La evolución homogénea del dogma católico

226. THE MODERN OPINION.—Most theologians today teach and almost take for granted the following two propositions:

First. Truths mediately or virtually revealed cannot be defined by the Church as divine faith, although they can indeed be defined as infallible truths.

Second. When the Church infallibly defines such truths, we must give them assent, not of divine faith, but of ecclesiastical faith.

Of these two propositions, the second is but a corollary of the first. Having in the previous chapters attempted to show that the first proposition is contrary to all theological tradition prior to Molina and to all the principles of the Thomistic school, it is needless to say that we hold the same opinion regarding the second proposition. However, since we have several times promised to deal in particular with that faith called "ecclesiastical," we shall now fulfill that promise. Let us begin by setting forth what is understood today by ecclesiastical faith.

227. MATERIAL OBJECT OF ECCLESIASTICAL FAITH.—The material object of ecclesiastical faith encompasses, according to modern theologians, all those truths that are revealed only in a mediate or virtual manner. In other words: all those truths that, without being contained formally or immediately in the revealed deposit, are nevertheless necessarily connected with that deposit or are necessary for its preservation. It comprises, according to the classification of today's theologians, six things, namely: a) theological conclusions properly so called; b) condemned propositions with a censure inferior to heresy; c) the universal laws of the Church insofar as their morality; d) the definitive approval of the rule and constitutions of religious orders insofar as the same; e) dogmatic facts; f) the canonization of the saints.

This classification into six items seems to us extremely empirical, for it does not obey any intrinsic principle of division. Nevertheless, we accept that division, both because it is fairly common among modern authors and because it contributes to clarity. The more philosophical approach would seem to be to divide what is mediately revealed, and therefore the secondary object of infallibility, into two members: a) mediately revealed doctrines; b) mediately revealed facts. But for the case at hand, one division or the other matters little, provided that everything mediately revealed is included, or everything necessarily connected with the revealed deposit, or everything necessary for its preservation. That is the true material object of the so-called ecclesiastical faith. Since that very thing is precisely the material object of Sacred Theology, it could very well be said that the material object of ecclesiastical faith is nothing other than theology infallibly defined by the Church.

At this point, let the reader note the immense field of truths withdrawn from divine faith, and attributed by modern theologians to ecclesiastical faith. It is well known that Catholic doctrine, taken in all its breadth, encompasses four degrees: a) revealed datum; b) dogmas of faith; c) infallible truths; d) theological conclusions (3). According to the modern theory, the first and second degrees are constituted exclusively by immediately revealed truths, and the third and fourth degrees, by mediately revealed truths. Thus, the first and second degrees are the proper field of divine faith, and the third and fourth, the proper field of ecclesiastical faith. From which it is clearly seen that two entire degrees, that is, half of Catholic doctrine, belongs or can belong to ecclesiastical faith, but never to divine faith. And since, however much one may wish to play with names, between the divine and the human there is no middle ground, the question of ascertaining whether the faith called “ecclesiastical” is or is not true divine faith amounts to ascertaining whether half of the doctrine with which the Church of Jesus Christ nourishes our supernatural life, and to which she obliges us to give, under penalty of eternal condemnation, an absolutely unconditional assent, is divine doctrine or merely human doctrine.

In reality, every question about whether a doctrine is divine or human is always a question of great importance; for it is no less serious to wish to pass off as human what is truly divine, than it would be to give as divine what is only human¹. Much more so if, as we have said, it is not a matter of an isolated proposition or truth, but of half and even the greater part of Catholic doctrine.

228. FORMAL MOTIVE OF ECCLESIASTICAL FAITH.—The defenders of ecclesiastical faith consider the following two motives as specifically distinct: a) divine revelation; b) divine assistance. These two motives are also usually expressed in this other way: a) the authority of God; b) the infallible authority of the Church. Divine revelation or the authority of God is the formal motive of divine faith; the assistance of God or the infallible authority of the Church, they say, is the formal motive of ecclesiastical faith. The act, then, of divine faith is expressed thus: "I believe such a truth because God has revealed it." In contrast, the act of ecclesiastical faith is expressed, according to the moderns, in this other form: "I believe such a truth because Holy Mother Church infallibly teaches it thus."

Since habits are specified by their formal motives, and since those two motives are specifically distinct for modern theologians, divine faith and ecclesiastical faith also are and must be specifically distinct. And since what is specifically distinct from the divine is not divine, modern theologians generally admit that ecclesiastical faith is not divine faith.

