I recently read a fascinating account of the birth of Jesus as revealed in a vision to St. Bridget. The account confirmed what Catholic theologians had already taught concerning the interesting ramifications of it being a virgin birth–consequences such as that it couldn’t have been a normal birth with all the pain and blood because in order for Mary to remain a virgin during and after the birth, her womb couldn’t have been opened or penetrated, and Jesus would have had to pass through her body in a similar way that He passed through walls following His resurrection.
The story got me thinking about the many things we Catholics have come to know not directly through Sacred Scripture, but in the 1600 years since the Canon of Scripture was determined, and even before that through writings that didn’t make it into the Canon. I recently finished St. Louis the Montfort’s book True Devotion to Mary, which is considered by many popes to be the authoritative work on what devotion to Mary is and what it isn’t. In other words, if you want to know what devotion to Mary is as I did, that’s the book to read. St. Louis wrote True Devotion to Mary sometime in the 1700s but the work was not discovered until the 1840s by a monk who was cleaning out the attic.
The ongoing role of Mary in the Church is one of those truths that isn’t spoken of directly in Sacred Scripture. It’s very clear in Scripture that Mary was a virgin at the time she gave birth to Jesus; it takes more understanding of the culture and the way the original languages of the Gospels were used to get from Scripture that Mary remained a virgin for the rest of her life. Bible scholars may be able to figure this out from the text. The rest of us learn it through Catholic teaching. The Catholic Church has had that particular teaching of Mary’s perpetual virginity handed down from the Early Church Fathers–Sacred Tradition. I don’t personally know the history of this doctrine that well, but I’m guessing the information probably originated from the Apostle John reporting on conversations he’d had with Mary while she was under his care where she flat out told him.
What exactly is Sacred Tradition? It’s a deposit of truth derived from God continuing to communicate with His people after Jesus’ resurrection and ascension, and after the Book of Revelation was penned. The Holy Spirit has communicated through Church councils, theologians (often referred to as Doctors of the Church), Divine revelation to mystics (people such as St. Bridget who see visions) and the experience of people living out the faith and sharing about it.
What is the purpose of Sacred Tradition? It is a fleshing out of the truths of Sacred Scripture, a development and maturing of the Faith as God reveals more to us over time, and also a more in-depth analysis of the consequences of holding to the truths laid out in Sacred Scripture, for example, the more technical aspects of how the virgin birth took place. Sacred Tradition will never, can never, contradict Sacred Scripture. However, Sacred Tradition does teach truths that are not explicitly found in Sacred Scripture. Often those truths are foreshadowed in types and symbols, but you wouldn’t automatically conclude the type or symbol referenced a particular doctrine.
It’s that “not explicitly found in Sacred Scripture” part that is the rub for the Protestants in my life. My husband will listen to me talk about some aspect of Catholic doctrine that inspires me. He’s actually a very good listener and makes a true and usually successful attempt to understand where I’m coming from and what it means to me and Catholics in general. But as soon as I start suggesting that it’s true in a universal sense, he’ll say there’s no basis for it in Scripture so it’s wrong for anyone to impose that belief on another.
Protestant Christians stick to what is clear in Scripture. There are certain things that all Christians must believe, such as Jesus being the Way, the Truth and the Life and the need for Him to have suffered and died so that we could have salvation. Those truths are repeated over and over in Sacred Scripture. But a belief like the Immaculate Conception (Mary being conceived without original sin)? Well, that’s fine for me to believe, but since the Immaculate Conception is not mentioned in Scripture, then I can’t make him believe it and I (or my Church) has no right to withhold the most intimate form of fellowship (Communion) on the basis of rejection of that and other Catholic doctrines.
The reason I hear most often for not venturing outside the bounds of “explicitly found in Sacred Scripture” in forming and accepting doctrine is the danger of adding unnecessary things onto the Gospel and burdening people with the traditions of man rather than sticking to the Word of God. In other words, it’s a safeguard. We all agree on the fundamentals found in the Bible and then develop our own views as we see fit on the more nebulous stuff and respect what others believe if it’s different. Let Sacred Scripture be authoritative and Sacred Tradition optional.
That view has always bothered me. On one hand I totally like the safeguard aspect of it, and I certainly do not want to burden people with carnally-derived traditions. Jesus and later St. Paul came down hard on people who did just that. On the other hand, I don’t believe that Sacred Tradition is carnal–it’s not a bunch of traditions of men that we’ve added to the pure Gospel. I actually believe that Sacred Tradition is a deposit of truth that God Himself has revealed to us through various means.
Now Sacred Tradition doesn’t just absorb everything that people over the ages happened to write or teach about the things of God. Just because I am writing this blog post about spiritual matters does not mean that as soon as I hit the publish button I have now added my voice to Sacred Tradition. Let’s suppose I receive a vision where Jesus appears to me and tells me various things. Even that does not automatically go into the deposit of faith. Jesus may have a message just for me, and that’s as far as it will go. But let’s suppose Jesus had a message for me to give to the world–one that is absolutely intended to become part of Sacred Tradition. In that case my parish priest and then the bishop of my diocese would get very interested in the message. They’d want to make sure it was completely in line with Church teaching up to that point. They’d want to make sure that it was authentic–that I truly was seeing and hearing Jesus. They’d want to make sure that I’d accurately transmitted His words. To that end I’d be subject to hours and hours of questioning and a number of psychological tests and who knows what else. Based on the experiences of other visionaries, that process is grueling and unpleasant but very important because God’s word is not something to be trifled with.
Authentic mystics and visionaries such as St. Bridget, St. Faustina, St. Catherine Laboure, St. Dominic and others throughout the centuries have had their messages probed and tested and discerned by the Church authorities, and those messages have made it into the Deposit of Faith.
The Catholic Church takes visions seriously and goes through a lot of trouble to discern their authenticity. Same with writings of eminent theologians such as St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Louis de Montfort. After thorough review the Church has approved their writings either in part or in whole (I know a few things St. Augustine wrote about have been rejected but most of his work has been approved) and they now form part of Sacred Tradition. We Catholics believe the Holy Spirit guides all parts of that discernment process according to the promise Jesus made to the Apostles during the Last Supper that the Holy Spirit would guide them into all truth. The Church authorities (or Magisterium) discern and then pronounce the worthiness of the message, mainly whether it comes from God or not.
And if God has spoken to us about the truths handed down through Sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium has discerned that God has indeed spoken, then we have to conclude that whatever God said is authoritative. Otherwise, we have to believe God speaks in order to hear His head roar, or for us to say it’s not clearly spelled out in Scripture so I don’t have to accept it. Considering that Sacred Scripture does say that God’s Word that goes forth from His mouth does not return to Him empty without first accomplishing the purpose for which He intended, I cannot accept the possibility of God’s Word in whatever way He chooses to speak ever being void or without purpose, or not authoritative.
One could potentially conclude that a mistake had been made in the discernment process and reject the message for that reason, but to accept that God does indeed continue to speak, that He has spoken and that His message was accurately transmitted, but not authoritative, poses a problem. There is really no room for “It’s okay for you to believe that, but don’t insist that I believe it” if God did indeed declare. You don’t just ignore something God says.
The Catholic Church has been around for 2000 years and throughout that time, the Holy Spirit has been true to Jesus’ promise and continued to reveal truth to and guide His people throughout that time until now. Rather than take the attitude of “I don’t have to believe it since I don’t see it in Scripture,” I think it would be more prudent (not to mention humble) to explore and consider first of all whether the Holy Spirit has actually done this, and if so, what has He revealed to His people? Our God has not remained silent and He does not speak empty words.