Sensus Fidei Recent Theological Reflection

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SENSUS FIDEI: RECENT THEOLOGICAL REFLECTION (1990–2001)* PART I JOHN J. BURKHARD Washington Theological Union, Washington DC, USA Several years ago, I examined the theological literature on the sensus fidei (henceforth, SF) from the years 1965 to 1989. 1 In the current article I propose to study the literature from 1990 to 2001 with a view to seeing whether the SF continues to occupy an important place in theological reflection and whether theologians indicate any new ideas or directions for rethinking this important teaching of the Second Vatican Council. 2 This article will attempt to establish the state of the question more than thirty-five years after the conclusion of Vatican II. Before proceeding to the task at hand, let me recall for the reader the six observations I made on the SF at the conclusion of my article. In 1993, I wrote in summary: There appears to be growing agreement among theologians on the following points. First, the SF is seen by the Council in the broader context of the infallibility of the whole Church. This means that it is ultimately an ecclesial reality.... Second, this infallibility, experienced and expressed as a ‘sense’ of the faith, is the direct gift of the Lord of the Church through his Spirit to the whole Church and to each member. It is not derived from another ministry in the Church but it is oriented to ministry.... Third, the SF, however one may translate the expression, pertains to the realm of knowledge, but where knowledge is understood to be a form other than discursive reasoning... . Fourth, it is entirely inappropriate to speak of the SF as something ‘passive’, in contradistinction to an ‘active’ exercise by the hierarchical magisterium or by theologians.... Fifth, a naı¨ve explanation is to be avoided. The SF brings its own limitations, dangers and temptations. It is something to be welcomed but also to be achieved. Believers who receive the gift are also called to realize it. It is never automatic or mechanical. And persons bring the weight of their own fragility, desire for power, self-appointed goals and sinfulness into play. 3 With these general conclusions in mind, let us proceed directly to the literature. BRIEF ADDENDA TO THE LITERATURE FROM 1965–1989 In the course of my earlier research, several important articles did not come to my attention until after I had published my overview of the r The Editor/Blackwell Publishing Ltd Oxford, UK and Boston, USA. HeyJ XLVI (2005), pp. 450–475

Transcript of Sensus Fidei Recent Theological Reflection

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SENSUS FIDEI:RECENT THEOLOGICALREFLECTION (1990–2001)*

PART I

JOHN J. BURKHARD

Washington Theological Union, Washington DC, USA

Several years ago, I examined the theological literature on the sensus fidei(henceforth, SF) from the years 1965 to 1989.1 In the current articleI propose to study the literature from 1990 to 2001 with a view to seeingwhether the SF continues to occupy an important place in theologicalreflection and whether theologians indicate any new ideas or directionsfor rethinking this important teaching of the Second Vatican Council.2

This article will attempt to establish the state of the question more thanthirty-five years after the conclusion of Vatican II.

Before proceeding to the task at hand, let me recall for the reader thesix observations I made on the SF at the conclusion of my article. In 1993,I wrote in summary:

There appears to be growing agreement among theologians on the followingpoints. First, the SF is seen by the Council in the broader context of theinfallibility of the whole Church. This means that it is ultimately an ecclesialreality. . . . Second, this infallibility, experienced and expressed as a ‘sense’ ofthe faith, is the direct gift of the Lord of the Church through his Spirit to thewhole Church and to each member. It is not derived from another ministry inthe Church but it is oriented to ministry. . . . Third, the SF, however one maytranslate the expression, pertains to the realm of knowledge, but whereknowledge is understood to be a form other than discursive reasoning. . . .Fourth, it is entirely inappropriate to speak of the SF as something ‘passive’, incontradistinction to an ‘active’ exercise by the hierarchical magisterium or bytheologians. . . . Fifth, a naıve explanation is to be avoided. The SF brings itsown limitations, dangers and temptations. It is something to be welcomed butalso to be achieved. Believers who receive the gift are also called to realize it. Itis never automatic or mechanical. And persons bring the weight of their ownfragility, desire for power, self-appointed goals and sinfulness into play.3

With these general conclusions in mind, let us proceed directly to theliterature.

BRIEF ADDENDA TO THE LITERATURE FROM 1965–1989

In the course of my earlier research, several important articles did notcome to my attention until after I had published my overview of the

r The Editor/Blackwell Publishing Ltd Oxford, UK and Boston, USA.

HeyJ XLVI (2005), pp. 450–475

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literature. Not all need to be mentioned, but several did add significantpoints to the general reflection, and I propose to examine six of thembefore moving on to literature after 1989.

In 1975, Michael Seybold published an article that glimpsed thepossibility of greater understanding between Catholics and Christians ofthe Reformed tradition because of Vatican II’s teaching.4 Seybold beganby expressing the concern of many non-Catholics regarding the sensitiveissue of the relationship between Scripture and the magisterium. Mightthe Council’s teaching on the SF be of service in redressing imbalances byboth Catholics and Reformed Christians? Seybold showed howincomplete the teaching of Vatican I was on the Church’s infallibilitywhen compared with Vatican II. One has to speak of real progress inunderstanding the matter of the relationship between believers and thehierarchical, or more precisely, the papal magisterium. The secret tounderstanding this progress can be found in the pneumatology andthe Trinitarian theology of the Council. Both of these pointed to thesecondary and ministerial character of ecclesiastical office or themagisterium. He pointed to the unity-in-tension of the Christologicaland the pneumatological dimensions of the Church as both intrinsicallynecessary and as surmounting any purely juridical understanding of themin the Church. Vatican II abandoned the abstract juridicism of a ‘passive’role of the laity vis-a-vis the hierarchy by encompassing the latter in themore global understanding of the Church’s faith as a ‘fundamental unityin the faith’ (‘Glaubensubereinstimmung’) of all believers.

Finally, Seybold examined the real problems connected with determin-ing the SF in the Church. I will refer to just two important points he made.First, though it is true that the SF cannot be identified with ‘public opinionamong the faithful’, since the former is a much more profound reality thanpolls could ever determine, in today’s world ‘opinion polls’ are oneconcrete aspect of an ‘incarnational’ understanding of divine revelation,and hence cannot be completely ignored either. Second, given the Coun-cil’s acceptance of the historicity of the Church, and not simply the world’sor humanity’s historicity, the Church has to come to terms with the thornyissue of pluralism. Today, uniformity is not the best way to assure the unityof the faith expressed in the SF. But this challenge demands a more deeplyrooted eschatological self-understanding by the individual believer and thecommunity of believers, as well as a more pastoral approach by themagisterium to interpreting and defining the faith.

Seybold clearly agreed with other scholars from the period in locatingthe SF in the context of the infallibility of the whole Church and asan ‘active’ participation of the laity in the Church’s pursuit of theinterpretation of revelation. What distinguished his work was the par-ticular stress he placed on the Holy Spirit. Finally, mention must be madeof his admirable definition of the SF as ‘the experience of the faith in theSpirit and the faith conviction of the whole community of the faithful’

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(p. 267), or later where he speaks of the SF ‘as an interior predispositionfor and an internal adhering to the whole of revelation’(p. 274).

In 1987, Gerald O’Collins examined Cardinal Newman’s famous workOn Consulting the Faithful in Matters of Doctrine, asking what Newmantoday would have intended by the term ‘the faithful’ and just how wemight go about a process of consultation.5 These are thorny andnotoriously difficult issues. Does one consult all believers, and if so, how,precisely? O’Collins expands the contemporary consultation to includetwo categories of Christians whose special contribution has emerged inour century: prophetic persons and the oppressed and marginalized.O’Collins fears that in a general process of consultation of the laity, thesetwo categories of Christians might be overlooked. Finally, in aconstructive move on the SF, O’Collins points to Newman’s highlightingthe fact that the faithful should be consulted especially on matters ofdevotion and worship. At first sight, this might appear somewhat minimaland patronizing on the part of the magisterium. However, O’Collinsshows that today we understand better how worship is constituted bysigns and symbols that mediate the divine. The effectiveness of such signsand symbols is a rich area for the faithful to reflect on and to share withtheir hierarchical leaders. Do the signs of the papacy or the sign of clericalcelibacy today, for instance, really fulfill their symbolical function? Thefaithful need to be heard on these and similar matters.

At the conclusion of my article in 1993, I called for special attention tothe poor and the excluded in determining the SF, and indicated therichness of their experience. I was delighted to learn subsequently ofthe insistence of O’Collins on this matter. Still, I must register somemisgivings about the way in which O’Collins tends to present prophets,saints, and the suffering members of the Church almost at the expenseof other believers. I agree that the voice and experience of the formerare absolutely necessary in the Church today, but at the same time wemust not forget that the SF pertains to all the faithful, and that we canlearn from the ordinary, distracted, confused, ill-informed, sinful, andecclesially marginalized members, e.g., the divorced and remarried,homosexual persons, alienated women, etc.

