Theological Problems of Conversion

THE THOMIST A SPECULATIVE QUARTERLY REVIEW OF THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY EDITORS: THE DoMINICAN FATHERS OF THE PRoviNCE oF ST. JosEPH Publishers: The Thomist Press, Washington 17, D. C. VoL. XI OCTOBER, 1948 No.4 THEOLOGICAL PROBLEMS OF CONVERSION T HERE exists a rather curious discrepancy between the very lively interest taken nowadays in apologetical, oecumenical, and other works which by their very nature tend to result in conversions to the Catholic Church, and the almost complete lack of reflection among Catholics on the problems connected with these conversions. This lively interest hardly needs demonstration. It can be measured, for example, by the numerous stories of converts which are being published and read and which furnish the principal material for psychological studies of conversion (Starbuck, James, DeSanctis, Th. Mainage, 0. P.) The lack of theological reflection is shown, among other instances, from the fact that the Dictionnaire de Theologie Catholique does not even mention the word conversion ; the Dic·tionnaire Apologetique de la Foi Catholique and the Lexicon Fur Theologie und Kirche have only very short articles on the subject and they are more historical than theological . In this study, we intend only to examine some of the theological problems related to conversion and indicate certain solutions; all of these problems could not be studied in one article. 409 410 C. F. PAUWELS It must be noted immediately that the word " conversion " can have several different meanings, all of these meanings having some connection between them. The different uses of the same word have been the cause of much confusion in the psychological study of conversion as we understand it. Conversion can mean (and it is in this sense that we write of it) a change of religious conviction, and notably the acceptance of the Catholic faith. It indicates a motion to something new from something old; therefore it has a counterpart in apostasy, and if we attend to the fact that as an old conviction is given up a new one is acquired we note that every conversion can be called an apostasy. Conversion in this first sense, however, implies something more than a merely intellectual act, for whoever accepts the Catholic faith enters the Catholic Church and intends to live a Catholic life. In another sense, conversion may mean the justificatio impii, the change from a bad life to a good one. In this sense, conversion has been the object of numerous theological studies, and has been considered by St. Thomas 1 and the modem authors. The latin term, conversus, has been used to designate a laybrother in the same sense. It should be noted that a conversion to the Catholic faith always implies some change from a bad to a good life, in this respect at least that the Catholic standards of good and bad must be accepted with the faith; therefore, almost every convert, even if he could be called a good Christian before his conversion, has to make some changes in his manner of life. Still, one can be a bad Catholic and a sinner at the same time, and such a one needs the justificatio impii without needing any change of faith. On the other hand, many non-Catholics are already in a state of grace before they are converted to the Catholic faith. Hence a connection between these two kinds of conversion is not only possible, but necessary. In a third sense, conversion may mean a change in religious life without any change of faith. This kind of conversion is studied by ascetical and mystical theologians.2 We call it a 1 Summa Theol., I-II, q. 113. 'Cf. Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ways of the Spiritual Life, London, 194~. THEOLOGICAL PROBLEMS OF CONVERSION 411 conversion when a man changes from a humdrum religious life to a more serious one, from carelessness about venial sin to a systematical endeavor to reach perfection. Although this kind of conversion implies no change in religious conviction and is thus very different from the first kind, it should be noted that the acceptance of the Catholic faith, which is the fullness of revelation and grace, must bring about in the life of good Christians who are in a...