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Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor As Expositions of 'Natural Law'

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Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor As Expositions of 'Natural Law' Aemaet Wissenschaftliche Zeitschrift für Philosophie und Theologie http://aemaet.de, ISSN 2195-173X Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor as Expositions of ‘Natural Law’∗ Contrasted with Their Irrational Rejection Carlos A. Casanova∗∗ 2018 ∗This paper was written to be presented at the first meeting of the John Paul II Academy for Life and the Family, held in Rome on May 21st, the title of which was “Human Life, the Family and the Splendour of Truth: Gifts of God, Humanae vitae 50 years – Veritatis splendor 25 years.” The Text is available under the Creative Commons License Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) Publication date: 15.06.2018. ∗∗Carlos A. Casanova is a Catholic philosopher from Venezuela, who now lives in Chile. PhD in Philosophy by Universidad de Navarra (1995), he is currently Full Professor at Universidad Santo Tomás. Epost: carlosacasanovag@XYZ (replace ‘XYZ’ by ‘Gmail.com’) Mail: Ejército 146, Universidad Santo Tomás. Torre C, piso 7, Centro de Estudios Tomistas. Comuna de Santiago. Santiago Chile Aemaet Bd. 7, Nr. 1 (2018) 56-101, http://aemaet.de urn:nbn:de:0288-20130928720 Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor 57 as Expositions of ‘Natural Law’ Abstract The paper holds that the encyclicals Humanae Vi- atae and Veritatis Splendor presuppose the West- ern and Christian view of morality as a science (natural or supernatural) which is able to uncover the real order of which human beings and their actions are a part. It shows how the theological dissidents who reject the main tenets of these en- cyclicals are unable to explain the moral order and, therefore, are less rational than the encyclicals and in lesser agreement with Revelation. In order to demonstrate the previous point, it classifies the dissidents in four categories according to the meta- physical views they presuppose: Kantian, Utilit- arian, Weberian and so called post-Modern (Marx- ist, Nietzschean, Freudian, Heideggerian, etc.). Fi- nally, it shows that the fourth kind of dissidence, the so called post-Modern, is the most frequent today and that this kind of dissidence is utterly lawless and irrational. 1 Introduction: Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor The two encyclicals by Popes Paul VI and John Paul II were a powerful thundering of the Holy Spirit amidst a disoriented world. They embody God’s calling of humani- ty to respect the dignity of their intellect, to allow Him heal their will, to acknowledge His plan for human nature and human persons. They proclaim once more the strength 58 Carlos A. Casanova of that great discovery of the Greeks: the intellect which for the first time Thales used for the formulation of real demonstrations and to search for the archaí, can be used to explore scientifically the moral order. And this science, which flourished under the skillful minds of Socrates, Pla- to and Aristotle, and under the Stoics and the Roman Ju- rists, was elevated by the light of Faith and the strength of Grace to a supernatural level and became moral theology under the skilfull minds of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church. Moral theology is a science which can uncover to the extent possible to the human mind assisted by Reve- lation and grace, the real order, the divine order in which we as human beings, with our nature and our personalities are integrated. As we shall see, the deep meaning of the theological dissidence is precisely that strange breeds have entered the Church of Christ: a breed of men who reject the reality of the divine order and even a breed of men who radically reject rationality. The doctrine of Humane vitae is a confirmation of the perennial teachings of the Church on the matter of sexu- al morality, considering the new challenges posed by the development of techniques used for the temporal or per- manent sterilization of the man or the woman and / or for the killing of the new life in the womb of the mother. (But perhaps the document did not underline sufficiently that Catholic parents in principle must receive the children that God sends, unless there are grave reasons to avoid a pregnancy.) This teaching was declared by Paul VI to be a natural law teaching and not only a revealed teaching. On this latter point, the Pope was entirely right and on a previous occasion I had the opportunity of (a) showing Aemaet Bd. 7, Nr. 1 (2018) 56-101, http://aemaet.de Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor 59 as Expositions of ‘Natural Law’ that Plato, a gentile philosopher deprived of Revelation, proves the very same doctrine in the 8th book of his Laws (838-841); and (b) proving the depth of the Papal insight.1 Veritatis splendor is an encyclical of wider scope. There, John Paul II endeavors to reach a