In his major work on the ecclesiology of communion, the late Jean-Marie Roger Tillard returned to the theme of the SF,6 which he hadtreated fourteen years earlier.7 He situates his discussion under thegeneral heading of the ‘Church of God, People of God in Communion’(Chapter Two) and more specifically under Part Two, ‘The Church ofGod, People of Faith’. In this section, Tillard treats successively thenotions of the spoken Word of God, the ‘sense of the faithful’, reception,and the Word preserved in the memory of the Church. This long chapterof seventy-two pages is really a full treatment of the theology of the Wordin the Church. I will concentrate on the section that treats the SF.

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If God’s Word is primarily a salvific ‘event’, then this word demandsliving continuity in the Spirit throughout history. Such continuity resultsfrom Christian communities living in communion and preserving theapostolic faith. Though the faith is one, the language in which it iscommunicated to successive generations and to different cultures mustchange, and the Church knows the identity of meaning in differentformulations by comparing the new language with the enduring‘testimony of the Scriptures’. A community can know this continuity ofbelief only by testing its faith expression in the context of the communionof the Church. In this complex process, all in the Church have acontribution to make, the faithful and the magisterium, each doing itspart and acting out of a sense of mutuality. Respect for each other’sreciprocal competence in matters of faith is itself a form of communion.The primary place where this sensus or instinctus is found is in the wholepeople of God or Body of Christ, and not in any single ministry or inexperts enjoying special competence in theology, exegesis, or otherbranches of knowledge. The SF even enjoys a certain primacy vis-a-visother expressions of the faith in the Church. Though the SF and the roleof the magisterium are ordered to one another, this fact does not excludetensions and conflict. Their communion is not something abstract andromantic, but is a real communion that arises out of the communion oflocal Churches and at the level of the local Church. Tillard highlights therole of the presbyterium in passing on the SF of the local Church to thebishop, so that in an ecclesiology of communion the SF might inform hisability to represent his Church to the communion of Churches. In thisway, the mutuality of the SF as understood by Tillard takes onmeaningful form. Since the presbyters must be close to their communitiesin a truly pastoral sense, the faithful sense their importance and the factthat they will be heard, while the bishop is confirmed in his sacramentallyrepresentative role. In this connection, Tillard speaks of a certain‘osmosis’ of roles. Finally, he explains the twofold character of themagisterium, namely its episcopal-pastoral and its theological-didacticforms. Here, too, mutuality is the rule. Theologians especially are calledto remind the hierarchy that in fulfilling their important role of guardingthe integrity of the faith they not forget that this faith is mediated bya plurality of theological expressions. The Second Vatican Councilrepresented a genuine communion of tasks and abilities in the Church:communion among the bishops, communion of perceptions and efforts atscholarly research, a communion of efforts to listen to one another, and acommunion of tensions felt at various levels of the Church.

By considering the SF in the context of a full ecclesiology, Tillardadvanced his former positions, while showing that the SF is not anecclesiological afterthought. The notion of ‘communion’ functioned in aunifying way by showing that the distinct contribution of each group inthe Church had its contribution to make in the unity of the Body of

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Christ. Without abandoning his earlier notion of the SF as a conspiratio,he was able to give it more definite ecclesiological form in terms ofcommunio. Tillard was also honest in admitting that the SF is oftenexperienced in terms of tension, but that this is not necessarilydebilitating. A secondary contribution was his understanding of the roleof the presbyters of a local Church as active agents in expressing the SF,but also by understanding them in their ancient sense as constituting ‘abody of elders’.

In 1988 Tillard added to his writings on the SF.8 If Tillard wasconcerned earlier with tensions in the Church caused by the laity’srejection of certain teachings and changes in the liturgy, the issue whichconcerns him here is change and continuity in the faith. Afterreinterpreting an aspect of the Church as societas inaequalis in acommunional sense with the help of the pneumatology of Vatican II,Tillard proceeds to show how the charism of episcopal ministry functionsin communion with charisms of the Spirit given to all believers. These twocharisms are not inimical of one another but are exercised in communionand in complementary, mutual service. Thus, the hierarchy ordinarilyacts ‘symbiotically’ with the sensus fidelium, and vice versa. As Tillardsays, ‘this symbiosis is that of the sensus fidelium with the service ofmemory’ (p. 339). The model of authority which Vatican II offers includesthe life of the whole Church as People of God and the assurance of theiridentity by the service of ‘memory’.

Deeper than ‘consensus’ arrived at by various political and sociologicalmeans, e.g., opinion polls or forms of voting, the sensus fidelium ‘is thepresence of the sensus fidei in each of the baptized’ (p. 340) which permitseach believer to ‘seize on what is in harmony with the authentic meaningof the Word of God or what follows from it’ (ibid.). The constitutive roleof the SF is beyond dispute, but it is a role that is exercised only inecclesial communion which seeks to understand God’s Word and to buildup the Church.9 The primary recipient of the SF is the communion ofbelievers, and each one exercises it only within that communion.Problems arise at the level of the insertion of the SF in concrete history:how is the Gospel to be lived in a determinate cultural, historical, socialand geographical situation? In other words, how is theWord of God to belived by the concrete person, both as an individual and a member of theBody of Christ, in ever-changing circumstances? In the Church, as well asin human society in general, the law of identity-in-change obtains,namely, that in order to be the same subject (semper ipse) a person cannotremain identically the same (nunquam idem). Change is inevitable, and theprocess involves self-realization. The interior understanding of the SF inall believers assures continuity, but it is an understanding that is lessdiscursive or rigorously logical, more global, more instinctive, and deeplyresponsive to an underlying sense of evangelical authenticity. Today,diocesan synods and various other forms of sounding out this ‘deep

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understanding’ of all believers are signs of the place of the sensus fideliumin the Church.

When the law of identity-in-change is applied to the Church, itbecomes clear that if the calls for change have their necessary place, theyare realized ‘by osmosis’ thanks to the ‘ministry of memory’ rendered bythe bishops primarily. The pole of ‘faithfulness to its memory’ is equallyconstitutive of the Church. Its Gospel, Christian identity, Tradition, andthe ‘deposit of faith’ all belong to the Church as ‘the same subject’ (semperipsa), and in this way the Church is preserved in change. But why isthe ‘ministry of memory’ the specific role of the bishops and theirpresbyterium? Because in the Church ‘memory’ has a special, biblicalmeaning: it is intimately linked with the Eucharist as the ‘remembering ofthe Lord’ (in the strong sense of the Hebrew meaning of anamnesis).Preaching and teaching derive their power from being rooted in thememory of the person of Jesus and his salvific act of self-giving. The bondbetween both elements must be maintained, especially since the tendencyis strong to separate the didactic, doctrinal and parenetic componentsfrom the communal celebration of the Eucharist. Thus (episcopal)presidency at the Eucharist involves promulgating the memoria Jesu tothe community in worship and only then deciding what needs to be donein situations where identity-in-change is at stake.

Basically, this effort calls for communion of both the sensus fideliumand the hierarchical ministry of ‘memory’, since communion is theprinciple of the Spirit’s guidance of the Church. By a process of‘reception’, the bishops (who themselves as baptized believers do notcease to participate in the sensus fidelium) attend to what is being said inthe Church and test it against the ‘deposit of the memory’ of the People ofGod. The episcopal ministry of reception is of its nature somewhatconservative, i.e., it attempts to conserve the permanent values and truthof revelation, but for all that does not refuse to communicate with others.The bishops are constantly involved in the process of rethinking,weighing, testing and clarifying what the faithful (including theologians)are saying against their own sense of the ‘memory’ of Christ. In a way,Vatican II can be understood as the episcopal reception of what many inthe Church thought after Vatican I, viz., the need to fashion a morecomplete and more balanced ecclesiology.

In this reflection on the SF by Tillard, we note certain changes ofaccent. His communion ecclesiology is more pronounced and the role ofthe Spirit is accentuated. To the earlier image of conspiratio he has addedthat of ‘symbiosis’. This scientific image permits him to coordinate thetwo poles of the constant application of the Gospel to the realities of lifeand the necessary ministry of the ‘memory’ of the Lord. He is careful toadd that that ministry depends on the role of the bishop in presiding at theEucharist, because the Eucharist preserves the Church in memory ofthe Lord. He brings this tension admirably to light in his formulation of

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the law of ‘continuity in change’. And finally, Tillard surprises us with atheory of ‘reception in reverse’ (if I might be permitted this phrase), i.e.,his accent is on the need of the bishops to attend to what the Spirit issaying in the Church as a whole, not by abandoning their judgment butby applying it carefully to the sensus fidelium. On the whole, I found thispresentation more original and stimulating than his contribution in Eglised’Eglises, all the while building on his earlier presentations.

