Engaging Karl Rahner's Trinitarian Theology with Bernard

THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA

Participation in the Triune God: Engaging Karl Rahner’s Trinitarian Theology with Bernard Lonergan’s Four-Point Hypothesis, as Developed by Robert Doran

A DISSERTATION

Submitted to the Faculty of the

School of Theology and Religious Studies

Of The Catholic University of America

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements

For the Degree

Doctor of Philosophy

Michael Kujan

Washington, D.C.

2018

Participation in the Triune God: Engaging Karl Rahner’s Trinitarian Theology with Bernard Lonergan’s Four-Point Hypothesis, as Developed by Robert Doran

Michael Kujan, Ph.D.

Director: Rev. John P. Galvin, Dr. Theol.

The Canadian Jesuit theologian Bernard Lonergan (1904-1984) introduced into

Trinitarian theology what his interpreter Robert Doran (1939- ) has called his “four-point hypothesis.” This hypothesis identifies four created supernatural realities through which human beings participate in the four relations among the three divine persons. These four created supernatural realities are the human existence of Jesus (i.e., the esse secundarium), sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory (i.e., the lumen gloriae) whereby the saints in heaven see God. Through these four, people participate, respectively, in the four divine relations of paternity, active spiration, passive spiration, and filiation. Paternity, filiation, and passive spiration constitute the three divine persons, respectively, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Active spiration is really identical to paternity and filiation considered together.

Ever since this four-point hypothesis came to Doran’s attention in 1994, he has sought to construct a systematic theology based upon it. Within his systematic theology, Doran appeals to this four-point hypothesis as the basis for a new formulation of the psychological analogy used to describe the Trinity, an exercise which Lonergan did not perform himself. Doran’s formulation of the psychological analogy differs from those developed previously by Augustine (354-430),

Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), and Lonergan inasmuch as his analogy does not proceed from what is known about human nature, but rather from the human experience of supernatural grace.

Accordingly, Doran has been developing a supernatural, psychological analogy for the Trinity by examining how the four created supernatural realities identified in Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis enable human consciousness to experience and participate in the divine life. Although Doran is developing such a supernatural, psychological analogy within the context of Lonergan’s Trinitarian theology, he invites others to make connections between the four-point hypothesis and the writings of other theologians. Toward this end, this study engages the four-point hypothesis with the Trinitarian theology of the German Jesuit, Karl Rahner (1904-

1984). It assesses Rahner’s theology as a possible framework within which to develop a four- point hypothesis and a supernatural, psychological analogy. It concludes that Rahner’s theology provides a stronger ontological foundation for both than Lonergan and Doran.

This dissertation by Michael Kujan fulfills the thesis requirement for the doctoral degree in Systematic Theology approved by Rev. John P. Galvin, Dr. Theol., as Director, and by William P. Loewe, Ph.D., and Joshua Benson, Ph.D., as Readers.

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– Rev. John P. Galvin, Dr. Theol., Director

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– William P. Loewe, Ph.D., Reader

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– Joshua Benson, Ph.D., Reader

For Diane, the love of my life.

iii TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS...... vii

INTRODUCTION...... 1

CHAPTER I: Bernard Lonergan’s Four-Point Hypothesis: Its Interpretation and Development...... 16

A. Lonergan’s Hypothesis...... 16

1. Lonergan’s Notes for His 1951-1952 Course on Grace...... 20

a) The Grace of Union, or the Esse Secundarium...... 25

b) Sanctifying Grace...... 59

c) The Habit of Charity...... 65

d) The Light of Glory...... 67

2. “De Ente Supernaturali”...... 68

3. Lonergan’s Notes for His 1947-1948 Course on Grace...... 74

4. Divinarum Personarum and De Deo Trino: Pars Systematica...... 77

B. Robert Doran’s Development of Lonergan...... 85

1. Doran’s Literature on the Four-Point Hypothesis...... 85

2. The Possibility of a Supernatural Trinitarian Analogy...... 87

3. Doran’s Systematic Theology...... 92

4. Doran’s Use of the Four-Point Hypothesis...... 103

5. Doran on a Phenomenology of Grace...... 105

6. Participation in Active and Passive Spiration...... 106

7. Participation in Paternity and Filiation...... 113

8. Two Forms of Participation in God: Notional and Essential...... 120

9. Distinguishing the Divine Relations by Their Orderings...... 122

10. Doran’s Planned Future Work...... 126

C. Responses to Doran’s Project...... 128

1. Charles Hefling...... 130

2. David Coffey...... 138

D. Conclusion...... 142

CHAPTER II: Karl Rahner’s Theology of Grace and the Trinity: Its Interpretation and Development...... 144

A. Philosophical Foundations for Theology...... 144

B. Pure Nature and Historical Nature...... 160

C. Uncreated Grace, Created Grace, and Quasi-Formal Causality...... 172

D. The Trinitarian “Grundaxiom” and Non-Appropriated Relations...... 189

E. Conclusion...... 201

CHAPTER III: Transposing the Four-Point Hypothesis into the Categories of Karl Rahner’s Theology...... 203

A. The Trinitarian Structure of Grace...... 205

B. Rahner on the Four Created Graces of the Four-Point Hypothesis...... 208

1. Point One: Esse Secundarium...... 211

2. Point Two: Sanctifying Grace...... 229

3. Point Three: The Habit of Charity...... 232

4. Point Four: The Light of Glory...... 234

C. Conclusion...... 242

CHAPTER IV: Developing the Four-Point Hypothesis into a Supernatural Trinitarian Analogy from the Foundations of Karl Rahner’s Theology...... 244

A. Natural Analogies for the Trinity...... 244

B. Toward a Supernatural Psychological Analogy...... 249

C. Conclusion...... 260

CHAPTER V: Comparing the Theologies of Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan as Foundations for the Development of a Supernatural, Psychological Analogy...... 262

A. The Natural Psychological Analogy as a Foundation...... 262

B. The Four-Point Hypothesis as a Foundation...... 267

C. The Relationship between Uncreated and Created Grace as a Foundation...... 274

D. Conclusion...... 282

CONCLUSION...... 284

BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 289

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am grateful to all of those who helped to make this study possible. I would like to thank

Rev. John Galvin for encouraging me as I pursued this course of study and for directing me throughout the process of research and writing. I am also indebted to Dr. William Loewe and to

Dr. Joshua Benson for their generosity as they devoted their time and attention to my work and provided helpful corrections and suggestions. My gratitude also extends to The Catholic

University of America for providing me with support and resources as I performed this study.

I am very appreciative of my parents, who have been so generous in their support of me over the years. I am especially grateful to Diane, the love of my life and the joy of my heart. I thank her for her patience and loving support as I worked to complete this study.

vii

INTRODUCTION

The Canadian Jesuit theologian Bernard Lonergan (1904-1984) introduced into

Trinitarian theology what his interpreter Robert Doran (1939- ) has called his “four-point hypothesis.” It was first presented in Lonergan’s notes for his course on grace in 1951-1952 at

Regis College in Toronto, then again in his Divinarum personarum (1957), which in turn was the forerunner to his De Deo trino: Pars systematica (1964). Ever since this four-point hypothesis came to Doran’s attention in 1994, he has written several articles working to construct a systematic theology based upon it. He has also recently continued to develop this systematic theology in the first volume of his projected two volume work The Trinity in History: A

Theology of the Divine Missions (2012).

This hypothesis identifies four created supernatural realities through which human beings participate in the four relations among the three divine persons. These four created supernatural realities are the human existence of Jesus (i.e., the esse secundarium), sanctifying grace, charity, and the light of glory (i.e., the lumen gloriae) whereby the saints in heaven see God. Through these four, people participate, respectively, in the four divine relations of paternity, active spiration, passive spiration, and filiation. Paternity, filiation, and passive spiration constitute the three divine persons, respectively, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Active spiration is really identical to paternity and filiation considered together.1

1 Cf. Robert M. Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1” (paper presented at the Lonergan Workshop, Boston College, Boston, MA, June 18, 2014), http://lonerganresource.com/pdf/books/1 /52%20-%20The%20Trinity%20in%20History%20-%20First%20Steps%20Beyond%20Volume%201.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 19: “Active spiration is really identical with paternity and filiation together, and so is only notionally or conceptually distinct from them.” 1 2

Within his systematic theology, Doran appeals to this four-point hypothesis as the basis for a new formulation of the psychological analogy used to describe the Trinity, an exercise which Lonergan did not perform himself, only hinting at the possibility. Doran’s formulation of the psychological analogy differs from those developed previously by Augustine of Hippo (354-

430), Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), and Lonergan inasmuch as his analogy does not proceed from what is known about human nature, but rather from the human experience of supernatural grace.

As a foundation for his project of expanding the four-point hypothesis into a new form of the psychological analogy, Doran cites Lonergan’s essay “Christology Today: Methodological

Reflections” (1976), in which he suggests a Trinitarian analogy that would begin with the dynamic state of being in love.2 Developing this idea, Doran has sought to transpose the traditional psychological analogy developed by Lonergan in his De Deo trino into a supernatural, psychological analogy based in Lonergan’s intentionality analysis of “religiously differentiated consciousness,” which explains how grace affects human consciousness. This amounts to a supernatural analogy from the order of grace based upon the human experience of the four created supernatural realities identified in Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis.

In addition, since Doran recognizes that human experience of the supernatural is based upon the elevation of human nature, he has sought to clarify his supernatural, psychological analogy by comparing the structure of religiously differentiated consciousness with the nature of

“interiorly differentiated consciousness,” which Lonergan developed to explain human

2 Cf. Bernard Lonergan, “Christology Today: Methodological Reflections,” in A Third Collection: Papers by Bernard J.F. Lonergan, SJ, ed. Frederick Crowe (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1985), 93-4.

3 consciousness on the level of nature, and which Doran has used to articulate Lonergan’s original natural psychological analogy with greater precision.3

Although Doran is using the four-point hypothesis to develop a supernatural, psychological analogy within the context of Lonergan’s theology, he invites others to make connections between the four-point hypothesis and the writings of other theologians.4 In fact, the

Trinitarian theology of the German Jesuit, Karl Rahner (1904-1984), ought to be engaged with this four-point hypothesis. His insights about the Trinity, the nature of grace, and the human experience thereof would serve as a valuable resource for those who seek to further develop a supernatural, psychological analogy around the four-point hypothesis going forward.

Rahner developed his Trinitarian theology in several articles, as well as in an extended treatment in the second volume of the systematic theology series Mysterium salutis (1967).5

Central to his theology is his widely influential “Grundaxiom” that the “immanent Trinity” of

God’s inner life “is the economic Trinity” expressed in history through the divine missions, “and

3 Cf. Robert M. Doran, The Trinity in History: Missions and Processions (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012), 391n49:

The analogy that I am proposing, which is a development on the possibilities latent in Lonergan’s later analogy, will be understood by analogy with precisely the natural realities to which we are currently appealing. That is one of my reasons for going into so much detail on the analogy from nature, even if I wish to promote an analogy from supernatural participation in divine life. The other reason, of course, is to establish the relations from above between the realm of religious values and the personal value of the subject in his or her self-transcendence.

4 Cf. ibid., xvi: “Readers will no doubt want more explicit connections than I have provided to other figures in the contemporary systematic-theological scene. But I have found that students with different interests are quite capable of providing these on their own. . . . I have to ask that readers allow the systematic task to stand on its own and that they make their own connections to other theologians and theological emphases.”

5 Karl Rahner, “Der dreifaltige Gott als transzendenter Urgrund der Heilsgeschichte,” in Mysterium salutis, Bd. 2, Johannes Feiner, Magnus Löhrer, Hrsg. (Einsiedeln: Benziger, 1967), 317-401.

4 vice-versa.” From this axiom, Rahner concludes that human beings have a “proper” or “non- appropriated” relation to each of the persons of the immanent Trinity, precisely on account of the economic Trinity’s two-fold manner of “self-communication” through grace and incarnation.

These non-appropriated relations constitute the participation of human beings in the life of each of the divine persons, rather than merely in the divine nature in a general sense. Rahner believed that unless the relations of human beings to the divine persons were non-appropriated, it would be impossible for people to experience by grace the Father, the Son, and the Spirit as “distinct manners of subsisting.” Everything they knew about God by revelation would then apply equally to all three persons, as following from the activity of their shared divine nature. In such a case, people’s experience of the economic Trinity would not amount to a real encounter with the different persons of the immanent Trinity. The different aspects involved in people’s experience of the economic Trinity would be merely appropriated, rather than properly attributed, to the persons of the immanent Trinity. For Rahner, such a situation would amount to a failure in God’s act of self-communication.

The identity of the immanent Trinity with the economic Trinity in Rahner’s theology, in which the non-appropriated relations of human beings to the divine persons are grounded, is constituted by the “quasi-formal” causality of God’s self-communication upon the human spirit through grace. This manner of causality is distinct from the “efficient” causality by which the

Trinity acts as one through the divine nature, wherein merely appropriated relations exist between each of the divine persons and creation. Doran has criticized Rahner for his description of God’s self-communication in grace as the quasi-formal cause of a supernaturally elevated person, rather than as the term of such a person’s created relation to God in the order of

5 exemplary causality, as Lonergan held. However, Rahner has concluded that unless God exercises quasi-formal causality, supernatural participation in the divine persons through non- appropriated relations is impossible. For this reason, it appears that Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity provides a stronger ontological ground than Lonergan for the four-point hypothesis.

Fundamental to this comparison of Lonergan, Doran, and Rahner in reference to the four- point hypothesis is their common belief that, to an extent, human beings can experience grace in this life. Indeed, without experience of the four preeminent graces mentioned in the four-point hypothesis, any supernatural Trinitarian analogy developed from it would be emptied of meaning. However, whether people experience grace is a disputed question in Catholic theology.6

6 Cf. L. Matthew Petillo, “The ‘Experience of Grace’ in the Theologies of Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan” (PhD diss., Boston College, 2009), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com .proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/304848745/fulltextPDF/DF71704BA1F41CCPQ (accessed January 23, 2018), 2-3:

The idea of ‘an experience of grace,’ though endorsed by transcendental Thomistic thinkers, has raised red flags in the minds of magisterial authorities. In one of the more recent versions of the Catechism, the following statement was issued regarding ‘grace’ and ‘experience:’ “since it belongs to the supernatural order, grace escapes our experience and cannot be known except by faith.” Aside from the official and relatively recent catechetical teaching that, at least ostensibly, rejects the idea of an ‘experience of grace,’ there are also large sectors of Catholic theologians who fail to recognize its legitimacy. While the document and its exponents, quite correctly, intend to preserve the supernatural character of grace, the exclusion of grace from consciousness has, in recent years, elicited reproach for reflecting an excessive abstractness and perhaps a certain extrinsicism that fails to meet the demands of the personalist turn in twentieth century theology. The so called “personalist turn,” as part of the overall pastoral reorientation of Catholic consciousness, was carried out more fully and explicitly under the auspices of Pope John XXIII as a means of reinvigorating a piety enervated by the overwhelming and pervasive sense of the absence of God in modern culture. Though precipitated by the scientific revolution and disseminated by those whom Schleiermacher called “the cultured despisers of religion,” the sense of divine absence—the feeling that God was an absentee father—was exacerbated during the twentieth century by the sudden and unpredictable eruption of war in 1914 and, most poignantly, by the epic monstrosities of Auschwitz nearly three decades later. By the mid 1940s, Christian piety, in the minds and hearts of the faithful, had become deflated by the felt disconnect and even polarity between, on the one hand, Church doctrine, which spoke so eloquently of divine love, and, on the other, the abysmal realities of human life. The conversation, which

In fact, paragraph 2005 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church argues that grace escapes human experience, for such experience would give people knowledge of when they have received sanctifying grace, thereby assuring them of their salvation. It notes that knowledge of personal salvation does not fall under the certainty of faith, since revelation only gives faith the assurance that God’s grace has been offered to humanity and is at work in the world. The

Catechism states,

Since it belongs to the supernatural order, grace escapes our experience and cannot be known except by faith. We cannot therefore rely on our feelings or our works to conclude that we are justified and saved. However, according to the Lord's words “Thus you will know them by their fruits” – reflection on God's blessings in our life and in the lives of the saints offers us a guarantee that grace is at work in us and spurs us on to an ever greater faith and an attitude of trustful poverty.7

In itself, the Catechism is an ordinary magisterial teaching, the publication of which was requested by a synod of bishops and promulgated with papal authority. Referencing a more authoritative source, the Catechism cites the extraordinary magisterial teaching of the “Decree on

Justification” from the sixth session of the Council of Trent (1547), which states the following in its ninth chapter:

Although it is necessary to believe that sins are neither forgiven, nor ever have been forgiven, except gratuitously by divine mercy for Christ's sake, yet it must not be said that sins are forgiven or have been forgiven to anyone who boasts of his confidence and certainty of the forgiveness of his sins and rests on that alone, since among heretics and schismatics this vain confidence, remote from all piety, may exist, indeed in our own troubled times does exist, and is preached against the Catholic Church with vigorous opposition. But neither is this to be asserted, that they who are truly justified without any doubt whatever should decide for themselves that they are justified, and that no one is

was Vatican II, emerged as the event in which the people of God mounted a response to this crisis of spiritual irrelevance.

7 Catechism of the Catholic Church: Revised in Accordance with the Official Latin Text Promulgated by Pope John Paul II, 2nd ed. (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1997), no. 2005. Emphasis in original.

absolved from sins and is justified, except him who believes with certainty that he is absolved and justified, and that by this faith alone are absolution and justification effected, as if he who does not believe this is doubtful of the promises of God and of the efficacy of the death and resurrection of Christ. For, just as no pious person should doubt the mercy of God, the merit of Christ, and the virtue and efficacy of the sacraments, so every one, when he considers himself and his own weakness and indisposition, may entertain fear and apprehension as to his own grace, since no one can know with the certainty of faith, which cannot be subject to error, that he has obtained the grace of God.8

In this passage, the decree argues that faith does not give one certainty that the grace one has received will be efficacious of salvation. Even though a person is justified by the grace of faith, salvation requires that faith be perfected by charity. One cannot be certain by the light of faith alone, however, that one’s actions are authentically motivated by charity through the reception of sanctifying grace. Hence, the text cautions against those who have vain confidence in their salvation through false assurance of being in the state of grace. The Catechism cites this passage from Trent because this affirms its claim that people cannot have an experiential knowledge of grace that would lead them to take their salvation for granted.

8 Heinrich Joseph Dominicus Denzinger and Peter Hünermann, Enchiridion Symbolorum: A Compendium of Creeds, Definitions, and Declarations on Matters of Faith and Morals, 43rd ed., eds. Robert Fastiggi and Anne Englund Nash (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2012), no. 1533-4:

Quamvis autem necessarium sit credere, neque remitti, neque remissa umquam fuisse peccata, nisi gratis divina misericordia propter Christum: nemini tamen fiduciam et certitudinem remissionis peccatorum suorum iactanti et in ea sola quiescenti peccata dimitti vel dimissa esse dicendum est, cum apud haereticos et schismaticos possit esse, immo nostra tempestate sit et magna contra Ecclesiam catholicam contentione praedicetur vana haec et ab omni pietate remota fiducia. Sed neque illud asserendum est, oportere eos, qui vere iustificati sunt absque ulla omnino dubitatione apud semetipsos statuere, se esse iustificatos, neminemque a peccatis absolvi ac iustificari, nisi eum, qui certo credat, se absolutum et iustificatum esse, atque hac sola fide absolutionem et iustificationem perfici, quasi qui hoc non credit, de Dei promissis deque mortis et resurrectionis Christi efficacia dubitet. Nam sicut nemo pius de Dei misericordia, de Christi merito deque sacramentorum virtute et efficacia dubitare debet: sic quilibet, dum seipsum suamque propriam infirmitatem et indispositionem respicit, de sua gratia formidare et timere potest, cum nullus scire valeat certitudine fidei, cui non potest subesse falsum, se gratiam Dei esse consecutum.

In his early writing “Analysis of Faith,” Lonergan seems to agree that supernatural realities surpass human knowledge. He does claim that grace can be experienced. However, he also argues that someone with faith can only have a conjectural knowledge of grace. For

Lonergan, intimate knowledge of grace and the supernatural only comes through the vision of

God. Thus, he believes that even though people can experience grace to an extent, they cannot judge the state of grace in their souls with certainty. He states,

The experience of grace, which one can have, grounds only a conjectural knowledge of grace. It is true that one may be moved by grace to eternal life, be directed towards a supernatural end. It is true that through God’s grace one may be moved to affirm ‘credendity,’ that he or she truly ought to believe. But it is not true that one who is so moved can be certain that this movement comes from God. Not only is the psychology here extremely complex, and not only is it imprudent to make a judgment about one’s own psychological state, but supernatural acts as supernatural lie outside the field of human knowledge, since they are supernatural for the very reason that they regard God as he is in himself.9

For Lonergan, the impossibility of judging the state of one’s soul, which the Catechism and the Council of Trent rightly emphasize, need not imply that grace cannot be experienced in any sense. Rather, human beings can have some limited experience of the supernatural in their growth from grace to glory. Later in life, Lonergan argued that such consciousness of grace enables one to supernaturally experience the dynamic state of being in love with God. Doran explains Lonergan’s belief that people can experience being loved by God and being invited to love God in return, which he described on occasion in terms of a fifth level of consciousness:

“The gift of God’s love for us poured forth into our hearts is an uncreated grace that effects in us,

9 Bernard Lonergan, “Analysis of Faith,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Vol. 19: Early Latin Theology, eds. Robert M. Doran and H. Daniel Monsour, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), 479.

9 as a relational disposition to receive it, and so as the consequent condition of its being given, the created grace of a fifth level of consciousness, at which we experience ourselves as loved unconditionally by God and invited to love God in return.”10 Furthermore, Doran explains how the fifth level of consciousness corresponds to what is called “sanctifying grace” in Scholastic theology, and how the dynamic state of being in love with God corresponds to “the virtue of charity.” These two are the remote and proximate principles of the operations of charity. These two comprise the conscious basis of people’s participation in God through grace. Doran explains these two graces as follows:

This experience of being loved unconditionally and of being invited to love in return is the conscious basis of (1) our share in the inner life of God, (2) our consequent falling in love with God, and (3) the dynamic state of our being in love with God. The dynamic state of being in love with God, in turn, as equivalent to what the Scholastic tradition called the infused virtue of charity, is the proximate principle of the operations of charity whereby God is attained as God is in God’s own self. But the created, remote, and proportionate principle of these operations – what Scholastic theology called the entitative habit or sanctifying grace of a created communication of the divine nature – is the fifth level of consciousness, the experience of resting in God’s unconditional love for us and of being invited to love in return, the real relation to, and constituted by, the indwelling God as term of the relation.11

Doran’s transposition of sanctifying grace and charity into the categories of intentionality analysis clarifies how grace can be experienced and understood as an analogue for the four divine relations of the God in whom people participate. This is what Doran has focused on in his development of Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis toward a supernatural analogy for the Trinity.

These transposed categories are essential to any such supernatural analogy. Indeed, while

10 Robert M. Doran, “Consciousness and Grace,” Method: Journal of Lonergan Studies 11, no. 1 (1993): 75.

11 Ibid.

10 scholastic metaphysics traditionally did not believe one could directly experience anything pertaining to the essence of the soul and its potencies, such as sanctifying grace and the habit of charity, the studies of interiority performed by theologians such as Lonergan, Doran, and Rahner have shown how these supernatural realities may be experienced subjectively, and not just known conceptually.12 Indeed, despite the appreciable reasons why the Catechism downplays the experience of grace, including its emphasis that one cannot judge the state of one’s soul, this teaching is likely to cause grace to appear extrinsic to human nature and people’s experience of

God in the world.13

12 Cf. Petillo, “The ‘Experience of Grace,’” 50-1:

Was it possible to express the medieval theology of grace in terms of human experience? The procedure of scholastic metaphysics begins with an awareness of objects as its initial set of data and proceeds through a series of deductions to an apprehension of the soul and its potencies. Since the concept of an ‘essence of the soul,’ in which sanctifying grace is received, results from inferential reasoning and is not experienced in the immediate data of consciousness, the technique proper to the scholastic method leaves no room for an experience of sanctifying grace. The idea of an experience of grace lies beyond the ambit of a thirteenth century ‘science of the soul.’ For it would require, in terms of the stage of meaning proper to scholastic theology, an experience of a supernatural gift received in the inner-most essence of the soul and its potencies; and according to scholastic science, there is no direct and immediate experience of the soul. An experience of what the scholastics meant by grace involves a breakthrough to a realm of interiority in which one becomes aware of the inner-most depths of the “soul.” Such a breakthrough requires a move beyond the “logical” techniques of medieval science to the “introspective” techniques of transcendental method. Both Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan employed the technique of introspection in their transcendental methods as a means of searching for the experiential equivalents of the basic terms and relations of scholastic metaphysics.

13 Cf. ibid., 4-6:

But why the insistence that grace “escapes our experience and cannot be known except by faith”? In other words, why is the Church hesitant to work out the full implications of the revolutionary insights of Vatican II? Firstly, the insistence that grace lies beyond the limits of human experience became important as a strategic ploy to counter the “certain knowledge of salvation” asserted by the reformers. In other words, there is a concern that if Catholics admit that grace can be verified in human experience, a concession is being made to the belief that personal salvation can be known with certainty. Secondly, the exclusion of grace from experience, in more recent times, has served the critical function of safeguarding the ‘supernatural’ from the reductionistic propensities of a post-modern hermeneutic of suspicion. Some fear that expressing grace in the language of human experience reduces a supernatural gift to the level of an empirical, predictable, controllable phenomenon. While the hermeneutic can be seen in the works of Nietzsche, Freud, Marx, and Durkheim, the specific venture of deconstructing religious experience was

Rahner likewise argues that grace can be experienced. He acknowledges that since people only know of supernatural realities through faith, many would be hesitant to claim an experience of grace unless they were mystics. However, Rahner suggests that there are “steps in the experience of grace,” and that the lowest of these steps are available to everyone. This suggestion is based upon the idea that grace is appropriated gradually. As Rahner writes,

Have we ever actually experienced grace? We do not mean by this some pious feeling, a sort of festive religious uplift, or any soft comfort, but precisely the experiencing of grace, i.e. of that visitation by the Holy Spirit of the triune God which has become a reality in Christ through his becoming man and through his sacrifice on the Cross. Is it possible at all to experience grace in this life? Would not an affirmative answer to this question mean the destruction of faith, of that semi-obscure cloud which envelops us as long as we are pilgrims on this earth? The mystics do indeed tell us – and they would testify to the truth of their assertion by laying down their lives – that they have already experienced God and hence also grace. But this empirical knowledge of God in mystic experience is an obscure and mysterious matter about which one cannot speak if one has not experienced it, and about which one will not speak if one has. Our question,

taken up by the American Pragmatist John Dewey. In the attempt to ‘get behind’ an awareness of the supernatural, Dewey reduces it to its ‘natural’ causes and conditions ‘beneath the surface’ of consciousness. The fear is that if all elements in consciousness are reduced to empirical explanation, locating grace in consciousness renders it vulnerable to the same reduction. Thirdly, since an experience of grace, aside from the Catholic mystical tradition, tends to be associated with the more spirited practices of some of the non- Catholic denominations, the resistance to affirming an experiential dimension to grace can be a means of preserving the contemplative mode of worship that typifies the Catholic tradition. In other words, it may be a deliberate attempt, on the part of the magisterium, to distance the Church liturgically from the anti- intellectual piety of some of the more charismatic churches for whom spontaneity in prayer— extemporaneous speech and tongues—the experience of being a sacred conduit through which the explosive grace of the spirit flows—becomes the mark of genuine religiosity; for such churches, any trace of a calculated, measured, and planned response to the Word of God—any hint of rational reflection— renders the response impersonal and automatically invalidates the prayer. The insistence that “grace escapes our experience and cannot be known except by faith” can be seen as an apologetic maneuver that attempts to distinguish and preserve the rich meditative spirituality of the Catholic liturgical tradition. In an attempt to defend Catholic piety and retain the supernatural and mysterious sense of grace, conservative voices in the Catholic Church tend to propose the Thomistic theology of grace, or most typically, some conceptualist variation, as the final and definitive word. In this conceptual framework, grace is relegated to a plane of existence beyond human consciousness—quarantined—and thereby removed from the dangers that would result from thinking about it in terms of human experience.

therefore, cannot be answered simply a priori. But perhaps there are steps in the experience of grace, the lowest of which is accessible even to us?14

Rahner goes on to describe the stages in which grace may be received and experienced.

He notes that God as uncreated grace is always offered to humanity, such that God’s self- communication is continually available to human experience. At first, on earth, the light of faith makes one aware of God’s self-communication only in an unthematic way.15 Ultimately, in heaven, the light of glory makes one conscious of it thematically. Hence, Rahner argues that people’s experience of the divine mysteries becomes increasingly thematic as the light of faith grows into the light of glory.16 Hence, one might say that the degree of created grace in the soul, whereby one’s faith is formed by sanctifying grace and charity, determines the extent to which a person’s consciousness of uncreated grace is thematic. Accordingly, people must appropriate

God’s grace in a gradual manner before their knowledge of the supernatural can become more thematic and the possibilities of their love can be intensified, realized, and solidified.17 Rahner

14 Karl Rahner, “Reflections on the Experience of Grace,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 3: The Theology of the Spiritual Life, trans. Karl H. Kruger and Boniface Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1967), 86.

15 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Christology within an Evolutionary View of the World,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 5: Later Writings, trans. Karl H. Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 172: “We are those even who in the experience of grace experience the event of the promise of the absolute nearness of the all-founding mystery (even though this experience is an unobjectified one).”

16 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Intellectual Honesty and Christian Faith,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 7: Further Theology of the Spiritual Life, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1971), 56: “Faith that is really committed feels itself protected and nourished by the experience of grace which precisely carries its own intrinsic justification with it. For such experience of grace, however subtle and indefinable the form in which it manifests itself, and however silent and interior the state of liberation which it brings, does point us on to the mystery of God.”

17 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Why and How Can We Venerate the Saints?” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 8: Further Theology of the Spiritual Life; 2, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1971), 19-20:

13 explains how people on earth who experience themselves as spirit, existing on the boundary between the world and God’s eternity, are able to experience their growth in grace, even prior to the beatific vision:

Man as spirit – precisely in real existence and not merely in theory – should really live on the border between God and the world, time and eternity, and [the man of the spirit and saint] always try again to make sure that they are really doing this, that the spirit in them is not merely the medium of the human kind of life. To proceed: once we experience the spirit in this way, we (at least, we as Christians who live in faith) have also already in fact experienced the supernatural. We have done so perhaps in a very anonymous and inexpressible manner. Probably we have experienced it in such a way even that we were unable to turn round – and did not dare to do so – to look the supernatural straight in the face. But we know – when we let ourselves go in this experience of the spirit, when the tangible and assignable, the relishable element disappears, when everything takes on the taste of death and destruction, or when everything disappears as if in an inexpressible, as it were white, colourless and intangible beatitude – then in actual fact it is not merely the spirit but the Holy Spirit who is at work in us. Then is the hour of his grace. Then the seemingly uncanny, bottomless depth of our existence as experienced by us is the bottomless depth of God communicating himself to us, the dawning of his approaching infinity which no longer has any set paths, which is tasted like a nothing because it is infinity. When we have let ourselves go and no longer belong to ourselves, when we have denied ourselves and no longer have the disposing of ourselves, when everything (including ourselves) has moved away from us as if into an infinite distance, then we begin to live in the world of God himself, the world of the God of grace and of eternal life.18

In this state God’s self-bestowal in grace is experienced with an immediacy in which the ‘object’ is precisely not brought into line with the other objects of the first-named experience, is not assignable to any particular ‘category’. Thus the process by which we make conceptually present to ourselves both God himself and our connection with him in knowledge and love, so that both he and it become ‘objects of enquiry’ to us, however important and necessary this process may be, is ultimately secondary. Of course in this too it is precisely the reality of God himself that we are explicitly directing our attention to. But in the last analysis this is in fact because in this act, which bears upon a concept, a still more basic and more elemental act takes place, one which has been elevated by grace to a state of transcendence in which it bears upon the reality of God himself and is upheld and sustained by it. The act achieved by our explicit consciousness always rests upon and presupposes the basic act, without being able to ‘take it in’ or thematise it in any exhaustive or comprehensive sense in each case.

18 Rahner, “Reflections on the Experience of Grace,” 88-9.

Rahner cautions, however, in a similar manner as the Catechism, that people cannot know when they are in the state of grace, lest they should experience a false assurance of their salvation. He stresses that salvation cannot be experienced as guaranteed until heaven, after one has voluntarily arrived, through grace, at an eternal acceptance God’s offer of self- communication. Salvation is a gift that must be received gratefully and selflessly. People can never claim it is owed to them, especially since they are unable to judge the state of grace in their souls. Before receiving salvation in heaven, people can be certain of God’s love, but not of their own sanctification. As Rahner writes,

Let each one of us look for the experience of grace in the contemplation of our life, but not so that we can say: there it is; I have it. One cannot ‘find’ it so as to claim it triumphantly as one’s own possession. One can only look for it by forgetting oneself; one can only find it by seeking God and by giving oneself to him in a love which forgets self, and without still returning to oneself.19

Having briefly introduced Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis, its development by Doran, and Rahner’s Trinitarian theology, this dissertation continues in the following chapters to discuss how their understanding of the experience of grace can lead to an analogical knowledge of the

Trinity: The first chapter introduces Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis and reviews its development in the current body of literature. The second chapter introduces Rahner’s

Trinitarian theology by situating it in the overall context of Rahner’s theology and by surveying the major trajectories of its interpretation. The third chapter suggests areas of agreement between

Rahner’s Trinitarian theology and the four-point hypothesis that would enable a transposition of the hypothesis into the categories of Rahner’s theology. The fourth chapter seeks to develop the

19 Ibid., 89.

15 four-point hypothesis into a supernatural Trinitarian analogy from the foundations of Rahner’s theology. The last chapter considers the theological differences between Lonergan and Rahner as potential obstacles to the act of transposing the four-point hypothesis from the context of

Lonergan’s thought to that of Rahner. It argues that Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity provides a stronger ontological ground than Lonergan for the four-point hypothesis and a supernatural, psychological analogy.

CHAPTER I

Bernard Lonergan’s Four-Point Hypothesis: Its Interpretation and Development

The purpose of this dissertation is to examine whether Karl Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity could provide a stronger ontological ground than Bernard Lonergan for the four- point hypothesis and a supernatural, psychological analogy. Toward this end, it is necessary to study the original context in which Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis and Rahner’s Trinitarian theology were expounded, as well as their development in the current body of literature. This first chapter will consider Lonergan’s hypothesis and its development, especially by his interpreter Robert Doran. With this foundation in mind, the next chapter will study Rahner’s

Trinitarian theology for the purpose of determining whether Rahner’s theology may be fruitfully developed in dialogue with the four-point hypothesis.

A. Bernard Lonergan’s Hypothesis

This section will study Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis in its original context. The development of this hypothesis in current scholarship will also be reviewed. Lonergan’s four- point hypothesis can be found in his notes for his course on grace in 1951-1952, and then in his

Divinarum personarum (1957), which was revised into its final form as De Deo trino: Pars systematica (1964). According to this hypothesis, there are four supernatural realities by which people participate in the four divine relations of paternity, active spiration, passive spiration, and filiation. Those four are, respectively, Christ’s esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of 16 17 charity, and the lumen gloriae. Lonergan’s hypothesis has been developed by his interpreter

Doran into a foundation for systematic theology. For Doran, this hypothesis also serves as the basis for a new Trinitarian analogy drawn from the human experience of the supernatural. Other

Lonergan scholars have also weighed in on the significance of the four-point hypothesis for theology going forward, especially as they engage Doran’s work.

After completing his doctoral dissertation at Gregorian University in 1940 (although he did not officially defend it until 1946), Lonergan taught at the College de l'Immaculee

Conception in Montreal from 1940-1946 and at Regis College in Toronto from 1947-1953.

During this time, Lonergan wrote some class notes and systematic supplements on the subject of grace that he prepared for his courses. Some of them include his systematic supplement “De ente supernaturali” (1946)1 and sets of notes from his two courses on grace from 1947-1948 and

1 Cf. Robert M. Doran, introduction to “The Supernatural Order,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Vol. 19: Early Latin Theology, by Bernard Lonergan, eds. Robert M. Doran and H. Daniel Monsour, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), 53: “The work ‘De ente supernaturali,’ whose title we might translate ‘On the Supernatural Order,’ was written by Bernard Lonergan in the fall semester of the academic year 1946-47, the last semester he taught at the College of the Immaculate Conception in Montreal.” For more history of the background of this and related texts, cf. J. Michael Stebbins, The Divine Initiative: Grace, World- Order, and Human Freedom in the Early Writings of Bernard Lonergan (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1995), xvii:

A good part of Bernard Lonergan's early academic career was spent coming to grips with the complexities of Thomas Aquinas's theology of grace. His doctoral dissertation, ‘Gratia Operans: A Study of the Speculative Development in the Writings of St Thomas of Aquin,’ was completed in 1940. It was extensively rewritten and published as a series of four articles in the journal Theological Studies in 1941 and 1942, and some twenty years later the articles appeared in book form as Grace and Freedom. In 1946 Lonergan composed a treatise, which has yet to be published, entitled De ente supernaturali: Supplementum schematicum (On Supernatural Being: A Schematic Supplement). Written near the end of the period during which Lonergan taught at the College de l'Immaculee Conception, the Jesuit seminary in Montreal, it served as a textbook for the course on grace that he taught on several occasions. Clustered around these major efforts were several articles that touched in one way or another on the doctrine of grace: these include ‘Finality, Love, Marriage’ (1943), which relates the divinization of human beings through grace to what Lonergan terms ‘vertical finality’; ‘On God and Secondary Causes’ (1946), a lengthy book review in which Lonergan spells out his understanding of causality in general and instrumental causality in particular; ‘The Natural Desire to See God’ (1949), on a disputed question regarding the interrelation of the

1951-1952.2 While “De ente supernaturali” and his two sets of notes from 1947-1948 on “The

Object of the Treatise on Grace and the Virtues” and “The Grace of Justification and the

Indwelling of the Holy Spirit” do not refer to the four-point hypothesis,3 they do contain much discussion of created grace that is useful in interpreting his later hypothesis. Most importantly,

Lonergan’s “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace” from 1951-1952 contain his first and most developed statement of the four-point hypothesis. While his notes for his 1947-1948 course were considered too loosely organized for inclusion in the Collected Works of Bernard

natural and supernatural orders; and the unpublished treatise De scientia atque voluntate Dei (1950), which contains an extended treatment of divine transcendence.

2 Robert M. Doran, “Sanctifying Grace, Charity, and Divine Indwelling: A Key to the Nexus Mysteriorum Fidei,” Lonergan Workshop 23 (2012): 168n8:

The notes . . . can be found on the website www.bernardlonergan.com: the 1947·48 courses are found at 16000DTL040 and 16200DTL040, and the 1951-52 notes at 20500DTL040. An edited version of the 1951- 52 notes, with translation, has been published in volume 19 of Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Early Latin Theology, trans. Michael G. Shields, eds. Robert M. Doran and H. Daniel Monsour (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011). Both sets of 1947-1948 notes have appeared in English translation by Michael G. Shields on the website. The principal supplements, “De ente supernaturali” and “De scientia atque voluntate Dei,” have been published with translation by Michael G. Shields in volume 19, Early Latin Theology, 2011.

3 In his 1947-1948 course notes on “The Object of the Treatise on Grace and the Virtues,” Lonergan entertains the possibility that creatures may have proper relations to individual divine persons when the latter are considered as constitutive principles of divine participation, rather than as effective principles of creation. However, he does not develop such an argument until his “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace” from 1951-1952. Cf. Bernard Lonergan, “Notes on the Object of the Treatise on Grace and the Virtues,” trans. Michael G. Shields, Bernard Lonergan Archive, Marquette University, http://www.bernardlonergan.com/pdf/16200DTE040.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 58: “This statement [‘all things must be held to be common to the Trinity inasmuch as they relate to God as their supreme efficient cause’] perhaps leaves a certain latitude in a case where God is not an effective but a constitutive principle.” Page numbers cited from Lonergan’s 1947-1948 notes correspond to those of the pdf file, not those of his original notes.

Lonergan, his 1951-1952 notes, along with “De ente supernaturali” and other writings, have been translated from Latin and gathered into the Collected Works, Volume 19: Early Latin Theology.4

After teaching at Regis College, Lonergan taught at the Gregorian University from 1953-

1964. There, Lonergan taught courses on the Trinity and Christology, and he wrote Latin textbooks for them. One of his volumes on the Trinity was originally entitled Divinarum personarum, which he finished in 1957. Lonergan’s four point hypothesis is found in its second and final form in this text. He eventually revised Divinarum personarum to become the volume

De Deo trino: Pars systematica, completed in 1964. His formulation of the four-point hypothesis is identical in both texts, however. This later formulation of the hypothesis is also Lonergan’s most well-known.

Since the 1951-1952 notes contain Lonergan’s first reference to the four-point hypothesis, they will be examined first. Afterward, those portions from “De ente supernaturali” and his 1947-1948 course notes that develop ideas related to the hypothesis will be considered.

Finally, his formulation of the hypothesis in Divinarum personarum and De Deo trino: Pars systematica will be studied.

4 Cf. Robert M. Doran, preface to Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Vol. 19: Early Latin Theology, eds. Robert M. Doran and H. Daniel Monsour, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), xv-xvi:

It was felt that, despite the valuable material contained in these 1947-48 notes, they were too loosely organized to be presented in a collection of Lonergan’s writings. But this is not the case with the 1951-52 notes. These represent the most complete systematic treatment of sanctifying grace to be found in Lonergan’s known writings, both published and unpublished. In this set of notes readers will also find an early statement of the hypothesis that first appeared in print in the 1957 Divinarum Personarum, in which the four divine relations are coupled with four created graces that participate respectively in the relations: paternity with the secondary act of existence of the Incarnation, active spiration with sanctifying grace, passive spiration with the habit of charity, and filiation with the light of glory. The treatment of this hypothesis is more ample in the 1951-52 notes than in Divinarum Personarum or the later De Deo Trino: Pars systematica.

1. Lonergan’s Notes for His 1951-1952 Course on Grace

In his 1951-1952 notes, Lonergan lays the foundation for his four-point hypothesis when he identifies the four preeminent supernatural realities, or created graces, through which God communicates himself in history. He states that “there are four graces that are preeminently qualified to be called such; these are the grace of union, the light of glory, sanctifying grace, and the virtue of charity.”5 In his notes, he defines each of these four realities in the following manner, drawing from Thomas Aquinas as his primary source:

The grace of union is that finite entity received in the humanity of Christ so that it exists through the personal act of existence of the divine Word. This grace is therefore the extrinsic term whereby one may say, ‘The Word was made flesh.’ The light of glory is that finite entity by which a created intellect is disposed to receiving the divine essence as an intelligible species and thus see God as he is in himself. Sanctifying grace is that finite entity by which a finite substance is reborn and regenerated for participating in the very life of God. Charity is that finite entity whereby a regenerated finite substance habitually possesses genuine friendship with God.6

Lonergan explains that these four supernatural realities are preeminent among all others because “the other graces are rather dispositions toward the above-mentioned graces or

5 Bernard Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Vol. 19: Early Latin Theology, eds. Robert M. Doran and H. Daniel Monsour, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), 631. Cf. Robert M. Doran, “The Four Entia Supernaturalia: Expanding the 1957 Hypothesis with Earlier Course Notes” (paper presented at the West Coast Methods Institute, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, CA, April 2009), http://lonerganresource.com/pdf/books/1/31%20- %20The%20Four%20Entia%20Supernaturalia.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 14: “There are four graces to which the word ‘grace’ applies in a preeminent way: the grace of union, the light of glory, sanctifying grace, and the habit of charity.” Note that Lonergan will also come to identify in this context the grace of union with the esse secundarium, which will be explained below.

6 Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” 631-3.

21 consequent upon them.”7 As examples of graces and supernatural realities subordinate to the preeminent four, he refers to faith, hope, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, infused cardinal virtues, and the resurrection of the body.8 On account of the priority of the four, Lonergan seeks to focus on their ontological foundation so as to show “why these graces are of such a high degree of perfection that they touch, in a way, subsistent being itself.”9

These four graces imitate God through participation in the divine essence, both as common the the three divine persons and as really identical with the four divine relations.

Accordingly, they may be said to imitate God not just generally, but specifically in reference to the divine relations. As a foundation for this principle, Lonergan notes that “the divine essence itself is the primary exemplary cause”10 of created things in two respects: “first, as absolute and common to the three divine persons; second, as being really identical with one or other real trinitarian relation – with paternity, filiation, active spiration, or passive spiration.”11 These divine relations are proper to the Father, the Son, the Father and the Son considered together

(because active spiration is really identical with paternity and filiation considered together), and the Holy Spirit, respectively.

Lonergan notes that all things, including the four preeminent graces, are efficiently caused by all three persons acting together through their common essence. Thus, they relate to

7 Ibid., 633.

8 Ibid.

9 Ibid.

10 Ibid.

11 Ibid.

22 the divine persons inasmuch as each of the persons shares in the common activity of efficient causation. God is also the exemplary cause of natural creatures to the extent that they are patterned after the divine being that caused them. The divine persons who are really identical with this divine being may also be said to be the exemplary cause of things, although natural creatures are patterned no more after one divine person than another, except by appropriation.

However, Lonergan argues that the situation is different for supernatural realities.12 He argues that since the four graces imitate God in a preeminent way, they each participate in a specific divine relation in a manner that may not be attributed to others. While they do relate to all three persons who shared in their creation, they also have a proper (i.e. non-appropriated) relation to one or another divine person according to the manner of their supernatural participation in the divine being. This conclusion gives Lonergan the ability to form the four-point hypothesis through the following explanation, in which he correlates the grace of union with paternity, the light of glory with filiation, sanctifying grace with active spiration, and charity with passive spiration:

Now since every finite substance is something absolute, it seems appropriate to say that it imitates the divine essence considered as absolute. But since these four eminent graces are intimately connected with the divine life, it seems appropriate to say that they imitate the divine essence considered as really identical with one or other real trinitarian relation. Thus the grace of union imitates and participates in a finite way the divine paternity, the light of glory divine filiation, sanctifying grace active spiration, and the virtue of charity passive spiration.13

12 Cf. ibid., 635: “For a finite substance imitates the divine essence in its absoluteness. But these graces, which exceed the proportion of any finite substance, imitate the divine trinitarian relations.”

13 Ibid, 633.

Although the four graces of the four-point hypothesis are efficiently caused by all three divine persons through a shared act, they nonetheless have relations that terminate in specific divine persons.14 Accordingly, they not only participate in the divine essence generally, but also imitate the divine relations in distinct manners. However, it may be unclear how each of the four supernatural realities has a proper and exclusive relation to a particular divine person (or, in the case of charity, two persons considered together through active spiration), and thereby participates in a divine relation as its exemplary cause.

Offering some clarity, Lonergan lists various reasons why it is appropriate to divide created grace into four preeminent forms that participate in the four divine relations. He states that this four-point hypothesis “shows the nexus between these graces and God’s own life”15 and

“clearly and distinctly lays bare the root of absolute supernaturality.”16 He believes it is fitting

“that four different ontological foundations are clearly and distinctly assigned to four different graces.”17

Additionally, Lonergan finds this hypothesis appropriate because it founds the connection between sanctifying grace and charity. He states, “Sanctifying grace and the virtue of charity are

(1) distinct, (2) commensurate, and (3) such that when grace is infused, charity flourishes, and

14 Note that while things have created relations that terminate in God, this does not imply that God changes ontologically. Cf. Lonergan, “Notes on the Object of the Treatise on Grace and the Virtues,” 54: “Everything extrinsic to God is predicated of God contingently; everything predicated of God contingently is predicated not entitatively but terminatively; and everything predicated of God terminatively supposes the term.” Also, cf. Doran, “The Four Entia Supernaturalia,” 18: “Whatever is said of God contingently is said not entitatively but terminatively, that is, of God as the term of a created relation.”

15 Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” 635.

16 Ibid.

17 Ibid.

24 when charity ceases, grace ceases. The foundation of this connection is that these graces imitate active spiration and passive spiration, which are (1) distinct, (2) correlative, (3) equal, and (4) inseparable.”18 Likewise, he notes that the hypothesis founds the connection between the incarnation and the beatific vision through the relationship between the grace of union and the light of glory. Lonergan explains, “Christ as man possessed the beatific vision throughout his entire mortal life. Thus, our glory depends upon our merits, in that we merit to the extent that we are living members of Christ. . . . The foundation of this connection is that, just as paternity is the principle and filiation the resultant, so also the grace of union is the principle and the light of glory is the resultant.”19

Lonergan also describes how the appropriateness of the four-point hypothesis can be seen in the incarnation itself on account of its participation in divine paternity and its relation to the

Son. He writes,

Divine paternity is the divine intellect as speaking his Word and thus intellectually generating his own Son. The Incarnation of the Son imitates, in a way, this generation; for the Incarnation is a certain re-generation in which, not a new person is born, but rather a new nature comes to an already existing person. Moreover, since the grace of union imitates divine paternity, it has a special relation to divine filiation; and thus the grace of union is a finite entity whereby a created humanity exists through the personal act of existence of the divine Word.20

Also, Lonergan notes that the appropriateness of the hypothesis is found in the light of glory on account of its participation in divine filiation and its relation to the Father. He states, “Since the

18 Ibid.

19 Ibid.

20 Ibid., 635-7

25 light of glory imitates divine filiation, the Word as spoken by the Father, it has a special relation to God the Father as intelligent and intellectually generating. And thus it founds the reception of the divine essence as a species and the vision itself.”21

Lonergan’s views that he expressed in his 1951-1952 notes about each of the four preeminent forms of created grace may be studied in some additional detail. The grace of union

(or esse secundarium), sanctifying grace, charity, and the light of glory will thus be examined in turn. Given that these notes are supplementary notes on sanctifying grace, Lonergan elaborates upon sanctifying grace there more than the other three preeminent graces. However, he does briefly relate sanctifying grace to charity and the light of glory in those notes. This is also the only place where Lonergan formulates the first point of his four-point hypothesis using the phrase “grace of union” instead of “esse secundarium,” and so it will be useful to examine how the grace of union may be identified with the esse secundarium that Lonergan draws from

Thomas Aquinas. On account of the controversial nature of this concept in Thomistic scholarship, it deserves some extended treatment.

a) The Grace of Union, or the Esse Secundarium

The term “grace of union,” as used by Lonergan above to describe “that finite entity received in the humanity of Christ so that it exists through the personal act of existence of the

21 Ibid., 637.

26 divine Word,”22 is a reality he will also refer to in his later formulation of the four-point hypothesis as the “esse secundarium,” a term used by Aquinas to describe the created existence of Christ’s humanity. Across his various theological writings, Aquinas almost always describes

Christ as having only a single existence (esse).23 However, in article four of his Quaestio disputata de unione Verbi incarnati,24 he attributes two existences to Christ, one for each of his two natures. He describes the two-fold existence of Christ in this passage in terms of esse principale and esse secundarium. Interpreters of Aquinas throughout history have differed on whether this distinction found within De unione should be viewed as compatible with or fundamentally divergent from his other statements on the esse of Christ, especially that contained in his Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, where he gives his most extensive treatment in support of the conclusion that Christ has only one existence (esse).

On account of the apparent conflict of ideas that De unione presents, some within the

Thomistic commentarial tradition dismissed the text as either having been falsely attributed to

Aquinas as its author, or else as having been a work from early in his career that ultimately gave way to formulations corresponding to his mature view on the matter.25 However, it has become

22 Ibid., 631.

23 The word esse, as used by Aquinas, will be translated and understood here as referring to “existence” rather than “being,” the latter of which Aquinas will more properly signify by the use of the word ens.

24 Thomas Aquinas, Quaestio disputata de unione Verbi incarnati, in Quaestiones Disputatae, Vol. II, eds. P. Bazzi, M. Calcaterra, T. S. Centi, E. Odetto, P. M. Pession (Taurini: Marietti, 1949), 421-35

25 Cf. Victor Salas, Jr., “Thomas Aquinas on Christ’s Esse: A Metaphysics of the Incarnation,” The Thomist 70 (2006): 579: “The easiest way to overcome the present difficulty would simply be to dismiss the problematic text or to disavow it as spurious. This is what some, such as Louis Billot, do, wheras others, Cajetan for instance, being more conservative in their assessment of the text’s authenticity, argue that the De unione is an early text eventually rejected by a more mature Aquinas.”

27 clear that the De unione was not only undoubtedly written by Aquinas himself, but also that it was a product from late in his career, having been written perhaps only some months before his parallel treatment found in the Summa theologiae.26

Aquinas articulated his view of the incarnation partially in response to other views suggested by Peter Lombard (c. 1096-1160), whose Libri quattuor sententiarum were widely used in theological education in Aquinas’ time.27 In addition to the view adopted by Aquinas that identified Christ’s being with a single suppositum, Lombard put forward other views for consideration which, in his mind, one might perhaps just as well maintain, such as that Christ was composed of two supposita or that the soul and body of Christ were related to his divine person only accidentally.28 Aquinas, in contrast, believes by the time of his writing of Summa theologiae III that it is the doctrine of the Church that there is only one suppositum in the being of Christ, such that all other accounts that deny this fact are not merely faulty but also heretical.29

26 Cf. Jean-Pierre Torrell, St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1: The Person and His Work, trans. Robert Royal (Washington, D.C.: CUA Press, 1996), 336-7: “The disputed question De unione verbi incarnati must be situated very probably toward the end of the second period of teaching in Paris, before Easter, early in April, or perhaps in May 1272. Given the doctrinal issues at stake in a.4 and their connection to IIIa q.17 a.2, concerning the unity of esse in Christ, the two writings are practically contemporaneous.” Cf. ibid., 333: “As to the Tertia Pars, probably begun in Paris at the end of the winter 1271-72, its composition was pursued in Naples until 6 December 1273, the date Thomas stopped writing.”

27 Cf. John Froula, “One and the Same Lord: The Thomistic Teaching on the Existence of Christ” (PhD diss., Ave Maria University, 2012), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com .proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/1523716086/fulltextPDF/474EA000A0894F77PQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 39: “The commentary on the Sentences was like the chef d’oeuvre that the apprentice was required to present in order to become the master artisan.”

28 Cf. Peter Lombard, Libri quattuor sententiarum lib. III, dist. 6 (Ad Claras Aquas, prope Florentiam: Ex Typographia Collegii S. Bonaventurae, 1916).

29 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 2, a. 6, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, eds. De Rubeis, Billuart, Faucher, et al. (Taurini: Marietti, 1948), 28-30.

All of Aquinas’ treatments on the being of Christ are conceptually unified around the idea that Christ has a single suppositum, which is almost always supported by the idea of there being only one existence in Christ.30 The affirmation of one suppositum allows one to attribute qualities pertaining to both the divine and human natures of Christ to his one person, understood as that which underlies them both as the ultimate subject of attribution.31 However, Aquinas’ multiplication of existences in Christ in De unione adds additional complexity to the issue. It causes one to wonder whether the attribution of an esse secundarium to the human nature of

Christ negates Aquinas’ claim that Christ has one suppositum, since in all other instances in

Aquinas this point is tied directly to his argument for a single esse in Christ.32 For this reason, while it is now commonly accepted that De unione was written around the time Aquinas wrote the third part of this Summa theologiae as an expression of his mature thought, scholars are currently divided over the issue of whether Aquinas’ treatment in De unione represents a divergence that is fundamentally irreconcilable with his typical manner of discussing Christ’s

30 This esse is put forward by Aquinas as that by which Christ exists simply, as a whole. Cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 5: “When speaking of Christ’s esse, in this context, he is using the word esse in its proper sense, and simpliciter, or simply speaking.”

31 Cf. ibid., 32: “The one esse acts as predicational bridge.”

32 As Adrian Hastings points out, whether one could rightly accuse Aquinas of monophysitism or Nestorianism hangs in the balance here. Cf. Adrian Hastings, “Christ’s Act of Existence,” Downside Review 73, no. 232 (1955): 140:

If it is true then that a real nature requires its own substantial existence, the refusal to admit more than one in Christ is at heart a revival of the old Monophysite error in a new form; but on the other hand if unity of person necessarily signifies a unity (and not only a union) of existence, then to say that there are two existences in Christ is tantamount to Nestorianism. In the one case, to deny the two existences would really be to deny that Christ’s human nature exists at all; in the other, to admit the two would be to place two persons in Christ.

29 being.33 While it may be argued that the concept of esse secundarium found in De unione implicitly contradicts the notion of a single suppositum in Christ, it is also possible to hold that the introduction of this term makes an important distinction which enriches Aquinas’ view on

Christ’s being without thereby creating a discontinuity in expression.

Aquinas deals with the being of Christ as it relates to the issue of his esse in five places.

They are Scriptum super Sententiis lib. III, dist. 6, q. 2, a. 2; Quodlibet IX q. 2, a. 2; Compendium theologiae lib. 1, cap. 212; Summa theologiae III q. 17, a. 2; and Quaestio disputata de unione

Verbi incarnati a. 4. It will be instructive to examine each of the first three texts in order to bring the most significant claims made by Aquinas in his Summa theologiae and De unione into a wider context. Then it will be possible to engage the two latter texts in greater depth, in light of which it will be determined whether there are any grounds for asserting their complementarity.

Scriptum super Sententiis Lib. III, Dist. 6, Q. 2, A. 2

In this text, the whole of which Thomist scholar Jean-Pierre Torrell believes Aquinas to have largely written between 1252-1256,34 the question at hand is whether in Christ there is not only one esse. Aquinas responds to the three different views put forward by Lombard that attempt to understand the being of Christ. The first holds that there are two supposita in Christ but only one person, whereas the third claims that the body and soul of Christ were accidentally

33 Cf. Joseph Wawrykow, “Hypostatic Union,” in The Theology of Thomas Aquinas, eds. Rik Van Nieuwenhove and Joseph Wawrykow (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2005), 251n43: “Scholars disagree sharply: has Aquinas there actually rejected what he argues for consistently in the Scriptum, ScG, and the ST? Or is it a merely terminological departure?”

