Friday, January 5, 2007
Incorruption of Tradition
Msgr. George Agius, Tradition and the Church (Adapted):
The Traditions of the Catholic Church consist of the Constituition which Christ Himself instituited and which the Apostles established throughout the world (as it was known back then). Even after the death of the Apostles, their commands were carried out by their successors. It would be unlikely that in the first centuries, the fundementals and principals of Christianity would become corrupted as to allow way for a different order of things in terms of Church governance. Some of the Apostles and their immediate successors lived to an old age, allowing the intermingling of one generation of Christians with another. This meant that a new generation of Christians would likely be brought up and instructed as were the first generation of Christians.
This affirmation about the impossibility of change in the government of the Church may also be applied to the impossibility of corruption of Apostolic teaching in the early centuries- and thus also down to our day. As no man can reject historical documents, we must take the writings of the Chruch Fathers for what they are worth- as historical documents and not as revealed truths. A destruction of historiacal certitude? I think so. We accept the Fathers' writings just as we accept those of Caesar or Flavius. There isn't a reason why we should believe those authors more than we do theearly writers of the Church. The Church Fathers' enlightened the Church and glorified the Faith!
Among the writings of the Fathers is the Canon of St. Vincent Lerin. In his Commonitorium, St. Vincent discerns what is pure from what is corrupt, to distinguish truth from plain opinion, to determine orthodoxy from faulty. "We must hold what has been held always, every-where and by all; this is truly and properly Catholic... this can be obtained if we follow universality, antiquity, consent."
Labels: Books, Quote, Traditionalism
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