In his contribution to the multi-volume commentary on Vatican IItwenty-five years after its convocation, Zoltan Alszeghy treated the SFfrom the point of view of the various epistemological issues involved.10 Ifthe development of dogma is a given in theology, the role of the SF in thatprocess, and particularly the SF as found in the faithful, is not assumed.In this process, Alszeghy singles out how a community becomesintellectually aware of certain problems that emerge only later in itsunderstanding of a dogma, i.e., how ‘the community judges that theoverall revealed image of the economy of salvation cannot be reconciledwith some statement that has emerged later in the history of thinking,or is inseparable from that statement’ (p. 141). In this unendinghermeneutical process, he stresses the fact that it takes place primarilyin the everyday faith-life of believers, and not simply in the writings oftheologians. These problems in understanding the faith are resolved in away akin to the three levels of discourse. Thus, in scientific discourse weare concerned with accurately describing some aspect of reality; inexhortatory discourse we challenge the listener to act in a certain way;and in poetic discourse we try to plumb the depths of human interiority.Now, the SF is not directly concerned with scientific or magisterialdiscourse, nor with exhortatory or norming discourse; it operates in thebroad range of lived experience (captured in the German word Erlebnis).In an understanding of the development of dogma, this experience is opento all believers. Their experience is not amorphous, but rather isstructured or fitted into a pattern that emerges in the course of a person’slife: It ‘entails a structure of beliefs, opinions, affective attractions, andbehavioral tendencies that he or she considers valid because it is testifiedto by the Spirit as a requirement and way of following Christ’ (p. 147).Thus, for Alszeghy, the SF is the ‘capacity to recognize the intimateexperience of adherence to Christ and to judge everything on the basis ofthis knowledge’ (ibid.).

Alszeghy explains how the epistemological model of ‘objectivecomprehension’ operates when persons encounter new realities notpreviously contemplated and try to integrate them into the objective andsynthetic view of the whole order of salvation they already possess.‘Objective comprehension’ points out how these new experiences canor cannot be integrated into or harmonized with the existing synthesis,and what changes will be necessary to achieve a new synthesis. Thisepistemological model is especially helpful today in matters of evaluating

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technical development, economic and social progress, politics, humanliberation, etc. It is evident how this model is open to wide use by thefaithful in their day-to-day lives. Though Alszeghy has no intention ofexcluding the faithful from scientific theological activity and itsappropriate epistemological model that he calls ‘transconceptualization’,in general the SF operates on the basis of the former model wherepersonal behaviour depends more directly on the connection ofexperience to Christian faith. The results of the model of ‘objectivecomprehension’ can be tested against the deepening of the convictions ofthe SF. He writes,

Consent becomes a sure criterion of truth when the community of believersperseveres in its spontaneous inclination toward a doctrine, becomes aware ofall its aspects, considers the objections raised against it, and examines itsconsequences. We can, therefore, say that the sensus fidei is sure when . . . asufficiently large community of believers perseveres for an extended period inthe spontaneous, affectively experienced, conviction that a doctrine isinseparably linked to the experience in which the believer freely and whollyentrusts himself to God, who is the source of salvation (pp. 151–52).

Not since the study on the criteriology of the SgF by Wolfgang Beinertin 197111 had a theologian devoted so much attention to understandingthe process of the SF in terms of its epistemology. Alszeghy has madethree contributions to the discussion. First, against the backdrop ofcurrent linguistic theory, which stresses the polyvalent nature of languageas informative, performative and normative discourse, and with the helpof the two theological models he presented, Alszeghy has given addedtheological weight to the SF. Second, he has helped us to understand itbetter by locating it within the wide range of human experience. Andthird, he has shown that far from being something amorphous or unruly,the epistemology of the SF points to an underlying structured synthesis oflived reality understood in the light of the Gospel. In these results,Alszeghy has made an important contribution to our understanding ofthe SF. My only observation is that his discussion tends, without reallywilling it, to separate unduly the three functions he pointed to, namely thescientific (theologians), the normative (the bishops) and the experiential(the faithful). The SF operates in each of these groups in a distinctive way,and the impression must be avoided that its proper place is in theunscholarly and non-hierarchical laity. The current change in thesituation of ministry in many local Churches points to a more complexsituation.12

In 1988, Luigi Sartori, who had already written on the SF,13 publisheda lengthy article on the sensus fidelium.14 The article consists of a shorterhistorical section and a longer systematic and ecumenical presentation.First, Sartori shows historically how the teaching of Vatican II on the SFdid not appear out of the blue. In a number of observations made by

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bishops at Vatican I (e.g., Cardinal Guidi of Bologna and Bishop Gasserof Brixen, who was the relator), we can detect ideas that would becomeofficial teaching at Vatican II.15 Moreover, this teaching can be found invarious forms throughout the documents of Vatican II, such as LumenGentium 12, Dei Verbum 8, Gaudium et Spes 43 and ApostolicamActuositatem. But Sartori is mainly concerned with addressing the issue of‘areas of competence’ that has emerged in the postconciliar discussion. Inother words, because of the conciliar teaching of the special ‘secular’character of the lay vocation in the Church, are the laity limited tomaking a contribution on the Church in the world but not on intra-ecclesial matters and technical doctrinal issues? Did the Council mean toteach this rather neat separation of competencies?

In order to answer this question, Sartori first asks about the nature ofthe Church, and explains how theologically the historicity of the Churchmust be taken with absolute seriousness. But part of this historicity is thecultural-linguistic character of the expressions of our faith. Individualsand human society change in accordance with the law of historicity as itaffects persons. So, too, the Church changes in many respects in accordwith the law of historicity. Concretely, that means that the expressions ofthe Church’s beliefs must also change in order to mediate meaning tohistorically determined persons. But this is a complex process in which allthe levels of society are involved, and not only its leaders. The same mustbe true for the Church, where a person ‘receives’ theWord of God only tothe extent that he or she also ‘hands it on’. In the incarnational theologyof Chalcedon, this can only mean that the human and the divine areinseparably implicated in the hermeneutical and linguistic process ofdoctrinal formulation. Moreover, the Incarnation reflects the inner-Trinitarian life, where the Eternal Word is not only ‘spoken forth’ orenunciated, but ‘returns’ to the Father as Word in unending ‘re-expression’ and in the love that is the Holy Spirit. Now, if we apply thesetheological insights to the Church, we see that the ‘reception’ spokenabout since the conclusion of the Council is none other than this activityof receiving, rethinking, applying and living by all believers. On the onehand, this certainly does not exclude the necessity of a magisterialteaching office in the Church, but this cannot mean that believers, and thelaity especially, have no direct contribution to make here, even in themost abstruse of theological questions. Though the functions aredifferent, the responsibility for (re)defining the faith belongs to all – fortheological and cultural-linguistic reasons. The law of specializationwhich seems to rule both our social life and our ecclesial life is not to berejected out of hand, but neither is it to be so extended as to mean thatcommon, ordinary experience plays no significant role any longer inhuman life.

In his ecumenical observations, Sartori points out how in the exerciseof his magisterium the pope acts in a public way that includes a certain

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‘personalization’ of the Church and not as someone outside of, or above,the Church. At such moments, the pope does not act entirely alonebecause he becomes a personal expression of the faith of the wholeChurch. But this necessarily means that the faith of the whole Church assensus fidelium comes to expression in authoritative magisterial state-ments. That faith, in fact, is the very heart of the authoritative teaching.Some meaningful form of consultation is needed, not as a condition ofofficial teaching but as a consequence of what it means to teach publicly.In the past, General Councils of the Church have expressed this aspect ofpublic teaching well, inasmuch as each bishop was expected to lay forththe faith of his community before the other bishops in order to arrive atunanimity among themselves. Referring to an article by Lukas Vischer,Sartori shows how today this process is better accomplished in anecumenical spirit of openness to the concrete experiences of historicity ofall the Churches, and where Vischer speaks of a certain ‘commonmagisterium’ among the Churches.16

Sartori’s article was an important contribution to the discussionbecause it considered the SF against the presuppositions of historicity ,the value of culture, and the role of language in expressing truth andmeaning. What I also found important was how Sartori related this dataof contemporary epistemology and hermeneutics to the fundamentalChristian beliefs of the Incarnation and the Trinity and saw in them not acontradiction but a context for better understanding the human situationand the need for society to have voices of authority in dialogue with itsmembers and with other societies, i.e., in this context with otherChurches.