34 Cf. Torrell, St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, 332.

30 united to Christ’s divine person.35 Aquinas argues that only the second opinion that affirms only one suppositum in the being of Christ is correct, whereas the other two lead to the notion of there being two esse, and consequently also two supposita (and two persons), in Christ:

Respondeo dicendum, quod secundum philosophum 5 Metaph., esse duobus modis dicitur. Uno modo secundum quod significat veritatem propositionis, secundum quod est copula; et sic, ut Commentator ibidem dicit, ens est praedicatum accidentale; et hoc esse non est in re, sed in mente, quae conjungit praedicatum cum subjecto, ut dicit philosophus in 6 Metaph. Unde de hoc non est hic quaestio. Alio modo dicitur esse, quod pertinet ad naturam rei, secundum quod dividitur secundum decem genera; et hoc quidem esse est in re, et est actus entis resultans ex principiis rei, sicut lucere est actus lucentis. Aliquando tamen sumitur esse pro essentia, secundum quam res est: quia per actus consueverunt significari eorum principia, ut potentiae vel habitus. Loquendo igitur de esse secundum quod est actus entis, sic dico, quod secundum secundam opinionem oportet ponere tantum unum esse; secundum alias autem duas oportet ponere duo esse. Ens enim subsistens, est quod habet esse tamquam ejus quod est, quamvis sit naturae vel formae tamquam ejus quo est: unde nec natura rei nec partes ejus proprie dicuntur esse, si esse praedicto modo accipiatur; similiter autem nec accidentia, sed suppositum completum, quod est secundum omnia illa. Unde etiam philosophus dicit in 2 Metaph., quod accidens magis proprie est entis quam ens. Prima ergo opinio, quae ponit duo subsistentia, ponit duo esse substantialia; similiter tertia opinio, quia ponit quod partes humanae naturae adveniunt divinae personae accidentaliter, ponit duo esse, unum substantiale, et aliud accidentale; secunda vero opinio, quia ponit unum subsistens, et ponit humanitatem non accidentaliter advenire divinae personae, oportet quod ponat unum esse. Impossibile est enim quod unum aliquid habeat duo esse substantialia; quia unum fundatur super ens: unde si sint plura esse, secundum quae aliquid dicitur ens simpliciter, impossibile est quod dicatur unum. Sed non est inconveniens quod esse unius subsistentis sit per respectum ad plura, sicut esse Petri est unum, habens tamen respectum ad diversa principia constituentia ipsum: et similiter suo modo unum esse Christi habet duos respectus, unum ad naturam humanam, alterum ad divinam.36

35 Cf. Peter Lombard, Libri quattuor sententiarum lib. III, dist. 6.

36 Thomas Aquinas, Scriptum super Sententiis lib. III, dist. 6, q. 2, a. 2, co., in Scriptum super libros Sententiarum, Tomus III, ed. Maria Fabianus Moos (Parisiis: P. Lethielleux, 1933), 238-9. For an English translation, cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 50-3:

I respond saying, that according to the Philosopher 5 Metaph., esse is said in two ways. One way according to which it signifies the truth of a proposition, according to which it is a copula; and thus, as the Commentator says in the same place, being is predicated accidentally; and this esse is not in the thing, but in the mind, which joins the predicate to the subject, as the philosopher says in 6 Metaph. So this question is not about that. Esse is said in another way, which pertains to the nature of things according to which it is divided according to the ten genera; and this particular esse is in the thing, and it is the act of being

Here, Aquinas notes that esse normally refers either to the copula used for predication or to the act of being resulting from the principles of a thing. However, it may also be used to signify the essence of a subsisting being, inasmuch as this is understood to be the principle according to which a thing exists. Aquinas claims that when esse is understood as referring to the act of being, one should posit only one esse in Christ. Also, when esse is taken in the sense of the essence of the thing subsisting, it still follows that one should posit only one esse in Christ; for although there are two essences in Christ which are predicated of him, esse is not, properly speaking, to be attributed to the nature or form of a thing by which it subsists, but only to the complete supposit inasmuch as it is that which subsists. In the case of Christ, his human nature is that by which he exists as human, but is ultimately not that which exists in itself. Only one esse is attributed to Christ so as to avoid the conclusion that Christ has two substantial esse, on account of which he would have two supposita and not one. Christ is therefore one subsistent

resulting from the principles of the thing, as “to light” is the act of lighting. Sometimes, however, esse is borrowed for essence, according to which a thing is: since it was customary that the principles of things, like potency or habit, be signified by act. Speaking then about esse according to what is the act of being, I say this, that according to the second opinion it follows to posit only one esse; but according to the other two it follows to posit two esse. For a subsisting being is what has esse as its what it is, although it would be to nature or to form as that by which it is: whence neither the nature of the thing nor its parts is properly called esse, if esse is accepted in the aforesaid way; and similarly neither accidents, but the complete supposit, which is according to which all those are. Whence also the philosopher says in 2 Metaph. that an accident is more properly of a being, than a being. Therefore the first opinion, which posits two subsistences, posits two substantial esse; similarly the third opinion, since it posits that the parts of human nature came to be to the divine person accidentally, posits two esse, one substantial and another accidental; according to the true opinion, since it posits one subsisting thing, and posits the humanity to come to the divine nature not accidentally, it follows that it would posit one esse. For it is impossible that some one thing have two substantial esse, since one is based on being: whence if there were more than one esse, according to which something is called a being simply, it is impossible that it be called one. But it is not unbecoming that the esse of one subsisting thing be to many in a respect, just as the esse of Peter is one, having nevertheless respect to his different constitutive principles: and likewise in its mode the one esse of Christ has two respects, one to the human nature, the other to the divine.

32 being. However, Aquinas does admit that there is nothing wrong in saying that the one esse of a subsisting being such as Christ has multiple respects, as to both his human and divine nature.

Aquinas does also note here that since the first and third opinions described by Lombard propose that Christ has two esse (two substantial esse according to the first and one substantial, one accidental according to the third), they are unable to describe Christ as one subsisting being.

Only in the event that one attributes one esse to Christ is it possible to do so. While this is immediately clear in the case of the first opinion, where two substantial esse (and therefore also two supposita) are posited, it is much less obvious why this is so in the case of the third. Would it not be possible for an accident, which Aquinas says a couple sentences earlier should not be called esse properly speaking, to exist in the divine esse as its one suppositum? Aquinas seems to be implying here that, while substance has no esse of its own except for that proportionate to its own act which accounts for its subsistence (which is not present in the case of Christ’s human nature, whose subsistence is constituted only by way of relation to the divine esse), an accident normally carries its own esse into another in which it subsists in relation. However, if the incarnation were to have taken place through an accidental union, this would have meant that the accidental esse of Christ’s humanity would not have been able to be received into a substance, as the divine esse has no potency toward receiving finite act. As such, in this unique case

(comparable perhaps to the situation of the accidental species of bread and wine in the Eucharist) the accidental esse of Christ’s humanity would have no substance to exist in; and thus, if it were made to exist by God, it would have to exist in itself by its own proportionate esse. In that case it would have to be that whereby it existed simply, thereby setting up a suppositum in addition to that of the divine esse. This would necessarily result in Christ being composed of two persons,

33 which for Aquinas is inadmissible. Accordingly, only the scenario in which the human nature of

Christ (as a substance) relates to the divine esse without thereby being required to carry its own esse into the divine esse (as an accident would) allows for the reality of a single suppositum in

Christ.

Initially, it would seem that Aquinas is ruling out here any manner in which one might attribute to the human nature of Christ an esse of its own. However, some will claim that

Aquinas’ language of the two respects leaves room for one to speak of the human nature of

Christ as esse in a sense analogous to and derivative from the one divine esse whereby Christ subsists. As John Froula argues,

Here at the end of the body of the article, St. Thomas speaks of two “respectus” of the esse of Christ, one of them to the human nature. Because they are respects of the divine esse, and one of them has a corresponding relational existence in re in the human nature of Christ, it can be called esse derivatively and analogically. One could make an argument that because Christ exists in a human nature, this “inness” or respectus, which is a real relation for his human nature, comes to be because it is in act, and is therefore a principle which can be called by the name esse. So we have three different propositions taken from III Sent. 6, 2, 2 that seem to converge on the conclusion that the human nature of Christ can be called an esse in the sense of essence or nature in act without a proportionate esse. The first is that esse is used for essence because the principles of something are signified by act. The second is that the human nature of Christ is not esse “properly so called,” the implication being that the human nature of Christ in act is improperly called esse by reason of it being a “quo est” of the subsisting Christ. The third is that there are two respects of the one esse of Christ to his two natures. While the phrase “esse secundarium” is not used, it would not be incompatible with the above to use that phrase to refer to the human quiddity or nature of Christ in act, which includes a concomitant real relation of union to the divine personal esse.37

37 Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 53-4.

Quodlibet IX Q. 2, A. 2

In his ninth quodlibetal question, which Torrell notes has been dated by scholars anywhere between 1256-1266,38 Aquinas follows a similar structure to that of his Scriptum in his approach to describing the being of Christ, although he adds some additional qualifications. He begins in a similar fashion by distinguishing the two meanings of esse drawn from Aristotle’s

Metaphysics. However, instead of distinguishing a third sense of esse as he did before, he divides the second meaning of esse as “act of being” into two ways, predicating the act of being differently to substances which subsist through themselves (which are properly said to have esse) and to things which do not subsist through themselves but through another (to which esse is attributed as that by which something exists). Concerning the latter category, Aquinas writes,

“Omnia vero quae non per se subsistunt, sed in alio et cum alio, sive sint accidentia sive formae substantiales aut quaelibet partes, non habent esse ita ut ipsa vere sint, sed attribuitur eis esse alio modo, idest ut quo aliud est.”39 However, since these things are viewed merely as superadded relative to the substantial being in which they subsist, Aquinas affirms only a single substantial esse in Christ.40 Yet, he also qualifies this statement with the observation that, although Christ is

38 Cf. Torrell, St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, 211.

39 Thomas Aquinas, Quodlibet IX, q. 2, a. 2, co., in Quaestiones Quodlibetales, ed. Raymundi Spiazzi (Taurini: Marietti, 1949), 181. For an English translation, cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 56: “All things that do not subsist through themselves, but in another and with another, whether they be accidents or [substantial] forms or whatever parts, do not have esse such as they truly are, but esse is attributed to them in another way, that is, as that by which something is.”

40 Cf. John F. Wippel, The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas: From Finite Being to Uncreated Being (Washington D.C.: CUA Press, 2000), 258:

Esse is truly and properly attributed to a thing which subsists in itself, that is, to a subsisting subject. But a twofold esse is assigned to such a subject. One esse results from those things by which the unity of the subsisting subject is completed. This is the subject’s proper and substantial act of being. Another kind of

35 one subsistent being, his divine and human natures both pertain to the overall integrity of his being inasmuch as his suppositum is of them both. He writes, “Quia ergo in Christo ponimus unam rem subsistentem tantum, ad cuius integritatem concurrit etiam humanitas, quia unum suppositum est utriusque naturae; ideo oportet dicere quod esse substantiale, quod proprie attribuitur supposito, in Christo est unum tantum.”41 This closely parallels Aquinas’ recognition of the two respects of Christ’s esse in the Scriptum.

It should also be noted that while Aquinas here identifies one substantial esse in Christ, he does not thereby explicitly preclude the notion that the human nature of Christ may be identified as a substance of its own in a certain sense (although Aquinas certainly does not think that Christ’s human nature subsists in itself as its own being apart from the divine esse). Froula argues that this text leaves room for an attribution of esse to Christ’s human nature when viewed as a substance. He states, “The restrictive use of substantial esse for the one esse of Christ should not be taken to mean that the humanity of Christ is in no way a substance, and that should esse be attributed to the humanity of Christ it would not be substantial in any way. The word proprie is key here: substantial esse properly said is only attributed to the supposit.”42

being (esse) is assigned to the subject in addition to all those factors which complete it as a subsisting subject. Thomas describes this as a superadded or accidental being (esse). . . . Thomas applies this reasoning to the theological question at issue. In Christ there is only one substantial act of being, that of the divine supposit; but in him there is also a manifold accidental being (esse).

41 Thomas Aquinas, Quodlibet IX, q. 2, a. 2, co., in Quaestiones Quodlibetales, 181. For English translation, cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 57: “Therefore in Christ we posit only one subsisting thing, to the integrity of which coincides also humanity, since one supposit is of both natures; therefore it is necessary to say that substantial esse, which is properly attributed to the supposit, in Christ is only one.”

42 Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 57.

Since Aquinas writes here that esse is attributed to forms and accidents as principles by which a subsisting thing has esse (natures could also be inserted here, since this is found in the list of such things from the Scriptum),43 he acknowledges the possibility of attributing esse to things in an improper sense. Furthermore, in his answer to the first objection, Aquinas notes that

Christ has two instances of a “special principle of being” (speciale essendi principium) by which the esse of Christ is specified and which form a diversity of life in his divine and human natures:

“Ad primum ergo dicendum, quod vivere dicit esse quoddam specificatum per speciale essendi principium; et ideo diversitas vitae consequitur diversitatem principiorum vivendi, sed magis respicit ad suppositum subsistens.”44 Froula consequently argues that the one suppositum of

Christ is specified into two certain specific esse, the first being that of his divine nature which is the source of his subsistence, and the second being that by which he has life in his human nature:

“What seems implied is that in Christ there are two certain specific esse because there are two special principles of being (essendi) in Christ. . . . What is really two are the principles of being

(essendi), or natures.”45 Froula suggests that the best way to interpret Aquinas’ statement that “to live” (vivere) looks more to the subsisting supposit than to the certain specified esse of the special principle of being is to conclude that “the specified kind of esse that goes with life is not

43 Cf. ibid., 56: “A nature, though not specified here along with accidents, forms, and parts, but also being that by which something is, can have esse attributed to it as well. There is an attribution of esse to the principles and elements of a subsisting thing.”

44 Thomas Aquinas, Quodlibet IX, q. 2, a. 2. ad. 1, in Quaestiones Quodlibetales, 181. For English translation, cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 57: ‘To the first, therefore, it should be said that to live means a certain specified esse, through a special principle of being; and thus diversity of life follows diversity of principles of living, but it more looks to the subsisting supposit.”

45 Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 58.

37 the primary sense of esse that goes with subsistence.”46 As such, Christ’s human life does not flow from the special principle of being that is his human substance per se, but ultimately from the esse properly speaking of the one suppositum in which his human substance and its certain specified esse subsists.

This language definitely goes beyond that contained in Aquinas’ account from the

Scriptum, where he had simply said that nature, form, and accidents are not properly called esse, since they are merely that by which the subsisting being has esse. Yet, although the Scriptum excludes nature, form, and accidents from the proper attribution of esse, it remains silent on the possibility of an improper attribution of esse to things by which a subsisting being has esse properly speaking in its suppositum. This possibility is simply brought into the forefront of discussion in Quodlibet IX. Hence, these two passages may certainly be read as compatible.

Compendium theologiae lib. 1, cap. 212

Aquinas’ treatment of the being of Christ in his Compendium theologiae, dated by Torrell between 1265-126747 is much shorter than that contained in his other works.

Ea vero quae ad suppositum sive hypostasim pertinent, unum tantum in Christo confiteri oportet: unde si esse accipiatur secundum quod unum esse est unius suppositi, videtur dicendum quod in Christo sit tantum unum esse. Manifestum est enim quod partes divise singule proprium esse habent, secundum autem quod in toto considerantur, non habent singule suum esse, sed omnes sunt per esse totius. Sic igitur si consideremus ipsum Christum ut quoddam integrum suppositum duarum naturarum, erit eius unum tantum esse, sicut et est unum suppositum.48

46 Ibid.

47 Cf. Torrell, St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, 349.

48 Thomas Aquinas, Compendium theologiae lib. 1, cap. 212, in Opuscula Theologica: Vol. I: De Re Dogmatica Et Morali, ed. Raymundi A. Verardo (Taurini: Marietti, 1954), 98. Translated by Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 59: “Truly it is necessary to confess that those things that pertain to the supposit or hypostasis are only one in Christ: hence if esse is taken according as one esse is of one supposit, it seems that it must be said that in

Many of the nuances found in the prior two texts fall out of discussion here, although they come back into discussion in the Summa theologiae. Here, Aquinas simply means to reiterate that when esse is understood as that of the suppositum, Christ has only one esse as the whole in which his various parts have esse. It may not be absolutely closed to other senses of esse, however; for, since Aquinas notes here that he is taking esse in a certain way, Froula claims that “multiple senses of esse are obliquely alluded to.”49

Summa theologiae III, Q. 17, A. 2

The following passage from the third part of the Summa theologiae, which was written between 1271-1273,50 is one of Aquinas’ most clear discussions of the being of Christ:

Respondeo dicendum quod, quia in Christo sunt duae naturae et una hypostasis, necesse est quod ea quae ad naturam pertinent in Christo sint duo, quae autem pertinent ad hypostasim in Christo sint unum tantum. Esse autem pertinet ad hypostasim et ad naturam: ad hypostasim quidem sicut ad id quod habet esse; ad naturam autem sicut ad id quo aliquid habet esse; natura enim significatur per modum formae, quae dicitur ens ex eo quod ea aliquid est, sicut albedine est aliquid album, et humanitate est aliquis homo. Est autem considerandum quod, si aliqua forma vel natura est quae non pertineat ad esse personale hypostasis subsistentis, illud esse non dicitur esse illius personae simpliciter, sed secundum quid: sicut esse album est esse Socratis, non inquantum est Socrates, sed inquantum est albus. Et huiusmodi esse nihil prohibet multiplicari in una hypostasi vel persona: aliud enim est esse quo Socrates est albus, et quo Socrates est musicus. Sed illud esse quod pertinet ad ipsam hypostasim vel personam secundum se, impossibile est in una hypostasi vel persona multiplicari: quia impossibile est quod unius rei non sit unum

Christ there is only one esse. For it is clear, that the divided parts of the singular have proper esse, but according as they are considered in a whole, they do not have their own esse, but all of them are through the esse of the whole. If therefore we consider Christ himself as a certain integral supposit of two natures, his esse will be only one, just as he is one supposit.”

49 Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 59.

50 Cf. Torrell, St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, 333: “As to the Tertia Pars, probably begun in Paris at the end of the winter 1271-72, its composition was pursued in Naples until 6 December 1273, the date Thomas stopped writing.”

esse. Si igitur humana natura adveniret Filio Dei, non hypostatice vel personaliter, sed accidentaliter, sicut quidam posuerunt, oporteret ponere in Christo duo esse: unum quidem secundum quod est Deus; aliud autem secundum quod est homo. Sicut in Socrate ponitur aliud esse secundum quod est albus, aliud secundum quod est homo: quia esse album non pertinet ad ipsum esse personale Socratis. Esse autem capitatum, et esse corporeum, et esse animatum, totum pertinet ad unam personam Socratis: et ideo ex omnibus his non fit nisi unum esse in Socrate. Et si contingeret quod, post constitutionem personae Socratis, advenirent Socrati manus vel pedes vel oculi, sicut accidit in caeco nato, ex his non accresceret Socrati aliud esse, sed solum relatio quaedam ad huiusmodi: quia scilicet diceretur esse non solum secundum ea quae prius habebat, sed etiam secundum ea quae postmodum sibi adveniunt. Sic igitur, cum humana natura coniungatur Filio Dei hypostatice vel personaliter, ut supra dictum est, et non accidentaliter, consequens est quod secundum humanam naturam non adveniat sibi novum esse personale, sed solum nova habitudo esse personalis praeexistentis ad naturam humanam: ut scilicet persona illa iam dicatur subsistere, non solum secundum naturam divinam, sed etiam humanam.51

51 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, co., in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 131. For English translation, cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 61-2, 65-7:

I respond saying that, since in Christ there are two natures and one hypostasis, it is necessary that those things which pertain to the nature in Christ be two, but those which pertain to the hypostasis in Christ be only one. But esse pertains to hypostasis and to nature, to the hypostasis as to that which has esse; but to nature as to that by which something has esse; for nature is signified through the mode of form, which is called a being because something is by it, just as by whiteness something is white, and by humanity someone is a man. But it is to be considered that if some form or nature which does not pertain to the personal esse of the subsisting hypostasis, that esse is not called the esse of the person simply, but according to which, as to be white is the to be of Socrates, not inasmuch as Socrates is, but inasmuch as he is white. And in this way nothing prohibits esse from being multiplied in a hypostasis or person, for Socrates is white by an esse other than that by which Socrates is musical. But that esse which according to itself pertains to the very hypostasis or person is impossible to multiply, since it is impossible that of a single thing there not be one esse. If therefore human nature comes to the Son of God, not hypostatically or personally, but accidentally, as some posited, it would follow to put in Christ two esse, one according to which he is God, another according to which he is man. Just one esse is put in Socrates according to which he is white, another according to which he is man, since white does not pertain to the personal esse of Socrates itself. But to be ‘headed’ and to be embodied, and to be ensouled, all pertain to the one person of Socrates, and therefore out of all these things is not anything other than the one esse of Socrates. And if it might happen that after the constituting of the person of Socrates, there came to Socrates a hand or foot or eyes, as it happened to the man born blind, from these things would not accrue to Socrates another esse, but only a relation to such things, since it would be said to be not only according to those things which it had before, but also according those things which came to it afterwards. Therefore, since the human nature is conjoined to the Son of God hypostatically or personally, as said above, and not accidentally, it follows that according to the human nature there does not come to him new personal esse, but only a new relation of the preexisting personal esse to the human nature, as, namely, that person already said to subsist, not only according to the divine nature, but also the human.

In this text, Aquinas begins his response by stating that a hypostasis (i.e. suppositum) is that which has esse but that a nature (which is signified through form and is differentiated from the suppositum)52 is that by which something has esse. Form, however, can be distinguished into various types relative to a substance. In other texts, Aquinas identifies different types of form which are relevant to the distinctions he makes in this text, and these may be usefully applied to them in order to clarify his meaning.

An important distinction Aquinas makes toward this end is between first substance

(substantia prima) and second substance (substantia secunda).53 These terms may be defined in reference to what Aquinas calls the form of the whole (forma totius).54 The forma totius designates the quiddity of a species (which in a composite substance involves both form and matter).55 Composite substances may also be denominated by the form of the part (forma partis),

52 For discussion of the signification of human nature by its form (that is “humanity,” which is the form of the whole considered with precision from individuating characteristics) and its distinction from the suppositum of the form of the whole considered as a being, cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, q. 3, a. 3, co., in Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, ed. Petri Caramello (Taurini: Marietti, 1948), 133.

53 For Aquinas’ distinction between first substance and second substance, cf. Thomas Aquinas, Quaestiones disputatae de potentia Dei, q. 9, a. 2, ad. 6-7, in Quaestiones Disputatae, Vol. II, eds. P. Bazzi, M. Calcaterra, T. S. Centi, E. Odetto, P. M. Pession (Taurini: Marietti, 1949), 71-2; Summa theologiae I, q. 29, a. 1, ad. 2, in Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 156.

54 For Aquinas’ understanding of the form of the whole, in its distinction from the form of the part, cf. Thomas Aquinas, In duodecim libros Metaphysicorum Aristotelis expositio VII, L. 9, C. 1467-69, in In duodecim libros Metaphysicorum Aristotelis expositio, eds. M. R. Cathala, Raymundi M. Spiazzi (Taurini: Marietti, 1964), 358-9.

55 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles lib. 2, cap. 68, n. 3, editio Leonina manualis (Romae: Apud Sedem Commissionis Leoninae, 1934), 167: “Aliquid sit forma substantialis alterius, duo requiruntur. Quorum unum est, ut forma sit principium essendi substantialiter ei cuius est forma: principium autem dico, non factivum, sed formale, quo aliquid est et denominatur ens. Unde sequitur aliud, scilicet quod forma et materia conveniant in uno esse: quod non contingit de principio effectivo cum eo cui dat esse. Et hoc esse est in quo subsistit substantia composita.” For an English translation, cf. On the Truth of the Catholic Faith- Summa Contra Gentiles, Book Two: Creation, trans. James F. Anderson (New York: Hanover House, 1955), 204:

41 which is the substantial form of a being that actuates its matter. The forma totius of a human being is its human essence, whereas its forma partis is its soul.

In reference to the forma totius, the substantia prima is the forma totius considered as an individual being (e.g. “a man”). In contrast, the substantia secunda is the forma totius abstracted without precision from individuating characteristics (e.g. “man,” considered absolutely as a common nature in terms of genus and species).56 While substantia secunda is considered abstractly without its manner of subsistence, it is impossible for a substance to subsist through anything but the esse of substantia prima. Thus, the substantia secunda is that by which something has esse and the substantia prima is that which has esse. Since this esse proper to the substantia prima is that of the forma totius considered as an individual being, it is called esse simpliciter (“existence simply”). Overall, the substantia prima corresponds to what Aquinas designated above as hypostasis, and the substantia secunda corresponds to what he called nature abstracted from its hypostasis.

The rest of the above text may be read in light of these terms and concepts in an effort to clarify its meaning. In the text, Aquinas moves on to distinguish a substantia prima, which has

For one thing to be another’s substantial form, two requirements must be met. First, the form must be the principle of the substantial being of the thing whose form it is; I speak not of the productive but of the formal principle whereby a thing exists and is called a being. The second requirement then follows from this, namely, that the form and the matter be joined together in the unity of one act of being; which is not true of the union of the efficient cause with that to which it gives being. And this single act of being is that in which the composite substance subsists.

Also, cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, q. 75, a. 4, ad. 2, in Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 351.

56 Besides being considered as a whole absolutely, the form of the whole can also be signified as a part by abstracting it with precision from individuating characteristics, leaving only its non-existing essential characteristics (e.g. “humanity”). Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra Gentiles lib. 4, cap. 81, n. 10, editio Leonina manualis. (Romae: Apud Sedem Commissionis Leoninae, 1934), 547.

42 one esse simpliciter, from an accidental form, by which the accidental esse of a substantia prima is multiplied according to its various accidental predicaments. Since accidental forms do not pertain to the personal esse simpliciter of the suppositum, but rather to the multiplication of esse according to different manners of being, they are called esse secundum quid (“existence according to which”).57 Aquinas states that such esse secundum quid can be multiplied in a being according to its various accidental predicaments without thereby negating the oneness of the substantia prima or hypostasis that is its esse simpliciter. However, Aquinas notes that the incarnation of Christ could not have consisted in an accidental union (a relational bond through esse secundum quid) between his divinity and humanity. In such a case, Christ’s humanity would have an esse simpliciter distinct from his esse simpliciter as God, both of which would be impossible to attribute to a single person that necessarily has only one esse simpliciter.

Aquinas goes on to note that while accidental form multiplies the esse secundum quid of a hypostasis, a substantial part of a whole being has no esse other than the one esse of the hypostasis to which it pertains. This principle applies to the composite substance of a human being that has multiple substantial parts, including a soul and a body. Such substantial parts pertain to the esse simpliciter of the hypostasis that is the human person. They add no additional esse to a person, but only relations between them and the person in which they subsist.

Forming an analogy with the esse of substantial parts in a composite substance,

Aquinas defends the central claim of this passage regarding the esse of Christ. He notes that just

57 Cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 206: “Nothing prevents a multiplication of accidental esse in Christ, because the esse of accidents does not terminate in the person the way the esse of a substantial human nature does.”

43 as a substantial part has no subsistent esse of its own besides that of the hypostasis to which it pertains, so too, in the case of the incarnation, does Christ’s human nature have no subsistent esse of its own besides the single esse of Christ’s divine person to which it pertains as its hypostasis. The assumption of a human nature in Christ only creates a relation between that nature and his person, not an additional subsistent esse or accidental esse secundum quid. Thus, while Christ’s human nature is that by which he has subsistent esse as a human, only Christ’s divine person has its own subsistent esse.

Hence, in the case of the hypostatic union, Christ’s human nature does not have a proportionate esse such that it would be that by which it would be that which had its esse simpliciter in itself as the suppositum of its own forma totius. It is therefore only the divine person of Christ whose esse is proportionate to the task of serving as the suppositum for the forma totius of his human nature, thereby grounding it in the one substantial esse of its substantia prima. Thus, Christ’s human nature may be thought of as a substantia secunda that is not considered to have its own proper subsistent esse, but only a relation to the substantia prima of his divine person to whose single esse simpliciter it pertains. This substantia secunda is that by which Christ’s humanity has esse simpliciter through its relation to the substantia prima.

Accordingly, Christ’s human nature does not have a substantial esse distinct from the divine esse; and since accidental esse secundum quid is not proper to it either, it does not appear that

Aquinas would attribute any esse to this substantia secunda other than the divine esse proper to

Christ’s divine person.58

58 Cf. Hastings, “Christ’s Act of Existence,” 144: “There is no second existence in Christ because existence is either substantial (simpliciter) or accidental (secundum quid) and that proper to his human nature can be neither.”

Despite his conclusions drawn thus far, Aquinas still has not satisfactorily addressed two important questions: 1) how is Christ’s human nature, when viewed as a substantia secunda distinct from the substantia prima of the divine suppositum, able to serve as the principle in which accidents become the principle by which they have their own multiplied esse secundum quid, and 2) how is Christ’s human nature able to really relate to the divine suppositum if the very esse in which he has esse simpliciter is merely logically related to him? These considerations seem to suggest that another esse of some sort may be required in Christ’s humanity to enable its central functions.

Aquinas makes further qualifications to his statement in the corpus through his replies to objections. The first, second, and fourth of these are very relevant to the issue described above, and are thus worth investigating. The first objection argues, “Esse consequitur naturam, esse enim est a forma. Ergo in Christo sunt duo esse.”59 Aquinas replies, “Esse consequitur naturam, non sicut habentem esse, sed sicut qua aliquid est, personam autem, sive hypostasim, consequitur sicut habentem esse.”60 It is to be observed here that while Aquinas admits that esse simpliciter follows from the nature/form that pertains to it, this esse simpliciter only follows from it in the

Also, cf. Dominic Bañez, The Primacy of Existence in Thomas Aquinas: A Commentary in Thomistic Metaphysics, trans. Benjamin S. Llamzon (Chicago: Henry Regency Company, 1966), 36: “The humanity in Christ our Lord does not have an existence that is created and received in a subject; rather it exists outside nothingness through the existence of the divine Word, which terminates and completes the order of that humanity to actuality.”

59 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, arg. 1, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 130. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4: IIa IIae QQ. 149-189, IIIa QQ. 1-73, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (1948; repr., Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1981), 2118: “[Esse] follows the nature, for [esse] is from the form. Hence in Christ there are two [esse].”

60 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, ad. 1, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 131. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2119: “[Esse] is consequent upon nature, not as upon that which has [esse], but as upon that whereby a thing is: whereas it is consequent upon person or hypostasis, as upon that which has [esse].”

45 sense of it being that by which it has esse simpliciter. Hence, the esse simpliciter following from the nature/form follows ultimately from the esse simpliciter of the hypostasis, which alone is that which has esse simpliciter. While not precluding the notion that esse can be multiplied in the case of accidental esse secundum quid, this reply clarifies how esse follows from Christ’s human nature in a way that maintains his single substantial esse.

The second objection argues, “Esse filii Dei est ipsa divina natura, et est aeternum. Esse autem hominis Christi non est natura, sed est esse temporale. Ergo in Christo non est tantum unum esse.”61 Aquinas replies, “Illud esse aeternum filii Dei quod est divina natura, fit esse hominis, inquantum humana natura assumitur a filio Dei in unitate personae.”62 Here, Aquinas views the one esse simpliciter of Christ according to the temporal and eternal aspects of his subsistent whole.63 He does so in a way that grounds and terminates his human nature (along

61 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, arg. 2, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 130. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2118: “The [esse] of the Son of God is the Divine Nature itself, and is eternal: whereas the [esse] of the Man Christ is not the Divine Nature, but is a temporal [esse]. Therefore there is not only one [esse] in Christ.”

62 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, ad. 2, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 131. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2119: “The eternal [esse] of the Son of God, which is the Divine Nature, becomes the [esse] of man, inasmuch as the human nature is assumed by the Son of God to unity of Person.” Cf. David A. Tamisiea, “St. Thomas Aquinas on the One Esse of Christ,” Angelicum 88 (2011): 400: “Christ’s human esse is none other than the divine esse when considered from the perspective of its subsisting in a human nature.”

63 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 2, a. 4, co, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 26:

Persona sive hypostasis Christi dupliciter considerari potest. Uno modo, secundum id quod est in se. Et sic est omnino simplex, sicut et natura verbi. Alio modo, secundum rationem personae vel hypostasis, ad quam pertinet subsistere in aliqua natura. Et secundum hoc, persona Christi subsistit in duabus naturis. Unde, licet sit ibi unum subsistens, est tamen ibi alia et alia ratio subsistendi. Et sic dicitur persona composita, inquantum unum duobus subsistit.

46 with the accidental esse which this form actualizes) in the esse simpliciter of his eternal suppositum constituted by his divine nature. This is what he means when he claims that the divine esse becomes the esse of his human nature inasmuch as his humanity is assumed into the esse of his divine person. As Joseph Wawrykow notes, this posits a communication of the divine esse to the human nature of Christ.64 For this reason, Christ’s human nature does not have esse simpliciter through itself, but rather through his eternal esse.

Finally, the fourth objection argues, “In Christo anima dat aliquod esse corpori, cum sit forma eius. Sed non dat sibi esse divinum, cum sit increatum. Ergo in Christo est aliud esse praeter esse divinum. Et sic in Christo non est tantum unum esse.”65 Aquinas replies,

Anima in Christo dat esse corpori inquantum facit ipsum actu animatum, quod est dare ei complementum naturae et specie. Sed si intelligatur corpus perfectum per animam absque hypostasis habente utrumque, hoc totum compositum ex anima et corpore, prout significatur nomine humanitatis, non significatur ut quod est, sed ut quo aliquid est. Et ideo ipsum esse est personae subsistentis, secundum quod habet habitudinem ad talem

For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2031:

The Person or hypostasis of Christ may be viewed in two ways. First as it is in itself, and thus it is altogether simple, even as the Nature of the Word. Secondly, in the aspect of person or hypostasis to which it belongs to subsist in a nature; and thus the Person of Christ subsists in two natures. Hence though there is one subsisting being in Him, yet there are different aspects of subsistence, and hence He is said to be a composite person, insomuch as one being subsists in two.”

64 Wawrykow, “Hypostatic Union,” 242: “What we learn here is that an additional way of putting ‘assumption’ is to speak of the communication of the divine esse to the human nature of Christ.”

65 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, arg. 4, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 130. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2118: “In Christ the soul gives some [esse] to the body, since it is its form. But it does not give the Divine [esse], since this is uncreated. Therefore in Christ there is another [esse] besides the Divine [esse]; and thus in Christ there is not only one [esse].”

naturam, cuius habitudinis causa est anima inquantum perficit humanam naturam informando corpus.66

Here, Aquinas seems to combine certain difficulties associated with the first and second objections and to present a solution thereunto. Having already shown in his replies to these prior two objections that 1) the esse following from the nature/form follows from the single esse of the hypostasis, and that 2) the divine esse becomes the esse of Christ’s human nature inasmuch as his humanity is assumed into the esse of his divine person which has esse simpliciter, the fourth objection presumes that Aquinas has not yet properly distinguished how Christ’s uncreated esse differs from his created esse which his soul, as the substantial form of Christ’s humanity, gives to its matter, consisting of his body and accidental predicaments.

In response to this objection, Aquinas notes that this substantial form does give esse to its matter in the sense that it perfects the nature and species of the body with actual animation. More precisely, the soul actualizes the body with esse simpliciter (since it is a substantial part within its matter)67 and actualizes its accidental predicaments in their esse secundum quid (since

66 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, ad. 4, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 131. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2119:

In Christ the soul gives [esse] to the body, inasmuch as it makes it actually animated, which is to give it the complement of its nature and species. But if we consider the body perfected by the soul, without the hypostasis having both—this whole, composed of soul and body, as signified by the word “humanity,” does not signify “what is,” but “whereby it is.” Hence [esse] belongs to the subsisting person, inasmuch as it has a relation to such a nature, and of this relation the soul is the cause, inasmuch as it perfects human nature by informing the body.

Cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 118: “There must be a distinction between the way esse follows on form or essence, and the way it follows on the subsistent. Esse follows on form, but only because form is that whereby, or that through which, or that in which, something is, variously expressed. Form does not have esse as that which is simply. The supposit is simply, and esse is said most properly of it.”

67 On how the soul communicates esse simpliciter to the body, cf. John F. Wippel, “Thomas Aquinas on Creatures as Causes of Esse,” International Philosophy Quarterly 40 (2000): 201:

48 accidents do not pertain to the esse simpliciter of the suppositum). Thus, Christ’s human soul, as the forma partis used to denominate his human nature in its abstraction from matter without precision, may be understood as a substantia secunda; for his soul is that by which he exists as human when it acts as a formal principle that is joined with its material principle through the esse simpliciter of the substantia prima to which the forma totius of his humanity pertains. This means that in perfecting the body with act, the soul is also that by which the forma totius of the human nature is perfected with the esse simpliciter proper to the divine suppositum. Aquinas accordingly ends his reply with the assertion that Christ’s soul, inasmuch as it perfects his human nature by informing his body with act, is the reality based upon which a relation is established between his divine esse and his human nature.

While Aquinas thus regards this relation as based in the perfection of the human nature through the soul’s actualization of the body, he has not thus far explicitly attributed any created esse to the human nature in itself. He has only attributed created esse to the accidental esse secundum quid, the perfection of which leads to the perfection of Christ’s human nature. The reason behind this seems to have been that the substantia secunda of the human nature has no substantial esse apart from the uncreated divine esse to which it pertains.

However, it would appear that Christ’s human nature must have some form of created esse in order to account for its relation to his divine esse. Indeed, this becomes clear when one considers that, for Aquinas, Christ’s divine person has only a logical relation to his human

As Thomas puts it in De pot. 3.9 ad 20, it is rather that God, the Creator, gives esse to the soul as realized in the body and that a human generator disposes the body so that it can participate in this same act of being by means of the soul which is united to it. . . . As Thomas expresses this in ST 1.76.1 ad 5, the soul communicates to corporeal matter that very act of being in which it subsists so that the act of being of the composite whole is the very same act of being as that of the soul itself.

49 nature, whereas his humanity has a real relation to his person. This view of Aquinas may be seen when examining Summa theologiae III, q. 2, a. 7, co., where he discusses the sense in which the hypostatic union is something created:

Omnis relatio quae consideratur inter Deum et creaturam, realiter quidem est in creatura, per cuius mutationem talis relatio innascitur, non autem est realiter in Deo, sed secundum rationem tantum, quia non nascitur secundum mutationem Dei. Sic igitur dicendum est quod haec unio de qua loquimur, non est in Deo realiter, sed secundum rationem tantum in humana autem natura, quae creatura quaedam est, est realiter. Et ideo oportet dicere quod sit quoddam creatum.68

Here, Aquinas notes that each relation between God and a creature is a real relation from the creature to God, but a logical relation from God to the creature. Thus, the hypostatic union of

Christ is in his human nature according to reality and in the divine esse only according to reason.

Now, since the divine esse only has a logical relation to Christ’s human nature, it would appear that there must be some created esse by which a real relation of his humanity to his person can be established; yet the only candidate for such an esse presented thus far seems to be esse secundum quid, which is not sufficient to communicate esse simpliciter to the human nature.69

68 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 2, a. 7, co., in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 31. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2034:

Every relation which we consider between God and the creature is really in the creature, by whose change the relation is brought into being; whereas it is not really in God, but only in our way of thinking, since it does not arise from any change in God. And hence we must say that the union of which we are speaking is not really in God, except only in our way of thinking; but in the human nature, which is a creature, it is really. Therefore we must say it is something created.

69 Cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 67-8: “The new relation that St. Thomas speaks of implies something being related to. The new relation of the preexisting personal esse, a relation of reason which goes without saying, implies some foundation in the nature where the relation is real. It would be odd that the subject of the relation, the relation being an accidental reality and having accidental esse, would have esse in absolutely no sense.”

In his reply to objection 2 of the same article, Aquinas argues further, “Ratio relationis, sicut et motus dependet ex fine vel termino, sed esse eius dependet ex subiecto. Et quia unio talis non habet esse reale nisi in natura creata, ut dictum est, consequens est quod habeat esse creatum.”70 He claims here that the hypostatic union, the subject of which is a real relation in

Christ’s human nature, is a created esse. Yet, since it has already been established that the hypostatic union is not an accidental union, it cannot be attributed to Christ’s human nature merely as an accidental esse; for Christ’s human nature would still require the esse simpliciter of a suppositum. However, this created esse cannot be substantial either; since, for Aquinas, there is only one substantial esse in Christ. Accordingly, the created esse that needs to be attributed to

Christ’s human nature must consist precisely in its termination in the divine esse simpliciter to which it pertains through a real relation. This esse would be different from an accidental esse that carries its own esse into another because a substantia secunda, in its termination in a suppositum to which it pertains, whether this be constituted through itself or through another principle of subsistence, does not threaten to add anything to the esse simpliciter of the suppositum.

This conclusion may perhaps suggest itself on the basis of Aquinas’ reference in Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2, ad. 2 to Christ’s eternal esse becoming the esse of his human nature through its assumption, which was examined above. Yet, it may also suggest itself on the basis of his reply to the third objection of the current article: “Homo dicitur et est Deus propter unionem inquantum terminatur ad hypostasim divinam. Non tamen sequitur quod ipsa unio sit

70 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 2, a. 7, ad. 2, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 31. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2034: “The specific nature of a relation, as of motion, [depends on the end or term, but its esse] depends on the subject. And since this union has its [esse] nowhere save in a created nature, as was said above, it follows that it has a created [esse].” The addition to this translation placed in brackets is mine.

51 creator vel Deus, quia quod aliquid dicatur creatum, hoc magis respicit esse ipsius quam relationem.”71 Here one might read between the lines to propose that the created esse of the human nature’s real relation to God is a unique type of created substantial esse. Yet, it would be so not as that which perfects human nature with subsistence, but rather as that by which the human nature terminates in the esse simpliciter of the divine suppositum. While this perfection by the esse simpliciter involves the soul’s consequent perfection of its matter, including accidental forms inhering in the body with temporal esse secundum quid, it does not pertain per se to accidental esse to terminate in the divine suppositum. It only pertains properly to the human nature as the forma totius to terminate in the substantia prima of the divine suppositum through its created esse.72

Quaestio disputata de unione Verbi incarnati, A. 4

Aquinas’ treatment of the being of Christ in De unione, which was noted earlier to have been written within months of the parallel text from the Summa theologiae, is unique for its terminological variance from the rest of the texts discussed above, perhaps in part since the

71 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae III, q. 2, a. 7, ad. 3, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 31. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2034: “A man is called Creator and is God because of the union, inasmuch as it is terminated in the Divine hypostasis; yet it does not follow that the union itself is the Creator or God, because that a thing is said to be created regards its [esse] rather than its relation.”

72 Such a notion of created esse in Christ would be similar to that identified by Henry of Ghent in his Quodlibet X. Cf. Stephen F. Brown, “Thomas Aquinas and His Contemporaries on the Unique Existence in Christ,” in Christ Among the Medieval Dominicans, eds. Kent Emery and Joseph Wawrykow (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1998), 221: “If the human nature in Christ were to lack its own proper existence and have the existence of the divine supposit, then the humanity of Christ would not have any created existence at all, and thus Christ would not be a creature according to his human nature, because something is not a creature if it does not participate in created existence.”

52 format of a disputed question allows for more tangents in discourse than a summa.73 Beside his usage of esse principale and esse secundarium to describe the being of the suppositum as it is made substantial in his divine and human natures, Aquinas also expands the phrase esse secundum quid to refer not only to accidental esse, but also to a substance by which a suppositum is made substantial (which may be considered as a substantia secunda if it is abstracted from the suppositum).74 In the corpus of article 4, after noting the similarity of the questions about whether something is a being and whether something is only one esse, Aquinas goes on to say the following:

Esse enim proprie et vere dicitur de supposito subsistente. Accidentia enim et formae non subsistentes dicuntur esse, in quantum eis aliquid subsistit; sicut albedo dicitur ens, in quantum ea est aliquid album. Considerandum est autem, quod aliquae formae sunt quibus est aliquid ens non simpliciter, sed secundum quid; sicut sunt omnes formae accidentales. Aliquae autem formae sunt quibus res subsistens simpliciter habet esse; quia videlicet constituunt esse substantiale rei subsistentis. In Christo autem suppositum subsistens est persona Filii Dei, quae simpliciter substantificatur per naturam divinam, non autem simpliciter substantificatur per naturam humanam. Quia persona Filii Dei fuit ante humanitatem assumptam, nec in aliquo persona est augmentata, seu perfectior, per naturam humanam assumptam. Substantificatur autem suppositum aeternum per naturam humanam, in quantum est hic homo. Et ideo sicut Christus est unum simpliciter propter unitatem suppositi, et duo secundum quid propter duas naturas, ita habet unum esse simpliciter propter unum esse aeternum aeterni suppositi. Est autem et aliud esse huius suppositi, non in quantum est aeternum, sed in quantum est temporaliter homo factum. Quod esse, etsi non sit esse accidentale - quia homo non praedicatur accidentaliter de Filio Dei, ut supra habitum est - non tamen est esse principale sui suppositi, sed

73 Cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 73: “A disputed question will deal with a question more broadly and consider things that are more tangential to the main point. The summa that St. Thomas wrote, while going into both sides of a question, is relatively more focused. It contains briefer treatments as the name summa implies.”

74 Cf. Hastings, “Christ’s Act of Existence,” 145: “St Thomas applies analogically the same terms and the same relationships to accidents in us and to the human nature in Christ, always however emphasizing that one is in the accidental the other in the substantial.”

secundarium. Si autem in Christo essent duo supposita, tunc utrumque suppositum haberet proprium esse sibi principale. Et sic in Christo esset simpliciter duplex esse.75

Aquinas begins by noting that a thing is called an ens (a being) inasmuch as it is called one esse according to its suppositum. He then claims that accidents and non-subsisting forms are called esse inasmuch as they are things by which something subsists. He clarifies that while accidental forms are those things secundum quid a thing is an ens, substantial forms are things by which subsisting things have esse simpliciter, and this is normally because they constitute the substantial esse of the subsistent whole. In Christ, however, the suppositum of the divine esse is made substantial simpliciter from the beginning only through his eternal divine nature; it is only made substantial through the human nature in the sense that it comes to be a man in time. For this reason, Aquinas says that while Christ has one esse simpliciter in the unity of his suppositum, he has two esse secundum quid according to his two natures. Thus, while the esse simpliciter of the suppositum is made substantial through the substance of the divine nature as

75 Thomas Aquinas, Quaestio disputata de unione Verbi incarnati, a. 4, co., in Quaestiones Disputatae, Vol. II, 432. For an English translation, cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 86-8:

For esse properly and truly is said of the subsisting supposit. For accidents and non subsisting forms are called esse, inasmuch as through them something subsists; just as white is called being in as much as through it something is white. But it is to be considered that some forms are that through which some thing is, not simply, but according to which; as are all accidental forms. But other forms are through which a subsisting thing simply has esse; since it is clear they constitute the substantial esse of the subsisting thing. But in Christ the subsisting supposit is the person of the Son of God, which is made substantial through the divine nature, but not made substantial through the human nature simply. Since the person of the Son of God existed before the assumption of humanity, the person was not made any greater, or more perfect, through the assumption of human nature. But the eternal supposit was made substantial through human nature inasmuch as he is this man. And therefore just as Christ is one simply because of the unity of the supposit, and two according to which, because of the two natures, thus he has one esse simply because of the one eternal esse of the eternal supposit. But there is also another esse of this supposit, not inasmuch it is eternal, but inasmuch as it is made man in time. Which esse, even if it is not accidental esse—since man is not predicated accidentally of the Son of God, as was said above—it is nevertheless not the principle esse, but subordinate. But if in Christ there were two supposits, then each supposit would have its own principle esse. And thus in Christ there would be two-fold esse simply speaking.

54 the esse secundum quid (according to which) it is eternal, the esse simpliciter of the suppositum also has an esse secundarium by which it is made substantial through the substance of the human nature as the esse secundum quid (according to which) it is temporal as a man. Now, although the esse secundarium is not an accidental esse (since the incarnation does not involve an accidental union), neither is it the esse principale of the esse simpliciter of the divine suppositum. If it were an esse principale, it would have its own suppositum apart from that of the divine esse simpliciter through its own proportionate act; but this cannot be because Christ has one suppositum and one esse simpliciter, even though he has two esse secundum quid.76

The first objection presented by Aquinas and his reply to it are instructive here. The objection is, “In Christo enim est esse divinum et humanum; quae non possunt esse unum, quia esse non dicitur univoce de Deo et creaturis. Ergo in Christo non est tantum unum esse, sed duo.”77 Here, it is suggested that since there are both divine and human esse in Christ which are not attributed to him univocally, there are two esse in Christ. Aquinas’ reply is, “Esse humanae naturae non est esse divinae. Nec tamen simpliciter dicendum est quod Christus sit duo secundum esse; quia non ex aequo respicit utrumque esse suppositum aeternum.”78 Aquinas

76 Cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 5: “The human nature of Christ does not have a proportionate act of supposital being, so esse in its primary sense, that of the being of the supposit, cannot be attributed simply speaking to the human nature of Christ.”

77 Thomas Aquinas, Quaestio disputata de unione Verbi incarnati, a. 4, arg. 1, in Quaestiones Disputatae, Vol. II, 432. For an English translation, cf. De unione Verbi incarnati, trans. Roger W. Nutt (Bristol, CT: Peeters, 2015), 133: “For in Christ there is divine [esse] and human [esse], which cannot be one [esse] since [esse] is not said univocally of God and creatures. Therefore in Christ there is not one [esse] only, but two.”

78 Thomas Aquinas, Quaestio disputata de unione Verbi incarnati, a. 4, ad. 1, in Quaestiones Disputatae, Vol. II, 432. For an English translation, cf. De unione Verbi incarnati, trans. Roger W. Nutt, 135: “The [esse] of the human nature is not the [esse] of the divine nature. Nevertheless, it should not be said simpliciter that Christ is two according to [esse]; because each [esse] does not concern the eternal suppositum in the same manner.”

55 acknowledges here that the esse secundum quid of the human nature is not the esse secundum quid of the divine nature, but notes also that Christ does not have two esse simpliciter. He rather only has the one esse simpliciter pertaining to his suppositum, to which his two esse secundum quid (namely the esse principale and the esse secundarium) do not relate in an equal way such as would establish distinct supposita.79

It is important to recall that Aquinas pointed out in the Summa theologiae that a relation exists between Christ’s human nature and divine person inasmuch as the substance of Christ’s human nature pertains to the esse simpliciter of the divine suppositum. However, while the human nature has a real relation to the divine esse, the divine esse only has a logical relation to the human nature. Thus, when De unione discusses how the esse simpliciter of the divine suppositum is qualified into two esse secundum quid by being made substantial in its relation to its two natures, this qualification is simply a logical relation that does not cause any change in the divine esse, which is not in potency to accidental change or being limited through reception into a finite essence.80 Also, since the divine nature is the divine esse, the esse secundum quid of

79 Cf. Charles Hefling, “Another Perhaps Permanently Valid Achievement: Lonergan on Christ's (Self-) Knowledge,” Lonergan Workshop 20 (2008), 137: “This esse secundarium is constitutive of the Word’s being-a- man, though not of his being or his being one. That which is, both as God and as man, that which “subsists” in both divine and human natures, is the person of the Word, and that whereby he is whatever he is—eternally or contingently, as God or as man—is the divine esse.”

80 On how God’s divine esse is not subject to limitation, cf. Froula, “One and the Same Lord,” 186-7: “Nature ordinarily limits or determines the esse that activates it. The human esse of Christ, being the divine esse communicated, uniquely is not limited by the human nature it activates.” Also, cf. James B. Reichmann, “Immanently Transcendent and Subsistent Esse: A Comparison,” The Thomist 38, no. 2 (1974): 345-6:

Aquinas sharply distinguishes the esse of God from common esse, the actuality immanent to each existing thing by which it is without qualification. The divine esse is subsistent, i.e., it is not that actuality of a form distinct from it but is, in this unique instance, also that which is. Hence the divine esse does not inhere in a subject but rather is one with the subject and with the divine essence. Consequently, no limitation is placed upon it. Because the divine esse subsists, it cannot be an esse which inheres within things and which

56 the divine nature likewise only has a logical relation to the divine esse, as they may be logically distinguished but are really identical.81 Furthermore, since the divine nature cannot be abstracted with or without precision from the suppositum of the divine esse, it can in no way be regarded as a substantia secunda as defined above. Despite being called an esse secundum quid in this text (a distinction which is merely logical in the end), the divine nature is that which has esse simpliciter as a substantia prima. However, the esse secundum quid of the human nature, as an esse secundarium which does not constitute its own subsisting suppositum, has a real relation to the esse principale inasmuch as it subsists in the divine esse simpliciter. This esse secundarium refers to the same kind of esse as that which was teased out earlier from Summa theologiae III, q.

17, a. 2 in light of Summa theologiae III, q. 2, a. 7; and this was identified above as the created esse of the human nature which, while not that which has esse simpliciter, is that by which it pertains to the human nature to terminate in the divine suppositum and therefrom receive its perfection with esse simpliciter. In many ways, therefore, the text of the De unione may be regarded as the logical conclusion of the argumentation put forward throughout the whole of

formally renders them in act. For the esse found in things does not subsist but has the form as its quasi principle (quasi principium), since it is limited and determined by the very form it actuates.

81 On the identification of God’s essence with his esse, cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, q. 3, a. 4, co., in Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 17: “Impossibile est ergo quod in Deo sit aliud esse, et aliud eius essentia.” For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1: 1a QQ. 1-119, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (1948; repr., Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1981), 17: “It is impossible that in God His existence should differ from His essence.” Also, on how the Trinitarian relations (which subsist in the divine esse) involve only a logical relation to the divine essence, cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, q. 39, a. 1, co., in Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 193: “Persona enim, ut dictum est supra, significat relationem, prout est subsistens in natura divina. Relatio autem, ad essentiam comparata, non differt re, sed ratione tantum, comparata autem ad oppositam relationem, habet, virtute oppositionis, realem distinctionem.” For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 194: “For person, as above stated (29, 4), signifies relation as subsisting in the divine nature. But relation as referred to the essence does not differ therefrom really, but only in our way of thinking; while as referred to an opposite relation, it has a real distinction by virtue of that opposition.”

Aquinas’ writings, following especially that found in the Summa theologiae where it reached its penultimate climax.

The above description of the esse secundarium of Christ’s human nature concurs very much with the way in which Lonergan formulates it. Like Aquinas, Lonergan understands the human nature of Christ to lack its own esse simpliciter distinct from that of the unlimited divine suppositum, yet nevertheless also to have received a limited esse secundarium beyond its natural proportions82 whereby it is assumed into the divine person and terminates thereunto: “The humanity of Christ lacks its own proper and proportionate [esse], and yet that same humanity is actuated by a created [esse] not proper to it—not, indeed, in order that it exist, but rather that it be actually assumed.”83 Since being assumed through the hypostatic union is beyond what is connatural to human nature, Lonergan understands the esse secundarium that enables this relation as a supernatural actuation of an obediential potency: “It is clear that this potency is obediential and this act supernatural.”84 This created supernatural act is not merely accidental (as grace is in the case of other humans who participate in the divine nature), but rather substantial

82 Cf. Bernard Lonergan, The Triune God: Systematics, vol. 12 of Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, eds. Frederick E. Crowe and Robert M. Doran, trans. Michael Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009), 471: “Since this assumption exceeds the proportion of nature, this secondary [esse] likewise exceeds the proportion of the assumed nature.” Thus, while non-proportional esse principale individuates by way of termination, the non- proportional esse secundarium is what enables the real relation of termination by actualizing an obediential potency beyond what is connatural to human nature.

83 Bernard Lonergan, The Ontological and Psychological Constitution of Christ, vol. 7 of Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, eds. Frederick E. Crowe and Robert M. Doran, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002), 73. While the English consistently renders Lonergan’s “esse” as “act of existence,” this translation may be misleading, because that term normally refers to the esse of the suppositum. Even if Lonergan had this translation in mind, he would not have understood this “act of existence” as one which causes the human essence of Christ to subsist in its own proportion, but rather only relates it to the esse simpliciter of the divine suppositum that does.

84 Ibid., 113.

(although it does not constitute a separate substantial esse simpliciter, but only a substantial esse secundum quid). He writes,

It is not an accidental created act with a relationship to uncreated act. For an accidental created act with a relationship to uncreated act, if received in the essence, is sanctifying grace; if received in the intellect, it is the light of glory. . . . If the potency is substantial, the act also is substantial. But the potency is substantial: it is the assumed human essence or nature. Therefore the act also is substantial, so that through it the Son of God is this man.85

Lonergan notes further that the esse secundarium is ontologically posterior to the esse principale (i.e. esse simpliciter) of the divine suppositum: “In the ontological order, however, the infinite [esse] of the Word is simply prior, while that [esse] or substantial supernatural act whereby the human nature is constituted as actually assumed is simply posterior or altogether secondary.”86 Even so, however, the esse secundarium is distinct from the esse principale because, while the latter involves merely a logical relation from Christ’s divine person to his human nature (since the infinite divine esse has no potency toward receiving any real relations), the former is that by which his human nature is really related to his divine person: “The substantial supernatural act received in Christ’s human essence is the foundation of the real relation of the assumed nature to the Word alone.”87 Hence, Lonergan identifies the relations between the two terms of the hypostatic union, namely “‘to assume’ and ‘to be assumed,’” as

“the relation of reason in the Word and the real relation in the assumed nature.”88

85 Ibid., 115.

86 Ibid., 145.

87 Ibid., 147.

88 Ibid., 145.

However, Lonergan is also careful to note that the esse secundarium is not God or man because it is not the esse simpliciter by which the divine and human natures subsist. It is rather

(strictly speaking) only that by which the human nature has a real relation to the divine person so as to subsist as a substance. Accordingly, since it is the esse simpliciter of the divine person which assumes the human nature, the esse secundarium is neither that which nor that by which the two terms of the hypostatic union are linked. The intermediary is in fact the divine personal esse. As he states,

The hypostatic union takes place in the person and on the basis of the person, so that the intermediary between the two natures is the person of the Word who is God and man. Besides, if the person of the Word were not that which links and unites the two natures, there would not be one and the same reality that is God and is man. Clearly, the secondary act of existence is neither God nor man, and so it is quite impossible for it to be that which links and unites the two natures in one person. Furthermore, as the person of the Word is that one same reality which is both God and man, so the Word’s infinite [esse] is that by which the person of the Word is both God and man. . . . On the other hand, the secondary [esse], as it is not that which links and unites, neither is it that by which the link and unifier links and unites.89

b) Sanctifying Grace

In his 1951-1952 notes, Lonergan defines sanctifying grace as “that finite entity by which a finite substance is reborn and regenerated for participating in the very life of God.”90 Following

Aquinas, he understands sanctifying grace as an accidental form that abides in the human soul as a quality and a habit. In his words, “Sanctifying grace is an accident in the genus of quality

89 Ibid., 149.

90 Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” 633.

60 reducible to the species of habit.”91 Lonergan also notes that sanctifying grace “is not a virtue, but is in the essence of the soul as in its subject.”92 This agrees with Aquinas’ account of the relationship between sanctifying grace and charity, where only the latter is understood to be a virtue.93 Aquinas disagreed on this point with Peter Lombard, who believed that sanctifying grace and the virtue of charity were only logically distinct.94 Aquinas maintained that the virtue of charity is ordained to the sanctifying grace in the soul as the principle that precedes it.95

91 Ibid., 615.

92 Ibid., 615.

93 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II, q. 110, a. 3, s.c., in Summa theologiae, Pars Ia IIae, eds. De Rubeis, Billuart, Faucher, et al. (Taurini: Marietti, 1948), 562. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 2: Ia IIae QQ. 1-114, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (1948; repr., Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1981), 1134: “Grace is neither faith nor hope, for these can be without sanctifying grace. Nor is it charity, since ‘grace foreruns charity,’ as Augustine says in his book on the Predestination of the Saints (De Dono Persev. xvi). Therefore grace is not virtue.”

