I. The Goal: A Moral Order
Following Christ’s resurrection, the early Christians and Apostles wrote letters to communicate with Christians scattered across the old world. In these letters the Apostles and various church leaders would clarify church doctrine, set up the local church hierarchy, issue ordinance instruction and seek information regarding the local congregation’s temporal and spiritual needs. These letters were recorded and treasured by the early church as words of God and placed in the New Testament. Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Hebrews and many more New Testament books were originally letters which began as the Epistle of James, “to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting.”
The Catholic Church has carried this tradition with Papal Encyclicals. The purpose of these encyclicals, often stated boldly and nobly at the beginning of each, is quite clear; namely, to “respond to the perennial questions which men ask about this present life and the life to come, and about the relationship of the one to the other.” (Gaudium Et Spes, 1965) (P.2).
Encyclicals are written to bring “to mankind light kindled from the Gospel, and… those saving resources which the Church herself, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, receives from her Founder.” (Mater Et Magistra, 1961) (P. 3). The Church justifies their rationale for this effort in the fact that, “the human person deserves to be preserved; human society deserves to be renewed.”
In essence the Encyclical is the Church’s tool for embarking on the purification of man and of mankind, to protect those “entering into association and fellowship” from “experienc[ing] hindrance in a commonwealth instead of a help” and finding “their rights attacked instead of being upheld” and to protect society from becoming “an object of detestation rather than of desire.” (Rerum Novarum, 1891) (P. 13). The Encyclical is designed to set up a moral order, “[b]ut the moral order has no existence except in God; cut off from God it must necessarily disintegrate.” (Mater Et Magistra, 1961) (P 208).
This “moral order” touches upon all facets of man as an individual and member of society: family, the sanctity of life and procreation, the virtue of work, autonomy, free will and many other issues. In fact the Church has declared it is “directed towards an authentic development of man and society which would respect and promote all the dimensions of the human person. . . seek[ing] to lead people to respond, with the support also of rational reflection and of the human sciences, to their vocation as responsible builders of earthly society. (Sollicitudo Rei Socialis 1987) (P. 1, emphasis added).
The Encyclicals declare it is “the right and duty of the Catholic Church to work for an equitable solution of the many pressing problems weighing upon human society and calling for a joint effort by all the people” requiring the “cooperation on a world scale for the economic welfare of all nations.” (Mater Et Magistra 1961)(P 28, 37). To this end, the Church “now addresses itself without hesitation, not only to the sons of the Church and to all who invoke the name of Christ, but to the whole of humanity.” (Gaudium Et Spes 1965) (P. 2) (emphasis added). The awareness of the duty of the Church as an expert in humanity . . . a mission distinct from the function of the State, even when she is concerned with people’s concrete situation.” (Sollicitudo Rei Socialis 1987) (P. 7).
To this end, the Church has declared:
Today the Universal Common Good poses problems of worldwide dimensions, which cannot be adequately tackled or solved except by the efforts of public authority endowed with a wideness of powers, structure and means of the same proportions . . . The moral order itself, therefore, demands that such a form of public authority be established.
(Pacem in Terris 1963) (P 137).
II. Issue: Revelation v. Logic
This paper attempts to examine how the Church is attempting to amass the worldwide force necessary to accomplish those worldwide goals it declares as essential to the Universal Common Good. It examines the Church’s effort, to provide a moral compass to all nations, regardless of religious, political, or social status in the hopes of establishing a more celestial and God like society.
As mentioned above, the Catholic Church claims a divine duty founded in its role as the leader of the world’s largest group of Christians while at the same time recognizing the essential role of human reason in implementing the goals it hopes to preserve.
Regardless of one’s faith or background, it would be impossible to discount the tremendous value just one Encyclical offers. It is an exercise in the articulation of and defense of morality. Its power is found in the Church’s ability to pinpoint those aspects essential to the moral order they are advocating and hold them in a clear light for others to examine. For example, Pope Paul VI in Humanae Vitae isolates the “procreative” and “unitive” aspects of the conjugal act in an attempt to protect the worth of marriage and childbirth against societal forgetfulness. (Humanae Vitae 1968) (P 12).
This alone is a magnificent feat worthy of respect. The Church knows declaring “ipse dixit” is insufficient to amass the following necessary to bring about the world effort it recognizes as essential. In doing this the Church attempts to strike a balance between its role as a religious authority because the “one true religion subsists in the Catholic and
III. Analysis of Authority: Divine Authority or Logic Primacy
John Paul VI wrote, “The Church is the first to praise and recommend the intervention of intelligence in a function which so closely associates the rational creature with his Creator, but she affirms that this must be done with respect for the order Established by God.” (Humanae Vitae, 1968) (p. 16).
