Thoughts on the passing of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI

Amongst the many tributes paid to Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI in recent days, it was the report of the observation of the Prime Minister of Italy, Giorgia Meloni, that I thought most fully captured what he was about. Media outlets shortened it to refer to him as "a giant of faith and reason", but the full text can be found on the website of the Italian Government.

Benedict XVI was a giant of faith and of reason. A man who loved the Lord and devoted his life to the service of the universal Church. He spoke, and will continue to speak, to the hearts and minds of people with the spiritual, cultural and intellectual depth of his Magisterium. A Christian, a shepherd, a theologian: one of history’s greats, whom history will not forget. 
I have conveyed the Government’s and my personal sympathy to the Holy Father Pope Francis for his and the entire Church community’s grief.

 This was also reinforced by Tim Stanley's contribution to the "Thought for the Day" on BBC Radio 4's Today programme this morning. He pointed towards Pope Benedict's address in Westminster Hall during his visit to Britain in 2010 as a key to understanding him. I would additionally point towards the lecture that Pope Benedict would have delivered at the La Sapienza university, had that visit gone ahead in January 2008.

The first of these highlights what should be the just relationship between government or state and the ethical proposals that might be the proper province of religions.

The central question at issue, then, is this: where is the ethical foundation for political choices to be found? The Catholic tradition maintains that the objective norms governing right action are accessible to reason, prescinding from the content of revelation. According to this understanding, the role of religion in political debate is not so much to supply these norms, as if they could not be known by non-believers – still less to propose concrete political solutions, which would lie altogether outside the competence of religion – but rather to help purify and shed light upon the application of reason to the discovery of objective moral principles. This “corrective” role of religion vis-à-vis reason is not always welcomed, though, partly because distorted forms of religion, such as sectarianism and fundamentalism, can be seen to create serious social problems themselves. And in their turn, these distortions of religion arise when insufficient attention is given to the purifying and structuring role of reason within religion. It is a two-way process. Without the corrective supplied by religion, though, reason too can fall prey to distortions, as when it is manipulated by ideology, or applied in a partial way that fails to take full account of the dignity of the human person. Such misuse of reason, after all, was what gave rise to the slave trade in the first place and to many other social evils, not least the totalitarian ideologies of the twentieth century. This is why I would suggest that the world of reason and the world of faith – the world of secular rationality and the world of religious belief – need one another and should not be afraid to enter into a profound and ongoing dialogue, for the good of our civilization.....

...there are those who argue – paradoxically with the intention of eliminating discrimination – that Christians in public roles should be required at times to act against their conscience. These are worrying signs of a failure to appreciate not only the rights of believers to freedom of conscience and freedom of religion, but also the legitimate role of religion in the public square. I would invite all of you, therefore, within your respective spheres of influence, to seek ways of promoting and encouraging dialogue between faith and reason at every level of national life.

 Pope Benedict's lecture prepared for La Sapienza explores the relationship between the mission of the Pope and the mission of a university, addressing the community of a university that in its origins was a Papal foundation but is now an institution of the Italian state. In discussing first the role of the Pope as Bishop of Rome, who first exercises a care for the community of the Church, Pope Benedict wrote:

Yet this community which the Bishop looks after – be it large or small – lives in the world; its circumstances, its history, its example and its message inevitably influence the entire human community. The larger it is, the greater the effect, for better or worse, on the rest of humanity. Today we see very clearly how the state of religions and the situation of the Church – her crises and her renewal – affect humanity in its entirety. Thus the Pope, in his capacity as Shepherd of his community, is also increasingly becoming a voice for the ethical reasoning of humanity.

Pope Benedict then goes on to suggest that there is a human wisdom passed down that gives a credibility to the religious thought of earlier generations:

Here, however, the objection immediately arises: surely the Pope does not really base his pronouncements on ethical reasoning, but draws his judgements from faith and hence cannot claim to speak on behalf of those who do not share this faith. We will have to return to this point later, because here the absolutely fundamental question must be asked: What is reason? How can one demonstrate that an assertion – especially a moral norm – is “reasonable”? At this point I would like to describe briefly how John Rawls, while denying that comprehensive religious doctrines have the character of “public” reason, nonetheless at least sees their “non-public” reason as one which cannot simply be dismissed by those who maintain a rigidly secularized rationality. Rawls perceives a criterion of this reasonableness among other things in the fact that such doctrines derive from a responsible and well thought-out tradition in which, over lengthy periods, satisfactory arguments have been developed in support of the doctrines concerned. The important thing in this assertion, it seems to me, is the acknowledgment that down through the centuries, experience and demonstration – the historical source of human wisdom – are also a sign of its reasonableness and enduring significance. Faced with an a-historical form of reason that seeks to establish itself exclusively in terms of a-historical rationality, humanity’s wisdom – the wisdom of the great religious traditions – should be valued as a heritage that cannot be cast with impunity into the dustbin of the history of ideas.

After observing that man, in exercising his reason, seeks what is good as well as what is true, Pope Benedict goes on to address the question that he would later address in Westminster Hall:

At this point, however, the question immediately arises: How is it possible to identify criteria of justice that make shared freedom possible and help man to be good? Here a leap into the present is necessary. The point in question is: how can a juridical body of norms be established that serves as an ordering of freedom, of human dignity and human rights? This is the issue with which we are grappling today in the democratic processes that form opinion, the issue which also causes us to be anxious about the future of humanity. In my opinion, Jürgen Habermas articulates a vast consensus of contemporary thought when he says that the legitimacy of a constitutional charter, as a basis for what is legal, derives from two sources: from the equal participation of all citizens in the political process and from the reasonable manner in which political disputes are resolved. With regard to this “reasonable manner”, he notes that it cannot simply be a fight for arithmetical majorities, but must have the character of a “process of argumentation sensitive to the truth” (wahrheitssensibles Argumentationsverfahren). The point is well made, but it is far from easy to put it into practice politically. The representatives of that public “process of argumentation” are – as we know – principally political parties, inasmuch as these are responsible for the formation of political will. De facto, they will always aim to achieve majorities and hence will almost inevitably attend to interests that they promise to satisfy, even though these interests are often particular and do not truly serve the whole. Sensibility to the truth is repeatedly subordinated to sensibility to interests. I find it significant that Habermas speaks of sensibility to the truth as a necessary element in the process of political argument, thereby reintroducing the concept of truth into philosophical and political debate.

Whilst many in public life seem to appreciate Pope Emeritus Benedict for his gentleness and warmth of character, it will be interesting to see how many really appreciate the dimensions of his intellectual thought on how the public sphere should have a just regard for religious belief. It would be quite unfair, for example, to dismiss his thought in this field on the grounds that it is being cited by two people who wider society would recognise as being politically right of centre

Faith and reason in a letter of Robert Bellarmine

To mark his feast day on 17th September, Thinking Faith have published an article about St Robert Bellarmine by Br Guy Consolmagno SJ, who works at the Vatican Observatory: Bellarmine in Perspective.

In part, the article gives an account of a letter written by Robert Bellarmine in connection with the Galileo affair. Br Consolmagno observes in connection with the letter:

We now recognise that the way science understands the universe is not subject to the kinds of proof that one would demand in mathematics. Rather, science argues from probability to probability, always recognising that no description is perfect or final. 

I suspect that this reading of a letter from the 17th century in the framework of a later time skews Br Consolmagno's way of reading it. I am not sure, for example, that practicing cosmologists do really consider the heliocentric view of our solar system as a "probability". My own reading of Bellarmine's letter, from the days of my youth some 20 years ago when Cardinal Ratzinger was still Cardinal Ratzinger and not Pope Benedict XVI, is offered below. What struck me then, and still strikes me now, about the letter is its profound trust in both human reason and in religious faith as giving access to knowledge. (My translation is, so far as I recall, taken from Part V of Arthur Koestler's book The Sleepwalkers.)

In April 1615, St. Robert Bellarmine wrote a letter to the author of a book which had defended the Copernican view of the universe, clearly addressing the letter to Galileo as well.  St. Robert Bellarmine fulfilled a role in the Church of his time similar to that of Cardinal Ratzinger in our own time.  He was a man of great intellect and profound devotion.  He was well informed about the state of contemporary scientific endeavour and seems to have had quite cordial communications with Galileo.  His letter is strikingly modern, and very concisely presents an answer to the debate as it had come to be presented. 

“..It seems to me that your Reverence and Signor Galileo act prudently when you content yourselves with speaking hypothetically and not absolutely, as I have always understood Copernicus spoke..”

