DXL – The Codification Fallacy

I’ve encountered this fallacy twice now–it’s an expression of Positivism, I think. It goes like this:

• “Catholics sneakily inserted the Filioque into the Nicene creed in [year]”
• “The immaculate conception of Mary wasn’t dogma until [year], people like Aquinas didn’t hold it actually”

Do you see what’s happening here? “No one believed this until Catholics passed a law saying to believe it.” This misunderstands how Catholic Doctrine works, and why Catholic Doctrine exists.

To clarify: The two lungs of Christian teaching are Scripture and Tradition. Scripture tells us what Christ said, the story of salvation, etc etc. If you’re reading me you don’t need to be persuaded about what Scripture is. Tradition is the body of practices carried forward from the death of Christ to the present day. There is not a document that says “Tradition”, it is a continuous chain of humanity from then to now.

Magisterium is both the teaching authority of the Church and the body of teachings itself. The Church has the authority to teach, it gives us explanations of scripture and ways we can understand our Faith. The Church stewards tradition across time.

There exists a gap in this framework. Tradition is “what people do”, the Magisterium is the authoritative teachings, and Scripture is the word of God. The gap is when some people disagree with the magisterium. “We’ve always done it this way” they might say, while the Magisterium would say “we don’t care, it’s wrong,” or “it’s confusing” or “something about it needs refinement”. Tradition, in other words, can come into conflict with the teaching authority of the Church.

That is when the Church steps in to bring clarity. Sometimes it’s a Church Council, sometimes it’s a declaration ex cathedra (and invocation which it’s important to note has only been used seven or so times in the history of the Church).

The Church, in other words, acts slowly, and usually acts LATE. Church Doctrine is a lagging indicator of belief, not a leading indicator. The Church generally tries to let things get worked out at the lowest possible level before intervening. Sometimes traditions can be taught back into place by sending good teachers. Sometimes a strongly worded encyclical can get everyone to shape up. When, at last, the Church intervenes, she intervenes with finality, and usually when there’s a point of danger to the faithful.

So in the case of the Filioque, there is a great deal of evidence that the Filioque language was already understood by a great many of the faithful, and the non-filioque understanding was a point of confusion which the Church needed to rectify. Inserting the language into the creed is consistent with tradition and practice and understanding at the time it happened and only an admonition to those who believe the slight but important error. The Filioque has subsequently been blown into a bigger problem because, IMNSHO the EO don’t have good ground to stand on contra Rome.

In the case of the Immaculate Conception, this is not something understandable by human reason, which is evidenced IMO by the fact that the smartest human to ever live, Thomas Aquinas, did not believe it. That’s not points against it, that’s rather points in it’s favor–that it’s incomprehensible and we were never going to get there on our own. That’s why Mary’s words at Lourdes, “I AM THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION” and her words countless other times in other apparitions ought to be taken seriously. The belief was codified in the 20th century but that doesn’t mean it was alien to Catholic belief.

And so: The date something was codified does not mean it is the date people started believing something. That is an error of positivism. The Catholic Church generally tries not to intervene, and in so doing makes doctrine a lagging indicator of belief.

It’s not the ‘gotcha’ many think it is.

AMDG