simplicity. This love and this aspiration to understand the truth must go hand
in hand, as is confirmed by the histories of the saints in the Church. These
received most brightly the authentic light that illuminates divine truth and
brings close God's very reality, because they approached this truth with
veneration and love-love in the first place for Christ, the living Word of
divine truth, and then love for his human expression in the Gospel, tradition
and theology. Today we still need above all that understanding and
interpretation of God's Word; we need that theology. Theology has always had
and continues to have great importance for the Church, the People of God, to be
able to share creatively and fruitfully in Christ's mission as prophet.
Therefore, when theologians, as servants of divine truth, dedicate their
studies and labours to ever deeper understanding of that truth, they can never
lose sight of the meaning of their service in the Church, which is enshrined in
the concept intellectus fidei. This concept has, so to speak, a two-way
function, in line with Saint Augustine's expression: intellege,
utcredas-crede, ut intellegas,150 and it functions correctly when
they seek to serve the Magisterium, which in the Church is entrusted to the
Bishops joined by the bond of hierarchical communion with Peter's Successor,
when they place themselves at the service of their solicitude in teaching and
giving pastoral care, and when they place themselves at the service of the
apostolic commitments of the whole of the People of God.
As in preceding ages, and perhaps more than in preceding ages, theologians
and all men of learning in the Church are today called to unite faith with
learning and wisdom, in order to help them to combine with each other, as we
read in the prayer in the liturgy of the memorial of Saint Albert, Doctor of
the Church. This task has grown enormously today because of the advance of
human learning, its methodology, and the achievements in knowledge of the world
and of man. This concerns both the exact sciences and the human sciences, as
well as philosophy, which, as the Second Vatican Council recalled, is closely
linked with theology151.
In this field of human knowledge, which is continually being broadened and
yet differentiated, faith too must be investigated deeply, manifesting the
magnitude of revealed mystery and tending towards an understanding of truth,
which has in God its one supreme source. If it is permissible and even
desirable that the enormous work to be done in this direction should take into
consideration a certain pluralism of methodology, the work cannot however
depart from the fundamental unity in the teaching of Faith and Morals which is
that work's end. Accordingly, close collaboration by theology with the Magisterium
is indispensable. Every theologian must be particularly aware of what Christ
himself stated when he said: "The word which you hear is not mine but the
Father's who sent me"152. Nobody, therefore, can make of theology
as it were a simple collection of his own personal ideas, but everybody must be
aware of being in close union with the mission of teaching truth for which the
Church is responsible.
The sharing in the prophetic office of Christ himself shapes the life of the
whole of the Church in her fundamental dimension. A particular share in this
office belongs to the Pastors of the Church, who teach and continually and in
various ways proclaim and transmit the doctrine concerning the Christian faith
and morals. This teaching, both in its missionary and its ordinary aspect,
helps to assemble the People of God around Christ, prepares for participation
in the Eucharist and points out the ways for sacramental life. In 1977 the
Synod of the Bishops dedicated special attention to catechesis in the modern
world, and the mature results of its deliberations, experiences and suggestions
will shortly find expression-in keeping with the proposal made by the
participants in the Synod-in a special papal document. Catechesis certainly
constitutes a permanent and also fundamental form of activity by the Church,
one in which her prophetic charism is manifested: witnessing and teaching go
hand in hand. And although here we are speaking in the first place of priests,
it is however impossible not to mention also the great number of men and women
religious dedicating themselves to catechetical activity for love of the divine
Master. Finally, it would be difficult not to mention the many lay people who
find expression in this activity for their faith and their apostolic
responsibility.
Furthermore, increasing care must be taken that the various forms of
catechesis and its various fields-beginning with the fundamental field, family
catechesis, that is the catechesis by parents of their children-should give
evidence of the universal sharing by the whole of the People of God in the
prophetic office of Christ himself. Linked with this fact, the Church's
responsibility for divine truth must be increasingly shared in various ways by
all. What shall we say at this point with regard to the specialists in the
various disciplines, those who represent the natural sciences and letters,
doctors, jurists, artists and technicians, teachers at various levels and with
different specializations? As members of the People of God, they all have their
own part to play in Christ's prophetic mission and service of divine truth,
among other ways by an honest attitude towards truth, whatever field it may
belong to, while educating others in truth and teaching them to mature in love
and justice. Thus, a sense of responsibility for truth is one of the
fundamental points of encounter between the Church and each man and also one of
the fundamental demands determining man's vocation in the community of the
Church. The present-day Church, guided by a sense of responsibility for truth,
must persevere in fidelity to her own nature, which involves the prophetic
mission that comes from Christ himself: "As the Father has sent me, even
so I send you... Receive the Holy Spirit"153.
"We must, then, disengage ourselves from everything so as to approach God interiorly..." St. Teresa of Jesus
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