This is a reference to the fact that the Copernican view was an interpretation of astronomical observations.  At least one other successful interpretation was possible, and it is in this sense that the Copernican view represented a “hypothetical” rather than an “absolute” claim.  To accept it as a “hypothesis” in this sense was quite a different thing than accepting it as being the way things really were.

“..If there were a real proof that the Sun is in the centre of the universe ... and that the Sun does not go round the Earth but the Earth round the Sun, then we should have to proceed with great circumspection in explaining the passages of Scripture which appear to teach the contrary, and we should rather have to say that we did not understand them than declare an opinion to be false which is proved to be true..”

This is the critical passage in the letter.  Underlying it is the conviction that the results of scientific study and the content of Christian faith are in harmony with each other.  When science can offer convincing proof, then it is necessary to look again at the way in which Scripture is understood.

“But I do not think there is any such proof since none has been shown to me.....I believe that the first demonstration (i.e. that the Copernican view is a workable hypothesis) may exist, but I have grave doubts about the second (i.e. the existence of proof that the Copernican view is the way things really are); and in the case of doubt one may not abandon the Holy Scriptures as expounded by the holy Fathers..”

This is an important balancing of the previously expressed willingness to look again at the way in which Scripture is understood.  In the seventeenth century there really was not any absolute evidence of the earth’s movement through space.  In the twentieth century there is, and, if he were alive today, St. Robert Bellarmine would accept that proof and be willing to understand Scripture differently as a consequence.

The Sleep of Reason

The novel entitled The Sleep of Reason is the penultimate novel in C P Snow's sequence Strangers and Brothers. It is set around the trial of two young women, living in what we would now call a same-sex relationship, who had kidnapped a young boy from a city play area to a country cottage one weekend and subjected him ill treatment before killing him. The crime appears clinically planned, and the two women are duly found guilty of murder. The central point at issue in the trial is not the events of the crime themselves, but the question of the responsibility of the two women for their actions, as their defence lawyers argue for a diminished responsibility that would mean they were guilty of manslaughter rather than murder.

The question of responsibility for actions, and particularly responsibility for actions of a most evil kind, is therefore a theme of the novel. It particularly reflects back to an earlier novel in C P Snow's sequence, George Passant. I have yet to read that novel, but George would appear to have been the centre of group of young people encouraged to reject all societal limitations and live in a complete freedom from any constraints whatsoever. The two women on trial in The Sleep of Reason were around the edges of a later generation in this group, a group with which Snow's narrator, Lewis Eliot, was associated in his younger days. The narrative of The Sleep of Reason speculates as to whether or not Cora and Kitty would have behaved differently if they had not had the association with George Passant's group, whether that association with a lifestyle lacking in any constraint could have any causal link to their actions against the boy they kidnapped. The insistent answer given is that one could never know one way or the other, though Lewis asks himself whether one of the two might have been the leader of the other.

The novel gains its title from the following passage, towards the end, when the protagonists are reflecting back on the outcome of the trial:

Reason. Why had so much of our time reneged on it? Wasn't that our characteristic folly, treachery or crime?

Reason was very weak as compared with instinct. Instinct was closer to the aboriginal sea out of which we had all climbed. Reason was a precarious structure. But, if we didn't use it to understand instinct, then there was no health in us at all.

Margaret said, she had been brought up among people who believed it was easy to be civilised and rational. She had hated it. It made life too hygienic and too thin. But still, she had come to think even that was better than glorifying unreason.

Put reason to sleep, and all the stronger forces were let loose. We had seen that happen in our own lifetimes. In the world: and close to us. We couldn't get out of knowing, that it meant a chance of hell. [Both at the time of C P Snow's writing and in the setting of the novel, this reference includes the events of World War II.]

Glorifying unreason. Wanting to let the instinctual forces loose. Martin said - anyone who did that, either hadn't much of those forces within himself, or else wanted to use others' for his own purpose. And that was true of private leaders like George as much as public ones.

(Were others thinking, as I did, of those two women? Was it true of one of them?)

To move to a different context, one wonders whether, since the legalisation of marriage between people of the same sex, those who have praised the consequent freedom to "marry the person they love" have really considered the relationship of reason to the life of passions and emotions. How does the readiness of the great and good to use the word "love" in a way that lacks substantial definition compare to a reasoned study of the affective life such as that proposed by the recently produced programme of the Pontifical Council for the Family, for example? Have we, in this context, also put reason to sleep?

St Robert Bellarmine on faith and reason

Nearly 20 years ago now I encountered the text of a letter written by St Robert Bellarmine at the time of the Galileo controversy. I am reminded by his feast day of the passage in that letter which demonstrates his faith in human reason in relation to his faith in the texts of Sacred Scriptures. The passage follows a previous section in which Bellarmine has insisted on the need to respect the sense in which Sacred Scripture has been understood by the previous tradition of the Fathers of the Church.

“..If there were a real proof that the Sun is in the centre of the universe, that the earth is in the third heaven, and that the Sun does not go round the Earth but the Earth round the Sun, then we should have to proceed with great circumspection in explaining the passages of Scripture which appear to teach the contrary, and we should rather have to say that we did not understand them than declare an opinion to be false which is proved to be true..”

Bellarmine indicates that (at the time at which he was writing) it was not definitively proven by science that the Earth rotated round the Sun, and that therefore the previous interpretation of the Sacred Scriptures on the matter should still be maintained. If he were alive today, and familiar with the evidence of science as we now have it, he would undoubtedly change his mind.

But it is interesting to note the comfortable existence of both a profound trust in human reason and a strong faith in Sacred Scripture.

Not Christianity, but superstition

When I heard a report of this case on BBC Radio news yesterday, the couple involved were described as being a "Christian couple". The website report more precisely identifies the couple as being Seventh Day Adventists, though it appears that their actions derived more from their own, more individual, religious stance than from that of the Seventh Day Adventists as a religious body. The situation, however, appears to have essentially been one where, on the grounds of a religious belief expressed in a particular manner of practising a "covenant", the ordinary care of the medical profession was disregarded.

This is not a religious belief on the part of the couple involved, and it certainly is not Christian belief. It is superstition. Whilst I do not wish to condemn at the level of the individuals involved, at the level of the general engagement between religious belief and our contemporary culture, it is important to say this clearly.

It is certainly not Christian belief for two essential reasons.

1. Christian faith, seen as a content that is believed (or as a Person who is followed), does not contradict the work of human reason. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church says (n.159):

Faith and science: "Though faith is above reason, there can never be any real discrepancy between faith and reason. Since the same God who reveals mysteries and infuses faith has bestowed the light of reason on the human mind, God cannot deny himself, nor can truth ever contradict truth." "Consequently, methodical research in all branches of knowledge, provided it is carried out in a truly scientific manner and does not override moral laws, can never conflict with the faith, because the things of the world and the things of faith derive from the same God. the humble and persevering investigator of the secrets of nature is being led, as it were, by the hand of God in spite of himself, for it is God, the conserver of all things, who made them what they are." 

Christian faith, understood as a human act on the part of the one who believes, likewise does not expect that one over-rides that other human act, the act of reason. This was the point underlying Pope Benedict XVI's address at Regensburg in 2006, the most controversial section of which the former Holy Father summarised thus:

The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God's nature.

It will never be a genuine act of faith (or of hope) on the part of a Christian to refuse medical attention in favour of an expected divine intervention. The case just reported indicates the danger represented by individuals who will, however, see such a denial of medical attention as an act of faith in God.

2. One of the themes to which Pope Francis returns is that of the ecclesial nature of Christian faith. It is not possible, he says, to claim to follow Christ without the Church. And therein lies the second reason for suggesting that the action of the couple who have just received prison sentences should not be described as a result of their Christian belief. While they do seem to have some level of ecclesial affiliation - to the Seventh Day Adventists - the situation of church groups that have no formal ecclesial affiliations beyond their own community lends itself to the kind of individual perception of faith that rejects medical treatment. When I have time, I will try and link to some of the reports of instances of pastors encouraging their adherents not to seek treatment and rely instead on God, reports associated with what one might call "non-ecclesial" Christian belief.

It is an ecclesial adherence that represents the assurance of that synthesis of faith with reason that I refer to in point 1 above. This, again, is a point that Pope Benedict XVI referred to in a controversial address, that which he was unable to give at La Sapienza University:

 Rawls perceives a criterion of this reasonableness among other things in the fact that such doctrines derive from a responsible and well thought-out tradition in which, over lengthy periods, satisfactory arguments have been developed in support of the doctrines concerned. The important thing in this assertion, it seems to me, is the acknowledgment that down through the centuries, experience and demonstration – the historical source of human wisdom – are also a sign of its reasonableness and enduring significance. Faced with an a-historical form of reason that seeks to establish itself exclusively in terms of a-historical rationality, humanity’s wisdom – the wisdom of the great religious traditions – should be valued as a heritage that cannot be cast with impunity into the dustbin of the history of ideas.

