| Catholic Search |
Custom Search
|
| Catholic Search |
|
Custom Search
|
The Popes Against Modern Errors
Encyclical Letter of Pope St. Pius X
On Modernism
(Pascendi Dominici Gregis)
September 8, 1907
Venerable Brethren, Health and the Apostolic Blessing
Duty of the Apostolic See
1. One of the primary obligations assigned by Christ to the office divinely
committed to Us of feeding the Lord's flock is that of guarding with the greatest
vigilance the Deposit of the Faith delivered to the Saints, rejecting the profane
novelties of words and the gainsaying of knowledge falsely so called. There
has never been a time when this watchfulness of the supreme pastor was not necessary
to the Catholic body, for, owing to the efforts of the enemy of the human race,
there have never been lacking "men speaking perverse things" (Titus
1:10), "vain talkers and seducers" (Acts 20:30), "erring
and driving into error." (2 Tim. 3:13). It must, however, be confessed
that these latter days have witnessed a notable increase in the number of the
enemies of the Cross of Christ, who, by arts entirely new and full of deceit,
are striving to destroy the vital energy of the Church, and, as far as in them
lies, utterly to subvert the very Kingdom of Christ. Wherefore We may no longer
keep silence, lest We should seem to fail in Our most sacred duty, and lest
the kindness that, in the hope of wiser counsels, We have hietherto shown them,
should be set down to lack of diligence in the discharge of Our office.
Necessity of Immediate Action
2. That We should act without delay in this matter is made imperative especially
by the fact that the partisans of error are to be sought not only among the
Church's open enemies; but, what is to be most dreaded and deplored, in her
very bosom, and are the more mischievous the less they keep in the open. We
allude, Venerable Brethren, to many who belong to the Catholic laity, and, what
is much more sad, to the ranks of the priesthood itself, who, animated by a
false zeal for the Church, lacking the solid safeguards of philosophy and theology,
nay more, thoroughly imbued with the poisonous doctrines taught by the enemies
of the Church, and lost to all sense of modesty, put themselves forward as reformers
of the Church; and, forming more boldly into line of attack, assail all that
is most sacred in the work of Christ, not sparing even the Person of the
Divine Redeemer, whom, with sacrilegious audacity, they degrade to the condition
of a simple and ordinary man.
Characteristics of the Modernists
3. Although they express their astonishment that We should number them among
the enemies of the Church, no one will be reasonably surprised that We should
do so, if, leaving out of account the internal disposition of the soul, of which
God alone is the Judge, he considers their tenets, their manner of speech and
their action. Nor indeed would he be wrong in regarding them as the most
pernicious of all the adversaries of the Church. For, as We have said, they
put into operation their designs for her undoing, not from without but from
within. Hence, the danger is present almost in the very veins and heart of
the Church, whose injury is the more certain from the very fact that their
knowledge of her is more intimate. Moreover, they lay the ax not to the branches
and shoots, but to the very root, that is, to the Faith and its depest fibers.
And once having struck at this root of immmortality, they proceed to diffuse
poison through the whole tree, so that there is no part of Catholic truth which
they leave untouched, none that they do not strive to corrupt. Further, none
is more skillful, none more astute than they, in the employment of a thousand
noxious devices; for they play the double part of rationalist and Catholic,
and this so craftily that they easily lead the unwary into error; and as audacity
is their chief characteristic, there is no conclusion of any kind from which
they shrink or which they do not thrust forward with pertinacity and assurance.
To this must be added the fact, whicih indeed is well calculated to deceive
souls, that they lead a life of the greatest activity, of assiduous and ardent
application to every branch of learning, and that they possess, as a rule, a
reputation for irreproachable morality. Finally, there is the fact which is
all but fatal to the hope of cure that their very doctrines have given such
a bent to their minds, that they disdain all authority and brook no restraint;
and relying upon a false conscience, they attempt to ascribe to a love of truth
that which is in reality the result of pride and obstinacy. [...]
Division of the Encyclical
4. It is one of the cleverest devices of the Modernists (as they are
commonly and rightly called) to present their doctrines without order and systematic
arrangement, in a scattered and disjointed manner, so as to make it appear
as if their minds were in doubt or hesitation, whereas in reality they are
quite fixed and steadfast. For this reason it will be of advantage, Venerable
Brethren, to bring their teachings together here into one group, and to point
out their interconnection, and thus to pass to an examination of the sources
of the errors, and to prescribe remedies for averting the evil results.