LITERATURE FROM 1990 TO 2001

We begin the review of literature on the SF after 1989 with the‘Instruction on the Ecclesial Vocation of the Theologian’ [Donumveritatis] of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith [henceforth,the CDF], dated 24 May 1990.17 For an understanding of the instruction,it is important to recall that the teaching of Vatican II on the SF takesplace in the context of a discussion entitled ‘The Problem of Dissent’ [yy32–41]. The instruction seems to have been issued because of the growingtensions felt in the Vatican between the genuine role of theologians toclarify teachings in fidelity to the Church’s expressed faith and to bringthem into fruitful dialogue with modern questions and conditions ofliving. The different explanations that often resulted from this effortseemed to be posed in terms of a dissenting view. The CDF wasparticularly dissatisfied with the publication and dissemination ofdiffering theological views in the modern press and other forms of massmedia. It was felt that undue pressure was being exerted by the media on

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the papal and episcopal magisterium, and that theologians were beingcaught up in this struggle. The CDF sought to limit public pressureby defining dissent in terms of ‘public opposition’, ‘manipulation andpressure to conform’ to public opinion, the utilizing of forms of ‘protest’,undue ‘critical opposition’ of theologians, and an invalid invocation of‘theological pluralism’ to justify cavalier dismissals of Church teachings.What was envisaged by the CDF’s understanding of dissent was itsmodern form as public pressure brought to bear on the magisterium.

In light of this context, the CDF’s instruction reviewed the teaching ofVatican II on the SF. In paragraph 35, it states the following:

The sense of the faith is a property of theological faith; and as God’s gift whichenables one to adhere personally to the truth, it cannot err. This personal faithis also the faith of the church, since God has given guardianship of the word tothe church. Consequently, what the believer believes is what the churchbelieves. The sensus fidei implies then by its nature a profound agreement ofspirit and heart with the church, sentire cum ecclesia. Although theological faithas such then cannot err, the believer can still have erroneous opinions since allhis thoughts do not spring from faith. Not all the ideas which circulate amongthe people of God are compatible with the faith. This is all the more so giventhat people can be swayed by public opinion influenced by moderncommunications media. Not without reason did the Second Vatican Councilemphasize the indissoluble bond between the sensus fidei and the guidance ofGod’s people by the magisterium of the pastors. These two realities cannot beseparated. Magisterial interventions serve to guarantee the church’s unity in thetruth of the Lord. They aid her to ‘abide in the truth’ in the face of the arbitrarycharacter of changeable opinions and are an expression of obedience to theword of God.

This summary of Vatican II is not so much incorrect as incomplete. Thetone is begrudging when it comes to the true role of all the faithful – laityand pastors alike – in helping to express the underlying faith of theChurch as a whole. No mention, for instance, is made that each of thebaptized really participates in the roles [munera] of Christ as prophet,priest and shepherd-king by reason of their being anointed in the Spirit.The text argues too quickly to the possibility of error on the part of thefaithful and their being easily led astray by today’s mass media. Vatican IIurged all the faithful to participate actively in clarifying, formulating, andproclaiming the faith of the Church. Moreover, at the Council thehierarchical or pastoral magisterium was encouraged to listen to and tosupport the genuine insights of all the faithful, including the lay faithful.The bishops, too, have an obligation to engage in fraternal and opendialogue with their flocks. Unfortunately, by its selective use of Vatican IIon the sensus fidei, the ‘Instruction on the Ecclesial Vocation of theTheologian’ only advanced the climate of competition between leadersand faithful that it sought to oppose.18

In an article that appeared in 1991, Patrick J. Hartin first explains theteaching of Vatican I and II on the exercise of infallibility by the bishops

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in Council and by the pope, and how these forms are related to theunderlying gift of infallibility by Christ to his Church.19 His mainpurpose, however, is to show how Vatican II’s teaching on the SFmust beextended to include all the Christian churches. To date, the teaching hasbeen too narrowly focused on the SF in the Catholic Church, whereas theCouncil was concerned more broadly about the Church of Christ, eventhough it ‘subsists in the Catholic Church’. As Hartin says, we need ‘thewider perception of sensus fidelium as applying to the whole body of theChristian faithful and not simply to the Roman Catholic Church’ (p. 83).He shows that this was the case because of the extent of Vatican II’s re-appropriation of many elements better preserved and better integratedinto their ecclesial lives by many Churches of the Reform, as well as by theOrthodox Churches. But how would this be worked out in a practical wayso many years after the Council?

Basing his argument on sociological findings among Catholics and onthe official teaching of other non-Catholic Churches, as well as onsociological data among their members, Hartin attempts to show that therejection by many Christians (the vast majority?) of the teaching of PaulVI on the sinfulness of all forms of artificial contraception, and theunambiguous support of this papal teaching by John Paul II, is notsupported by the sensus fidelium in the Church of Christ on its broadestunderstanding, i.e, as including all Christians. Why then does the RomanCatholic magisterium continue to reject artificial contraception as sinfulwhen the faithful seem to be so convinced that it is not sinful and that inmany instances is even necessary? Hartin shows how this teaching,because of its anthropological grounding, cannot be understood apartfrom human experience. He writes: ‘One’s understanding of humannature and subsequent action do not simply come directly through therevealed word of scripture, but the various sciences also help to throwlight upon human nature, and attention must always be given to thediscoveries coming from their research’ (p. 86). In particular, he showshow the reasoning of the magisterium continues to be bound to anoutdated anthropology, which was expressed by Thomas Aquinas in itsclassical form, that saw the beginning of life in terms of full potentialityfor human life in the male semen. In radice, everything is already given inthe male semen and is only received by a women and sheltered in herwomb. To stop this life is tantamount to homicide. Today, neither sciencenor believers accept this anthropology and its consequences forconception of human life. In short, it pertains neither to the deposit ofthe faith nor to contingent truths connected with revelation. If themagisterium saw the indispensability of the sensus fidelium on thebroadest level of all believers, it might be inclined to reexamine itsteaching on this sensitive and divisive matter.

I think Hartin’s insight that the SF needs to be seen in terms of thewhole ‘Church of Christ’ is an important one that other scholars have

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failed to consider. However, I have two reservations. First, regarding hisinterpretation of Lumen gentium 12, I am not convinced that in article 12the bishops at Vatican II thought that they were teaching about the sensusfidelium in this broadest or universal sense. The description of anepiscopally structured Church that follows and the explicit reference tothe ‘sacred magisterium’ sound like expressions of how the sensus fideliumis understood in the Roman Catholic Church. Second, I do not think thatthe example of birth control is a helpful one for making his point, at leastnot in terms of its obvious application to the Roman Catholic Church. Itseems evident to Hartin that the widespread rejection of papal teachingon artificial contraception is an expression of the sensus fidelium. Hartinmight be right, but that is not certain. In my opinion, we are still too closein time to the magisterial teaching of Paul VI to be able to say he wasdefinitely right or that he was definitely wrong. The teaching ofHumanaevitaemight represent only a first stage in the Church’s reformulation of itsteaching on the means of limiting conception in marriage. We havemoved into a second stage where the papal teaching is being engaged bythe conjugal experience of the faithful and by broader currents of thoughtin the various human sciences. At this point we really cannot predict whatthe final formulation of the teaching will be. It might be in a form thatmodifies and nuances both the official papal teaching and the popularlyformulated dissent from this teaching by many of the faithful, not tomention the objections of theologians. We are in the midst of the processof reception of the Church’s teaching, and it is hardly possible to predictwhat its final form will be. To be human is to be historical and so to someextent to be open to real change and development, not as expressions of acertain biological or psychological determinism, but as an expression ofhuman self-transcendence in freedom. In a Roman Catholic perspective,it is a simplification to say the pope is right and the majority of the faith-ful are wrong, or to say that the pope is wrong and the majority of thefaithful are correct. Such disjunctive thinking is unproductive andmisleading.

On the other hand, Bernard Sesboue understands the complexity of theissue of determining the sensus fidelium in his article published thefollowing year.20 The first thing we notice is that Sesboue is concernedwith the role of the SF in moral matters, and he examines the specific caseof the change in the Church’s official position on lending money atinterest, which had been judged to be immoral from the early Churchonwards. The clarity of this case helps Sesboue in determining severalaspects of the SF which is not permitted by too hasty a recourse to thecontemporary situation of the widespread rejection of the CatholicChurch’s official position on artificial birth control. First, the determina-tion of the SF cannot be rushed, and for this reason opinion polls are nothelpful in coming to a conclusion. It is an almost maddeningly slowprocess. Only after much experience do the different levels of believers –

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the faithful, theologians, experts, the bishops, the pope – come toagreement on a disputed matter. Second, it pertains primarily tounderstanding human experience and not to interpreting creedalstatements or technical issues. Furthermore, it can be detected in whatpeople in the Church, and the laity in particular, do and how they decide amatter of conscience. For Sesboue, in determining the sensus fidelium onan issue of the practice of the faith, the laity in question include primarilythose believers who are truly engaged in their faith, i.e., whose faith ex-acts something from them. The theologian, whether cleric or layperson, contributes by helping to articulate the non-verbal or ambiguousexperience of such convinced and often conflicted Christians. Theylend their skill at expressing this experience and thereby helping tocommunicate it better to the bishops who have yet another responsibilityof teaching the Christian faith and practice in an authoritative way. Theformation of schools of thought, discussion and debate among thehierarchy, theologians and the faithful eventually leads to clarification ofpoints on which all can agree. But this demands time and liberty ofreflection, research and discussion.