Without these two criteria, it appears to me that something that calls itself a Christian belief is in reality nothing more than superstition.

That the law of the land intervenes and sentences a couple to prison in these circumstances seems entirely right. It is not a question relating to religious belief and practice; it is a question relating to ordinary human reason expressed in the duty of care that parents have for their children.

It would be unfortunate if those who represent a hostility towards Christianity in the culture of our times were to see in this case ammunition to attack Christianity as such. As I argue above, these events do not represent Christian belief in practice; they represent superstition.

Fr Cantalamessa's Third Advent Homily

The theme of Fr Cantalamessa's third homily for the Holy Father and members of the Roman Curia was "The Christian Response to Rationalism". The full text can be found here. I am usually minded to advise "reading the whole", as any comment easily gives only a partial impression, and I would do the same in this case, too.

Once again, Fr Cantalamessa draws significantly on the thought of Blessed John Henry Newman. The first point that Fr Cantalemessa makes is that it is a usurpation of reason (Newman's phrase) when it attempts to reason about religion upon purely secular maxims, maxims that are intrinsically foreign to the nature of religion. This does not mean for Newman that we must reject the style of reason that is of our general use when we come to study matters of religion, and replace it with another and contradictory style of reason. Religion is rightly the subject of such study. But the appopriate application of that rational study reveals that, in the case of religious belief, there are other, wider factors at play too. These wider factors have a rationality of their own style, and it is the offence of rationalism to exclude these wider factors.

"... When the Gospel is said to require a rational faith, this need not mean more than that faith is accordant to right reason in the abstract, not that it results from it in the particular case." [A footnote cites the University Sermons]

Taking up Newman's thought again, Fr Cantalamessa argues that:

Rationalism cannot be combated with another rationalism, although of a contrary sign. Hence, another way must be found that does not pretend to replace the rational defense of the faith, but to accompany it, also because the recipients of the Christian proclamation are not only intellectuals, able to engage in this type of debate, but also ordinary people who are indifferent to it and more sensitive to other arguments.

This leads Fr Cantalamessa to considering how a reflection on rationalism has implications for the evangelising mission of the Church. In speaking of how the divine and the sacred impact upon us uninvited, he suggests that a recovery of the sense of the sacred - be that in the religious experience of the community of those who hold a religious belief, in the religious experience of the individual who is a mystic and receives a particular gift of encounter with God, or be that in the experience of one who recognises the sacred in the observation of the world around us. Fr Cantalamessa draws significantly on Rudolf Otto's phenomenology of the religious experience of man, translated in English with the title "The Idea of the Holy".

If this is so, the re-evangelization of the secularized world must pass also through the recovery of the sense of the sacred. The terrain of culture of rationalism -- its cause and at the same time its effect -- is the loss of the sense of the sacred; it is necessary therefore that the Church help men to re-ascend the slope and rediscover the presence and beauty of the sacred in the world. Charles Peguy said that "the terrible penury of the Sacred is the profound mark of the modern world." One notices it in every aspect of life, but in particular in art, in literature and in everyday language. For many authors, to be described as "desecrating" is no longer an offense, but a compliment.

Fr Cantalamessa argues that, in addition to what I might call the reason of intellect the field of religious belief has also a reason of witness or of testimony, the two reasons being quite open to each other and not at all contradictory. When an individual person comes to religious belief, it is generally the case that factors other than intellectual argument have been at play in their journey, and these other factors are perfectly rational.

Theologian Karl Rahner, taking up, it seems, a phrase of Raymond Pannikar, affirmed: "The Christian of tomorrow, will either be a mystic or he won't be." He intended to say that, in the future, to keep faith alive would be the testimony of persons who have a profound experience of God, more than the demonstration of his rational plausibility. Essentially, Paul VI said the same thing when he affirmed in "Evangelii Nuntiandi" (No. 4): "Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses."

And he finishes by suggesting that Christmas, being more than ever challenged in its authentic meaning by secularising and materialistic influences, provides a privileged opportunity for Christians to recognise and live out a sense of the sacred in the world.
 
Oh, and along the way Fr Cantalamessa cites Edith Stein as an example of one whose mystical experience exemplifies how vivid is their discovery of God. In later conversation with her closest friend, Hedwig Conrad-Martius, the friend at whose house she was staying when the incident referred to below occurred, Edith Stein would refer to her journey to the Catholic faith as "my secret for myself" (Secretum meum mihi) and not disclose anything more about it:

It was precisely from one of these encounters that a disciple of philosopher Husserl, a Jewess and convinced atheist, one night discovered the living God. I am speaking of Edith Stein, now St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross. She was a guest of Christian friends and one evening when they had to go out, she stayed alone in the house and not knowing what to do, took a book from their library and began to read it. It was the autobiography of Saint Teresa of Avila. She went on to read it the whole night. Having come to the end, she simply exclaimed: "this is the truth!" Early in the morning she went to the city to buy a Catholic catechism and a Missal and, after having studied them, went to a neighboring church and asked the priest to baptize her.

The debate about God - continued

At The Emperor has no clothes, Paulinus comments on coverage by the BBC of Stephen Hawkings denial of God. This makes a useful read. I offered my own first comments here.

Prompted by the following paragraph from the Times leader yesterday, I have since reflected on the place that reason has - or should have - in this debate.

The ground for religious faith in the modern age cannot be a misguided insistence that science is the path to God: that way lies intellectual chaos. It is more likely to lie in the pull of emotion and - in the title of a famous essay by William James - the will to believe. Because proof of God's existence is ultimately lacking only a decision of the heart will suffice.

The first sentence suggests a disjunction between the use of reason (intellect) that belongs with science, and knowledge of the existence of God; the one is reasoned while the other is "intellectual chaos". It should really be clear that reason, intellect, has a part to play both in the study of the physical sciences and in the study of the question of God's existence. Reason might be deployed differently in the two spheres, but it is to be deployed in both. Science can rightly contribute to the way in which someone comes to religious belief, while for another person it might not so contribute. The difference is made by the particular play of reason in the circumstances of the life of the individual. It is "intellectual chaos" to limit the legitimacy of the range of human reason to the physical sciences only - that form of irratinality known as scientism.

The last two sentences of the leader also indicate a denial of the part played by reason, though this is hidden behind a rightful recognition of other factors at play alongside that of the intellect. A decision for religious faith is certainly an act of the will; but it is also an act of the intellect. There might be an attraction that might be characterised by the term emotion; but that is not to say that there is not at the same time an exercise of reason. It is one of the contributions to our thought of John Henry Newman to present the profoundly rational character of the way in which people come to knowledge, a way that embraces other aspects of human being along with the intellect. It would be most unfortunate if the reference to a "decision of the heart" in the last sentence quoted - resonant as it is with Cardinal Newman's motto and the theme of the forthcoming Papal visit, "Heart speaks to heart" - were to be seen as attributing irrationality to any knowledge outside of the area of the physical sciences. There is nothing irrational about the way in which Newman would understand a "decision of the heart", quite the contrary.

Stephen Hawking seems to me to be denying the possibility of reason outside of the realm of the physical sciences. A little ironically, he has in the last two or three days displaced from the media headlines the militant secularists, who deny the possibility that a kind of collective reason might be expressed in a religious tradition.

Both of these styles of the denial of reason are not very skilled. They are rather like gentle full tosses being bowled down the wicket towards Pope Benedict XVI, ready to be struck over the bowlers' heads into the stands for six runs in two weeks time. And that John Henry Newman might well provide the thought that Pope Benedict uses as he swings his bat on both aspects of this denial of reason is quite exquisite!

Thoughts on dialogue

This post is prompted by the invitation to discussion (difficult to use the word "dialogue" twice in the same sentence) about dialogue contained in NewmanCause's comment to my earlier post about Newman and the Apostolic Constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus. What has prompted me is this paragraph from the post by NewmanCause that I discussed in my post just referred to (my italics added to highlight the aspect which most prompts my thoughts):

It has been axiomatic for Catholic ecumenists that the Church must learn from those with whom she is in ‘dialogue’. What is right in this way of thinking need not be abandoned, once it is recognised, as the Holy Father has recognised, that ‘dialogue’ cannot be an end in itself. Even when ‘dialogue’ is ordered, as it must be, towards conversion to the Catholic Faith, the Church may still stand to learn from those whom she receives into full communion.