clear and updated formu- lation of moral theology’s basic tenets and to place them within the organisms of Christian life and theological wis- dom. The Pope makes clear that the commandments are necessary for salvation as Christ Himself has taught un- equivocally; that they are, however, just a necessary con- dition for a higher state of perfection, following Christ; and that the gift of the Holy Spirit is needed for the moral life of the new creature (chapter 1 and nn. 28-29). But then John Paul II confronts the subjects concerning which the- re has been dissent among theologians with the perennial magisterium of the Church, especially after the II Vatican Council. And he focuses on the meaning of the law and its relationship with human freedom; the relation between conscience and truth; and the structure of the moral act, including the fundamental orientation of the person to his final end. In all these subjects, John Paul II shows a tho- rough knowledge of Scripture and of the philosophical and theological issues. He, very especially, grasps that the main questions are: (a) whether there is a truth about the good (see n. 30); (b) if the intellect [conscience] and the will [freedom] have to conform to an order which, coming from God, they do not create, and this precisely to achieve the 1See “¿Por qué tiene tantas dificultades la razón natural en nuestra época para reconocer las doctrinas centrales de la encíclica Humanae vitae?,” in Razón y tradición. Estudios en honor de Juan Antonio Widow. Globo, Santiago, 2011, tomo II, pp. 353-377. 60 Carlos A. Casanova sought end (eternal life, happiness) and freedom (“truth will set you free”); and (c) whether there are kinds of ac- tions which, because of their species [“object”], are always evil and therefore forbidden and incompatible with the hu- man good even if the agent has a “good intention” and / or calculates that the total amount of consequences of his action will be good. Humanae vitae was bitterly contested by Catholic theo- logians and clerics, not suprisingly. The issues dealt with were too dear to the powers of this world (which nowa- days are clearly not Christian), and too many theologians and Catholic universities received substantial funding from such powers and wanted to fit in with the neo-Malthusian culture which those powers promote.2 But even Veritatis splendor received a strong opposition and was harshly con- tested, despite its dealing with more general issues not so directly applied to human action: some dissident theolo- gians grasped that the basic tenets from which they had criticized Humanae vitae were skilfully addressed by John Paul II. The negative critical responses against the ency- clicals by Catholic theologians can be classified according to the philosophical categories which theologians necessa- rily use even if they speak very much against “metaphy- sics” and “philosophy” and praise instead “social” or other “sciences.” There are mainly four kinds of categories on which an author can fall, Kantianism, Utilitarianism, We- berianism and post-Modern. Most authors have traces of two or more of these categories, since Kant and Marx have 2See E. Michael Jones, Libido Dominandi, Saint Augustine Press, South Bend, 2006. Aemaet Bd. 7, Nr. 1 (2018) 56-101, http://aemaet.de Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor 61 as Expositions of ‘Natural Law’ influenced the Utilitarian, and authors with Kantian lea- nings are affected by Utilitarian or so called post-Modern influences. For example, a mostly Utilitarian author such as Louis Janssens has undoubtedly Marxist influences.3 The classification is useful, however, because it helps to reduce the different views to their principles. 2 Four kinds of positions that reject the real order of reality (a) Some responses use Kantian concepts such as “au- tonomy” (in theological jargon, “conscience”4), “op- tion,” “choice” and the like. In Chile, for example, Tony Mifsud claims that the Law cannot replace the individual’s discernment because if it did, the decisi- on would be not free and responsible, but immature and heteronomous.5 3In “Ontic Evil and Moral Evil” he holds mainly a proportionalist view, but he clearly adheres to some Marxist theses such as these: the endeavours to overcome ontic evil require from us that we do not tolerate the current structures of production; the proposal of an utopia without ontic evil, as that contained in Marx’s Communist Manifesto, is good; thanks to Marx in Belgium was suppressed the work of children. See “Ontic Evil and Moral Evil”, in Proportionalism. For and Against, Christoper Kaczor, editor. Marquette University Press. Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 2000, pp. 100-147. 4I do not mean that in every case “conscience” is jargon. I mean that in contexts in which what is meant is [Kantian] “autonomy” the use of “conscience” instead is jargon. 5I must clarify that Mifsud is not a Kantian. He draws from wha- tever sources to defend lawlessness, as we will see.
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