229. NATURE OF ECCLESIASTICAL FAITH.—For if that ecclesiastical faith is not divine faith, what is it? Is it purely human? Is it some mixture of human and divine faith?

Here is where modern authors get tangled up, and it is delightful to contemplate their balancing acts of nomenclature in classifying this new species of faith. Some affirm that this ecclesiastical faith is almost divine; others, that it is mediately divine; others, that it is indirectly divine; others, that it lies between the divine and the human; others, that it is human; others, that it is divine-human; others, finally, that it is neither divine nor human faith, but science.

So that no one may think that we exaggerate or that we attempt to ridicule so serious a matter, it will be well to cite a few texts, chosen at random, but as short as possible. Here they are:

"Hanc quam aliqui appellant fidem ecclesiasticam, possumus dicere fidem mediate divinam" (Franzelin).

"Ecclesiastical faith, or mediately divine faith" (Vacant).

"Regarding faith mediately and indirectly divine, it does not seem to differ from ecclesiastical faith" (De Groot).

"Neither purely divine nor purely human" (Becanus).

Between divine faith and human faith (Antoine).

"Une foi humaine and ecclesiastical" (Péréfixe).

"Of ecclesiastical faith, or divine-human faith" (Pégues).

"Fides humana certissima, fere ad fidem divinam pertinens, et parum ab illa distans" (Granados).

"Assensus theologicus qui discursu innititur" (Molina).

As can be seen, the nomenclature of that new faith could not be more varied. For this reason, other authors, with the greatest prudence, content themselves with speaking to us at length about ecclesiastical faith, as if it were something "self-evident," without descending to tell us whether it is divine faith, human faith, or something midway between the two.

230. ORIGIN OF ECCLESIASTICAL FAITH.—One must distinguish between the origin of the name and the origin of the idea.

The origin of the name is very modern. It does not go back beyond the celebrated disputes with Jansenism concerning the faith that must be given to the definitions of the Church on dogmatic facts, and, therefore, it does not go back beyond the second half of the seventeenth century²

The first to employ it was the archbishop of Paris, Monsignor Pérfixe, in a pastoral letter against Jansenism bearing the date of June 7, 1664.

The occasion on which Archbishop Pérfixe adopted that name of ecclesiastical faith seems to be the following:

His predecessor on the see of Paris, Monsignor De Marca, had said in a pastoral letter against the Jansenists that the definition of dogmatic facts by the Church was a matter affecting the "substance of the dogma," and therefore divine faith was owed to it. This stirred up the Jansenists a great deal, and the worst of it was that there was no lack of orthodox theologians who shared the Jansenists' opinion against the archbishop. Archbishop Péréfixe, wishing to issue his pastoral of 1664 against the Jansenists, first gathered in council Grandin and other theologians of the Sorbonne. This archbishop, judging by what Fénelon indicates about him, had such narrow ideas about divine faith that he believed it could only concern what was revealed in an immediate, nominal, and express manner. Since it is evident that dogmatic facts are not revealed in that way, it was agreed that the assent of divine faith could not be given to definitions of dogmatic facts, as Archbishop De Marca had believed. On the other hand, the assent of human faith, as the Jansenists wanted, was also not sufficient, since an infallible faith was at issue. What was required, then, was a faith inferior to divine faith and superior to human faith. How was this faith, midway between divine and human, to be named? Because to hold the Jansenists' subtle cavils in check, the generic name of faith was not enough, and a specific name was needed. They consulted and disputed over several sessions, and since it was a question of the faith owed to the infallible authority of the Church, they agreed to call it ecclesiastical faith. The name, being short and expressive, was a success. The archbishop used it in his pastoral; the theologians who had agreed upon it in the conference with the archbishop dictated it and popularized it among their disciples in daily handwritten lessons, and soon the great writers of the Sorbonne, such as Tournely, D'Argentré, and Grandin, used it in their printed works, thus giving it letters of naturalization in the republic of theological letters. Such we believe to have been the origin of the name ecclesiastical faith, or at least what most contributed to its adoption and popularization, as is gathered from what the authoritative Fénelon recounts, and which Tournely and Grandin, both writers extremely versed in everything concerning the Jansenist disputes, in which they took part, seem to confirm.

