Theologians and the Magisterium

Abstract

Ten years ago, in September, 1966, an International Theological Congress was convened in Rome to study the theology of the Second Vatican Council. On the occasion of the Congress, Pope Paul addressed a letter to the participants and also delivered to them a significant discourse in the course of a concluding Audience. In both of these texts, Pope Paul developed an analysis of the role of the theologian in the Church which is still as relevant as it was ten years ago.In his letter, the Pope began by discussing the limits which divine revelation and the unity of the faith imposes upon the freedom of theologians. He then went on:But once these limits are recognised -and they are required by the very dignity of the Word of God, which of its nature is one and is everlasting -there remains an immense field of research where, as the Vatican Council put it, 'it is recognised that all the faithful, clerical and lay, possess a lawful freedom of inquiry and of thought, and the freedom to express their minds humbly and courageously about those matters in which they enjoy competence'. (Gaudium et Spes, 62). It is precisely this lawful freedom which is the basis of progress in theology 1 Freedom is indeed a condition of all genuine progress in theology. But it is not in itself necessarily a guarantee of theological progress. It would be idle to deny that the new freedom given to Catholic theologians in the past ten years has been sometimes abused. Things have been written and said which have been quite simply a disgrace to Catholic theology. It often seems that much of the best work in theology is still being done by men formed in the older tradition and now themselves no longer young. The best fruits of freedom have, in many respects, still to be reaped.The freedom which the Council sought to restore to all the members of the Church, and in particular to theologians, is a freedom in faith, a freedom to serve the believing community in the unity of charity which marks the body of Christ. This freedom calls for a greater sense of responsibility than ever on the part of all members of the Church. As freedom increased, the sense of personal responsibility was required to grow in keeping with it. As control by Church authority over the thinking and practice of Catholics diminished, the taking over by members of the Church, each in their own place and sphere, of personal responsibility for the purity of Catholic teaching and the fidelity of religious observance ought to have increased. When, for example, Church authority ceased to enforce the old regulations about prior 1.