Dialogue as encounter with a culture

I would first like to suggest that dialogue has the nature of an encounter with a culture. One might talk of representatives of the Church, or of an individual in the Church, engaging in an encounter with a culture. The culture has its representatives, who might be termed the "partners" with whom dialogue is undertaken.  What I think is a good example of dialogue as encounter with a culture is my post Jessica Hausner's Lourdes. In this I bring to bear my own experience of Lourdes and of Catholic faith to comment on a film which touches on that experience. I also think that Jessica Hausner, without necessarily accepting a supernatural, or even a religious, reality to the phenomenon that is Lourdes, has nevertheless genuinely and honestly engaged with the event that is a pilgrimage to Lourdes. In this sense, she is a genuine partner with whom one can enter into dialogue through commenting on her work.

Inter-religious dialogue, or ecumenical dialogue, can be seen as special cases of this where the partner in the dialogue is a representative of another religion or Christian denomination. To again refer to the sphere of film, the existence of "ecumenical juries" at some film festivals would illustrate this.

In this kind of dialogue, one's own experience gains something from the experience of the dialogue partner. We might see something supportive of our own experience that we had not seen before. In some cases, we might change or adjust our point of view, but not always.

Dialogue as a moment in evangelisation

In its teaching about the nature of evangelisation (Evangelii Nuntiandi, General Directory for Catechesis), the Church speaks about a presence of the Church, or of the individual Christian, in the activity of the world. Sometimes termed "presence in charity", this might not be a presence that is explicitly proclaimed as a Christian presence, but it is a presence prompted and imbued with a Christian spirit. An example of this might be participation in port, hospital or industrial chaplaincy, where many of the encounters one has with seafarers, patients or co-workers might be without explicitly religious content. For most Catholics, it refers to their everyday encounters with neighbours, friends and colleagues.

I think this is also is an aspect of understanding dialogue as encounter with a culture, but brought perhaps to the level of individual human relationships. However - and this is the point at which I would enter into discussion though, I think, not necessarily disagreement with NewmanCause - this will rarely take place with an explicit intention of seeking conversion to the Catholic faith. Indeed, where it to be undertaken with such an explicit intention, there are circumstances in which it would become proselytism of the very worst kind.

What the Catholic Church's teaching allows us to do, though, is to still see this as a moment in the dynamic of evangelisation which imbues the whole of the Church's life. In this sense, it has a reference towards conversion to the Catholic faith, as part of a wider activity of the whole Church. Evangelical Christians have a tendency I think to see evangelism as only occurring when they explicitly proclaim the faith (this is another moment in evangelisation for us Catholics, but not the only one), which does not always lead to positive experiences on the part of their hearers.

Conditions to enable dialogue

"Moving goal posts" are an image that we often use when we are trying to deal with someone, or with an issue, where the ground rules keep changing; it is impossible to know in which direction to kick the ball if the goal posts don't stay still. Dialogue can only occur if the partners to that dialogue have a common concern for the truth of what is known or believed, and a common concern for the moral rightness of what is done. Indifference to truth or indifference to the idea of moral right and wrong make dialogue impossible. Seeing the school or university as a community of learning depends upon this idea of a common searching for what is true and morally good, a searching undertaken together by the faculty and the students. The enterprise of education is, or should be, an enterprise of dialogue.

This consideration prompts me to identify an excruciating irony in our contemporary political situation, and that occurs when the representatives of a political and social culture that is thoroughly secularist (and therefore relativist in both its attitude to the idea of truth and the idea of moral right and wrong) urges on us the need for inter-religious dialogue! It strikes me that what is needed more than anything else is a dialogue between religious belief and non-religious political and social cultures; but the relativism of the latter renders that dialogue all but impossible.

Bridges and Tangents gave an account of exploring fundamentals without being fundamentalist when introducing the current series of Faith Matters lectures. I think he expresses what one might term the basis on which a Catholic is able to enter into dialogue with others:

The title of the series is quite provocative: ‘Fundamentals of Faith’. At first glance, it makes me think of the word ‘fundamentalism’, with all its negative associations – a belief system that is unthinking, unreflective, arrogant, closed to the truths of history and science, of philosophy and psychology. But perhaps that is intentional. The purpose of each lecture is to show that Christians can explore the fundamentals of their faith without being fundamentalist. The root meaning of the word ‘fundamental’, of course, is something that acts as a foundation. Thinking deeply about the fundamentals of faith should actually make you less ‘fundamentalist’ and more reflective, more open, and yes – more faithful.

Pope Benedict in the Czech Republic

I think I agree with Auntie Joanna - Pope Benedict has been saying some very good things during his visit to the Czech Republic, and it has all rather been ignored by the media, the media in this case including Catholic blogs.

As you will have realised, this blog has a bit of an excuse - it has been rather excited by the visit of the relics of St Therese (well, OK, rather obessessed by it). So this is an attempt to make amends.

As is usual, Blog-by-the-Sea has a summary of coverage with useful links. The website of the Holy See has a page from which you can link to the texts of all the Pope's addresses during the visit. I am choosing to comment on the Pope's address during his meeting with the academic community in Prague.

In political, cultural and educational discourse in this country (the UK), there is a contradictory and inconsistent reference to reason. On the one hand, religious beliefs are attacked as being "unscientific" and "irrational"; while on the other, the ideas used to promote homosexual/lesbian/transgender rights by those who attack religion for its resistance on these matters, demand a profoundly unscientific attitude to the human body. There is no really consistent idea of the appropriate use of reason - and so our school system can have as its mantra "raising standards", whatever that might mean; and individual schools develop mission statements or strap-lines that make no reference to truth or wisdom. Not that these things are usually bad in themselves - it's just that they don't define what one might call reason or education. They could equally apply to Strictly Come Dancing, for example.

Firstly, an extract from Pope Benedict's address that talks about the relation of reason to a historical tradition, something to which Pope Benedict referred more fully in the address that he prepared for La Sapienza, but was in the event not able to deliver:

From the time of Plato, education has been not merely the accumulation of knowledge or skills, but paideia, human formation in the treasures of an intellectual tradition directed to a virtuous life. While the great universities springing up throughout Europe during the middle ages aimed with confidence at the ideal of a synthesis of all knowledge, it was always in the service of an authentic humanitas, the perfection of the individual within the unity of a well-ordered society. And likewise today: once young people’s understanding of the fullness and unity of truth has been awakened, they relish the discovery that the question of what they can know opens up the vast adventure of how they ought to be and what they ought to do.

Secondly, an extract which discusses the situation of an education that has abandoned consideration of reason and truth:

The idea of an integrated education, based on the unity of knowledge grounded in truth, must be regained. It serves to counteract the tendency, so evident in contemporary society, towards a fragmentation of knowledge. With the massive growth in information and technology there comes the temptation to detach reason from the pursuit of truth. Sundered from the fundamental human orientation towards truth, however, reason begins to lose direction: it withers, either under the guise of modesty, resting content with the merely partial or provisional, or under the guise of certainty, insisting on capitulation to the demands of those who indiscriminately give equal value to practically everything. The relativism that ensues provides a dense camouflage behind which new threats to the autonomy of academic institutions can lurk. While the period of interference from political totalitarianism has passed, is it not the case that frequently, across the globe, the exercise of reason and academic research are – subtly and not so subtly – constrained to bow to the pressures of ideological interest groups and the lure of short-term utilitarian or pragmatic goals? What will happen if our culture builds itself only on fashionable arguments, with little reference to a genuine historical intellectual tradition, or on the viewpoints that are most vociferously promoted and most heavily funded? What will happen if in its anxiety to preserve a radical secularism, it detaches itself from its life-giving roots? Our societies will not become more reasonable or tolerant or adaptable but rather more brittle and less inclusive, and they will increasingly struggle to recognize what is true, noble and good.

It is not by any means the first time that Pope Benedict has spoken in these terms about the role of education, be it in the school or the university. And yet, His Holiness' thinking on this question is totally neglected in public debate on education in our country. Should we be surprised?

Templeton Prize awarded to Bernard d'Espagnat

The website of the Templeton Prize reports the award of the 2009 Templeton Prize to Bernard d'Espagnat. Physics World's report of the award is here. This award is interesting because Bernard d'Espagnat's work as a physicist and philosopher has explored the implications of quantum mechanics for how we understand the reality of the world.

As I understand his thought, d'Espagnat argues from the non-localisation of objects associated with a quantum mechanical understanding of them to the notion that the whole of reality has being "as a whole" and that "being" should not be associated with any individual object in isolation from others. He argues that the (mathematical) formulations of quantum mechanics represent a tool that can be used to predict the outcomes of measurements that we might make of events, and resists the giving of any "reality" to the wavefunctions and their associated probabilities of differing outcomes. Thus, at a superficial glance, his thought can appear to be idealistic - in the philosophical sense of that word.