231. TESTIMONIES OF FÉNELON, OF TOURNELY, AND OF GRANDIN. Here is how Fénelon expresses himself in his reply to the bishop of Saint-Pons: "You say that M. de Marca required this divine faith… But Monseigneur De Péréfixe, who examined what was the most rigorous language of the later scholastics, with M. Grandin, and with some other celebrated doctors, whom he was willing to admit to his council for this deliberation, believed that he should give the name of divine faith only to the belief of truths expressly, nominally, and immediately revealed. Now he did not find that the heretical character of the text of Jansenius was expressly, nominally, and immediately revealed. And in fact it is not in that manner. Hence M. De Péréfixe concluded that one could not, in all scholastic rigor, say that one must believe the heretical character of the text of Jansenius by divine faith. This is what M. Grandin, whom this prelate admitted with some other able doctors to his council on this question, very clearly disentangled in those writings dictated at the Sorbonne, which are still in the hands of a great number of bachelors. This worthy prelate and these grave doctors believed that, to close the mouths of the defenders of Jansenius, one must employ the terms of ecclesiastical faith.³

The celebrated theologian of the Sorbonne, Honorato Tournely, who wrote a few years after Fénelon, also clearly indicates that Mgr. De Marca, predecessor of Mgr. Péréfexe in the archbishopric of Paris, still taught that divine faith was owed to the definitions of the Church on dogmatic facts, and that his successor Mgr. Péréfexe, in order to appease the outcries of the Jansenists, was the first to use the term ecclesiastical faith. Tournely states the following:

Regarding this question as thus expounded, there are various opinions among theologians.

First among them is the opinion of those who not only acknowledge the Church as infallible in doctrinal facts, but also hold that these facts pertain to faith itself, and that they cannot be denied after the Church’s definition without the mark of heresy, because of the inseparable connection between fact and right, or dogma... It is remarkable with what impetus and ardor of soul the followers of Jansenius rose up against this opinion: with what gloomy colors they portrayed it, as if it utterly overthrew the foundations of divine faith, thrusting forward, namely, a new and unrevealed fact as the object of faith... The Most Illustrious De Marca, archbishop of Paris, seems to have inclined to this opinion when he said that definitions of this kind concerning doctrinal facts pertain to a part of the dogma“.

He then recounts four opinions extremely opposed to the previous one, held by those who, along with the Jansenists, deny the infallibility of the Church in dogmatic facts, and he sets forth his own opinion in the following form:

Sixth and finally, the opinion which we embrace here holds that the Holy Spirit so assists the Church, by a singular aid and assistance, in her judgment concerning the sense of propositions or books, that she can never deviate from the truth. Hence, the faithful are bound to acquiesce in her judgment not only by what is called religious silence, but by assent and approval from the depths of their soul. The motive, therefore, of this assent and interior adherence is the supreme authority of the Church itself. Some, following the most illustrious Archbishop of Paris, Péréfixe, call this faith ecclesiastical, which is intermediate between faith simply divine and simply human; just as ecclesiastical precepts are said to be neither simply divine nor simply human.

Whatever the mind of Mgr. Péréfixe may have been in inventing the name of ecclesiastical faith, Tournely sets it forth in the following text:

Instabis: The most illustrious Péréfixe, archbishop of Paris, in his mandate of the year 1664, on the 8th of June, said that it can be affirmed only through malice or through ignorance that definitions of fact pertain to faith.*

Respondeo illustrissimi archipraesulis mentem hanc dumtaxat fuisse aequalem scilicet non debere fidem definitioni facti, ac iuris seu dogmatis: quasi unum sit utriusque credendi motivum, et par in omnibus auctoritas: dogma siquidem creditur propter immediatam revelationem, factum propter auctoritatem Ecclesiae: the latter is believed with ecclesiastical, the former with divine faith. That the most illustrious archbishop demands obedience of mind toward definitions of fact, however, is declared by the following words immediately subsequent in the cited mandate, which ought not to have been omitted by the adversaries: "He requires, he says in French, only for this regard a human and ecclesiastical faith, which obliges one to submit sincerely one's judgment to that of legitimate superiors"⁴.

This claim of Fénelon and Tournely is confirmed by Grandin, who, as we have seen, was one of the theologians who attended the consultations of Archbishop Péréfixe. Here are his words: "You ask: by what name is that faith to be called which the Church's judgment and declaration concerning facts establishes? I answer that it may be called human and ecclesiastical... And indeed by that name the most illustrious archbishop (Péréfixe) called it in his mandate issued on June 7, in the year 1664, which name, if it seems new to anyone, the thing itself ought not to seem new"⁵. Péréfixe's pastoral letter bears exactly that date noted by Grandin: "Given at Paris, this seventh of June, sixteen hundred sixty-four"⁶.

