Prima Pars
5. Dei Filius III: The Church as a Sign of Credibility, the Canons on Faith, and the Two Kinds of Knowledge of God
Class of 2005-12-22
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/10-prima-pars/005-dei-filius-iii-the-church-as-a-sign-of-credibility-the-canons/

[0:00] First, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. God, Our enlightenment. Guardian angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, ordinate luminaria images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, pray for us and help us to understand, what you've written. In the. Name of the Father, the Son, Holy Spirit, Amen.

[0:29] I was thinking, you know, just of how the word revelation we said has two meanings, and one is revelation that corresponds to on our side faith, right? And then the second one is the full revelation, which corresponds on our part to the beatific vision, seeing God as He is face to face. That's a fuller revelation, huh? Because then you're seeing God as He is, right? But reminds me a little bit of how Thomas Aquinas, in those communion prayers, will speak of convivium, like for the Eucharist, he'll say, "O sacrum convivium," right?

[1:16] O sacred banquet, huh? And then when he talks about the beatific vision, he's asking for that. Say at the prayer after communion, he says, "O ineffabile convivium," huh? Inexpressible, huh? Unspeakable banquet, huh? Well, the idea of the banquet is it's a metaphor, right? The banquet is supposed to be a meal that has everything, right? You know, and if you've been to some of these these buffets, you know, where or brunches, you know, where it's a breakfast and a dinner together, huh?

[1:51] You remember one time taking my my mother to when we were teaching out in California, and I'm going down this line of all the different table to table things, you know, and I'm cutting, and then looked over on the other side, the real good stuff was the other side. Yeah. So if you're after those days, I got two plates, you know, guys, attendants running to help me, you know, carrying my plates back.

[2:13] Yeah. I used to know a guy at the package store who who would go to these brunches and of course you'd go there and you'd spend two or three hours there, right? And you you eat your breakfast, you know, and you've got to eat your dinner in the same sitting. But you know, St. Thomas explains sometimes the words of God, you know, to Abraham or Moses. says, I will show you every good, and Thomas says that is myself.

[2:45] So the banquet's kind of a metaphor for every good, and so, but it's it's interesting that Thomas uses that same metaphor for the Eucharist. We call it O sacrum convivium. But then at the end of that thing from the Liturgy I guess it is, he'll say that it's the pignus, the pledge of eternal life, right? So it's kind of an anticipation of it, huh? Okay. And then you'll use the word convivium again in the prayer after communion.

[3:18] He's asking for the beatific vision, and then he calls it the ineffable banquet, huh? There's that interesting psalm there. I think it's Psalm 62 in the correct numbering, where the soul is said to be in a banquet, huh? And you can understand that as referring to the Eucharist, huh? Or you can understand as referring to the Eucharist referring to the what banquet of eternal life. But the two go together, huh?

[3:45] Because one is in a sense a foretaste of the other, in a way that's in the definition then of faith, huh? That's the substance of things hoped for, right? Substance has a sense there of what substare to stand under. The Greek word is etymologically the same. It's hypostasis there, not ousia. But hypostasis has the same etymology as substantia, sub under, stand, huh? So it's like a foundation of the things hoped for.

[4:14] What's hoped for is eternal life. Eternal life is to know Him and Him whom you have sent, right? To know God as He is. And so sometimes Thomas will go back to that, as we mentioned last time, to divide the articles of faith, huh? Okay. Like in the Adoro te devote, right? He'll say, "In In cruce latebat sola deitas so on the cross was hidden, only the divinity, but here also the humanity is hidden.

[4:43] But he's believing both, and then he asks for what the penitent thief asked for. So kind of you're asking for eternal life, but this is like a a foretaste of eternal life, huh? And so you divide sometimes the articles of faith by the same what two things that Christ has in the definition in Saint John of eternal life. The eternal life is to know you, you know, God and and Him whom you have sent, huh?

[5:12] To know in a sense the divinity and humanity of Christ. So that's also in the definition of what of faith, huh? So you look at these three things: the two meanings of a revelation, right? Or the two uses of the metaphor convivium, right? And then the definition of faith as a substance of things hoped for, the conviction of what is not seen, huh? But there's a reference back to the will there.

[5:40] You say the substance of things hoped for, because hope is in the will, right? And you want to bring out that the assent or reason to what it doesn't see is due to it's being moved by the will to assent, huh? Although it's also helped by The internal gift of faith, and it's also helped by these external signs.

[6:07] Okay, we just, I think, looked last time at part four: there, necessity of faith for salvation. On the bottom of page ten, I think that's where we were, and that very strong thing. Since then, without faith, it is impossible to what please God and reach the fellowship of His sons and daughters. It follows that no one can ever achieve justification without it. Neither can anyone attain eternal life unless he or she perseveres in it to the what end?