94 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II, q. 110, a. 3, co., in Summa theologiae, Pars Ia IIae, 562. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 2, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 1134: “Some held that grace and virtue were identical in essence, and differed only logically-- in the sense that we speak of grace inasmuch as it makes man pleasing to God, or is given gratuitously--and of virtue inasmuch as it empowers us to act rightly. And the Master seems to have thought this (Sent. ii, D 27).”

95 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I-II, q. 110, a. 3, co., in Summa theologiae, Pars Ia IIae, 562. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 2, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 1134:

The virtue of a thing has reference to some pre-existing nature, from the fact that everything is disposed with reference to what befits its nature. But it is manifest that the virtues acquired by human acts of which we spoke above (55, seqq.) are dispositions, whereby a man is fittingly disposed with reference to the nature whereby he is a man; whereas infused virtues dispose man in a higher manner and towards a higher end, and consequently in relation to some higher nature, i.e. in relation to a participation of the Divine Nature. . . . And thus, even as the natural light of reason is something besides the acquired virtues, which are ordained to this natural light, so also the light of grace which is a participation of the Divine Nature is something besides the infused virtues which are derived from and are ordained to this light.

Lonergan continues by describing the various formal effects of sanctifying grace, which he divides into four kinds: primary or secondary, and immanent or transcendent.96 He distinguishes them as follows:

(a) A primary immanent formal effect is one that is truly predicated of a subject on account of an intrinsic constitutive element in that subject. . . . (b) A secondary immanent formal effect is one that is truly predicated of a subject on account of a distinct and necessary reality consequent upon an intrinsic constitutive element in that subject. . . . (c) A primary transcendent formal effect is one that is truly predicated of one subject on account of an intrinsic constitutive element in another subject. . . . (d) A secondary transcendent formal effect is one that is truly predicated of one subject on account of a distinct and necessary reality consequent upon an intrinsic constitutive element received in another subject.

Lonergan identifies one of the primary immanent effects of sanctifying grace as participation in the divine nature through the imitation of active spiration. He notes that while active spiration is attributed the Father and the Son as a substantial relation, it cannot be attributed to a finite substance, which can only have accidental relations. Yet, a finite substance can still imitate active spiration through the absolutely supernatural reality of sanctifying grace as an accidental form. As Lonergan explains,

The primary immanent formal effect of sanctifying grace is that it makes one who has it a participant of the divine nature. For this grace imitates the divine essence considered according to its being identical with active spiration. Now active spiration belongs to the very nature and life of the divine Trinity. But no finite substance, being something absolute, can imitate the divine essence according to this aspect, which is a relation.97

96 Cf. Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” 623-5.

97 Ibid., 637.

Lonergan identifies a secondary immanent formal effect of sanctifying grace as the virtue of charity.98 He points out the parallel between the relationship of active spiration to passive spiration and that of sanctifying grace to charity. Accordingly, sanctifying grace is the principle of which charity is the resultant. This will be examined more in the section below on the habit of charity.

Lonergan mentions other secondary immanent formal effects of sanctifying grace whose presence in the soul varies according to a person’s state of life.99 These include proximate principles of supernatural operations, such as the infused virtues of faith and hope.100 These proximate principles are secondary effects of sanctifying grace that depend upon its primary effect, which is its role as the remote principle of supernatural operations. One example of a proximate principle would be the virtue of charity, as noted above. Another example, which

Lonergan does not explicitly mention in this text, is the light of glory present in the saints in heaven. However, he does discuss it as such in his 1946 systematic supplement “De ente supernaturali,” which will also be examined below.

98 Cf. ibid., 639: “An immanent and formal but secondary effect of sanctifying grace is the infused virtue of charity. For charity flows from sanctifying grace as potencies flow from the essence of the soul. For as active spriation is to passive spiration, so is sanctifying grace to the virtue of charity. Just as sanctifying grace imitates active spiration, so does the virtue of charity imitate passive spiration. Now active spiration is to passive spiration as the principle to its resultant. Therefore sanctifying grace is to charity as the principle to its resultant.”

99 Cf. ibid.

100 Elsewhere, Lonergan notes that faith and hope uninformed by charity are merely virtually supernatural, not absolutely supernatural. The latter attains God as God is in se, but the former attains God only in some respect. Cf. Lonergan, The Triune God: Systematics, 471-3n.

Lonergan identifies two kinds of primary transcendent formal effects of sanctifying grace.101 They are divided based upon whether sanctifying grace is considered as an effect of divine love or as a term of divine love. In the former case, it is known that God efficiently causes sanctifying grace in a person. In the latter case, it is known that God loves those whom he has made pleasing by sanctifying grace. When understood as effects, these transcendent effects relate to essential divine love, which is common to all three divine persons. Yet, when regarded as terms, they relate to notional divine love, which is proper to individual divine persons. Lonergan notes that there are no transcendent formal effects of sanctifying grace that are secondary. This is because transcendent formal effects of sanctifying grace “are not to be conceived as consequences; but supposing God as one and as a Trinity, by the very fact of having grace one also has adoptive sonship, brotherhood with the Son, the gift of the Spirit, the indwelling of the

Three, and mutual friendship with God.”102

While considering sanctifying grace as a term of divine love, Lonergan describes it as the extrinsic term of the Father’s love through the Holy Spirit for his incarnate Son in history.

Noting that “the Father eternally and necessarily loves the Son as God by the Holy Spirit,”103

Lonergan points out likewise that “in time and contingently he loves the Son as man by the Holy

Spirit.”104 Yet, Lonergan argues, “This fact, being contingent, requires an appropriate extrinsic term. This appropriate term is sanctifying grace alone. For it imitates extrinsically that active

101 Cf. Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” 641-3.

102 Ibid., 663.

103 Ibid., 643.

104 Ibid.

64 spiration whereby the Father loves.”105 Hence, the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father, when joined to the extrinsic term abiding in Christ that is sanctifying grace, communicates the

Father’s love to the incarnate Son in history. In this manner, the passive spiration of the Holy

Spirit, working in history, creates in Christ a participation in active spiration through the gift of sanctifying grace.

This love is not simply that which is characteristic of the divine nature generally, but is more specifically that which is proper to the Holy Spirit as sent by the Father. Lonergan understands this love as a “notional” property that is not merely appropriated to a particular divine person. As he explains,

Sanctifying grace in the man Christ is the term of notional divine love if the Father himself loves him, if the Son as man is loved, and if the Holy Spirit is a gift properly conferred upon Christ. But according to Scripture the Son is loved properly and not by appropriation: the Father loves properly and not by appropriation; and the Spirit is properly and not by appropriation conferred by way of a gift. Therefore sanctifying grace in the man Christ is the term of notional divine love whereby the Father loves the Son in the Holy Spirit.106

The sanctifying grace bestowed upon Christ is also the means through which all human beings participate in the divine life. Christ has sanctifying grace by necessity as a consequence of the grace of union,107 and he shares it freely with the the rest of humanity. Through sharing in

Christ’s sanctifying grace, people are able to participate in active spiration and receive the

105 Ibid.

106 Ibid., 645.

107 Cf. Lonergan, The Triune God: Systematics, 565: “The grace of union is substantial, while sanctifying grace is an accident; again, there are many who have sanctifying grace, while only Christ has the grace of union. Nor does it tell against this that sanctifying grace necessarily follows the grace of union, for what are called inseparable accidents likewise follow necessarily on substance.”

Father’s love by adoption.108 Hence, Lonergan notes that “the Father properly and not by appropriation loves those who would come to believe in Christ.”109 This love is given to people through the Holy Spirit being sent into the world, the extrinsic term of which is sanctifying grace. As Lonergan explains, “Just as sanctifying grace is the extrinsic term according to which the just are loved by notional love, so also is grace the extrinsic term according to which the uncreated Gift, the Holy Spirit, notional love, is given to the just.”110

c) The Habit of Charity

In his notes, Lonergan defines the habit or virtue of charity as “that finite entity whereby a regenerated finite substance habitually possesses genuine friendship with God.”111 In his explanation, he describes charity as a secondary formal effect of sanctifying grace. He also draws an analogy between sanctifying grace as the principle of charity and active spiration as the principle of passive spiration. Although they exist inseparably from one another, Lonergan identifies a real distinction between sanctifying grace and charity, analogous to the one between

108 Cf. Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” 647: “One is a child by adoption if (1) he has not been begotten in a natural way, and (2) is loved by the Father just as the Father loves his own Son; but (1) the just are not naturally God’s children but rather ‘by nature children of wrath’ (Ephesians 2.3), and (2) they are loved by the Father as he loves his own Son (John 17.23).”

109 Ibid., 645.

110 Ibid., 655-7.

111 Ibid., 633.

66 active and passive spiration. On these grounds, he argues that charity participates in passive spiration, just as sanctifying grace participates in active spiration. He writes,

An immanent and formal but secondary effect of sanctifying grace is the infused virtue of charity. For charity flows from sanctifying grace as potencies flow from the essence of the soul. For as active spiration is to passive spiration, so is sanctifying grace to the virtue of charity. Just as sanctifying grace imitates active spiration, so does the virtue of charity imitate passive spiration. Now active spiration is to passive spiration as the principle to its resultant. Therefore sanctifying grace is to charity as the principle to its resultant. Moreover, active and passive spiration are really distinct, correlative, inseparable, and equal. Therefore sanctifying grace and charity are really distinct. With the infusion of grace, charity is also infused; when charity is lost, so is grace; and the measure of grace in the same person is the same as the measure of charity.112

Lonergan proceeds to note that while the soul’s reception of divine love is the consequent external term of the sending of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit dwells in the soul by the infusion of divine charity. Thus, charity participates in the passive spiration of the Holy Spirit and has a proper relation to the active spiration of the Father and the Son. Lonergan explains,

The just possess the Spirit insofar as this uncreated Gift is given to them through grace. Further, grace is the appropriate external term of this donation because it externally imitates active spiration and therefore has a proper relation to uncreated passive spiration. But the Spirit is had by participation through infused charity. For the virtue of charity externally imitates passive spiration which is the Holy Spirit. Finally, with regard to fruition, the Spirit is possessed insofar as through grace the just habitually have a true knowledge of God and a proper love for him.113

112 Ibid., 639.

113 Ibid., 657.

d) The Light of Glory

Lonergan describes the light of glory (lumen gloriae) in his 1951-1952 notes as “that finite entity by which a created intellect is disposed to receiving the divine essence as an intelligible species and thus see God as he is in himself.”114 This closely follows Aquinas’ understanding of the light of glory. For him, the beatific vision of God in heaven consists of the following form of union between God and the soul: “In the vision wherein God will be seen in

His essence, the Divine essence itself will be the form, as it were, of the intellect, by which it will understand: nor is it necessary for them to become one in being, but only to become one as regards the act of understanding.”115 Through the divine similitude of the light of glory, the intellect of the human soul is disposed to this vision of God, just as matter is actualized by form.116

114 Ibid., 633.

115 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae Suppl., q. 92, a. 1, ad. 8, in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 5: IIIa QQ. 74-90, Supplement QQ. 1-99, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (1948; repr., Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1981), 2950. For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 1042: “In visione qua Deus per essentiam videbitur, ipsa divina essentia erit quasi forma intellectus qua intelligit. Nec oportet quod efficiantur unum secundum esse simpliciter: sed solum quod fiant unum quantam pertinet ad actum intelligendi.”

116 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, q. 12, a. 2, co., in Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 53. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 50: “The essence of God is His own very existence, as was shown above (Question 3, Article 4), which cannot be said of any created form; and so no created form can be the similitude representing the essence of God to the seer. . . . To see the essence of God, there is required some similitude in the visual faculty, namely, the light of glory strengthening the intellect to see God.” Also, cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae Suppl., q. 92, a. 1, ad. 15, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, 1043. For an English translation, cf. Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 5, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2951: “[The light of glory] is the medium under which the object is seen. . . . It does not come in between the knower and the thing known, but is that which gives the knower the power to know.”

Lonergan identifies the light of glory, together with sanctifying grace, as that through which God bestows adoptive sonship upon people. Yet, he argues that sanctifying grace and the light of glory cause one to imitate the Son of God in distinct manners, the former according to the Son’s active spiration, and the latter according to his filiation. As he writes, “According to St

Thomas, adoptive sonship means being made to be like God’s natural Son (Summa theologiae, 3, q. 23, a. 3 c.). Through sanctifying grace we are made like the Son as the Word spirating love.

Through the light of glory we are like the Son as Son, the Word begotten by the Father.”117

2. “De Ente Supernaturali”

In his 1946 systematic supplement “De ente supernaturali,” Lonergan provides additional detail about the relationships among the four preeminent created graces involved in the communication of the divine nature. He discusses the relationships among these four most specifically while addressing the first two of five theses in his text. In the text’s first thesis, he identifies the existence of “a created communication of the divine nature, which is a created, proportionate, and remote principle whereby there are operations in creatures through which they attain God as he is in himself.”118 In describing this created communication of the divine nature,

Lonergan identifies two operations through which God is attained in himself: “the beatific vision

117 Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” 647.

118 Bernard Lonergan, “The Supernatural Order,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Vol. 19: Early Latin Theology, eds. Robert M. Doran and H. Daniel Monsour, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), 65.

69 in the intellect, and the act of charity or love in the will.”119 He notes that these operations depend upon their principles, namely the four supernatural realities of the grace of union (i.e. the esse secundarium), sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory.

When articulating the relationships among these four graces as principles of supernatural operation, Lonergan draws upon a distinction he makes between remote and proximate principles in a being. As he explains, “That principle is remote which gives rise to the proximate principles in which the operations themselves are received.”120 In the case of a being that exists in itself,

Lonergan notes that the remote principle of its operations is its substance, while the proximate principles of its operations are its accidental potencies. He writes, “In the order of being, of things as they are with respect to themselves, the remote principle is substance, from which arise accidental potencies in which operations are received as in their proximate principles.”121

However, Lonergan believes that a remote principle is not always a substance, but rather, for instance, an accidental form in the case of sanctifying grace or an esse secundarium in the case of the grace of union. Accordingly, Lonergan identifies the grace of union and sanctifying grace together as the twofold remote principle of the beatific vision and acts of charity, the supernatural operations by which God is attained in himself. He describes the grace of union as the primary remote principle, and sanctifying grace as the secondary remote principle. Lonergan also claims that this twofold remote principle gives rise to the light of glory and the habit of

119 Ibid., 69.

120 Ibid., 67.

121 Ibid.

70 charity as the proximate principles in which supernatural operations are received. Lonergan explains these remote and proximate principles as follows:

Those who perform operations by which they attain God as he is in himself also possess not only the proximate principles of these operations, namely, the light of glory and the habit of charity, but also the remote proportionate principle of these same operations. This principle is what we call the communication of the divine nature, and since it is contingent it is also necessarily finite and created. This principle is twofold: primary and secondary. The primary principle is the hypostatic union, the grace of union, by virtue of which this man, our Lord Jesus Christ, is really and truly God. This Name by itself is not enough: an objective reality is required in order that this man be truly said to be God, and this reality, being contingent, is something created and finite as well. The secondary principle is sanctifying or habitual grace by virtue of which we are children of God, sharers in the divine nature, justified, friends of God, and so forth.122

Lonergan has thus shown the relationships among the four supernatural realities in the created communication of the divine nature.123 He also notes that there are two uncreated communications of the divine nature in God, namely from the Father to the Son and from the

Father and the Son together to the Holy Spirit. This is communicated in the relation of paternity to filiation, as well as in the relation of active spiration to passive spiration in the two divine processions. As Lonergan writes,

122 Ibid., 71-3

123 Lonergan also specifies that the created communication of the divine nature is materially identical with sanctifying grace, yet formally diverse from it. Cf. ibid., 73: “There is material identity but formal diversity between sanctifying grace and the created communication of the divine nature within us. For this created communication is sanctifying grace not simply as such but inasmuch as it is the remote proportionate principle of the operations by which we attain God as he is in himself.” Lonergan notes that this relationship is analogous to that which exists between nature and substance. Cf. ibid.:

Materially, substance and nature are the same; formally, nature differs from substance in that nature is substance not simply as substance but as the remote proportionate principle relative to operations. Similarly, there is material identity but formal diversity between sanctifying grace and the created communication of the divine nature within us. For this created communication is sanctifying grace not simply as such but inasmuch as it is the remote proportionate principle of the operations by which we attain God as he is in himself.

Besides these created communications of the divine nature there are also two uncreated communications of it. The Father communicates the divine nature to the Son, and the Father and the Son together communicate it to the Holy Spirit. These communications are eternal, necessary, and uncreated. They are uncreated, since they are really identical with the divine processions, which are really identical with the internal divine relations, which in turn are really identical with the divine essence, which is really identical with the uncreated divine act of existence.124

In his second thesis, Lonergan argues that the created communication of the divine nature, and by extension each of the four preeminent supernatural graces, is absolutely supernatural. He claims this because it “exceeds the proportion not only of human nature but also of any finite substance.”125 However, Lonergan admits it is difficult to conceive how a human being could participate in the nature of God. In fact, in his 1951-1952 notes, he goes so far as to ask whether finite participation in God is even intelligible. There, he raises the following objection to divine participation, “There seems to be a contradiction here. This participation is either finite or it is infinite. If infinite, it is not a participation but God himself. If it is finite, it is not divine, for God by his very nature is infinite; nor is it absolutely supernatural, since a finite substance is proportionate to a finite accident.”126

Addressing this difficulty in “De ente supernaturali,” Lonergan concedes that no finite substance can be absolutely supernatural on account of the nature of substance: “Since, then, a substance is defined only in terms of what it is in itself, it follows that a substance defined in

124 Ibid., 73.

125 Ibid., 79.

126 Lonergan, “Supplementary Notes on Sanctifying Grace,” 617.

72 terms of God as he is in himself is God and is infinite.”127 Thus, an absolutely supernatural substance would have to be infinite and identical with God. However, Lonergan contends that some finite realities other than substance can be absolutely supernatural. They would be infinite only in some respect by virtue of their imitation of the divine nature. As Lonergan explains,

A substance defined by God as he is in himself is necessarily infinite, we agree; but as to something other than a substance so defined being necessarily infinite, we admit that it is infinite in some respect, but not simply infinite. . . . It is not simply infinite, but only in a certain respect, namely, in that it is ordered to the attainment of God as he is in himself.128

Such things would differ from substance inasmuch as their being is defined not in terms of themselves, but in reference to something else, namely a substance. Among those things which are defined in relation to something else, Lonergan identifies existence (esse), accidental forms, and operations. He states,

Not everything can be defined apart from a relation to something else. In this category are everything except substances; thus existence is the act of a substance, an accident is that to which belongs existence in something else, namely, in a substance, and cognitive and appetitive operations (except those in God) not only are in something else but also have an ordination to something else, namely, their respective objects. If these operations are defined in terms of God as he is in himself, no immediate difficulty need arise; for they are not defined only in terms of what they are in themselves but also in terms of that in which they exist and that object to which they are directed.129

These categories of finite reality besides substance may be ascribed to the four preeminent supernatural graces and their consequent supernatural operations.130 Indeed, an

127 Lonergan, “The Supernatural Order,” 97. Lonergan argues the same way in his 1947-1948 course notes. Cf. Bernard Lonergan, “Notes on the Grace of Justification and the Indwelling of the Holy Spirit,” Bernard Lonergan Archive, Marquette University, http://www.bernardlonergan.com/pdf/16000DTE040.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 27: “A substance cannot be absolutely supernatural and still finite.”

128 Lonergan, “The Supernatural Order,” 95.

129 Ibid., 97.

73 absolutely supernatural, yet finite existence is the grace of union (as an esse secundarium). Also, the most preeminent accidental forms that are absolutely supernatural are sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory. Finally, these four supernatural realities are the remote and proximate principles of absolutely supernatural, yet finite operations, which include the beatific vision and acts of charity.

Overall, these absolutely supernatural realities enable those creatures in which they inhere to imitate God. They facilitate divine participation in creatures by forming created relations in them that terminate in God as the exemplary cause of the supernatural order, even though such relations exceed the natural proportion of finite creatures. Indeed, as Lonergan explains in thesis 4, “potency to the absolutely supernatural is obediential,”131 rather than natural.

However, God’s gift of grace to a human being can actualize this obediential potency, which only a rational creature can have by virtue of its natural ability to know and love God.

130 Cf. Bernard Lonergan, The Incarnate Word, vol. 8 in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, eds. Robert M. Doran and Jeremy D. Wilkins, trans. Charles C. Hefling (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016), 559:

Essential holiness is, however, communicated to creatures supernaturally, and that in two ways. First, it is communicated accidentally. In this way the uncreated gift of the Holy Spirit is given in sanctifying grace, and in the beatific vision the divine essence itself is given as it slips into a created intellect (Summa theologiae, 1, q. 12, aa. 4, 5). Second, it is communicated substantially. This happens only to Christ, in whom a human nature is united with God in the person of the Word.

131 Lonergan, “The Supernatural Order,” 127.

3. Lonergan’s Notes for His 1947-1948 Course on Grace

In his 1947-1948 notes for his course on grace, Lonergan makes some important remarks on the relationship between uncreated and created grace. While Lonergan defines created grace in the passages noted above, he describes uncreated grace here as the manner in which God supernaturally dwells in creatures by the gift of created grace. More precisely, created grace is that by which the divine love of uncreated grace terminates in human beings. Hence, Lonergan explains that they coexist inseparably: “The uncreated gift is the intimate divine love as terminating in the just. The created gift is that by which this same love terminates in the just. Just as love as terminating and that by which the love terminates cannot be separated, so the uncreated and created gifts cannot be separated.”132

By the divine indwelling of uncreated grace, God is the effective and constitutive principle of human participation in the supernatural. On this point, Lonergan specifies that God’s uncreated grace is not present in the human soul as an inherent form, but as the term of a created relation that exists by the formal indwelling of created grace. As he writes, “This uncreated gift as uncreated is constituted by God alone; hence God is to the condition of the just not only as the effective principle but also as the constitutive principle. This constitutive principle, however, is not within the just as an inherent form but is present to the just as the term of a relation.”133

132 Lonergan, “Notes on the Grace of Justification and the Indwelling of the Holy Spirit,” 93.

133 Ibid., 5. Cf. ibid., 5n.17. There, in an editorial footnote, Robert Doran comments that in the midst of teaching this 1947-1948 course, Lonergan substituted the above quote for an earlier statement in his notes, which had originally translated, “Through this same finite effect there is constituted not only the indwelling of the Holy Spirit but also the vivification of the justified through the same Spirit.” While the original statement may be understood to indicate that created grace is the constitutive principle of the justification of souls, or at least that

Lonergan argues that God cannot be an inherent form in a justified person because “the infinite God cannot be a received form limited by the receiving potency.”134Although it may appear as though God cannot be the constitutive principle of human justification unless he is received in the soul intrinsically, Lonergan claims it is sufficient for divine indwelling that God be present in the justified as the term of a relation. He states, “We deny . . . that every constitutive principle is received intrinsically. It is clear that there is no relation without a term, and equally clear that the term of a relation is not received intrinsically in the subject.”135

Despite maintaining that God cannot be an inherent form in the strict sense, Lonergan considers it within the bounds of Catholic orthodoxy to describe God as the form of justification in a broader sense. He cites Hermann Lange and Heinrich Lennerz as examples of theologians who describe God as an extrinsic and assisting form, rather than an intrinsic form, which is proper to created grace alone.136 Lonergan himself believes that God should at least be understood to be the form of justification inasmuch as the Holy Spirit is the soul of Christ’s mystical body, the Church. He states, “The Holy Spirit, then, is the soul of the mystical body of

created grace precedes uncreated grace, the revised one clearly ascribes logical priority to uncreated grace as the constitutive principle. Created grace is not the constitutive principle of justification, but rather that by which uncreated grace dwells in the human soul.

134 Ibid., 22.

135 Ibid., 23.

136 For Lonergan’s citations of Lange and Lennerz, cf. ibid., 60: “Lange, [De gratia] §455, p. 342 [italics in original]: ‘. . . the formal cause, strictly speaking, that is, intrinsically informing, is created grace, but uncreated grace as the term of a relation can be said to be a formal cause in an analogous sense, that is, extrinsic and assisting (just as an exemplar cause also is reduced to a formal cause.’” Also, cf. ibid., 61: “Lennerz, De gratia redemptoris 133, likewise expressly admits that the Spirit can be said to be a form in a broader sense: as the term of a relation he can be said to be an extrinsic, assistant, form ‘of the subject of the relation . . . in the manner of an assistant and analogous form.’”

Christ; and ‘form’ has the same meaning as ‘soul,’ for ‘soul’ is defined as the first act or form of an organic body. . . . To say, therefore, that the teaching of the Council denies to the Holy Spirit any notion of form would be to say that the Council denies to the Holy Spirit any notion of soul of the mystical body of Christ.”137

Lonergan does not wish to take this analogy too far, however. For this reason, he exercises some caution when discussing positions like that of Matthias Joseph Scheeben (1835-

1888), who maintained that justification is constituted not only through created grace dwelling formally in the soul, but also through uncreated grace being its “quasi form.”138 As Lonergan states, “Scheeben taught that our justification is constituted not solely by a physical entity infused and inherent in us but also by an uncreated gift, tri-personal, in the manner of a quasi form.”139 Lonergan appears wary of how far this concept may be taken, noting that “but it is hard to tell where metaphor ends and proper language begins.”140

Thus, Lonergan maintains agreement with the teaching of the Church at the Council of

Trent by stating that created grace is, strictly speaking, the single formal cause of justification.141

137 Ibid., 62.

138 Cf. Matthias Joseph Scheeben, The Mysteries of Christianity, trans. Cyril Vollert (St. Louis, MO: B. Herder Book Co., 1946), 165-71.

139 Lonergan, “Notes on the Grace of Justification and the Indwelling of the Holy Spirit,” 51.

140 Ibid.

141 Cf. ibid., 77: “The Holy Spirit must necessarily be denied to be an intrinsic determinant, for in that case created grace would not be the single formal cause.” For the teaching of the Council of Trent, cf. Heinrich Joseph Dominicus Denzinger and Peter Hünermann, Enchiridion Symbolorum: A Compendium of Creeds, Definitions, and Declarations on Matters of Faith and Morals, 43rd ed., eds. Robert Fastiggi and Anne Englund Nash (San Francisco, Ignatius Press, 2012), no. 1529: “Demum unica formalis causa est iustitia Dei, non qua ipse iustus est, sed qua nos iustos facit, qua videlicet ab eo donate renovamur spiritu mentis nostrae, et non modo reputamur, sed vere iusti

This is true despite the uncreated grace of the Holy Spirit being the soul or form of the mystical body of Christ. Reconciling these two ideas in an imperfect analogy, he writes, “The Holy Spirit is the soul of the entire mystical body of Christ in such a way that created grace received in the just is the single formal cause of justification.”142

4. Divinarum Personarum and Deo Deo trino: Pars Systematica

Lonergan’s four point hypothesis is found in its second and final form in his Divinarum personarum (1957). He revised this text to become the volume De Deo trino: Pars systematica

(1964). His formulation of the four-point hypothesis is identical in both texts, however. Hence, it will be cited from this later volume.

This final formulation develops the nature of the four divine relations, and briefly correlates them with the supernatural realities of the esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory. His greater focus upon the divine relations in his

Trinitarian volume marks an approach that differs from that of his course notes on grace, which develops the four preeminent supernatural graces in greater depth, according to their interrelation and manner of divine participation. Such is understandable, given the different concentration of each text.

nominamur et sumus, iustitiam in nobis recipientis unusquisque suam, secundum mensuram, quam Spiritus Sanctus partitur singulis prout vult, et secundum propriam cuiusque dispositionem et cooperationem.”

142 Lonergan, “Notes on the Grace of Justification and the Indwelling of the Holy Spirit,” 71.

Lonergan’s treatment of the four point hypothesis in De Deo trino: Pars systematica reads as follows:

There are four real divine relations, really identical with the divine substance, and therefore there are four very special modes that ground the external imitation of the divine substance. Next, there are four absolutely supernatural realities, which are never found uninformed, namely, the secondary act of existence of the incarnation, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory. It would not be inappropriate, therefore, to say that the secondary act of existence of the incarnation is a created participation of paternity, and so has a special relation to the Son; that sanctifying grace is a participation of active spiration, and so has a special relation to the Holy Spirit; that the habit of charity is a participation of passive spiration, and so has a special relation to the Father and the Son; and that the light of glory is a participation of sonship, and so in a most perfect way brings the children of adoption back to the Father. But if one says that God operates externally not according to the relations but according to the common nature, and therefore the real divine relations cannot be participated in in this way, we must answer with a distinction. The objection would be true if God were a natural agent that could produce only something similar in nature, as fire always produces heat and water always causes moisture. But the divine nature common to the Three is intellectual, and just as God by the divine intellect knows the four real relations, so also by the divine intellect, together with the divine will, God can produce beings that are finite yet similar and absolutely supernatural.143

As in his earlier formulation, Lonergan here notes how the four divine relations are imitated by four supernatural realities. He notes how these realities enable the created substances which they inform to participate in the notional activity of the persons to whom those relations correspond. He also states that they involve relations to the same divine persons as those to which the divine persons in which they participate are related. He explains that grace can enable creatures to participate in the divine relations because God can create not only as the efficient cause of things similar to the divine nature, but also as the exemplary cause of things which bear

143 Bernard Lonergan, The Triune God: Systematics, 471-3.

79 some notional similarity to the divine persons. This is possible for God on account of the infinite act of God’s intellect and will in creating absolutely supernatural, yet finite beings.

In De Deo trino, Lonergan argues that the best model for understanding the Trinity is

Aquinas’ psychological analogy, which describes the divine processions in terms of the internal processions of the human intellect. He argues that one will have an insufficient understanding of the divine processions if they are understood solely in terms of the good as self-diffusive, or modeling the Trinity as a perfect society of love.144 He believes that these models give rise to further questions that they do not solve. While Lonergan does not explicitly draw a connection between the psychological analogy and the four-point hypothesis, some of his interpreters, such as Robert Doran, believe his thought invites one to be developed.145

While clarifying the psychological analogy, Lonergan discusses the relative priority among the personal properties, relations, and notional acts in the Trinity. These are realities

144 Cf. ibid., 131.

145 In a passage from Divinarum Personarum, which Lonergan did not carry over into De Deo trino: Pars systematica, he admits that there are some imperfections to the psychological analogy. His remarks acknowledge room for improvement to the analogy, which some of Lonergan’s interpreters surmise could come through utilizing the four-point hypothesis. Cf. ibid., 777:

The first imperfection is that we do not clearly and distinctly grasp the formality of intellectual emanation. The only intellectual emanation in us is the procession of one accidental act from another; therefore we can scarcely consider them together. The second imperfection is the radical difference between created and uncreated intellectual emanation. In created emanation one accidental act proceeds from another. But in uncreated emanation one subsistent person proceeds from another. . . . Although in both cases there are one and three, still in the image there is one person and three accidental acts, while in God there is one act and three subsistent persons. Nor is the numerical similarity so significant that the totally diverse enumerated realities can be understood clearly and distinctly on diverse grounds. Finally, the third imperfection is that not only is it impossible to demonstrate the divine processions by the natural light of reason, but also, after these processions are affirmed in faith, the process of reasoning that leads to affirming intellectual emanations is lengthy, difficult, and obscure.

80 which Thomas Aquinas had also distinguished.146 In their understanding, the three divine persons are constituted by their personal properties, which are identical with the relations of paternity, filiation, and passive spiration. The relation of active spiration is not a personal property and does not constitute any persons in God because it is common to the Father and the Son.

Furthermore, the Son and the Holy Spirit proceed as distinct persons through the notional acts of generation and spiration, respectively.

Lonergan notes that the same reality in God is constitutive of the divine persons, their notional acts, and their relations; yet, he states that their relative priority may be distinguished conceptually.147 Toward this end, he asks whether the notional acts are prior or posterior to the relations that constitute the divine persons. He explains that this may be answered differently, depending upon whether notional acts are signified passively or actively.148 According to

Lonergan, notional acts signified passively are prior to personal properties because they are the way towards constituting the person by the property (e.g. the filiation that constitutes the person of the Son is a result of being generated, not vice-versa). A notional act signified actively

(dealing here with the case of generation, rather than spiration, which does not constitute a person) is posterior to the corresponding personal property (e.g. paternity) inasmuch as the latter is viewed as a relation constitutive of the person, but it is prior inasmuch as the relation as relation is consequent and grounded upon the notional act. Ultimately, one and the same reality

146 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, q. 32, a. 3, co., in Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 171.

147 Cf. Lonergan, The Triune God: Systematics, 373-5.

148 For Lonergan’s source in Aquinas, cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, q. 40, a. 4, co., in Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 204.

81 in God is constitutive of the person and of its notional act and of its relation. So these distinctions within the eternal and ultimately simple God are merely conceptual ways of making the Trinity understandable to temporal human beings.

Also of importance in Lonergan’s text is his depiction of how the three persons each possess all perfections that are identical with the divine essence they share. These perfections include not only essential attributes, but also the divine relations, which are only logically distinct from the divine essence. Consequently, while the persons are distinguished by their relations, the relations are also in each of the persons on account of their real identity with the divine essence. Yet, a person is constituted by only one of these relations that are in it. On account of this, each person is really distinct from the other persons, despite all of them being identical with the divine essence. As Lonergan states, “There is as much perfection in each of the persons as in all three together. For we affirm that there is only one real perfection; and where there is only one real perfection, it obviously cannot in itself be more or less.”149 He continues,

We concede that when we are thinking of one person and prescinding from the other two we are unable to consider the divine perfection and order. But we deny that in such a consideration we are adverting to the perfection that is present in each of the divine persons; for according to the doctrine of circuminsession, there is in each of the divine persons not only the very substance of the other persons but also the relation or personal property that is really identical with this substance. Therefore, be careful not to confuse (1) that which a divine person is with (2) the perfection that is in a divine person.150

When treating the divine missions, Lonergan notes that they are constituted in God but have their term in creatures. Hence, while their terms are efficiently caused by all three persons

149 Lonergan, The Triune God: Systematics, 433.

150 Ibid., 435.

82 acting together through their shared essence, the divine missions are proper to the person who is sent into the world. Lonergan explains, “Contingent truths, whether predicated of the divine persons commonly or properly, have their constitution in God but their term in creatures.

Therefore, although the external works of God are necessarily common to the three persons, the missions in the strict sense are necessarily proper, since a divine person operates by reason of a relation of origin.”151

This truth is relevant to the four-point hypothesis because it enables the four supernatural realities, as the terms of the divine missions, to be related properly to specific divine persons.

Yet, it is important to note that the divine persons are not dependent upon the terms of their missions in creatures. For Lonergan, a temporal mission is constituted by a divine relation of origin, and it also requires an appropriate external term.152 However, the external terms of the divine missions are not their constitutive conditions, but rather their consequent conditions.153

This is because the person sending is in no way dependent upon the creature that the mission has as its term.

151 Ibid., 439.

152 These external terms follow necessarily upon the gift of the divine missions to the humanity of Christ or to any human being. Cf. ibid., 577:

When divinity itself is communicated, a consequent external term is demanded. So, just as a substantial act, received in a human essence, follows upon the hypostatic union, and just as sanctifying grace in the soul of one who is justified follows on the uncreated gift of the Holy Spirit, so also the light of glory in a created intellect follows on the communication of the divine essence. See Summa theologiae, 1, q. 12, a. 5. Moreover, sanctifying grace and the light of glory pertain to the accidental order, and so admit of degrees; thus, as sanctifying grace is greater in some and smaller in others. See Summa theologiae 1, q. 12, a. 6.

153 Cf. ibid., 463-7.

In explaining the relations among the divine persons and their relation to creation,

Lonergan distinguishes between constitution and creation, which may be understood in both active and passive senses.154 God has both being and agency by his intellect, yet while constitution pertains to God’s being, creation concerns God’s agency. In constitution, what God understands about God is God; and in creation, what God understands to be outside God is outside God. Constitution and creation are both involved in the elements of the divine missions.

Common to all three divine persons by appropriation are active constitution of a mission (by common conceiving and willing) and active creation of its consequent term (by efficient causality), albeit not confusedly but distinctly. Passive constitution is proper to the one sending and the one sent. All of the above involve logical relations of the Triune persons toward the world they are sent to; nothing real and intrinsic is added to the intrinsically immutable divine persons. Passive creation is the appropriate external term dependent upon the first efficient cause.

Lonergan continues by noting that the incarnation of the Son and the giving of the Spirit are similar in the manner of their constitution and creation described above, but different as to what is constituted and created.155 The material external term of the incarnation is a nonsubsistent human nature, since the hypostatic union is in the person;156 whereas in the giving

154 Cf. ibid., 467-71.

155 Cf. ibid.

156 Also, since a mission is to a subsistent, the Son is not said to be sent to the nonsubsistent nature that he assumed, but rather to the human race as its mediator. Cf. ibid., 487.

84 of the Spirit it is a subsistent human nature, since the union of grace is between persons.157 The corresponding formal external term of the incarnation is the esse secundarium reduced to the category of substance, and that of the giving of the Spirit is sanctifying grace in the category of quality.

The Son alone becomes incarnate, and he performs visible works that are proper to himself through his human nature. Therefore, he has a visible mission, properly speaking.

According to Lonergan, the Son may also be said by appropriation to have an invisible mission, insofar as “some effects of grace regard more the intellect” than the will and thereby “express a certain likeness to the Son.”158 In contrast to the Son, who has a proper visible mission, the only thing that is proper to the Holy Spirit is being sent with an invisible mission.159 Lonergan specifies that even though the Father, Son, and Spirit come to dwell in souls as uncreated grace by the power of their shared essential love, only the Spirit is sent according to his proper perfection as the gift of notional love.160 Indeed, the Father and the Son dwell in souls according to their own notional perfections in manners distinct from that of the Spirit. Furthermore, the

Spirit’s activity in his invisible mission has been manifested in history by visible signs such as

157 The external terms of the divine missions also include their successive stages in reaching all people. Cf. ibid., 491.

158 Ibid., 499.

159 Cf. ibid.

160 Cf. ibid., 471-3.

85 fire or a dove, and so Lonergan states that the Spirit may be said to have a visible mission by appropriation.161

B. Robert Doran’s Development of Lonergan

1. Doran’s Literature on the Four-Point Hypothesis

Robert Doran, as one of Lonergan’s leading interpreters, has taken a special interest in developing the four-point hypothesis into a Trinitarian analogy as a foundation for systematic theology. He is the foremost scholar on this manner of developing the four-point hypothesis.

Doran became aware of Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis in 1994, and he has written many articles developing it as the ground for his systematic theology. Building on the research collected in these articles, Doran completed the first volume of a projected two volume work The

Trinity in History: A Theology of the Divine Missions in 2012. The first volume is entitled

Missions and Processions, and the second volume, which Doran projects will be completed by

2020,162 has an anticipated title of Missions, Relations, and Persons.163

161 Cf. ibid., 499.

162 Robert M. Doran, “The Structure of Systematic Theology (2)” (paper presented at the Colloquium on Doing Systematic Theology in a Multi-religious World, Marquette University, November 7, 2013), http://lonerganresource.com/pdf/books/1 /51%20-%20The%20Structure%20of%20Systematic%20Theology%202.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 20-1: “I am giving myself, God willing, seven years to write that volume.”

163 Cf. Robert M. Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1” (paper presented at the Lonergan Workshop, Boston College, Boston, MA, June 18, 2014), http://lonerganresource.com/pdf/books/1 /52%20-%20The%20Trinity%20in%20History%20-%20First%20Steps%20Beyond%20Volume%201.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 2.

Doran’s first volume of The Trinity in History draws from Lonergan’s theology of the divine processions in the first chapter of De Deo trino: Pars Systematica to develop a Trinitarian analogy from the order of grace. Doran notes, “The concentration in this first volume on sanctifying grace and charity enables me also to develop an analogy for Trinitarian procession in the order of grace, to argue that grace itself has a Trinitarian structure, and in fact that it is an elevation into participation in the life of the Triune God.”164 In the second volume, Doran intends to develop Lonergan’s theology of divine relations and persons in the second chapter of De Deo trino to enrich the Trinitarian analogy Doran constructed in the first volume. It will include further discussion of the invisible and visible missions of the incarnate Word, as well as the interpersonal nature of grace. As Doran explains,

As I worked through Lonergan’s chapter on the divine processions fairly thoroughly in order to write the first volume, so I wish to do the same for his chapters on the divine relations and persons in writing the second volume. I foresee that this volume will have far more to say about the invisible and visible missions of the Word than did volume 1, and that it will relate the ‘religious values’ constituted by the divine missions more fully to cultural and social values than did volume 1, which was primarily concerned with the relation of religious values to the personal value of the authenticity of subjects. While volume 1 introduced the category of ‘social grace,’ volume 2 will expand on it considerably. It will present a Trinitarian theology of social grace.165

164 Robert M. Doran, “A Response,” Method: Journal of Lonergan Studies, n.s. 4, no. 1 (2013): 65. Cf. Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 2:

The first volume of The Trinity in History is devoted to an attempt to understand the relation of divine processions and divine missions, especially by suggesting conscious correlatives to the created external terms of sanctifying grace and charity. In this sense the volume is concerned primarily with the relation between the mission and the procession of the Holy Spirit. In the background there lurks the methodological doctrine that, if the missions are the processions, then one can now begin a systematic theology of the Trinity with the missions without abandoning the traditional ordo doctrinae starting point of the processions. The missions give access to the processions, and they do so by identity.

165 Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 2.

2. The Possibility of a Supernatural Trinitarian Analogy

The supernatural Trinitarian analogy that Doran develops from Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis is essential to his systematic theology. The possibility of such analogy is discussed by

Doran in his article “Being in Love with God: A Source of Analogies for Theological

Understanding.” There, Doran cites the First Vatican Council to explain how knowledge of divine mysteries can be developed differently through the respective orders of nature and grace:

The First Vatican Council speaks of theological understanding in the following manner: ‘Reason illumined by faith, when it inquires diligently, reverently, and judiciously, with God’s help attains some understanding of the mysteries, and that a highly fruitful one, both from the analogy of what it naturally knows and from the interconnection of the mysteries with one another and with our last end’ (DB 1796, DS 3016, ND 132).166

Here, the council notes that divine mysteries can be better understood in two different ways: either by analogy from the natural knowledge of the things God has made, or through recognizing the interconnection of supernatural realities through the grace of faith.

Building on the idea that divine mysteries can be clarified in light of others to which they are connected, Doran suggests that analogies may be formed between them. According to his theory, one might arrive at a clearer understanding of the Trinity through an analogical comparison with the manner in which human beings participate in supernatural realities. He states,

Lonergan at least potentially opens the possibility of a different kind of analogy from that emphasized by the Council, an analogy not based on natural knowledge, at least not proximately, but grounded in the supernatural life of grace, a certain kind of analogy of

166 Robert Doran, “Being in Love with God: A Source of Analogies for Theological Understanding,” Irish Theological Quarterly 73 (2008), 227.

faith, if you wish, or better, an analogy of grace. The Council spoke of understanding the mysteries of faith not only by analogy with what reason knows naturally but also through the interconnection of the mysteries with one another. But the statement to which I am referring goes beyond both of these avenues to theological understanding, in that it evokes the possibility of an analogy between various mysteries of faith. It is the possibility of such an analogy that I wish to explore in this article.167

While Doran claims that Lonergan’s trinitarian theology is open to the possibility of a trinitarian analogy developed from the human experience of grace, he acknowledges that

Lonergan did not advance such an analogy himself. Yet, he believes that a statement Lonergan made in his essay “Christology Today: Methodological Reflections” about the dynamic state of being in love lays the groundwork for one. There Lonergan states, “The psychological analogy

. . . has its starting point in that higher synthesis of intellectual, rational, and moral consciousness that is the dynamic state of being in love.”168 Even though Lonergan does not distinguish here between natural and supernatural love, Doran notes that the dynamic state of being in love of which Lonergan speaks might be specified in terms of supernatural love so as to form a basis for

167 Ibid., 228.

168 Bernard Lonergan, “Christology Today: Methodological Reflections,” in A Third Collection: Papers by Bernard J.F. Lonergan, SJ, ed. Frederick Crowe (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1985), 93. For Lonergan’s full account of the dynamic state of being in love, cf. ibid., 93-4:

Such love manifests itself in judgments of value. And the judgments are carried out in decisions that are acts of loving. Such is the analogy found in the creature. Now in God the origin is the Father, in the New Testament named ho Theos, who is identified with agape (1 John 4:8,16). Such love expresses itself in its Word, its Logos, its verbum spirans amorem, which is a judgment of value. The judgment of value is sincere, and so it grounds the Proceeding Love that is identified with the Holy Spirit. There are then two processions that may be conceived in God; they are not unconscious processes but intellectually, rationally, morally conscious, as are judgments of value based on the evidence perceived by a lover, and the acts of loving grounded on judgments of value. The two processions ground four real relations of which three are really distinct from one another; and these three are not just relations as relations, and so modes of being, but also subsistent, and so not just paternity and filiation [and passive spiration] but also Father and Son [and Holy Spirit]. Finally, Father and Son and Spirit are eternal; their consciousness is not in time but timeless; their subjectivity is not becoming but ever itself; and each in his own distinct manner is subject of the infinite act that God is, the Father as originating love, the Son as judgment of value expressing that love, and the Spirit as originated loving.

89 a Trinitarian analogy from the order of grace.169 On the possibility of such an analogy, Doran says,

Now it is true that Lonergan’s sketch of a trinitarian analogy that begins with the dynamic state of being in love does not necessarily imply a supernatural analogy, an analogy from the order of grace, the analogy of created participations in active and passive spiration. . . But neither does it exclude the possibility of such an analogy, and this possibility is what I propose to pursue here.170

The type of analogy Doran seeks is one that connects human intersubjective relationships with their foundation in the relations among the three divine subjects. It looks to identify how the grace of divine indwelling shapes human subjectivity and yields understanding of the Trinitarian life in which one participates by grace. Doran explains, “In what is truly a groundbreaking transformation of traditional language, Lonergan says that the state of grace is a social situation, a set of intersubjective relationships, where the founding subjects are the three divine subjects, and where grace prevails because they have come to dwell in us and with us.”171

Doran notes that the human experience of grace which would undergird such an analogy must be developed by forming a phenomenology of grace. Doran hopes to contribute to this task, stating: “There remains the need to specify more closely the interior dynamics of the later analogy. What is needed, of course, is a phenomenology of grace. I am not prepared to offer that,

169 Cf. Robert M. Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005), 99:

Even when the analogy for the Trinity shifts, as it does in Lonergan’s later writings, to a starting point in “that higher synthesis of intellectual, rational, and moral consciousness that is the dynamic state of being in love,” and so that is sanctifying grace, still, because the language used is philosophical, general categories continue to be employed. In Lonergan’s later psychological analogy, the created analogue is actually not nature but created grace. But the categories that are employed to describe it and to explain it are by and large general categories.

170 Doran, “Being in Love with God,” 231.

171 Ibid., 237.

90 but I hope I may be able to suggest some elements of such an account.”172 He goes on to provide the following explanation of how grace affects human consciousness:

I wish to suggest a movement from the gift of God's love to a knowledge and orientation (let us call it a horizon) born of that love, and a movement from the gift and the horizon together to acts of loving that coalesce into a habit of charity. In traditional terms, the gift of God's love is sanctifying grace, the horizon born of that love consists of faith and hope, and the disposition that proceeds from the gift and the horizon together constitutes charity. The gift of God's love and the horizon born of it are the created graced analogue of active spiration, and so of Father and Son together, and the habit of charity that proceeds from them is the created graced analogue of passive spiration, and so of the Holy Spirit. From the gift of God's love to faith and hope, and from these together to love; from the Father to the Word, and from Father and Word together to the proceeding Love that is the Holy Spirit. In terms of consciousness it is easier to speak of the horizon born of the gift of God’s love than it is of that gift itself. I believe there is a graced, elementally global, and for the most part tacit orientation of a human subject’s cognitive openness, a disposition that favours evidence for affirming the goodness of being in the face of all contrary evidence rather than acquiescing to the contrary evidence itself. Such an orientation issues in an affirmation of value, a yes, that as cognitive is faith and as oriented into ever greater mystery and awaiting yet further discovery of that mystery is hope. From the gift of God’s love and the faith and hope born of it there proceed acts of loving that cumulatively coalesce into an ever firmer habit of charity.173

Here Doran notes that the horizon of human knowledge is born of God’s love, indicating that grace constitutes human beings with an orientation to God and a share in divine love.

Furthermore, he argues that human consciousness of grace also yields analogical knowledge of the Trinity. However, this analogy from the order of grace requires its foundation in the order of nature. Doran argues that the natural process of human reasoning and the analogy of being are implicitly operative in the supernatural analogy. Yet, on account of the intimate relationship between nature and grace in the created order of being, it is difficult to isolate purely natural

172 Ibid., 238.

173 Ibid., 240.

91 philosophy in human reason. Natural reason is, in fact, always influenced by grace. Doran explains,

Clearly, I am suggesting a further analogy, an analogy from what we know only in faith. But even this supernatural analogy is differentiated into its various elements by appealing to the natural process of moving from loving grasp of evidence to judgment of value and from these together to decision, a process that we can know by employing our natural powers of intelligence and reason. The analogy of being has to be implicit in any analogy of faith or of grace, because the order of salvation presupposes the order of creation. Conversely, however, we may say with Hans Urs von Balthasar that our natural cognitive powers always operate either under the positive sign of faith or under the negative sign of unbelief. There are here no neutral points. The Christian option will acknowledge and accept the indelible presence of grace at the heart of concrete philosophical thinking.174

Overall, Doran believes that the interconnection of the divine mysteries of grace and the

Trinity allows insight into the divine persons to be drawn from Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis.

He concludes his article as follows:

Furthermore, the supernatural analogy to which I am appealing is an analogy that reveals precisely the interconnection of the mysteries with one another and with our last end, as the First Vatican Council wished for all theological understanding. This will become even more obvious when we appeal, as I believe we may, to the same realities to ground an understanding of the interrelation of the divine and human consciousnesses of the incarnate Word, and when the incarnation, the inhabitation of the Holy Spirit, and the beatific vision are all related to one another in the explication of Lonergan’s magnificent systematic vision.175

174 Ibid., 241-2. Cf. Hans Urs von Balthasar, Theo-Logic, Vol. 1: The Truth of the World, trans. Adrian J. Walker (San Francisco: Ignatius, 2000), 11-12.

175 Doran, “Being in Love with God,” 242.

3. Doran’s Systematic Theology

Doran believes that systematic theology has to begin with the Trinity.176 In his book The

Trinity in History, Doran develops Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis into a Trinitarian analogy that serves a foundation for his own systematic theology. Doran describes this text as “the third book in a series published by the University of Toronto press, but the first to engage full-scale in the functional specialty ‘Systematics.’”177 The preceding books in this series, published in 1990 and 2005, “deal respectively with issues of Foundations (Theology and the Dialectics of History) and method (What Is Systematic Theology?).”178 Doran views these two books as contributing to a theory of history, which is one of the two main aspects of which his systematic theology, understood as a “unified field structure,” is comprised. Doran summarizes the composition of his systematic theology as follows: “The two main aspects of that field structure are the theory of history worked out in Theology and the Dialectics of History and somewhat refined in What Is

176 Cf. Doran, “The Structure of Systematic Theology (2),” 7:

Thus, this proposal about systematics, relying as it does on a hypothesis that links trinitarian relations with the structure of created grace, insists that systematics has to begin with the Trinity. The commonplace understanding of Lonergan is that everything begins with the human subject. This, I think, is a profound misunderstanding. Method (not just the book but the task) begins with the subject. But systematic theology begins with God. It proceeds in the order of teaching, of synthesis, of composition, and in that order one begins with the understanding of that which will make it possible to understand everything else.

177 Doran, “A Response,” 61. Lonergan divides theology into eight functional specialties in his book Method in Theology. For his discussion of the functional specialty of systematics, cf. Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology (New York: Herder and Herder, 1972), 335ff.

178 Doran, “A Response,” 61.

Systematic Theology? and the elaboration of Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis regarding grace, which began to get my attention in 1994.”179

Overall, Doran’s systematic theology involves an integration of the four-point hypothesis with a theory of how history has been influenced by the divine missions. Doran shares

Lonergan’s view that the divine missions are identical with the divine processions of the immanent Trinity as joined to an external term in history. Doran explains how this theological foundation allows for the full range of Christian doctrine to be expounded systematically:

The doctrines on creation, revelation, redemption, church, sacraments, and praxis are not explicitly included in the core ‘focal meanings’ contained in the four-point hypothesis, but positions in their regard are obviously demanded in a systematic theology. Those positions cannot be developed without a theory of history. Even the four-point hypothesis contains a demand for expansion into a theory of history, since at the core of the hypothesis is the theology, not only of the immanent Trinity – there are four real divine relations, really identical with divine being – but also and especially of the divine missions; and the divine missions are the Trinity in history, for the missions are identical with the divine processions joined to created external terms that are the consequent created conditions of the fact that the processions are also missions.180

Doran has been writing about the four-point hypothesis since it came to his attention in

1994. Doran collected some of his articles on the topic in his book What Is Systematic Theology?

Shortly after its release, his article “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology” reiterated his desire to develop the four-point hypothesis into a Trinitarian analogy that could serve as the

179 Ibid., 64.

180 Robert M. Doran, “The Unified Field Structure for Systematic Theology” (paper presented at the Lonergan Workshop, Boston College, Boston, MA, 2002), http://lonerganresource.com/pdf/books/1 /12%20-%20The%20Unified%20Field%20Structure%20for%20Systematic%20Theology.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 20-1.

94 foundation for a systematic theology.181 With this task in mind, Doran describes the four-point hypothesis in that article as follows:

The hypothesis is referred to as a "four-point hypothesis" because it relates four created supernatural realities, respectively, to the four divine relations. The created graces are participations in and imitations of the divine relations. Thus, (1) the esse of the assumed

humanity of Jesus participates in and imitates divine paternity; (2) sanctifying grace, later identified by Lonergan with a dynamic state of being in love without qualification, participates in and imitates active spiration; (3) the habit of charity that is the first and basic consequence of sanctifying grace participates in and imitates passive spiration; and (4) the light of glory participates in and imitates filiation.182

While the four-point hypothesis is central to his systematic theology, Doran stresses that, in order to serve as a proper foundation, it cannot stand on its own. In order to prevent systematic theology from closing itself off from other intellectual disciplines, he believes the four-point hypothesis must be engaged with ideas that also pertain to other fields of knowledge. He notes,

“If the four-point theological hypothesis were left to stand alone, the theology that would be built around it would be abstract and relatively static. The hypothesis would ground only the use of special categories, that is, of categories peculiar to theology, and not of those general categories that theology shares with other disciplines.”183

Here, Doran differentiates between “special categories” specific to theology and “general categories” involving not only theology, but also other sciences such as philosophy and history.

Lonergan had also distinguished these two in his Method in Theology. Doran describes these two

181 Cf. Robert Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” Theological Studies 67 (2006): 751: “We may appeal to [the four-point hypothesis] for a new form of the psychological analogy for the divine processions, an analogy located in the divine missions themselves, and . . . we may begin a systematic theology with that new analogy.” Emphasis is Doran’s.

182 Ibid., 752.

183 Ibid., 755.

95 types of categories as follows: “General categories come within the purview of other disciplines besides theology, and so are shared with these disciplines. Examples would be ‘justice,’ ‘social structures,’ ‘alienation,’ ‘ideology,’ ‘existence,’ even ‘God.’ Special categories are peculiar to theology: for example, ‘grace,’ ‘sin,’ ‘the mystical body of Christ,’ ‘the beatific vision.’”184

For Doran, a successful systematic theology requires the assistance of the conclusions reached by other disciplines. Therefore, systematic theology relies not only upon special categories exclusive to its own discipline, such as the supernatural realities described in the four- point hypothesis, but also upon the general categories applicable to various other disciplines.

Doran defends his position by pointing out that Aquinas had also recognized the importance of theology drawing in an auxiliary fashion from the general categories of other scientific disciplines, such as Aristotle’s metaphysics. As such, theology’s special categories concerning the supernatural, which Aquinas drew from Philip the Chancellor’s theorem of the supernatural, receive additional clarity from the general categories of other sciences. Furthermore, Doran identifies a parallel between the special and general categories of Aquinas’ systematic theology and those of the systematic theology he is developing from Lonergan’s philosophy and theology:

“As Aristotle's metaphysics provided Aquinas with his general categories and Philip the

Chancellor's theorem of the supernatural grounded Aquinas's special categories, so Lonergan's

‘basic and total science’ would ground today's general categories, and his four-point hypothesis

184 Ibid., 776.

96 would ground today's special categories.”185 Accordingly, Doran describes his quest for a unified field structure in reference to Aquinas’ systematic theology as follows:

It could be said that for Aquinas the unified field structure consisted of (1) the theorem of the supernatural and (2) Aristotle's metaphysics. In this article I propose that a contemporary unified field structure would consist of (1) the four-point hypothesis and (2) a theory of history emergent from Lonergan's cognitional theory, epistemology, metaphysics, and existential ethics along with my complementary suggestions regarding psychic conversion and esthetic-dramatic operators of human development. I regard these as basically continuous developments on the two elements of Aquinas's unified field structure.186

Overall, Doran believes that systematic theology requires a two-fold foundation in special and general categories. The former of these may be derived from a psychological Trinitarian analogy from the order of grace. The latter are formed in reference to a theory of history. Doran proceeds to explain how each ought to be studied.

As noted above, Doran believes that while Lonergan focused on developing a natural psychological analogy for the Trinity, he also hinted at the possibility of a supernatural, psychological analogy.187 Doran notes that both types of analogy proceed from a consideration of

185 Ibid., 754. Lonergan’s “total and basic science” and the general categories resulting from it are largely developed in his philosophical work Insight. Cf. Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? 98: “It is clear from Lonergan’s treatment of general categories in Method in Theology that Insight would contribute not only a great portion of the general categories themselves but also the basic framework for generating all of these categories.”

186 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 776. On the relation of the medieval theorem of the supernatural to the four-point hypothesis, cf. Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? 196: “The four-point hypothesis . . . sublates the medieval theorem of the supernatural into the relation of four created supernatural realities to the four divine relations.”