The Modernist Personality
5. To proceed in an orderly manner in this somewhat abstruse subject, it must
first of all be noted that the Modernist sustains and includes within himself
a manifold personality; he is a philosopher, a believer, a theologian, an historian,
a critic, an apologist, a reformer. These roles must be clearly distinguished
one from another by all who would accurately understand their system and thoroughly
grasp the principles and the outcome of their doctrines.
Agnosticism
6. We begin, then, with the philosopher. Modernists place the foundation of
religious philosophy in that doctrine which is commonly called Agnosticism.
According to this teaching human reason is confined entirely within the field
of phenomena, that is to say, to things that appear, and in the manner
in which they appear: it has neither the right nor the power to overstep these
limits. Hence it is incapable of lifting itself up to God, and of recognizing
His existence, even by means of visible things. [...]
Vital Immanence
7. However, this Agnosticism is only the negative part of the system of the
Modernists: the positive part consists in what they call vital immanence.
Thus they advance from one to the other. Religion, whether natural or supernatural,
must, like every other fact, admit of some explanation. But when natural theology
has been destroyed, and the road to revelation closed by the rejection of the
arguments of credibility, and all external revelation absolutely denied, it
is clear that this explanation will be sought in vain outside of man
himself. It must, therefore, be looked for in man; and since religion
is a form of life, the explanation must certainly be found in the life of man.
In this way is formulated the principle of religious immanence. Moreover,
the first actuation, so to speak, of every vital phenomenon - and religion,
as noted above, belongs in this category - is due to a certain need or impulsion;
but speaking more particularly of life, it has its origin in a movement of the
heart, which movement is called a sense. Therefore, as God is the object
of religion, we must conclude that faith, which is the basis and foundation
of all religion, must consist in a certain interior sense, originating
in a need of the divine. [...]
The Need of the Divine
The Modernist's Revelation
[...]
Religious Consciousness and Faith
From this, Venerable Brethren, springs that most absurd tenet of the Modernists,
that every religion, according to the different aspect under which it is viewed,
must be considered as both natural and supernatural. It is thus that
they make consciousness and revelation synonymous. [...]
Deformation of Religious History
In all this process, from which, according to the Modernists, faith and revelation
spring, one point is to be particularly noted, for it is of capital importance
on account of the historico-critical corollaries which they deduce from it.
The unknowable they speak of does not present itself to faith as something solitary
and isolated; but on the contrary in close conjunction with some phenomenon,
which, though it belongs to the realms of science or history, yet to some extent
exceeds their limits. Such a phenomenon may be a fact of nature containing within
itself something mysterious; or it may be a man, whose character, actions and
words cannot, apparently, be reconciled with the ordinary laws of history. Then
faith, attracted by the unknowable which is united with the phenomenon, seizes
upon the whole phenomenon, and, as it were, permeates it with its own life.
From this two things follow. The first is a sort of transfiguration
of the phenomenon, by its elevation above its own true conditions, an elevation
by which it becomes more adapted to clothe itself with the form of the divine
character which faith will bestow upon it. The second consequence is a certain
disfiguration - so it may be called - of the same phenomenon,
arising from the fact that faith attributes to it, when stripped of the circumstances
of place and time, characteristics which it does not really possess;
and this takes place especially in the case of the phenomena of the past, and
the more fully in the measure of their antiquity. From these two principles
the Modernists deduce two laws, which, when united with a third which they have
already derived from agnosticism, constitute the foundation of historic criticism.
An example may be sought in the Person of Christ. In the Person of Christ,
they say, science and history encounter nothing that is not human. Therefore,
in virtue of the first canon deduced from agnosticism, whatever there is in
His history suggestive of the divine must be rejected. Then, according
to the second canon, the historical Person of Christ was transfigured by faith;
therefore everything that raises it above historical conditions must be removed.
Lastly, the third canon, which lays down that the Person of Christ has been
disfigured by faith, requires that everything should be excluded, deeds and
words and all else, that is not in strict keeping with His character, condition
and education, and with the place and time in which He lived - a method of reasoning
which is in passing strange, but in it we have the Modernist criticism.
The Religious Sense
[...]
The Intellect and Religious Sense
[...] This is the task of the intellect, whose office it is to reflect and to
analyze; and by means of it, man first transforms into mental pictures the vital
phenomena which arise within him, and then expresses them in words. Hence
the common saying of the Modernists: that the religious man must think
his faith. The mind then, encountering this sense, throws itself upon it, and
works on it after the manner of a painter who restores to greater clearness
the lines of a picture that have been dimmed with age. The simile is that
of one of the leaders of Modernism. [...]
The Origin of Dogma
The Nature of Dogma
Dogmas are Symbols
[...]