[6:45] And Thomas sometimes, when he talks about that, will say even in terms of learning a human science from a human teacher, right? You need what a kind of human belief in this teacher, and you won't achieve wisdom without that human belief first. And so, God is not doing violence to our nature when, for the highest of all, right, He requires this belief before He gives us the full knowledge.

[7:16] But as I was mentioning last time, as you go from the lowest up towards the highest of the philosophical sciences, even the dependence upon the teacher becomes greater, right? And I mentioned too how how the word mathematics, which is most proportioned to our mind, is named from the student, but theology is sometimes given the name sacra doctrina or doctrina Christianitatis, Augustine's title of his work. But you're naming it from the teacher, doctrina, as opposed to mathematics.

[7:50] It's kind of like the the two opposite what extremes, huh? And so your dependency of belief becomes even greater as you go up to the higher things. Now, part five here was the necessity, right, of the church for faith, huh?

[8:13] And first of all, is this twofold necessity of the church for faith, huh? Again, I remind you that the thick black thing is the official text; the other is just that nitwit or dimwit commentator, right, dividing the text a bit, huh? Okay.

[8:37] But that's important. I mentioned how before the great wise men of Greece, the seven wise men, put up at the Oracle of Delphi, "Know thyself," right? Yeah. And as far as the life of the mind is concerned, know yourself means, in part. When whether you're a wit, whether you're a dim wit, or a what nitwit, huh? And most of us are best dim wits, right? And therefore, we need to believe the wits, huh, in order to what learn from them, huh?

[9:10] But even these wits, and you see, you know, how Aristotle spent twenty years in the school of Plato. So even a wit learns from a what another wit, right? Just as Mozart learned from Haydn, as he admits himself, or from you know the two Bachs that he was in contact with, especially, but other great composers before him, right? So even the wit learns from wit. But in point of fact, we dim wits need to learn from the wits, and therefore we need to what believe them for those three, at least for those three reasons I was giving last time, huh?

[9:46] Because the wit knows the road to get somewhere, right? And you won't know that that's the road until you've gone down that road a long way, right? And so you're believing the wit when. You set out to follow that road, huh? That you would get somewhere by following that road. But when you do get somewhere, then you turn around and you say, "Hey, now I know, right? Now I don't need you anymore."

[10:12] Okay, now I know the Pythagorean theorem, right? I had to do 46 things to get there, but now I know it, and I don't just take something in workbook three that I wanted to learn about. Yeah, yeah, but I believe I believe Euclid that this is going to get me to the Pythagorean theorem, which I've heard about all my life, right? But then again, the idea that the wise man sees those

[10:40] fundamental things that illuminate all kinds of other things, and they'll emphasize those things, and insist upon you getting a very distinct and strong knowledge of these basic things, and you don't realize how many things will be what, how many doors is open for you until later on. But unless you what, as Empedocles says, press these things down firmly into your mind, right? They'll get away from you, huh?

[11:09] But if you press them firmly down into your mind, he says, you'll get many other things from them. How do I know that? Well, you're going to have to believe me, right? But press this down firmly in your mind, and you'll start to see one thing after another, right? I know. I know. It's myself, just as a teacher. Sometimes I'm reading Shakespeare or something, I run across something kind of good, and I say, "Oh, I could use this in this or that course," right?

[11:34] And sometimes you even go to the point of memorizing a little few words of the great guy. And then I'm in another class, another subject, and all of a sudden I see another use of the same thing. And then another class, another use, right? So he said something that is fruitful; it will lead to many things. But how would I know that first, right? Okay. And then, as I mentioned before, we have to in these more difficult things.

[12:02] We have to think about them. In general, we have to think about something, and sometimes a long time before we really understand it. Why do you continue to think about something unless you believe that by thinking about it long enough you'll come to what understanding, right? And once you you know, find this happening a lot with somebody, then you have even more belief in him, right? But at first, you're believing him because what?

[12:33] You know, think about it, huh? And okay, and you think about it for a while, and then it starts to become what clear, right? So you're believing him, huh? Up until this point,

[12:48] you persevere in thinking about it because you believe this is going to lead to some understanding, right? So that we could fulfill our duty of embracing the true faith. And of persevering unwavering in it, God through His only begotten Son founded the Church,

[13:15] and He endowed His institution with clear notes to the end that she might be recognized by all as a guardian and teacher of the revealed Word. So we depend upon the Church not only for teaching us the truth, but also the Church is itself, as we said, I think more explicitly later on, is itself a great witness to what? To the truth. Yeah, a motive of credibility, right?