187 Cf. Darren Dias, “The Contributions of Bernard J.F. Lonergan to a Systematic Understanding of Religious Diversity” (PhD diss., St. Michael’s College, 2008), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/304411979/fulltextPDF /8552C2E3EED74387PQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 89: “Bernard Lonergan proposes two psychological analogies for understanding the Trinity. The first, developed early in his career and enunciated in his lengthy treatise De Deo Trino can be called the ‘natural-cognitional’ analogy while the other analogy found in his later writings the ‘supernatural-affective’ analogy.” Also, cf. ibid., 130:

97 the experience of human consciousness. However, a supernatural analogy, which would build upon the conclusions reached through a natural analogy, is the type Doran believes would yield the most insight into the Trinity and would provide an improved foundation for systematic theology. As such, Doran seeks to formulate a supernatural, psychological analogy that builds upon, yet advances beyond, the natural psychological analogies developed previously by

Augustine, Aquinas, and Lonergan. Doran explains,

It thoroughly complicates the matter that there are actually two psychological analogies in Lonergan's writings, analogies drawn from the dynamic consciousness of the intelligent creature; and that one of these, the purely cognitional analogy, is natural, and the other, the one that begins with love, is an analogy in the supernatural order; for the love with which it begins is the love of God poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. The natural analogy has been worked through by Lonergan . . . but it is the supernatural analogy that is really the one we should be hitching our star to. We must go beyond the analogies offered us in relatively detailed fashion by Augustine, Aquinas, and especially the early Lonergan, even as we acknowledge that developing these analogies promoted permanent achievements in human self-understanding and that we must rely on those achievements as we move on from them to develop an analogy that was only hinted at by Lonergan in his late reflections. For all that, though, we must follow Lonergan in articulating the analogy from nature first, the cognitional analogy. Only on that basis can we take up the challenge that he presented late in life to develop an analogy in the supernatural order.188

The new analogy incorporates insights from the previous natural-cognitional psychological analogy regarding God as dynamically conscious, the number of processions, their grounding of four real relations of which only three are really distinct from one another and also subsistent modes of being; hence, these relations are actually the three persons of the Trinity. In the transposition from metaphysical categories to the interiority categories of a methodical approach there are also marked differences in the two analogies. God is no longer conceived of as the Father as understanding and principle of the Word; the Word as affirmation of that understanding; and the Spirit as the love of that self-understanding. Instead, the new starting point is the experience of love and the analogy is drawn from the analysis of human development from above downward. Thus, the Father is originating love, the Son the judgment of value that expresses that love and the Spirit the originated love.

188 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 760. For more detail on Doran’s development of the psychological analogy, cf. Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 22:

The structure of the psychological analogy is the same whether the analogy be that proposed by Augustine, by Aquinas, by Lonergan, or by anyone else. What differs is principally the analogue for the Father, the Speaker of the divine Word. In Augustine, that analogue is called memoria. In Aquinas, it is intelligere, understanding precisely as dicere, as speaking an inner word. In the early Lonergan, it is the same as for

Doran believes that Lonergan’s analogy from nature and his four-point hypothesis detailed in De Deo trino can serve as a foundation for a supernatural analogy. However, Doran argues that they must first be modernized by transposing them from the scholastic categories of their original explication to the categories of “interiorly and religiously differentiated consciousness” developed by Lonergan later in life to express how a person undergoes self- appropriation. He states, “The objects intended in the four-point hypothesis must be identified, as far as possible, in categories that are based in elements in interiorly and religiously differentiated consciousness. The metaphysical terms and relations of an earlier theology, while still helpful and even necessary, are not enough.”189 Accordingly, Doran explains that developing a systematic theology “calls for self-appropriation (a) in the natural order and (b) in the supernatural order, that is, it calls for interiorly and religiously differentiated consciousness, respectively.”190 In addition, Doran notes that the general and special categories used in his systematic theology are drawn respectively from the experience of interiorly and religiously differentiated consciousness:

For Lonergan all theological categories should have a proximate or remote base in interiority and religious experience; thus, all general categories should have a corresponding element in intentional consciousness, while all special categories should

Aquinas, but in a much more fully articulated and differentiated expression of cognitional process. In the later Lonergan, it is Agapē uttering a judgment of value. In the analogy that I am suggesting, it is again memoria now understood as the retrospective appropriation of the Befindlichkeit or state of mind in which one finds oneself gifted by unconditional love, with this appropriation grasped (reflective understanding) as sufficient evidence for a judgment of value.

189 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 757.

190 Ibid., 763.

have a corresponding element in religious experience; and the theologian should be able to show the relation of the categories he or she employs to these respective bases.191

Realizing how human identity is shaped by nature and grace is fundamental to Doran’s systematic theology. This culminates in the development of special categories from the human experience of grace that yield knowledge of one’s identity and relation to God as Trinity. As such, Doran explains that the first of two goals required to ground a systematic theology consists in “transposing the traditional psychological analogy for the trinitarian processions and relations

(as Lonergan has developed this analogy in De Deo trino) into a supernatural, psychological analogy based in religiously differentiated consciousness.”192

The second task involved in forming a systematic theology is developing a theory of history. It is necessary to link theology with history because of the centrality of the divine missions, which are identical with the divine processions of the immanent Trinity as joined to an external term in history. In fact, a Trinitarian analogy cannot be properly formed unless it takes into account the human experience of the divine missions in history. Doran stresses the importance of integrating a theory of history and the divine missions into a Trinitarian analogy grounded in the self-appropriation of religiously differentiated consciousness:

It is another thing to add to this requirement of self-appropriation, which in one form or another and to a greater or lesser extent is already followed by the trinitarian theologies of Augustine, Aquinas, and Lonergan, the additional requirement of formulating all this material eventually in terms of a theory of history. This adds a new dimension to the

191 Ibid., 776. Cf. Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? 95: “Interiorly differentiated consciousness is the base from which are derived general theological categories. . . . Religiously differentiated consciousness is the base from which are derived special theological categories.” Emphasis is Doran’s.

192 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 761.

100

theology of the Trinity. The direct impact, of course, is on that dimension of trinitarian theology that treats the divine missions, and particularly the mission of the Holy Spirit.193

Overall, Doran develops his systematic theology according to the ordo disciplinae instead of the ordo inventionis, just as Lonergan did in his De Deo trino: Pars systematica.194 This means that his systematic exposition of the Trinity “will follow the way of teaching and learning rather than the way of discovery, and so it will begin with those realities whose understanding does not presuppose the understanding of anything else, but which, once understood, render possible the understanding of everything else. In trinitarian theology this means starting with the

193 Ibid., 764-5.

194 Cf. Lonergan, The Triune God: Systematics, 59-69. There, Lonergan notes that the goal of theology as a science is the certain knowledge of things through causes. This goal is pursued in a two-fold manner on this side of the beatific vision. Dogmatic theology seeks certitude, while systematic theology seeks an understanding of causes. These two are required to complement one another toward the goal of theological knowledge. Systematic theology seeks to grasp reasons and causes, corresponding to the first operation of the intellect; whereas dogmatic theology makes existential judgments of certitude, corresponding to the second operation of the intellect. The former focuses on coherence (conceptual relations of things), and the latter on correspondence (truth/fact). These two operations together comprise the complete intellectual process toward the common objective of knowledge. In the case of theology, catechetical understanding of the meaning of articles of faith is pursued through the dogmatic way. This precedes the assent of faith, which realizes through the systematic way that these articles are true and cohere with each other. However, a deeper understanding of the divine mysteries takes place after the initial assent of faith. The dogmatic way, or the order of discovery (ordo inventionis), pursues analysis, resolution, certitude, and the temporal way of knowing. Its goal is to demonstrate what is certain, or a proposition’s degree of certitude. It begins from what is most obvious and moves to what is more remote and obscure. At the end of its process, it adds understanding to what it demonstrated previously. It appeals to the multitude of believers to give support to its claims of certitude. In the order of discovery, the dimensions of the Trinity are studied in the following order: missions, personal distinctions, consubstantiality, personal properties, relativity, and psychological analogies used to understand relations of origin. The systematic way, or the order of teaching/learning (ordo disciplinae), pursues synthesis, composition, probability (since systems are built around hypothetical suppositions), and the logical simultaneity of knowledge. Its goal is to understand what is certain. It begins with first principles (things that can be understood apart from other notions) and moves toward a synthetic grasp of all the issues pertaining to the certitudes of faith. At the beginning of its process, its initial understanding provides the foundation for further understanding of that which it will demonstrate posteriorly. It can ignore the multitude of believers and pursue individual methods of synthetic understanding. In the order of teaching/learning, the dimensions of the Trinity are studied in the following order: The one God, intellectual processions, relativity, persons considered together, persons considered individually, persons in relation to the divine essence and relations and processions/notional acts, and persons related to one another and to human beings.

101 divine processions.”195 Accordingly, Doran’s systematic theology begins by discussing the divine processions; only afterward does it treat their emanation into history as divine missions related to an external term. Furthermore, its understanding of the Trinity from the outset is synthesized in reference to human participation in the divine processions and missions through the supernatural realities of the four-point hypothesis. In relating human experience to the

Trinity, Doran’s systematic theology will “appeal also to an analogy with created realities in the supernatural order, that is, to an analogy with what we know only by revelation, to an analogy with realities in the order of grace: realities that enable us consciously to participate in, and so to imitate, the conscious inner life of the very God whose mystery we are attempting to understand.”196 Furthermore, Doran notes that “even these analogies from created supernatural realities, precisely as humanly constructed analogies, are themselves grounded in analogies from what is naturally known.”197 As such, all developments of a supernatural analogy in Doran’s theology are grounded in a proper understanding of human nature and the natural psychological analogy for the Trinity this yields. As a basis for a synthetic understanding of the Trinity, natural and supernatural analogies together set the stage for Doran’s systematic theology.

In contrast to the ordo disciplinae (or ordo doctrinae) of systematic theology, Doran affirms with Lonergan that the ordo inventionis is proper to dogmatic theology. As a result, dogmatic theology treats Trinitarian theology in the reverse order as systematics. Yet, given their

195 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 766-7.

196 Ibid., 767.

197 Ibid.

102 place among the eight functional specialties of theology identified by Lonergan, systematic theology picks up from where dogmatic theology leaves off. Taking the judgments of fact and of value expressed in dogmatic theology, systematics attempts to work out appropriate systems of conceiving the realities indicated by doctrine. In this manner, systematics can remove apparent doctrinal inconsistencies, point to an inner coherence among the various doctrines of the Church, and clarify doctrine through the use of analogies offered from more familiar human experience.

In the case of the Trinity, dogmatic theology begins with the divine missions and ends by considering psychological analogies used to understand the divine processions and missions.

This corresponds to Lonergan’s order of presentation in his De Deo trino: Pars dogmatica.

Conversely, in his De Deo trino: Pars systematica, Lonergan used Augustine’s natural psychological analogy as a starting point for his systematic theology. While Lonergan did not develop until the end of that volume the four-point hypothesis relevant to a supernatural, psychological analogy, it informs the starting point of Doran’s new venture in systematic theology. Doran explains the order of his systematic theology as follows:

Thus, as the way of discovery that Lonergan outlines in De Deo trino: Pars dogmatica ended with Augustine's psychological analogy, which then became the starting point of the way of teaching and learning, so Lonergan's particular embodiment of the way of teaching and learning ended with a four-point hypothesis that now informs the starting point of a new venture along the same kind of path, the ordo doctrinae. If we are beginning our systematics in its entirety where Lonergan ended his systematics of the Trinity, it is only on the basis of the development found in his own trinitarian theology that we are able to do so. He began with the processions. We begin, on a “macro” level, with the processions and missions together, affirming with Lonergan's assistance that they are the same reality, except that the mission adds a created contingent external term that is the consequent condition of the procession being also a mission.198

198 Ibid., 770.

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4. Doran’s Use of the Four-Point Hypothesis

With this structure of Doran’s systematic theology in mind, it is possible to examine in detail the relevance of the four-point hypothesis for his Trinitarian analogy. In seeking an understanding of the divine processions and the divine missions, Doran examines each of the four supernatural realities of the hypothesis as an analogue for the Trinitarian relations. He notes,

The four-point hypothesis itself is part of our starting point, not our conclusion, and that hypothesis aims at an obscure understanding not only of divine processions but also of divine missions and of the created consequent conditions of divine missions—the secondary act of existence of the assumed humanity, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory—as a new set of analogues from which we can gain an obscure understanding of the processions and relations immanent in God's being.199

For Doran, the external terms of the divine missions correspond to the supernatural realities described in the four-point hypothesis, precisely as they are experienced in history.

These terms are the consequent condition for the divine processions also being missions. Doran proceeds to specify the terms of the divine missions of the Word and Spirit that account for their presence in human beings:

The emanations of Word and Spirit in God, linked to their appropriate contingent external terms in history (the assumed humanity of the incarnate Word, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and—beyond history but proleptically within it in the form of hope—the light of glory), are the ultimate condition of possibility of any consistent and sustained intelligent and responsible emanations in human beings, precisely through the gift of the Holy Spirit, which is the eternal emanation of the Spirit in God linked to its external term in history and proceeding not only from the eternal Father and Word but also from the same Word as incarnate and as sent by the Father.200

199 Ibid., 769.

200 Ibid., 765. Doran also refers to the light of glory as the consequent condition of the beatific vision, rather than that of a divine mission. Cf. Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? 74: “The four created supernatural realities that are the created consequent conditions either of the divine missions (the esse secundarium of the Incarnation, sanctifying grace, and the habit of charity) or of the beatific vision (the light of glory).” Yet, Doran should not be

104

Making use of the four-point hypothesis in a Trinitarian analogy is not without obstacles, however. For example, Doran notes that the scholastic categories in which the four-point hypothesis was originally formed do not so easily clarify how the four supernatural realities affect human consciousness as the basis for analogy. Doran notes, for instance, “Sanctifying grace has been called an entitative habit, rooted in the essence of the soul. Such it is. Such terminology of itself says nothing about the difference that this habit would make in consciousness.”201 For this reason, as noted above, Doran believes that the original formulation of the four-point hypothesis needs to be transposed into language pertaining to Lonergan’s later theology on religiously differentiated consciousness.

Another problem consists in the task of framing the human experience of grace in terms of a phenomenology of grace so that it can be used to develop the supernatural analogy. In order for the analogy to yield insight, Doran believes one “must, of course, also relate these supernatural analogues of divine life to operations and states identified in our own interiority and to our participation in the historical dialectic.”202 While Doran is hoping to contribute to this task of explaining how grace affects human consciousness, he notes that “a phenomenology of grace has barely begun to be composed.”203

interpreted by this statement as denying his belief expressed elsewhere that the light of glory is an external term of divine mission that constitutes in human beings a participation in divine filiation.

201 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 761.

202 Ibid., 770.

203 Ibid.

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5. Doran on a Phenomenology of Grace

Developing a phenomenology of grace is a task involving several challenges. For instance, among the four terms of the divine missions, Doran notes that the esse secundarium and the lumen gloriae can only be understood in light of people’s current experience of sanctifying grace and the habit of charity. These latter two constitute a human being’s participation in active and passive spiration, respectively.204 Experience of these two elements of the four-point hypothesis is direct, albeit shrouded in mystery, whereas the other elements are understood indirectly.205 This is because, as Doran explains, “Only by extrapolation from our own participation in divine life can we find some structural understanding of the human Jesus’ created participation in divine paternity and of the saints’ participation in the divine Son.”206 As

204 Cf. Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? 109: “Sanctifying grace is a created participation in the active spiration of the Spirit by the Father and the Son, and the habit of charity breathed forth from sanctifying grace is a created participation in the passive spiration that is the Holy Spirit.”

205 Cf. L. Matthew Petillo, “Grace, Glory, and the Gaze of Love,” in Grace and Friendship: Theological Essays in Honor of Fred Lawrence, from His Grateful Students, eds. M. Shawn Copeland and Jeremy D. Wilkins (Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University Press, 2016), 197:

Since most of us, I presume, are neither divine persons subsisting in human nature nor experiencing the beatific vision, we lack the conscious data required for a direct verification of the esse secundarium and the lumen gloriae. We might say that sanctifying grace, charity, and in a comparatively greater way, the light of glory are, to use Lonergan’s turn of phrase, “shrouded in mystery”; or, to use a trite metaphor, the conscious data on sanctifying grace and charity are the tip of a supernatural iceberg whose vast reality lies largely within the depths of an ocean of transcendence that is, for the time being, out of our view. In other words, because we lack data on grace and charity, we are dealing with realities affirmed in faith and understood only by analogy.

206 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 769. Cf. Doran, The Trinity in History, 167. Also, cf. Doran, “A Response,” 65: “In particular, for us, as opposed to Jesus the incarnate Word of God and to the enjoying of the beatific vision by the blessed, the realm of religious values in the scale of values is constituted by the participation in active and passive spiration in the Trinity manifested through sanctifying grace and charity.”

106 such, human experience of sanctifying grace and the habit of charity is the starting point for constructing a Trinitarian analogy from the order of grace. Doran states,

Our understanding of the first and fourth points of the hypothesis (the assumed human nature of the incarnate Word and the light of glory) can be had only by extrapolation from and modification of our understanding of the second and third points. These created participations in active and passive spiration are precisely the area in which the supernatural creaturely analogy for the trinitarian relations is developed.207

Doran goes on to explain in more detail why the esse secundarium and the lumen gloriae cannot be understood directly through phenomenology, but rather only indirectly:

In fact, in the case of the secondary act of existence of the incarnate Word, there are available to us no data whatever for such a phenomenology, even if the affirmation of the esse secundarium can be shown to be isomorphic with human acts of reasonable judgment, and even if we are able to conclude from dogmatic premises something about the consciousness and knowledge of Jesus. Nor is there available any material that would enable us to compose a phenomenology of the light of glory and the beatific vision. In the case of both the secondary act of existence and the light of glory, then, we must move by extrapolation from what is available to us, namely, the dynamic state of being in love in an unqualified sense and the operations of charity, of the originated loving, that follow habitually from such a state. Thus, only in the realm of the supernatural analogues of active and passive spiration do we have the data for a phenomenology of grace; and even there, only with great difficulty.208

6. Participation in Active and Passive Spiration

For Doran, it is clear that the experience of sanctifying grace and the habit of charity is the entry point for discovering the nature of the other elements of the four-point hypothesis. The

207 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 761. Cf. Doran, The Trinity in History, 162.

208 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 770-1. Cf. Doran, The Trinity in History, 169-70.

107 phenomenological study of grace begins with the human experience of these two because they are the condition for participation in divine love.209 Furthermore, the effect of sanctifying grace and charity upon human consciousness constitutes a point of reference for learning analogically about active and passive spiration. Doran stresses that if one is to learn about the distinct relations of active and passive spiration, then sanctifying grace and charity must be recognized as really distinct in the manner they affect human consciousness.210 Suggesting that the nature of this distinction lies in the difference between “the habitual grasp and affirmation of the lover” and “the habitual state of originated loving,” Doran states,

If we are going to continue to distinguish sanctifying grace from the habit of charity, as the four-point hypothesis invites us to do, it is important to specify some distinction in consciousness here; and I suggest that the distinction is one between the habitual grasp and affirmation of the lover (sanctifying grace) and the habitual state of originated loving (the habit of charity) that flows from the grasp and affirmation.211

In some of his other writings, Doran expands upon the important, yet difficult task of identifying the mutually opposed relations between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity in human consciousness. Toward this end, he notes that while charity apprehends an object intentionally, the conscious experience of sanctifying grace is non-intentional. Furthermore,

209 Cf. Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? 77: “Thus the intelligent emanation in God of the Holy Spirit, the eternal procession in God of the Holy Spirit, joined to the created, contingent, consequent external terms that are sanctifying grace and the habit of charity (as well as to the operative movements that are known as auxilium divinum or actual grace), the eternal intelligent emanation of the Spirit in God as also Gift in history, is the ultimate condition of possibility of any consistent or recurrent intelligent emanation of authentic judgments of value and schemes of recurrence rooted in acts of love in human beings.”

210 Cf. ibid., 109: “Between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity there is as much a real distinction as there is between active and passive spiration in the Trinity.”

211 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 772.

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Doran states that charity proceeds from sanctifying grace just as passive spiration proceeds from active spiration.212 As he explains,

As active and passive spiration are distinct by mutually opposed relations, so sanctifying grace and charity, the created participations in these divine relations, are also distinct by mutually opposed relations, and the tricky point is to try to capture in language the conscious element entailed in these created supernatural relations. Religious experience is, for the most part, well spoken of in terms of the dynamic state of unqualified being in love. But that gift has to be further differentiated into an actively spirating love and the acts of love and habit of love that flow from that spiration. The corresponding conscious element, however, is not an element exclusively in intentional consciousness, precisely because the experience occurs without there being an apprehended object to which it responds. The conscious component of sanctifying grace is an actively spirating love that is given to us, that is not a response to an apprehended object, and that is a participation in the active spiration of the Holy Spirit by the Father and the Son as one principle. What proceeds in God is amor procedens, the Holy Spirit, and what proceeds in us is charity, the created participation in the passively spirated Holy Spirit. Charity is intentional consciousness, but the conscious component of sanctifying grace is nonintentional, in that it is not a response to an apprehended object.213

While Lonergan had maintained a real distinction between sanctifying grace and charity in his early Latin theology, he did not clearly do so when articulating the categories of religiously differentiated consciousness in his methodical theology. This complicates Doran’s goal of transposing the four-point hypothesis from the metaphysical terms of scholastic theology to the phenomenological terms of methodical theology. Indeed, the four-point hypothesis cannot

212 Cf. Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 1-2:

In the case of the mission of the Holy Spirit, the relevant external terms are two: sanctifying grace and charity. Sanctifying grace, the elevation of the subject’s central form to participation in divine life, is the created base of a created relation to the eternal uncreated Holy Spirit. As the base of a relation to the Holy Spirit, it is said to participate in and imitate the Father and Son together as they actively “breathe” the Holy Spirit. That divine relation is termed “active spiration.” Charity, on the other hand, proceeds from sanctifying grace, and so is the created base of a created relation to Father and Son breathing the Holy Spirit; thus it participates in and imitates the eternal Proceeding Love that is the Holy Spirit passively spirated.

213 Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? 109.

109 be used in methodical theology unless the latter acknowledges a real distinction between sanctifying grace and charity. Therefore, Doran desires to differentiate the two more so than

Lonergan did late in his career when subsuming them both under the category of “the dynamic state of being in love with God.” Doran explains,

A particular problem has been raised over my continuing appeal to the four-point hypothesis, and the problem has to do precisely with the distinction of sanctifying grace and charity. In effect, the question is being asked whether the distinction survives the transition from a metaphysical to a methodical theology. As far as the history of Lonergan’s own position on the issue is concerned, we may say the following. Lonergan made it very clear as early as 1946 that the doctrine of an absolutely supernatural communication of the divine nature can be maintained whether or not one’s systematic understanding of the doctrine includes a distinction between sanctifying grace and charity – a distinction that Aquinas makes and that Lonergan repeats from Aquinas and that Scotus denies. The distinction perdures in his theological writings in a Scholastic mode, and is very clear in the notes under investigation. However, in the 1974 Lonergan Workshop, in a question-and-answer session, he admits that his later methodical transposition of the category of sanctifying grace into the expression ‘the dynamic state of being in love with God’ represents an ‘amalgam’ of sanctifying grace and charity. I’m asking whether that methodical transposition can be refined so as to preserve the distinction. And I want to preserve the distinction precisely because it provides us with a hypothetical understanding of how it can be true that we do indeed enjoy distinct created relations to each of the three uncreated divine persons.214

Doran argues that sanctifying grace and charity are really distinct inasmuch as they have distinct orderings within human consciousness. In this manner, they imitate the real distinction between active and passive spiration, their created participations. As Doran notes, “Relations are multiplied not by terms but by orderings. Active spiration and passive spiration are two orderings, and so their created counterparts must also be two relations.”215 On the one hand,

214 Doran, “Sanctifying Grace, Charity, and Divine Indwelling,” 171-2.

215 Robert M. Doran, “Social Grace and the Mission of the Word” (paper presented at Colloquium on Doing Catholic Systematic Theology in a Multireligious World, Marquette University, November 2010), http://lonerganresource.com/pdf/books/1

110

Doran understands sanctifying grace to be ordered to the Holy Spirit through a participation in the active spiration of the Father and the Son considered together:

The created consequent condition by which it is possible to affirm a created relation to the uncreated Holy Spirit, that is, what has been known as sanctifying grace, imitates and participates in the uncreated relation to the Holy Spirit that the Father and the Son together are. That is, it imitates and participates in what the psychological analogy has traditionally called active spiration.216

On the other hand, Doran describes charity as ordered to the Father and the Son considered together through a participation in the Holy Spirit: “Charity relates us back to the Father and the

Son in a created participation in the passive spiration of the Holy Spirit, setting up an inverse created relation to the uncreated Father and Son, who thus also dwell in us as distinct terms of a distinct created relation corresponding to their distinction as divine Persons.”217 Hence, as noted above, human consciousness is ordered in distinct manners through sanctifying grace as “the habitual grasp and affirmation of the lover” and through charity as “the habitual state of originated loving.”218

Having maintained the real distinction between sanctifying grace and charity during this categorial transposition, Doran is able to expound upon the second and third points of the four- point hypothesis in terms of methodical theology as follows:

The starting point in unpacking that four-point hypothesis is the link between sanctifying grace and charity as created participations in, respectively, active spiration and passive

/37%20-%20Social%20Grace%20and%20the%20Mission%20of%20the%20Word.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 7n7.

216 Ibid., 8.

217 Ibid., 8-9.

218 Cf. Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 772.

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spiration. From the standpoint of religiously and interiorly differentiated consciousness, these created participations are (1) the recalled reception (memoria) of the gift of God’s love (that is, of sanctifying grace as it affects consciousness) grounding a subsequent set of judgments of value (faith), as these together participate in active spiration and so set up a special relation to the indwelling Holy Spirit, and (2) a return of love (charity) participating in the Proceeding Love that is the Holy Spirit, which establishes a special relation to the indwelling Father and Son. Memory and faith combine to imitate and participate in active spiration, and charity imitates and participates in passive spiration.219

Here, Doran tries to establish continuity between the metaphysical and methodical approaches to grace and the Trinity by appropriating concepts from Augustine such as memoria.

Yet, Doran proceeds to construct a unique supernatural analogy for the Trinity by investigating phenomenologically what human consciousness reveals about the Trinitarian structure of grace.

He writes,

The analogy that I am suggesting starts with the reception of the gift of God’s love, recollected in memory, from which there proceeds a set of judgments of value; and from these two there flows the charity that is the love of God in return. What makes this analogy different from those proposed by Augustine, Thomas, and both the early and the later Lonergan is not its structure, which is identical in all of these analogies, but rather the fact that it is explicitly an analogy, not from nature to the supernatural order, but from the experience of supernatural grace to its creator, the triune God. Created grace itself has a Trinitarian form. The analogy in the order of grace begins with the gift of God’s love, retrospectively interpreted as a gift of being on the receiving end of a love that is without qualification and that has about it something that seems to emanate from the foundation of the universe. It is possible (and I wish to emphasize the word ‘possible,’ since I am not an Augustine scholar) that this retrospective interpretation of one’s own religious giftedness might be linked to Augustine’s memoria, which was the starting point of his analogy. If memoria for Augustine is the condition under which the mind is present to itself, then my appeal to Augustine is valid. If that is not the meaning of memoria in Augustine, then I am proposing a distinct first step in the analogy. In either case, the initial step in the analogy is composed of the gift of God’s love recollected and acknowledged in memoria. This issues in the inner word of a judgment of value proceeding from memoria and acknowledging the goodness of the gift. This judgment of value is the foundation of a universalist faith that is present in all authentic religion. The recollection and judgment of value together constitute a created share in, participation in,

219 Doran, The Trinity in History, 17.

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imitation of, divine active spiration, the active loving of the Father and the Son for each other from which divine Amor procedens, passive spiration, the Holy Spirit, originates. Memoria and its verbum spirans amorem give rise to the disposition of charity, the antecedent universal willingness that is a created participation in and imitation of the Holy Spirit, a disposition that establishes a reverse relation of love for the Father and the Son. The relation between the love acknowledged in memoria and its word, on the one hand, and charity on the other is analogous to the relation between active and passive spiration in the triune God.220

While forming a supernatural, psychological analogy on the basis of human participation in active and passive spiration, Doran stresses that the external term of the Spirit’s historical mission affects not just individuals, but also communities and the development of history. Doran argues that “the discernment of the mission of the Holy Spirit thus becomes the most important ingredient in humankind’s taking responsibility for the guidance of history.”221 For this reason,

Doran emphasizes the category of social grace, discovering precedent in Lonergan’s concept of the state of grace as a social situation rather than simply an individual habit. He writes,

The combination of the four-point hypothesis with the theory of history thus enables us to relate Trinitarian theology, even the theology of the immanent Trinity, directly to the processes not only of individual sanctification but also of human historical unfolding. Not only is the discernment of the mission of the Holy Spirit in all its concrete details the most important ingredient in humankind’s taking responsibility for the guidance of history, as we said above, but conversely, the appropriation of the integral scale of values, again as much as possible in all its concrete details, would represent the contribution of systematics to the church and to various local Christian communities in their communal discernment of the mission of the Holy Spirit. As the theology of a very recent generation disengaged in a new way the notion of social sin, so the theology of this generation, if it begins with the four-point hypothesis in the context of a theory of history, will elaborate the notion of social grace, or, to use Lonergan’s own expression in the final chapter of the systematic part of his De Deo trino, the notion of the state of grace, not as an individual

220 Robert M. Doran, “What Is the Gift of the Holy Spirit?” (paper presented at Colloquium on Doing Catholic Systematic Theology in a Multireligious World, Marquette University, October 2009), http://lonerganresource.com/pdf/books/1 /34%20-%20What%20Is%20the%20Gift%20of%20the%20Holy%20Spirit.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 14-15.

221 Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? 77.

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habit but as a social situation, as an intercommunion of the three divine subjects, one of them being the incarnate Word of God, with all of those who have said yes to the offer of a created participation in divine life and as the consequent intercommunion of these human subjects with one another in the incarnate Word.222

7. Participation in Paternity and Filiation

While the experience of sanctifying grace and charity constitute the starting point from which a phenomenology of grace can be formed, Doran does not believe that active and passive spiration are the only Trinitarian relations open to analogical insight. In fact, he argues that when the four-point hypothesis is transposed into the terms of the phenomenology of religious interiority, it also yields some understanding of paternity and filiation. Such insight can gained by reflecting upon how human beings participate in the uncreated divine relations through their created terms in history, thereby possessing created relations to the divine persons.223

One analogue for the divine relations that shapes human consciousness is the secondary act of existence (esse secundarium) of Christ’s humanity. Doran otherwise identifies the esse

222 Ibid., 204-5.

223 Cf. Doran, “The structure of Systematic Theology (2),” 6-7:

[The four-point hypothesis] links the four divine relations – paternity, filiation, active spiration, and passive spiration – with four created imitations of and participations in those relations: respectively, in Scholastic terms that need transposition into religious interiority to the extent that this is possible, these are the grace of union or secondary act of existence of the Incarnation, which names the created base of the created relation of the assumed humanity of Jesus to the eternal divine Word; the light of glory, which is the consequent condition of the gift of beatific knowing and loving, and the created base of a created relation to the Father; and both sanctifying grace and the habit or disposition or circle of operations that constitutes charity, which are the distinct consequent conditions of the gift of the Holy Spirit and participation in trinitarian life rooted in the gift, the respective bases of created relations first to the Holy Spirit and then to the Son and the Father.

114 secundarium as “the grace of union required by and consequent upon the constitutive cause of the union.” Doran clarifies the relationship between the esse secundarium and the grace of union as follows:

This “secondary act of existence” is required, not for the human essence of Christ to be real, not for the existence of that essence, not as the constitutive cause whereby Christ the man exists, not as some intermediary linking and uniting the divinity and humanity, not as the grace of union constituting the union, but only as the grace of union required by and consequent upon the constitutive cause of the union.224

Doran states that the grace of union, or the esse secundarium, “names the created base of the created relation of the assumed humanity of Jesus to the eternal divine Word.”225 As such, the esse secundarium, as the created term of filiation in history through the Son’s humanity, involves a created relation to the Son that is analogous to the Father having an uncreated relation to the

Son in his paternity. For this reason, the esse secundarium involves a participation in paternity and provides some analogical insight into the person of the Father in his relation to the Son.

It may seem counterintuitive for Christ’s esse secundarium to participate in paternity rather than filiation. However, Doran argues this is so because the esse secundarium grounds the relation of Christ’s humanity to the second person of the Trinity. Accordingly, this relation to the

Son imitates the Father’s relation to the Son. Hence, Doran notes that “this relation, precisely as relation to the Word, participates in and imitates paternity, so that anyone who sees Jesus sees

224 Doran, The Trinity in History, 52.

225 Doran, “The Structure of Systematic Theology (2),” 6.

115 the Father.”226 Just as the Father speaks through the Son who is spoken, so too does the Son speak as the incarnate Word through his humanity. Doran explains this idea as follows:

The divine Word immanent in the Godhead does not speak; the immanent divine Word is spoken; in technical theological language, its notional act is not dicere, to speak, but dici, to be spoken. But the incarnate Word speaks, and he speaks only what he hears from the Father. The relation of the assumed humanity to the person of the divine Word alone is also a created participation in and imitation of the Father’s real relation to the Son, a participation in and imitation of the relation to the Son, the Dicere, that we call paternity. The secondary act of existence grounding the relation of the assumed humanity of Jesus to the eternal divine Word is in our history the base of a created participation in and imitation of the Father’s eternal relation to the Word that the Father eternally speaks.227

Doran believes that a phenomenology of the esse secundarium cannot be developed directly, given that only the conscious experience of Christ pertains to this reality. As noted previously, Doran has remarked that “there are available to us no data whatever for such a phenomenology, even if the affirmation of the esse secundarium can be shown to be isomorphic with human acts of reasonable judgment, and even if we are able to conclude from dogmatic premises something about the consciousness and knowledge of Jesus.”228 Doran was originally pessimistic about the extent to which the esse secundarium could be transposed into the categories of interiorly and religiously differentiated consciousness. However, Doran has recently argued that such a transposition may be successfully performed in reference to Christ’s human consciousness, rather than that of other human beings without the esse secundarium.229

226 Ibid., 20.

227 Doran, The Trinity in History, 53.

228 Doran, “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology,” 770.

229 Cf. Robert M. Doran, “Are There Two Consciousnesses in Christ? Transposing the Secondary Act of Existence” Irish Theological Quarterly 82, no. 2 (2017): 152n11:

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Doran suggests that some of the dogmatic theology Lonergan develops in The Incarnate

Word and The Ontological and Psychological Constitution of Christ concerning Christ’s divine and human consciousnesses may yield material for systematic understanding of how these two consciousnesses interrelate.230 Doran believes that this relationship may be explained in terms of

Christ’s experience of the esse secundarium in his human consciousness.231 Toward this end,

Doran explains the manners in which Christ is present to himself, first in his divine consciousness and then in his human consciousness:

The divine consciousness of the incarnate Word, then, would be the consciousness ‘on the side of the subject that is the Son in being consciously generated by the Father’ as well as ‘on the side of the subject that is the Son who with the Father consciously spirates the Spirit.’ The incarnate Word is present to himself through divine consciousness in this way, conscious as well of the Father from whom he proceeds and of the Holy Spirit whom, together with the Father, he spirates. His human consciousness, on the other hand, is ontologically grounded in the secondary act of existence that makes it true to affirm that the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity is this man Jesus of Nazareth. This human consciousness is the mission consciousness of the Eternal Word become flesh. It is the consciousness on the side of the subject that is the Son in being consciously sent by the Father.232

The basic issue is one of validating terms and relations by specifying the conscious intention from which they are derived. At times this will entail something of a point-by-point correspondence between metaphysical or other theoretical categories and intentionality or religious-experiential categories (as Lonergan does, for example, with ‘sanctifying grace’ and ‘being in love with God’), and at times we will have to be satisfied with naming the intentional operations in which the theoretical categories were grasped and affirmed. For a long time I thought the latter would be as far as we could go with regard to the transposition of esse secundarium, until Eric Mabry started my thinking in a different direction. Mabry is a doctoral student at Regis College in Toronto working on esse secundarium in both Aquinas and Lonergan. His comment to me was that the transposition might be in terms not of our consciousness but of Christ’s. What I have done with that comment is my own responsibility, but I owe to Mabry the insight that moved me in this direction.

230 Cf. ibid., 149-50. Cf. Lonergan, The Ontological and Psychological Constitution of Christ, 190-285, and idem, The Incarnate Word, 464–539.

231 Cf. Doran, “Are There Two Consciousnesses in Christ?” 151-2.

232 Ibid., 153. Cf. The Triune God: Systematics, 387-9. Also, cf. Eric Mabry, “In Illo Tempore: Being and Becoming in the Historical Life of Jesus Christ,” Heythop Journal 58 (2017): 31: “Jesus’ human self-presence is the created participation of his human subjectivity in his divine self-presence.”

117

Hence, while Christ is present to himself as generated by the Father in his divine consciousness, he is present to himself as sent into the world by the Father in his human consciousness. Indeed, while Christ knows that he is sent in his divine consciousness on the side of the object, he only experiences himself as sent on the side of the subject in his human consciousness. For this reason, Doran concludes, “His divine consciousness is procession consciousness, and his human consciousness is mission consciousness.”233 Furthermore, he argues, “The two consciousnesses are related and joined in the one Person of the incarnate Word, in whom procession becomes mission because of the contingent created condition of that becoming, consequent upon the divine decision, the created secondary act of existence that accrues to the assumed human nature of the Word.”234

This correlation of the divine missions with the divine persons as united to their created external terms gives Doran “a way of transposing the esse secundarium into the condition of possibility, or ontological ground, of Jesus’ mission consciousness.”235 Accordingly, the following analogy may be drawn: Just as Christ is conscious of the Father as the one from whom he proceeds (i.e. “procession consciousness”), Christ is conscious of the esse secundarium as the ontological ground of his mission consciousness. The esse secundarium may thus be understood as a created participation in the divine relation of paternity that generates the Son and sends him with a divine mission. Thus, the esse secundarium ontologically grounds Christ’s conscious

233 Doran, “Are There Two Consciousnesses in Christ?” 153.

234 Ibid., 168.

235 Ibid., 148.

118 experience of this mission.236 This ground of Christ’s mission consciousness also ensured that

Christ’s humanity had the light of glory and the beatific vision from the moment of its creation, such that it might participate in divine filiation even before Christ’s death and resurrection.237

The light of glory is another analogue for the divine relations as they shape human consciousness. Doran notes that “the light of glory . . . is the consequent condition of the gift of beatific knowing and loving, and the created base of a created relation to the Father.”238

Accordingly, the lumen gloriae present in the saints, as the created term of the Father’s paternal relation to humanity that exists by virtue of the divine missions, involves a created relation to the

Father through a participation in filiation. Through it, one can come to understand something of the Son in his relation to the Father.

Knowledge of the Father and the Son in their paternity and filiation may also come from considering the created terms of active and passive spiration in history, which are the habit of charity and sanctifying grace, respectively. On the remaining two analogues for the divine

236 Cf. Mabry, “In Illo Tempore,” 31: “This supernatural, created, existential principle is the contingent result of God’s speaking in History. It is the finite horizon under which all Jesus’ human experiences, operations, acts, and actions unfold and take place.”

237 Cf. Ibid., 28:

As first act of Christ’s human intellect, the beatific vision elevates Christ’s self-presence such that he is truly present to himself in a supernatural but still human way. As noted above, every act has a subject pole and an object pole. Christ’s supernatural self-presence is the subject pole of the beatific vision, whereas God as quidditatively understood is the object pole. Without beatific knowing, Christ would be incapable of affirming, ‘I am the Son of God.’ Jesus must know that he is God, but to do so he must first have a quidditative knowledge of what God is, otherwise the crucial part of the judgment would remain an unknown, namely, God. But a quidditative knowledge of God is only possible through the beatific vision, whereby God informs the human intellect with his very own essence so that by his essence the human intellect may understand him but not comprehend him.

238 Doran, “The Structure of Systematic Theology (2),” 6.

119 relations, Doran writes, “Both sanctifying grace and the habit or disposition or circle of operations that constitutes charity . . . are the distinct consequent conditions of the gift of the

Holy Spirit and participation in trinitarian life rooted in the gift, the respective bases of created relations first to the Holy Spirit and then to the Son and the Father.”239 Therefore, sanctifying grace, as the created term of passive spiration in history through the indwelling of the Holy

Spirit, involves a participation in active spiration and a created relation to the Holy Spirit. It thereby yields some understanding of the Holy Spirit. Likewise, the habit of charity, as the created term of the Father and the Son’s shared relation to humanity (through active spiration) that exists on account of the divine missions, involves a participation in passive spiration and a created relation to the Father and the Son considered together. It thus provides insight into the

Father and the Son in their relation to the Holy Spirit through active spiration. Furthermore, sanctifying grace and charity are related in a manner analogous to that between active and passive spiration. As Doran writes, “A created participation in that same Spirit, that is, charity, is breathed from the elevation into a share in divine life that is sanctifying grace, in a manner analogous to the being-breathed of the Holy Spirit from the active breathing of the Father and the

Son in their mutually opposed relations of paternity and filiation.”240

Accordingly, these various analogues for the Triune God present in human consciousness enable God’s self-communication to be understood not only in reference to the Holy Spirit, but also to the Father and the Son. Doran argues,

239 Ibid., 6-7.

240 Ibid., 20.

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This divine self-communication, constituted by God alone, allows not only the Holy Spirit but each of the persons of the Trinity to be present to those to whom the created grace of God’s favor (gratia gratum faciens) has been given. The gift of the Holy Spirit as the uncreated term of a created relation also allows the other persons of the Trinity to be present as distinct terms of distinct created relations, for the Holy Spirit is an uncreated relation to the Father and the Son, and so to be related to the Holy Spirit must entail being related to the Father and the Son as terms of a distinct relation.241

8. Two Forms of Participation in God: Notional and Essential

According to Doran, the four created supernatural realities through which human beings participate in the relations of the divine persons are efficiently caused by all three persons acting together through their common essence. He states, “The created gift by which God gives us this participation in divine life is effected, created, by the love that is common to the three divine persons.”242 Indeed, all forms of participation in God, whether natural or supernatural, entail a created relation to all three divine persons as their efficient cause. Yet, Doran argues that “since the four preeminent graces are intimately connected with the divine life, they can appropriately be said to imitate the divine essence insofar as the divine essence is identical to one or other divine relation.”243 Accordingly, each of the four supernatural realities that enable divine participation gives human beings a proper (i.e., non-appropriated) created relation that terminates

241 Doran, The Trinity in History, 79.

242 Ibid.

243 Doran, “The Four Entia Supernaturalia,” 15.

121 in particular divine persons to the exclusion of others in the order of exemplary causality.244

Humans would thereby participate in the divine relations that they imitate by their own created relations in distinct and proper ways. For Doran, this also involves a participation in the

“notional acts”245 proper to each divine person, as opposed to those essential properties that all three persons share in common through their shared essence.246 Thus, he claims that the supernatural elements are “immanently constituted in terms of created participations in what

Aquinas calls the ‘notional acts’ proper to each of the divine persons.”247

One might consider whether each of the various manners of divine participation described above should more properly be understood as a relation to all three persons through a participation in the divine essence generally, rather than participation in a single personal relation specifically, except by appropriation. This possibility may be entertained with at least three of the four elements of the four-point hypothesis. On account of the hypostatic union, the esse secundarium of Christ clearly has a proper relation to the Son that is exclusive to him. However, for the other three supernatural elements, it is perhaps less clear how each one might enable a

244 Cf. ibid., 15: “The ontological foundation of these four graces, these four entia supernaturalia, is grounded in exemplary causality.”

245 Cf. Doran, “What Is the Gift of the Holy Spirit?” 12: “The term ‘notional acts’ is used to name the distinct manner in which each of the divine persons is subject of the one divine conscious act of unrestricted understanding and unqualified love. These acts are ‘notional’ because they cause the divine persons to be known as distinct from one another.”

246 Cf. Doran, “Sanctifying Grace, Charity, and Divine Indwelling,” 175: “Sanctifying grace is effected, caused by the essential divine love common to the three persons, but it establishes in us distinct relations to each person, because the gift is immanently constituted in terms of the distinct divine relations and is to be understood as a created imitation of and participation in those relations.”

247 Doran, The Trinity in History, 79.

122 human being to have a proper relation that is exclusive to a particular divine person (or, in the case of charity, two persons considered together), and thereby participate in a divine relation.

Doran argues that although the four elements of the four-point hypothesis are efficiently caused to exist in human beings by all three divine persons acting together, they nonetheless entail created relations to specific divine persons as their uncreated terms. This is because these supernatural realities are the created external terms that are consequent conditions of divine missions. By imitating the manner in which the divine persons have relations that terminate in the other divine persons, they involve a real participation in the different divine relations.

Accordingly, the supernatural elements in human life involve not only a general participation in the divine essence, but also non-appropriated relations that are specific to particular divine persons.

9. Distinguishing the Divine Relations by Their Orderings

Doran makes some important clarifications regarding how the divine relations are distinguished. One may initially have the impression that the relations are distinguished and multiplied according to their terms, considering that each is involved in a pairing of relational opposition. Indeed, Doran does describe the terms of the divine relations in the following manner: “The terms of the divine relations as immanent to the Godhead are the opposed relations: paternity to filiation, filiation to paternity, active spiration to passive spiration, and

123 passive spiration to active spiration.”248 In fact, the terms of the divine missions do have important implications for the relations among the four created terms of the divine missions.

Doran continues, “The missions add a created external term to each relation, and that created external term will also have to be understood in relational terms.”249

Now, while one may consider the multiple subjects and terms involved in the divine relations, Doran argues that these cannot distinguish the relations other than in a purely logical or conceptual way. He ultimately claims that “for Lonergan relations are really distinguished, not by a multiplication of terms, but by a multiplication of orderings.”250 Doran states that the divine relations are really distinguished neither by their distinct terms nor by their distinct subjects. He provides the following remarks in defense of his argument:

Paternity and active spiration each regards a distinct term: paternity regards the Son as term, and active spiration the Holy Spirit. But the reason for the multiplication of relations lies not in distinct subjects or in distinct terms but in distinct orderings. The same may be said of filiation and active spiration. The terms are distinct, since the term of filiation is the Father and the term of active spiration is the Holy Spirit. But the ordering is one: for the Father to beget the Son and for the Son to be begotten of the Father is for them together to breathe the Holy Spirit.251

Doran’s reasoning implies that if the relations were distinguished by their terms, there would be a real distinction between active spiration and both paternity and filiation. Such would amount to the constitution of a fourth person in God that is really distinct from the other three,

248 Doran, “The Structure of Systematic Theology (2),” 19.

249 Ibid.

250 Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 5n6. Cf. Lonergan, The Triune God: Systematics, 248-51.

251 Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 20.

124 which is theologically inadmissible. Also, if the relations were distinguished by their subjects, there would be only three, rather than four relations. Yet, without the fourth relation of active spiration, the passive spiration of the Holy Spirit would be left without either an opposed relation in reference to the Father or a manner of procession that distinguishes it from filiation.

However, if paternity and filiation are understood together as ordered toward breathing the Holy Spirit, then active spiration may be considered as only logically or conceptually distinct from paternity and filiation.252 Under this conception, Doran believes that “to beget and to be begotten are, together, actively to love.”253 This allows for the existence of four divine relations that constitute no more than three divine persons. In the following remarks, Doran explains how active spiration is really identical with paternity and filiation, such that it is only conceptually distinguished from them:

The relation of what utters the Word to the Word that is uttered, and the relation of what utters the Word to the Love that proceeds from the Word uttered, are conceptually distinct, but really one relation. Again, the relation of what is uttered to the Speaker that utters it is conceptually distinct from its relation to the Love that proceeds from it, but these two conceptually distinct relations are really one. To utter the Word and to be the Word uttered by the Father are, together, actively to spirate Proceeding Love.254

252 Cf. Jeremy D. Wilkins, “Method and Metaphysics in Theology: Lonergan and Doran,” Method: Journal of Lonergan Studies, n.s. 5, no. 2 (2016): 66n35:

We conceive wisdom one way and power another. But we know that, in reality, divine wisdom is divine power. The distinction is merely notional, merely a function of the way we think. On the other hand, we know that the Father is really not the Son, so divine paternity is really not divine filiation. The distinction is real. Finally, we conceive the Father’s relation to the Son one way, and his relation to the Spirit another. Thus, our concept of generation is not our concept of spiration. But we know that, in God, generation really is spiration, for the Father, by one and the same real ordering, utters the Word and breathes the Spirit. A multiplicity of really distinct terms does not constitute a diversity of real relations. However, it does provide a basis in the object, for distinguishing, notionally, the order of the Father to the Son, and the order of the Father to the Spirit. See Triune God: Systematics, 246-60; 732-36.

253 Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 19.

254 Ibid., 20.

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Doran notes that while only three of the four divine relations may be really distinguished from one another, the four supernatural acts imparted to humanity by grace each maintain a real distinction from the others. In Doran’s view, this reflects the difference between God’s uncreated relations, which exist necessarily by their real identity with the divine substance, and humanity’s created relations, which are contingent and require God’s help to be brought to perfection. Doran describes how the supernatural, psychological analogy between God and human beings is more remote on this point:

The analogy in this case is very remote, because in us there are two distinct acts actively spirating love: understanding as uttering a judgment of value and the judgment of value thus uttered. In God there is but one infinite act by which God understands and speaks and conceives and judges. . . . God cannot utter the value judgment that is the divine Word without Love proceeding from the utterance and the judgment. In us, on the other hand, there is an exigence, not a necessity, that the value judgment that is spoken from the grasp of sufficient evidence also breathe love. The ordering can and often does break down.255

Finally, Doran has noted that in a letter from Lonergan to Philip McShane, dated August

25, 1976, Lonergan admitted a complication of the four-point hypothesis regarding the real identity of active spiration with paternity and filiation. There, Lonergan states that “to shift the esse secundarium from participatio Patris to participatio Patris et Spiritus seems fine if one wishes to identify the esse secundarium with the gratia sanctificans Christi. The relation of participatio Filii to the Spiritus as well as the Pater seems to follow by implication from the real identity of filiatio with spiratio activa.”256 Here, while stressing the real identity of paternity and

255 Ibid., 20.

256 Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 24. Here, Doran quotes a letter from Bernard Lonergan to Philip McShane, dated August 25, 1976.

126 filiation with active spiration, Lonergan does not deny that the grace of union and the light of glory are really distinct from sanctifying grace. Yet, he notes that their respective participation in paternity and filiation necessarily involves a participation in the active spiration of the Father and the Son together. Consequently, participation either in paternity through the esse secundarium or in filiation through the light of glory necessarily involves reception of the sanctifying grace that imitates active spiration. It is in this sense that Lonergan identifies Christ’s grace of union and light of glory with his sanctifying grace. Indeed, the presence of either the esse secundarium or the light of glory in the soul necessarily entails the presence of sanctifying grace. Conversely, while human beings may have sanctifying grace without an esse secundarium and before having received the light of glory, their reception of sanctifying grace depends upon their solidarity with

Christ, who recapitulates humanity through his esse secundarium and light of glory. These suggestions of Lonergan demand a more thorough investigation of the relations among the four created terms of the divine missions, which Doran intends to perform the second volume of The

Trinity in History.

10. Doran’s Planned Future Work

In the second volume of The Trinity in History, Doran has said he will seek to examine more thoroughly the relational structure of the divine processions, the divine missions, and the created bases that are the consequent condition of the processions being missions. Doran has noted that the first thesis he will examine in that volume is as follows: “Since the reality of the two divine processions with which the divine missions are identical is the reality to be attributed

127 to relations, the missions themselves and the external terms that allow the processions to be missions will have a thoroughly relational structure.”257 The examination of this thesis will be essential to the study of how human beings participate in the order of the divine relations.

Doran has identified several questions that he would like to address in the upcoming volume. They consider the extent to which there are relations among not only the divine persons, but also the created terms of the divine missions. Doran explains his rationale for such relations existing among the four supernatural elements as follows: “For if the Father, the Son, and the

Holy Spirit are themselves relations to one another, there must also be a set of created relations among all of the created terms of those relations: not simply a relation between each of the created terms and the uncreated reality to which that base, as the term of a mission, is related.” 258

Doran notes how his realization goes beyond what Lonergan had advanced in reference to the four-point hypothesis:

Lonergan’s celebrated ‘four-point hypothesis’ already bears out the connection of the missions to the relations. It correlates the preeminent created graces – hypostatic union understood in terms of the secondary act of existence of the Incarnation, sanctifying grace, charity, and the light of glory – with the four divine relations. But there remains an issue of specifying the relations among the four created participations in the divine relations. The first issue, then, in correlating divine missions with the divine relations is to specify relations among the four principal entia supernaturalia, the created external terms that are consequent conditions of divine missions, that correspond to, imitate, and participate in the divine relations.259

257 Doran, “The Structure of Systematic Theology (2),” 19.

258 Ibid., 20.

259 Doran, “The Trinity in History: First Steps beyond Volume 1,” 11.

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While Doran has previously written about the relations between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity, he has not yet explained how all four of the created terms of the divine missions are related to one another. Doran offers the following questions concerning the foundational reality of the created supernatural order to be examined in the second volume:

 What is the relation of the secondary act of existence of the Incarnation not only to the Word but also to sanctifying grace, to charity, and to the light of glory?  What is the relation of sanctifying grace not only to the Holy Spirit, and not only to charity (which we have already established), but also to the secondary act of existence and to the light of glory?  What is the relation of charity not only to the Father and the Son, and not only to sanctifying grace (which again we have already established), but also to the secondary act of existence and to the light of glory?  And what is the relation of the light of glory not only to the Father but also to the secondary act of existence, to sanctifying grace, and to charity?260

C. Responses to Doran’s Project

Doran foresees the continued development of the four-point hypothesis into a supernatural Trinitarian analogy as a collaborative effort. He states,

In the course of my efforts to envision how a systematic theology based in Lonergan's theological method might unfold, I have become increasingly convinced that the first answer to such a question must be, “collaboratively.” No one person can write such a systematics in our time, but a group sharing the same assumptions regarding the fundamental issues that Lonergan discussed under the rubric of religious, moral, and intellectual conversion can go a long way. One hope of mine in recent years has been to assemble such a group and start working with them, and that hope now seems to be taking the form of an online research enterprise that could soon be up and running. Before my hope takes that cyberspace form, though, it seems to have found a more traditional organ of communication.261

260 Doran, “The Structure of Systematic Theology (2),” 21.

261 Robert M. Doran, “Addressing The Four-Point Hypothesis,” Theological Studies 68, no. 3 (2007): 674.

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Doran’s project has elicited significant response among scholars, especially in the journal

Theological Studies where Doran’s article “The Starting Point of Systematic Theology” was published. Among those who have published responses to Doran’s development of Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis, some profess fundamental agreement with the way Doran has sought to transpose it from metaphysical theology to methodical theology. These include Darren Dias and

Neil Ormerod, who have initiated a collaborative project inspired by Doran’s work that involves writing a new systematic theology in five volumes for the intended use of MDiv/MA theology students.262 However, others believe that if Lonergan’s hypothesis is to be transposed into the terms of methodical theology, it should be reduced from four points to two or three. For instance,

Charles Hefling has responded to Doran by advocating the formulation of a three-point hypothesis to ground a methodical systematic theology.263 Additionally, David Coffey has responded to Doran and Ormerod by suggesting that points two through four of the hypothesis be reduced to one point, leaving incarnation and grace as the two points whereby the Trinity is understood analogically.264

262 Cf. Robert M. Doran, “A New Project in Systematic Theology,” Theological Studies 76, no. 2 (2015): 243-59.

263 Cf. Charles Hefling, “On the (Economic) Trinity: An Argument in Conversation with Robert Doran,” Theological Studies 68, no. 3 (2007): 642-60.

264 Cf. David M. Coffey, “Response to Neil Ormerod, and Beyond,” Theological Studies 68, no. 4 (2007): 900-15.

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1. Charles Hefling

In his response to Doran’s article in Theological Studies, Hefling expresses excitement for Doran’s systematic theology project founded on the four-point hypothesis. However, he suggests, “It might well seem that what systematic theology is called upon to work out is not a four-point but a three-point hypothesis.”265 He expresses some reservations against adopting the four-point hypothesis, such as with his claim that “Doran is putting all his eggs in the basket of a hapax legomenon.”266 He notes that other than the brief statement of De Deo trino, no other publication of Lonergan in his lifetime discussed four external terms of divine communication to creatures (note that Lonergan’s course notes were not published until 2011). In all other discussions of the external terms, such as in The Ontological and Psychological Constitution of

Christ and The Incarnate Word, there are only three: Christ’s esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, and the light of glory.267 He states, “To the best of my knowledge, it is only the list in De

Deo trino that adds habitual charity to what Lonergan otherwise thought of consistently as a threefold communication of divinity to creatures.”268

Hefling gives a couple of reasons why the four-point hypothesis is not the one best suited for use in methodical theology. One issue he mentions is that, according to Lonergan’s early metaphysical theology, active spiration is not really distinct from paternity and filiation. Yet,

265 Hefling, “On the (Economic) Trinity,” 647.

266 Ibid., 645.

267 Cf. ibid., 645-6.

268 Ibid., 646.

131 incongruently, sanctifying grace is really distinct from the esse secundarium and the light of glory, although it cannot be absent when either of these is present. For Hefling, there appears to be a better analogy between the three really distinct divine relations and only three of the created supernatural realities identified in the four-point hypothesis. Thus, he argues that a three point hypothesis would be better suited to form an analogy for the Trinity than a four-point hypothesis focusing on all four divine relations. Accordingly, he emphasizes, “The four real relations occupy a kind of conceptual halfway-house. It is equally essential to show that, of the four, only three are really distinct, since it is with these three that the divine Persons are identical.”269

Hefling does admit, however, that the categories of metaphysical theology distinguish between entitative and operative habits, thereby implying a real distinction between sanctifying grace and charity, as well as the existence of four created supernatural realities, rather than three.

Indeed, he identifies an analogy between the natural and the supernatural used in Lonergan’s early theology which allows for this distinction: “As the soul stands, in the natural order, to will and intellect, of which it is the principle, so grace stands, in the supernatural order, to charity and faith. Broadly speaking, then, what distinguishes charity from grace, both of which are supernatural, is what distinguishes will from soul.” Hefling also describes how this analogy depends upon an understanding of the faculties of the human soul that Lonergan developed in

“De ente supernaturali”:

Stated briefly and schematically, the relevant order as he then conceived it comprises (A) substance, (B) accidental or passive potency, and (C) operation. In the case of human acts, potency (B) is further divided into operative faculties (B1), such as will and intellect, and habits (B2), which may, though they do not necessarily, inform those

269 Ibid., 646.

132

faculties. While it is always through its faculties (B1) that the human soul (A) receives or elicits operations (C), in general the operations may or may not occur habitually (B2). . . . Grace is an “entitative” habit, defined as a habit that modifies the essence of the soul. The modification, in this case, supplies an explanatory viewpoint for understanding how loving and knowing God can occur with no disparity between subject and act. However—and this is the crucial point—acts of charity and vision have a further condition. Their occurrence requires the elevation not only of the soul itself (A), but of its essential potencies (B1) as well. That is, it requires the infusion of “operative” habits (B2): the habit of charity, in the will, and the light of glory, in the intellect. To say that this condition must be met is the same as to say that acts of charity and acts of vision do not occur otherwise than habitually. Some supernatural acts, notably acts of faith and hope, may be either transient or habitual. Charity, on the other hand, “faileth not,” and neither does the beatific vision. That they do not is accounted for by positing the gift of correspondingly supernatural habits. . . . An act of charity (C) depends proximately on habitual charity (B2), an operative habit in the will (B1), and at the same time depends remotely on sanctifying grace, an entitative habit that modifies substantial form, namely the soul (A).”270

Nevertheless, Hefling argues that when one’s conception of sanctifying grace is transposed from the context of metaphysical theology to that of methodical theology, it cannot be really distinguished from charity. Hefling points to a passage in Lonergan’s Method in Theology where he sketches what a theology of grace looks like before and after being transposed from metaphysical theology to methodical theology.271 Hefling states,

On the “before” side, the “theoretical theology” of grace that Lonergan presents is none other than the one he had made his own in earlier writings. As I have just outlined, it “presupposed a metaphysical psychology in terms of the essence of the soul, its potencies, habits, and acts.” On the “after” side the sketch indicates categories that a methodical theology would use instead. Only one of the older terms, “acts,” remains once the transposition has been effected. All the others disappear, for a reason that is not far to seek. While it is from acts that a methodical theology will, in the first instance, derive its terms and relations, the acts it derives them from are the conscious acts of the conscious, concrete subject. The derivation, that is to say, has an experiential basis. But the study of

270 Ibid., 649-50.

271 Cf. Lonergan, Method in Theology, 298: “Now to effect the transition from theoretical to methodical theology one must start, not from a metaphysical psychology, but from intentionality analysis and, indeed, from transcendental method.”