Sesboue demonstrates the components of the process he has outlinedby drawing on the history of the controversy surrounding the exclusionby the official Church of demanding interest on loans. He demonstratesthe necessity of something genuinely new intervening in order to justify achange in teaching or practice. Thus, what might have been morallyacceptable in the light of banking practices before the advent of neweconomic principles in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries had to giveway to questioning and the formulating of interim moral positions in thelight of new social principles. The process was not without cost: theacceptance of considerable ambiguity, respect for the official positionof the Church while entertaining personal doubts and engaging inquestionable practices, and being engaged to some degree in open conflictwith one’s fellow Christians or one’s leaders.

Sesboue has made an important contribution to the discussion byhighlighting the role of new social conditions in life, the value andrichness of human experience, the inevitability of change in life, but alsothe need for time and the challenge from authority to effect change in aconstructive way. Especially in matters of engagement in the world andquestions of conscience, the faithful have an indispensable role to play inthe formulation of principles of Christian moral conduct. However, I doneed to register one major disagreement with Sesboue, and that is hisvirtual limitation of a contribution in these matters to what we often call‘practicing Catholics’ – despite the ambiguity of the designation. Theteaching of Vatican II on the SF refers to all believers and makes no suchdistinction among the faithful. Obviously, there are real differences ofengagement in the faith and in the Church on the part of Christians.However, to insist too much on the differences results in diminishing our

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appreciation of the real bonds of baptism. This is where I think Hartin isclearer in seeing the role of all Christians, and not just Catholics, incoming to an understanding of the faith. What Sesboue fails to appreciateis that the Spirit can also be addressing the wider Church preciselythrough the radical questioning, rejection, or indifference toward theChurch of the marginally involved – or even by the Church’s hostilecritics. The SF also calls for making room for a forum in which all thebaptized can be involved. It is salutary and startling to recall just howappreciative Jesus was of the religiously alienated persons of his day andtheir conflicts with their religious leaders.

In his contribution the same year, James L. Heft set himself the task ofasking how the sense of the faithful contributed to the formulation of thedogmas of Mary’s Immaculate Conception and her Assumption, andwhat significance this has for ecumenical dialogue.21 Heft first reviews thethesis of J. Robert Dionne, that history shows us that official Churchdoctrine is sometimes received by the Church, while at other timesdoctrines are not received over the long haul, but reveal a history ofdiscontinuity, detours and even dead ends.22 Given this empirical fact,Dionne has argued for caution by the papal magisterium on matters thathave not been solemnly defined as dogmas. The argument moves in thesame general direction as the articles by Hardin and Sesboue, namely,sometimes papal teaching is upheld by the bishops and the faithful, whileat other times it submits to change with the concurrence of the bishops.At any rate, doctrines are rather open, even if official teaching, and theofficial Church should not rush to dogmatize them because of a supposedinfallible ordinary teaching of the episcopal magisterium. As a result, thepope and the bishops also receive doctrine from the sensus fideliumand this fact accounts for the possibility of change regarding doctrinein the Church. The fact that the popes felt it necessary to consult thefaithful confirms the fact that the magisterium also really ‘learns’ fromthe faithful.

The ecumenical implications of Dionne’s position are important, andChristians of the Reformed tradition are encouraged to take note of theessential role played by the SF in the definition of the faith in Catholicsources. It is not so simple as drawing a line of absolute separationbetween dogmatic matters (e.g., Christology or the Trinity) reserved tothe pope and bishops, and moral, family or social issues, which are opento contribution by the laity. In fact, Heft shows, the Marian doctrines ofthe last two centuries often deal with issues of anthropology andeschatology that the faithful seem quite competent to deal with in the wayappropriate to them. We must be careful in making too rigid a distinctionbetween dogma and doctrine, with all the implications of this distinctionvis-a-vis the role of the faithful. Like Hardin, Heft also calls forbroadening our understanding of the sensus fidelium to include non-Catholic Christians, and here the ecumenical implications begin to

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emerge clearly. Henceforth, future consultation of the faithful by thepope and the bishops needs to include consultation with all the Churchesof East and West. Far from being divisive, therefore, the recent Mariandogmas open up important areas for reflection and discussion among allChristians. Heft challenges non-Catholics to be open to rethinking theMarian doctrines, in as much as they are not just about Mary in a narrowsense but include Christological and ecclesiological elements that areindispensable for them to consider. As with all dogmas, so too with theMarian dogmas, we still need to speak of their development in terms ofunderstanding and appropriate formulation. Far from being an areasealed off from further reflection, the Marian dogmas are fertile groundfor the process of a deepening appreciation and have a positiveecumenical contribution to make.

In his article on the SF, Heft has confirmed the intuitions of sometheologians on a number of issues and raised some interesting questions.His contribution has not so much broken new ground as shown that thediscussion of the sensus fidelium is not only an intra-Catholic matter butan inter-Christian one. Even doctrinal matters which at first blush seem tobe divisive and might better be avoided, upon closer examination showdogmatic positions which are held in common or at least are urgent issuesfor Catholics and non-Catholics alike. An important aspect of this issue isto see the role played by Christian experience in such matters, and thatpart of the ecumenical dialogue includes an ecumenically sensitive sharingof this experience with one another.

The same year, Paul G. Crowley published a richly suggestive articleon Cardinal Newman’s understanding of the nature of doctrine andits relevance in a new ecclesial context.23 After explaining Newman’sunderstanding of Christian revelation in terms of an idea, i.e., somethingliving, developing, multifaceted and corporately shared by believers,Crowley asks how we should understand Newman’s organic pattern ofdevelopment of understanding in our intellectual and cultural condition.First, he reminds us of Karl Rahner’s position on the status of the Churchtoday as world Church, and no longer primarily Eurocentric. What isdominant in this understanding is the primacy of the local societies andfaith communities in all their particularity for experiencing and living thefaith. In this changed social condition, the Church as universal or catholicnecessarily expresses itself in richly diverse ways that call for genuineinculturation of the faith. A world Church calls forth inculturated faithand not rigid uniformity of faith expressions and Christian praxis. In thelate twentieth century and beyond, inculturation is the form in whichNewman’s idea of Christian faith will develop.

Next, recognizing that our thought-world is no longer one dominatedby metaphysics or epistemology but by hermeneutical issues of under-standing and communication of what is understood, a hermeneuticaltheory like that of Hans-Georg Gadamer can be of great help. Drawing

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on Gadamer’s theory of a ‘fusion of horizons’, Crowley shows how ithelps to explain current understanding from a fusion of the horizon ofunderstanding of a past statement (in Scripture or tradition) withsubsequent expressions, now constituting a tradition of interpretations,and especially with a new historically conditioned understanding sharedby believers today. Such a fusion of understandings does not mean therejection of past interpretations, but a moving beyond them in terms oftheir meaning for today. In turn, today’s meaning will become a momentin a new, future process of the fusion of horizons. In Crowley’s words, ‘Inthis fusion of horizons the subject’s current horizon is broadened. Thehorizon of the tradition, in turn, becomes more sharply focused within theconsciousness of the subject, in this case, within the faith consciousness ofthe local church. The result of this process is a new horizon of meaningwhich does not obliterate the former understandings, but rathertranscends them’ (p. 169). With Gadamer’s help we can see that theprocess of inculturating the faith today need not be understood as thecollision of incommensurable cultures but as a fusion of horizons inwhich all the cultures encountering each other can only benefit fromdeeper understanding, however different they may be.

Finally, Crowley sees the importance of the sensus fidelium interms of the role it plays in the process of inculturation as thecollective understanding that results from living the faith in particularhistorical, cultural conditions. In today’s circumstances of a worldChurch and the ineluctability of inculturated forms of the faith, the sensusfidelium plays an analogous role to the one it played for Newmanin his teaching of a ‘development of the idea of Christianity’. Crowley’sarticle is important because he shows the relevance of the hermeneuticalquestion in today’s thought-world. He is successful in this attemptbecause he realizes that it is the underlying issue of the need forinculturating the faith and the new circumstances of being a worldChurch that we find ourselves in today. Newman still has much to teachus, especially in his stress on the need for a dynamic collectiveunderstanding of the faith, but Crowley views Newman in a changedphilosophical context.