[13:41] Seeing the Church, huh? And as he goes on to say here, how the institution and character of the Church meets its necessity, and he says in general, to the Catholic Church alone belong all those things so many and so marvelous which have been divinely ordained to make for the manifest credibility of the Christian faith. So you have all these examples of what the miracles, right, the lives of the saints, huh, as well as the prophecies that fulfilled and so on.

[14:15] And then he goes on to say, in particular, the Church itself is a sign or motive of credibility. What is more, the Church herself, by reason of her astonishing propagation, as Thomas, you know, he talks about this in the Summa Contra Gentiles as, well, this is not like Muhammad there, who's promising what, you know, hurries and material things, right? And and and using the sword, you know, to convert and so on.

[14:46] But the Church here, it's propagated despite teaching things that are what above our mind, right? And proposing a way of life that is not, in not pleasant to the flesh, right? And yet it is propagated, huh? Her outstanding holiness and her great saints, and her inexhaustible fertility in every kind of goodness by her Catholic unity, right?

[15:19] And Catholic means what universal, and her unconquerable what stability, right? Is a kind of great and perpetual motive of credibility, and an incontrovertible evidence of her own divine mission. I think this kind of interesting because isn't our age characterized by problems in believing? And isn't you know the Tocqueville talks about this, but we hear about it, right? And isn't interesting, you know, that the two councils that are in

[15:58] the last two councils, Vatican I and now Vatican II. The two dogmatic constitutions in Vatican II, one was on divine revelation, and the other was on the church, right? Now, why is it kind of providential that the the mystery of the church, or the mysteries of the church, right, about the church, that they are being kind of what clarified in the councils of our time, right? Why is that appropriate?

[16:32] People are questioning more, so it's better to have it. Yeah, yeah, to have more things written on them, especially from the church itself. Yeah, yeah. If the church itself is a greater perpetual motive of credibility, right? Then the mystery of the church is something you want people to what meditate upon, right? Because that would be a help for them in in believing what the church teaches. So

[17:01] sometimes there is a kind of a ad hoc, you know, to the age, you know, the councils dealing with the problems of that age in a way. So maybe there is a reason why the mystery of the church is in our time, right? The preoccupation of the Vatican I, which was not completed, but completed in Vatican II, right? You know, one of the two dogmatic constitutions. Isn't this the reason for it, right?

[17:30] In terms of what the importance of the mystery of the church, the church and all these things are singled out here. Its propagation, its holiness, its fertility, every kind of goodness, its catholic unity, its stability, and so on, is a kind of greater perpetual motive of credibility that we especially have a problem in our time. You know, sometimes they call it the age of the age of faith, right?

[17:55] I mean, there people sometimes have problems of faith there too, but but they didn't call it the age of faith because they wouldn't call our age the age of faith. I don't think. It's called ours the age of disbelief or the age of the age of doubt or something, right?

[18:14] So this I think is is interesting, huh? Casts some light upon the the suitability of such a mystery or the mysteries, I should say, of the church being unfolded in our time, huh?

[18:35] I think I mentioned before was it one of the historians I guess who taught medieval history, you know, and I guess he converted to the Catholic faith, and the guy before him had been the head of the medieval history converted himself, and because it's kind of a you know curious thing to see it all these conversion people get into medieval history. But I suppose in medieval history you tend to meet what the mystery of the church in a way too.

[19:00] You kind of see in a concrete way, and somehow it has that effect upon these people, right? That that brings them into the into the church. So he speaks here then of the effect of this sign on those in and out of the church, right? So it comes about that, like a standard lifted up for the nations, she both invites to herself those who have not yet believed, and likewise assures her sons and daughters that the faith they profess rests on the firmest of foundations.

[19:38] So it helps those who are already in the church, right? That descent of faith in them will not be what a blind descent, right? This is exterior help for the church. At the same time, it attracts people from the what outside, right?

[19:55] I know one guy who came into the church, you know, because the church was the only thing that was. Consistently, teaching pro-life, right? Because you knew by by natural reason, right, the reasonableness of the pro-life position, right? And then you see the church teaching this, right? And you see a lot of these Protestant sects and so on, you know, equivocating and so on. I mentioned the time when when my son was in the the Boy Scouts there, and they were the the Boy Scout thing was attached to the the Episcopal Church there, and and so one day we went over to one of their services to see what it was like, you know.

[20:35] And of course, it was kind of corny with our service in terms of having the same you know reading from the gospel, but we've just gone to mass in our church if we were to sit in their service, and it happened to be the gospel for our Lord was being kind of tough there about what marriage is, right? And the permanence of it, and they had dropped those words out of it.