However, d'Espagnat does talk about "Being", with a capital letter, as being a kind of ground behind the phenomna of quantum mechanics. In my own way of expressing it, d'Espagnat recognises that quantum mechanics, because of its probabilistic and non-localised nature, moves the question of existence away from being just a question about the existence of old-fashioned, physical objects that we can touch, feel, throw around and measure with a metre rule to being a question about what it existence is in itself. The philosophical implication of quantum mechanics is to force us to think about the idea of Being, and, for d'Espagnat, this consists of some sort of "Being" that takes in the "whole" of what is contained in the quantum mechanical formulation of things.

The idea of God to which d'Espagnat is attracted is that expressed in the way God reveals his name to Moses: "I am who am". He is in some ways more attracted to Eastern religions, with their sense of mystery about existing/being, than he is to Christian faith which has a "harder" tradition of the way it understands being. So far as I can gather, he is agnostic so far as the existence of God is concerned.

The most accessible account of his thought I have been able to find is in the text of a lecture or paper on the website of the Pontifical Lateran University: "State of the Art" and perspectives: Quantum Physics and the Ontological Problem. There is also a shorter account in Bernard d'Espagnat's statement on receiving the Templeton Prize.

d'Espagnat's work does raise a question about the ability of mankind, whether it be through the methods of science or those of philosophical enquiry in the broadest sense of that term, to come to knowledge of the Reality that he describes as being "veiled". If this "veiled" is understood in a Balthasarian sense (and there is no reason to think that d'Espagnat explicitly does understand it in this sense), it is at once a "hiding" and a "showing" that can reveal to us Reality. One can perhaps imply this possibility in d'Espagnat's thought. At the end of his paper from the Lateran University, he writes:

..it seems to me that there is some relationship between the "ontological suggestions" of contemporary physics and the "negative theology". My point is that there exists a similarity between the notion of Mind-Independent Reality - so much removed from our way of thinking that is is not even embedded in space and time - and the God of this theology, concerning which we can say what it is not. Consequently, I would not be averse to a view that, leaving somewhat aside the awkward question of "God as a person", would identify Man-Independent Reality with the notion we have of some divine Being.

And at the end of his statement on receiving the Templeton Prize:

I consider I have sound reasons to believe in the ground of things I mentioned,lying beyond our ability at conceptualizing and which from time immemorial thinkers, less naive than was often thought, called “the Divine.”

It also raises a second question, a question about the exact nature of the "veiled" Reality of which d'Espagnat speaks and writes. Is it the same idea of Being that we find in traditional metaphysical study, or is it something different?

School Science Review on creationism, intelligent design and science education

The School Science Review is the journal of the UK Association for Science Education (ASE). The ASE is the professional body representing those involved in science education in schools, colleges and teacher training in the UK. It is, I believe, the largest of the subject organisations in the education field in the UK.

The September 2008 issue of the School Science Review has an article entitled "Creationism, intelligent design and science education". This is a very lucid and useful article, for teachers of religious education as well as for science teachers. If you do not have access to your own copy of the journal, but would like to read the article, ask the head of science in your school if they can let you have a photocopy of the article or, failing that, contact the science advisory teacher (or equivalent) in your local authority. What follows is the abstract of the article.

Science teachers may currently find questions about creationism and intelligent design being raised in science lessons. In 2007 the UK Government's Department for Children, Schools and Families published some guidance on these matters, followed almost immediately by a resolution of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. It therefore seems appropriate, especially in view of the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin's birth, to examine the meanings of these terms and how they differ from traditional beliefs in creation and design.

Apart from a very lucid account of the scientific/philosophical/religious issues themselves, Michael Poole also gives a good account of how these issues have been treated in public policy debate. Or, more accurately, mis-treated in that public debate tends to insufficiently distinguish ideas of creationism and intelligent design from the traditional religious understandings of creation and design. This demonstrates rather well how Christians of what one might call (and I intend this charitably) a fundamentalist evangelical tendency - who in practice do not give sufficient recognition to the part played by human reason in the search for knowledge, particularly knowledge of God - do a great disservice to the standing of religious belief in the public square by creating the opportunity for such mis-treatment.

The same issue of School Science Review also contains the ASE statement on "Science Education, Intelligent Design and Creationism". This is rather less useful than Michael Poole's article. Whilst it can be stated as a truism that creationism and intelligent design are not scientific theories, and therefore should not have a place in the science curriculum of a school, the ASE statement rather begs the question of how these ideas relate to human reason in a wide sense and opts out of the question as to whether or not these ideas should have a place elsewhere in the curriculum. In so far as they are ideas that can be subject to the critique or analysis of human reason, there seems to me no prima facie reason to ban these ideas simply as non-scientific, which seems to be the implication of the ASE statement.

More than ever, Pope Benedict XVI's emphasis on the importance of both faith and reason, and the correct understanding of the relationship between the two, can be seen to be quite prophetic.

"Christianity an overwhelming force for good in the world": Prime Minister of Australia

I found it interesting to look at the World Youth Day's website, and their official media player , yesterday evening. Videos of the opening Mass (the whole thing ...) have already been posted. You might find it best to look at the highlights video, in which you can find the welcome speech by Mr Rudd, the Australian Prime Minister. The speech is reported at Zenit, under the title Prime Minister notes Faith-Reason Partnership. I think it is worth watching it on video, rather than just reading the news report or a text. I think it is very interesting as a genuine exercise of dialogue with the Catholic Church by a political leader.

I think there are three noteworthy aspects of Prime Minister Rudd's speech. The first is his emphasis, and I felt there was an emphasis on this in his speech, that the World Youth Day pilgrims are welcome in Australia. This is a valuable counter to those who may undertake anti-Catholic protests during the coming days.

The second is his observation about the partnership of faith and reason:

"Some say there is no place for faith in the 21st century. I say they are wrong. Some say that faith is the enemy of reason, I say, also they are wrong. Because faith and reason are great partners in our human history and in our human future. Rich in humanity, rich in scientific progress."

This observation can clearly be seen in the context of Pope Benedict XVI's own interest in the relationship between faith and reason, an interest which is a prominent feature of his pontificate. It is a welcome participation in dialogue to see the theme being picked up by the leader of a nation such as Australia. I think, too, that a greater exploration of Prime Minister Rudd's last sentence would be useful. He seems to suggest that it is faith that contributes the humanity to our history and future, faith that makes science (cold, hard) human (warm, good). Pope Benedict would have something to say about this.

The third noteworthy aspect is what Prime Minister Rudd said about the contribution of Christianity in the world.

"Some say only that which they see wrong in Christianity and in the Church, I say let us speak also about what is right in Christianity and the Church."

He then highlighted that it was the Church that first opened schools, hospitals and social action for the poor.

"And I say this, that Christianity has been an overwhelming force for good in the world."

One slight note of caution, perhaps, about exactly what Prime Minister Rudd understands by the word "faith". It is not completely clear that he understands the word in a truly religious sense; and his references to "Christianity" and to the "Church" are sufficiently open to refer to Christian denominations other than Catholicism as well as to Catholicism. He does not necessarily see them as "religious" rather than "social" - but nevertheless, I think he has engaged in a dialogue in a proper and encouraging way. What he says about Christianity can be fairly said of all Christian denominations, including Catholicism. His final affirmation is particularly welcome and courageous given the focus of media attention on things that are, or have been, wrong in the Church.

Pope Benedict XVI and Pseudo-Dionysius

My attention was caught a day or two ago by ZENIT's report of a General Audience address on the sixth century writer known as Pseudo-Dionysius. I have had an (unfulfilled) interest in Pseudo-Dionysius since I read a few months ago about his writing on angels, and realised that Edith Stein had made considerable use of it in the section of her book Finite and Eternal Being devoted to created pure spirits.

The first point to arise from the ZENIT report is an understanding of the nature of dialogue in general, and that between Christianity and contemporary culture in particular:

The Holy Father noted how Pseudo-Dionysius wrote, "'I would not like to cause polemics; I simply speak of the truth; I seek the truth.' And the light of truth by itself makes error fade and makes what is good shine. With this principle he purified Greek thought and related it to the Gospel.

"This principle, which he affirms in his seventh letter, is also the expression of a true spirit of dialogue: It is not about seeking the things that separate, one must seek the truth in Truth itself; this, then, shines and causes errors to fall," the Pontiff affirmed.

The second point to emerge is one that is reflected in Cardinal Murphy O'Connor's recent lecture. It is the question of how the greatness of God is related to our ability to talk about Him, and how we can find a proper language in which to talk about this relationship.