133

the conscious subject, which articulates that basis, “prescinds from the soul, its essence, its potencies, its habits, for none of these is given in consciousness.” Conscious acts, precisely as conscious, survive the transition to a methodical theology of grace. The potencies and the essence of the soul do not.272

Hefling argues that the four-point hypothesis cannot be used in a methodical theology because the terms used to explicate it in metaphysical theology are no longer to be found.273 He concedes to Doran that there might be a way to preserve the traditional distinction between sanctifying grace and charity “by drawing a functionally equivalent distinction, in the

‘transposed’ terms appropriate to a methodical theology.”274 Yet, he does not believe this to be possible. He explains, “There is no evidence, however, that Lonergan drew any such distinction in his later work. Nor, more importantly, do the ‘transposed’ terms appropriate to a methodical theology, defined as he defines them in Method, lend themselves to drawing it.”275

Despite the difficulties of transposition, however, Hefling believes that a three-point hypothesis may be used in methodical theology. He acknowledges a participation in paternity,

272 Hefling, “On the (Economic) Trinity,” 650.

273 On Hefling’s position, cf. L. Matthew Petillo, “Love and Light: A Hypothesis Regarding Lonergan's Four-Point Hypothesis,” Lonergan Workshop 25 (2014): 285-7:

According to the theorem of the supernatural, the entitative habit of sanctifying grace is rooted in the essence of the soul, while the operative habit of charity is rooted in the will as one of its potencies. In scholastic theology, the real distinction between the essence of the soul and its potencies grounds the real distinction between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity. But in Hefling’s opinion . . . if, in a methodical theology, there is no distinct faculty called “will,” then there is no appropriate metaphysical soil in which the habit of charity as distinct from sanctifying grace, can take root. . . . If Hefling is right that “will” and “intellect” are not relevant categories in a methodical theology, at the very least, it raises questions about the explanatory value of special categories that rely on these faculties as their metaphysical basis. . . . If a theology that derives its terms and relations from an analysis of conscious intentionality cannot warrant a metaphysically distinct faculty called “intellect,” how does the “light of glory” get transposed?

274 Hefling, “On the (Economic) Trinity,” 650.

275 Ibid.

134 filiation, and passive spiration in the transposed terms of methodical theology. He points to

Lonergan’s use of the term “dynamic state” in referring to the conscious experience of something that is functionally equivalent to a hybrid between entitative and operative habits.276 Thus, one of the three points of his hypothesis would be the dynamic state of being in love, taking the place of both sanctifying grace and charity. This reality enables participation in passive spiration. Another point of Hefling’s hypothesis involves the functional equivalent of the esse secundarium, which he describes as follows: “Its being is being-assumed by the Son only, and as such it participates in the divine relation that is a relation to the Son, that is, in ‘paternity.’”277 He clarifies that this external term of divine mission “is not the assumed humanity of Christ itself,” but rather “the fact of its being the humanity of a divine Person.”278 While the being-assumed of the Son participates in paternity, Hefling believes that filiation is participated by the functional

276 Cf. ibid., 651-2:

At the same time, however, one of the terms Lonergan does include—indeed, the central term—is “dynamic state,” which he says is conscious and which he characterizes as a “habitual actuation” of the human capacity for self-transcendence. Perhaps, then, such a conscious state, which seems to be neither a subject nor an act, as such, can be thought of as taking on at least part of the role that older theology assigned to habit. On that assumption, it would be possible to ask how far, if at all, the dynamic state in question might represent a transposition of an “entitative” or alternatively an “operative” habit. . . . It would perhaps be consonant with Lonergan’s own statements to say that the one conscious state he refers to functions both quasi-entitatively, transforming the conscious subject, and quasi-operatively, reorienting the conscious acts of deciding by which the subject is self-constituted. Some such interpretation would preserve the old language and something of its old sense. It would not, however, preserve the old distinction. Rather, it would amount to an alternative—and seriously misleading—way of referring to unrestricted love as at once a dynamic state and a principle. In other words, it would be a restatement of the fact that sanctifying grace is at once operative and cooperative. It seems clear that Lonergan himself saw no reason to distinguish between an “entitative habit” of sanctifying grace and an “operative habit” of charity, once he had moved away from the faculty psychology on which such a distinction rests.

277 Ibid., 658.

278 Ibid., 658-9n30.

135 equivalent of the light of glory. He writes, “To know as God knows, then, would be to participate in the divine relation that is a relation to the Father, that is, in ‘filiation.’”279

In light of these observations, Hefling summarizes his hypothesis as follows: “This

‘three-point hypothesis,’ in sum, posits a being related to God the Son, by participation that is unique to the incarnate Word. It posits a being related to God the Father, by participation that is eschatological. And it posits a being related to the Father and the Son, by participation that is the created counterpart of the uncreated gift of the Spirit.”280

In his response to Hefling, Doran argues that the four-point hypothesis is not strictly a hapax legomenon. Notwithstanding its prior history in Lonergan’s course notes, Doran points to the long editorial period between the appearance of Divinarum personarum and De Deo trino:

Pars systematica as evidence that Lonergan thought of it as valid for at least several years.

Otherwise, Lonergan would have removed it from the latter text. As Doran explains,

Strictly speaking, this is not a hapax legomenon, since it appeared as well in the earlier Divinarum personarum, which first appeared in 1957. Even if this text was the forerunner to the De Deo trino: Pars systematica of 1964, Lonergan changed a good deal from the earlier text, as appendix 4 in The Triune God: Systematics manifests, but he did not see fit to change or abandon this hypothesis.281

Doran concedes to Hefling that Lonergan only discusses three supernatural terms of the divine missions after De Deo trino. Indeed, he sates, “I have also been aware all along that

Lonergan's later formulations in terms of his intentionality analysis are ‘three-point’ rather than

279 Ibid., 659.

280 Ibid.

281 Doran, “Addressing The Four-Point Hypothesis,” 677.

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‘four-point’ formulations.”282 Yet, Doran admits dissatisfaction with this shift because he believes “there is real value to the metaphysical distinction between sanctifying grace and charity,” and he has “been taken with the extraordinary explanatory systematic potential of the four-point hypothesis.”283

Doran disagrees with Hefling’s desire to “leave a participation in active spiration out of the discussion of created grace,” believing that “the four-point hypothesis better accounts for the divine indwelling of the three divine Persons.”284 Doran claims that his article “Being in Love with God: A Source of Analogies for Theological Understanding” addresses the manner in which the four-point hypothesis might be transposed into methodical theology, even though Lonergan did not do so himself.285 That article has been quoted above. In it, Doran draws upon Christiaan

282 Ibid., 678.

283 Ibid. Cf. Dias, “The Contributions of Bernard J.F. Lonergan to a Systematic Understanding of Religious Diversity,” 141-2:

Lonergan himself did comparatively little to explicitly develop and draw out the full implications of the four-point hypothesis. In fact, the later Lonergan's trinitarian formulations in the language and categories derived from intentionality analysis are frequently expressed in “three-points” and not four as in De Deo Trino. However, from the 1957 “forerunner” to the later editions of De Deo Trino, Divinarum personarum, through its many editions and amendments by Lonergan himself, the “four-point” hypothesis remains. The later Lonergan's trinitarian thought concentrates upon the experience of the three persons of the Trinity, Father, Son and Spirit, ad extra. There is nothing to suggest that Lonergan discarded his ad intra insights, including his distinction between active and passive spirations. In fact, his rather nebulous language of “the gift of God's love,” “the dynamic state of being in love,” “knowledge born of religious love,” “acts of loving,” and “judgment of value” encourage a technical refinement in which the four-point hypothesis can be expressed in a methodical theology. The larger critical issue for the interpretation of Lonergan's thought is whether in his concern for intentionality analysis and a corresponding methodical theology, Lonergan abandoned some of the insights gleaned from his more “metaphysical theology.” If not, then what is the relationship between the two: how can Lonergan's four-point hypothesis be transposed from a metaphysical theology to a methodical theology with its categories of interiority?

284 Doran, “Addressing The Four-Point Hypothesis,” 682.

285 Cf. ibid., 677-8.

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Jacobs-Vandegeer’s article “Sanctifying Grace in a Methodical Theology,” where the following observation is made:

We may have reason to doubt the accuracy of a description of the interiority of grace if it stands at odds with the theoretical theology of the early Lonergan. In other words, if an account of religious interiority has metaphysical implications that contradict the key achievements of Lonergan's early theology as found in his dissertation and in his Latin works (e.g., “the theorem of the supernatural”), that account may need correction. Though interiority analysis gives the critical basis for eliminating misleading metaphysical terms and relations, we may also proceed with the awareness that the insights of an older, theoretical theology may at times serve as correctives to the oversights of a contemporary, methodical theology.286

Doran concurs with Jacobs-Vandegeer that some traditional metaphysical insights, such as the real distinction between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity, should have a functional equivalent in methodical theology. Accordingly, Doran echoes Jacobs-Vandegeer as he explains how such equivalents may be identified. Indeed, through intentionality analysis,

Doran distinguishes a state pertaining to the unity of consciousness (such as sanctifying grace) from a state in which this unity is manifested (such as the habit of charity):

For Jacobs-Vandegeer, if what Lonergan calls the dynamic state of being in love corresponds to what a medieval theology calls sanctifying grace, then that state has to do with the unity of consciousness as that unity reflects an entitative habit radicated in the essence of the soul, in central form, and manifested in diverse acts of faith, hope, and love, as well as in other operations and states. The dynamic state that corresponds in a “methodical theology” to what in a metaphysical theology is called sanctifying grace is a radical enrichment of the unity of consciousness that accompanies the acts of the theological virtues and other acts while remaining distinct from them.287

286 Christiaan Jacobs-Vandegeer, “Sanctifying Grace in a ‘Methodical Theology,’” Theological Studies 68, no 1 (2007): 56.

287 Doran, “Addressing The Four-Point Hypothesis,” 678. Cf. Jacobs-Vandegeer, “Sanctifying Grace in a ‘Methodical Theology,’” 63:

Being in love unrestrictedly does not signify an experience either equivalent to or even independent of some accidental or conjugate act. In any effort to explain the transposition that Lonergan proposed, I

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2. David Coffey

David Coffey has an article published in Theological Studies that responds to Doran’s

“The Starting Point of Systematic Theology” and Ormerod’s “Two Points or Four?—Rahner and

Lonergan on Trinity, Incarnation, Grace, and Beatific Vision” from the same journal. Coffey argues against Doran’s four-point hypothesis in favor of a two-point model of understanding the

Trinity through incarnation and grace. He also reacts to Ormerod’s article because it argues in favor of Lonergan’s conception of divine participation over Rahner’s as well as Coffey’s, given

Ormerod’s impression that “Coffey’s Christology is to some extent the logical unfolding of

Rahner’s position on Christology and grace, together with a strong application of Rahner’s grundaxiom.”288 Coffey notes in his rejoinder that “I have been more influenced by Rahner, though by no means have I been captive to him.”289 Hence, he does not presume that his arguments capture how Rahner would have responded to the early Lonergan’s four-point

suggest that the following four points may provide critical guideposts: (1) accidental operations render the subject conscious; (2) an entitative habit resides in the essence of the soul, in the substance as distinct from in its accidents; (3) the entitative habit constitutes the remote principle of the consequent operations received in the proximate potencies that arise from it; and (4) the conscious manifestation of that remote principle remains distinct from the operations themselves. The last point underscores the need to identify in consciousness the difference between “being in love unrestrictedly” (sanctifying grace) and the acts of faith, hope, and charity (theological virtues) that it makes possible (as from a remote principle).

Also, cf. ibid., 71-2: “If Lonergan attributed consciousness to the unity of the subject, still he maintained that distinct operations render the subject conscious. . . . The key to understanding the transposition lies in maintaining the crucial distinction between consciousness as diversified by the operations and consciousness as an identity immanent in the diversity.”

288 Neil Ormerod “Two Points or Four?—Rahner and Lonergan on Trinity, Incarnation, Grace, and Beatific Vision,” Theological Studies 68, no. 3 (2007): 670.

289 Coffey, “Response to Neil Ormerod, and Beyond,” 900.

139 hypothesis, had he been aware of it. Indeed, he states, “I leave it to others, should they wish, to defend Rahner against Ormerod's criticisms.”290

Coffey wishes to maintain the first and fourth points of Lonergan’s hypothesis, although in a significantly modified form. Regarding the esse secundarium, Coffey believes that it does not participate in paternity, but rather in filiation. He provides his reasoning as follows:

The sacred humanity must itself be regarded as receptive, indeed as pure, created receptivity. The most accurate way of conceiving this situation is to grasp the sacred humanity as receptive in relation to the Father and, therefore, as participating in and imitating the receptivity of the Son, that is, the sonship of the Second Person in the immanent Trinity, which is pure, uncreated receptivity in relation to the Father. . . . The esse of the assumed humanity of Christ, therefore, does not participate in and imitate the divine paternity, as Lonergan and Doran would have it. Rather, it participates in and imitates the divine sonship of the Son.291

Indeed, Coffey argues that not just the esse secundarium, but all manners of divine participation through created grace occur through imitation of the Son, not the Father or the Holy

Spirit.292 Consequently, he states, “This disposes of points two and three of the four-point hypothesis.”293 In fact, he argues that, with the abandonment of various metaphysical categories in Lonergan’s methodical theology, there is no room anyway for a real distinction between sanctifying grace and charity, or even the light of glory when it is understood as a greater degree of sanctifying grace in its eschatological state.294

290 Ibid., 901.

291 Ibid., 902.

292 Cf. ibid., 903.

293 Ibid.

294 Cf. ibid., 906:

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For Coffey, that which remains to be transposed from Lonergan’s original hypothesis are points one and four, where both the esse secundarium and the light of glory are understood as participations in the Son. According to his view, while the incarnation (esse secundarium) is the special manner in which Christ’s humanity participates hypostatically in the Son, all other human beings imitate the Son in a common manner through grace, which may only be conceptually differentiated into sanctifying grace, charity, and the light of glory as distinct kinds of grace.

Coffey explains how he thinks the esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, and the light of glory, while related to different divine persons, ultimately reduce to two modes of participation in filiation:

This leaves the three basic supernaturalia, namely, the substantial sanctification of the sacred humanity in the hypostatic union, sanctifying grace, and the light of glory. Each of these is related to a different divine Person: the first to the Son, the second to the Holy Spirit, and the third to the Father, but, more importantly, each is a form of filiation, the first two in its receptive mode and the third in its donative mode. Even more basically, the three supernaturalia reduce to two, in that the third is the eschatological dimension of the others, which themselves are instrinsically related, the second a participation in the first.295

I stated earlier that I suspected that Lonergan himself had lost confidence in the four-point hypothesis, which would explain his silence on it after 1964. By 1972, the publication year of Method in Theology, he had “moved out of a faculty psychology with its options between intellectualism and voluntarism, and into an intentionality analysis that distinguishes four successive layers of conscious and intentional operations.” This move entailed not an abandonment of metaphysics but a relegation of metaphysical terms and

relations to the realm of the derived and the consequent embrace of a ‘critical metaphysics’ in which ‘for every term and relation there will exist a corresponding element in intentional consciousness.’ In a lecture

delivered at Marquette University in 1968, Lonergan had said that the study of the subject “prescinds from the soul, its essence, its potencies, its habits, for none of these is given in consciousness.” The skepticism

thus expressed did not extend to the existence of the soul: “Subject and soul, then, are two quite different topics. To know one does not exclude the other in any way.” From this it appears that he no longer held that there was any real distinction between the essence of the soul and its potencies and habits. By this move, however, he had apparently abolished the ground for distinguishing between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity. And, given that the light of glory is the eschatological perfection of faith animated by charity (see 2 Cor 5:7), neither did there appear to be any longer a ground for distinguishing between the eschatological state of sanctifying grace and the light of glory.

295 Ibid., 915.

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Some of the responses Doran gave to Hefling’s article could similarly be applied to

Coffey’s arguments. Indeed, Doran and Ormerod remain convinced that the four-point hypothesis can be transposed into the terms of a methodical theology, despite Lonergan not having clearly done so in his lifetime. Furthermore, as noted above, they view participation in the four divine relations as the best model for understanding the divine indwelling of the three divine persons. Since all three divine persons are communicated in history through the divine missions,

Doran and Ormerod believe it would be odd if all four divine relations, with which the three divine persons are necessarily connected, did not have external terms in various forms of created grace. They believe it is only by participating in the four divine relations through their respective external terms that people can have non-appropriated relations that terminate distinctly in each of the divine persons. Contrary to Coffey, they contend that it would be impossible to have a distinct and proper relation to each of the divine persons if humans only attained God through participation in filiation. For them, it does not make sense for Coffey to acknowledge a relation to each of the three persons through the esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, and the light of glory, respectively, only to reduce these three to two modes of participation in filiation.

Doran and Ormerod defend their belief that there are four preeminent supernatural realities by arguing that grace should be differentiated not merely logically in terms of its degree, but really in kind. This leads to the real distinction of the esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory from each other. In their belief that these four participate in the four divine relations, and not solely filiation as Coffey maintains, they hold that the esse secundarium participates in paternity, rather than fililation. They draw an important

142 distinction between Christ’s esse secundarium and his humanity, claiming that the former participates in paternity and the latter in filiation through the hypostatic union. In contrast,

Coffey does not seem to clearly differentiate the two in this manner, resulting in him conflating both as participations in the Son. At any rate, if one grants the existence of four really distinct created supernatural realities, rather than two or three, they believe that the best way to account for their differentiation is to understand them as the created terms of the four divine relations.

D. Conclusion

This chapter examined Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis, which states that there are four preeminent created graces, namely Christ’s esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the lumen gloriae. These are supernatural realities which enable human participation in the four divine relations of paternity, active spiration, passive spiration, and filiation. This hypothesis was studied in its original context as a product of Lonergan’s early Latin theological work. Lonergan’s first formulation of this hypothesis was found in his notes for his course on grace in 1951-1952. His final formulation of it was identified in his Divinarum personarum

(1957), which was later revised into his De Deo trino: Pars systematica (1964).

This chapter also discussed Doran’s belief that Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis lays the groundwork for a supernatural, psychological analogy for the Trinity. Accordingly, Doran’s reflections upon Lonergan’s hypothesis were examined, as were his attempts to develop it into a

Trinitarian analogy. It also noted how Doran has made this hypothesis the foundation for his

143 systematic theology, which develops a supernatural analogy for the divine processions from the human experience of the supernatural order and the divine missions.

Finally, this chapter discussed the reaction of different scholars to Doran’s expansion of the four-point hypothesis into a supernatural analogy for the four divine relations. It studied some of Doran’s objections against his critics who reject the four-point hypothesis, in particular

Hefling and Coffey. It noted that they suggest alternative foundations for a supernatural analogy, such as a three-point or two-point hypothesis. However, both of these were found wanting.

Despite objections to the contrary, it appears that Lonergan has laid the groundwork for a

Trinitarian analogy that makes use of the four point hypothesis. Noticing this, Doran has developed Lonergan’s hypothesis in order to construct a psychological analogy from the supernatural order of human experience. This analogy has been developed within the tradition of

Lonergan’s Trinitarian theology to the point that it may be usefully compared with the

Trinitarian theology of Karl Rahner. Attention will now be turned to this task.

CHAPTER II

Karl Rahner’s Theology of Grace and the Trinity: Its Interpretation and Development

In his development of Bernard Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis into a supernatural, psychological analogy, Robert Doran seeks to transpose the four-point hypothesis into the categories of a methodical theology that addresses the concerns of modern philosophy. He believes the most appropriate categories for such a transposition are those of interiorly and religiously differentiated consciousness, which Lonergan developed after his original formulation of the four-point hypothesis. However, it may be that the categories of another theologian’s thought may prove more useful in developing a supernatural analogy based upon the four-point hypothesis.

Therefore, this dissertation now turns to examine whether Karl Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity would provide a stronger ontological foundation for a supernatural analogy based upon the four-point hypothesis. In preparation for this assessment, this chapter will examine the major themes of Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity as they pertain to the four-point hypothesis and a supernatural psychological analogy.

A. Philosophical Foundations for Theology

Rahner and Lonergan have a loose philosophical connection concerning a broad movement known as Transcendental Thomism. While they differ significantly on epistemology,

144 145 they share a related conception of intellectual dynamism.1 However, they expressed it differently.

According to Lonergan’s psychological model of transcendental deduction, the intellect’s unthematic orientation toward what is ultimately intelligible guarantees the isomorphism between the knower and that which is known. Hence, the intellect authentically grasps the reality of being insofar as the act of self-appropriation manifests this isomorphism.2 This allows the reality one experiences to be known through critical realism in accord with Lonergan’s transcendental method, also referred to as his generalized empirical method (GEM).

Furthermore, in Lonergan’s critical realist epistemology, humanity’s intellectual dynamism toward the transcendent is born from the unrestricted desire to know in anticipation of God’s absolute act of understanding. He writes, “As the metaphysics of proportionate being rests on the isomorphism of the proportionate knower to the known, so the transition to the transcendent is effected by proceeding from the contingent subject’s unrestricted desire to know to the transcendent subject’s unrestricted act of understanding.”3

For Rahner, the intellect abstracts forms not only on the basis of what is given in sensation a posteriori, but also in reference to the infinite horizon of being toward which

1 Cf. John F. X. Knasas, “Intellectual Dynamism in Transcendental Thomism: A Metaphysical Assessment,” American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 69, no.1 (1995): 16: “I claim that despite inevitable idiosyncrasies, the philosophies of Maréchal, Rahner, and Lonergan contain a common conception of intellectual dynamism.”

2 Cf. Paul St. Amour, “Kierkegaard and Lonergan on the Prospect of Cognitional-Existential Integration,” Lonergan Workshop 18 (2005): 50: “Knowing is not a matter of confronting a world already out there and then of somehow getting accurate representations of that world into our heads. Knowing involves the active and conscious performance of experiential and intelligent and rational operations whereby the knower intentionally becomes that which is known. In knowing there is performed an identity, a unity, an ‘isomorphism’ between knower and known.”

3 Bernard Lonergan, Insight (New York: Philosophical Library Inc., 1957), 679.

146 intellectual dynamism is oriented a priori. In his view, every act of human knowledge involves not only an explicit apprehension of intentional objects, but also an implicit pre-apprehension

(Vorgriff) of the infinite horizon of being. It is in reference to absolute being that finite beings may be understood and affirmed in their reality.

The philosophical foundations of Rahner’s thought will be examined in order to determine their suitability for grounding a Trinitarian analogy through the four-point hypothesis.

Rahner synthesized aspects of the philosophies of various figures, including Thomas Aquinas,

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), Joseph Maréchal (1878-1944), and Martin Heidegger (1889-1976).

Sensitive to the epistemic concerns of modern philosophy, Rahner believed that Thomistic philosophy as traditionally conceived lacked a sufficient basis for verifying the extra-mental reality of intelligible objects. With these concerns in mind, he engaged Thomistic thought with aspects characteristic of modern philosophy, including transcendental anthropology. Yet, despite his distinctly modern focus on human subjectivity, he understood it not as autonomous, but rather as dependent upon God in its fundamental orientation. Avoiding the extreme of autonomous subjectivity found in modern philosophy, Rahner sought to integrate the insights of ancient and medieval philosophy into his own philosophical synthesis. As he has explained,

Plato, Aristotle and Thomas will remain immortal philosophers from whom we must learn. But this does not alter the fact (even if the kind of philosophy studied in the Church has only taken notice of it in the last forty years or so) that philosophy today and hence theology too cannot and must not return to the stage before modern philosophy’s transcendental anthropological change of direction since Descartes, Kant, German Idealism (including its opponents), up to modern Phenomenology, Existentialism and Fundamental Ontology. With few exceptions, e.g. Blondel, it can be said that this whole philosophy is most profoundly un-Christian in so far as it pursues a transcendental philosophy of the autonomous subject, who stands aloof from the transcendental

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experience in which he experiences himself as continually dependent, with his origin in and orientation towards God.4

In his unsuccessful philosophy dissertation, Spirit in the World, Rahner develops a metaphysical anthropology that discerns the scope of human knowledge in its pre-apprehension or outreach (Vorgriff) toward the infinite horizon of being. He explains humanity’s pre- apprehension of the infinite, which is concurrent with its knowledge of the finite, by drawing upon Aquinas’ understanding of the intellect’s excessus described in Summa Theologiae I, q. 84, a. 7, ad 3. Rahner notes that, for Aquinas, “the excessus is necessary for apprehending the objects of metaphysics in spite of the fact that sensibility is the abiding ground of our knowledge.”5 Rahner presents his concept of the Vorgriff as a development of Aquinas’ excessus, according to which, following the conversion to the phantasm, the agent intellect abstracts knowledge of finite being through an implicit reference to the infinite. This indicates the infinite breadth of the agent intellect’s apprehensive power and the same breadth shared by the possible intellect’s receptive power.6 Rahner says,

We must therefore ask how the agent intellect is to be understood so that it can know the form as limited, confined, and thus as of itself embracing further possibilities in itself, as bordering upon a broader field of possibilities. Obviously this is possible only if, antecedent to and in addition to apprehending the individual form, it comprehends of

4 Karl Rahner, “Theology and Anthropology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 9: Writings of 1965- 1967; 1, trans. Graham Harrison (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1972), 38-9.

5 Karl Rahner, Spirit in the World, trans. William Dych (London: Sheed and Ward, 1968), 142n14.

6 Cf. ibid., 242:

If, then, the agent intellect is the spontaneous, dynamic ordination of the human spirit to esse absolutely, the “quo est omnia facere,” then the possible intellect as intellect is the potentiality of the human spirit to comprehend esse absolutely in receptive (hinnehmender) knowledge, the “quo est omnia fieri.” The receptive (empfangende) breadth of the possible intellect is the same as the apprehensive (zugreifende) breadth of the agent intellect.

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itself the whole field of possibilities and thus, in the sensible concretized form, experiences the concreteness as limitation of these possibilities, whereby it knows the form itself as able to be multiplied in this field. This transcending apprehension of further possibilities, through which the form possessed in a concretion in sensibility is apprehended as limited and so is abstracted, we call “pre-apprehension” (“Vorgriff”). Although this term is not to be found literally in Thomas, yet its content is contained in what Thomas calls “excessus” (excess), using a similar image.7

Rahner believes that whenever the human intellect reflects explicitly upon a finite being, it implicitly affirms esse commune in the act of pre-apprehension. Esse commune is not the absolute being proper to God, but it does include the community of all existing finite beings, any of which may be known by the intellect on account of its infinite scope of pre-apprehension.

However, the finitude of the human intellect does not allow esse commune to be comprehended in its fullness through explicit knowledge. Indeed, Rahner notes that esse can only be understood when it is concretely limited, either by a definite form or according to ens commune when, as an abstraction referring to the aspects of being common to all finite beings, it is understood to represent every concrete form. As Rahner explains,

The esse apprehended in the pre-apprehension, as only implicitly and simultaneously apprehended (miterfasst) in the pre-apprehension, was known implicitly and simultaneously (mitgewusst) as able to be limited by quidditative determinations and as already limited, since the pre-apprehension (Vorgriff), if it is not to be a “grasp” (Griff), can only be realized in a simultaneous conversion to a definite form limiting esse and in the conversion to the phantasm. The fullness of being which esse expresses is therefore never given objectively. If esse is made objective in reflection in order to be known (gewusst) itself (not merely implicitly and simultaneously known [mitgewusst] in the pre- apprehension), then that can only be done insofar as it is itself concretized again by a form. This is either a definite form, and then it limits esse to the fullness of a definite degree of being, or it represents every form, it is the form of ens commune (any-quiddity), and then its esse is indeed not limited to any definite degree of ontological actuality, but for that reason is completely reduced to the empty void of ens commune. Hence, insofar as this esse simultaneously apprehended in the pre-apprehension is able to be limited, it

7 Ibid., 142.

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shows itself to be nonabsolute, since an absolute necessarily excludes the possibility of a limitation. This esse apprehended in the pre-apprehension is therefore in itself esse “commune” (“common” esse), although this must not be equated with ens commune.8

Additionally, Rahner notes that in every act of knowing, the absolute esse of God’s being is implicitly affirmed along with esse commune as an object of pre-apprehension that fills its breadth.9 Yet, in this act of pre-apprehension, a conscious understanding of absolute being does not take place. In fact, human reason cannot even demonstrate the possibility of a divine grace whereby one might apprehend absolute esse explicitly. Nevertheless, while humans are unable to know the divine essence without the grace of the beatific vision, Rahner claims that people can still explicitly affirm the absolute being of God as the ground of their knowledge of finite beings.10 As Rahner indicates,

But in this pre-apprehension as the necessary and always already realized condition of knowledge (even in a doubt, an in-itself, and thus esse is affirmed) the existence of an Absolute Being is also affirmed simultaneously (mitbejaht). For any possible object which can come to exist in the breadth of the pre-apprehension is simultaneously

8 Ibid., 180-1.

9 Cf. Karl Rahner, Hearer of the Word, translation of the 1st edition, ed. Andrew Tallon, trans. Joseph Donceel (New York: Continuum, 1994), 51:

It is true that the Vorgriff does not immediately put God as an object before the mind [Geist], since, as the condition of the possibility of all knowledge of objects, the Vorgriff itself never represents an object in itself. But in this Vorgriff as the necessary and always already fulfilled condition of every human knowledge and action, the existence of an absolute being, hence of God, is always already co-affirmed, even though not represented. The Vorgriff coaffirms as objectively as possible that which, as a possible object, may come to stand in its range; otherwise it would once more aim at nothingness. An absolute being would wholly fill the range of the Vorgriff. Hence it is co-affirmed as real, since it cannot be grasped as objectively merely possible, and since the Vorgriff intends primarily not merely possible, but real being. In this sense we may and must say: the Vorgriff aims at God.

10 Cf. John McDermott, “Karl Rahner in Tradition: The One and the Many,” Fides Quaerens Intellectum 3, no. 2 (2007): 22: “Nature seems to be oriented in perpetual self-transcendence as if to esse commune, but insofar as God’s existence is presupposed the movement can be said to approximate God asymptotically. Here the distinction between nature and the supernatural perfection of the beatific vision is clearly upheld; the direct vision of God would be a gift beyond the attainment of man’s powers which only wander perpetually.”

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affirmed. An Absolute Being would completely fill up the breadth of this pre- apprehension. Hence it is simultaneously affirmed as real (since it cannot be grasped as merely possible). In this sense, but only in this sense, it can be said: the pre-apprehension attains to God. Not as though it attains to the Absolute Being immediately in order to represent (vorstellen) it objectively in its own self, but because the reality of God as that of absolute esse is implicitly affirmed simultaneously by the breadth of the pre- apprehension, by esse commune. In this respect, grasping absolute esse would also completely fill up the breadth of the pre-apprehension. But, on the other hand, insofar as in human knowledge, which alone is accessible to philosophy, the pre-apprehension is always broader than the grasp of an object itself because of the conversion to the phantasm, nothing can be decided philosophically about the possibility of an immediate apprehension of absolute esse as an object of the first order.11

The divine nature can be known only apophatically apart from revelation. However, the intellectual dynamism of the human spirit toward God affirms the existence of God as the ground of the spirit’s self-presence. Hence, one may reflect upon the structure of intellectual dynamism to form an argument of natural theology for the existence of God. Since human self-presence must confront its contingent existence, one’s experience of identity would be in flux unless it were referred to its necessarily existing ground in God’s absolute being. Indeed, human identity requires possible fulfillment in the absolute, lest it dissolve into nothingness. Yet, such hypothetical non-being is contradicted by spirit’s experience of its real existence through self- presence. Thus, since intellectual dynamism affirms that absolute being must be possible as a ground of human existence, which it affirms really and not just conceptually (as in an ontological argument), God’s absolute being is known to exist necessarily. An associate of Rahner, the transcendental philosopher Emerich Coreth explains this argument as follows:

We experience the dynamism of our intellect towards unity beyond all multiplicity, towards the unconditioned beyond everything conditioned, towards the infinite past all finiteness. This dynamism reveals to us as the final end or goal of the finite spirit the one,

11 Rahner, Spirit in the World, 181.

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unconditioned, and infinite being. This dynamism makes sense only if it is directed towards such a goal. This goal is an a priori condition of the possibility of the undeniable striving of the human spirit. But such a striving, which constitutes the very essence of our mind, cannot head towards nothingness. Its end must at least be possible. . . . Thus the act must be possible by which the spirit reaches absolute and infinite being, and the act is possible only if its content, in casu, absolute being itself, is possible; otherwise, the striving of the spirit, as it really is, would be contradictory. But if the absolute being is possible, it is also necessarily real. In the present case, and only in it, may we conclude from the possibility to the reality, provided only that the possibility in question is not a mere logical possibility, but the real possibility of being. Hence we do not conclude from a conceivable, non-contradictory concept of God to his reality. This would be an invalid conclusion. But we start from the real activity of the spirit, which is possible only if it aims at a really possible end, the absolute being. And the latter is possible only as being itself, which subsists no longer in the duality of being and essence, but whose essence it is to be, whose being is its essence; therefore, it is the absolutely necessary being, which by its very essence cannot not be. . . . But we have shown that the possibility of the absolute being is a condition of the possibility of the activity of the spirit, as it strives towards the absolute. Hence the Absolute Being really exists.12

For Rahner, the nature of spirit consists in its orientation toward God through pre- apprehension. Indeed, the process of abstracting and receiving knowledge through the agent and possible intellects reveals spirit to itself as it stands before absolute being. Rahner notes,

Abstraction showed itself on the one hand to be grounded and accomplished in an excessus to absolute esse, and on the other hand as the becoming conscious of the a priori structure of the spirit itself in the sensibly given content which it informs. . . . The essence of the spirit is the “quo est omnia fieri”: spirit is in potency for absolute being. It is “in a certain way (that is, in potency and in ordination towards) everything.” Its becoming conscious of its a priori reality is therefore the pre-apprehension of absolute being, and vice versa.13

This potency of spirit for knowledge of absolute being manifests the ultimate end of human life. Rahner says, “This also tells us what the end and goal of the spirit is. For the end of a

12 Emerich Coreth, Metaphysics, trans. Joseph Donceel (New York: Herder and Herder, 1968), 178-9.

13 Rahner, Spirit in the World, 281.

152 power corresponds to the breadth of its scope.”14 Hence, spirit is constituted with a natural desire to know God explicitly, whom it pre-apprehends implicitly. The intellect can naturally understand God asymptotically as the ground of finite being, and this gives fulfillment to spirit’s natural desire. However, spirit’s natural desire is ultimately fulfilled only through God’s unexacted gift of grace, in which the transcendent nature of God is revealed through self- communication.15 In fact, Rahner maintains that the spirit’s asymptotic openness to absolute being shows the possibility of receiving a greater fulfillment from divine revelation.

Consequently, in his subsequent text Hearer of the Word, Rahner discusses how the absolute transcendence of intellectual dynamism anticipates a possible revelation from God. He states, “To our fundamental human makeup belongs the a priori absolute transcendence toward being pure and simple. . . . A priori at least, humanity is open for every kind of knowledge and does not restrict the scope of a possible revelation.”16 Therefore, Rahner claims that the human ability to receive divine revelation can be known philosophically as an epistemic foundation for theology:

It looks as though an epistemological validation of this humble listening to and welcoming of God’s work were a priori impossible, since they presuppose a supremely free initiative of the transcendent God in a self-revelation no human being can foresee. If we start from ourselves, God’s revelation cannot be validated either in its actuality, or in its necessity, or in its inner nature. This being the case, we understand at once that an epistemological validation of theology (which should somehow be previous to it) cannot

14 Ibid., 283.

15 Cf. Rahner, Hearer of the Word, 56n: “There is still room for a subjective widening by grace of the horizon of human knowledge (a new visibility brought about by the ‘light of faith’ as a subjective faculty, as an ‘infused virtue’). The only requirement for this (and this is precisely our point here) is that the objective openness of our natural transcendence should not from the start anticipate all possible objects of revelation as due to humanity.”

16 Ibid., 55.

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apply to God’s word, but only to our listening to it. It can establish that it is a priori possible for us to hear an eventual revelation of God.17

This insight about the scope of human transcendence is fundamental to Rahner’s study of the philosophy of religion and its relation to theology. In light of this, he notes that “a metaphysical anthropology turns into an ontology of the obediential potency for a possible free revelation.”18 However, in seeking to demonstrate humanity’s obediential potency (potentia oboedientialis) for receiving a divine revelation so as to know God more deeply, Rahner clarifies that “we are not speaking of the obediential potency for supernatural life, as our ontic elevation to a share in God’s own life, but only of the obediential potency for a listening to an eventual word of God.”19 Indeed, he believes that since human knowledge is always mediated through finite objects, one cannot naturally demonstrate the possibility of an immediate vision of God. As he states, “Philosophically we cannot say whether the spirit’s transcendental capacity may ever be filled without the help of a finite sense object. We cannot say whether the beatific vision is intrinsically possible, much less whether it is humanity’s due.”20 Hence, Rahner argues that

17 Ibid., 5. The word “ergehenden” in the original German is translated here as “eventual.” For the original from the first edition published in 1941, cf. Karl Rahner, Hörer des Wortes: Zur Grundlegung einer Religionsphilosophie, in Sämtliche Werke, Bd. 4: Hörer des Wortes, ed. Albert Raffelt (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 1997), 18: “Wenn das richtig ist, dann ist von vornherein einsichtig, daß sich eine wissenschaftstheoretische Begründung der Theologie, die doch wenigstens irgendwie der Theologie vorausliegend gedacht werden soll, nicht auf das Wort Gottes, sondern auf das Hören des Wortes durch den Menschen, nur auf die apriorische Möglichkeit des Hörenkönnens einer möglicherweise ergehenden Offenbarung Gottes erstrecken kann.”

18 Ibid., 138.

19 Ibid., 16.

20 Ibid., 68. Cf. Karl Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 4: More Recent Writings, trans. Kevin Smyth (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 61:

The philosophy of religion, conceiving of God as essentially and perpetually the holy mystery, can of course offer no grounds for a philosophical proof of the possibility of the beatific vision and hence of grace

154 while natural reason can know the possibility of hearing a revelation from God, it cannot prove that the inner nature of a possible revelation could consist in God’s complete self-communication to humanity.

Rahner proceeds to show that the epistemic validation of the human openness to divine revelation is grounded in an understanding of the analogy of being. He refers to Aquinas, who discussed self-presence (or self-possession) as a transcendental reality of being that can be used as an analogue for comparing different degrees of being.21 For Rahner, everything in existence imitates God according to the extent to which its being involves a degree of self-presence, where a being emanates its essence and returns to itself in a form of reflexion. He identifies this self- presence of being with the luminosity of being, according to which beings have varying degrees of luminosity that participate in the divine light, from which all things have their being, goodness, and intelligibility.22 This analogue enables the following understanding of the gradation of being: the more immanent this self-presence is in a being, the more it is able to express and appropriate itself.23 As Rahner explains,

and the supernatural order in general. . . . The answer can be given only by revelation, and this revelation cannot be confined to words, but must be also the giving of grace, as an inner, objectless though conscious dynamism directed to the beatific vision.

21 Cf. Rahner, Hearer of the Word, 33: “Knowing, in its original nature, is the self-presence of being. Thomas says practically the same thing. What we called the self-presence, is called by him reditio subjecti in seipsum [the return of the subject into itself]. For Thomas to know is an activity by which the knower returns into itself, resulting, therefore, in a self-presence.”

22 Cf. ibid.: “The essence of being is to know and to be known, in an original unity which we have called the self-presence of being, the luminosity of being for itself.”

23 Cf. ibid.: “In a remarkable chapter of his Summa contra gentiles (IV, 11) he claims that the degrees of being—we might say the degrees of possession of being, of intensity of being—correspond to the degrees of the power of coming to oneself, or returning into oneself.”

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We may once more refer to the previously mentioned chapter of Summa contra gentiles (IV, 11), in which Thomas superbly exposes this gradation of the return of the thing into itself, throughout the different degrees of being. Everything strives back toward itself, it wishes to come into itself, to take possession of itself, since it is what it wishes to be, namely being, to the extent that it takes possession of itself. Every activity, from the purely material up to the inner life of the triune God, is but a gradation of this one metaphysical theme, of the one meaning of being: self-possession. Now this self- possession implies a double stage: an outward expansion, an extraposition of its own essence out of its own ground, an emanation—and a taking-back-again, a reintegration of this essence that has stepped out of its ground and stands as it were revealed. The more these two stages are immanent to the being which steps out of itself and returns to itself, the more a being is able to utter itself and to keep what is thus uttered within itself, to assimilate the uttered essence, so much the more it participates in being, as presence to itself. Next Thomas examines the different degrees of being. The material being utters itself to some extent in its outward activity, thus showing what it is. But what is thus shown, the manifestation of its ground in its activity, does not stay with it. It is uttered but it cannot be assimilated as such by the one that utters it. It operates only upon others. Strictly speaking it shows only to others what it is and remains hidden to itself. It is no longer luminous for itself, but only for others. It is only in human beings that the utterance for our own essence in thought and in action returns for the first time wholly to ourselves. Insofar as through our thinking and acting we show what we are, we know about ourselves. We “perceive” and “understand” ourselves.24

For Rahner, this analogy of being emerges from the tension between the openness and hiddenness of being. While all things are intelligible inasmuch as they have being, which indicates the openness of being, the pure being of God has the quality of hiddenness as an absolute mystery that no finite intellect can comprehend. Concerning this mystery, Rahner says,

“We must inquire why, despite and in its luminosity, pure being is that which is utterly concealed, why being, to the extent that it is being, is not only present-to-itself, but also hidden, present-only-to-itself.”25

24 Ibid., 38-9.

25 Ibid., 58.

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In response to this question, Rahner argues that God remains incomprehensible despite being absolutely luminous because humans “know of God’s infinity only in connection with finite beings.”26 This is significant since self-presence cannot be predicated univocally of finite and infinite being. As Rahner notes, “the concept of the being of a being is itself a fluctuating concept, which cannot in its universality be pinned down to a determined, univocal meaning

(hence to a determined manner of self-presence).”27 Hence, while an analogy can be drawn between God and creation, contemplating the self-presence of finite being does not enable one to comprehend God’s infinite being. As Rahner writes, “The positive aspect of this infinity, which only the concept, not the Vorgriff alone, might make known, remains hidden, despite the basic openness of this domain of infinity, which results from the spirit’s transcendence.”28 Indeed, even should God be revealed to humanity, God would remain incomprehensible as the absolute mystery.

Human understanding of God is very limited apart from revelation. In fact, it is impossible to deduce the possibility of divinization through grace unless one experiences God’s revelation. Noting these limitations of natural human reason, Rahner states that “we know the infinity of God only when, through negation, we move beyond the finite.”29 However, the doctrine of divine incomprehensibility does not imply that human beings have no obediential potency to further understand God through revelation. On account of the orientation of the

26 Ibid., 59.

27 Ibid., 38.

28 Ibid., 60.

29 Ibid., 59.

157 human spirit toward God’s being, the “self-manifestation of the infinite remains meaningful and still has something that may be revealed.”30 In fact, the analogy of self-presence may be used to show that humans can receive a possible divine revelation.

Rahner argues that the analogy of being as self-presence manifests the freedom of the personal God to reveal the divine being in history. He explains that the self-presence of a human knower is marked by a contingent existence. Now, inasmuch as people are present to themselves, they may consciously reflect upon their implicit pre-apprehension of the horizon of being and realize that their acts of self-knowledge co-affirm a necessary ground of human existence.31

Since people do not exist necessarily by their self-presence, they are rather known to exist as the consequence of a free decision of a creative power whose self-presence is necessary and absolute. Rahner explains how human knowledge affirms its existential dependence upon God’s free power to create:

God is the whither of the Vorgriff of the human spirit, but is such because God looms before the finite as free power. Thus, when finite knowledge knows God, this knowledge is carried by God’s own free positing of this finite reality, which we call creation. Thus it is always already a reply to a free word, spoken by the absolute, implicitly affirmed as such a free action when, on account of our transcendence, we finite spirits perceive the distant radiance of the infinite light.32

30 Ibid.

31 Bernard Lonergan also speaks of humanity’s affirmation of God within the horizon of knowledge. Cf. Lonergan, Method in Theology, (New York: Herder and Herder, 1972), 103: “The question of God, then, lies within man’s horizon. Man’s transcendental subjectivity is mutilated or abolished, unless he is stretching forth towards the intelligible, the unconditioned, the good of value. The reach, not of his attainment, but of his intending is unrestricted. There lies within his horizon a region for the divine, a shrine for ultimate holiness. It cannot be ignored.”

32 Rahner, Hearer of the Word, 70.

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When God is affirmed as absolute being, it is known that God’s intelligibility is fully present to God because of his perfect self-presence. God is also known to be purely free in creating finite being, with all of its relative degrees of self-presence. Now, the degree of self- presence in a finite being determines its ability to know itself, the world, and God. 33 Human beings are able to return to themselves in thought and action, but they cannot comprehend the absolute subjectivity of God within their own finite subjectivity. In fact, no finite being can grasp the ultimate intelligibility of God.

However, the human spirit is sufficiently present to itself that its intellectual dynamism pre-apprehends God, even though God transcends natural understanding. In its outreach toward the reality of God that exceeds the limits of natural reason, the human intellect manifests an obediential potency for receiving further knowledge of God through revelation, should God freely give it. As Rahner notes, “The contingency of this finite creature implies as such that it is changeable, hence that by itself it must be the object of further possible free interventions of the

33 Cf. Rahner, Spirit in the World, 97-8:

Knowing is being-present-to-self (Beisichsein), the reflectedness-upon-itself (Insichreflektiertheit) of being itself. Knowing will know something to the extent in which it is this something. From this it follows that it is established a priori in the being of a knower what it can know, because its being is the a priori norm for what it can become. The ontological structure of a knowing essence is the a priori norm of its possible objects. The structure of an existent of a definite intensity of being can be transposed into the structure of its presence-to-self, in fact it is already and always this, and thus is also the structure of its proper object, and hence also the a priori condition for all else that is to be known by it. That is all the more true since knowledge is a result of the ontological unity of object and cognitive faculty, but this becoming-one has the a priori norm of its possibility in the being of the cognitive faculty as the existent which unites the object with itself. Since the a priori of knowledge is grounded in the structure of being, and since an ontological union of knowing and known must also and necessarily respect the intrinsic ontological structure of the known, the a priori of knowledge does not conceal the nature of possible objects, but has already and always revealed it.

159 absolute.”34 In the following passage, he explains how the analogical knowledge of God as the ground of all being has the potential to grow into a deeper understanding of the absolute mystery, although intellectual dynamism cannot exceed its natural limits without revelation:

Through the Vorgriff, in the analogy of our concept of being, we reach from the start, although in an empty way, all possible degrees of the intensity of being, from the pure possibility of prime matter up to pure being. On the other hand, in the appearances, specified degrees of the intensity of being are made immediately accessible to our intuition. By denying the limits of such a specified, immediately accessible intensity of being, by displaying these limits upwards in the direction of pure being, it is possible to determine, in some way, albeit only negatively, extramundane beings as such and not only in their most general determinations, which they share with all beings. . . . The concept of being is not merely a static one, of the most empty and meaningless generality. For all its empty universality it possesses an inner dynamism toward the fullness of being (that is the meaning of the analogy of the concept of being). That is why it has, by itself, the possibility of growing interiorly, as it were, and of taking on a richer content, from within and not through the adding of external properties derived from elsewhere. Thus it becomes possible to let the concept of being, together with its transcendental determinations, grow by and out of itself until, stopped as it were in its dynamism by negation at a certain point, it designates a certain extramundane intensity of being.35

Indeed, just as God is free in creating the world, so too is God’s historical revelation free.

It is not necessary that God be revealed. As Rahner explains, “Pure being is free being, hence it is not from the start and necessarily manifested to the finite being.”36 Furthermore, he says,

“Insofar as the free positing of God makes God appear to us as a person, the knowledge of this personal God depends always on God’s own free decision.”37 Ultimately, while God was not bound to it, God has been revealed in history through God’s self-communication. God’s

34 Rahner, Hearer of the Word, 71.

35 Ibid., 130.

36 Ibid., 73.

37 Ibid., 70.

160 revelation is such that the human spirit is ultimately able to know, yet not comprehend, the divine essence in the beatific vision through the grace of the light of glory.

B. Pure Nature and Historical Nature

The philosophical views Rahner developed in Spirit in the World and Hearer of the Word shape his unique understanding of the relationship between nature and grace, which he advanced in his subsequent writings. He does believe in common with many scholastically trained theologians that human nature is marked by an obediential potency for the reception of grace, whereby it may participate in God’s supernatural life. Yet, Rahner’s view is distinctive on account of his claim that this obediential potency is rooted in the soul’s intellectual dynamism toward God as the whither of human existence. In this dynamism, the soul naturally remains open to the possible gift of God’s self-communication through its pre-apprehension of God’s absolute being. Rahner maintains that, even without grace, human intellectual dynamism would be naturally oriented toward God asymptotically through pre-apprehension. Gratuitously, God’s grace has actually been communicated to human beings for their fulfillment in the present order of existence.

Rahner indicates that transcendental analysis can reveal much of what constitutes human nature. It can help distinguish between that which human beings receive through grace and that which belongs to them naturally, although it is difficult to differentiate these two possibilities of

161 human existence through experience.38 Indeed, Rahner notes that the idea of “pure nature,” as distinct from “historical nature” that is actually impacted by grace and sin, serves as an important remainder concept that clarifies the unexacted nature of grace.39 However, he emphasizes that in the actual order of human existence, it is impossible to define exactly what human nature would be like if God had never offered grace to it. As Rahner explains,

This is not intended to deny that something which is recognized to be present in consequence of a transcendental analysis of the human reality belongs to human nature (even in the theological sense). . . . But conversely . . . one cannot ascertain the whole of human nature by such a transcendental method. . . . Once anthropology (in the widest sense) is forced to make use of a nontranscendental (and in this sense a posteriori) method in ascertaining man’s nature, it begins at this point to become unavoidably ‘imprecise’. For there is no way of establishing quite clearly in all cases from experience alone (at least without recourse to theology) whether what experience shows about man belongs to his nature as such (invariably and without exception) or to his historical nature, so far as this displays features (invariably and without exception from the

38 Cf. Karl Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith: An Introduction to the Idea of Christianity, trans. William Dych (New York: Crossroad, 1978), 129-30:

Therefore God’s self-communication in grace, as a modification of transcendence in and through which the holy mystery, that mystery by which transcendence is intrinsically opened and borne, is present in its own self and in absolute closeness and self-communication, cannot by simple and individual acts of reflection and psychological introspection be differentiated from those basic structures of human transcendence which we tried to present in the second chapter of our reflections. The absolutely unlimited transcendence of the natural spirit in knowledge and freedom along with its term, the holy mystery, already implies by itself such an infinity in the subject that the possession of God in absolute self-communication does not really fall outside of this infinite possibility of transcendence, although it remains gratuitous. Therefore the transcendental experience of this abstract possibility on the one hand and the experience of its radical fulfillment by God’s self-communication on the other cannot be clearly and unambiguously differentiated simply by the direct introspection of an individual as long as the history of freedom in its acceptance or rejection is still going on, and hence as long as this fulfillment through self-communication has not yet reached its culmination in the final and definitive state which we usually call the immediate vision of God.

39 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship Between Nature and Grace,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 301-2: “A precise delimitation of nature from grace (supposing it were possible at all) and so a really pure concept of pure nature could thus in every case only be pursued with the help of Revelation, which tells us what in us is grace and so provides us with the means of abstracting this grace from the body of our existential experience of man and thus of acquiring pure nature (in its totality) as a ‘remainder’.”

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empirical point of view, but conditioned by the fact of vocation to a supernatural end) which it would not have had if this vocation had not existed.40

Although there is no way to determine precisely how human beings would exist in the absence of grace, transcendental analysis can still determine the dimensions of pure nature to some extent. Rahner states, “This is not to deny that in the light of experience and still more of

Revelation it might not be possible in some determinate respect to use a transcendental method to delimit what this human nature contains. ‘Animale rationale’ may still in this respect be an apt description.”41 Such abstract delimitations of pure human nature, however, should not distract one from the supernatural end of humanity’s historical nature in its “concrete quiddity.” Rahner writes,

Must not what God decrees for man be eo ipso an interior ontological constituent of his concrete quiddity ‘terminative’, even if it is not a constituent of his ‘nature’? For an ontology which grasps the truth that man's concrete quiddity depends utterly on God, is not his binding disposition eo ipso not just a juridical decree of God but precisely what man is, hence not just an imperative proceeding from God but man's own inward depths? If God gives creation and man above all a supernatural end and this end is first ‘in intentione’, then man (and the world) is by that very fact always and everywhere inwardly other in structure than he would be if he did not have this end, and hence other as well before he has reached this end partially (the grace which justifies) or wholly (the beatific vision).42

Without undermining the insight that grace is unexacted, the study of pure nature from a theological perspective also shows how people have a specific obediential potency to be

40 Karl Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 298n2.

41 Ibid., 314.

42 Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship Between Nature and Grace,” 302-3.

163 transformed by grace without ceasing to be human.43 This does not imply that grace is owed to human beings, but neither does it mean that human nature has a neutral posture toward grace as something extrinsic and non-repugnant. It rather involves a fundamental yet unexacting orientation toward the supernatural. This indicates the natural value of the human spirit and its manner of existence, which would be inherently meaningful even if God had never offered himself to spirit as grace. Indeed, human beings in the state of pure nature would have had a natural end capable of fulfillment, although imperfect.44 Rahner explains,

Even when the gratuitousness of grace for human nature as such has been recognized, it is still helpful to try to work out more clearly how human nature is ordained to grace, as a potentia oboedientialis. It is not necessary to take this potentia oboedientialis as more or less just a non-repugnance, which would be the extrinsicism of which we have spoken already. To be ordained to grace, and to be so constituted that there is an exigency for grace which would render the whole ordination to grace futile if grace were not actually

43 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Potentia Oboedientialis,” in Sacramentum Mundi: An Encyclopedia of Theology, Vol. 5, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: Herder and Herder, 1970), 65-6: “By reason of its unlimited transcendence in knowledge and freedom, this nature can be potentiality for the self-communication of God, since it is thus capable of receiving this self-communication without being eliminated thereby and ceasing to be a human and creaturely being.43 On “specific obediential potency,” cf. Andrew Dean Swafford, Nature and Grace: A New Approach to Thomistic Ressourcement (Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2014), 16:

“Obediential potency” has two distinct meanings: (1) “generic” obediential potency which corresponds to the case of a miracle, and which indicates no real relation between the specific nature of the creature and its miraculous transformation; and (2) “specific” obediential potency which corresponds to man’s specific capacity for the beatific vision, and which stipulates that the capacity for a certain elevation is in fact rooted in the very nature of the creature in question; this elevation is therefore perfective of that particular nature, albeit in a way that transcends the powers of its nature, strictly speaking.

44 Cf. Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship between Nature and Grace,” 317: “Not as though the remotest doubt were being thrown here on the fact that man has a nature and that this in itself has an end assigned to it.” Also, cf. ibid., 315-6:

There is no reason why it could not retain its meaning and necessity even without grace, if on the one hand one can learn to see it as the indispensable transcendental condition of the possibility of a spiritual life at all; and on the other hand if this spiritual life, although in comparison with the beatific vision it remains eternally in umbris et imaginibus, can at any rate be shown to be neither meaningless nor harsh but can always be seen as a positive, though finite, good which God could bestow even when he has not called man immediately before his face. . . . A spiritual life towards God as an end approached merely asymptotically is not to be dismissed as meaningless from the start.

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imparted, are by no means the same thing. Spirit, that is, openness for God, freedom and conscious self-possession, is essentially impossible without a transcendence whose absolute fulfilment is grace. Still, a fulfilment of this sort is not owed to it, if we suppose that this conscious possession of self in freedom before God is meaningful in itself, and not just as a pure means and a mere stage on the way to the beatific vision. This supposition arises from the absolute (not ‘infinite’) value and validity of every personal act, in itself.45

Rahner clarifies that humanity in the current state of existence has only one end, a supernatural one. Also, while it is true that humanity in the the state of pure nature would have had a natural end, it would have been intrinsically oriented toward elevation to a supernatural end should it ever receive God’s self-communication. As Rahner indicates,

The (real) end of man must be designated as “supernatural”. . . . One can only speak of a “natural end” of man with extreme caution. If a natura pura had ever existed, it would have had a “natural end” (which would have been completely different from the actual end of man, not just materially but also formally). And in the real order, as man now actually exists, there are elements which on this unreal supposition would belong to such a “natural end”. But this does not justify one in speaking of a “natural end” of man as he actually is. Thomas Aquinas’s language does not make the natural end an alternative to the supernatural end. . . . The “supernatural” end . . . can quite well be understood as supernatural and as intrinsic at the same time. For the “essence” or “nature” of man is that of a purposeful free being, whose “nature” it is to be open without limit to the free disposition of God (as potentia oboedientialis). And the finality of man . . . must be seen from the outset in terms of a dialogal relationship between divine and human freedom. These constitute the end, so that the “nature” of man is only a formal and permanent pre-

45 Karl Rahner, “Nature and Grace,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 4: More Recent Writings, trans. Kevin Smyth (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 185-6. Cf. Karl Rahner, Nature and Grace: Dilemmas in the Modern Church, trans. Dinah Wharton (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1964), 139-141:

The attempt to work out more clearly the way in which nature is ordered to grace (in the sense of a potentia obedientialis) is still meaningful when we realize that grace is not due to nature, whether sinful or not. . . . Even though a spirit (i.e., openness to God, freedom and conscious and free self-possession) is essentially impossible without this transcendence, whose absolute fulfillment is grace, yet this fulfillment does not thereby become due. . . . Without transcendence open to the supernatural there is no spirit; but spirit itself is already meaningful without supernatural grace. Its fulfillment through grace is not, therefore, an exigency of its nature, although it is open to this supernatural fulfillment. . . . We can only fully understand man in his “undefinable” essence if we see him as potentia obedientialis for the divine life; this is his nature. His nature is such that its absolute fulfillment comes through grace, and so nature of itself must reckon with the meaningful possibility of remaining without absolute fulfillment.

