I commend wholeheartedly Matt's post. Humility, especially regarding what we can know, is always a work in progress.
Neither Matt nor Fernandez emphasize our inability to know the truth. What we cannot have is the final and total truth about God or even other humans: to claim such would be hubris. What we can have are partial but accurate truths--about our beloved spouses, our children, physics and even God. We believe it true without a doubt that God created and sustains the world. Yet we do not know just how God did it.
While I certainly know and care for my gay and trans relatives, I am sure that I do not know them as God does and humility requires me to accept that genetic research Matt mentions should not be irrelevant to any claims to know more about them, whether my own claims or the dicastery's. God's understanding is eternal; ours evolves.
As always, I really appreciated this piece, Matt! Intellectual humility is important. I totally get the frustration with anyone with a blog or social media commenting on theological topics, though at the same time I don't love the presumption regarding the professionalization of theology...Portier would sometimes reference "devotional knowledge," and I don't think that should be discounted or theology left only in the hands of professionals. At the same time, I get frustrated when I see harsh criticisms by Catholics who lack such intellectual (or any) humility. Just this past week, a picture of the pope giving communion in the hand to his brother had a string of comments saying things like "communion in the hand is diabolical," "Receiving the eucharist in the hand is receiving it unworthily," "It's sacrilege to receive Communion in the hand. Of course, what would this pope know about it. Sacrilege is his middle name." Practically every comment was in this negative vein. Oh, and then there was the old video that resurfaced of him singing Feliz Navidad DURING ADVENT (gasp!). Anyway, I wrote this piece during the sede vacante that was published right after Leo's election: https://churchlifejournal.nd.edu/articles/more-catholic-than-the-pope-the-recent-history-and-future-of-american-catholic-moral-theology/
Hi Matthew, thank you for the mention of my article (even if as a “mistaken interpretation!”) and for engaging thoughtfully with Card Fernandez’s talk. Of course on one level there is nothing wrong with the talk, as you point out: Intellectual humility is important; we can’t claim to know everything etc. My interest is in why a Prefect for the Dicastery responsible for offering a “clear word from the Church” (Pope Leo), would choose to emphasize our inability to know the truth, including truths of the faith, especially in a post-truth age which would happily accept such an assessment. So I locate this talk & another in the context of a general trend during the Francis pontificate towards downplaying the importance of reason and emphasizing love/mercy and examine whether that false dichotomy might be part of the liberal/conservative divide. As I wrote about today, in Logos and love, I think a positive vision of reason and an appreciation of paradox could help bridge that gap. Grazie e Buon lavoro!
I commend wholeheartedly Matt's post. Humility, especially regarding what we can know, is always a work in progress.
Neither Matt nor Fernandez emphasize our inability to know the truth. What we cannot have is the final and total truth about God or even other humans: to claim such would be hubris. What we can have are partial but accurate truths--about our beloved spouses, our children, physics and even God. We believe it true without a doubt that God created and sustains the world. Yet we do not know just how God did it.
While I certainly know and care for my gay and trans relatives, I am sure that I do not know them as God does and humility requires me to accept that genetic research Matt mentions should not be irrelevant to any claims to know more about them, whether my own claims or the dicastery's. God's understanding is eternal; ours evolves.
As always, I really appreciated this piece, Matt! Intellectual humility is important. I totally get the frustration with anyone with a blog or social media commenting on theological topics, though at the same time I don't love the presumption regarding the professionalization of theology...Portier would sometimes reference "devotional knowledge," and I don't think that should be discounted or theology left only in the hands of professionals. At the same time, I get frustrated when I see harsh criticisms by Catholics who lack such intellectual (or any) humility. Just this past week, a picture of the pope giving communion in the hand to his brother had a string of comments saying things like "communion in the hand is diabolical," "Receiving the eucharist in the hand is receiving it unworthily," "It's sacrilege to receive Communion in the hand. Of course, what would this pope know about it. Sacrilege is his middle name." Practically every comment was in this negative vein. Oh, and then there was the old video that resurfaced of him singing Feliz Navidad DURING ADVENT (gasp!). Anyway, I wrote this piece during the sede vacante that was published right after Leo's election: https://churchlifejournal.nd.edu/articles/more-catholic-than-the-pope-the-recent-history-and-future-of-american-catholic-moral-theology/
Hi Matthew, thank you for the mention of my article (even if as a “mistaken interpretation!”) and for engaging thoughtfully with Card Fernandez’s talk. Of course on one level there is nothing wrong with the talk, as you point out: Intellectual humility is important; we can’t claim to know everything etc. My interest is in why a Prefect for the Dicastery responsible for offering a “clear word from the Church” (Pope Leo), would choose to emphasize our inability to know the truth, including truths of the faith, especially in a post-truth age which would happily accept such an assessment. So I locate this talk & another in the context of a general trend during the Francis pontificate towards downplaying the importance of reason and emphasizing love/mercy and examine whether that false dichotomy might be part of the liberal/conservative divide. As I wrote about today, in Logos and love, I think a positive vision of reason and an appreciation of paradox could help bridge that gap. Grazie e Buon lavoro!