Benedict XVI contended that the theology of the sixth-century author is "the first great mystical theology." His teachings use "negative theology," that is the idea that "the most elevated concepts of God never reach his true greatness" and that "it is easier to say what God is not than to express what he really is."

This formulation seems to me a very helpful one. There is no implication that the "most elevated concepts of God" are not true, or are inaccurate - in so far as they may be part of what God has revealed, they are true and certain. However, as the effort of the human mind, even supported by faith, to reach God, they still have a way to go in order to "reach his true greatness".

Pseudo-Dionysius tells us that "in the end, love sees more than reason. Where the light of love is, the shadows of reason fade away. Love sees, love is an eye and experience gives us much more than reflection," the Holy Father added.

Again, there is no implication that reason cannot "see", or is false or inadequate for our knowing something of God. Instead, there is a statement of the "more" that is seen by love. In comparison to the "light of love" reason is "shadows"; but in the comparison, and not in the sense that reason is "shadows" in which nothing can be "seen".

And the final point that emerges is the possibility that Pseudo-Dionysius provides a model that could be followed for dialogue with the eastern religions:

[Pope Benedict] said [Pseudo-Dionysius] has a new relevance as a "great mediator in the modern dialogue between Christianity and the mystical theologies of Asia, marked by the conviction that it is impossible to say who God is, that only negative expressions can be used to speak of him; that God can only be spoken of with 'no,' and that it is only possible to reach him by entering into this experience of 'no.' And here is seen a similarity between the thought of the Areopagite and that of the Asian religions. He can be today a mediator like he was between the Greek spirit and the Gospel."

SSPX, scholasticism and phenomenology

The Sensible Bond has posted about the position of the Society of St Pius X, the society attached to the Tridentine liturgy and previously led by Archbishop Lefebvre. As someone who has not followed events involving the Society closely, this seems to be a well informed and well considered post.

The dialogue in the "comments" is also of interest. One aspect of that dialogue refers to the place of Thomist or scholastic philosophy, and asks about the insights that can be gained from phenomenology and personalism. Since St Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein) is my favourite saint, I do think phenomenology has a lot to offer... but there is perhaps the need to "return to the sources" of that movement in philosophy, to the realist phenomenology of people like Edith Stein. It is interesting that Edith and her friends at the time saw in this realist phenomenology a "new Thomism"; that many of them were Christian believers prompted Edith's first recognition of religion as being a subject worthy of philosophical study. A significant subject of study was the human person, and the religious nature of the person featured in that.

I feel that a realist phenomenology, as a methodology, can provide the means for the dialogue with secularists and atheists that Cardinal Murphy O'Connor was seeking in his recent lecture. It involves a "stepping back" from any previously held positions (a temporary, methodological neutrality, not a rejection); and it expects human reason to be applied to the full range of human experience (not just the physical sciences!) to determine essentially what those experiences are made up of. Seen as a search for the truth of things - and this is how the early phenomenologists saw it - this then leads to adherence to the truth that has been achieved. Or, to use a religious term, "conversion". In the early twentieth century, the context for this was an anxiety to overcome the gulf between our knowing and the truth of things that was perceived in Kantian and post-Kantian philosophy; in the first years of the twenty first century, the challenge is that covered by the generic term "post-modernism" which gives a similar experience of an unbridgeable gap between our knowing and things themselves.

Cardinal Murphy O'Connor: Faith in Britain today (2)

As previously indicated, here is the further post on Cardinal Murphy O'Connor's lecture. An interesting insight that Cardinal Murphy O'Connor's lecture suggests is that the key dialogue that is needed in our society is less a dialogue between the different religions but rather more a dialogue between religious belief and atheism.

In some ways it is a bit nit-picking to select short quotations from the lecture for comment - my apologies to the Cardinal for that; but the need to present a coherent and consistent understanding of what reason is, what faith is and, then, how the two relate to each other, appears to me vital to achieving a proper dialogue with atheism.

"Our faith is not founded on the conclusions of reason, but it is grounded in the Logos, the expressive Word that comes from God, and it is compatible with reasoned thought"

One might want to add to this that "the conclusions of reason" might provide some grounding for our faith, since reason is going to be very much to the fore in a dialogue with atheism, but Cardinal Murphy O'Connor is correct in asserting a decisive grounding in the revelation of God in the Word.

"We should remember that the proper response to God is that of faith, not absolute certainty".

The opposing of faith and certainty in this sentence is, I think, unfortunate; and the following discussion of Thomas Aquinas and Augustine reflects the unfortunate nature of the sentence. First of all, we need to be clear that faith can give a confident and certain knowledge of the truth contained in revelation - but some will read this sentence as a denial of that. That there is something more to be learnt about God, both intellectually and in terms of our lived communion with him, may be the intention of the "not absolute certainty" and be what Aquinas calls "imperfect knowledge", but that is not the same as questioning the confidence that we can have in the knowledge achieved through faith.

In his interview on Radio 4's Today programme, Cardinal Murphy O'Connor said:

"..reason of itself cannot prove the existence of God .."

and

" .. reason is not enough .."

The defined teaching of the Church is that we can come to a confident knowledge of God through the use of reason in studying the world around us. What faith, that is, the knowledge achieved through God's self-revelation, provides is another, complementary way in which this knowledge of God's existence can be known. In their different circumstances, people may in practice rely on one way of knowing more than they do on the other for their knowledge of God's existence, or they may not get there at all. But I think, in dialogue with atheism, religious believers are going to want to insist on the ability of reason to come to knowledge of God's existence.

"If Christians really believed in the mystery of God, we would realise that proper talk about God is always difficult, always tentative ... A God who can be spoken about comfortably and clearly by human beings cannot be the true God."

But the reference to God as mystery does not mean that what we say about God should not be said, or that we cannot have confidence in what we say about Him. It recognises that the revealed mystery of God is something to be lived as well as spoken about and known. The difficulty and tentativeness can refer to the what-is-still-to-be-learnt in our intellectual lives, but we need to be careful that it does not make a statement that we cannot really know about God at all.

The last part of this post is slightly adapted from the comment I sent earlier today to the "Debate" forum for this lecture on the Westminster diocesan website.

Reason can come to know things about the physical world around us (the physical sciences), about the human person and his presence in the world (the social sciences) etc. It can address questions about things that are not material - human motivations and consciousness. And from this, it can also address questions about the meaning of life, the universe and everything - and, whilst there is always more to be learnt or discovered, there is a possibility for confidence in this knowledge. And one can equally apply this reason to the phenomena of religion - it being profoundly irrational to deny the existence of religion as a phenomenon. An honesty in this study will not, in my view, permit the characterisation of religious belief as simply personal imaginings, its OK if you need it, invention of the early Church, etc. It is also necessary to understand what the term faith means - and again this has not been fully developed in the Cardinal's lecture. Faith is a knowledge that can be confident of what it knows in the same way that reason can be confident of what it knows, though the source of that knowledge is different. Yes, we can grow into greater knowledge, both reasoned and faith-based knowledge, but that is not the same as denying the confidence that we can have in both.

And, here I would want to endorse Cardinal Murphy O'Connor's call for greater dialogue between believers and non-believers. Let's undertake that through the hard work of applying our reason in all its many different approaches (the physical and social sciences) to the questions of atheism and religious belief. Religious believers are of the view that what we believe and teach can stand up to this challenge of reason; can the atheist position stand up to the same challenge?

As they say these days ... "bring it on".

Thinking Faith - a relativisation of reason

The Jesuit on-line journal Thinking Faith carries an article "Reasonable Catholicism: Interpreting the Whole Text". In some ways, this article makes interesting reading. I ended up feeling, though, that it presented a very tired argument. That having been said, why do I think it is worthy of a critique?

Firstly, the author is currently a university chaplain working with Catholic students. An article in an on-line academic journal may not be a fair indicator of his apostolate with the students. If it is, though, I feel that the students deserve better than this.

Secondly, the question of the relationship between faith and reason is a prominent theme for Pope Benedict XVI. The relativisation of reason that I believe is expressed in this article can completely undermine how Pope Benedict, and indeed Pope John Paul II before him, is understood on this issue.

The tiredness of the ideas presented in this article is summarised in the introductory paragraph (my emphasis):

If the Christian faith is a ‘religion of the book’, a tradition handed down through the centuries, how are we to make sense of that book and that tradition
when we speak today in a very different language?

Unstated, but implied, is a questioning of the ability of language to express reality, a questioning of the ability of reason (seen as a faculty of the human person) to know the truth of the world. A very tired idea!