[20:56] Oh, they did. So I was going to twit the minister, you know, I said, what's the idea of dropping these words out? But you don't want to offend anybody in the congregation, you know? But you know, I mean, what you know, what's happened to Anglicans in England and you know things like that, so they keep on watering it down to to to all things and to all things in the perverse sense, to be nothing to anybody.

[21:28] now the inward aid now he talks about, right? To this witness of the church is added the effective help of power from on high. For the Lord, the kind Lord, the merciful Lord, stirs up those who go astray, and helps them by His grace so that they may come to the knowledge of the truth, and also confirms by His grace those whom He has translated into His admirable light, so that they may not so that they may persevere in this light, not abandoning them unless He is first what abandoned them.

[22:18] And the two corollaries that he has from this here. Consequently, the situation of those who, by the heavenly gift of faith, have embraced the Catholic truth, is by no means the same as that of those who, led by human opinions, follow a false religion. For those who have accepted the faith under the guidance of the Church, can never have any just cause for changing this faith or for calling it into question.

[22:53] This being so, giving thanks to God the Father, who has made us worthy to share with the saints the light, let us not neglect so great a salvation. But looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. Now that's interesting, right? He's both the beginning and the what? The end. Yeah. Let us hold the unshakable confession of our hope.

[23:19] Okay, now you have the canons here, huh? These anathemas here, right? So if you know doubt in your mind, is there what? You're obligated. We should skip those that might offend someone. So if anyone says that human reason is so independent that faith cannot be commanded by God, let him be what? Anathema, right? And

[23:53] on our part, you know, you see a lot of times in St. Paul, I guess in other places, the obedience of faith, right? Which corresponds, you know, to the command of the son on the side of God, right? But when you speak of obedience of faith, you're touching upon the fact that the will is involved there, right? The will is moving the reason to assent, huh? Okay.

[24:29] Now, can a human teacher command belief? Not prudently. Doesn't seem that he can, does he? Huh? I told you my teacher Kasurik went up to Laval the first time, and and he said to De Koninck, "You know, if you teach philosophy, the way I've been taught, be down the states. I'll get up and leave your class." And De Koninck says, "Fine." He didn't say, "Thou must believe me," right?

[25:03] You know, but but God can command it because you know we belong to God fully, right? We belong to God more than we belong to ourselves, huh? Okay. Now, if

[25:23] you do speak of people belonging to somebody in real life to some extent, you can say your children belong to you, right? Huh? Okay. I can say my wife belongs to me, or I belong to my wife in some sense, right? Okay. But none of this is as complete as the way that we belong to what? God, right? Huh? Because I didn't, I didn't give my children their soul, right?

[25:48] He has something to do with their their body, the production of their body, right? Um, but God is responsible not only for their body but for their the very sense of their soul, right? So my children belong much more to God than they do to me. Although in some sense they belong to me, right?

[26:11] That's an interesting question to ask, You know, do the grandchildren belong more to the parents or to the grandparents? But whichever is the correct answer, that I think they belong more to the parents, right, than the grandparents. I think. But but whatever you answer those questions, they belong much more to God, right? That's the first thing to say. So God can what command, right? Our beliefs, huh?

[26:40] But I think it's a very common idea that human reason should be what independent, right? I've met you know people kind of crazy parents, you know, who say you know I'm not going to bring their kid up in any religion, you know, but let him or her decide when they get to be 21 or something. But religion, if any, they want to follow, right? You know, as if you cannot interfere with the independence of their mind.

[27:14] That's kind of like a like a axiom for some of these people, right? That the the mind should be what. Yeah, so independent, huh?

[27:29] Second, canon. I suppose canon means what? Rule, measure. Yeah, Is it measure the basic word. against the canon? Yeah, that's what I understand. Yeah, compilation like canon of scripture. Yeah, yeah. But something that you've got to be measured by, right? You know, so this is very precise. If anyone says that divine faith is not to be distinguished from natural knowledge about God and moral matters, and consequently that for divine faith it is not required that revealed truth should be believed because the authority of God reveals it, let him be what anathema, right?

[28:14] As Thomas said in the second question there, Nihil hoc verbo veritatis verius verbo veritatis verius. He's believing God, right? Whatever the Son of God says, credo quidquid dixit Dei Filius. I believe whatever the Son of God says. Nihil hoc verbo veritatis verius. Nice alliteration there. Nothing than this word of truth is more what. True. Yeah, so you know God is truth itself. So this is the word of truth itself.

[28:40] Nothing is more true than the word of truth. But but it comes out better in the Latin because you can the the the verbo veritatis verius, right? In English, doesn't come out with the same first letter.