The reader will pardon us for these lengthy quotations, given their supreme importance in establishing the origin of the name of the so-called ecclesiastical faith. With them, in our opinion, two things are clearly proven: first, that that name of ecclesiastical faith dates from June 7, 1664, the date of the pastoral letter of Archbishop Péréfixe; second, that the invention of that new ecclesiastical faith was due to an apologetic opportunism, to the desire to calm the outcries of the Jansenists, who could not bear that anyone should speak of divine faith when dealing with the dogmatic fact of the condemnation of Jansenius's book.

En parentheses, we have noted with satisfaction that, since the publication of this study of ours in La Ciencia Tomista, several theologians now take for granted, although without citing us, the origin, date, and author that we assigned to the modern ecclesiastical faith, and they even adduce in confirmation the very same authors and citations that we had adduced. With this, we consider well spent the not inconsiderable

And this is what could happen regarding the five propositions that have been extracted from the book entitled Augustinus, by Jansenius, bishop of Ypres...

It is for this reason that one cannot sufficiently praise the paternal wisdom and charity of our Holy Fathers the Popes Innocent X and Alexander VII, who, in order to remove every pretext from those who might in the future wish to sustain these five propositions, not only condemned them in themselves by their Constitutions of the years 1653 and 1656, but also declared, and particularly Alexander VII, that the five propositions were taken from the book of Jansenius, entitled Augustinus, and that they condemned them in the sense in which that author had taught them. Whereupon the Lords Archbishops and Bishops of this Kingdom, desiring to conform themselves, believed they could do nothing better than to draw up a Formulary of profession of faith in the very sense of the said Constitutions; and which, being signed, would make clearly known those who submitted sincerely to the said Constitutions: from which, as well as from the Formulary, it is certain that no occasion can be taken, unless one be malicious or ignorant, to say that they demand a submission of divine faith in what concerns the Fact, requiring only in that regard, as has been so often said, a human and Ecclesiastical faith, which obliges one to submit sincerely one's judgment to that of one's legitimate superiors, because otherwise it would be easy by this device to escape the condemnation of all sorts of errors: and that under the pretext of the question of Fact, one could always preserve the liberty of defending one's opinion concerning the Right...

Donné à Paris, ce septième Juin, mil six cens soixante quatre" (Ordinance of Monseigneur the most illustrious and most reverend Hardouin de Péréfixe, Archbishop of Paris. In Paris, at François Muget’s, 1664, pp. 3-4-5-7).

It seems evident that the phrase "comme il a esté si souvent dit" refers to the word "humaine," and not to the word "ecclésiastique," which appears here for the first time. The "sense" of this word is ancient, but the word is new, as Grandin observes (l. c.).

We warmly thank the learned Fr. Mandonnet, O. P., for having provided us with a copy of the letter of Mons. Péréfixe.

7 March 1921. Work and time that it took us to clarify that important historical fact, whose trace seemed to have been completely lost among theologians after the eighteenth century. We believe that the name of Archbishop Péréfice will not take long to become widespread among theologians as the father of the modern ecclesiastical faith.

232. THE FORERUNNERS OF ECCLESIASTICAL FAITH.—If the name of ecclesiastical faith is very modern, the origin of the thing signified is not much more ancient. It dates from the end of the sixteenth century.

Indeed, the first precursor of what today is understood by ecclesiastical faith is, without any doubt, the celebrated author of the Molina, Luis Molina. Before the renowned theologian from Cuenca, all theologians, without distinction of schools, had admitted that what is mediately or virtually revealed can be defined as of divine faith by the Church, and that, once defined, it merited the assent of true divine faith.

Molina was the first to deny that what is mediately or virtually revealed could ever pass into being of divine faith, even if the Church defined it as dogmatically as it defined the two wills in Christ. Then, if the definitions of such virtual revelation by the Church do not merit divine faith, what assent do they merit? Theological assent, Molina replies, for it is assent founded on reasoning. Theologians assent to what is defined, based on the very scientific reasoning by which the Church availed herself to declare and define such virtual revelation. For the faithful, the following simple reasoning suffices: “The Church cannot err in her definitions: but the Church has defined such a truth, therefore such a truth is certain” ⁷

The Thomist school always regarded it as de fide, and its denial as heretical, that the infallibility of the Church extends to the mediate or virtual revealed. Modern theologians also admit quite generally that this is of divine faith or, at least, that it is a revealed truth and definable as of divine faith. But they deny (although inconsistently, as we shall see in due time) that it follows from this that the defined thing itself is of divine faith. The infallible authority for defining the virtual is, they say, of divine faith; but the defined thing is only of ecclesiastical faith.