The article is not based on a coherent idea of what reason is:

This leaves ‘reasonable’ still surprisingly vague. Unfortunately, one of the things that we are going to have to cope with is that ‘reason’ is not as precise a concept as we would all like it to be. ... The vast edifice of teaching that articulates the ambiguous narratives of scripture into a coherent whole itself needs interpretation in the light of new reason and reasoning. It is essentially incomplete. ... But then are not all commandments within the tradition, even those most fiercely proclaimed, subject ultimately to the test of reason? Or, more disturbingly, are they not subject to the test of reasonings (plural) that may differ substantially from that reasoning in which they once were grounded? Things that seemed sacred and secure, a clear pathway to God, are called into question by those who have a different account of human flourishing. Entering into the dialogue of reason, once again, has a cost.

I think these citations, from three different parts of the article, demonstrate starting from an imprecise understanding of what reason is (failing to give an account of reason as a faculty or ability of the human mind ordered toward knowledge of the world in which we live). The ambiguity created by this starting point allows the recognition that the ability to reason can be exercised in different ways ("new reason and reasoning") to instead be expressed as if it were a completely different and novel thing altogether ("new reason and reasoning"). And it finally leads through to a relativisation of reason (as ability to know the truth of the world about us) to "reasonings" (different ways of exercising our ability to know). What is missing is a properly developed account of reason as an ability of the human mind, and of what constitutes a proper use of that ability and an improper use of it (the idea that some lines of argument or reasoning are correct and others are wrong).

It is perhaps part of the logic if this article that a relativisation of Scripture, and the miracles described in Scripture, to our contemporary reading of it is also apparent in the article (see paragraphs 8 and 9). This is not to deny that we read Scripture in the light of reason, or that we can see in Scripture messages or signs for our life today. But, to escape this becoming a form of relativism, it is important to have a sound understanding of the nature of reason that is absent from this article. A relativisation of tradtion and magisterium also follows in the next paragraph (paragraph 10).

The final paragraph, though quite poetic in nature, has a fundamental flaw. It carefully ignores the nature of "the texts" of Scripture and tradition as revelation, and how certainly we read them in the light of reason, but also in the light of faith. It praises reason, but leaves us to ask where and how it relates to faith. The"M" word (magisterium) is missing.

Throughout the Christian era and before it there has always been more than one way of being reasonable. That diversity is reflected in the texts, whether scriptural or dogmatic which attempt to articulate a narrative or a teaching, and point us towards the dynamic reality of our relationship with God. It is the challenging, but liberating work of Christian reasoning in every age to interpret the whole text so that its deep truth may be recognised and so can set us free.

Welcoming Benedict XVI in USA

One of the interesting things about Pope Benedict XVI's visit to America is that of comparing the different speeches that have been given to welcome him. I have already posted on President George Bush's welcome speech at the White House. Below I compare that welcome to the welcome given by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon when Pope Benedict visited the UN.

The welcome speeches given by Archbishop Wuerl and Cardinal Egan at the beginning of the celebrations of Mass at the National's Stadium and the Yankee's Stadium are of rather a different nature. It appears to be the fashion to offer a welcome/introduction at the beginning of special celebrations like this - but I am not convinced that the style of welcome speeches offered on these two occasions really sits within the meaning of the rubric that allows a brief introduction to the Mass.

President George Bush: welcome to Benedict XVI at the White House

“Most of all, Holy Father, you will find in America people whose hearts are open to your message of hope. And America and the world need this message. In a world where some invoke the name of God to justify acts of terror and murder and hate, we need your message that ‘God is love.’”

The reference to Pope Benedict’s encyclical letter Deus Caritas Est is key to understanding President Bush’s words.

“The United States is the most innovative, creative and dynamic country on earth -- it is also among the most religious.”

Subtly, President Bush affirms the religious character of US society, clearly intending by that belief in revealed religions (perhaps primarily Christianity).

“Here in America you'll find a nation of prayer. Each day millions of our citizens approach our Maker on bended knee, seeking His grace and giving thanks for the
many blessings He bestows upon us. Millions of Americans have been praying for your visit, and millions look forward to praying with you this week.”

“Here in America you'll find a nation of compassion. Americans believe that the measure of a free society is how we treat the weakest and most vulnerable among us. So each day citizens across America answer the universal call to feed the hungry and comfort the sick and care for the infirm. Each day across the world the United States is working to eradicate disease, alleviate poverty, promote peace and bring the light of hope to places still mired in the darkness of tyranny and despair.”

These two paragraphs reflect the two-fold structure of Deus Caritas Est - an analysis of the nature of human loving, and of God’s character as Love, followed by charity as the living out of God’s love in the world.

“Here in America you'll find a nation that welcomes the role of faith in the public square. When our Founders declared our nation's independence, they rested their case on an appeal to the ‘laws of nature, and of nature's God.’ We believe in religious liberty. We also believe that a love for freedom and a common moral law are written into every human heart, and that these constitute the firm foundation on which any successful free society must be built.”

The idea of a common moral law, rooted in God and manifested in nature and in the human heart; and thereby, the possibility that the laws of the land should defend such basic values as the good of human life.

“Holy Father, Laura and I are privileged to have you here at the White House. We welcome you with the ancient words commended by Saint Augustine: ‘Pax Tecum.’
‘Peace be with you.’”

An attitude of profound courtesy from someone who is not a Catholic, and a demonstration of what Benedict XVI would term “dialogue”.

UN Secretary-General: greeting to Benedict XVI at the United Nations

“Whether we worship one God, many or none -- we in the United Nations have to sustain and strengthen our faith every day. As demands on our Organization multiply, we need more and more of this precious commodity. I am profoundly grateful to his Holiness Pope Benedict XVI for bestowing some of his faith on us -- and for placing his trust in us. He possesses both of these in abundance. May we be strengthened by his visit today.”

This concluding paragraph sums up Ban Ki-moon’s address: religious indifferentism, and the use of the word “faith” indiscriminately with regard to those who have and those who do not have religious belief, as if the word means the same for both groups,

“I am deeply grateful to His Holiness for accepting my invitation to visit the United Nations -- home to all men and women of faith around the world. Your
Holiness, welcome to our common home.

The United Nations is a secular institution, composed of 192 States. We have six official languages but no official religion. We do not have a chapel -- though we do have a meditation room.”

The absence of an official religion is the expression of an appropriate secular/lay character of the United Nations, but see above for the use of the word "faith".

“Before leaving the UN today, you will visit the Meditation Room. My great predecessor, Dag Hammarskjöld, who created that room, put it well. He said of the stone that forms its centerpiece: ‘We may see it as an altar, empty not because there is no God, not because it is an altar to an unknown God, but because it is dedicated to the God whom man worships under many names and in many forms.’”

The absence of chapels for the different religions in favour of a common “meditation room” goes beyond appropriate secularity to treating the different religions as themselves non-religious phenomena which must conform to non-religious criteria; and Dag Hammarskjold expresses again the religious indifferentism already noted.

“But if you ask those of us who work for the United Nations what motivates us, many of us reply in a language of faith. We see what we do not only as a job, but as a mission. Indeed, mission is the word we use most often for our work around the world -- from peace and security to development to human rights.”

Again, the word “faith” is used indiscriminately to refer to the faith of religious belief and to a secular meaning, though I feel the use of the word “mission” has here greater possibilities of genuine commonality of meaning.

“Your Holiness, in so many ways, our mission unites us with yours.

You have called for an open and sincere dialogue, both within your Church and between religions and cultures, in search of the good of humankind.”

I think there is a fairness in the use of the word “mission”, and a genuine commonality of meaning for the word. Ban Ki-moon listed in his speech some of the ways in which the UN and the Holy See share common purpose (in working to relieve poverty and achieve nuclear disarmament, for example).

But, it has to be said, the outlook of the United Nations, as represented by the General Secretary, goes counter to much of what Pope Benedict XVI stands for. Where President Bush shows a clear appreciation of Pope Benedict's mission, General Secretary Ban Ki-moon appears to be deliberately presenting a form of secularism as an alternative. The frustrating thing about this is the attempt to present it as if it is similar to the mission of Benedict XVI and the Catholic Church!

Tony Blair "Faith and Globalisation": some comments on a transcript

A transcript of Tony Blair's lecture, the first of this year's Cardinal's Lectures on Faith and Life in Britain, can be found on the website of the Archdiocese of Westminster. I believe there are several points of interest in the transcript. I am going to avoid commenting adversely on Tony Blair's previous record as a Member of Parliament and as Prime Minister (bar one quick comment) - LifeSiteNews is probably carrying the best comment of this type. I am not going to comment, either, on the aims outlined for his Foundation on inter-faith relations - perhaps someone else will comment on that for me. I am sure too that other comments could be made than mine. Fr Tim has some comments that are worth adding to mine, as has Rita.