[29:05] In consequence, that for divine faith is not required that revealed truth should be believed because the authority of God reveals it. That can be anathema. Okay. Now the thing about external signs, this is very important too. If anyone says that divine revelation cannot be made credible by external signs, and that therefore men, women ought to be moved to faith only by each one's internal experience or private inspiration, that can be anathema.

[29:34] That's very strong, right? Okay. The reasonable service of faith, huh? Now, what's a sign, by the way? What's Augustine's definition of sign that Thomas takes over in this thought? Something that points to something else without the Well, the first idea is that it strikes the senses, right? Yeah. Yeah, that which strikes the senses and brings to mind something other than itself, right? So, okay. So the miracle, for example, is something that the senses, right, can perceive, and it brings to mind the God, right, as being the author of what is being confirmed by miracle, or again, the fulfillment of a prophecy, right?

[30:32] The fulfillment of it is something sensible, right? And therefore, you realize that this is being, you know, foretold, you know, centuries before, right? That's a motive of credibility, right? But you might say that to be moved by signs is what most, you know, natural for man, huh? Okay. That's where we first learn, right, by sensible signs.

[31:04] There is a similar reason we don't come to talk about the sacraments. You know, why are the sacraments? Why is grace given to us under the likeness of something sensible? Well, again, goes back to the nature of man as an animal that has what reason, right? And because he's an animal, he starts with his what Senses. huh? There's a similar reason for this here too, huh? As in, according to the nature of man as an animal that has reason, right, that he have this sensible meaning by signs, motives of credibility, right?

[31:45] Who's the modern philosopher? There, a lot of them do it, but Hume is, I guess, the most famous one. Hume is always attacking the credibility of miracles.

[31:58] Even about the even the lies causality, so. Yeah, yeah. And it makes reference now to human people like that, right? Because it's close to him. If anyone says that all miracles are impossible, and that therefore all reports of them, even those contained in sacred scripture, are to be set aside as fables or myths, or that miracles can never be known as certainty, nor can the divine origin of the Christian religion be proved from them, let him be anathema, right?

[32:35] Okay, so it's very strong then about the the authenticity and the authority of the miracles, huh? As both able to what make credible the faith, but they couldn't do that unless, as the fourth thing says here, they could be known with some what certainty, right? Huh? Yeah. Okay.

[33:05] What's that thing? Is it in C. S. Lewis's biography? There, you know, or he's kind of an atheist for certain period of his life. There, and he's walking across the campus, and one of the professors saying, "You know, the evidence for the for the resurrection is pretty good, you know." And C. S. Lewis spoke that sinking feeling he had. I got to handle this now. The little book I gave you was it uh by uh Alexis Carrell.

[33:33] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because he was not, you know, he wouldn't want to publish this or like that, you know, openly because his his scientific authority would be called questioned, you know. But he's kind of forced by the truth itself to admit that something has happened here.

[33:54] Now, the next thing is important to do, and Thomas is always insisting, following Augustine, Augustine Thomas, that the ascent to faith is nevertheless, say, what, free act, right? And that therefore it's meritorious, right? Okay, okay. I get no merit for assenting to the statement that no odd number is even, or every whole is more than one of its parts, right? Because my mind or my reason is forced by the truth itself to assert these things, right?

[34:26] But what you believe, you assent to because you're what? Reason is moved by your will, okay. But if it's if it's going to be meritorious, it will be meritorious every time because you have to be in the state of grace for something in order to for something to be truly meritorious, doesn't it? Yeah, it's got to be a free act, yeah. Yeah, it has to be free, but you also have to be in the state of grace, and couldn't you have somebody assent to faith without being in the state of sanctifying grace?

[34:58] Yeah, you could have unformed faith. Yeah, yeah. So not every not every act of faith would be no, no, but it can be meritorious. Oh, it can be, yes, yeah. Faith, formed faith by charity. You know, in Vatican I there, or in Vatican II, rather, in that premium, right to the uh Dei Verbum, right, it ends up with that quote from Augustine, you know, that the whole world by believing might come to hope, and by hoping come to love, huh?

[35:27] So, in the order of generation, yeah, in the order of time, belief is before hope, yeah, and hope is before charity, but then charity can form hope and faith. So St. Paul speaks of charity believes all hopes. All right, that's formed faith, right? That's the faith that saves, right? From formed faith, huh? So, if anyone says that the ascent to Christian faith is not free, but is necessarily produced by arguments of human reason.

[36:00] Because then we'd be like what we have in geometry, right? Demonstration, or that the grace of God is necessary only for living faith, which works by charity. Let him be anathema, right? So he speaks of it being a gift of God. We saw in the text earlier, remember that faith, even without charity, is still a gift of God. Remember that text back there. Um. But anyway, it's got here in the canons anyway.