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view of this relationship, but is not something which of itself constitutes this end. For the self-communication of God (grace), in spite of being supernatural, is the very “heart” of man.46

According to Rahner, God’s existence is affirmed implicitly and ineluctably by human transcendence.47 As he explains, “If the Whither of transcendence is that which by disclosing itself gives transcendence its reality; if transcendence is the condition of possibility of all spiritual understanding and insight; and if the Whither of transcendence is the holy mystery: then the holy mystery is the one thing that is self-explanatory, the one thing that is its own self- sufficient reason, even in our eyes.”48 This transcendental affirmation of God’s existence, which would exist in a state of pure nature, is qualified in historical nature by the element of grace.

Human beings experience the offer of grace through God’s self-communication at least unthematically within the horizon of their transcendence. Consequently, in the order of grace, natural theology and revealed theology take place together. Rahner explains, “There cannot be any pure philosophy whatever as something produced by man himself in his concrete life. In his thinking man as philosopher is in fact constantly subject to a theological a priori, namely that

46 Karl Rahner, “Order, IV. End of Man,” in Sacramentum Mundi: An Encyclopedia of Theology, Vol. 4, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: Herder and Herder, 1969), 119-20.

47 According to Rahner, an atheist’s denial of God is self-destructive inasmuch as all people implicitly affirm the existence of God in the transcendental orientation of their spirit. Cf. Karl Rahner, “Atheism,” in Sacramentum Mundi: An Encyclopedia of Theology, Vol. 1, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: Herder and Herder, 1968), 117: “A philosophical criticism of atheism will first have to show, by a transcendental method, that, epistemologically (critically) and metaphysically, absolute scepticism or a positivist, pragmatist or ‘criticist’ restriction of human knowledge to the realm of immediate experience is self-destructive, and that therefore the very possibility of metaphysics is always affirmed by its implicit existence in man’s necessary knowledge.”

48 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 57.

166 transcendental determination which orientates him towards the immediate presence of God.”49

Furthermore,

Revealed theology has the human spirit’s transcendental and limitless horizon as its inner motive and as the precondition of its existence. It is only because of this transcendental horizon that something like ‘God’ can be understood at all. ‘Natural’, ‘philosophical’ theology is first and last not one sphere of study side by side with revealed theology, as if both could be pursued quite independently of each other, but an internal factor of revealed theology itself; if philosophical theology, however, is transcendental anthropology, so is revealed theology too.50

The implicit pre-apprehension of God orients human beings to seek an explicit knowledge of God in order that they might become more consciously aware of God and God’s workings in the order of grace.51 God’s grace may thereby be appropriated freely and consciously with a cooperative spirit. Moreover, God enlightens human beings through revelation with the knowledge that their identity is ultimately rooted in God’s love. As Rahner says, “The capacity for the God of self-bestowing personal Love is the central and abiding existential of man as he really is.”52 Hence, the “love of God is the only total integration of

49 Karl Rahner, “On the Current Relationship between Philosophy and Theology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 13: Theology, Anthropology, Christology, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1975), 63.

50 Rahner, “Theology and Anthropology,” 34.

51 Cf. Francis Schüssler Fiorenza, “The New Theology and Transcendental Thomism,” in Modern Christian Thought: Vol. II, eds. James C. Livingston, et al. (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2000), 210:

This pre-apprehension of God is a knowledge of God, but God as the undefined and absolute mystery. Consequently, the quest for meaning still endures. This pre-apprehension is both the condition of the search and the impetus for the search. As the condition for the search it constitutes the de facto historical transcendental condition of the possibility for the human person to be open to and to hear God’s revelation or, as the title of his second book expresses, it is to be ‘Hearers of the Word.’ Rahner’s transcendental and existential analysis, therefore, aims to show the conditions of the possibility not merely of metaphysical knowledge of God, but of Christian revelation.

52 Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship between Nature and Grace,” 312.

167 human existence,”53 and “in this love, therefore, man enters into the adventure of his own reality.”54

This grace is identified by Rahner as God’s self-communication, whereby God is bestowed upon human beings so that they may be brought to perfection in holiness. This self- communication establishes an intersubjective union between God and humanity, about which

Rahner writes, “This self-communication means precisely that objectivity of gift and communication which is the climax of subjectivity on the side of the one communicating and of the one receiving.”55 On the effects of God’s self-communication, Rahner states, “Ontological self-communication must be understood as the condition which makes personal and immediate knowledge and love for God possible.”56 Thus, the grace of God’s self-communication gives human beings the opportunity to know and love God as their ultimate end. Rahner explains,

We can describe the transcendental experience of God’s self-communication in grace, or, to put it differently, the dynamism and the finalization of the spirit as knowledge and love towards the immediacy of God, which dynamism is of such a kind that, because of God’s self-communication, the goal itself is also the very power of the movement (we usually call this movement grace).57

By always being present to human beings as their fulfillment and source of identity, God offers them the grace of participation in his own divine life as the absolute subject. Rahner

53 Karl Rahner, “Theology of Freedom,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 6: Concerning Vatican Council II, trans. Karl H. Kruger and Boniface Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1969), 187.

54 Ibid., 188.

55 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 118.

56 Ibid., 122.

57 Ibid., 130.

168 explains that “in this self-communication God . . . does not originally cause and produce something different from himself in the creature, but rather that he communicates his own divine reality and makes it a constitutive element in the fulfillment of the creature.”58 Therefore, Rahner believes that God is the “quasi-formal cause” who elevates human finality by grace beyond what it would have been naturally through God’s efficient causality of creation. Hence, he writes,

“God’s own being is the quasi-formal cause and not merely the external efficient cause of a determination of the finite being.”59 Thus, human identity is formally grounded in the grace of

God’s self-communication and quasi-formal causality, “in which God’s ‘actus infinitus’ itself becomes the ‘finite’ actuality of a finite potency.”60 With this in mind, Rahner identifies the nature of the human person as “the event of God’s absolute self-communication.”61

Rahner uses the term “supernatural existential” to express the reality of human existence that has been elevated by grace toward God as its supernatural end in its concrete quiddity.62

58 Ibid., 121.

59 Karl Rahner, “Natural Science and Reasonable Faith,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 21: Science and Christian Faith, trans. Hugh M. Riley (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1988), 36. This is not meant, however, as an argument for pantheism. Cf. ibid., 35-6.

60 Karl Rahner, “Revelation, II. God’s Self-Communication,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 1466-7.

61 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 126.

62 Cf. L. Matthew Petillo, “The ‘Experience of Grace’ in the Theologies of Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan” (PhD diss., Boston College, 2009), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com .proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/304848745/fulltextPDF/DF71704BA1F41CCPQ (accessed January 23, 2018), 125: “For Rahner, the human quiddity—‘what it means to be’ human—is a combination of nature and the supernatural existential. So the supernatural existential, as a disposition for God (which functions as material cause in relation to God) is part of the human quiddity; it is part of the definition of ‘human.’ Human ‘nature,’ is what Rahner refers to as a ‘remainder concept.’” Also, cf. Kenneth D. Eberhard, “Karl Rahner and the Supernatural Existential,” Thought 46, no. 4 (1971): 555:

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Human nature is structured in such a way that, when fully constituted in its quasi-formal cause by grace, it is ordered to participation in the divine life through the supernatural existential.63

Rahner explains how the grace for salvation is constantly offered to all human persons through their supernatural existential, as well as how this grace must be appropriated through their free will:

The supernatural grace of faith and justification offered by God to men . . . can perfectly well be interpreted on the basis of God's universal will to save as a grace which, as offered (!), is a constantly present existential of the creature endowed with spiritual faculties and of the world in general, which orientates these to the immediacy of God as their final end, though of course in saying this the question still remains wholly open of whether an individual freely gives himself to, or alternatively rejects, this existential which constitutes the innermost dynamism of his being and its history, an existential which is and remains continually present. God's universal will to save objectifies itself in that communication of himself which we call grace. It does this effectively at all times and in all places in the form of the offering and the enabling power of acting in a way that leads to salvation.64

The supernatural existential is nothing other than the relationship of man to the horizon of absolute being as gracious. That is to say, it is a relation to absolute being, which is offering itself to man in immediate proximity. The supernatural existential is man's “situation” within this offer: an offer which affects him ontologically and intrinsically because it affects his preconcept by which he performs every act of knowing and willing. Hence, Rahner can call it a real ontological determination which is nevertheless previous (logically prior) to man's freedom and previous to and independent of sanctifying grace (which is the offer as accepted). It is continual because it involves man's horizon, from which it is impossible for him to escape. It obliges man to a supernatural ultimate end because this supernatural horizon is de facto the only horizon which man historically has. And finally, the ordering itself is a grace: for it is an offer to which man himself has no right.

63 Cf. Gerald McCool, “Philosophy and Christian Wisdom,” Thought, 44 (1969): 494: “If God has called man to the supernatural order, the call cannot have left his nature unchanged. Its consequence has been the production within man of a supernatural ontological reality, the supernatural existential.”

64 Karl Rahner, “Observations on the Problem of the ‘Anonymous Christian,’” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 14: Ecclesiology, Questions in the Church, The Church in the World, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1976), 288. Cf. Karl Rahner, “Theos in the New Testament,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 83n: “This necessary ‘natural’ openness of man to God is, in the historically realized scheme of things, always necessarily ‘overlaid’ (even when man is not in a state of justifying grace) by a supernatural ‘existential’ ordering the spiritual person to the God of eternal life.”

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While humanity’s historical nature is immediately apparent to Rahner’s experience as constituted with a supernatural existential, his concept of pure nature (in which people would have “natural existentials”65) is relatively thin as a remainder concept of historical nature.

Although pure nature lies outside of humanity’s actual experience, and cannot fulfill it because of its supernatural calling in the order of grace, Rahner explains that it is an important concept to investigate because it shows how humanity is open to the reception of grace through obediential potency without exacting it:

Man can experiment with himself only in the region of God’s supernatural loving will, he can never find the nature he wants in a ‘chemically pure’ state, separated from its supernatural existential. Nature in this sense continues to be a remainder concept, but a necessary and objectively justified one, if one wishes to achieve reflexive consciousness of that unexactedness of grace which goes together with man’s inner, unconditional ordination to it.66

As the whither of human transcendence, God is understood differently in the order of grace than he would be in a state of pure nature.67 Indeed, Rahner cautions against “identifying this unlimited dynamism of the spiritual nature in a simply apodeictic way with that dynamism which we experience (or believe we experience) in the adventure of our concrete spiritual existence, because here the supernatural existential may already be at work – as subsequently

65 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Man (Anthropology), III. Theological,” in Sacramentum Mundi: An Encyclopedia of Theology, Vol. 3, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: Herder and Herder, 1969), 369.There, Rahner identifies “the inescapable dualism in spiritual creatures between what belongs to their ‘essence’ and what to their ‘concrete existence,’” which implies a distinction between “natural or supernatural existentials.”

66 Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship between Nature and Grace,” 315.

67 Cf. Karen Kilby, “The Vorgriff auf Esse: A Study in the Relation of Philosophy to Theology in the Thought of Karl Rahner” (PhD diss., Yale University, 1994), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/304136186/fulltextPDF /2FD3BF969147459APQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 140: “The Vorgriff is on his account a feature not only of pure nature but also (albeit in a different way) of our actual nature.” Related to this is Rahner’s distinction between natural revelation and real revelation. On this, cf. Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 170-1.

171 emerges in the light of Revelation.”68 In the state of pure nature, God would only be experienced in a “distant and aloof” manner as “an overtone as it were of our subjective transcendence” and as “the condition of possibility of knowledge of categorized objects.”69 However, through grace and revelation, the mystery of God can be experienced intimately and, in the beatific vision, directly in itself. Humanity’s subjective nature is thus endowed with a higher degree of self- presence than would be possible without grace, which grants the human intellect a more clarified understanding of the reality of God and the analogy of being. Yet, even with grace, God always remains incomprehensible and does not cease to be the absolute mystery. Rahner writes,

When we described the nature of the holy mystery, as present to our transcendence, we said that this presence of the mystery has the nature of the distant and aloof. The holy mystery is accessible only in our experience of subjective transcendence, and only in so far as this transcendence acts as the condition of possibility of an objectivated knowledge according to categories. If these two elements of the distant aloofness of the holy mystery are eliminated: if therefore the Whither of our transcendence is no longer known merely as an overtone as it were of our subjective transcendence but experienced in itself, and if the experience no longer takes place as the condition of possibility of knowledge of categorized objects; and if such experience is possible – which we do not prove a priori but presuppose as guaranteed by revelation: then the holy mystery no longer manifests itself as a distant aloofness. But that does not mean that it no longer is a mystery. On the contrary, the mystery is there and most truly itself, radically nameless, indefinable and inviolable. Grace is therefore the grace of the nearness of the abiding mystery: it makes God accessible in the form of the holy mystery and presents him thus as the incomprehensible. In the vision of God face to face which grace makes possible many mysteries are indeed removed. But this only means that what they express is manifested in its own being and substance, is experienced therefore in itself and must no longer rely for its manifestation on the word that does duty for it and the authority of the recognized spokesman and prophet. Nonetheless, these mysteries remain mysterious and incomprehensible. They do not lose their mystery and become perspicuous. They can still not be resolved into something distinct from their content from which the content could be deduced and so made ‘intelligible’. The Trinity for instance is not ‘clearly understood’

68 Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship between Nature and Grace,” 315.

69 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 55-6.

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in the vision – it is contemplated as the divine incomprehensibility; otherwise it would not be identical with God who is identical with his incomprehensibility.70

Although the human intellect pre-apprehends God unthematically, it can only know God thematically through its encounter with the world in history. Hence, an elevated human subject may at first experience grace only unthematically through its pre-apprehension of God as self- communicated, but grace may be experienced thematically as one consciously encounters and apprehends God’s revelation in history. The conscious experience of grace reaches its climax in the beatific vision, but before grace is fully appropriated, it may be experienced more or less thematically as a person’s conscious knowledge and love of God develops in response to grace.

Hence, Rahner notes that God’s union with humanity through grace does not immediately result in an explicit knowledge of God in the beatific vision: “So far as it is the ontological presupposition of the beatific vision, this union is already posited independently of an actually exercised apprehension of the threefold God by man in knowledge and love.”71

C. Uncreated Grace, Created Grace, and Quasi-Formal Causality

A major aspect of Rahner’s theological anthropology is his understanding of the relationship between uncreated grace and created grace. He places emphasis differently than the neo-scholastic thought that had been dominant in theology prior to the rise of the nouvelle theologie, Transcendental Thomism, and other contemporary theological movements. While the

70 Ibid.

71 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 335.

173 neo-scholastics largely explained uncreated grace as a result of created grace,72 Rahner stresses that the indwelling of uncreated grace enables the possibility of receiving created grace.73 By elaborating upon the nature of uncreated grace, Rahner desires to bring the view more consonant with Scriptural and patristic theology that regards “created grace as a consequence of God’s communication of himself to the man whose sins have been forgiven” into harmony with the scholastic depiction of “created grace as the basis of this communication.”74 Ultimately, Rahner stresses that “man is endowed by grace not only with something created but with God himself.”75

This can be regarded as an authentic recovery of Aquinas’ view of the relationship between uncreated and created grace, notwithstanding other differences between Rahner and Aquinas.76

72 Cf. ibid., 324: “However diverse they may be among themselves, it is true of all the scholastic theories that they see God’s indwelling and his conjunction with the justified man as based exclusively upon created grace. In virtue of the fact that created grace is imparted to the soul God imparts himself to it and dwells in it. Thus what we call uncreated grace (i.e. God as bestowing himself upon man) is a function of created grace.”

73 Cf. ibid., 343: “‘Uncreated grace’ is not ontologically speaking a pure consequence of created grace as a qualitative accident.” Also, cf. Fred Sanders, “The Image of the Immanent Trinity: Implications of Rahner’s Rule for a Theological Interpretation of Scripture” (PhD diss., Graduate Theological Union, 2001), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/304697503/ fulltextPDF/92C826F944084DBBPQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 92: “Rahner reverses the trend of post- Tridentine neoscholasticism toward giving priority to created grace, by arguing that the created grace within a person is only the consequence of that which is primary, the personal presence of God to the human being.”

74 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 325. Rahner believes that the idea of created grace can be reconciled with the biblical and patristic depiction of divine indwelling. Cf. Karl Rahner, The Trinity, trans. Joseph Donceel (New York: Crossroad, 1970), 67n: “The doctrine of grace must show in more detail that the doctrine of “created” (infused and “habitual”) grace, as it prevails in Latin theology since the reaction against Peter Lombard, does not contradict this biblical and patristic basic conception, or should, at least, not reject it.”

75 Rahner, “Man (Anthropology), III. Theological,” 369.

76 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Quaestio disputata de caritate, a. 1, in Quaestiones Disputatae, Vol. II, eds. P. Bazzi, M. Calcaterra, T. S. Centi, E. Odetto, P. M. Pession (Taurini: Marietti, 1949), 753-7; Summa theologiae I-II, q. 110, a. 2, in Summa theologiae, Pars Ia IIae, eds. De Rubeis, Billuart, Faucher, et al. (Taurini: Marietti, 1948), 561-2; Summa theologiae II-II, q. 23, a. 2, in Summa theologiae, Pars IIa IIae, eds. De Rubeis, Billuart, Faucher, et al. (Taurini: Marietti, 1948), 127-8. Also, cf. Joseph A. DiNoia, “Nature, Grace, and Experience: Karl Rahner’s Theology of Human Transformation,” Philosophy & Theology 7, no. 2 (1992): 115: “Rahner is in basic accord with

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Rahner describes uncreated grace as the reality of God as self-communicated to humanity through personal indwelling. Establishing a relation of God to humanity, uncreated grace bestows humanity with a supernatural end through the supernatural existential.77 Created grace, by contrast, refers to the modification of human beings whereby they are made “connatural”78 with the supernatural end to which God calls them in divine providence. This transformation enables participation in the divine life and grounds the relation of human beings to God’s uncreated grace. As Rahner writes,

‘Uncreated grace’ (God’s communication of himself to man, the indwelling of the Spirit) implies a new relation of God to man. But this can only be conceived of as founded upon an absolute entitative modification of man himself, which modification is the real basis of the new real relation of man to God upon which rests the relation of God to man. This absolute entitative modification and determination of man is created grace, which has in consequence a twofold aspect: it is ontologically the formal basis of the analogical supernatural participation in God’s nature through entitative assimilation of man to God’s spirituality and holiness (consortium formale), and it is the basis of a special relation (union, indwelling) between man and God himself (consortium terminativum).79

Since the gift of created grace is impossible without the presence of its giver in the human soul, Rahner stresses that the uncreated grace of God is logically prior to the created grace that unites human beings to God. He also argues that God’s indwelling through self-

Aquinas in his emphasis on the primacy of uncreated grace and in his conception of the relation of nature and grace. It is with respect to his notion of the experience of grace, with its dependence on the conceptualities of transcendental idealism, that main divergences between Rahner and Aquinas can be identified.”

77 Cf. Stephen J. Duffy, The Graced Horizon (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1992), 217: “For Rahner . . . the supernatural existential is not a “disposition” for the offer of uncreated grace. It is the offer itself, present continually since God is one’s enduring Woraufhin of transcendence.

78 Cf. Rahner, “Man (Anthropology), III. Theological,” 369: “Grace is the condition of the possibility of the capacity for connatural reception of God’s self-manifestation in word (faith – love) and in the beatific vision; nature is the constitution of man which is presupposed by, and persists in, this capacity to hear.”

79 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 324-5.

175 communication changes the ontological core of a person not merely in an accidental or external way, but in a formal and internal way. This reflects his understanding of the supernatural existential, according to which God’s self-communication fundamentally transforms human finality.

Rahner’s primary analogy for the relationship between uncreated and created grace is that between form and matter.80 Inasmuch as God marks humanity with a supernatural end and constitutes its supernatural existential, Rahner understands God’s uncreated grace to be the

“quasi-formal cause” of human nature as elevated by grace. Accordingly, created grace is the

(quasi-)material cause of God’s self-communication that corresponds to the quasi-formal causality of uncreated grace. Together, as in the union between matter and form, created grace as material cause and uncreated grace as quasi-formal cause establish the supernatural finality of the human person.81

Rahner argues that God does not change or become part of creation when self- communicated as uncreated grace. He uses the prefix “quasi” when describing God’s formal causality because it clarifies that God remains immutable and uncreated when offered to

80 Cf. ibid., 334: “Thus it becomes clear that the proposition no longer holds good which maintains that man has uncreated grace because he possesses created grace; on the contrary, with Scripture and the Fathers the communication of uncreated grace can be conceived of under a certain respect as logically and really prior to created grace: in that mode namely in which a formal cause is prior to the ultimate material disposition.”

81 Cf. ibid., 333: “Now according to St Thomas it is the case with a dispositio ultima (dispositio quae est necessitas ad formam) that on the one hand as causa materialis it logically precedes the forma, and yet on the other that it depends for its subsistence upon the formal causality of the forma, so that to affirm its presence is simultaneously to affirm with inner necessity the presence of the formal causality of the forma and conversely.”

176 humanity as uncreated grace.82 He justifies his use of the term “quasi-formal causality” as follows:

It cannot be impossible in principle to allow an active formal causality (eine formale Wirkursächlichkeit) of God upon a creature without thereby implying that this reactively impresses a new determination upon God’s Being in itself, one which would do away with his absolute transcendence and immutability. One may explicitly draw attention to this meta-categorical character of God’s abidingly transcendent formal causality by a prefixed ‘quasi’, and in our case then be entitled to say that in the vision of God his Being exercises a quasi-formal causality. All this ‘quasi’ implies is that this ‘forma’, in spite of its formal causality, which must be taken really seriously, abides in its absolute transcendence (inviolateness, ‘freedom’). But it does not imply that the statement, ‘In the beatific vision God occupies the place of a species in virtue of a formal causality’, is a mode of speech lacking all binding force; on the contrary, it is the quasi which must be prefixed to every application to God of a category in itself terrestrial. The only reason why it is specially to be recommended in our case that the quasi should be explicitly added is that (as opposed to efficient causality) it provides an emphatic reminder of the analogical nature of our concepts in the matter of a relationship to the world known only through Revelation.83

As the principle of created grace, uncreated grace logically precedes created grace, although the latter is also required for the soul to participate in the former. Therefore, God’s formal indwelling through uncreated grace requires that the soul be moved in its material disposition toward this form through created grace. While created grace is considered an accidental form relative to the soul, it is considered matter relative to the quasi-formal indwelling of God.

82 Cf. Kilby, “The Vorgriff auf Esse: A Study in the Relation of Philosophy to Theology in the Thought of Karl Rahner,” 107: “God acts only as quasi-formal cause, however—there is only an analogous relationship between the kind of thing the divine self-communication is and known instances of formal causality: in this one case alone the cause remains intact, free over against the thing caused, unentangled in the being of which it nevertheless becomes the (accidental) form.”

83 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 330-1.

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Rahner’s focus upon the logical priority of uncreated grace marks him apart from those neo-scholastics who would have expressed uncreated grace as merely the end result for which created grace prepares the human soul. Rahner is unique in his emphasis that human beings only have created grace to the extent that they are united with God’s uncreated grace. Although the human soul is always marked with a supernatural existential by the presence of God’s self- communication, God’s transcendent causality in grace allows space for human freedom to accept or reject the call to supernatural life. Accordingly, to the extent that this call is accepted with the aid of grace, God draws the human person closer to God’s uncreated grace and bestows the gift of created grace in due proportion.84

The ability to freely respond to God through created grace requires that people have already been ontologically constituted with a supernatural existential, within the situation of which they can then ontically respond to God in freedom. On this matter, Rahner notes “the difference and unity of the ontic and ontological aspects of this quasi-formal causality of God, in which God’s ‘actus infinitus’ itself becomes the ‘finite’ actuality of a finite potency.”85 For

Rahner, the possibility of ontic freedom presupposes God’s ontological constitution of humanity with the supernatural existential. In other words, the supernatural end of participation in the divine life must be made connatural to human beings before they can freely respond to its offer.

84 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Grace, II. Theological,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 589: “Grace as God’s self-communication is not only a constitutive principle of the capacity for its acceptance (in what theology calls the supernatural habitus of faith, hope and love), but also of the free act of acceptance.”

85 Karl Rahner, “Revelation, II. God’s Self-Communication,” 1466-7.

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In the ontological constitution of grace, there remains a distance between God and human beings to the extent that they have yet to cooperate with this grace ontically in freedom.86 Until

God’s grace is fully appropriated, human beings experience tension within this distance between their natural identity and their personal appropriation thereof.87 They may achieve a relative identity of person and nature once they fully appropriate divine grace. Yet, only God, as pure act, has an absolute identity of person and nature.88

Upon its complete appropriation, God’s indwelling results in the beatific vision. This requires that created grace, as the material cause of humanity’s union with God, enables the soul to be fully disposed to God’s quasi-formal union through the divine similitude that is the light of glory. Since the quasi-formal cause of this union logically precedes its material cause, uncreated grace imparts sanctifying grace and then the light of glory in order to structure this material cause and dispose the soul to the beatific vision of God as uncreated grace. Yet, in the beatific

86 Rahner notes that it is indeed possible for an evil will to arise within this distance. Cf. Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 105: “An evil will does indeed contradict God within that difference which obtains between God and a creature in transcendental uniqueness. . . . This difference is affirmed in the act of freedom, in a good act as well as an evil one.”

87 Cf. Karl Rahner, “The Theological Concept of Concupiscencia,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 362-4:

There always remains in the nature of things a tension between what a man is as a kind of entity simply present before one (as ‘nature’) and what he wants to make of himself by his free decision (as ‘person’): a tension between what he is simply passively and what he actively posits himself as and wishes to understand himself to be. The ‘person’ never wholly absorbs its ‘nature’. . . . The dualism of person and nature just indicated has its metaphysical roots in the finitude of man; thus ultimately in the distinction between essence and existence, in virtue of which the essence, in its complete unfolding, always remains an ideal capable of being attained only asymptotically by the concretely existing being, even as regards the freedom through which it makes itself what it is.

88 Cf. ibid., 366-7: “An absolute identity of nature and person . . . is found only in the absolute freedom of the infinite Being. In the case of exhaustive, ideal dominion of the finite person over its nature, this exhaustiveness can only consist in the fact that the personal decision is wholly and securely achieved as regards the nature.”

179 vision, the finite form of the human intellect into which God is received remains finite, and God remains infinite. Rahner explains that “God’s active formal causality does not interiorly determinate the ‘form’ in itself (as is the case with finite forms)” and that “God’s Being in spite of its relation as form to the finite mind does not make the divinity into an inner determination of this mind.”89

Like the scholastics, Rahner discusses created grace as an accidental form that modifies the soul.90 He similarly divides created grace into actual and habitual.91 However, he argues that created grace, which “is ontologically an accidental reality,”92 is only absolutely supernatural inasmuch as it is constituted quasi-formally by God’s self-communication. Accordingly, created grace is not, strictly speaking, a sufficient cause of the supernatural elevation of the human spirit apart from the quasi-formal indwelling of God’s uncreated grace.93 Indeed, Rahner states that

89 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 330-1n19.

90 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Grace, II. Theological,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: A Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (London: Burns & Oates, 1975), 592: “It is of course true that the concept of uncreated grace means that man himself is genuinely and inwardly transformed by this self-communication and that therefore in this sense there is a “created”, accidental grace (i.e., not posited by the very fact of positing man’s nature, but received by him).”

91 Cf. ibid., 593: “Grace is habitual inasmuch as God’s supernatural self-communication is permanently offered to man. . . . The same grace is called actual inasmuch as it is the basis of this act of acceptance in which it actualizes itself.”

92 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 333n24.

93 Cf. Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship between Nature and Grace,” 310n:

Grace is only then conceived of in its true essence when it is recognized to be not just the created ‘accidental’ reality produced by God’s efficient causality ‘in’ a (natural) substance, but includes ‘uncreated grace’ in its own concept in such a way that this may not be conceived of purely as a consequence of created grace. For it is difficult to see from an ontological point of view why it should not at least be possible for a created accident (however ‘divinizing’ it may be thought to be) to be ordered to a natural substance connatural with it, i.e. it is difficult to see how a purely created, accidental reality could be supernatural simpliciter.

180 created grace may only be considered something absolutely supernatural in light of its connection with the uncreated grace to which human beings relate in their supernatural existential. As he explains,

Thus it becomes possible to say in what the strictly supernatural character of a created grace (here primarily the light of glory) consists: while in the created entity in general its relation to the divine cause does not belong to the inner distinguishing features of its essence (Ia 44.1 ad 1), created grace, as ultima dispositio to an immediate communication of the divine Being itself in the mode of formal causality – a communication which can only exist in terms of this formal causality – involves a relation to God which belongs to its very essence. And it is so and only so that a created grace can possess the quality of something absolutely supernatural. This is seen most clearly when one takes into consideration what sort of entity is capable of being an absolute mystery. It is necessary to provide an answer to this question if one bears in mind the Thomist doctrine of the relationship between knower and known, that a created thing purely as such can never be an absolute mysterium. For in principle it is always possible in virtue of the convertibility of being, knowing and intelligibility, to correlate with any finite grade of being a knower of the same or a higher level of being to which the former grade of being of a finite level is not in principle inaccessible. Accordingly Ripalda’s view was in itself quite sound, when he held that created grace (the inner, essential connexion of which with uncreated grace he did not clearly perceive) can only be unexacted in concrete fact with respect to any really created substance, but not with respect to some still higher, conceivable and creatable substance (cf. H. Lange, De Gratia, Freiburg 1929, n. 260). Given a grace which on the one hand is ontologically an accidental reality and on the other remains as such purely in the created order, it is really impossible to show why to such an accident there should not correspond a created substance as possible, from which such an accident could proceed connaturally. Hence we may sum up our conclusions as follows: it is quite impossible for something purely created to be really absolutely supernatural and to present an absolute mysterium; but if there is something supernatural simply speaking which is absolutely mysterious, then God himself must belong to what constitutes it, i.e. God in so far as he is not merely the ever transcendent Creator, the efficient cause of something finite which is distinct from him, but in so far as he communicates himself to the finite entity in quasi- formal causality.94

94 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 333n24. Cf. Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 66:

This distinction between efficient and quasi-formal causality in God is the clear basis of the essential and radical distinction between the natural and the supernatural. And this is not difficult to understand. A reality which is not God himself, and does not exist as consequence of such a self-communication (as created actuation by uncreated act), which is therefore simply a created entity, cannot be supernatural in the

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Rahner’s conclusion in this passage that created grace is intimately bound with uncreated grace should strongly qualify how one interprets his reference to Ripalda’s view that there may be a creatable substance for which created grace would be connatural, rather than unexacted.

Here, Rahner emphasizes that created grace and uncreated grace must always, in principle, be offered together as the matter and form of God’s self-communication in history. Created grace cannot exist without uncreated grace, just as matter cannot exist without form. Given this connection, which Rahner admits Ripalda “did not clearly perceive,” it seems to follow that to hypothesize a creatable substance for which created grace is connatural amounts to supposing a creature for which uncreated grace is connatural (albeit only inasmuch as it could receive it).

Yet, such a creature would be impossible because uncreated grace is identical with God, who is supernatural relative to any creatable substance. It appears for this reason that God is the only reality, actual or hypothetical, whose being naturally includes uncreated grace. Thus, if uncreated grace cannot be acquired through the natural means of any creature, then neither can created grace. Accordingly, a creature cannot receive created grace unless God’s uncreated grace is freely communicated in an unexacted manner. God thereby disposes the creature with created grace to serve as the material cause of God’s quasi-formal self-communication.

strictest sense. For such a reality can as such not be a created substance: the question of its gratuitousness could have absolutely no meaning, since there would be no recipient of the gift distinct from the gratuitous gift. And an additional accidental determination which would also be a purely created one cannot be absolutely supernatural. For it is ontologically quite arbitrary to postulate the logical repugnance and impossibility of a created substance which would not be naturally on the same level of being as the supernatural accidental determination in question. A possible determination of a subject, where the determination is finite and created, can always be ordained to a possible substantial subject, from which it flows as its normal determination.

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Overall, while Rahner does not refute Ripalda explicitly here, his view concerning the relationship between created and uncreated grace undermines Ripalda’s theory, inasmuch as it would only seem to be valid if there were no necessary connection between created and uncreated grace. Yet, such is not the case, and Rahner argues against Ripalda more explicitly on this point elsewhere.95 Hence, even when postulating a creatable substance for which created grace would be connatural, this creature could not acquire this accident unless God freely gave it along with uncreated grace, which is necessarily unexacted by creatures.

In the quotation cited above, Rahner concurs with Aquinas that human nature may be considered apart from its efficient causation by God, just as human nature can be considered apart from a possible elevation by grace (although not from its dynamic openness to it). In the article of the Summa Theologiae to which Rahner refers, Aquinas explains that no finite being can be self-existing. It belongs to the essence of any finite being that, should it exist, it exists by being caused. God causes beings to exist by allowing them to participate in God’s self-existing being. Indeed, “All beings apart from God are not their own being, but are beings by participation.”96 Furthermore, since the power of causation belongs essentially to God, God accounts for the participation of finite beings in the divine being. Thus, “Whatever is found in anything by participation, must be caused in it by that to which it belongs essentially, as iron

95 Cf. Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship between Nature and Grace,” 310n: “There is no essence of a creaturely kind which God could constitute for which this communication could be the normal, matter-of-course perfection to which it was compellingly disposed. This is indeed (against Ripalda) the general teaching of theology today: grace and glory are simply speaking supernatural.”

96 Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae I, q. 44, a. 1, co., in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1: 1a QQ. 1-119, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (1948; repr., Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1981), 229. For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, ed. Petri Caramello (Taurini: Marietti, 1948), 224.

183 becomes ignited by fire.”97 Accordingly, creatures only have the quality of being caused through their relation to God and God’s free decision to create. As he states, “Though the relation to its cause is not part of the definition of a thing caused, still it follows, as a consequence, on what belongs to its essence; because from the fact that a thing has being by participation, it follows that it is caused.”98

Conversely, however, Rahner believes that the nature of created grace cannot be considered apart from uncreated grace. This is due to the difference between God’s efficient causality in creation and God’s quasi-formal causality in self-communication. In Rahner’s understanding of quasi-formal causality, God is able to unite with what was constituted as different from God through God’s efficient causality.99 He explains that while an efficient cause creates something different from itself, a formal cause becomes the constitutive element of the subject in which it dwells:

In efficient causality the effect is always different from the cause. But we are also familiar with formal causality: a particular existent, a principle of being is a constitutive element in another subject by the fact that it communicates itself to this subject, and does not just cause something different from itself which is then an intrinsic, constitutive principle in that which experiences this efficient causality.100

97 Ibid.

98 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 44, a. 1, ad. 1, in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 229. For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 224.

99 Cf. Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 122: “This self-communication of God to what is not God implies the efficient causation of something other and different from God as its condition.” Also, cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 36: “He does not merely indirectly give his creature some share of himself by creating and giving us created and finite realities through his omnipotent efficient causality. In a quasi-formal causality he really and in the strictest sense of the word bestows himself.”

100 Ibid., 121.

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Rahner analogously depicts quasi-formal causality in terms of the hylomorphic union of matter and form. In such a union, matter can only be designated according to its determinate form, which is in turn individuated in the designated matter that it adapts to itself. As Aquinas states, “Now in all things composed of matter and form, the determining principle is on the part of the form, which is as it were the end and terminus of the matter. Consequently for the being of a thing the need of a determinate form is prior to the need of determinate matter: for determinate matter is needed that it may be adapted to the determinate form.”101 Similarly, Rahner argues above that uncreated grace is the determining principle of created grace, such that the latter cannot be considered apart from its intrinsic relation to the former as its formal determination.

The intrinsic relationship of created grace to uncreated grace shapes Rahner’s view of how human identity is constituted by the gift of God’s self-communication in the order of grace.

When God’s offer of uncreated grace bestows humanity with a supernatural existential, this does not only enable it to receive created grace as an accidental modification of its nature.102 Indeed, human beings are only able to receive created grace as an accidental form because they have been modified more fundamentally by uncreated grace, which is the quasi-formal determining

101 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 60, a. 7, co., in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 4, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 2344. For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Pars IIIa et Supplementum, eds. De Rubeis, Billuart, Faucher, et al. (Taurini: Marietti, 1948), 372-3.

102 Cf. Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 123: “The doctrine that grace and fulfillment in the immediate vision of God are supernatural does not mean that the supernatural ‘elevation’ of a spiritual creature is added extrinsically and accidentally to the essence and the structure of a spiritual subject of unlimited transcendence.” Also, cf. Phan, Eternity in Time, 59: “For Rahner the eschatological fulfillment of human beings is not something accidental or artificially added to our nature. Rather it is the consummation of what is most intimate and essential to us; it is the fulfillment of ourselves. Conversely it also shows that failure to achieve this goal does not affect merely some secondary part of the person but his or her very self.”

185 principle of their reception of God’s self-communication.103 Accordingly, Rahner notes, “God in his own proper reality makes himself the innermost constitutive element of man.”104

While God does not change by serving as the quasi-formal cause of human existence in the order of grace,105 God is intimately communicated to people’s essential being in their self- presence. Since the inner dynamism of human subjectivity that encounters God as its ground pertains to its essential being,106 God’s self-communication as uncreated grace is a determining principle of humanity’s supernatural elevation.107 Rahner explains that God fundamentally shapes human identity and self-presence because “in transcendence as such, absolute being is the innermost constitutive element by which this transcendental movement is borne towards itself, and is not just the extrinsic term and extrinsic goal of a movement.”108

103 Cf. Petillo, “The ‘Experience of Grace’ in the Theologies of Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan,” 114: “For Rahner, the self-communication of God, which is the primary meaning of grace, creates a disposition and openness in the creature to receive that communication. In Rahner’s estimation, this disposition is not an ‘accidental modification’ of the creature’s being, but rather a defining and constitutive feature.”

104 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 116.

105 Cf. ibid., 120: “God makes himself a constitutive principle of the created existent without thereby losing his absolute, ontological independence.” Also, cf. ibid., 121: “Only the absolute being of God can not only establish what is different from himself without becoming subject to this difference from himself, but can also at the same time communicate himself in his own reality without losing himself in this communication.”

106 Cf. ibid., 119:

The essence of man . . . becomes present basically and originally in transcendental experience. Here man experiences himself as a finite, categorical existent, as established in his difference from God by absolute being, as an existent coming from absolute being and grounded in absolute mystery. The fact that he has his origin permanently in God and the fact that he is radically different from God are in their unity and mutually conditioning relationship fundamental existentials of man.

107 Cf. ibid., 117: “‘Self-communication’ is meant here in a strictly ontological sense corresponding to man’s essential being, man whose being is being-present-to-himself, and being personally responsible for himself in self-consciousness and freedom.”

108 Ibid., 121-2.

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In its elevation of the human person, God’s uncreated grace is the transcendental formal cause of justification, while created grace is its categorical formal cause. As Rahner writes,

“Created grace alone (as a finite determination of the subject) can be called forma in the strict

(categorical) sense of the word (as opposed to the divine Being itself, which remains transcendent with respect to the creature in spite of its formal causality).”109 Hence, despite his view of quasi-formal causality, Rahner affirms the doctrine of the Council of Trent that created grace is the single formal cause of justification:

The Council’s teaching on created grace as the unica causa formalis of justification does not exclude our conception of the relationship between created and uncreated grace. For in this conception too created grace remains the ‘unique’ formal cause of justification, in so far as it alone is the genuine (categorical) ‘form’ of the justified man, and once it is posited, justification as a whole is really posited with it already.110

A central aspect of Rahner’s belief in God as quasi-formal cause is that God constitutes human subjectivity with freedom in transcendence.111 This transcendent causality is established

109 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 341.

110 Ibid., 342. For the teaching of the Council of Trent, cf. Heinrich Joseph Dominicus Denzinger and Peter Hünermann, Enchiridion Symbolorum: A Compendium of Creeds, Definitions, and Declarations on Matters of Faith and Morals, 43rd ed., eds. Robert Fastiggi and Anne Englund Nash (San Francisco, Ignatius Press, 2012), no. 1529: “Demum unica formalis causa est iustitia Dei, non qua ipse iustus est, sed qua nos iustos facit, qua videlicet ab eo donate renovamur spiritu mentis nostrae, et non modo reputamur, sed vere iusti nominamur et sumus, iustitiam in nobis recipientis unusquisque suam, secundum mensuram, quam Spiritus Sanctus partitur singulis prout vult, et secundum propriam cuiusque dispositionem et cooperationem.”

111 Cf. Rahner, “Theos in the New Testament,” 110: “The personal God so transcends the world that he can allow this world, which is totally dependent on him, a genuine activity, even with regard to himself; that what is totally dependent on him acquires through his own agency a genuine independence with regard to him; that God can set man free with regard to God himself.” The word “Selbständigkeit” in the original German is translated here as “independence.” For the original, cf. Karl Rahner, “Theos im Neuen Testament,” in Schriften zur Theologie, Bd. 1 (Einsiedeln: Benziger, 1954), 126:

So ist für die Metaphysik die Gefahr fast unvermeidlich, daß sie nicht versteht, daß der personale Gott ein so weltüberlegener ist, daß er dieser von ihm restlos abhängigen Welt dennoch eine echte Aktivität, und zwar ihm selbst gegenüber, verleihen kann, daß die personalgeistige Welt wirklich reaktiv Gott gegenüber

187 within the difference between the finite subjectivity of human beings and the absolute subjectivity of God. Since God is the transcendent ground of the categorical world, God is not differentiated from the world in the same manner as categorical realities are relatively distinguished. Rahner explains,

Of course the subjectivity and personhood which we experience as our own, the individual and limited uniqueness through which we are distinguished from others, the freedom which has to be exercised only under a thousand conditions and necessities, all of this signifies a finite subjectivity with limitations which we cannot assert with these limitations of its ground, namely, God. And it is self-evident that such an individual personhood cannot belong to God, who is the absolute ground of everything in radical originality. . . . In this sense God is not an individual person because he cannot experience himself as defined in relation to another or limited by another, because he does not experience any difference from himself, but rather he himself establishes the difference, and hence ultimately he himself is the difference vis-à-vis others.112

Since God is not “defined in relation to another,” Rahner argues that the difference between God and the world is God. Hence, any change in the world is grounded in the reality of

God. As such, God may freely unite with creatures within this differentiation through transcendent causality. As Rahner writes, “The difference between God and the world is of such a nature that God establishes and is the difference of the world from himself, and for this reason he establishes the closest unity precisely in the differentiation.”113 Yet, he also notes that God’s self-communication does not involve any real change in God. This is because the difference between God and human beings “is not something which happens to him, but rather he alone

sein kann, daß das restlos von ihm Abhängige durch ihn eine echte Selbständigkeit ihm gegenüber erhält, daß Gott den Menschen Gott selbst gegenüber freigeben kann.

112 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 74.

113 Ibid., 62.

188 makes it possible.”114 However, this does not mean that God’s self-communication takes place only on the side of the creature. Such would imply that God is not truly communicated by grace.

Indeed, created grace cannot enable divine participation without uncreated grace.115 Accordingly,

“It is a self-communication in which the God who imparts himself brings about the acceptation of his gift, in such a way that the acceptance does not reduce the communication to the level of merely created things.”116 Hence, God’s self-communication reveals a differentiation within the unity of God’s absolute self-presence in its relation to humanity as quasi-formal cause. Rahner elaborates,

It follows as a formal axiom that if the difference present in something imparted by God, as such, is only on the side of the creature, there can be no question of a self- communication, in which there is a real difference in that which is imparted as such, therefore ‘for us’, God must then be differentiated ‘in himself’, without prejudice to his unity (which is then characterized as that of the absolute ‘essence’), and this differentiation is characterized as the relative mode of the relationship of himself to himself. We may therefore affirm: if revelation (a) attests a real self-communication, and (b) declares that this self-communication contains differences for us (appears as mediated, but not by a mediation of a purely created type, which would destroy its

114 Ibid., 105. Cf. P. de Letter, “Divine Quasi-Formal Causality,” Irish Theological Quarterly 27, no. 3 (1960): 223:

The union between the soul and God by grace is not a mutual relation; the divine Act unites the soul to himself and he terminates this relation of union. All the newness or change resulting from this divine quasi- formal causality lies in the soul, there is none in God. . . . He terminates the relation of the soul’s real union with him without being himself the subject of a real relation of union with the soul. Only in a mutual relation are the two related ones both subject and term of the respective twofold relation.

115 Cf. Letter, “Divine Quasi-Formal Causality,” 223: “The self-gift of the Uncreated Grace to the soul, transforming and divinizing it, of necessity ‘produces’ created grace, a new form inherent in the soul, uniting it to God and making it like unto him. The quasi-formal causality of God which by itself does not produce any effect, but only unites the soul to himself, of necessity goes together with an efficient causality which effects the transformation of the soul or produces created grace.”

116 Karl Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 4: More Recent Writings, trans. Kevin Smyth (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 97.

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character of real self-communication), then distinction and mediation is eo ipso affirmed of God as he is in himself and of himself.117

D. The Trinitarian “Grundaxiom” and Non-Appropriated Relations

Rahner believes that God has been revealed in history as a Trinity of persons, inasmuch as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each present to humanity in God’s self-communication.

These three persons, or “distinct manners of subsisting” (a term that Rahner believes is more suitable than “person” in the modern context), share the divine essence and its power of efficient causality in creating the world.118 They also share one consciousness and subjectivity.119 Yet they are distinct in their notional activity and are conscious of each other.120

117 Ibid., 96n28.

118 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 109: “The one God subsists in three distinct manners of subsisting.” Also, cf. ibid., 111-2: “The same God, as distinct in a threefold manner, is concretely ‘three-personal,’ or, the other way around, that the ‘three-personality’ co-signifies the unity of the same God.” Further, cf. Jordan Matthew Miller, “You Loved Me before the Foundation of the World: An Examination of Karl Rahner’s Doctrine of Trinity and Comparison to that of Hans Urs Von Balthasar” (PhD. diss., Fordham, 2014), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/1562902315/fulltextPDF/ 52ABA5A66B5B4FEBPQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 149:

Rahner contrasts German “subjectivity” (Subjektivität) with the Latin “subject” (Latin – distinctum subiectum) remarking that “if we keep any modern connotation out of the concept of the person as such (in God!), then it says simply no more than ‘distinct subject’” [Rahner, The Trinity, 112-3]. It is evident that he is using Subjektivität to mean consciousness or self-awareness, as he uses the term in this way throughout the book; by contrast, it is clear that, as he uses it here, distinctum subiectum does not mean consciousness or self-awareness. Based on the context, it would seem that his tacit definition of subiectum (at least within trinitarian doctrine, perhaps not in other areas) is simply ‘manner of subsisting,’ insofar as this terminology is explicitly stated by Rahner to signify nothing more or other than what the term ‘person’ signified before it became “unavoidably burdened” by the evolution of language.

119 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 75-6: “There exists in God only one power, one will, only one self-presence, a unique activity, a unique beatitude, and so forth. Hence, self-awareness is not a moment which distinguishes the divine ‘persons’ one from the other, even though each divine ‘person,’ as concrete, possesses a self-consciousness. Whatever would mean three ‘subjectivities’ must be carefully kept away from the concept of person in the present context.” Also, cf. ibid., 76n: “Hence within the Trinity there is no reciprocal ‘Thou.’ The Son is the Father’s self-

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Drawing upon his concept of God’s self-communication as a quasi-formal cause in history, Rahner argues that God has a history, but that this does not undermine God’s immutability.121 He thus identifies the Trinity present in the world through the divine missions with the Trinity in itself, such that “the doctrine of the Trinity cannot be adequately distinguished from the doctrine of the economy of salvation.”122 Accordingly, Rahner claims in his

“Grundaxiom” that “the ‘economic’ Trinity is the ‘immanent’ Trinity and the ‘immanent’ Trinity is the ‘economic’ Trinity.”123

This axiom has been interpreted in various ways, and it is often criticized.124 Yet, despite what some of its critics argue, Rahner’s identification of the immanent Trinity with the economic

utterance which should not in its turn be conceived as ‘uttering,’ and the Spirit is the ‘gift’ which does not give in its turn. Jn. 17, 21; Gal. 4, 6; Rom. 8, 15 presuppose a creaturely starting point for the ‘Thou’ addressed to the Father.”

120 Cf. ibid., 107n:

Although we may say that each of the divine “persons” is “conscious” of the two others, and does not merely possess them as “objects” of knowledge, this derives not only from the identity of the divine essence (and from the accompanying absolute self-presence of this essence) in the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, but also from the fact that every “notional act” (identical with the divine essence) renders, as conscious (and relative), every other notional act co-conscious.

121 Cf. Rahner, “Revelation, II. God’s Self-Communication,” 1467:

The term self-communication also implies that God himself can really have a “history” of his own, and does not merely posit it as distinct from himself. . . . It is often obscured, however, by an over-anxious scholastic philosophy under the impression that it endangers the dogma of God’s immutability. Correctly understood, the idea of God’s self-communication explains God’s quasi-formal causality by maintaining the dialectical insight that God who “in himself” is unchanging (“quasi . . .”), can have a change in the changeable creature (“. . . formal”), e.g., God’s Word himself was made man “in time.”

122 Rahner, The Trinity, 24.

123 Ibid., 22. Italics are Rahner’s.

124 For a study of Rahner’s Trinitarian theology and his “Grundaxiom,” cf. Michael Hauber, Unsagbar Nahe: Eine Studie zur Entstehung und Bedeutung der Trinitätstheologie Karl Rahners (Innsbruck: Tyrolia, 2011). On the debate surrounding the interpretation of Rahner’s “Grundaxiom,”cf. Nancy Dallavalle, “Revisiting Rahner: On the Theological Status of Trinitarian Theology,” Irish Theological Quarterly 63 (1998): 133; Bruce Marshall,

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Trinity and Truth (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 264-5. For a more lengthy account, cf. Miller, “You Loved Me before the Foundation of the World,” 43-4n41:

Rahner’s axiom is certainly the most thoroughly discussed aspect of his doctrine of the Trinity. The meaning of the axiom (both Rahner’s own intended meaning, and the meaning of the axiom insofar as it has taken on ‘a life of its own’ outside of Rahner’s work) has been frequently debated. It is not possible to discuss here more than forty years of debate, but by focusing on a handful of authors the key issues can be raised. There is widespread disagreement as to how the axiom should be received. Fred Sanders presents a typology according to which various authors are cast as ‘radicalizers’ or ‘restricters’ in their responses to the axiom (Sanders, The Image of the Immanent Trinity: Rahner's Rule and the Theological Interpretation of Scripture, New York: Peter Lang, 2005). ‘Radicalizers’ (Sanders cites P. Schoonenberg, J. Moltmann, and C. LaCugna as examples) are those who understand the axiom as a strict identity, calling into question whether it makes sense to speak about ‘immanent’ and ‘economic’ at all. ‘Restricters’ (Sanders cites Y. Congar, W. Kasper, and Balthasar as examples) are those who challenge the second half of the axiom (“immanent Trinity is economic Trinity”) in order to affirm the transcendence of God and divine freedom. Sanders is sympathetic to Rahner’s trinitarian theology but is himself a ‘restricter,’ arguing that the second half of the axiom must be qualified and that the economic Trinity is the image of the immanent Trinity. Dennis Jowers (Karl Rahner’s Trinitarian Axiom: ‘The Economic Trinity is the Immanent Trinity and Vice Versa’, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2006) identifies at least four possible “misconstruals” of the axiom: (1) a "trivially obvious identity" (Trinity = Trinity); (2) an absolute identity (no distinction of economic and immanent); (3) economic Trinity as ‘copy’ or ‘photo’ of immanent; (4) de facto identity, meaning that God might actually be different in his immanent being than he is in economy, but in fact is not different (by free choice) (Jowers, 87-89). According to Jowers, “Rahner’s actual meaning” is that “[the divine self-communication] can, if occurring in freedom, only occur in the intra-divine manner of the two communications of the one divine essence by the Father to the Son and the Spirit.” (Rahner, Trinity, 36). “In other words,” says Jowers, “the immanent constitution of the Trinity forms a kind of a priori law for the divine self-communication ad extra so that the structure of the latter cannot but correspond to the structure of the former.” (Jowers, 89-90). Jowers rejects the axiom completely, but his central objection does not hit the mark, as it rests on a fundamental misreading of Rahner's teaching on divine immutability and his doctrine that God truly changes in/as the creature. Jowers clearly takes this to mean that God’s essence is mutating, which would (if true) open Rahner to Jowers’ objection that we cannot know for sure that God’s being is truly revealed in the economy if God’s being itself can change. (Jowers 90-91) But Rahner explicitly rejects a mutability of the divine essence in itself. God changes in/as the other insofar as the being of the other (creature) is a participation in God's being (discussed below). David Lincicum ("Economy and immanence: Karl Rahner’s doctrine of the Trinity,” European Journal of Theology, 14 no 2 (2005), 111-118) distinguishes between a “methodological” and an “ontological” interpretation of Rahner’s axiom, the former meaning that we only know the immanent Trinity through the economy, and the latter meaning that there is no distinction at all between the immanent Trinity and the economy; he affirms the ‘methodological’ and rejects the ‘ontological’ interpretation. Meanwhile Randal Rauser ("Rahner's Rule: An Emperor Without Clothes?" International Journal of Systematic Theology 7 no 1 (2005), 81-94) takes a very dim view of the Grundaxiom, arguing that it is "an axiom in search of an interpretation.” He identifies three possible interpretations: strict realist, loose realist, anti-realist; none of these, he says, are both (1) non-trivial and (2) possibly true. For his part, Rahner states many times that God’s being is distinct from salvation history, and that the threefoldness of God’s being is prior to the creation of the universe. Even so, there is ambiguity: he also states that “no adequate distinction can be made between the doctrine of Trinity and the doctrine of the economy of salvation” (Rahner, Trinity, 24) and remarks that the Incarnation must be our “guiding norm” for the axiom that the divine being has no ‘real’ (i.e., ontologically constitutive) relation to creatures, rather than allowing this axiom to act as the norm for our understanding of the Incarnation (Rahner, Trinity, 24).

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Trinity does not reduce the divinity to its finite historical expression, but rather emphasizes

God’s “radical character of disclosure in the hypostatic union and in grace.”125 As he explains,

“God has given himself so fully in his absolute self-communication to the creature, that the

‘immanent’ Trinity becomes the Trinity of the ‘economy of salvation’, and hence in turn the

Trinity of salvation which we experience is the immanent Trinity. This means that the Trinity of

God’s relationship to us is the reality of God as he is in himself: a trinity of persons.”126

Furthermore, Rahner’s axiom does not imply pantheism or panentheism either, as if the divine essence were identical with the created world. Rahner clarifies this in the following remarks:

This relationship of a created being to God can on the one hand be identified with the reality of this being; in an idea of creation which rejects every form of pantheism one may not say that God himself is an inner constitutive element of a created being. But in this affirmation theologians must exercise caution for theological reasons which have nothing to do with natural science. For theologians recognize in the theology of grace and in the beatific vision a relationship of God to a creaturely reality in which reality God’s own being is the quasi-formal cause and not merely the external efficient cause of a determination of the finite being. This theological datum already indicates that an efficacy of God through himself and not through a created mediation must be rejected as a pantheistic view only if God at the same time be conceived as an inner essential constitutive element belonging to the essence of the finite being. The distinction between God and creature which rejects pantheism therefore does not exclude a determination of a finite being by God himself as such.127

Here, Rahner explains that God’s quasi-formal causality is the determining principle of a human being’s supernatural elevation, rather than the “inner essential constitutive element belonging to the essence of the finite being.” Otherwise, a form of pantheism would follow. This

125 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 69.

126 Ibid.

127 Karl Rahner, “Natural Science and Reasonable Faith,” 35-6.

193 may appear to contradict Rahner’s statement in Foundations of Christian Faith that “God in his own proper reality makes himself the innermost constitutive element of man.”128 However, as noted earlier, Rahner’s reference to formal causality as a constitutive element is applied analogically to the relationship between God’s uncreated grace and human nature. He clarifies that God is only an inner constitutive element of human beings in the mode of quasi-formal causality, and not in the mode of strict formal causality whereby grace would make human nature identical with the divine nature. Even though God’s self-communication is the ground of human transcendence in the order of grace, and is not external to human beings, the two remain distinct. This is what Rahner means when he says in Foundations that “in transcendence as such, absolute being is the innermost constitutive element by which this transcendental movement is borne towards itself, and is not just the extrinsic term and extrinsic goal of a movement.”129

Hence, whenever Rahner does describe God as an inner constitutive element of humanity’s concrete existence, such as in the following passage, he does so in a manner that affirms the difference between God and human transcendence:

God is present for us as the absolute future. . . . Salvation history . . . is the proclamation of an absolute becoming which does not continue into emptiness but really attains the absolute future, which is indeed already moving within it; for this becoming is so truly distinguished from its yet-to-come future and fulfilment (without implying pantheism, therefore) that the infinite reality of this future is nevertheless already active within it and supports it as an inner constitutive element of this becoming, even though it is independent of this becoming itself (and in this way every form of primitive deism and

128 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 116.

129 Ibid., 121-2.

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any merely external relationship of God and the world are eliminated from the very start, and the truth in pantheism is preserved).130

Furthermore, Rahner’s distinction between pure nature and historical nature may resolve this problem of interpretation. Examining his conception of the relationship between human nature in itself and human nature as elevated by the supernatural existential clarifies his understanding of how God’s grace relates to the constitution of a human being. When Rahner describes God’s quasi-formal causality as the inner constitutive element of human beings, he does so in reference to their concrete quiddity, but not their pure nature. In this respect, Rahner affirms that God’s self-communication can be an inner constitutive element of human beings with a supernatural existential, but denies that it belongs to the composition of their essence in itself. Accordingly, the human essence is the prior condition for God’s self-communication that elevates the creature in transcendence. As Rahner writes,

God is not only causa efficiens but also causa quasi formalis of that which the creature is in the truest and most concrete sense. The nature of the spiritual creature consists in the fact that that which is ‘innermost’ to it, that whence, to which and through which it is, is precisely not an element of this essence and this nature which belongs to it. Rather its nature is based upon the fact that that which is supra-essential, that which transcends it, is that which gives it its support, its meaning, its future and its most basic impulse, though admittedly it does so in such a way that the nature of this spiritual creature, that which belongs to it as such, is not thereby taken away from it but rather obtains from this its ultimate validity and consistency and achieves growth and development because of it. The closeness of God’s self-bestowal and the unique personality of the creature grow in equal, and not in converse measure. This self-bestowal of God, in which God bestows himself precisely as the absolute transcendent, is the most immanent factor in the creature. The fact that it is given its own nature to possess, the ‘immanence of essence’ in this sense, is the prior condition, and at the same time the consequence, of the still more radical immanence of the transcendence of God in the spiritual creature, this creature

130 Karl Rahner, “Marxist Utopia and the Christian Future of Man,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 6: Concerning Vatican Council II, trans. Karl H. Kruger and Boniface Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1969), 60.