My own article from 1992 examined the teaching of Vatican II on theSF.24 I stressed the grounding of the teaching in the Council’s rethinkingof ministry in the Church in terms of the threefold office of Christ asProphet, Priest, and King. The Council clearly taught that Christ sharedthese ‘offices’ with the whole People of God and not just with themembers of the hierarchy. According to Vatican II, the clearest evidenceof Christ’s sharing his salvific work with all believers is its teaching aboutthe charisms given freely and liberally by the Holy Spirit in the Church.Finally, I pointed to several ideas regarding the future of the conciliarteaching. I especially stressed the need to familiarize the Catholic faithfulwith the Council’s high regard for their dignity and the importance of

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their contributions in the formulating of Christian doctrine and in theprocess of evangelization. Finally, the Church’s appreciation of theteaching on the SF will need to mature as regards the Church ascommunio, the very nature of revelation and how it is formulated, thecategory of ‘ordinariness’ as the locus of salvation, the nature of ministryas coterminous with Christian existence, and the need to continue toencourage Vatican II’s call for coresponsibility in the Church on the partof everyone.

In the following year, a study on the SF by five scholars appeared inGerman.25 Five articles in the collection constitute a self-contained studyof the SF. I propose to treat all five studies together before offering acritique of the entire work.

First, Walter Kirchschlager examined whether the New Testamentsupports the idea of the SF in the Church.26 Though the term sensusfidelium appears nowhere in the New Testament, the reality is veryevident. In studies of Paul, the Fourth Gospel, and Acts of the Apostles,Kirchschlager insists on two important theological data: the collegialcharacter of the communities and their witness to Christ and the role ofthe Holy Spirit in continuing to bring the communities into the fullnessof Christ’s revelation. He writes: ‘The sensus fidei is articulated in thecommon action of the whole community. A pronounced oppositionbetween the authority structure of the community and the rest of itsmembers is nowhere to be found. Instead, a conscious effort is made tointegrate them’ (p. 20). The author concludes by remarking that for theNew Testament the SF does not exclude but rather includes a diversity(Vielfalt) of expression of belief. Unity in the faith and plurality ofexpressions of the faith are not mutually exclusive.

In his contribution, Josef Steinruck turned to the history of theChurch.27 He examined five areas of Church life in which the faithful wereactive: the liturgy, including the sacrament of Order; issues of faith, piety,and the formation of confraternities; the filling of Church offices;participation at ecumenical councils and synods; and the administrationof Church goods. Steinruck gives particular attention to the role the laityhave played in the election of their bishops and pastors. In general, thepicture that emerges from the history of the Church is one in which thefaithful have participated in a broad variety of activities and that theirparticipation was not seen as something unusual or as a challenge to therole of hierarchical authority. Another conclusion the author draws isthat the Church has always developed its lived structures in dialogue withthe structures then accepted in the civil society at large. Though this nevermeant a simple adopting of these structures, e.g., the absolute monarchiesof the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it did mean taking over manyelements from them. He then suggests that the same will necessarily betrue for the Church today as it continues this process in an era influencedby democratic principles.

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The systematician, Wolfgang Beinert added to his already importantstudies on the SF by his new contribution for the book.28 Beinert saysforthrightly that today we need to state clearly that the witness characterof Christian truth comes from five interrelated sources: Scripture,tradition, the magisterium, theological research, and the sensus fidelium.Each is necessary today, and each strengthens the other in its task ofgiving witness to Christ. But each also operates differently from theothers. The faithful understand the faith consciously or precognitively,but generally not in the same way as bishops or theologians do. Thefaithful are challenged to work toward the ‘consonance’ of the truth asthey experience it in the whole of their lives with the teaching of themagisterium. Nor does the perception of this ‘consonance’ emergewithout conflict. The growing importance of the Church understood ascommunio means that the highly ‘vertical’ way of understanding truth(from the pope and bishops downward) needs to make room for a more‘horizontal’ understanding in which the role of each group of believers isrespected. To achieve this, Roman Catholic theology needs to continue toincorporate pneumatology more effectively into its ecclesiological theoryand practice. One such gain is clearly a greater appreciation of the role ofall charisms in the Church.

A major problem with the sensus fidelium remains the ways it isdetermined. Beinert helps advance the issue by giving us four rules. First,there is a certain proportionality between the commitment of the believerto Christian praxis and that person’s degree of credibility in expressingthe SF. Second, what the SF claims shows itself to be of benefit to thewhole Church or to a group of believers for whom it is demanded and forwhom the praxis fosters true Christian life. Third, a statement of thesensus fidelium must be in conformity with the content of the Gospel asunderstood in accordance with generally accepted hermeneuticalprinciples. And fourth, the rule of dialogue always obtains, since themagisterium, theologians, and the faithful – all three – can arrive at anappropriate statement and lived praxis only by showing mutual respectand communicating with one another, generally over a longer period oftime. The SF can be neither forced nor rushed.

Dietrich Wiederkehr studies the difficulty with the acceptance of theteaching of Vatican II on the SF.29 He does this concretely by examiningtwo cases, the call by the local Church of Basel gathered in synod in 1974for changes regarding the exercise of the ordained ministry, and the caseof the condemnation of Liberation Theology by the Congregation for theDoctrine of the Faith in 1984. In both instances, the roles of local bishops,theologians, and the faithful were given little attention by Romanofficials. In the second case, the Congregation did nuance its criticisms ina later statement (1986) and this leads the author to hope for yet moresensitive official responses to positions taken by the sensus fidelium. Still,the tone of the article remains far from optimistic and challenges the

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magisterium in particular to greater willingness to engage in dialogue inthe Church.

In his contribution, Gunter Koch examines some of the pastoralconsequences of the SF in the Church.30 In particular, he develops atheology of dialogue, also called for by Beinert andWiederkehr. The onlyway to avoid the danger of identifying the sensus fidelium with inadequatemeans of expression, such as opinion polls or the tallying of percentageson divisive topics, is for Church authorities to encourage genuinedialogue in which each person and group in the Church can be heard andwhere tolerance is shown. However, dialogue is not easy. It demands areal spirituality, an appropriate asceticism, and meaningful opportunitiesfor it to come to expression. The latter include the liturgy, a parish’scatechetical program, and adult education. Real questions and solidpositions do not happen in a vacuum but only where sincere efforts ateducation take place. Koch’s ideal is one of a polyphony of voices, inwhich each voice adds to the richness of the whole work.

Mitsprache im Glauben? was the first full-length book to treat the topicof the SF in a way that presented a synthesis of the fundamental questionsin a way accessible to most lay readers.31 By and large the work wassuccessful in achieving its goals, and the articles by Steinruck and Beinertin particular helped to advance the theological discussion as well. If onlyfor the reason that it was the first such book to appear in print since theCouncil, it would deserve attention.

At a meeting of German-speaking Catholic professors of systematicand fundamental theology in 1992, the topic of the sensus fideiwas treatedin depth.32 The six presentations given on that occasion, however, werenot published until 1994 – a year after Mitsprache im Glauben? Theobjective of this meeting was obviously to advance the question of the SF,to relate it to other fields of study, and to offer criticisms. I will look atcertain articles in the collection that fit into the present summary of theliterature.

First, I propose to look at the contribution by the sociologist Franz-Xaver Kaufmann.33 The author asks the probing question as to the veryutility of the term sensus fidelium and focuses on the issue of thecommunication of the faith today in the light of the general crisis ofWestern civilization. For the Church, two crises have emerged at the sametime, a crisis of tradition which the Church shares in general withWesternsocieties affected by modernity and a crisis of communicating the faith.Kaufmann concentrates on the second crisis, since it questions the veryconcept of the sensus fidelium. He fears that using the term creates theimpression that a consensus fidelium exists and that the forms of suchcommunication are at hand in the Church. Instead of consensus, todaywe must speak of widespread ‘communicative dissent’ even among thosewho can be classified as practicing Catholics. Kaufmann sees little hopefor change so long as the dominant ecclesiology remains ‘ecclesiocentric’

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and refuses to become ‘communional’, i.e., an ecclesiology that makes itspeace with pluralism, freedom, conscience, participation, consent, anopen attitude, and with constructive dissent as a means toward solvingthe crisis of communicating the faith to a future generation. Efforts toreinforce the authority of the magisterium or to insist on a purportedunity of expression (e.g., the Catechism of the Catholic Church) remainecclesiocentric and cannot resolve the problem. But in the context of acommunional model of the Church, the term sensus fidelium can take onreal meaning.

Kaufmann points to two important features of the postmodernecclesial situation. First, postmodernism speaks openly about the ‘returnof religion’ in its critique of modernity. The postmodern ethos is less‘atheistic’ than modernity in its heyday. On the other hand, this religio-sity is very ambiguous and diffuse. Postmodernity seems to presentCatholicism with a real opportunity, but one that has its price, and that isthat the Church must become a ‘teaching and a learning community’. Toaccomplish this, the Church must be willing to foster real, meaningfulcommunication among all its members. Such an ecclesial community cancreate the social ‘practicability structures’ (Relevanzstrukturen) withoutwhich the Church in a postmodern world will continue to be dividedinternally and can only stagnate. With such ‘practicability structures’ theChurch can go about the necessary business of building a ‘body ofknowledge commonly held’ and common practices that provide meaningand that are the prerequisites for effective socialization of futuregenerations of Christians. The author insists on the necessity of a‘network of organizational structures’ that both facilitate the ‘teachingand learning of communicative praxis’ locally and still connect this more‘local’ experience with a sense of universality or of an overarching sense ofmeaning and place in the world and history. Finally, he reviews brieflysome of the possibilities available in the literature of social theory andcognitive science.