[36:57] Okay. And then the last canon: if anyone says that the condition of the faithful and those who have not yet attained. Part two. if you're looking for that Oh, okay, because over there is that. Corollary. Yeah. The last. Oh, page ten. Right paragraph right above part three there. This corollary concerning the nature of faith. I don't know. I see on top of thirteen. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And so, faith in itself, even though it may not work through charity, is a gift of God, right?

[37:35] And its operations of work belong to the order of salvation. Okay. Okay. So it's not the faith that saves, but it's it's the beginning. It's the beginning of the. Necessary. Yeah.

[37:54] So now the the sixth canon here: if anyone says that the condition of the faithful and those who have not yet attained to the only true faith of the light, so that Catholics may have a just cause for calling in doubt by suspending their assent the faith which they have already received from teaching the Church until they've completed a scientific demonstration of the credibility to their faith, let them be what anathema, right?

[38:20] Because you wonder sometimes, you know, how people nowadays sometimes in the church there they're so poorly instructed as to what the the the articles of faith are. People of the faith today. Yeah. Yeah. Before the. Tom is Tom Secundus works the so-called Naples sermons, right? Which he kind of makes into kind of like a treatise, but he's going through the articles of the faith, right? And apparently, he had the churches packed, you know, people coming over to hear what he had to say.

[38:53] But they don't. They don't explain these things, you know. I remember my mother would come back from church and son, you know, say, you know. Why doesn't the priest ever explain? You know, it's puzzling over the gospel or or some miscellaneous, some puzzling thing in there, and they never really, you know, explain the thing very much. Yeah, maybe they don't believe it themselves. Yeah, could be, could be.

[39:17] Years ago, there, you know, before Vatican II, there, when you had a, you know, more fixed readings each Sunday, right? You probably saw those things that Dominicans did, you know, where they had the the catena aurea of Thomas for each gospel, yeah, and then they had, you know, anywhere from seven, ten speeches, sermons by the church fathers on that particular thing. What a beautiful thing just to prepare!

[39:43] I sometimes I I still have it in four volumes. Maybe I'll give it to you someday. But I mean, and you just go through the whole year, liturgical year, and and read like each week, you know, the the sermons for that Sunday, and if priests did that, I mean, you know, he'd be giving much better. Sermons and and more orthodox. I know I know you prepared him for that way.

[40:08] how's he supposed to prepare a sermon when he's been taught in the seminary that Jesus never said those things? yeah, that's terrible. yeah, yeah, so you wonder what's the state of their faith is right in some of these people, you know? But now still, perhaps in the Baltimore catechism, I mean, we memorize the thing. Then how much we understood, but you know, they that stick with you, and then as later years, you had something to come back to and think about.

[40:46] Now we get to chapter fourth on faith and reason. So part one: the twofold order of the knowledge of divine things. The two ways in which they are to be distinguished. The perpetual agreement of the Catholic Church has maintained and maintains this too: that there is a twofold order of knowledge, distinct not only as regards its source, but also as regards its what object, right? Huh? What's the distinction of these according to these two ways?

[41:31] Well, first of all, by their principle. With regard to the source, we know at the one level by natural reason or by the natural light of reason. At the other level, by divine faith, by the light of faith,

[41:48] and then by their object. With regard to the object, besides those things to which natural reason can attain, there are proposed for our belief mysteries hidden in God, which, unless they are divinely revealed, are incapable of being what known. Okay, but notice, huh? You could also know some things by both, huh? Okay, by both what natural light of reason, right, and by the light of faith, huh?

[42:19] That's kind of interesting, you know, if you think about the the the Ten Commandments, say, right? Are the Ten Commandments known by the light of faith or by the light of reason? More by the light of faith and reason, but they can be known by faith. Yeah, by yeah. What? Take example of the fourth commandment. Honor your father and mother, right? Huh? Okay. Well, in the book called the Topics, which is Aristotle's book on dialectical reasoning, and he's talking about what a dialectical problem is, right?

[42:52] He says if somebody is in doubt with his snow is white. He says, "This is not dialectical problem. Such a man is lacking sensation," he says. Okay, if a man, you know, doesn't think you should honor your father and mother, right? He's not in need of argument. He says he's in need of being punished. Just obviously, Aristotle, right? That if you don't honor your father and mother, you know, it's not a question of should I honor my father and mother?

[43:25] You know, that's not a question for Aristotle, right? It's obvious that you should honor your father and mother, and therefore, someone who who questions this is not in need of being

[43:36] reasoned with, but he's in need of being punished. Whereas you see, you can see this is naturally known, right? And and that's the what fourth commandment, huh? Or in the Nicomachean Ethics, and Aristotle is taking up what virtue is, right? And virtue lies in the middle, huh?