As can be seen, Molina does not yet call that assent ecclesiastical faith, but theological assent. But since the reasoning on which the faithful base that assent, according to Molina, is an improper reasoning, such assent is rather of faith than of science. And since, according to Molina, that assent is not of divine faith, because it deals with mediately revealed things, nor of purely human faith, because it is an infallible assent, we have an assent identical or very similar to what today is called ecclesiastical faith. Molina may well, therefore, be called the father or first forerunner of ecclesiastical faith.

The second precursor of ecclesial faith is Granados, also a Jesuit and a Spaniard like Molina. Granados⁸ devotes himself to defending Molina on the question of virtual revelation against the attacks, above all, of the distinguished Navarrete. However, he corrects Molina on two points: first, that the example Molina gives of the definition by the Church of the two wills in Christ does not please him, and he has every reason, for all theologians have always been unanimous in affirming that true divine faith must be given as assent to such a definition.

The second point on which Granados corrects Molina is that the assent we give to the infallible definitions of the Church concerning what is virtually revealed is a theological assent based on reasoning, as Molina would have it. Ordinary faithful, Granados rightly says, understand nothing of theologies or reasonings, and they simply restrict themselves to giving credence to what the infallible Church teaches them.

For then, what kind of faith is that, if, as Granados teaches with Molina, it is not divine faith? It is, says Granados, a most certain human faith, but so close to divine faith that when one does not speak with theological rigor, as was not spoken before Molina, it is usually called divine faith⁹

As can be seen, with Granados the seed of the future ecclesiastical faith has already taken another small step forward. In Molina it was still a theological or scientific assent. In Granados it is already true faith, but a faith midway between the divine and the human. Nothing is lacking now except the name ecclesiastical, with which it was later baptized in Paris by Archbishop Péréfixe.

The third precursor of ecclesiastical faith is the Jesuit Becanus, but in a very singular way. Instead of limiting what we today call ecclesiastical faith to virtually revealed truths, Becanus extends it even to formally revealed truths, such as the articles of faith. For Becanus, the distinction between divine faith and non-divine faith lies not at all in the matter, but in the motive. There are three specifically distinct motives of faith, namely: divine authority, human authority, and the authority of the Church, which is an authority intermediate between the human and the divine. If we believe, says Becanus, the articles of faith by divine authority, the act is of divine faith. If we believe them by human authority, the act is of human faith. If we believe them by the authority of the Church, the act is not of divine faith, but of a faith of a lower order, of a faith quasi intermediate between purely divine faith and purely human faith ¹⁰:

Here already appears, with even greater relief than in Granada, the future ecclesiastical faith. Becanus died in 1624, exactly forty years before the pastoral of Archbishop Péréfixe. His Summa Theologiae Scholasticae, one of whose numerous editions was made in Paris itself in 1658, must have been one of those scholastic books which, as Fénelon tells us, Grandin and his colleagues of the Sorbonne, consultors of Archbishop Péréfixe in the said conference of the year 1664, in which the name that should be given to that faith midway between the divine and the human was decided, turned over with eagerness.

Finally, one could also count—if not among the precursors, at least among those who have contributed to the modern idea of ecclesiastical faith—all those theologians who followed Molina in holding that theological conclusions can be infallibly defined by the Church, but not as being of divine faith; such were Kilber, among the great theologians of the Society [of Jesus], and the Salmanticenses (in appearance, at least), among the great Thomist theologians. But these theologians already belong to the second half of the seventeenth century, and their works are later than the pastoral letter of Archbishop Péréfixe, in which the name of ecclesiastical faith appears¹¹.

233. AMONG THE THOMISTS OF THE 18TH CENTURY.—At the beginning of the 18th century, ecclesiastical faith is already spoken of so commonly in many non-Thomist theological works, especially in Antoine and in Tournely¹²

In the Thomist school this new faith seems to be regarded with distrust, and its name does not yet appear even in Contenson, nor in the Salmanticenses, nor in Gonet, nor even in Gotti. The first among the classical Thomists to name it is Billuart, but without ever quite resolving to tell us clearly whether the dogmatic facts, on the sole occasion of which Billuart names ecclesiastical faith, deserve only ecclesiastical faith or, on the contrary, divine faith. Both in the treatise De Fide and in the De Incarnatione he touches on the question ex professo, but he contents himself with giving both resolutions (*Respondeo primo... Respondeo secundo), leaving the reader to adopt whichever he pleases ¹³