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being considered as that which has been endowed with grace through the uncreated grace of God.131

Rahner stresses with his axiom that the divine missions must be really predicated of the divine persons in themselves, given God’s free decision to enter into history. Even though the created external terms of the divine missions are efficiently caused by all three divine persons through the power of their shared nature, Rahner argues that the actions performed by these missions are not predicable of all three. In fact, God’s quasi-formal causality communicates each divine person uniquely as uncreated grace through the divine missions and their external terms of created grace. As Rahner notes,

The true and authentic concept of grace interprets grace (hence also salvation history) as a self-communication of God (not primarily as “created grace”) in Christ and in his Spirit. Grace should not be reduced to a “relation” (a purely mental relation at that) of the one God to the elected creature, nor to a relation which is merely “appropriated” to the other divine persons. In the recipient himself grace is not some created sanctifying “quality” produced in a merely causal way by the one God.132

Thus, when the Father sends the Son and Spirit, each of these divine missions is not merely appropriated to a divine person, but is properly attributable to only one. This is because

“the relations of the three divine persons to man in grace are not simply appropriations. Each divine person has his own proper relationship to man in grace, even though each of these relations presupposes and includes the others.”133 Rahner explains his position by noting that

“not-appropriated relations of a single person are possible when we have to do, not with an

131 Karl Rahner, “Immanent and Transcendent Consummation of the World,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 10: Writings of 1965-1967, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1973), 281.

132 Rahner, The Trinity, 22-3.

133 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 70.

196 efficient causality, but with a quasi-formal self-communication of God, which implies that each divine person possesses its own proper relation to some created reality.”134 He applies this principle not only to the incarnation of the Son, as has been traditionally argued,135 but also to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.136

Rahner also argues that the incarnation is not only properly attributed to the Son, but that no divine person but the Son could have become incarnate in salvation history. He states, “Only the Logos has such an immanent relationship to the other divine persons that he can be the one who can assume hypostatically a created reality and hence be the essential and irreplaceable revealer of the Father.”137 Rahner believes this follows necessarily from the concept of God’s self-communication, “for if each divine person could become incarnate, the Logos precisely could not appear as himself, as this particular person of the Trinity, in the personal manifestation of God in the economy of salvation.”138

134 Rahner, The Trinity, 77.

135 Cf. Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 344:

The argument here is that where one divine Person as such in distinction from the other two has a relation to a created reality which is proper to the given Person, this relation can only be a hypostatic unity (such as is given in Christ’s case alone), since this union must on the one hand occur in respect of what is proper to the individual Persons, yet on the other hand proper, relative subsistence is the one thing which belongs to a divine Person in distinction from another (cf. Denz 703).

136 Cf. ibid., 323: “The conjunction of the Holy Spirit in particular with man is a proper and not merely appropriated one.”

137 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 71.

138 Ibid. For Rahner’s criticism of theologians who maintain that any of the divine persons could have become incarnate, cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 11: “Starting from Augustine, and as opposed to the older tradition, it has been among theologians a more or less foregone conclusion that each of the divine persons (if God freely so decided) could have become man, so that the incarnation of precisely this person can tell us nothing about the peculiar features of this person within the divinity.”

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Furthermore, since the personhood of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit cannot be understood univocally, Rahner believes it cannot be disproved that each person communicated through revelation appears as only that person can. He laments that “should the doctrine of the

Trinity have to be dropped as false, the major part of religious literature could well remain virtually unchanged.”139 He argues that if the divine persons were not really communicated in their uniqueness, then humanity has not really encountered the immanent Trinity through the economic Trinity:

The opposite of this second presupposition has never been proved. Every possible proof relies on the supposition that what one divine hypostasis can do must also be possible to each of the others. But this apparently obvious consideration is in fact a major fallacy. It proceeds entirely from the basically false supposition that what we call ‘hypostasis’ in God, three times, represents a general concept. The truth is however that what we call hypostasis in God is precisely that by which each of the divine persons is uniquely distinct from the other two, and is absolutely nothing else. It is therefore completely impossible to conclude from what one hypostasis in God can do, to what another must be able to do. We are therefore perfectly entitled to identify the immanent and the salvific Trinity. And this is the only way to prevent the doctrine of the immanent Trinity from appearing as a mere piece of subtle dialectic in a purely formal reconciliation of one and three.140

139 Rahner, The Trinity, 10-11. Cf. Edmund Hill, “Karl Rahner's ‘Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise De Trlnitate and St. Augustine,’” Augustinian Studies 2 (1971), 67-8:

Rahner states what is wrong with the present situation by remarking that modern Christians ‘are almost just 'monotheist' in their actual religious experience’. You could quite simply abolish the whole dogma of the Trinity, and it would make no difference to the practical, personal faith of popular Christianity. The dogma is not even implicit in the ordinary believer's faith in the incarnation, because he expresses that faith in such terms as ‘the divinity of Christ’, or ‘Jesus Christ, true God and true man’, or ‘Jesus Christ is God’; hardly ever in such terms as ‘The Word was made flesh’, or ‘Jesus Christ is God the Son’. And Rahner rightly blames theologians and their way of dealing with the treatise ‘De Trinitate’ for this most unfortunate weakness in every-day Christian belief. He blames two things in particular; first, what he calls the isolation of this treatise from the rest of dogma, which in its turn is due to an exaggerated application of the principle that all divine operations ad extra are common to the three divine persons (a principle that induces in theologians an ‘anti-trinitarian timidity’), and in a lesser degree to the splitting of the treatise on God into a first part ‘De Deo Uno’, followed by ‘De Deo Trino’; and secondly a more or less explicit assumption, or even assertion, that any of the divine persons could have become man, and a consequent failure to ask what it means that in fact it was the Logos or the Son who became man.

140 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 71. Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 11-12n:

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If God’s self-communication were just something created through efficient causality, there would be no way in which human beings could have a real relationship to the divine life of the Trinity.141 This is because God’s logical relation to creatures as their efficient cause can establish nothing more than a real relation of creatures to God as their creator. It does not give human beings any non-appropriated relations to individual persons of the Trinity. While aspects of God’s efficient causality might be appropriated to one of the divine persons, they are really proper to all three persons, possessed by each in their own way.142 Besides, the necessity that

God is a Trinity of persons cannot be known apart from revelation and grace.

Rahner contrasts the logical relation of God to creation as efficient cause with the relation of God to human beings as quasi-formal cause. He does not seek to refute the principle that God

Every doctrine of the Trinity must emphasize that the “hypostasis” is precisely that in God through which Father, Son, and Spirit are distinct from one another; that, wherever there exists between the three of them a real, univocal correspondence, there is absolute numerical identity. Hence the concept of hypostasis, applied to God, cannot be a universal univocal concept, applying to each of the three persons in the same way. Yet, in Christology, this concept is used as if it were evident that a “hypostatic function” with respect to a human nature might as well have been exercised by another hypostasis in God. Should we not at least inquire whether this well-determined relative subsistence, in which the Father and the Spirit subsist in pure distinction from—not in equality with—the Son, should not make it impossible for them (unlike in the case of the Son) to exercise such a hypostatic function with respect to a human nature.

141 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 14-5:

Average theology . . . sees in divine grace only the appropriated relations of the divine persons to man, the effect of an efficient causality of the one God. . . . Someone might reply that our future happiness will consist precisely in face-to-face vision of this triune God, a vision which “introduces” us into the inner life of the divinity and constitutes our most authentic perfection, and that this is the reason why we are already told about this mystery during this life. But then we must inquire how this could be true, if between man and each one of the three divine persons there is no real ontological relation, something more than mere appropriation.

142 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 77: “The activity which is common to all three persons and appropriated only to one is (as with the divine essence) possessed by each of the three persons in his own proper way. The threefold way of subsisting of this activity (considered principiative) is as intrinsic and necessary for its existence as it is necessary and essential for the divine essence to subsist as threefold.”

199 has no real ontological relations to creatures when considered from the perspective of scholastic metaphysics. Yet, Rahner’s unique position on quasi-formal causality leads him to affirm an analogous and qualified sense in which God may be attributed with real ontological relations to human beings.143 He argues, “How can the contemplation of any reality, even of the loftiest reality, beatify us if intrinsically it is absolutely unrelated to us in any way?”144 Accordingly,

Rahner maintains that while God remains essentially unchanged as a quasi-formal cause, the unity of God’s absolute self-presence as the immanent Trinity is differentiated in God’s relation to humanity through the economic missions of the divine persons.145

143 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 15n11: “This way of formulating our position does not intend to touch the problem whether God has ‘real’ relations ad extra (outwards). We may abstract from this problem here. In our context, ‘real-ontological,’ as proper to each single divine person with respect to man, should be understood only in the analogical sense (insofar as the ‘reality,’ not the specificity of the relation is concerned). Thus the Logos as such has a real relation to his human nature.” Also, cf. Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” 88n15:

One cannot escape this conclusion by the would-be clever scholastic reference to the fact that the hypostatic union does not bring about any ‘real relation’ in the Logos himself and hence that nothing in the order of salvation can be predicated of the Logos as such, as touching the Logos himself. Whatever is the exact meaning of the axiom of scholastic metaphysics, that God has no ‘real relations’ ad extra, the truth remains – and it must be taken as the decisive norm for this axiom, and not vice versa – that the Logos himself is really and truly man, he and only he and not the Father and not the Spirit. And hence it remains eternally true that if everything that is to be affirmed truly and permanently of the Logos himself is to be included in a doctrine of the divine persons, then this doctrine itself implies an assertion dealing with the order of salvation.

144 Rahner, The Trinity, 15.

145 Cf. Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” 96n28:

It follows as a formal axiom that if the difference present in something imparted by God, as such, is only on the side of the creature, there can be no question of a self-communication, in which there is a real difference in that which is imparted as such, therefore ‘for us’, God must then be differentiated ‘in himself’, without prejudice to his unity (which is then characterized as that of the absolute ‘essence’), and this differentiation is characterized as the relative mode of the relationship of himself to himself. We may therefore affirm: if revelation (a) attests a real self-communication, and (b) declares that this self- communication contains differences for us (appears as mediated, but not by a mediation of a purely created type, which would destroy its character of real self-communication), then distinction and mediation is eo ipso affirmed of God as he is in himself and of himself.

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Indeed, the uncreated grace imparted through the divine missions does enable humanity to participate in the inner life of the Trinity. Rahner emphasizes that the divine missions bestow human beings with real relations to specific divine persons, who are each communicated uniquely through quasi-formal causality. Consequently, the relations that humans have to each of the persons communicated through the grace of the divine missions are non-appropriated. As such, Rahner characterizes “man’s relationship in grace as a non-appropriated relation to the three divine Persons, without doing injury to the principle of the unity of efficient causality in the creative action of the threefold God ad extra, and without making the indwelling conjunction of the three divine Persons into a hypostatic union.”146

Rahner believes that the grace of the divine missions gives peoples’ relationship to God a trinitarian structure. In fact, the quasi-formal causality of God’s uncreated grace fills human nature with the created graces that are the created terms of the divine missions. Since the created terms of the divine missions must be really predicated of the divine persons, Rahner argues that the differentiation present in this trinitarian structure of grace must also be really attributed to the distinctions among the three divine persons. As he explains, “The consequent trinitarian structure of our direct relationship with God through grace is also proper to God because of his actual self- communication – if we assume this, then the permanent mystery of the ‘immanent’ Trinity is made possible.”147 Accordingly, Rahner concludes that the immanent Trinity is made known to

146 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 346.

147 Rahner, “Theology and Anthropology,” 32.

201 human beings anthropologically through their experience of the incarnation and grace whereby the economic Trinity is present in the world:

If the anthropocentric perspective is applied to the doctrine of the Trinity, many things become more intelligible without at the same time destroying the mystery. We need only make the quite legitimate assumption that, on account of God’s absolute self- communication in ‘uncreated’ Grace, the immanent Trinity is strictly identical with the economic Trinity and vice versa, and we are then able to read the doctrine of the Trinity ‘anthropologically’ without falsifying it.148

E. Conclusion

It was noted at the beginning of this chapter that Doran seeks to transpose the four-point hypothesis into the categories of a methodical theology that addresses the concerns of modern philosophy. He believes that Lonergan’s later theological categories of interiorly and religiously differentiated consciousness are the ones most suitable for such a transposition. However, this chapter suggested that Rahner’s theological categories could be more useful in developing a contemporary analogy for the Trinity based upon the four-point hypothesis.

148 Ibid. Cf. Dennis W. Jowers, The Trinitarian Axiom of Karl Rahner, 86: “In order for human beings to know the Trinity itself, Rahner holds, they must experience God’s triune nature in some way in the depths of their own being; indeed, the Trinity must become in some sense, an aspect of their being.” Also, cf. Patrick Burke, Reinterpreting Rahner: A Critical Study of His Major Themes (New York: Fordham University Press, 2002), 247:

It was in the context of his discussion of the formal/quasi-formal causality of grace upon man that Rahner asserted that the traditional axiom that all works of the Trinity ad extra are common to the three persons of the Trinity need no longer apply to the workings of grace. . . . This change of perspective enabled Rahner to appeal to man’s experience of grace in order to explain the distinctions of the three divine persons as modes of the one divine mystery and to affirm the identity of the immanent and economic Trinity. . . . Indeed, by studying his own subjectivity under grace, man not only can find the ground for his belief but also can know the truth of God even unto the inner-trinitarian life.

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This chapter laid some groundwork for transposing the four-point hypothesis into

Rahner’s theological categories. It examined the aspects of his theology of grace and the Trinity that are pertinent to the issues discussed in Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis and in Doran’s development of it into a supernatural analogy. The themes discussed included the philosophical foundations of Rahner’s theology, his distinction between pure nature and historical nature, his understanding of the relationship between uncreated grace and created grace, his view of God’s self-communication as a quasi-formal cause, his “Grundaxiom” that identifies the immanent

Trinity with the economic Trinity, and his belief that people have non-appropriated relations to the divine persons through grace. These features of Rahner’s theology were highlighted in preparation for examining whether they might serve as a foundation for a four-point hypothesis and a supernatural, psychological analogy.

Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity contributes significantly to the discussion of how the experience of grace may lead to an analogical understanding of the Trinity. It is worth considering whether the four-point hypothesis may be transposed into Rahner’s theological categories studied above, especially those pertaining to the “Grundaxiom” and God’s quasi- formal causality as the determining principle of humanity’s supernatural existential. In the following chapter, these categories of Rahner’s thought will be considered in their potential utility for developing a supernatural analogy based upon the four-point hypothesis.

CHAPTER III

Transposing the Four-Point Hypothesis into the Categories of Karl Rahner’s Theology

Having examined the theologies of Bernard Lonergan and Karl Rahner concerning grace and the Trinity, one may note some important similarities and differences between them. Rahner agrees with Lonergan that God’s uncreated grace communicates not only the divine essence, but also the three divine persons and their four substantial relations. Consequently, it establishes in human beings a non-appropriated relation to each of the three divine persons through which they participate in the divine life. This uncreated grace is bestowed upon human beings along with the gift of created grace, by which they relate to the divine persons communicated through the divine missions. These missions correspond to the divine processions, precisely as united with their external terms in history.

Rahner and Lonergan concur that uncreated grace is ontologically prior to created grace, although they differ in their understanding of their respective form of causality. For Lonergan, uncreated grace is the exemplary cause of created grace, which God efficiently causes in people so that they acquire relations that terminate in uncreated grace. In Rahner’s view, by contrast, uncreated grace is bestowed upon human beings through quasi-formal causality. Its corresponding material cause, created grace, is produced in a person through God’s efficient causality.

Yet, despite their fundamental differences, both approaches highlight the fact that created grace enables human beings to have a unique, non-appropriated relation to each of the divine persons communicated as uncreated grace. This suggests the existence of some differentiation 203 204 within created grace that accounts for these non-appropriated relations to the divine persons. If created grace were not differentiated in reference to the divine persons, then there would seem to be no way in which distinct non-appropriated relations could be established between human beings and each of the persons of the Trinity. Lonergan develops this train of thought more than

Rahner, yet the latter makes several remarks that point in this direction.

In his four-point hypothesis, Lonergan identifies four preeminent created graces as the created terms of the divine missions by which the Trinity and its relations are communicated.

Since Rahner did not develop a four-point hypothesis, he does not divide created grace into four preeminent forms and correlate them with the four divine relations as clearly as Lonergan does.

However, Rahner does appear on occasion to divide created grace in a four-fold manner as distinct manners of participation in the divine persons. Given Rahner’s belief in the non- appropriated relations established through grace, such a differentiation of created grace could be used to develop a four-point hypothesis from Rahner’s theology.

With that in mind, this chapter will discuss the possibility of transposing the four-point hypothesis from the context of Lonergan’s thought to that of Rahner. Toward this end, areas of agreement between Rahner’s theology and each of the points of the four-point hypothesis will be identified. This exercise is not meant merely to corroborate Lonergan’s hypothesis from an alternative theological perspective. In fact, if Rahner’s argument is sound that non-appropriated relations to the divine persons are impossible without God’s quasi-formal causality, Rahner’s theology would provide a stronger ontological foundation for the four-point hypothesis.

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A. The Trinitarian Structure of Grace

Like Lonergan and other theologians, Rahner identifies four divine relations among the divine persons. These correspond to the notional acts of the active begetting of the Father, the passive begetting of the Son, the active spiration of the Father and the Son together, and the passive spiration of the Spirit.1 He also states concerning divine fatherhood and sonship that

“both of these relations [are] identical with the active spiration of the Spirit by the Father and the

Son.”2 These divine relations are present to humanity through uncreated grace.

Rahner stresses that uncreated grace establishes a supernatural relationship to God in the person who receives it.3 The self-communication of the one God reveals the Father, Son, and

Holy Spirit distinctly.4 Since the divine missions are interrelated and inseparable, God’s self-

1 Cf. Karl Rahner, The Trinity, trans. Joseph Donceel (New York: Crossroad, 1970), 78: “Insofar as these four relations must be conceived as an active producing or as a ‘passive’ being produced, we may say that there are in God four ‘notional’ acts, active and passive begetting, active and passive spiration.”

2 Ibid.

3 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Theology and Anthropology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 9: Writings of 1965- 1967; 1, trans. Graham Harrison (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1972), “Grace is not a ‘thing’ but – as communicated grace – a conditioning of the spiritual and intellectual subject as such to a direct relationship with God.”

4 Cf. Karl Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 4: More Recent Writings, trans. Kevin Smyth (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 70: “The absolute self- communication of God to the world, as the mystery which has drawn nigh, is Father as the absolutely primordial and underivative; it is Son, as the principle which itself acts and necessarily must act in history in view of this free self- communication; it is Holy Spirit, as that which is given, and accepted by us.” The phrase “notwendig inerhalb der Geschichte handeln müssendes” in the original German is translated “necessarily must act in history.” For the original, cf. Karl Rahner, “Über den Begriff des Geheimnisses in der katholischen Theologie,” in Schriften zur Theologie, Bd. 4: Neuere Schriften (Einsiedeln: Benziger, 1960), 95: “Die absolute Selbstmitteilung Gottes an die Welt als nahekommendes Geheimnis heißt in ihrer absoluten Ursprünglichkeit und Unableitbarkeit Vater, als selbst handelndes und zu dieser freien Selbstmitteilung notwendig innerhalb der Geschichte handeln müssendes Prizip Sohn und als geschenktes und von uns angenommenes Heiliger Geist.” Also, cf. Karl Rahner, “The Mystery of the Trinity,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 16: Experience of the Spirit: Source of Theology, trans. David Bourke

206 communication is a single act.5 However, all of the divine persons exercise their own quasi- formal causality.6 Consequently, the uncreated grace of God’s self-communication has a trinitarian character.7 As Rahner writes, “The gift in which God imparts himself to the world is precisely God as the triune God, and not something produced by him through efficient causality, something that represents him. And because he is the triune God, this ‘trinitarian character’ also affects the gift and makes it triune.”8 This trinitarian character of uncreated grace is

(London: Darton, Longman and Todd 1979), 258: “If God is Trinitarian and is really related to man and not merely by appropriation, then the communication of being and of self by God must also be Trinitarian. If in this self- communication he possesses as ‘Father’ a specific relationship to man, one can also speak quite naturally and without contradiction of the self-communication of the one God, as one can of the self-communication of the Father in his ‘originality’.” Furthermore, cf. Karl Rahner, “Oneness and Threefoldness of God in Discussion with Islam,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 18: God and Revelation, trans. Edward Quinn (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1983), 115: “In this salvific economic Trinity the unoriginated and permanently sovereign God is called Father; in his self-communication to history, Logos; in his self-communication to man’s transcendentality, Holy Spirit.” 5 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Trinity, Divine,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 1760:

The divine self-communication to the world in the Spirit (grace) and the self-communication in the hypostatic union are one and the same free act, because these two communications are each the condition of the other. The hypostatic union is only rationally thinkable if it causes or implies the grace given to the world through the divine Spirit (or at least in the humanity of Christ, and then in all men, by reason of the social nature of this humanity). And conversely, the grace given to the world has its necessary historical manifestation and eschatological irreversibility in what we call the hypostatic union. Thus the two missions may be understood as interconnected moments of the one self-communication of God to the world.

6 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 345: “In logical priority to the visio as a conscious act, they have each as divine, mutually distinct Persons their own proper quasi-formal causality upon the created spirit, a causality which makes it possible for these divine Persons to be possessed ‘consciously’, and, what is more, immediately.”

7 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 120: “We must construct a doctrine of grace which possesses a trinitarian structure. When all this happens, then the real doctrine of the Trinity is presented in Christology and in pneumatology.”

8 Rahner, “Trinity, Divine,” 1758-9. Cf. “Intellectual Honesty and Christian Faith,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 7: Further Theology of the Spiritual Life, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1971), 63: “This self-bestowal of God (upon man in the history which he shapes for himself as a free and intelligent being) has a threefold aspect. Now the three aspects involved, inasmuch as they mutually constitute the

207 communicated in a single act that is expressed in distinct manners through the divine missions, and it is received by human beings through a single act in the two modalities of knowledge and love.9

While uncreated grace is a Trinity of persons, it does not transform a human being into three persons when bestowed along with created grace. Indeed, a Trinity of persons is a perfection that pertains necessarily, and only, to the absolute being of God. All created persons are finite individuals who are grounded in the divine Trinity. However, there is evidence in

Rahner’s theology suggesting that a trinitarian character may be found not only in uncreated grace, but also in the created graces that are the terms of the divine missions. Drawing from his thought in the following remarks, it will be argued that different modalities of created grace are

self-bestowal of God, are inherent in the divine nature as such. In this self-bestowal on God’s part, therefore, what we Christians are accustomed to call the triune nature of God is already present.” Also, cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 35:

These three self-communications are the self-communication of the one God in the three relative ways in which God subsists. The Father gives himself to us too as Father, that is, precisely because and insofar as he himself, being essentially with himself, utters himself and in this way communicates the Son as his own, personal self-manifestation; and because and insofar as the Father and the Son (receiving from the Father), welcoming each other in love, drawn and returning to each other, communicate themselves in this way, as received in mutual love, that is, as Holy Spirit. God relates to us in a threefold manner, and this threefold, free, and gratuitous relation to us is not merely a copy or an analogy of the inner Trinity, but this Trinity itself, albeit as freely and gratuitously communicated.

9 Cf. Karl Rahner, “On the Theology of Hope,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 10- Writings of 1965- 1967; 2, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1973), 245-6.

Now there are only two such modes or – better – aspects in this one divine self-bestowal: the first aspect is constituted by the Logos and the second by the divine Pneuma. It is precisely through these two aspects that God as ungenerated, God the ‘Father’ (not, therefore, an abstract divinity!), who is incomprehensible and never loses his incomprehensibility even through his act of divine self-bestowal, imparts himself. Because of this we cannot imagine that the Trinity in the modes of subsistence in the one God implies ipso facto that there is also a trinity in the response by which we accept this self-bestowal of the Father in Logos and in Pneuma. The fact that there is only one act of self-bestowal in which the ‘Father’ imparts himself in Logos and Pneuma implies that in the response, i.e. the ‘theological’ virtue, of man which is itself upheld by this divine self-bestowal, only a single act is conceivable with two modalities: faith and love, to correspond to the Word and the Love of the Father.

208 required for humans to have a non-appropriated relation to each divine person communicated through the divine missions. Further, the following remarks will reveal areas of agreement between Rahner’s theology and Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis.

B. Rahner on the Four Created Graces of the Four-Point Hypothesis

Rahner believes that God’s uncreated grace bestows itself upon human beings together with various created graces, which are the created formal effects of God’s quasi-formal causality.

These formal effects of uncreated grace through the divine missions consist in the subsistence of

Christ’s human nature and the perfection of human knowledge and love.10 According to Rahner, uncreated grace accomplishes the incarnation through the created grace of the hypostatic union.

Furthermore, uncreated grace brings about the perfection of human knowledge and love through the created graces of the light of glory and sanctifying grace.

Rahner most often identifies the created formal effects of God’s self-communication as incarnation and the grace that grows into glory. However, he has also suggested that they may be differentiated in a three-fold manner: incarnation, grace, and glory. This requires that one distinguish grace from glory, which Rahner suggests is reasonable. He writes the following about these mysteries strictly speaking:

10 Cf. Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 330-1n19: “An ontology, developed in more detail than is here possible, of the formal causality of the divine Being in regard to finite being would doubtless be able to show (once this concept had been presupposed) that something of the sort is basically possible, so long as the divine Being remains unaffected, only in two cases: either as unio hypostatica, or as the communication of this Being as the object of immediate knowledge and love.”

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There are only three [mysteria stricte dicta] which can seriously be considered as such according to the teaching of theologians: the Trinity, the Incarnation and the divinization of man in grace and glory. If we then ask why these mysteries are to be called mysteria stricte dicta, we must begin by dividing them into two groups: the trinitarian mystery of God in itself, and the mysteries of the Incarnation, grace and glory, in so far as these last deal with a relationship of God to the non-divine. . . . When we then examine theologically the two other mysteries (or three, if we distinguish grace from glory) we note at once that they have a common element, which links them together, marks them off sharply and clearly from all other relationships of God to the non-divine, and also makes them intelligible as a closed duality. For both mysteries involve what we call in scholastic theology a quasi- formal causality on the part of God, in contradistinction to his efficient causality.11

Accordingly, Rahner recognizes at least three strictly supernatural created realities that result from God’s quasi-formal causality: the hypostatic union, the supernatural bestowal of sanctifying grace, and the light of glory in the beatific vision. As he states,

All the strictly supernatural realities with which we are acquainted (the hypostatic union, the visio beatifica and – as we shall go on to show here – the supernatural bestowal of grace) have this in common, that in them there is expressed a relationship of God to a creature which is not one of efficient causality (a production out of the cause, ‘ein Aus- der-Ursache-Herausstellen’), and which must consequently fall under the head of formal causality (a taking up into the ground [forma], ‘ein-In-den-Grund[forma]- Hineinnehmen’): the ontological principle of the subsistence of a finite nature in the one case, the ontological principle of a finite knowledge in the other.12

11 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 65.

12 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 329-30. Cf. Vincent Battaglia, “An Examination of Karl Rahner’s Trinitarian Theology,” Australian eJournal of Theology 9, no. 1 (2007): 13: “In the areas of grace, Christology, and the beatific vision, Rahner says that some created actuation – respectively, sanctifying grace, the esse secundarium (the humanity of Christ), and the light of glory – disposes created reality to quasi-formal union with the Uncreated Act.” Also, cf. P. de Letter, “Created Actuation by the Uncreated Act: Difficulties and Answers,” Theological Studies 18, no. 1 (1957), 67:

From revelation we know three manners of God's self-donation to men: the Incarnation, sanctifying grace, the beatific vision. In each of these there is a created actuation by the uncreated Act. For each of these we must state briefly what it is that is actuated by the uncreated Act, what is the reality of the created actuation, what particular union with God results from, or gives rise to, the created actuation. We follow the order of historical realization and ontological dependence between the three: the Incarnation is the source of all sanctifying grace, and this leads to the beatific vision.

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Since Rahner does not often distinguish sanctifying grace from the habit of charity, one might conclude that his theology would more closely align with the three-point hypothesis proposed by Charles Hefling than with Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis. The lack of a clear distinction between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity would suggest that Rahner believes there are only three strictly supernatural created realities, as Hefling similarly maintains. Also, when Rahner speaks of the growth of grace into glory, he often does not specify whether sanctifying grace and the light of glory are different graces in kind, or only in degree. Thus, he may appear to agree with David Coffey’s two-point hypothesis, in which incarnation and grace are the only two kinds of created supernatural realities. However, there is some evidence that

Rahner makes a real distinction between sanctifying grace and both the habit of charity and the light of glory, which will be examined in this chapter.

Rahner’s ambiguity is due to his tendency to frame “sanctifying grace, the gift of faith, divinely infused virtues, etc.” in terms of “the a priori determination of man’s ‘transcendentality’

(in grace) as such,” rather than as “(unique) ‘categoreal’ determinations of man.”13 However,

Rahner does admit of some differentiation within humanity’s transcendental horizon. Since

God’s uncreated grace establishes a non-appropriated relation in human beings to each of the divine persons, it is evident to Rahner that humanity’s graced horizon has a trinitarian structure.

This trinitarian structure of grace is also evident in the external terms, or created formal effects, of the divine missions by which the immanent Trinity becomes the economic Trinity.

Accordingly, human transcendence may be differentiated with respect to the various forms of

13 Karl Rahner, Preface to Otto Muck, Transcendental Method, trans. William D. Seidensticker (New York, Herder and Herder, 1968), 10.

211 created grace by which God bestows human beings with non-appropriated relations to the divine persons and their uncreated grace.

For Rahner, all three divine persons are communicated in history through the divine missions. It would seem odd if all four divine relations, with which the three divine persons are necessarily connected, were not also manifest in the divine missions through their external terms in the various forms of created grace. This would explain why created grace may be really differentiated into four supernatural created realities. Indeed, Rahner’s theology may be interpreted to imply that people cannot have non-appropriated relations that terminate distinctly in each of the divine persons unless they share in the created graces that participate in the four divine relations communicated as uncreated grace through the divine missions. This participation of created grace in uncreated grace exists on account of the relationship between their respective types of causality: material and quasi-formal. Thus understood, the four created graces are all necessary and interrelated aspects of God’s self-communication. Furthermore, Rahner’s discussions of the created grace of union (or esse secundarium), sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory may constitute a foundation for transposing the four-point hypothesis into the categories of his thought. His statements about these four created supernatural realities and their relation to the divine persons will be examined in what follows.

1. Point One: Esse Secundarium

First to be considered is Rahner’s theology of the created grace of union, the equivalent of the esse secundarium discussed by Lonergan. Rahner notes that while only Christ experiences

212 his created grace of union directly, people can indirectly experience it asymptotically as the ultimate fulfillment of the human obediential potency for union with God. Christ’s existential relationship to God as human may thus be understood analogically. Rahner explains,

The fact that this existential relationship of Christ as man to God is not immediately available in our own experience, thus where our concepts have their origin, does not absolutely forbid our making such statements. For the ontic relationship of his human nature is not immediately available to us either, and yet it can be stated in an analogical, indirect and asymptotic way. Otherwise there would be no Christology at all which could say something about what Christ really is.14

While this external term of the Son’s divine mission is created ad extra by all three persons through efficient causality, only the Son is said to be incarnate because of the Son’s personal quasi-formal causality.15 On account of the hypostatic union, Rahner attributes the human nature of Christ to the Son in a non-appropriated manner. Consequently, the transcendental orientation of Christ’s human intellect toward God enables him to recognize his own divine filiation and immediate proximity to the Word, with whom his human nature is hypostatically united.16

14 Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 172.

15 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 23:

Here something occurs “outside” the intra-divine life in the world itself, something which is not a mere effect of the efficient causality of the triune God acting as one in the world, but something which belongs to the Logos alone, which is the history of one divine person, in contrast to the other divine persons. This remains true even if we admit that this hypostatic union which belongs exclusively to the Logos is causally effected by the whole Trinity. There has occurred in salvation history something which can be predicated only of one divine person.

16 Cf. Roman A. Siebenrock, “Christology,” in The Cambridge Companion to Karl Rahner, eds. Declan Marmion and Mary E. Hines (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 115. Rahner clarifies that Christ’s awareness of God is not simply reducible to the same form of “God-consciousness” that is capable of being experienced by all other human beings, such as Friedrich Schleiermacher believed. Cf. Tyron Inbody, “Rahner’s Christology: A Critical Assessment,” Saint Luke's Journal of Theology 25, no. 4 (1982): 298: “Neither is [Rahner]

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Rahner also emphasizes through his “Grundaxiom” that the Son is the only divine person who could have become incarnate. Otherwise, he notes, “If one admits that each divine person can enter into hypostatic union with a created being, then the fact of the incarnation of the Logos really reveals nothing about the Logos himself, that is, about his proper immanent divine being.”17 Hence, he argues against a univocal understanding of the divine hypostases: “One should at least ask whether the particular relative subsistence, in which Father and Spirit are distinct from and not identical with the Son, might not prevent the exercise of such a functio hypostatica (though it does not, in the case of the Son).”18 Rahner contrasts with Lonergan on this issue, as Lonergan adopts Thomas Aquinas’ position that any of the divine persons could

speaking simply about a consciousness Christology, viz., a human being who has raised his God-consciousness to a more or less complete level.”

17 Karl Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 4: More Recent Writings, trans. Kevin Smyth (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 90. Cf. Fred Sanders, “The Image of the Immanent Trinity: Implications of Rahner’s Rule for a Theological Interpretation of Scripture” (PhD diss., Graduate Theological Union, 2001), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest- com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/304697503/ fulltextPDF/92C826F944084DBBPQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 83: “Rahner is in line with the consensus view, but he goes further by arguing that it is not merely fitting for the economic Logos to be the immanent Logos; it is in some sense necessary.”

18 Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” 80n. Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 29-30n25:

He who denies that the Father or the Spirit too might have become man would deny them a “perfection” only if it had first been established that such a possibility is a real possibility, hence a “perfection” for the Father or for the Spirit. But precisely this is not sure. Thus it is, for instance, a perfection for the Son as Son to descend from the Father. But it would be pure nonsense to conclude thence that the Father as such should also possess this perfection. Since the hypostatic function “outwards” is the corresponding divine hypostasis, we are not allowed to deduce anything for another hypostasis from the function of this hypothesis, even when our abstract universal concept of subsistence shows no contradiction with the hypothesis that the Father should cause a human nature to subsist.

214 have become incarnate. Lonergan argues, “Since the divine act of existence is common to the three persons, the potency to enter into the hypostatic union is also common to all three.”19

Rahner believes that the existence of the incarnate Christ has a necessary connection to grace and vision, both as received in himself and as communicated to others.20 On the one hand,

Christ received sanctifying grace and an immediate vision of God as a matter of ontological necessity.21 On the other hand, since the grace and vision of all human beings is mediated

19 Bernard Lonergan, The Ontological and Psychological Constitution of Christ, vol. 7 of Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, eds. Frederick E. Crowe and Robert M. Doran, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002), 137.

20 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Resurrection, I. Resurrection of Christ, 3. The Soteriological Aspect of Christ’s Resurrection,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 1442:

Where theology rightly, if not unanimously, postulates a physical instrumental causality of Jesus’ glorified humanity for the supernatural life of man, a basis is available for a more precise interpretation of the soteriological significance of the risen and exalted Lord as such. . . . Such an endeavor would of course raise the question whether every strictly supernatural communication of God to a created spirit in grace and vision is not necessarily (ontologically and therefore morally) to be thought of as an element (provisional preparation and subsequent repercussion in the world as a whole) of God’s personal self-communication to the world in the hypostatic union, which itself, as the communication of God himself to a historical reality, is only fully accomplished in the definitive fulfilment of that history which we attain in the resurrection of Jesus. Only on this basis would it perhaps be possible to indicate why Jesus not only de facto and by a certain extrinsic suitability is the first to rise to the definitive state of glory (Col 1:18; I Cor 15:20), but is necessarily the first.

21 Regarding the necessity of Christ’s sanctifying grace, cf. Karl Rahner, “On the Theology of the Incarnation,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 4: More Recent Writings, trans. Kevin Smyth (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 112n:

All Catholic theologians are familiar with the view that the hypostatic union of the humanity of Christ with the Logos has as a necessary consequence the intrinsic divinization of this human nature. Though it is a consequence of the hypostatic union which is morally and indeed ontologically necessary, it is distinct from the union, and through it alone is the humanity of Christ sanctified and divinized ‘in itself’ – and (though in a unique measure of intrinsic holiness) is precisely that which is to be bestowed on all men as grace of justification.

Regarding the necessity of Christ’s immediate vision of God, cf. Karl Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, trans. William V. Dych (New York: Crossroad Publishing Company, 1984), 200: “The intrinsic effect of the hypostatic union for the assumed humanity of the Logos consists precisely and in a real sense only in the very thing

215 through Christ, these may only be received in the act of being assimilated to God’s self- communication in Christ.22 Further, Rahner suggests that Christ’s incarnation is necessary for the reception of grace and vision by all, even the angels.23 Indeed, he subordinates angelology to

Christology and identifies the grace of the angels with the grace of Christ.24 In his view, God’s self-communication requires the creation of finite persons, its addressees, in a world of both spirit and matter. This is because he understands matter as “the necessary otherness of the finite spirit.”25

which is ascribed to all men as their goal and their fulfillment, namely, the immediate vision of God which the created, human soul of Christ enjoys.”

22 Cf. Siebenrock, “Christology,” 115. Also, cf. Patrick Burke, Reinterpreting Rahner: A Critical Study of His Major Themes (New York: Fordham University Press, 2002), 138: “God’s immediacy to the spirit is mediated through Christ’s humanity, for just as the visio beatifica does not destroy but in fact demands the created lumen gloriae as its mediation, so also Christ’s humanity remains as a finite mediator of the infinite God.”

23 Cf. Karl Rahner, “The Body in the Order of Salvation,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 17: Jesus, Man, and the Church, trans. Margaret Kohl (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1981), 80: “The beatific vision, the direct contemplation of God, is based on a grace which would not exist, and probably could not exist, unless the divine Logos had taken, and remained, flesh.” Also, cf. Peter Joseph Fritz, Karl Rahner’s Theological Aesthetics (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2014): 129: “Angels, though they may seem self- sufficient, receive everything by the grace of Christ. Grace is the layer that must subtend all consideration of subjectivity, whether human or angelic. Rahner diverges from Heidegger on this count because instead of an apriorism of finitude, Rahner sets forth an apriorism of the infinite grace of Christ.” 24 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Angel,” in Sacramentum Mundi: An Encyclopedia of Theology, Vol. 1, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: Herder and Herder, 1968), 31:

The pure “spirituality” of the angels was taught in the 6th century and was then made the absolute starting point of angelology in such a way that theologically the unity of angels and men in the one saving history of the incarnate Word and the natural conditions of that unity remained relatively obscure. . . . Consequently, the subordination of angelology to Christology (an explicit theme with Paul) does not receive its due theological weight. Even today there are textbooks of dogmatics — Schmaus is an exception — in which angelology is conceived quite non-Christologically. It was not, however, completely lacking when (as with Suarez in contrast to Aquinas and Scotus) the grace of the angels was viewed as the grace of Christ.

25 Rahner, The Trinity, 90. For a fuller explanation, cf. ibid., 89-90:

The self-communication of the free personal God who gives himself as a person (in the modern sense of the word!) presupposes a personal recipient. It does not just happen that God communicates himself to him; the addressee of the self-communication must be such on account of the very nature of this self-

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Rahner draws the further conclusion that divine self-communication necessarily results in the incarnation of Christ.26 This means that Christ would have become incarnate even if humanity had never sinned.27 Given God’s free offer of grace, Rahner argues that the incarnate

communication. If God wishes to step freely outside of himself, he must create man. There is no need to explain in detail that he must then create a spiritual-personal being, the only one who possesses the “obediential potency” for the reception of such a self-communication. The only question which traditional school theology might raise is the objection that an immaterial, uncorporeal personal subject (an “angel,” therefore) must be considered as another possible addressee of God’s self-communication; that, in fact, there are angels who have received this self- communication. It is impossible to refute this objection completely here. But it should not be considered valid. In order to see this we must first show that there exists a unity of spirit and matter (the world), in which the angels too remain included in their own way; that the grace of the angels is also the grace of Christ, hence a moment of this self-communication of God which proceeds towards the one world, as constituted of spirit and matter, the latter being the necessary otherness of the finite spirit. While this self- communication is free, it necessarily finds, in the incarnation (and in no other way), its peak and irreversible finality. In this one process the angels receive grace as peculiar personal moments in the one world of spirit and matter.

26 It should be noted that although this is Rahner’s most commonly expressed belief, he does appear to speculate, at least on one occasion, that perhaps the Word could have redeemed the world without becoming incarnate. While Rahner argues that any possible order of redemption would have to involve the self-communication of the Son as the redeemer, it is unclear whether he thinks such a divine mission of the Son could have terminated in anything other than the created grace of union. In any case, such a created term would have to be proper to the Son alone, or else the economic Trinity would fail to communicate the immanent Trinity. This may imply that in any possible order of grace, each of the divine relations would have a created term. Cf. Karl Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 178-9:

All is to be redeemed, because as good it is capable of redemption, because apart from Christ it is all lost, as a whole, with all its goodness. All. But how does this happen, when he shares the appearance and the concreteness of this lost state, when he himself becomes what is in need of redemption? He could have done this in another way? He could have saved the world even without this, and redeemed it into his freedom and infinity? Certainly: but in fact he did so by becoming himself what was in need of redemption, and in this way, this way alone, must take place that one Redemption which really exists and is the only one we know.

27 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Order, III. Supernatural Order,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 1115-6:

The supernatural order is a Christological order. Although it is a theologically controverted view, it can nevertheless be postulated that God’s original intention in his self-communication, which gave the history of salvation its structure even before the Fall, was directed to the incarnation of the Logos as its historical, eschatological culmination. The incarnation, therefore, together with the glorification of Christ, which because of sin takes place through death, both manifests the supernatural order absolutely in history and definitively establishes it in the world. In other words, it is permissible to assume with Scotism that even supralapsarian grace was the grace of Christ, and that the supernatural order as such is Christological.

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Christ is the necessary and proper manifestation of the immanent Logos in history. In accord with his “Grundaxiom,” he argues that “Christ’s ‘human nature’ is not something which happens to be there, among many other things, which might equally well have been hypostatically assumed, but it is precisely that which comes into being when God’s Logos ‘utters’ himself outwards.”28 Indeed, he remarks that if Christ becoming an angel would have expressed the immanent Word just as well as his incarnation in human flesh, such arbitrary manifestations would seem to teach humanity nothing more about the Word than mere appropriations:

A really Christian angelology must, from the start, fit in with the fact of the God-man. It should not start from the hypothesis or implication that God might equally well have become an angel, if only he had wished it. For whether we like it or not, such a hypothesis makes of the incarnation an unbelievable myth; it does not let God appear in the flesh; that which appears no longer expresses anything of the one who appears.29

The incarnation reveals the Son perfectly to human beings in Christ’s solidarity with them. Christ also reveals humanity to itself, since the hypostatic union is the ultimate fulfillment of humanity’s obediential potency for intimate union with God. As Rahner writes, “The highest actuation . . . of this obediential potency (and this is no purely negative determination, no purely formal non-repugnance) makes the self-suspended thing all the more man in the most radical sense, precisely unites it thus with the Logos.”30 Hence, Rahner views the incarnate Christ as the

Christ does not become and remain head and goal of saving history only when he enters into it because of sin. The supernatural order present in the history of salvation is from the outset of such a kind that God willed to communicate himself to the world in Christ in the Incarnation.

28 Rahner, The Trinity, 89.

29 Ibid., 90.

30 Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 171n. Cf. Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 217:

218 climax of humanity’s evolutionary development.31 Since Christ is the archetype of humanity,

Rahner states that “Christology is the end and beginning of anthropology.”32 Accordingly, he notes, “Christology may be studied as self-transcending anthropology, and anthropology as deficient Christology.”33 Indeed, Rahner stresses that Christ is the first and constitutive embodiment of that union with God to which all people are ordered:

Although the hypostatic union is a unique event in its own essence, and viewed in itself it is the highest conceivable event, it is nevertheless an intrinsic moment within the whole process by which grace is bestowed upon all spiritual creatures. . . . When God brings about man's self-transcendence into God through his absolute self-communication to all men in such a way that both elements constitute a promise to all men which is irrevocable and which has already reached fulfillment in one man, then we have precisely what is signified by hypostatic union.34

Rahner clarifies, however, that Christ’s manner of participation in God is different than that of the rest of humanity.35 He states that “the prerogatives which accrue intrinsically to the human reality of Jesus through the hypostatic union are of the same essential nature as those

If this is what human nature is, the poor, questioning and in itself empty orientation towards the abiding mystery whom we call God, then we do understand more clearly what it means to say: God assumes a human nature as his own. If in this indefinable nature, whose limit, that is, its ‘definition,’ is this unlimited orientation towards the infinite mystery of fullness, is assumed by God as his own reality, then it has reached the very point towards which it is always moving by virtue of its essence. It is its very meaning, and not just an accidental side activity which it could also do without, to be given away and to be handed over, to be that being who realizes himself and finds himself by losing himself once and for all in the incomprehensible.

31 Cf. Siebenrock, “Christology,” 119.

32 Rahner, “On the Theology of the Incarnation,” 117.

33 Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 164n.

34 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 201.

35 Cf. Rahner, “On the Theology of the Incarnation,” 112: “It might be imagined that this God-becoming- man takes place as often as men come into existence and that the incarnation is not a unique miracle. This would imply that the historicity and personality in question was reduced to the level of the nature which is everywhere and always the same: and this would be nothing short of mythologizing the truth.”

219 which are also intended for other spiritual subjects through grace.”36 Here, Rahner indicates that

Christ’s union with the divine is necessary and intrinsic to his ontological constitution as the Son, whereas others are united with God through a contingent reception of grace. It is clear that he does not describe the hypostatic union only in terms of the sanctifying grace that Christ shares in common with other human beings.37 Rahner denies that the hypostatic union is merely an accidental union when he writes that it “cannot be understood only as a ‘moral unity,’ as for

36 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 200. Emphasis is Rahner’s.

37 In his criticism of Rahner’s theology, Thomas Joseph White claims that “the ‘grace of union’ has been in effect reduced solely to a union of ‘habitual grace’” (Thomas Joseph White, The Incarnate Lord: A Thomistic Study in Christology, Thomistic Ressourcement Series, Vol. 5 (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University Press, 2015), 77). Indeed, he thinks Rahner’s writings imply “that the hypostatic union consists formally, in some sense, in the ‘habitual graces’ of knowledge and love that are given to the human nature of Christ,” such that “the ‘grace of union’ (to use the classical terminology) flows forth from the habitual, sanctifying grace of Christ” (ibid., 97). In his assessment, Rahner “has in effect purposefully evacuated from his theology of the hypostatic union any other criteria by which to denote this union other than that of habitual, sanctifying grace” (ibid., 98). Hence, he argues that the hypostatic union in Rahner’s thought “seems to be constituted primarily by what Aquinas would term the accidental quality of habitual grace (ibid., 99). By way of contrast, he points out that Rahner “almost never speaks either of the hypostatic ‘subsistence’ of a divine person in a human nature or of the union of two natures in a divine person” (ibid, 98). He interprets this to mean that Rahner “takes aim in particular even at traditional subsistence theories of the incarnation” (ibid., 93) and “evacuate[s] the hypostatic union of any real intrinsic ontological content” (ibid., 113). However, White is incorrect in his assumption that “Rahner does not tell us ‘how’ the Word exists or subsists as human, except by reference to the inherent presence of sanctifying grace in the soul of Christ” (ibid., 99). In fact, Rahner is clear that “the unio hypostatica implies or involves an entitative determination, namely the being- united of the human reality with the Logos, as an ontological determination of this human reality” (Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 170). Hence, for Rahner, the divine esse of the Logos ontologically determines Christ’s humanity through the hypostatic union. Accordingly, Christ’s habitual grace is the effect, rather than the cause, of the hypostatic union. Another passage where Rahner discusses how the Logos subsists as human may be found in Rahner, “On the Theology of the Incarnation,” 238:

To give greater clarity to the inexhaustible content of the truth of faith which expresses the incarnation, one could take up here the Thomistic doctrine, that the humanity of Christ exists by the existence of the Logos. But when putting forward this thesis, one should be clear that this existence of the Word is again not to be thought of as the reality which – merely because of its being infinite – could bestow existence on any thinkable ‘essence’, as if it could offer any essence a ground of existence which in itself was indifferent to this essence rather than that or to which manner of existent being arose thereby. The being of the Logos – considered of course as that which is received by procession from the Father – must be thought of as exteriorizing itself, so that without detriment to its immutability in itself and of itself, it becomes itself in truth the existence of a created reality – which must in all truth and reality be predicated of the being of the Logos, because it is so.

220 example between a human word or a mere sign on the one hand and God on the other. It must rather be understood only as an irrevocable kind of union between this human reality and God, as a union which eliminates the possibility of separation.”38 Accordingly, “The unio hypostatica implies or involves an entitative determination, namely the being-united of the human reality with the Logos, as an ontological determination of this human reality.”39 The uncreated grace of union brings about this entitative determination of Christ’s humanity through bestowing the created grace of union, which may be identified as the esse secundarium.

Rahner warns that while Christ is unique among all humans by the hypostatic union, his humanity must not be reduced to his divinity. Although Christ is a single existential subject, he has two centers of activity and self-consciousness in his divine and human natures. Rahner notes that the modern tendency to identify personhood with self-consciousness has unfortunately inclined some to think that the person of Christ must have only one center of self-consciousness.

This conceptual tendency leads down the road toward either monophysitism or, at least, monothelitism. Rahner explains,

The doctrine of two natures involves a duality of even a merely psychological and relative kind between an existentially independent I-centre (Ichzentrum) in the man Jesus and the Logos. . . . The concept of person is always at least in danger of being understood in such a way that the ‘independence’ in view here seems to be excluded. It is not merely since the nineteenth century, with Günther’s modern concept of person and Existentialist philosophy, that this has been the case. The concept of person as the ontological principle of a free active centre, self-conscious, present to itself and through itself in being, is a concept which, in the sense just indicated, has always played round the edge of the most static and objective concept of person. . . . If it were not the case, monothelitism would have been quite inconceivable; for it was not just a political device for making a

38 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 202.

39 Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 170.

221

concession to monophysitism, but persisted with such vigour that today it is still a widespread ‘heresy’ among Christians – all verbal orthodoxy notwithstanding.40

Against the idea of monothelitism, Rahner notes that Christ’s humanity “cannot be conceived of simply as God’s activity in and through a human nature thought of as purely instrumental, a nature which in relation to the Logos would be, ontologically and morally, purely passive.”41 Interpreting his humanity as a mere instrument of his divine consciousness would amount to a belief in mono-existentialism that fails to account for his finite human existence and self-consciousness.42 In contrast, Rahner insists it is uniquely possible for Christ’s divine person to have two distinct centers of freedom through the incarnation. He writes, “Only a divine Person can possess as its own a freedom really distinct from itself in such a way that this freedom does

40 Ibid., 159-60.

41 Ibid., 161. Cf. Karl Rahner, “Exegesis and Dogmatic Theology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 5: Later Writings, trans. Karl H. Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 83: “Would it not be possible to eradicate in this way quite a few monophysite tendencies in Christology (not, of course, in the official dogmatic theology but only in that of individual Christians), which on closer examination see nothing more in the ‘human nature’ of the Logos than a sort of livery or puppet for God, something which is directed only towards us and not also in dialogic freedom towards God?”

42 Cf. Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 160-61:

In the customary teaching about sin, untouched by any kind of Existentialism, a distinction is made between peccatum personale and peccatum naturae; in this terminology too we see that existential ideas about the person are simultaneously at play. If these come to the fore, a connexion obtrudes itself upon the mind: where there is a single person, there is a single freedom, a single unique personal active centre, in relation to which any other reality (= nature, natures) can only be in this person the material and the instrument, the recipient of commands and the manifestation of this single, personal centre of freedom. But this is precisely not the case with Jesus. Otherwise he would only be the God who is active among us in human form, and not the true man who can be our Mediator with respect to God in genuine human freedom. It would of course be utterly false to say that the conceptual pair ‘Person-nature’ involves this monothelite interpretation (it would, be better and clearer to say today ‘mono-existentialist conception’). But the concept of person, as it is in actual fact understood, in fact insistently suggests this interpretation, and it is again and again taken unreflexively in this sense, though the interpretation is never reflexively thought out and formulated (for that would be heretical).

222 not cease to be truly free even with regard to the divine Person possessing it, while it continues to qualify this very Person as its ontological subject.”43

Ultimately, Christ’s human self-consciousness is characterized by an awareness of his own creatureliness relative to the divine Word with whom his human nature is hypostatically united. As Rahner points out, “The ‘human nature’ of the Logos possesses a genuine, spontaneous, free, spiritual, active centre, a human self-consciousness, which as creaturely faces the eternal Word in a genuinely human attitude of adoration, obedience, a most radical sense of creaturehood.”44 This implies that Christ’s humanity has its own existential center of activity that distinguishes it from God as a creature.

Christ’s human awareness of his divinity is not merely subconscious. Rahner points out that there is a direct proportion between the degree to which a being is present to itself in act and the degree to which that being is intelligible and self-aware.45 Thus, since Christ’s humanity is hypostatically united to the pure act of the Son through the created grace of union, this entitative

43 Ibid., 162. Cf. Karl Rahner, “Jesus Christ, IV. History of Dogma and Theology,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 770: “God’s closer proximity does not absorb the creature but makes it more independent.”

44 Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 158.

45 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Dogmatic Reflections on the Knowledge and Self-Consciousness of Christ,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 5: Later Writings, trans. Karl H. Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 205: “We start then from the axiom of the thomistic metaphysics of knowledge according to which being, and self-awareness, are elements of the one reality which condition each other immanently.” Also, cf. Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 303:

The presupposition for an ‘ontological Christology’ is the insight which is already found in classical Thomism that in their ultimate meaning being and consciousness are the same thing, that an existent possesses being to the degree that the existent is ‘present to itself’ and ‘returns’ to itself, and thereby is responsible for itself in knowledge and freedom, and precisely in this way becomes open to the whole of reality and is both intelligens et intellectum. . . . He is someone whose ‘basic constitution’ as the original unity of being and consciousness is to have his origins in God radically and completely, and to be given over to God radically and completely.

223 determination enables Christ to be consciously present to himself in his humanity as a divine person. As Rahner explains,

The higher an entity . . . in its grade of being, compactness of being, ‘actuality’, the more intelligible it is and present to itself (bei sich selbst). . . . The fact that Christ’s humanity is substantially united to the Logos, in so far as this is a determination (‘act’) of the human nature itself, cannot be simply ‘subconscious’. For as something ontically higher, this determination is something real which cannot be simply unconscious at least in the case where its subject has attained that grade of actuality in being which involves a presence to itself (Bei-sich-selbst-sein) of this entity. At least in the case where this presupposition is satisfied, it is metaphysically impossible that this actuality of the subject should be simply unconscious, when we remember that this actuality is entitatively higher in comparison with the level of actuality proper to the subject, and that this subject is present to itself; it is impossible that the immediate subject of the human presence-to-itself should not also be present to itself precisely in so far as it is wholly and substantially made over to the Logos.46

Rahner maintains that Christ had the light of glory even while he lived on earth, just as he had the fullness of sanctifying grace and charity. This gift was not received contingently, as it has been by the non-divine saints in heaven. His vision of God is unique in that it is an intimate, immediate, and ontologically necessary consequence of his grace of union. Indeed, he experiences himself as the uncreated God even as he sees God through the created grace of the light of glory.47 Rahner explains,

46 Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 169. Cf. Edward L. Shirley, “The Relationship between Christology and Mariology in the Writings of Karl Rahner,” Dissertation, Fordham University, 1990, http://search.proquest.com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtft/docview/3038 66077/fulltextPDF/6B84685840B4C11PQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 185-6: “The higher the degree of being, the higher the degree of self-consciousness. Therefore, this highest ontological determination of the created reality of Christ, that is to say, God himself, must be conscious of itself (for what is higher on the plane of being cannot be lower on the plane of consciousness). Therefore, the visio immediata is an intrinsic part of the hypostatic union itself.”

47 For Rahner’s view on the necessity of the light of glory for an immediate vision of God, cf. Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace” 336n26: “A created supernatural disposition (grace or the light of glory, which are capable of growth) is a necessary presupposition of the vision.” For Rahner’s thoughts on the relationship between the light of glory and the humanity of Christ, cf. Karl Rahner, “Dogmatic Questions on Easter,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 4: More Recent Writings, trans. Kevin Smyth (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 132:

224

The ‘visio immediata’ is . . . the consequence and not the presupposition of the conscious being-with-the-Logos of Christ’s soul. It is not (in the last resort) a donum, conferred as a moral ‘title’ on the human soul on account of its being united hypostatically to the Logos, for reasons of convenientia or decentia; it is the hypostatic union itself, in so far as this is necessarily an ‘intelligibile actu’ in the intelligens actu of Christ’s human soul.48

Rahner also notes that the Father is self-communicated along with the Son in the incarnation of Christ. He states that the Father “utters himself and in this way communicates the

Son as his own, personal self-manifestation.”49 Indeed, the utterance of the Father into history produces the humanity of Christ through the created grace of union. In this sense, the Father speaks through the Son who is spoken. Yet, since the Father is the one who utters, rather than the one who is uttered into the world with a human nature, Rahner argues, “When we say that the

Son is the salvific self-communication of the Father, we do not say that the Father has appeared and has united himself ‘hypostatically’ to some human nature.”50 Thus, Christ’s human nature is proper to the Son alone.

The immanent Word does not speak, but is rather spoken by the Father. Hence, Rahner stresses that “the Logos is not the one who utters, but the one who is uttered.”51 However, the incarnate Word does speak what he hears from the Father in his humanity, as “Christ’s ‘human

This leads to the question of how the lumen gloriae, which admits to the immediacy of God, is related to the glorified humanity of Christ, for which we have also claimed the function of perpetual mediation of the immediacy of the vision of God. This function must exist, if we are really to affirm a perpetual function of mediatorship in the God-man, and if it is not to be excluded by what is after all the essence of salvation and supernatural bliss, the immediate vision of God.

48 Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” 170.

49 Rahner, The Trinity, 35.

50 Ibid., 63n17.

51 Ibid., 106.

225 nature’ . . . is precisely that which comes into being when God’s Logos ‘utters’ himself outwards.”52 Here, it should be noted that since the created grace of union grounds Christ’s mission to speak to the world what he hears from the Father, it must do so by grounding a created relation of Christ’s humanity to the immanent Word. This created relation of Christ’s humanity to the Son is analogous to the Father’s uncreated relation to the Son. Now, just as paternity is what relates the Father to the Son, the created grace of union is what relates Christ’s humanity to the Son. As such, it follows that the created grace of union imitates divine paternity.