[43:59] Between two extremes, Aristotle is pointing out there's no middle, what of the extreme, huh? Okay, so you can't say you know, well, if you if you commit adultery too much or too little, that's bad. Just the right amount, no? Adultery is already Aristotle says by definition an extreme, right? Okay, just like Aristotle like your topic murder, right? You know, if you murder too much or too little, that's bad.

[44:28] Murder matter right amount. Don't steal too much and too little. No, but but in the definition of murder or the definition of of stealing or the definition of adultery is already included. It's it's extreme, yeah, yeah. So so there's no need of that. Is this for an obvious example, right? Is adultery an example he uses, right? So so there are things that can be known both by the natural light of reason, right, and by the light of what faith, huh?

[45:02] And this is you know forgotten a lot of times in contemporary discussions, you know, where you know if by the light of faith you know that abortion is wrong, right, or homosexuality is wrong. Well, then it's only a matter of faith, right? It's matter of religion, right? You see, and and Plato there in his last work, The Laws, right? The Athenian Stranger proposes a law against homosexuality in The Laws on the grounds that it's contra naturam against nature, huh?

[45:32] Okay, so natural reason can know that homosexuality is something bad, right? And it can also be known, and even better, you might say, by the light of faith. But it can also be known by natural light of reason. But people don't realize that two different ways of knowing can sometimes know the what same thing. And and the first example of this in our knowledge is the senses, right?

[46:05] That I can know. The roundness of this mug here, by the sense of what touches, I'm knowing it now, right? And I can know it by my what eyes, right? Now my eyes don't know the roundness of it the same way the sense of touch does. Sense of touch knows it through the hardness of it, right? Okay. The sense of sight knows it through the what color, right?

[46:31] But they're both knowing the what shape of it. Yeah. So if you put a rubber ball in my hand, I could feel it, right? You know, if my eyes were closed, you put a rubber ball in my hand, I could feel it and see that it's round. It's spherical, right? If you just sat on the thing and didn't touch it, I could see that it's round too.

[46:51] So it is possible for two different senses to know the same thing, but in different what ways, huh? Okay. I was reading a thing by a he's a professor. He's a I guess a real diehard Calvinist, and he claims that like when it comes like I guess the articles of faith and like that, he rejects the concept of natural reason is able to know it. And he says that you know when Aquinas interpreted I guess Aristotle and said that you know you can't know certain things you know by natural reason things of God that he in effect opened up the way to rationalism and that this is you know progressive way to Descartes and then you know what and then this is why we have

[47:41] one of the big I guess messes we have right now in denial of objective truth because you know he you know by by saying that natural reason can't know things of you know things of faith you're opening up the way to to rationalism I guess I know that was that based on his I guess you know the fact that because we're so depraved you know told depravity that the world is totally useless in knowing the things of God or yeah I mean they might go to the to that extreme right you know you have the you have fideism as they call it I guess is the name for that people who say you know that you can't know anything about God except by faith right

[48:24] and that's contrary to what you know Saint Paul was saying in the teaching of the Vatican I right because they quote St. Paul the things from Romans one twenty right okay but the church all said in its own words Aaron so there's some things you can know about God right huh okay but other things about God you can't know except by faith right and those are more properly the what articles of faith right and and the things that can be known by reason as well as by faith about God are sometimes called the preambula what walks before right okay um but basically Is the Trinity and the what incarnation, right?

[49:08] And then you could say those things are defined by the Trinity, incarnation, right? Okay. But those are the fundamental things. So, like when we make the sign of the cross, say the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, we're touching upon those two mysteries, right? The mystery of the Trinity. We say, in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. And then making the the sign of the cross, get me in trouble in Saudi Arabia doing that, get me in jail.

[49:35] When is speaking about the what? what was free incarnation? Yeah, yeah. So, but you could say whatever is defined by them, right? So, if you define the Church, let's say, as the mystical body of Christ, well, then the Church is going to be a mystery too, right? Okay. Even though, even though you can know, like with the the shape, the shape of the mug, you can know that both through the sense of touch and through the sense of sight.

[50:10] Yeah, The things I know by by sight, like color, that I don't know at all by by touch. Oh yeah, yeah. And the things I know by touch, like hot and cold, I don't know by sight, right? But I take that example to show that it's possible for the same thing sometimes, right? To be known in two different ways, right? Okay. So some people, you know, jump to the idea that if the church teaches this, then naturally can't know it.