What John Paul VI seemed to recognize was the fine persuasive line the Catholic Church must walk between logic born of man and divine authority born of revelation. Ultimately, to influence the world through its encyclicals, the Church must present the information in a way that flexes analytical muscle strong enough to be recognized as sound, but pure enough as Catholic dogma to actually present those goals it seeks to advance.
It would be easy for the Church to appeal to society’s prurient interests and endorse behavior society seeks to excuse. While it is true that such promulgation of bowel driven logic would attract many followers, the Church seems to recognize these followers would be as short lived and teachable as flies drawn to decay.
On the other hand, the Church would get no where by declaring to the world that those who violate God’s commandments will rot in the third circle of damnation reserved for those who don’t listen to them. Even if that teaching where true, the acidic presentation would attract only the most faithful in heart and drive more liberal societies to ban such religion from their shores.
Ultimately, to effectuate its goal of providing moral direction to the world, the Church must strike a balance between the doctrinal integrity required to shape the moral society they seek and the logical persuasion necessary to appeal to the whole world.
This raises the issue of whether the Encyclicals accomplish this?
Doctrinal Integrity and Logical Persuasion may at first seem to be each others antitheses. Drawing upon the example from above, it seems integrity requires the harsh vinegar of truth and persuasion requires ample amounts of honey. It appears impossible to mix divine authority and logical persuasion without spoiling the message.
However, Jesus Christ demonstrated the Christian world’s greatest example of this mixture. His very life demonstrates a willingness to hold high the unpopular standard of truth and pour open the jars of soul warming honey, all the while retaining his divine role as the Son of God. While the Pharisees and Sadducees had divorced logic and revelation each claiming one as superior, Christ reunited them under one common light: Himself.
While on the one hand the encyclicals declare their divinity rooted in Christian tradition, they fail to acknowledge that the truth’s underlying value is that it testifies of itself. Therefore, while they do advance an articulation of those principles that make for example, marriage “holy” they seem to lose the persuasive power of that holiness in the articulation.
This raises the issue of whether the correct metaphor is one where the Church is like a yearning plant; grown from the soil of man’s logic and stretching for the heavens to strengthen itself in God’s wisdom as it would the sun. Or if the correct analogy is that the Church, already nestled in the heavens, is enlightening the earth’s path to heaven?
Selecting a metaphor is outcome determinative. Authority born of man is tied to the limits of man’s logic and unable to attain the full persuasion Christ and his Apostles achieved. The truth they taught burned in their listeners’ hearts and minds. See Hebrews 10:16. Truth doesn’t burn in one’s heart simply because it is logical. Nor does moral decree alone make one’s mind click with understanding. It takes a synergy of religious and logical truth to cause one’s mind and heart to join the cause of the Christians.
The Encyclicals approach this level of synergy often. Their statements have persuaded the nations of the earth to rethink their social structures, as well as the hearts and minds of individuals to embrace truths they espouse. However, these successes have been equally matched with failures because of a dearth of appeal to religious authority.
While it is true, the encyclicals have gained world wide circulation, it has come at somewhat of a cost. The references to the Papal authority and underlying values of Christianity are sparse and unpredictable. The power of an Apostle, such as the Pope, is in his ability to speak as the persuasive and undeniable authority of God on Earth. To be recognized as a heavenly messenger, and gain the power of the second metaphor, assertion of the Church’s authority need not be harsh, but it must still be asserted.
The Encyclicals authority is more often based in tradition than in revelation. Amos 3:7 in the Old Testament reads, “God will do nothing, save he revealeth his secrets to his prophets.” The secret to attaining the world unity the Encyclicals seek and the moral order our world so desperately needs will remain a secret, until the Church can plant its feet in divine authority and in the power of persuasion born of logic and spirit.
Merely interpreting the “word of God” as left by Christ seems to be the underlying flaw eroding the Church’s Christian synergy. Christ and his Apostles could influence man because the truths they taught were truths for that day. They were revealed by God for that time and place. The moral order will be reachable if the Church will declare that logic is actually the fruit of divinity and revelation. This is why Christ proclaimed, “I am the light of the world.” His light is the source of all logic and truth. The Church must show the world the prize man’s logic seeks is the truth God is willing to give liberally to all who ask, John 3:5. The moral order will be reachable when men see logic is a reflection of God’s light.
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