In her contribution, Sabine Pemsel-Maier, too, points out the dangerof a naive understanding of the sensus fidelium in the Church.34 It is oftenassumed that the SF has to do with the role played by the faithfulexclusively in the development of dogma. Thus, what the faithful expressimperfectly, from an epistemological point of view, by their actions, e.g.,forms of Marian devotion, is raised to a higher epistemological level bythe hierarchical magisterium, e.g., in the definitions of Mary’s Immacu-late Conception and Assumption. Within the context of a growingawareness of what it means to become a ‘subject’ in society, but also in theChurch, the author shows the importance of the role of ‘experience’ bothin order to become a subject in the modern sense of the term and in termsof what this means for the ecclesial notion of the SF. If one lays greaterstress on the role played by experience, with all the richness this term hascome to assume philosophically, the role of the faithful in bearing and

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explicating the SF is expanded greatly. The author demonstrates this factbriefly by referring to the documents of Vatican II.

The contribution by Dietrich Wiederkehr examines the SF againstcontemporary understandings of truth.35 Like the participants beforehim, Wiederkehr too is sceptical of a simplistic understanding of thesensus fidelium. Beginning with an examination of the pluralism of ourtimes and its characteristics, he passes on to what he calls a ‘politics oftruth’ (Wahrheitspolitik). Like many today, he understands truth not interms of some fixed, self-evident content, but more as understanding thatemerges in a process that tends toward a future, or ‘eschatological’, goal.The truth we seek is determined by its location in human history and bythe conditions of knowledge which today are understood increasingly associally and culturally determined. To a Westerner, the concept of truthhas taken on a new meaning, one that is more processive, participative,dialogical, and, as eschatological, open to further completion. Theteaching of Vatican II on the sensus fidelium, therefore, needs to berethought in terms of these changed perspectives with regards to truth.The accent is less that of a purported full possession of the truth by thebody of believers in the Church, or on the magisterium’s more perfectgrasp of the truth and its demand for obedience, and more on the searchfor truth (Suchbewegung) as constitutive of truth. The sensus fidelium infact is just this ‘process of seeking the truth’ that must lead to consensusand be revealed in it.

The demand to seek consensus, however, is better achieved locally andwithin specific cultural circumstances, and has the advantage of involvingindividuals and groups meaningfully in the process of consensus-building. In this perspective, too, the role of episcopal conferences takeon added meaning and force. But all of this demands confidence inthe abiding presence of the Spirit throughout the process, respect forsubsidiarity, and patience in the face of the time and effort that are neededto reach consensus. In this process, there is genuine need for institutionalsupport and direction. As the author indicates, ‘Only by intending andstruggling in individual acts, together with institutional support, canthere be consensus in the faith as emerging convergence on truth’ (p. 197).Thus, far from being excluded, the magisterium plays an essential rolein the search for truth. Wiederkehr points to five areas in particularwhere this role needs to be exercised: by providing a sense of security(Vergewisserung) as to the origin of faith, by assuring continuity intradition, by insisting on the need to keep alive the fullness of theChurch’s truth, by assuring mutual communication, and by insisting onthe demand to remain open to eschatological fullness.36

Finally, I would like to examine the article by Wolfgang Beinert in thiscollection.37 After a rather lengthy presentation of the history of the termat Vatican II, in the postconciliar magisterial literature, and its use inecumenical documents, Beinert turns again to an examination from the

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perspective of systematic theology. He stresses the ecclesial character offaith and shows how the sensus fidei leads to the sensus fidelium in theChurch as congregatio fidelium. The issue of ‘consensus’ then is not anincidental one but is at the heart of the Church’s proclamation of the faithand of its credibility. Because the SF is shown in the fullness of Christianlife and involves all of the believer’s activities in the world as well,systematic theology needs to be open to all the richness of the SF, evenprophetic and mystical movements. The SF is a genuine mediation ofGod’s revelation. This means that it needs to be tested only against thisrevelation and not primarily because it can be shown to echo themagisterium. In other words, the SF is a true ‘theological resource’ (locustheologicus) and possesses its own formal authority. It stands togetherwith the hierarchical magisterium and the magisterium of theologians as atestimony to revelation communicated in Scripture and tradition, but alsocommunicated in a living way in the richness of human experience. In thisoften difficult process, openness to dialogue, struggling to reachconsensus, and the patient acceptance of inevitable tensions are thehallmarks of the SF. Beinert concludes his contribution by pointing to themany questions that remain both as to a full understanding of the SF aswell as questions of how it should be implemented concretely orinstitutionally in the Church. Even though much needs to be clarified,the fact remains that the SF is a real factor in the life of the Church and inthe proclamation of the Gospel in particular.

Each of the articles in this collection points to problems associatedwith the SF. One has the feeling that thirty years after the proclamation ofthe Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, many in the Church are comingto the realization that we are moving into another period of reflection,one in which the problems surrounding human knowledge and the searchfor truth, the phenomenon of the ever-increasing pluralism of positions,and the growing sense of lostness in a de-centred world. These studiespoint to the past represented by Vatican II and the postconciliardiscussion of the SF almost as expressions of a certain naivetethat is impotent in the face of the ever more urgent questions oflate modernity. This is the contribution of the collection: not a denialof the teaching of Vatican II on the sensus fidelium but a challenge torethink it courageously in the light of new questions, and the realizationthat at some point the sensus fidelium has to lead to some form ofconsensus fidelium.

Notes

*In Grateful Memory of Jean-Marie Roger Tillard, O. P. (1927–2000). The second part of thisarticle will appear in the January 2006 issue of the Hey J.

1 ‘Sensus Fidei: Theological Reflection Since Vatican II (1965–1989)’, HeyJ XXXIV(1993), pp. 41–59. and 123–36.

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2 The central passage for the conciliar teaching is the Dogmatic Constitution on theChurch, 12.

3 HeyJ XXXIV (1993), p. 133.4 ‘Kirchliches Lehramt und allgemeiner Glaubenssinn. Ein Reformatorisches Anliegen

aus der Sicht des I. und II. Vatikanischen Konzils’, Theologie und Glaube 65 (1975), pp. 266–77.5 ‘Note a proposito della consultazione dei fedeli’, La Civilta Cattolica 138/4 (1988),

pp. 40–45.6 Eglise d’Eglises. L’ecclesiologie de communion (Paris: Cerf, 1987), pp. 143–54. ET. Church

of Churches: The Ecclesiology of Communion, by R. C. De Peaux (Collegeville: Liturgical Press,1992), pp. 108–18.

7 See my discussion of Tillard’s article ‘Le ‘Sensus Fidelium’. Reflexion theologique’ and, inreaction, the papers by Fernand Dumont and Emilien Lamirande in art. cit., pp. 48–54. In 1982Tillard returned to the subject of the sensus fidelium in his contribution ‘Theologie et vieecclesiale’ in Bernard Lauret and Francois Refoule (eds.), Initiation a la pratique de la theologie,vol. 1 (Paris: Cerf, 1982), pp. 161–82. In this chapter, Tillard approaches the topic in a way verysimilar to his pioneering presentation in 1974 at the Fifth Colloquium of the Centre d’etudesd’histoire des religions populaires. His later presentations benefitted greatly from considering thesensus fidelium in a much broader ecclesiological context, as we will see below.

8 ‘Autorite et memoire dans l’eglise’, Irenikon 61 (1988), pp. 336–46 and 481–84.9 On the specific role of the SF in the ‘laity’, see the short article by Jesus Sancho Bielsa,

‘El sensus fidei en los laicos’ in A. Sarmiento, T. Rincon, J. M. Yanguas and A. Quiros (eds.),La mision del laico en la Iglesia y en el mundo. VIII Simposio Internacional de Teologıa de laUniversidad de Navarra (Pamplona: Ediciones Universidad de Navarra, 1987), pp. 545–51.

10 ‘The Sensus Fidei and the Development of Dogma’ in Rene Latourelle (ed.), Vatican II:Assessment and Perspectives Twenty-Five Years After (1962–1987), vol. 1 (New York: Paulist,1988), pp. 138–56.