1. Tony Blair rejects religious indifferentism, and does so explicitly.

"Even if by far most religious people are not prone to the use of terror, at least not nowadays, there are extremists in virtually every religion. And even where there is not extremism expressed in violence there is extremism expressed in the idea that a person’s identity is to be found not merely in their religious faith, but in their faith as a means of excluding the other person who does not share it. Let me be clear. I am not saying that it is extreme to believe your religious faith is the only true faith. Most people of faith do that. It doesn’t stop them respecting those of a different faith or indeed of no faith." [my emphasis]

And commenting on his Foundation, Blair insists that "It is not about losing our own distinctive faith". Where Tony Blair here uses the term "extreme" would others use, pejoratively, the term "fundamentalist"?

Now, it does not take a lot of imagination to see where this principle could be applied in contemporary British society. It is not extreme for the Catholic Church to hold to its official teaching on homosexuality, or to expect the education offered in its schools to be in accord with Catholic moral teaching, most especially with regard to sexual and marital ethics. And this should not be read as lack of respect for those who have different views on these matters.

Though it might have been nice if Tony Blair had been willing to draw the conclusion himself ... But see point 7 below, which might indicate that Tony Blair would not want to apply his principle at the level of specific beliefs.

2. Tony Blair recognises that charitable activity undertaken by religious believers is rooted in their religious faith.

Tony Blair gives a wide ranging list of religious initiatives for justice and the relief of poverty, and then observes:

"For all these actors faith is not something incidental to their actions. It is the wellspring of them, the font, the origin, the thing that makes these people who they are and do what they do ... They believe that they act as instruments of God's love when they perform such actions." [Again, my emphasis.]

This is a theme more fully developed in Part II of Pope Benedict XVI's encyclical Deus Caritas Est. Christian charitable activity is not just a work of welfare that could be left to others but a living practice of God's love for others arising from the very nature of the Church; it is an essentially religious activity and not a secular one. If my memory serves me correctly, Cardinal Paul Josef Cordes of the Pontifical Institute Cor Unum has been making the point that Catholics engaged in charitable activity cannot leave their religious faith out of their commitment to charity.

Again, one can see points where this principle has consequences in contemporary Britain. Catholic charities should have the freedom to carry out their activities in ways that are in accordance with the teaching of the Church. Catholic health care facilities (and, indeed, Catholic individuals working in health care facilities) should not be forced to provide contraceptive and abortion services that conflict with Catholic teaching. Catholic adoption agencies should not be presented with the choice either to place children with gay or lesbian couples or to close down. The charitable activity of these institutions cannot be separated from their religious belief in such a way.

Again, it might have been nice for Tony Blair to draw the conclusion himself ... But, again, see point 7 below, which might indicate that Tony Blair would not want to apply his principle at the level of specific beliefs.

3. Tony Blair very usefully presents religion as a force for good in history.

Whilst recognising that there have been times, places and people where religious faith has not been for the good, Tony Blair does give a long list of examples of organisations and activities where religious believers have made a contribution for the good. One might find his inclusion of "the radical and brave liberation priests of South America" in the list a bit undiscriminating, but the reference to "those that in their thousands and hundreds of thousands work in the poorest, most disease-ridden, conflict ravaged parts of Africa this day and every day" seems to show an understanding of the sheer scale of religious engagement in charitable activity.

And, in reaction against militant secularism, he writes:

"But let us also recall for a moment the evils of the 20th century done in the furtherance of political ideology; fascism and the holocaust; communism and the millions of Stalin's victims. And recall how the heroic defiance of those evils was often led by men and women of faith".

4. Tony Blair touches on the question of the relationship of faith and reason.

"I see Faith and Reason, Faith and Progress, as in alliance not contention" [Upper case as used in the transcript.]

"Yet for most people of faith, religious belief is quintessentially about truth. So, science and faith, reason and faith should never be seen as opposites but as bedfellows."

"Faith is a living and growing belief, not stuck in one time in history, but moving with time, with reason, with knowledge, informed by scientific and technological discovery not in antithesis to it, as well as directing those discoveries toward humane ends. Faith is not something separate from our reason, still less from society around us, but integral to it, giving the use of reason purpose and society a soul, and human beings a sense of the divine"

Ifeel there are two weaknesses. The apparent equation of "reason" with "progress", and "reason" with "science" makes one wonder what Tony Blair is trying to denote by the word "reason", and this is only partly lifted when he goes on to see faith as giving purpose to the use of reason. Reason is used in fields of study other than science. And, because there is no distinction made in his comment between different religions, the fact that religions are not uniform in their ability to form a synthesis of modern science with their religious belief is skated over.

It is interesting, nevertheless, that Tony Blair felt it useful to include these references to the relationship of faith and reason. Understanding that relationship is key to establishing dialogue between religious belief and secular culture. The relationship has, again, been much more fully developed by Pope John Paul II in his encyclical Fides et Ratio, and is a repeated theme of Pope Benedict XVI. A discussion of the relation of faith and reason was, for example, what the address at the University of Regensburg was about in September 2006.

5. Tony Blair argues for a positive role of religion in the present times.

"I ... argue that religious faith is a good thing in itself, that so far from being a reactionary force, it has a major part to play in shaping the values which guide the modern world, and can and should be a force for progress. But it has to be rescued on the one hand from the extremist and exclusionary tendency within religion today; and on the other from the danger that religious faith is seen as an interesting part of history and tradition but with nothing to say about the contemporary human condition."

"Faiths can transform and humanise the impersonal forces of globalisation, and shape the values of the changing set of economic and power relationships of the early 21st century"

Again, I think this is an issue that has been addressed more fully (but on a rather smaller scale!) by Pope Benedict XVI in the address that he was due to give in January at the University La Sapienza in Rome, but was prevented from giving. As well as once again addressing questions of faith and reason, Pope Benedict makes a case for the presence of a religious voice in a secular university, explicitly arguing that

"In the face of an a-historical reason that tries to construct itself through a-historical rationality, the wisdom of humanity as such -- the wisdom of the great religious traditions -- is to be valued as a reality that cannot be with impunity thrown into the dustbin of the history of ideas."

6. Tony Blair asserts the inalienable worth of every human being.

"Faith corrects, in a necessary and vital way, the tendency humankind has to relativism. It says there are absolutes – like the inalienable worth and dignity of every human being – that can never be sacrificed."

I really do not know what to make of this in the context of Tony Blair's voting record on pro-life issues. But it is there in the transcript.

7. Tony Blair does not speak with an ecclesial sense, referring to "faith" in a way that abstracts from any specific religion or content of belief.

Throughout, Tony Blair talks about "faith", or "people of faith", and similar. He also refers to "faiths" where we might more commonly talk about different religions, though he does name the major faiths. He also makes reference to "organised religion" rather than to "churches" or "denominations" or "religions". Nowhere do I think he refers to a "church". For someone who has recently been received into the Catholic Church, I find this a bit strange, since the Catholic Church does have such a strong sense of "Church" about it. It also reflects a language typical of those who view religion as a secular phenomenon, and not a religious one - an "organised religion" is a socially occuring phenomenon, and can be studied as such, whereas to refer to a "church" would be to admit something of divine origin in that phenomenon. It might well be that it represents an adjustment to the context in which he is speaking, rather than a lack of ecclesial sense in Tony Blair's personal faith. It does, though, seem to involve a detachment of the idea of faith (as a life stance) from its content (specific religious beliefs) into a kind of abstractness that will be difficult for individual religions to recognise.

8. Tony Blair makes a useful observation that politics is now less about left vs. right than about open vs. closed.

"The forces shaping the world at this moment are so strong and all tend in one direction. They are opening the world up. I sometimes say to people that in modern politics, the dividing line is often less between traditional left vs. right; but more about open vs. closed. Mass migration is changing communities, even countries. People communicate ideas and images instantly around the world, creating immediate political and ideological movements in a ferment of quickly devoured information. Economically the world system is ever more dependent on confidence, robust when things seem good, extraordinarily brittle when confidence dips. The world is interdependent today, economically, politically, even to a degree ideologically.

The divide, then, is between those who see this as positive - the opening up offering opportunity; and those who see it as threatening and wish to close it back down. As you can see from the Presidential race in the U.S., there are new questions that cross traditional Party lines: free trade vs. protection; engagement in foreign policy or isolationism; supporting immigration or opposing it. In these, the issue is less left vs right but open vs closed. And they all derive from a fear that globalisation is throwing people, cultures, countries together but with no common sense of values
or understanding of each other. "

I think that this is a useful characterisation of the present situation. Not only does it have relevance to political movements and parties, but to local communities and to individuals in those communities. It is relevant when we consider how an individual might react to a new neighbour from a different country, for example.