[50:43] It can't be something in it. Um. Ah. And I said that the first example to refute that is that well, so well the eyes know it, then the the touch can't know it because the eyes are a different sense than the touch, right? Well, the eye is a different sense than the touch, right? But um. And they're not going to know the same thing in the same way.

[51:06] If they knew the same thing the same way, then they wouldn't be the same sense, right? You know. But it's possible for them to know the same thing, but not in the same way. Aristotle, you know, in the De Anima we remember those distinctions between the private sensibles, right, which are known by each sense and only by that sense, right? And then the common sensibles, like surface and shape and so on, right, which can be known by more than one sense, huh?

[51:34] But they know it as a kind of modification of their private sensible. So I know the shape of this table here by the the end of the color of the table, right? Okay. I know it by my sense of what. Touched by the end of the hardness, the hardness gives way here, right? It's hard, and the sense gives way. Okay. So, but I can know the same thing in different ways, huh?

[52:04] And and you can say too that that. Even with our sense knowledge, there's more certitude when you know the same thing in two ways, right? Okay. That's why it's very important in the development of us, I suppose, is this hand and eye coordination, right? No, but if you have a man, somebody who like he's a young man, he hasn't studied philosophy or anything like that. but he does hold tenaciously to the truths of the faith.

[52:43] Yeah. So he believe he believes he doesn't know, but he believes that God exists. Yeah. But then if he goes on and studies these things, and then he sees and understands the proof for God's existence, he no longer he no longer has faith. about those things. About about say the existence of God because now it's been proven to him. Yeah. I've I've always had a difficulty here for one reason, and that's with with faith.

[53:10] The certitude of faith finally is in a way infinitely greater than any certitude I can give myself from natural reason. And so, if I had if I believed in God's existence and had infinite certitude in a way in that existence because I was holding it through supernatural faith, then I come to understand the proofs for God's existence. I no longer am holding it by faith by faith, and consequently, my certitude is infinitely less.

[53:41] And I've never been happy with that because I yeah yeah. No, and no, I think you said the light of faith is still extending to those things, but I, but not in the same way, right? You know. Okay, is it because I know I've read what you can't... I've read that in a way that once you do see something by reason essentially it does belong to what you're called the preambles of the faith, not faith simply speaking.

[54:10] But see, in a sense, that happens to be a big vision, right? A big vision, faith disappears, and now you see it as it is, right? Okay. So, but your certitude doesn't dwindle. Yeah. I mean, you know, but to what extent people understand the proof existence of God? yeah, that sort of thing. When I was you know teaching at St Mary's College one time, they called me up and they wanted me to speak to the to a meeting of the American Association of University Women.

[54:37] Of what? American Association of University Women. Okay. I had no idea what common audience to expect, right? And it was some Catholic woman who called me up, right? To belong to it, wanted me to give some talk about morality. I forget the thing. So I went down there, and I I assume they're kind of you know college educated group, you know, and I give a fairly serious talk, right?

[55:01] But I think I probably lost them, you know, fairly early, you know. But they they seem to be like my mother's sewing club or something, Oh maybe a university woman Now not great university woman, you know, and so on. And so, but anyway, in the kind of the little coffee hour afterwards, you know, talking to different individuals, you know, and some Catholic woman comes up and she says, "was it just enough to do what the church says what the church says, " and I said, "Yeah, that's enough.

[55:30] " That was it, you know. So, you know, they gave me the reasons why it was necessary, right? You know, a bene esse, right, for the well-being, right. Even those things that that can be known by natural reason would be known by very few, and by those few, with what at a long time and maybe with what not too much certitude, or maybe some errors mixed in, and so on.

[55:57] So. You need the faith even for those things. Okay, so you can say basically it's the incarnation, the Trinity, and the incarnation, right? And then the things are defined by them, right? That are knowable only by the light of faith, huh? And then there are scripture references to these two kinds of knowledge of divine things.

[56:34] Now, Thomas in the Summa contra Gentiles, that's divided in that way. In the first three books, you're talking about those things that can be known both by natural light of reason and by faith, and then the fourth book, which will be divided against the first three books, you're talking about those things are known only by what faith.

[57:00] Wherefore, when the apostle witnesses that God was known to the Gentiles from created things, and that's the quote we had earlier, right? Invisible things of God and things that have been made are made known. So, when it comes to treat of the grace and truth which came by Jesus Christ, he declares, "We impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glorification.

[57:25] None of the rulers of this age, none of the philosophers, understood this. God has revealed it to us through the Spirit, for the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. And the only begotten Himself, in His confession to the Father, acknowledges that the Father has hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to the what little ones, huh? Okay, so you need that littleness, that humility, to obey God, right?

[57:58] In the sense of, faith. So that independence of reason comes from a kind of pride.