Oxford Univ. Sermon, n. 15, The Development of Religious Doctrine, part 2

In the sermon titled The Developments of Religious Doctrine St. John Henry Newman asserts that  people often hold beliefs or assumptions of which they are not conscious, but, he claims, not being conscious of a perception is not a proof of its absence. He offers various examples: “A peasant may have such a true impression (about something), yet be unable to give any intelligible account of it, as will easily be understood.” He notes that often a person feels sad or worried without knowing the reason for these feelings.

Newman draws a distinction between implicit and explicit knowledge and affirms that “the absence, or partial absence, or incompleteness of dogmatic statements is no proof of the absence of impressions or implicit judgments, in the mind of the Church.” He notes that centuries may pass before the Church offers a formal explanation of a truth held by countless Christians.

There are ideas latent in the Christian mind that are difficult to elicit and define. “It will often happen, perhaps from the nature of things, that it is impossible to master and express an idea in a short space of time.” Some people have an idea which haunts them throughout their life but they are unable to express it until in the end they succeed. For instance, that beauty is an important way to God. Some eminent scholars spend their entire life developing a single idea.

For Newman another characteristic of dogmatic statements is that they do not represent well the meaning intended. For example the teaching of the need of baptism for salvation or that the Church established by Christ is one. Once made they may seem incomplete or even harsh outlines of an idea.

In light of these possibilities Newman acknowledges the challenge and risk of developing doctrines implicitly received and yet the Christian cannot renounce this need. By way of example we have the teaching of the role of Mary in salvation history and the mystery of the Church. Just as other sciences admit of true and false theories, so does theology. Over time, sometimes even centuries, by means of study, debate, events in history, the liturgy, and in the end, the discernment of the teaching authority of the Church, doctrines are defined.

Another objection to the development of doctrines is that theologians arrive at dogmas that are unconnected from each other, or with the experience of daily life. Newman argues that all sciences admit of implicit and explicit arguments. Some truths are known without or before they are formulated in a precise manner. Why should theology be excluded from this? Why should the ideas of Christianity not be allowed the use of scientific analysis? He asserts that a man may follow the thinking of Aristotle without knowing that he does so.

Newman also offers an argument from the existence of very serious debates as a sign that developments in ideas are more the question of words or party spirit. He writes: “considering the strong feelings and energetic acts and severe sufferings which age after age have been involved in the maintenance of the Catholic dogmas, it is surely a very shallow philosophy to account such maintenance a mere contest about words, and a very abject philosophy to attribute it to mere party spirit, or to personal rivalry, or to ambition, or to covetousness.”

In the process of the development of an idea, an impression on the imagination gradually becomes a system or creed in reason. “One proposition necessarily leads to another, and a second to a third; then some limitation is required; and the combination of these opposites occasions some fresh evolutions from the original idea, which indeed can never be said to be entirely exhausted.” This was the case with the heresies about the Trinity and the working out and definition of doctrines of the Trinity.

When a doctrine develops the previous doctrine continues as doctrine. For instance, the doctrine of penance is a development of the doctrine of baptism, but it remains a distinct doctrine. Newman notes, however, that with regards to doctrines on the Trinity we are not speaking so much of parts and a system but of real Persons.

Theology thus seeks to make explicit truths that sometimes were only implicit in the minds of believers. In doing so objects that make impressions on our senses and which are complex in their relations are understood as integral and one. These doctrines correspond to whole, individual and substantial things or beings as the case may be. They represent the sacred objects of our faith such as the forgiveness of sins, the Church, or the Blessed Trinity.