Evolution of Dogma
13. Dogma is not only able, but ought to evolve and to be changed.
This is strongly affirmed by the Modernists, and clearly flows from their principles.
For among the chief points of their teaching is the following, which they deduce
from the principle of vital immanence, namely, that religious formulas if they
are to be really religious and not merely intellectual speculations, ought to
be living and to live the life of the religious sense. [...]
The Modernist as a Believer
14. Thus far, Venerable Brethren, We have considered the Modernist as a philosopher.
Now if We proceed to consider him as a believer, and seek to know how the believer,
according to Modernism, is marked off from the philosopher, it must be observed
that, although the philosopher recognizes the reality of the divine as the object
of faith, still this reality is not to be found by him but in the heart of the
believer, as an object of feeling and affirmation, and therefore confined within
the sphere of phenomena; but the question as to whether in itself it exists
outside that feeling and affirmation is one which the philosopher passes over
and neglects. For the Modernist believer, on the contrary, it is an established
and certain fact that the reality of the divine does really exist in itself
and quite independently of the person who believes in it. If you ask on what
foundation this assertion of the believer rests, he answers: In the personal
experience of the individual. [...]
Destruction of One True Religion
How far this position is removed from that of Catholic teaching! We have already
seen how its fallacies have been condemned by the Vatican Council. Later
on, we shall see how these errors, combined with those which we have already
mentioned, open wide the way to Atheism. Here it is well to note at once that,
given this doctrine of experience united with that of symbolism,
every religion, even that of paganism, must be held to be true. What
is to prevent such experiences from being found in any religion? In fact, that
they are so is maintained by not a few. On what grounds can Modernists deny
the truth of an experience affirmed by a follower of Islam? Will they claim
a monopoly of true experiences for Catholics alone? Indeed, Modernists do not
deny, but actually maintain, some confusedly, others frankly, that all religions
are true. [...]
Religious Experience and Tradition
15. There is yet another element in this part of their teaching which is absolutely
contrary to Catholic truth. For what is laid down as to experience is also applied
with destructive effect to tradition, which has always been maintained by the
Catholic Church. Tradition, as understood by the Modernists, is a communication
with others of an original experience, through preaching by means of the intellectual
formula. [...]
Faith and Science
Faith Subject to Science
The Methods of Modernists
The Modernist as Theologian
The Principle of Divine Permanence
Dogma and the Sacraments
The Holy Scriptures
The Church
Relation of Church and State
The Church's Magisterium
The Evolution of Doctrine
Tradition and Progress
The Modernist Complex
Previous Condemnations of Modernism
Further Examination of Modernism
The Modernist as Historian
The Modernist as Critic
His Principles of Criticism
Modernist Confusion
Modernist Treatment of the Bible
Contrary to Catholic Teaching
The Modernist as Apologist
Modernist Apologetic Methodology
Modernist Confusion
The Simplicity of Truth
Subjective Arguments
The Modernist as Reformer
[...]
Modernism, Synthesis of All Heresies
39. It may, perhaps, seem to some, Venerable Brethren, that We have dealt at
too great length on this exposition of the doctrines of the Modernists. But
it was necessary that We should do so, both in order to meet their customary
charge that We do not understand their ideas, and to show that their system
does not consist in scattered and unconnected theories, but, as it were, in
a closely connected whole, so that it is not possible to admit one without admitting
all. For this reason, too, We have had to give to this exposition a somewhat
didactic form, and not to shrink from employing certain unwonted terms which
the Modernists have brought into use. And now with Our eyes fixed upon the whole
system, no one will be surprised that We should define it to be the
synthesis of all heresies. Undoubtedly, were anyone to attempt the task
of collecting together all the errors that have been broached against the faith
and to concentrate into one the sap and substance of them all, he could not
succeed in doing so better than the Modernists have done. Nay, they have gone
farther than this, for, as We have already intimated, their system means the
destruction not of the Catholic religion alone, but of all religion.
[...]
The Danger of Curiosity
Pride Sits in the Modernist House
Ignorance of Modernists
Methods of Propagandism
Modernist Contempt for the Fathers
The Temerity of the Modernists
Calls for Vigilance
Scholastic Philosophy
Promotion of Sound Theology
The Role of Profane Studies
Practical Application
"Do Not Lay Hands Hastily..."
Examine Publications Carefully
Imprimatur and Nihil Obstat
Censorship
Priests as Editors
Congresses
Diocesan Vigilance Committees
Triennial Returns
Conclusion
Apostolic Blessing
[...]
Taken from The Popes against Modern Errors by TAN Books & Publishers, Inc.
Other pages discussing Catholic
doctrine and history:
Return to Catholic Doctrine Homepage