For the rest of the eighteenth century, the most reputable Thomists imitated the example of Billuart, while the other theologians, with the exception of St. Alphonsus Liguori, Muzzarelli, and a few others, gradually inclined toward ecclesiastical faith, which they first began to apply to dogmatic facts and ended up extending also to theological conclusions ¹⁴

In the nineteenth century, whose first half was so poor for theology, and in what we have covered so far of the twentieth, the idea of ecclesial faith has been gaining ground, and today it is almost general among authors. One must except, however, the Jesuit Schifini and the Dominican Tuyaerts, who combat it ex professo, as well as the reputed Fr. Gardeil and some others, who, without directly attacking it, make their displeasure with it quite clear.

Such seems to us to be, broadly speaking, the true history of the so-called ecclesiastical faith ¹⁵.

234. OBJECT OF THE PRESENT STUDY.—In this chapter, which deals entirely with ecclesiastical faith, and in which we shall endeavor to be as concise as possible, the question is not precisely about that modern name of ecclesiastical given to this faith, but about its true nature. We propose to examine in the light of the doctrine and principles of Saint Thomas whether this faith called ecclesiastical is specifically distinct from true divine faith or is the same divine faith under another name and with purely accidental differences. The question cannot be of greater importance, for what is not true and specifically divine, whether it be called ecclesiastical or civil, is essentially and infinitely distant from what is essentially and truly divine. Between what is truly divine and what is truly non-divine, the distance can never be merely one of degree, but of species, and even of genus, and more than of genus: the very radical and infinite distance that exists between God and the creature.

235. OUR POINT OF DEPARTURE.—In treating this question, we will always proceed from the principles of St. Thomas or from those principles that are admitted by all or by nearly all theologians.

All theologians admit, since it is already a dogma of faith, that truths formally or immediately revealed can be defined by the Church as of divine or Catholic faith, and not merely as of ecclesiastical faith. In discussing, therefore, ecclesiastical faith, there is no question at all of those truths, but only of truths revealed mediately or virtually.

All or nearly all theologians also admit that the Sacred Congregations, when they teach without the Pope, or that the Pope himself when he teaches without the intention of defining ex cathedra, are not infallible. In speaking, then, of ecclesiastical faith, no reference whatsoever is made to the faith we give to the non-infallible teachings of the Church, which is usually called “religious assent,” but rather to the faith we give to its infallible teachings or definitions.

Finally, all or almost all theologians admit that the extension of the Church's infallibility to mediately or virtually revealed matters is a truth of divine faith, already defined by the ordinary or practical magisterium of the Church or, at least, a truth truly revealed and definable as of divine faith¹⁶.

Therefore, whenever we speak of ecclesiastical faith we understand the assent owed to those truths which are: a) virtually revealed; b) already infallibly defined by the Church; c) and of which infallibility of the Church we are assured by divine revelation.

236. SOLUTION CRITERIA.—The essential or specific distinction between two habits can only come from one of these two sources: a) the formal object; b) the formal motive.

The formal object of divine faith is what is truly revealed by God. The formal motive of divine faith is the divine authority of God as revealer. We believe with divine faith only what God has revealed, and we believe what God has revealed because of the divine authority that the word of God possesses and deserves.

Therefore, all criteria for ascertaining whether the so-called ecclesiastical faith is of divine faith must be reduced to two: a) to ascertain whether the object of ecclesiastical faith, that is, what is mediately revealed, is truly revealed or not: if it is, it merits divine faith; if it is not, it neither merits it nor can it be given to it; b) to ascertain whether the authority of the Church, in defining what is mediately revealed, is truly divine authority or not: if it is, it merits divine faith; if it is not, it neither merits it nor can divine faith ever be given to it, but rather another faith of a lower order, essentially distinct from divine faith.

237. OUR OPINION.—Our opinion or, better said, our most intimate conviction is that, according to the doctrine and principles of Saint Thomas, the mediate or virtual revelation is implicitly and really revealed; that the authority with which the Church infallibly defines what is virtually or mediately revealed, whether doctrines or facts, is a real and truly divine authority; that the so-called ecclesiastical faith which we give or ought to give to such definitions is not essentially distinguished, but only accidentally, from the divine or Catholic faith which we give to definitions concerning what is formally revealed; in a word, that ecclesiastical faith is divine faith and not human faith nor a middle faith between the divine and human.

In the following sections we will set forth, with all the clarity and brevity that we can muster, both the principles of Saint Thomas and the theological reasons on which our conviction is based.