11 See ‘Bedeutung und Begrundung des Glaubenssinnes (Sensus fidei) als einesdogmatischen Erkenntniskriteriums’, Catholica 25 (1971), pp. 450–86 and my discussion ofthis article in ‘Sensus Fidei: Theological Reflection Since Vatican II (1965–1989)’, HeyJ XXXIV(1993), pp. 45–47.

12 Early in 1988, Giandomenico Mucci published an article on the infallibility of theChurch and the roles of the magisterium and the faithful in witnessing to and determiningChristian faith. Unfortunately, despite good intentions, his study does little to advance the issueof the nature and role of the SF or to answer the question of the relationship of the two poles orexpressions of belief. Curiously, he continues to maintain the ‘passive’ role of the laity withrespect to infallibility by referring to it consistently as infallibilitas in credendo, whereas the role ofthe magisterium as infallibilitas in docendo is an ‘active’ exercise. Instead of trying to relate thetwo expressions of the SF, each distinct yet interconnected, Mucci insists on keeping them quiteseparate. His real fear is that any acknowledgment of a doctrinal role, or of the ‘doctrinalauthority’ of the faithful, will lead inevitably to the confusion of employing opinion polls,pressure group tactics associated with democratic politics, forms of voting which favor themajority, etc. This fear prevents any serious investigation of the role of genuine consultation inthe Church and the appropriate forms for today. See ‘Infallibilita della Chiesa, Magistero et‘autorita dottrinale’ dei fedeli’, La Civilta Cattolica 139/1 (1988), pp. 431–42.

13 ‘What is the Criterion for the Sensus Fidelium?’ in Jurgen Moltmann and Hans Kung(eds.), Who Has the Say in the Church? Concilium 148, (New York: Seabury, 1981), pp. 56–60.

14 ‘Il ‘sensus fidelium’ del popolo di Dio e il concorso dei laici nelle determinazionedottrinali’, Studi Ecumenici 6 (1988), pp. 33–57.

15 Cardinal Guidi, the Archbishop of Bologna, delivered one of the most memorablediscourses at Vatican I. Guidi supported the majority view of the conciliar bishops who favoureda strong definition of papal infallibility. However, as a Dominican theologian familiar with theThomistic position on infallibility, he also had a keen sense that papal infallibility was not simplya personal prerogative of the pope but served as an expression of the Church’s infallibility. Papalinfallibility could not be divorced from the Church’s own infallibility. Guidi’s cautions were notintended to saddle the papal exercise of infallibility with conditions of its exercise but withmaking it unmistakable that any exercise of infallibility by the pope is always also an attestationof the underlying belief of the whole Church, particularly as given expression by the bishops asleaders who witness to the faith of their communities. His intervention brought about animportant change in the formulation of the doctrine of papal infallibility at Vatican I and so keptthe continuing role of the episcopate in the Church’s consciousness even while he supported the

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papal claims. Bishop Vincent Gasser of Brixen also belonged to the majority, but as the officialrelator for the Deputation of the Faith, or the one responsible for explaining Chapter IV of theConstitution Pastor aeternus, he was also instrumental in shepherding the constitution throughto its final approval on 18 July 1870. In particular, Gasser was successful in explaining the phrasethat when the pope teaches infallibly it is by way of issuing a teaching ex cathedra. The intent wasto make it clear to all the bishops that the exercise of papal infallibility was rare, was the highestpossible exercise of his magisterium, was not a purely personal exercise of infallibility but anecclesial act, and that it was strictly limited to the deposit of revealed truth. See the discussions byCuthbert Butler in Christopher Butler (ed.), The Vatican Council 1869–1870, Based on BishopUllathorne’s Letters, (London: Collins and Harvill Press, 1962), pp. 353–55, where Guidi isquoted extensively, and ibid., pp. 386–99 (‘BishopGasser’s Exposition’) onGasser’s presentationto the bishops. See also Klaus Schatz, Papal Primacy: From Its Origins to the Present, translatedby John A. Otto and LindaM. Maloney (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1996), pp. 157–66for a particularly lucid and careful presentation and explanation of the underlying ecclesiologicalissues, as well as the points of agreement and disagreement among the bishops at Vatican I.

16 ‘How Does the Church Teach Authoritatively Today?’ in Who Has the Say in theChurch?, pp. 1–10.

17 See Origins 20/8 (5 July 1990), pp. 117–26.18 Also from 1990, see Salvador Pie-Ninot, ‘Sensus Fidei’ in Rene Latourelle and Rino

Fisichella (eds.),Dictionary of Fundamental Theology (New York: Crossroad, 1995), pp. 992–95.The author presents a fine history of the concept from the early Church to such postconciliardocuments as John Paul II’s Apostolic Exhortation The LayMembers of Christ’s Faithful People[Christifideles Laici], art. 14 – an extended summary of Vatican II’s teaching on the SF. The focusof the article, however, is on the sensus fidei as an epistemological criterion for establishingChristian belief. The author has concisely outlined the principal issues and questions regardingthe sensus fidelium and the teaching authority of the hierarchy, the contribution of praxis byChristians to the Church’s teachings, and the emerging importance of ecclesial synodality andconsultation for determining the consensus fidelium. Mention should also be made of Michael J.McGinniss, ‘Sensus Fidelium, USA: Laity and Church Structures for the Future’, Listening, No.25 (1990), pp. 71–85. The article is primarily dedicated to the topic of the place of laity and thegrowth of lay ministry in particular in the postconciliar Church in the United States of America.

19 ‘Sensus Fidelium: A Roman Catholic Reflection on Its Significance for EcumenicalThought’, Journal of Ecumenical Studies 28 (1991), pp. 74–87.

20 ‘Le ‘sensus fidelium’ en morale a la lumiere de Vatican II’, Le Supplement 181 (1992),pp. 153–66.

21 ‘‘‘Sensus Fidelium’’ and the Marian Dogmas’, One in Christ 28 (1992), pp. 106–25.22 The Papacy and the Church: A Study of Praxis and Reception in Ecumenical Perspective

(New York: Philosophical Library, 1987).23 ‘Catholicity, Inculturation and Newman’s Sensus Fidelium’, HeyJ XXXIII (1992),

pp. 161–74.24 ‘Sensus fidei: Meaning, Role and Future of a Teaching of Vatican II’, Louvain Studies 17

(1992), pp. 18–34.25 Gunter Koch, ed.,Mitsprache im Glauben? Vom Glaubenssinn der Glaubigen (Wurzburg:

Echter, 1993).26 ‘Was das Neue Testament uber den Glaubenssinn der Glaubigen sagt’ (ibid., pp. 7–24).27 ‘Was die Glaubigen in der Geschichte der Kirche zu vermelden hatten’ (ibid., pp. 25–50).28 ‘Der Glaubenssinn der Glaubigen in der systematischen Theologie’ (ibid., pp. 51–78).

See also the author’s ‘Bedeutung und Begrundung des Glaubenssinnes (Sensus fidei) als einesdogmatischen Erkenntniskriteriums’, Catholica 25 (1971), pp. 271–303 and ‘Das Finden undVerkunden der Wahrheit in der Gemeinschaft der Kirche’, Catholica 43 (1989), pp. 1–30 and mydiscussion of these articles in ‘Sensus Fidei: Theological Reflection Since Vatican II (1965–1989)’,pp. 45–47 and 131–133.

29 ‘Glaubenssinn des Volkes: Einbahnstrasse oder Gegenverkehr?’ in Mitsprache imGlauben?, pp. 79–98.

30 ‘Glaubenssinn – Wahrheitsfindung im Miteinander. Theologische Grundlagen –pastorale Konsequenzen’ (ibid., pp. 99–114).

31 Earlier works, such as Foi populaire, foi savante Cogitatio fidei 87 (Paris: Cerf, 1976) andJohann B. Metz and Edward Schillebeeckx (eds.), The Teaching Authority of BelieversConcilium180 (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1985) had treated more specialized questions and were intendedprimarily for theologians.

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32 Dietrich Wiederkehr (ed.), Der Glaubenssinn des Gottesvolkes – Konkurrent oder Partnerdes Lehramts? Quaestiones disputatae 151 (Freiburg: Herder, 1994).

33 ‘Glaube und Kommunikation: eine soziologische Perspektive’ (ibid., pp. 132–60).34 ‘Differenzierte Subjektwerdung im Volke Gottes’ in ibid., pp. 161–81.35 ‘Sensus vor Consensus: auf dem Weg zu einem partizipativen Glauben – Reflexionen

einer Wahrheitspolitik’ (ibid., pp. 182–206).36 After Wiederkehr’s article, there is a short and suggestive contribution by Werner

Bockenforde, a canon lawyer, entitled ‘Statement aus der Sicht eines Kirchenrechtlers’ ( ibid., pp.207–13).

37 ‘Der Glaubenssinn der Glaubigen in Theologie- und Dogmengeschichte. Ein uberblick’(ibid., pp. 66–131, including eight pages of bibliography).

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