Blessed Pius X and Theology

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. XIV JULY, 1951 No. 8 BLESSED PIUS X AND THEOLOGY ''LOXIII was the Pope of kings, of emperors, of courts, of chanceries, of bishops; Pius X is the Pope of Theology and of Canon Law, the Pope of the poor, the lowly, the parish priest." 1 Such a judgement would scarcely be challenged, except for one item: does Bl. Pius X have a better claim to the title, "Pope of Theology," than Leo XIII? The facts seem to support such a claim, although they are not well known. Pope Leo XIII is everywhere hailed as the instigator of a revival of philosophy and theology in the Church, and rightly. Conscious of the eddies of unorthodox or dangerous thought that stirred in many Catholic universities and seminaries ; Pope Leo, XIII urged the restoration of Thomistic philosophy and theology. His very insistence and the actual 1 Quoted by R. M. Huber in his " Biographical Sketch of Pope Pius X," a chapter of A 'Symposium on the Life and Work of Pope Pius X (Washington: Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, 1946), p. 16. 818 314 JAMES M. EGAN restoration of ·such study aroused an opposition, which till then had been more or less unobstrusively undermining the foundations of Catholic thought, and brought it into the open. However, it was left to Leo's successor, Bl. Pius X to deal with the opposition in its most virulent forms and, at the same time, to foster the growth of a sane· philosophy and theology within the Church. Providentially, then, the holy Pontiff was forced to turn his thoughts frequently to the state of philosophical and theological thinking within the Church. Apart from any. historical circumstances, the motto of his reign, "Instaurare omnia in Christo," would have led his thoughts in the same direction, for the mind must first be the " mind of Christ," if the heart is to be His. The Holy Father was quite conscious of this connection; in his first Allocution to the Cardinals, he says: " Since Christ is Truth, Our first task is to be the teacher and herald of truth." 2 A reader of this short allocution is surprised to note that it it almost entirely devoted to this question of the defense and propagation of truth. It would seem that the Holy Father clearly foresaw what was to be the great preoccupation of his Pontificate. and even the accusations that his actions in this sphere would arouse. He points out that there is an abiding thirst in man for the truth, that almost by instinct he is led to embrace it lovingly and to cling to it whenever it is presented to him. Yet, there is also the fact of sin and the deep wound that man's intellect and appetites suffer because of it. As a result, there are many who hate nothing more than the sound of truth, which unmasks their errors and curbs their lusts. Nevertheless, the duty of a Supreme Pastor is clear, and always has been: everything that is true and good may be embraced by the Church, approved and even fostered by Her: errors and vice must be condemned. To those who cling to error, such action on the part of the Pope may seem obscurant- •ASS, XXXVI, p. 194. BLESSED PIUS X AND THEOLOGY 315 ism, obstructionism; but the Holy Father insists: "We are not trying to delay the progress of humanity, but to prevent its destruction." 3 During the remainder of his Pontificate, there were many who refused to accept this evaluation of the Holy Father's actions. He was the Pope who condemned "Modernism"; therefore, he was the Pope who opposed progress , especially in philosophy and theology. It is this judgement that has predominated in the minds of many whenever there is a question of Bl. Pius X and theology. We should like to show that the Holy Father most explicitly mapped out a program of true progress in the fields of sacred learning and was in no sense opposed to real progress...