This comparison could yield some analogical understanding of the Father in his relation to the

Son. On this matter, Rahner’s view appears to be compatible with Lonergan and Robert Doran’s position that the created grace of union participates in paternity, rather than filiation.53

Now, while Rahner mostly speaks of Christ’s human subsistence in terms of the created grace of union, he does use the language of esse secundarium on at least one occasion. In a dialogue at the “Symposium de l'Arbresle” in 1961, which is transcribed in Problèmes Actuels de

Christologie in a French translation, Rahner discusses the term esse secundarium as used by

Thomas Aquinas.54 He suggests that Aquinas’ statements on the existence of Christ in Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2 and Quaestio disputata de unione Verbi incarnati are not contradictory, as they may appear. He contends, rather, that they emphasize different aspects of the issue in a

52 Ibid., 89.

53 Cf. Robert M. Doran, The Trinity in History: Missions and Processions (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012), 53.

54 Cf. H. Bouëssé et al., “Débats sur le Rapport du P. Patfoort,” in Problèmes Actuels de Christologie: Travaux du Symposium de l'Arbresle 1961, eds. H. Bouëssé and J.-J. Latour (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1965).

226 complementary manner.55 He believes that Aquinas’ discussion of Christ’s esse secundarium in

De unione does not contradict his claim in Summa theologiae III, q. 17, a. 2 that the divine esse is the esse of Christ. For Rahner, it is possible to reconcile both statements of Aquinas if the esse secundarium is defined as “what is given by the divine esse to this nature, in the way that it makes it exist.” Toward this end, he explains that Christ’s humanity exists through the divine esse, as the infinite quasi-formal cause of its subsistence, and through the esse secundarium, as

God’s finite formal effect.56 He says,

55 Cf. Dennis W. Jowers, The Trinitarian Axiom of Karl Rahner: The Economic Trinity Is the Immanent Trinity and Vice Versa (Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2006), 170n: “Rahner offers what he regards as a reconciliation of the view that Christ’s human nature exists by the existence of the Word with the view that this nature possesses its own esse secundarium. . . . Rahner at least seems to ascribe two esses, the Logos’ esse divinum, and a creaturely esse secundarium, to the incarnate Christ.”

56 Guy Mansini discusses the quasi-formal relationship of the divine esse to Christ’s esse secundarium in Rahner’s theology. In fact, he identifies a quasi-formal relationship between uncreated grace and each of the created graces. Cf. Guy Mansini, “Quasi-Formal Causality and Change in the Other: A Note on Karl Rahner’s Christology,” Thomist 52 (1988): 294:

Just as uncreated grace is quasi-formally related to the just so that created sanctifying grace is its dispositive formal effect, really distinct from it, and just as the divine essence is quasi-formally related to the created and beatified intellect so that the lumen gloriae is its dispositive formal effect really distinct from it, so the divine esse of the Logos is quasi-formally related to the humanity of Jesus so that the esse secundarium of Christ spoken of by St. Thomas is its dispositive formal effect, really distinct from it.

Rahner elsewhere identifies a quasi-formal relationship of uncreated grace to the created graces of sanctifying grace and the light of glory. Cf. Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 341:

Does not our view, with its emphasis on the relative independence of uncreated grace as regards created grace, endanger the significance of created grace for justification, adoption, etc., as Trent sees them? We need not here go into the familiar controversy conducted above all by Scheeben and Granderath as to the meaning of Chapter VII of the Sixth Session of the Council of Trent in the matter of the unica causa formalis iustificationis. In this question too we may surely have recourse to the concepts developed in scholastic theology in its treatment of the visio beatifica. Just as there the light of glory is seen as the dispositio ultima quae est necessitas ad formam, so here an analogous relationship may be assumed to hold between created and uncreated grace. In this regard created grace is seen as causa materialis (dispositio ultima) for the formal causality which God exercises by graciously communicating his own Being to the creature.

227

I have some difficulty accepting that St. Thomas could have changed his position so quickly; whether De Unione is anterior or posterior to the IIIa pars, the difficulty remains in both cases. That is why I wonder whether these two views, which seem so diverse, are not reconcilable in a certain way. Could not the esse secundarium be conceived as what is given by the divine esse to this nature, in the way that it makes it exist? This question is really very complex: indeed, on the one hand, it is necessary to assign to the divine esse a formal, and not only efficient causality, which causes something distinct from itself, in human nature, to be something human. And on the other hand, an infinite act communicating itself to a finite potency, considered in itself, is neither limited nor restricted. Nevertheless, what it does in nature itself is and remains finite and limited in some manner. That is why we must distinguish in God a formal cause and its formal effect. Is it not in this sense that a reconciliation of the two views attributed to St. Thomas would be possible?57

Furthermore, Rahner argues that while Christ’s human nature subsists in a divine person instead of a human person, this does not remove something positive from his humanity. He notes that when God causes a human nature to subsist as a person, this negates that human nature’s limitations in regard to personality. Hence, as Christ’s humanity is caused by God to subsist in the divine esse, the divine esse negates a negativity in his human nature inasmuch as it adds

57 H. Bouëssé et al., “Débats sur le Rapport du P. Patfoort,” 414-5:

J’ai quelque difficulté à admettre que saint Thomas ait pu changer si rapidement de position; que le De Unione soit antérieur ou postérieur à la IIIa pars, la difficulté demeure dans les deux cas. C’est pourquoi je me demande si ces deux opinions, qui paraissent si diverses, ne sont pas conciliables d’une certaine façon. L’esse secundarium ne pourrait-il pas être conçu comme ce qui est donné par l’esse divin à cette nature, en tant qu’il la fait exister? Cette question est vraiment trés complexe: en effet, d’un côté, il faut assigner dans l’esse divin une causalité formelle, et pas seulement efficiente, qui fasse que quelque chose de distinct de soi, dans la nature humaine, soit quelque chose d’humain. Et d’un autre côté, un acte infini se communiquant à une puissance finie, considéré en lui-même, n’est ni limité ni restreint. Néanmoins, ce qu’il fait dans la nature elle-même, est et reste fini et limité de quelque manière. C’est pourquoi nous ne pouvons que distinguer en Dieu une cause formelle et son effet formel. N’est-ce pas dans ce sens que serait possible une conciliation des deux opinions attribuées à saint Thomas?

Translation is mine. For another occasion on which Rahner identifies two existences in Christ, one principal and one secondary, cf. John M. McDermott, “The Christologies of Karl Rahner,” Gregorianum 67 (1986): 310n: “At a seminar with the Theology Department after the reception of an honorary doctorate on May 25, 1982 at Fordham University Rahner replied to a question about the number of existences in Christ with a chuckle: ‘An old question: in one respect, two; in another, one.’”

228 something more to it that exceeds the limitations of finite personality, namely divine personality.

Hence, the divine esse does not undermine Christ’s human nature and subjectivity, but rather adds to it insofar as the Son’s divine personality exceeds the limitations of human personality. As

Rahner explains,

Here is what one might say: in the very concept of created personality, there is something negative. Thus, what the divine personality negates within the human personality is a negativity and not some positivity. Human nature does not let go of what, by itself, must be assigned to it; it only gives up a certain limitation as to our personality. It is not because something is lacking that it is not a human person, but rightly because it has much more.58

Accordingly, Rahner concludes that subsisting in the divine esse elevates Christ’s finite human existence (as an esse secundarium) beyond what is natural to humanity apart from a hypostatic union with the Word. As he states, “So we could demonstrate why it is more perfect to exist in the Divine Word for that nature (that nature not being the nature of God). This is the reason why human nature must be analyzed in such a way that it appears that the ultimate actuation of this nature is precisely the actuation by the divine esse.”59 These insights provide much material for reflection upon the esse secundarium as an analogue for the relationship of the

Father to the Son.

58 H. Bouëssé et al., “Débats sur le Rapport du P. Patfoort,” 415:

Voici ce qu’on pourrait dire: dans le concept même de personnalité créée, il y a quelque chose de négatif. Donc, ce que nie la personnalité divine au sein de la personnalité humaine, c’est une négativité et non pas quelque positivité. La nature humaine ne laisse pas partir ce qui, par soi, doit lui être assigné, elle ne fait qu’abandonner une certaine limitation quant à notre personnalité. Ce n’est pas parce que quelque chose lui manque, qu’elle n’est pas une personne humaine, mais c’est bien parce qu’elle a beaucoup plus.

59 Ibid.: “Alors on pourrait démontrer pourquoi c’est plus parfait d’exister dans le Verbe divin pour cette nature-là (cette nature n’étant pas la nature de Dieu). C’est la raison pour laquelle la nature humaine doit être analysée de telle sorte qu’il apparaisse que l’ultime actuation de cette nature est précisément l’actuation par l’esse divin.”

229

2. Point Two: Sanctifying Grace

Rahner believes that the Son is not the only member of the Trinity to whom humanity has a non-appropriated relation through a particular form of created grace. Indeed, the hypostatic union is not the only instance in which a divine person has a special hypostatic relation to something created.60 Rather, he stresses that human beings are related to each of the three divine persons in a non-appropriated manner through the created formal effects of uncreated grace. As will be seen below, Rahner argues that the gift of sanctifying grace bestows people with a relation to the Holy Spirit who dwells in them. He also discusses charity as a participation in the

Holy Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son. Hence, his views bear some similarity to

Lonergan’s claims about sanctifying grace and charity in his four-point hypothesis.

In the event of God’s self-communication, the notional knowledge and love of the Son and Spirit are bestowed upon human beings as uncreated grace in an interrelated manner.61 As

Rahner notes, “The two basic aspects of the divine self-communication condition each other from the start. Hence we must be able to show that moments of one basic manner of self- communication must also have meaning and importance for the other one.”62 Now, since the divine persons are interrelated, each as a quasi-formal cause through uncreated grace, their

60 Cf. Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” 89: “It has not been strictly proved by Galtier and the theologians who share his theory that a special hypostatic relation must be strictly a hypostatic union.”

61 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 117n: “For every metaphysics of the spirit even knowledge as such possesses already a moment of volition, hence of love. This too entails that the utterance of the Logos as such occurs in a movement of love, which reaches its completion in the ‘breathing’ of the Spirit.”

62 Ibid., 95n13.

230 respective material causes (i.e. created graces) must also be interrelated. These created graces, which communicate the Trinity as the external terms of the divine missions, shape human knowledge and love together as the two modalities of human transcendence.63

Accordingly, Rahner correlates the divine missions with the divine processions of the

Son and Holy Spirit, who are communicated economically through their created external terms of incarnation and grace.64 Indeed, he identifies the divine missions with the “two absolute self- communications of God in the hypostatic union and in the grace which grows into glory.”65

Rahner explains further that the divinizing sanctification of human beings is properly related to the Spirit, just as Christ’s humanity is properly related to the Son:

It follows that the two immanent processions in God correspond (in identity) with the two missions, and that the relationships to created realities constituted in formal (not efficient) causality by the missions as processions are not appropriations (procession of the Logos — hypostatic union; procession of the Spirit — divinizing sanctification of man). The relationships are proper to the persons in each case.66

In considering the divine processions and missions, Rahner recognizes the following as mysteries: “the Trinity with its two processions, and the two self-communications of God ad

63 Ibid., 116: “An authentic metaphysics of the spirit tells us that there are two (and only two!) basic activities of the spirit: knowledge and love.”

64 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Revelation, II. God’s Self-Communication,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 1468: “Corresponding to the two Trinitarian processions, immanent in the Trinity and in the economy of salvation, incarnation and grace can be regarded as two self-communications of God, both having their ground in God’s one free decision to self- communication ad extra.” Also, cf. Rahner, “Trinity, Divine,” 1761: “They [the missions] terminate respectively in the human nature of Christ and the ‘created’ grace of the justified.”

65 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 71.

66 Rahner, “Trinity, Divine,” 1759. Cf. Mansini, “Quasi-Formal Causality and Change in the Other,” 294: “Uncreated grace is quasi-formally related to the just so that created sanctifying grace is its dispositive formal effect, really distinct from it.”

231 extra in a real formal causality corresponding to the two processions.”67 For him, the incarnation of the Son and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit are “the inner, mutually related moments of the one self-communication, through which God (the Father) communicates himself to the world unto absolute proximity.”68 Hence, through the divine missions of the Son and Spirit and their external terms, the Father is also communicated. Indeed, the incarnation communicates the

Father inasmuch as the esse secundarium participates in paternity by its non-appropriated relation to the Son. Likewise, sanctifying grace communicates the Father together with the Son inasmuch as sanctifying grace participates in their active spiration by its non-appropriated relation to the Spirit.

Furthermore, the interrelation of the two divine missions suggests a relationship between the esse secundarium, by which Christ’s humanity subsists in the Word, and sanctifying grace, by which the Spirit dwells in people. Thus, Rahner describes God’s self-communication through four pairs of aspects, in which the first terms correspond to the Son and the second terms to the

Spirit.69 These four double aspects of God’s self-communication may be received by human beings as the fulfillment of their transcendence.70 While he does not claim them to be exhaustive,

67 Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 72.

68 Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” 85.

69 Cf. Peter Phan, Eternity in Time: A Study of Karl Rahner’s Eschatology (Cranbury, NJ: Susquehanna University Press, 1988), 144: “The first series of four terms—origin, history, invitation, and knowledge—constitutes a unity and describes the first moment of God’s self-communication, namely, the Incarnation of the Son. The second series of four terms—end, transcendence, acceptance, and love—also constitutes a unity and describes the second moment of God’s self-communication, namely, the descent of the Spirit.”

70 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 91: “The four double aspects thus become intelligible under this assumption, namely, that the human personal subject is the addressee who is, of his very nature, demanded by the divine self- communication, which creates him as the condition of its own possibility.”

232 these pairings describe how the Spirit leads human beings to accept God’s self-communication offered by the Son.71 He writes,

Once we presuppose this concept of the self-communication of God, it reveals to us a fourfold group of aspects: (a) Origin-Future; (b) History-Transcendence; (c) Invitation- Acceptance; (d) Knowledge-Love. We must first explain each of these double aspects. Next we must consider the inner unity of the first members of every pairing as contrasted with that of the second members. If we succeed in this second task, we shall understand that the one self-communication of God occurs in two basic ways which belong together.72

3. Point Three: The Habit of Charity

In addition to identifying incarnation and grace as the two modes of God’s self- communication, Rahner appears on occasion to distinguish the habit of charity from sanctifying grace. For instance, he notes in one place that the life of grace and habitual charity are related but distinct effects of receiving the Eucharist: “Strengthening, increase and complete fulfilment of the life of grace, increase of habitual charity and awakening of actual charity are all among the first and most characteristic effects of the Holy Eucharist.”73

Rahner regards the habit, or virtue, of charity as the principle of charitable acts. Indeed, he notes that “the specific Christian love of neighbour is both in potency and in act a moment of

71 Cf. ibid., 88n11: “We do not claim here and in what follows that we can necessarily distinguish only these four couples of aspects. It suffices that they exist and that, in the unity of all the elements of either side, they sufficiently clarify for us the doubleness of God’s self-communication.”

72 Ibid., 88.

73 Karl Rahner, “The Meaning of Frequent Confession of Devotion,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 3: The Theology of the Spiritual Life, trans. Karl H. Kruger and Boniface Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1967), 182.

233 the infused supernatural theological virtue of caritas.”74 For Rahner, the virtue of charity is rooted in its openness to God’s self-communication in the form of sanctifying grace. As he states, “Caritas means nothing else than the absolute radicality of this love in so far as it is open to the immediacy of the God who communicates himself under the form of grace.”75 Further, he expresses the dependence of the virtue of charity upon sanctifying grace when he says, “In this basic act [of the love of neighbor] are also accepted the conditions of its possibility, one of which is the reference of man to God when supernaturally elevated by grace.”76 Hence, Rahner identifies the virtue of charity as an effect of sanctifying grace: “Genuine love is de facto always that theological virtue of caritas which is sustained by God himself through his grace.”77 Overall, these comments seem to indicate a real distinction between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity.

Rahner’s theology of the habit of charity appears to be adaptable to developing a four- point hypothesis because it indicates how charity participates in the divine relation of passive spiration. In fact, he regards the habit of charity as a distinct form of created grace that relates one to God through the non-appropriated indwelling of the Holy Spirit. He explains that it is “the infused supernatural theological virtue of caritas by which we love God in his Spirit for his own

74 Karl Rahner, “Reflections on the Unity of the Love of Neighbour and the Love of God,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 6: Concerning Vatican Council II, trans. Karl H. Kruger and Boniface Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1969), 236.

75 Ibid., 243.

76 Ibid., 246.

77 Karl Rahner, “Marriage as a Sacrament,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 10: Writings of 1965-1967, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1973), 206. Emphasis in original.

234 sake and in direct community with him.”78 This statement resembles Lonergan’s description of the habit of charity as a participation in the Spirit’s passive spiration, to which the Father and

Son have a non-appropriated relation through active spiration.

It is granted that Rahner does not distinguish between entitative and operative habits, which is how Lonergan came to affirm a real distinction between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity early in his career. Yet, transcendental method can be used to identify four preeminent created graces even without relying upon the metaphysical psychology of the scholastics that focuses on how grace affects the different faculties of the human soul. Indeed, if it is possible for

Doran to transpose the four-point hypothesis of Lonergan’s early Latin theology into the categories of his later methodical theology, so too might it be transposed from its original theological context into the categories of Rahner’s transcendental theology. This transposition would include a real distinction between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity.

4. Point Four: The Light of Glory

For Rahner, the esse secundarium of Christ’s humanity enables other humans on earth to receive sanctifying grace, which in turn allows people to receive supernatural love through the habit of charity and supernatural knowledge through the light of glory.79 In heaven, God’s

78 Rahner, “Reflections on the Unity of the Love of Neighbour and the Love of God,” 236. Cf. ibid., 246: “Both acts [i.e. love of God and love of neighbor] are necessarily supported by the (experienced but unreflected) reference both to God and to the intramundane Thou and this by grace (of the infused caritas).”

79 Cf. Rahner, “The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,” 68: “Is this elevation to grace and glory only really possible on the basis of the hypostatic union? . . . We can only have this vision in its immediacy, in so far as it is mediated by the hypostatic union of the human nature of Jesus with the Logos of God.”

235 uncreated grace perfects each of these created graces in the saints. Yet, the light of glory is unique among these four in that people do not receive it at all until they enter heaven, when God bestows the beatific vision upon them. The beatific knowledge received in God’s quasi-formal causality through the light of glory is prefigured by what people on earth know from divine revelation through the light of faith.80 Yet, only the light of glory serves as the material disposition by which people may receive the quasi-formal self-communication of God in the beatific vision. As Rahner says,

In the beatific vision there is present as its ontological presupposition a ‘relation’ between creature and God which is not a categorical one, resting upon an accidental absolute modification, but is a quasi-formal causality of God himself upon the created spirit; so that (corresponding to the general nature of the relationship of a ‘forma’ to its formal effect) the reality of the mind in the beatific vision, so far as such a reality in itself is due to a species as the means of knowledge, is the very Being of God.81

Rahner does not always identify an ontological distinction between sanctifying grace and the light of glory. Indeed, he states that “grace and beatific vision form a unity, in which grace initiates and has the same formal character as the vision of God, so that grace and glory are two

80 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Beatific Vision,” in Encylopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 80: “God himself fulfils in a quasi-formal way the necessary function of a species impressa for cognition. If in addition a created real, ontological specification of the mind is required (the lumen gloriae as perfecting the habitus of faith – D 475), the relation of this to God’s quasi- formal self-communication for the beatific vision must be described in a similar way to the relation between ‘created’ and ‘uncreated’ grace.”

81 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 332. Cf. Burke, Reinterpreting Rahner, 51: “Through quasi-formal causality the beatific vision and the lumen gloriae exist in a relation of mutual priority.” Cf. ibid., 241: “Just as the beatific vision logically precedes the lumen gloriae, which exists as its material cause and dispositio ultima, so also God’s presence in the soul in uncreated grace logically precedes the created grace that is its material cause and disposition ultima.” Also, cf. Mansini, “Quasi-Formal Causality and Change in the Other,” 294: “The divine essence is quasi-formally related to the created and beatified intellect so that the lumen gloriae is its dispositive formal effect really distinct from it.”

236 historical phases of the one grace.”82 Yet, he does distinguish the two when he writes that “the created grace of the ‘pilgrim’ state (status viatoris) is distinct at least in degree from the light of glory.”83 Rahner also seems to suggest that they differ in kind, rather than merely in degree, when he states that the glory of the beatific vision is “not just a growth” from sanctifying grace as “a final stage arising out of an inner impulse.” He argues that the beatific vision, bestowed by

God’s uncreated grace through the light of glory, is “a new eschatological intervention” of God beyond sanctifying grace. As he explains,

Just as grace in general as an entitative supernatural elevation of man can be described in more precise detail only in terms of its definitive unfolding, the visio (though this ‘unfolding’ and ‘disclosure’ are not just a ‘growth’ to a final stage arising out of an inner impulse but are also a new eschatological intervention of the God who is still in himself concealed), so too uncreated grace is only to be determined in terms of the visio: it is the homogeneous commencement, already given though still concealed and still to unfold, of that communication of the divine Being taking place by way of formal causality to the created spirit which is the ontological presupposition of the visio.84

Rahner notes that people with the light of glory behold not just the divine nature in the beatific vision, but rather all three divine persons who are communicated as uncreated grace.85

82 Rahner, “Revelation, II. God’s Self-Communication,” 1467-8.

83 Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 336n26. Cf. ibid., 336-7:

We need not attempt to decide here how we should interpret the distinction between the communication of the divine Being to man by way of formal causality in grace and in the visio: whether we should interpret it as a difference in the degree of this increasing communication in itself, or as a difference derived from the difference in the material disposition to this communication. In other words, we do not intend to take up the question whether the growth from uncreated grace to the possession of God as the basis of the visio beatifica is an inner growth of this possession in itself or just the ‘growth’ (always understood with the restriction indicated above) of created grace into the light of glory – or whether this either-or is really not justified at all in a more precisely worked-out ontology of the relationship between causa formalis and causa materialis.

84 Ibid., 334-5.

85 Cf. Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” 95:

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This is only possible because people have non-appropriated relations to each of the divine persons through grace.86 When people receive beatific knowledge of their relations to the divine persons through the light of glory, they participate in the filiation of the Son as the divine Word.

This participation in the Son gives them a non-appropriated relation to the Father as children of

God. Hence, Rahner suggests that this divine sonship exists properly in relation to the Father alone, and not in relation to the Son and Spirit:

We are children of the Father of Christ by participation in the eternal sonship of the only begotten Son. And it remains an open question whether we can characterize as sonship the justified man’s relationship through grace to the Son and the Spirit (so that this fatherhood by grace is merely appropriated to the First Person of the Trinity); or whether, strictly speaking, it is not possible to interpret this relationship to the Son and the Spirit as sonship, so that each of the three divine Persons has its own proper relationship to the justified man, not merely an appropriated one.87

This trinitarian communication (the ‘indwelling’ of God, the ‘uncreated grace’, to be understood not merely as the communication of the divine ‘nature’ but also and indeed primarily as communication of the ‘persons’, since it takes place in a free spiritual personal act and so from person to person) is the real ontological foundation of the life of grace in man and (under the requisite conditions) of the immediate vision of the divine persons at the moment of fulfilment.

86 Cf. Rahner, “Beatific Vision,” 79: “The doctrine of the beatific vision must, therefore, from the start make its Trinitarian aspect clear. When reference is made to a ‘sharing in the divine nature’, it must not be overlooked that this participation is necessarily triune and is given for there to be a direct relation between God and the spiritual person of the creature. It is, therefore, implied that there is a direct relation of the creature to God precisely as Father, Son, and Spirit.” Also, cf. Rahner, “Remarks on the Dogmatic Treatise ‘De Trinitate,’” 95n25:

We have therefore an immediate vision of the divine persons, which cannot be thought of as mediated by a created ‘species impressa’, but only by the actual reality of the object contemplated itself which imparts itself in real quasi-formal causality to the subject, as the ontological condition of possibility of formal knowledge. But this implies necessarily a real and ontological relationship of the subject to each of the persons as such in their real proprieties. This point was perhaps not considered attentively enough by medieval theologians, but it is certainly a consequence of their theological principles with regard to the vision.

87 Karl Rahner, “Theos in the New Testament,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 147-8.

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Rahner’s eschatology clarifies why people with sanctifying grace are bestowed with the light of glory in heaven by God’s uncreated grace. His eschatological views thus warrant some attention. In “The Hermeneutics of Eschatological Assertions,” Rahner expounds upon seven hermeneutical principles for eschatological assertions. The first two principles concern the object of eschatological assertions. The first principle is that eschatological assertions pertain to the future, not simply the present.88 The second principle is that while God knows future realites through omniscience, God reveals them in a manner which does not exceed the capacity of human understanding.89 Hence, although human reason is limited, people are guided into their eschatological future first through the light of faith, then ultimately through the light of glory.

The third and fourth principles identify the tension between history and transcendence in eschatological assertions and the manner of its resolution. The third principle identifies the dialectical tension between the transcendent hiddenness of the last things (eschata) and the human spirit’s immanent concern with the present.90 The fourth principle advances a resolution

88 Cf. Karl Rahner, “The Hermeneutics of Eschatological Assertions,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 4: More Recent Writings, trans. Kevin Smyth (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966), 326: “The Christian understanding of the faith and its expression must contain an eschatology which really bears on the future, that which is still to come, in a very ordinary, empirical sense of the word time.”

89 Cf. ibid.:

The Christian understanding of the nature, life and personal being of God takes his ‘omniscience’ not merely as a metaphysical axiom, but as a strict truth of faith, and makes it include God’s knowledge of future events. In so far as this knowledge embraces the realities of the world and mankind, there can be no denying or doubting, in metaphysics or theology, the fundamental ‘abstract’ possibility of the communication of such future events: they are known by God and they are human, and hence do not of themselves in principle go beyond the capacity of human understanding.

90 Cf. ibid., 329-31:

The sphere of eschatological assertions and hence of their hermeneutic is constituted by the dialectical unity of two limiting statements. . . .

239 to this tension by noting that the present has an etiological relation to the future, such that human nature experiences futurity in its own self-awareness in the present.91 This is due to the nature of the human spirit, which concerns itself with both the categorical realities of history and its transcendental orientation toward the infinite. Accordingly, when God reveals the eschata to humanity, God does so not by causing a transcendent apocalyptic vision to invade upon and eviscerate the present historical order. Instead, God’s revelation of the eschata meets human beings where they are in history and allows them to correlate their present experience of God in history with their transcendental and eschatological orientation. Rather than be annihilated by the eschatological revelation of God, history is able to be consummated through the human spirit’s

(a) It is certain from Scripture that God has not revealed to man the day of the end. . . . The truth is that the end has for us a character of hiddenness which is essential and proper to it and effects all its elements. . . .

(b) The second element which constitutes and defines the sphere of eschatological assertions and hence their hermeneutic, is the essential historicity of man. . . . His self-understanding embraces beginning and end of his temporal history, both in the life of the individual man and of humanity.

91 Cf. ibid., 332:

If what has been said in 3a and 3b is correct, that is, if such real future is known and present, but as something hidden, we are to expect – under the reserves made in Thesis 1 – that the content of this knowledge, no matter whence it comes, which is part of the present constitution of man, is the element of the future yet to come which is necessary to present existence. Knowledge of the future will be knowledge of the futurity of the present: eschatological knowledge is knowledge of the eschatological present. An eschatological assertion is not an additional, supplementary statement appended to an assertion about the present and the past of man but an inner moment of this self-understanding of man. Because man is, by and in being orientated to the future, he must know about his future. But in such a way, that this knowledge of the future can be a moment in his knowledge of the present. And only thus. This alone is sufficient to give the content of eschatological knowledge the character of hiddenness. If it were an account of the future anticipated and ‘fore’ – seen as it is in itself, then the future, as the fulfilment of what is human, could not really have the character of hiddenness and mystery. It could be marvellous, unexpected and amazing, just as if someone were to fore-tell that I should one day be emperor of China. But it could not be mysterious and hidden if it were described in terms of its own phenomena, created ones, even in the state of their fulfilment. But if this knowledge is: 1. a moment in the self-understanding of the present of man, which self-understanding is a constitutive moment of the being of man as person and spirit; and 2. if this self- understanding essentially bears on freedom, risk and abandoning oneself to the uncontrollable: then this known futurity necessarily shares the character of this existence, as something moving into the unforeseen.

240 dynamic encounter of grace. Hence, while human freedom is exercised in the present, it has a transcendental relation to the immanent and transcendent consummation of the world.92

Ultimately, the beatific vision is the culmination of human freedom in its knowledge and love for

God as the ultimate good. Hence, the light of glory builds upon sanctifying grace when human freedom reaches its fulfillment in reference to God, the ground of human identity.

Building upon these ideas, the fifth principle (which Rahner calls the basic principle) claims that what God reveals to humanity about the eschata corresponds to the actual history of salvation as it gradually unfolds unto its consummation.93 Since salvation history has reached a

92 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Immanent and Transcendent Consummation of the World,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 10: Writings of 1965-1967, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1973), 281:

93 Cf. Rahner, “The Hermeneutics of Eschatological Assertions,” 334:

Man’s knowledge of the future still to come, even his revealed knowledge, is confined to such prospects as can be derived from the reading of his present eschatological experience. And thus we can understand that the progress of eschatological revelation in the pre-Christian and Christian revelation up to its climax in Christ is identical with the progress of the revelation of the actual history of salvation, that is, with God’s actual action on man at any given moment. Thus the climax of eschatological revelation is necessarily what it actually is: that God has revealed to man his trinitarian self-disclosure and self-communication in the grace of the crucified and risen Lord, a revelation already actual, though still only in faith. Eschatology is therefore not a pre-view of events to come later – which was the basic view of false apocalyptic in contrast to genuine prophecy. It does not draw on future events, accessible because God is ‘already’ contemporary to them, in a metaphysical doctrine of the being and knowledge of God, and so can

241 climax in Christ’s incarnation, everything humans know about the eschata is derived from the knowledge of Christ. Through their encounter with Christ, human beings anticipate the consummation of their current eschatological situation. Ultimately, the second coming of Christ will lay bare the eschata and finish the world’s consummation. This explains why Christ is the mediator of all grace, including the light of glory.94 Additionally, since Christ is the climax of divine revelation, it follows that the light of glory can only culminate created grace inasmuch as it participates in Christ’s filiation as the Word of God. The light of glory perfects humanity’s imitation of Christ by allowing people to share in his non-appropriated relation to the Father.

The sixth and seventh principles essentially unpack this basic principle. The sixth principle describes several implications of the basic principle that clarify its meaning. For instance, Rahner notes that eternal salvation is realized in the consummate freedom of the human spirit when it completely accepts divine grace.95 The seventh principle identifies the criterion of the basic principle according to which one may distinguish the form and content of eschatological assertions. The nature of images, as the form through which the eschata are

already speak of them. Eschatology is the view of the future which man needs for the spiritual decision of his freedom and his faith. It derives from the situation in the history of salvation brought about by the event of Christ, which is the aetiological source of knowledge. It looks forward to the definitive fulfilment of an existence already in an eschatological situation.

94 Cf. Karl Rahner, “The Eternal Significance of the Humanity of Jesus for Our Relationship with God,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 3: The Theology of the Spiritual Life, trans. Karl H. Kruger and Boniface Kruger (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1967).

95 Cf. ibid., 340:

Hence on principle only one predestination will be spoken of in a Christian eschatology. And it contains only one theme which is there on its own behalf: the victory of grace in redemption consummated. Possible damnation can only be spoken of, but must be spoken of, in so far as, and only in so far as it is forbidden to man to take the sure triumph of grace in the world as providing him himself with already fixed and acquired points in his estimation of an existence which is still to be lived out in the boldness of freedom.

242 depicted in eschatological assertions, requires that one understand the content they communicate through the power of abstraction. Rahner connects this point with Thomas Aquinas’ epistemic views about turning to the phantasm, in which the intellect apprehends truth only by abstracting an intelligible species from a mental image. This follows from Rahner’s basic principle that people learn of the eschata by abstracting from the various images and modes of expression through which God is revealed in salvation history. Yet, in the light of glory, human beings are able to see God directly, rather than through an image or a finite intelligible species. As a participation in the Son, the light of glory is the material disposition for a beatific vision of the otherwise invisible God, whom the Word makes visible to humanity as the perfect image of the

Father.

D. Conclusion

This chapter identified areas of agreement between Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis and

Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity. It examined Rahner’s reflections upon Christ’s esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory. While noting his occasional lack of precision, it also discussed the respects in which Rahner distinguishes these four created graces and correlates each of them in a non-appropriated manner with a participated divine relation. In agreement with Rahner’s theology of human beings’ non-appropriated relations to the divine persons, it contended that these four created graces facilitate distinct manners of participation in the uncreated grace of the divine persons and the four divine relations among them. Accordingly, it argued that the four-point hypothesis could be transposed into

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Rahner’s theological categories, especially those pertaining to God’s quasi-formal causality as the determining principle of humanity’s supernatural existential.

This chapter has laid some groundwork for transposing the four-point hypothesis from

Lonergan’s methodical theology to Rahner’s transcendental theology. Additionally, it has prepared for the construction of a supernatural, psychological analogy for the Trinity on the basis of Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity. These topics will be explored in the next chapter.

CHAPTER IV

Developing the Four-Point Hypothesis into a Supernatural Trinitarian Analogy from the Foundations of Karl Rahner’s Theology

This chapter will use Karl Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity to further develop the four-point hypothesis. It will argue that developing a supernatural psychological analogy for the Trinity in reference to the four-point hypothesis would be agreeable with Rahner’s

Trinitarian theology and would allow its major themes to be expounded with increased precision.

In preparation for this discussion, it will be necessary in what follows to distinguish natural and supernatural analogies for the Trinity. Additionally, Rahner’s critical remarks about traditional psychological analogies will be examined in order to show his openness to a supernatural psychological analogy.

A. Natural Analogies for the Trinity

Natural reason cannot understand the divine essence or God’s necessary existence as a

Trinity of persons. However, it can use various analogies to reach a partial understanding of God on account of the likeness of creatures to their creator.1 Such analogies attempt to describe the

1 The differences among these natural analogies are not based in the divine essence, which is ultimately simple, but rather in the multiple and varied ways in which creatures imitate and participate in God. Furthermore, the different manners of participation in God by creatures correspond to the multiplicity of divine ideas. Cf. John F. Wippel, “Thomas Aquinas on the Distinction and Derivation of the Many from the One: A Dialectic between Being and Nonbeing,” The Review of Metaphysics 38, no. 3 (1985): 582-3:

For Thomas a divine idea is a given way in which God views his essence as capable of being imitated by a creature. Since God views his essence as capable of being imitated in many different ways, there are many 244 245 divine essence in reference to the essential properties of creatures that participate in God’s being.2 Yet, since God’s reality as efficient cause, which creatures naturally imitate, is shared in common by all three divine persons, natural reason cannot demonstrate any of the properties of

God as a differentiated Trinity. As Thomas Aquinas states, “The creative power of God is common to the whole Trinity; and hence it belongs to the unity of the essence, and not to the distinction of the persons. Therefore, by natural reason we can know what belongs to the unity of the essence, but not what belongs to the distinction of the persons.”3 Further, he notes, “The essential attributes of God are more clear to us from the standpoint of reason than the personal properties; because we can derive certain knowledge of the essential attributes from creatures which are sources of knowledge to us, such as we cannot obtain regarding the personal properties.”4 Hence, natural reason alone cannot discover any plurality in the unity of God. It can only prove that the divine essence is one and that God is personal.

different divine ideas. These ideas, of course, are not really distinct from the divine essence or from one another. But the actually existing creature which corresponds to any such divine idea will be really distinct both from the divine essence and from other creatures.

2 For a Thomistic account of the participation of creatures in God, cf. Cornelio Fabro, “Intensive Hermeneutics of Thomistic Philosophy,” translated by B. M. Bonansea, Review of Metaphysics 27, no. 3 (1974): 468: “All creatures are beings by participation, inasmuch as their essence participates in the esse which is the ultimate act of all reality.”

3 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 32, a. 1, co. in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1: 1a QQ. 1-119, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province (1948; repr., Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1981), 169. For the original Latin, cf. Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, ed. Petri Caramello (Taurini: Marietti, 1948), 168-9.

4 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 39, a. 7, co. in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 200. For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 198.

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However, the use of natural reason is not the only means humans have to understand

God. In fact, supernatural revelation provides them with further insight into divine reality.

Although God has one essence and one act of existence, salvation history reveals that God subsists as three divine persons. The biblical names for these divine persons are “Father,” “Son,” and “Holy Spirit.” Even though they are based upon natural analogues, they are presented as appropriate names for the divine persons by which they may be properly denominated. By implication, the terms “paternity,” “filiation,” and “passive spiration” are used to denominate the notional properties which, as substantial relations in God, constitute and distinguish the divine persons.5 Even though these terms for the notional properties are based upon natural analogues in their mode of signification, they may be predicated of the divine persons in a non-appropriated manner.6 By contrast, terms that properly denote the divine essence under different aspects may be predicated of one particular person only by appropriation.

In addition to the biblical names of “Father,” “Son,” and “Holy Spirit,” other names for the divine persons have been used by theologians to further explain their divinely revealed notional properties and relational opposition. For instance, the natural psychological analogy for the Trinity denominates the divine persons with such analogical names as “Intellect” or

5 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 32, a. 2, co., in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 171: “There must also be some abstract terms whereby we may answer that the persons are distinguished; and these are the properties or notions signified by an abstract term, as paternity and filiation. Therefore the divine essence is signified as What; and the person as Who; and the property as Whereby.” For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 170.

6 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 33, a. 2, ad. 4, in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 174: “The terms generation and paternity like the other terms properly applied to God, are said of God before creatures as regards the thing signified, but not as regards the mode of signification.” For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 174.

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“Memory” for the Father, “Word” or “Understanding” for the Son, and “Will” or “Love” for the

Holy Spirit. This analogy seeks to describe the notional properties of the divine persons in terms of the essential properties of the human intellect. It does not seek to demonstrate the Trinity, but rather to note parallels between God’s revealed truth about the Trinity and that which is observed in nature. In this case, Aquinas explains that reason operates by “confirming an already established principle, by showing the congruity of its results.”7

In clarifying the divine processions through the analogy of human intellectual processions, the natural psychological analogy provides a model for understanding the Trinity’s relational opposition. Yet, it should be noted that the divine intellect and will pertain to the divine essence that the Trinity shares in common. Hence, the essential attributes which the names

“Intellect,” “Word,” and “Will” suggest may only be appropriated to particular divine persons.8

Accordingly, while each of these names may be properly predicated of one of the divine persons, there are significant limits to what they can clarify about their notional properties. This is not surprising, since supernatural mysteries far exceed all natural attempts at explanation.

Rahner expresses concerns about these limits of natural psychological analogies for the

Trinity. He thinks that they often use circular reasoning when their models of human psychology

7 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 32, a. 1, ad. 2 in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 169. For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 169.

8 Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 39, a. 7, co., in Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1, trans. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, 200: “The divine person can be manifested in a twofold manner by the essential attributes; in one way by similitude, and thus the things which belong to the intellect are appropriated to the Son, Who proceeds by way of intellect, as Word. In another way by dissimilitude; as power is appropriated to the Father, as Augustine says, because fathers by reason of old age are sometimes feeble; lest anything of the kind be imagined of God.” For the original Latin text, cf. Summa theologiae, Prima Pars, 198.

248 are derived from their presuppositions about the doctrine of the Trinity.9 Furthermore, by focusing on the human intellect as a model for the divine relations, he believes that “the psychological theory of the Trinity neglects the experience of the Trinity in the economy of salvation in favor of a seemingly almost gnostic speculation about what goes on in the inner life of God.”10 He especially criticizes the traditional Augustinian psychological analogy because it depicts what is notional in God in terms of what is essential in human beings:

[The theologian’s] Augustinian-psychological speculations on the Trinity result in that well-known quandary which makes all of his marvelous profundity look so utterly vacuous: for he begins from a human philosophical concept of knowledge and love, and from this concept develops a concept of the word and “inclination” of love; and now, after having speculatively applied these concepts to the Trinity, he must admit that this application fails, because he has clung to the “essential” concept of knowledge and love, because a “personal,” “notional” concept of the word and “inclination” of love cannot be derived from human experience. For should he try so to derive it, the knowing Word and the loving Spirit themselves must in turn have a word and a love as persons proceeding from them.11

9 Cf. Karl Rahner, The Trinity, trans. Joseph Donceel (New York: Crossroad, 1970), 117-8: “Classic psychological speculations about the Trinity . . . have no evident model from human psychology for the doctrine of the Trinity. . . . Rather it postulates from the doctrine of the Trinity a model of human knowledge and love, which either remains questionable, or about which it is not clear that it can be more than a model of human knowledge precisely as finite. And this model it applies again to God.”

10 Karl Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith: An Introduction to the Idea of Christianity, trans. William Dych (New York: Crossroad, 1978), 135.

11 Rahner, The Trinity, 19. Cf. Neil Ormerod, “Wrestling with Rahner on the Trinity,” Irish Theological Quarterly 68 (2003): 24: “Rahner’s major criticism of the psychological analogy is that it remains hypothetical. It cannot be proven to be the case. It is unscriptural, except on the basis of artificial ’eisegesis’. It cannot explain the transition from essential to notional acts.”

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B. Toward a Supernatural Psychological Analogy

As an effect of God’s essential power of efficient causality, the human intellect has a created relation toward all three divine persons in common. In addition to this, however, human beings supernaturally imitate the divine persons through grace and acquire a unique, non- appropriated relation to each of them. This grace gives humans a participated experience of the notional properties of the divine persons.

The participation of human beings in the divine relations is an indispensable aspect of

God’s self-communication. Indeed, the persons of the immanent Trinity can only be said to enter history in their relative differentiation as the economic Trinity because the four created graces of the divine missions imitate the uncreated grace of the divine relations. Otherwise, only that which is common to the divine persons could be said to have entered human history, rather than the persons themselves in their differentiation. The intimate union of created grace with uncreated grace is what distinguishes it from all other created things which only imitate God as effects of God’s efficient causality which is common to all three divine persons.

Now, one might argue that the divine relations of paternity, filiation, and passive spiration cannot be participated because each of them is proper only to the one divine person that it constitutes. It is certainly true that since the divine persons subsist in an incommunicable manner, their notional properties and relations are also incommunicable and idiomatic. This means, for example, that only the Father can be the Father and have the divine relation of paternity. Yet, created participations of these notional properties and relations are communicable because the divine relations do not constitute persons in their finite mode of participation.

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Although grace enables human subjectivity to participate in the absolute subjectivity of God that subsists in three subjects, human subjectivity continues to subsist in one finite subject after receiving grace. Imitation of these divine relations in a finite mode does not undermine their incommunicability in their infinite mode.

The human experience of grace and participation in the divine relations may serve as a foundation for developing a stronger Trinitarian analogy than that constructed from natural human psychology. As such, Rahner suggests a new approach in developing analogies for the

Trinity.12 He argues that a more insightful Trinitarian analogy would describe the immanent

Trinity in terms of the divine relations of the economic Trinity which human beings experience in salvation history. As he writes, “Reflection about the distinctive character of man’s transcendent orientation in grace towards God as an essential mystery makes it clear who God really is (insofar as this can ever be expressed).”13 He believes it is preferable to describe the immanent Trinity through the economic manifestation of the divine relations because this relationality is what constitutes the differentiation within the unity of the divine essence.14

12 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 115: “An attempt to bring home to the intelligence of the faith an understanding of the threefold-distinct manner of subsisting of the one God by means of psychological categories and according to the model of the spiritual self-actuation of man differs considerably from the method used in the present essay.”

13 Karl Rahner, “God, III. Doctrine of God,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: A Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (London: Burns & Oates, 1975), 570-1. Cf. John P. Galvin, “Invitation of Grace,” in A World of Grace: An Introduction to the Themes and Foundations of Karl Rahner's Theology, ed. Leo J. O’Donovan (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1995), 68: “Our relationship with God in grace provides a starting point for an understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity.”

14 Cf Rahner, The Trinity, 69: “By pointing to the relationality of the divine persons we derive some help against the basic logical difficulty against the doctrine of the Trinity, namely, how there can be three really distinct persons in God, if each one of them is really identical with the one, simple essence of God.”

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Yet, so long as a psychological analogy does not neglect the economic Trinity, Rahner believes it could be useful as an analogical model for the immanent Trinity.15 He suggests that a psychological analogy for the Trinity would be greatly improved if it placed more emphasis upon the notional character of the word and love of the Son and Holy Spirit. He believes that knowledge of these notional acts cannot come from a study of human nature in itself, but only from humanity’s encounter with the divine missions of incarnation and grace.16 This is because

“the doctrine of the ‘missions’ is from its very nature the starting point for the doctrine of the

Trinity.”17 Accordingly, he argues, “‘Psychological’ interpretation of the Trinity can be legitimate, important, and illuminating only if it shows how it derives from the real and only starting point of the whole doctrine of the Trinity and how it leads back to it.”18

Rahner recommends a more modest approach to a psychological analogy that “does not try to explain why divine knowledge and love imply two processions ad modum operati”19 based

15 Cf. Rahner, The Trinity, 119: “When developing its ideas it has, as it were, forgotten about the ‘economic’ Trinity. If one does not do this, if one always remains within what faith tells about the ‘economic’ Trinity, it is still possible to construct a ‘psychological’ theology of the Trinity.”

16 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Reflections on Methodology in Theology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 11: Confrontations; 1, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1974), 108: “The Trinity as present in the economy of salvation through the two ‘missiones’ (of grace and the Incarnation) necessarily embodies also the Trinity as immanent.”

17 Rahner, The Trinity, 48.

18 Ibid.

19 Ibid, 119. Cf. Karl Rahner, “Trinity, Divine,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 1764: “The psychological interpretation of the Trinity fails to explain why God’s self-possession in knowledge and love, a single act, as it were, flowing from the essence of the one God, should demand a procession ad modum operati, as verbum and as amatum in amante, given the absolute actuality and simplicity of God. Without such a procession there is no real triad of ways of subsistence.”

252 upon the reasons why the human intellect requires such processions.20 He does recognize that

“an authentic metaphysics of the spirit tells us that there are two (and only two!) basic activities of the spirit: knowledge and love.”21 However, he argues, “We cannot further explain why or how these two basic actuations of God’s essence, as present in the unoriginated Father and, on account of God’s simplicity, essentially identical within him, constitute nonetheless the basis for two processions and thus for three distinct manners of subsisting.”22 Therefore, Trinitarian analogies that describe the divine persons in terms of different aspects of their shared intellectual nature can articulate only very little about their non-appropriated, notional properties.

Instead, Rahner favors constructing a Trinitarian analogy from the human experience of the divine persons’ notional acts that are revealed and participated in history through God’s self- communication.23 In this sense, he does not seek to repudiate traditional psychological analogies

20 Cf. Jordan Matthew Miller, “You Loved Me before the Foundation of the World: An Examination of Karl Rahner’s Doctrine of Trinity and Comparison to that of Hans Urs Von Balthasar” (PhD. diss., Fordham, 2014), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview /1562902315/fulltextPDF/ 52ABA5A66B5B4FEBPQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 109-10:

The classic version of the psychological doctrine has no way to explain why God’s knowledge, which is “absolute primordial self-presence,” necessarily generates a distinct hypostasis (the Logos), nor why this hypostasis is a Word, an Utterance. Why should God need to utter or speak within his own being when he is “original self-presence in absolute identity”? The same problem applies in a different way to the Spirit as love. Why should God’s knowledge or love “demand a processio ad modum operati” – that is, why should there be any need for God to produce distinct hypostases? Procession and generation imply movement, and distinction: one thing originates from another thing. Why should a distinct hypostasis have to be generated or proceed in order for God to know and love himself in absolute self-presence? In the human being, an act of knowing requires an operatum, an object. But God, says Rahner, does not require an object in order to have knowledge. God’s knowledge is not constituted by the generation of the Logos: it is not that God knows because he generates the Logos; he knows and only thus generates the Logos.

21 Rahner, The Trinity, 116.

22 Ibid., 117.

23 Cf. Miller, “You Loved Me before the Foundation of the World,” 111:

253 for the Trinity, but rather to improve them.24 For this purpose, he suggests that an analogy might be constructed which argues not “from an abstract consideration of the human spirit and its activities (in a strangely isolated individualism), but rather from those structures of human existence which first clearly appear in its experience of salvation history.”25 As he explains,

We may build a psychological analogy of the Trinity, even though such a theology is essentially more modest than the classic one in its design (not in its success). . . . For in the “economic” doctrine of the Trinity we have understood God’s self-communication as two-and-one in truth and love, as truth and love. If we experience that the divine self- communication is given in two distinct ways, then the two intra-divine processions are already co-known as distinct in this experience of the faith, even though we cannot tell why they still remain such even when we abstract from the free “economic” aspect (“for us”) of the “immanent” Trinity. We might even ask the further question (which we cannot go into here) whether it would not be possible to derive the “model” for a “psychological” doctrine of the Trinity not so much from an abstract consideration of the human spirit and its activities (in a strangely isolated individualism), but rather from those structures of human existence which first clearly appear in its experience of salvation history: in its transcendence towards the future, as lovingly opening up and

His new version of the ‘psychological’ doctrine of Trinity, founded in the economy, does not “try to explain why divine knowledge and love imply two processiones ad modum operati” – that is, it does not attempt to understand or ‘get behind’ the fact that divine knowledge and love involve the production of two hypostases distinct from the Father. It is “more modest” than Scholasticism in that it simply observes within God’s one self-communication to us an irreducible distinction of truth and love, and recognizes that this distinction must be located first in God’s own being. Hence “we may build a psychological theology of the Trinity” if our foundation is Jesus and the Spirit, not the human mind considered in abstraction; again, Rahner has already done so.

24 Cf. ibid., 111-2:

He anticipates the criticism that by departing from the classical Scholastic psychological doctrine he is jettisoning fifteen centuries of Catholic trinitarian thought. Yet he is emphatic that the proposal is a corrective, not a repudiation. He stresses that “the starting point of an Augustinian [psychological] theology of the Trinity is undeniable,” and that “there can be no doubt about the basic justification” of the psychological analogy; what he is departing from is not the psychological doctrine, but the attempt to build the psychological doctrine without constant reference to Jesus Christ and the outpouring of the Spirit. When the psychological doctrine is cut off from the economy of salvation, it enables and makes worse the “encapsulation and isolation of the doctrine of Trinity,” insofar as it is serves to give some kind of content to a Trinity “locked within” the divine nature and inaccessible to human experience. The problem is not that Scholasticism affirms an imago Trinitatis within the structure of the human mind, but that it does not allow the history of salvation to act as the primary point of reference for all trinitarian doctrine.

25 Rahner, The Trinity, 119-20.

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accepted; in its existence in history, in which the faithful truth is present as knowledge about itself.26

The type of analogy which Rahner suggests, but does not fully develop, is one that might be called a supernatural psychological analogy. It would provide some insight into the reality of the Trinity from its explanation of how created grace affects the structures of human existence and imitates the divine relations present in the world as uncreated grace. Such a supernatural psychological analogy has been proposed by Robert Doran on the basis of Bernard Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis that correlates the four preeminent created graces with the four divine relations. Lonergan’s original formulation of the four-point hypothesis does not specify precisely how the four created supernatural realities affecting human consciousness imitate and are analogous to the divine relations. However, Doran has studied the relationships between the esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory in human consciousness as the basis for a supernatural psychological analogy.

In the previous chapter, it was shown how Rahner at times distinguishes four created graces whereby humans have non-appropriated relations to the divine persons. Inasmuch as they dispose people toward the self-communication of the divine persons, they participate in the four divine relations bestowed as uncreated grace. Furthermore, it was argued that Rahner’s writings suggest that the esse secundarium imitates the Father in his relation to the Son, that sanctifying grace imitates the Father and the Son in their relation to the Spirit, that the habit of charity imitates the Spirit in his relation to the Father and the Son, and that the light of glory imitates the

Son in his relation to the Father. This indicates that his theology is one into which Lonergan’s

26 Ibid.

255 four-point hypothesis can be transposed. Now, just as Doran has worked to develop a supernatural psychological analogy for the Trinity from Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis, it seems possible to develop a similar analogy from Rahner’s theological insights.

Indeed, Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity provides further groundwork for developing a supernatural analogy from a four-point hypothesis transposed into his own theological categories of quasi-formal causality and the supernatural existential. In one place, for instance, Rahner indirectly suggests the possibility of a supernatural psychological analogy while discussing knowledge and love as the two modes of human self-realization in transcendence. He writes,

In the doctrine of the Trinity we know of two ‘processions’, in other words two modes of mediation through which God as ungenerated (the Father) utters himself and possesses himself in love, so that three modes of subsistence in the one God are constituted, the ‘procession’ as Word and also as ‘breathing forth love’. In conformity with this, in any Christian interpretation of man, we must hold fast, in spite of many contrary tendencies of recent times, to the fact that there are two basic modes of human (transcendental) self- realisation: awareness of, and reflection upon the self through knowledge and through free love, corresponding to the two basic transcendentals Verum and bonum, in which the one (unum) being (ens) imposes itself. These two basic transcendentals, then, are such that we cannot at will add any others to them on the same plane. Thus it appears that from what we know both of God and of man it is natural to expect two basic attitudes to be involved in man’s right realisation of his own nature, two basic virtues which correspond to this original transcendental duality inherent in man. This is all the more true in view of the fact that a ‘divine’ or theological virtue is sustained precisely by God’s self-bestowal, and the response of the creature who has personal status and is endowed with spiritual faculties to this divine self-bestowal is precisely made possible and effective by the divine self-bestowal itself. Now there are only two such modes or – better – aspects in this one divine self-bestowal: the first aspect is constituted by the Logos and the second by the divine Pneuma. It is precisely through these two aspects that God as ungenerated, God the ‘Father’ (not, therefore, an abstract divinity!), who is incomprehensible and never loses his incomprehensibility even through his act of divine self-bestowal, imparts himself. Because of this we cannot imagine that the Trinity in the modes of subsistence in the one God implies ipso facto that there is also a trinity in the response by which we accept this self-bestowal of the Father in Logos and in Pneuma. The fact that there is only one act of self-bestowal in which the ‘Father’ imparts himself in Logos and Pneuma

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implies that in the response, i.e. the ‘theological’ virtue, of man which is itself upheld by this divine self-bestowal, only a single act is conceivable with two modalities: faith and love, to correspond to the Word and the Love of the Father.27

Rahner claims in this text that the two modes of self-realization in human nature are perfected when God’s self-communication bestows people with gifts of divine knowledge and love, which are not merely shared essentially by the Trinity in common, but which are possessed notionally by particular divine persons. He notes that human beings do not become a trinity of persons when receiving the self-communication of the divine Trinity. Yet, just as God’s self- communication is a single act with two aspects in the sending of the Son and the Spirit, Rahner notes that the single act of the human response to God has two modalities that correspond to the divine processions. These reflections provide some framework for developing a supernatural psychological analogy that seeks to understand the divine processions (whereby the Father

“utters himself and possesses himself in love”) in terms of how grace affects the two modes of self-realization under which humans receive God’s self-communication.

Although Rahner focuses in this passage on the two divine missions, this does not mean his theology is opposed to using a four-point hypothesis as a framework for a supernatural psychological analogy for the Trinity. In his view, the Son and Spirit are sent in order to bestow upon human beings a non-appropriated relation to each of the divine persons, including the

Father. As such, his theology implies that people are able to experience the uncreated grace of all three divine persons through their created graces that imitate the divine relations.

27 Karl Rahner, “On the Theology of Hope,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 10- Writings of 1965-1967; 2, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1973), 245-6.

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For Rahner, the esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory each participate in the divine relations inasmuch as all created grace is the material effect of God’s quasi-formal causality. Created grace is not absolutely supernatural per se apart from uncreated grace (just as prime matter does not exist without form). However, God’s quasi-formal self-communication elevates human beings through created grace to a participation in the divine relations, which establishes in them a non-appropriated relation to each of the divine persons.

Rahner’s discussion of the interrelationship among the four preeminent created graces, as detailed in the previous chapter, may be used to develop some analogical understanding of the relations among the divine persons. Firstly, he understands the esse secundarium of Christ as the origin of all other created graces that people receive through the mediation of Christ’s humanity.

This imitates the Father as the unoriginated source of the Son and Spirit as divine processions.

Also, inasmuch as the esse secundarium brings Christ’s humanity into being as a perfect expression of the Father, it imitates the Father’s relationship of paternity that communicates the divine nature to the Son through generation. Indeed, the manner in which the Son was begotten in time reflects how the Son is begotten in eternity. Christ experiences the esse secundarium inasmuch as his transcendental orientation toward God enables him to recognize his own divine filiation as the Son, with whom his human nature is hypostatically united. While Christ is the only human who experiences the esse secundarium as the ground of his divine filiation, others can indirectly experience it asymptotically as the ultimate fulfillment of the human obediential potency for divinization. The relationship of Christ’s human existence to God may thus be understood analogically as a foundation for a supernatural psychological Trinitarian analogy.

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Secondly, Rahner believes that sanctifying grace moves people in the experience of their supernatural existential to accept God’s self-communication. The gift of sanctifying grace constitutes a union with divine love that is initiated through the mediation of the Son’s esse secundarium (which participates in the Father’s paternity) and that culminates in the light of glory (which participates in the Son’s supernatural knowledge as the perfect expression of the

Father). Accordingly, sanctifying grace imitates active spiration as the relation of paternity and filiation considered together. This establishes in human beings a relation to the Holy Spirit who, as God’s notional love breathed forth by the Father and the Son, moves them to embrace God’s self-communication.

Thirdly, Rahner describes the habit of charity as the principle of charitable acts. It is a gift that follows from people’s openness to God’s self-communication through sanctifying grace.

Having encountered God in their supernatural existential, those who choose to embrace the

Trinity through the gift of sanctifying grace are given the habit of charity as an effect of being made pleasing to God. The habit of charity is an immediate effect of the Spirit who dwells in souls with sanctifying grace. This gift imitates the supernatural love of the Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son as Gift. It also gives people a relation to the Father and the Son, who offer human beings a participation in divine love through the gift of the Spirit who proceeds from them.

Fourthly, Rahner discusses the light of glory as the material disposition for the beatific vision of God. Although the light of glory is only bestowed upon the saints in heaven, this is anticipated on earth by those who receive supernatural knowledge through the light of faith, which gives them certainty of the truth of divine revelation. The light of glory is an effect of the

259 divine mission of the Son, who makes God visible to humanity as the perfect expression of the

Father. Hence, when people receive supernatural knowledge of the divine persons through the light of glory, they participate in the filiation of the Son. This participation in the Son gives people a non-appropriated relation to the Father as children of God.

When considering these four created graces as a whole, it may be observed that the esse secundarium of Christ’s humanity enables other humans to receive sanctifying grace, which in turn allows them to receive supernatural love through the habit of charity and supernatural knowledge through the light of glory. Due to the intimate relationship of created grace with uncreated grace, these four dimensions of the human experience of grace yield some analogical understanding of the four divine relations of the Trinity. Such an analogy is similar to the natural psychological analogy inasmuch as it describes the divine processions in terms of knowledge and love. However, a supernatural psychological analogy that focuses on how grace affects human subjectivity indicates more about why the absolute subjectivity of God necessarily subsists in three divine subjects.

Building upon Rahner’s view of the analogy of being, it may be noted that creatures imitate God according to their relative degree of self-presence. Accordingly, grace elevates human subjectivity by making it more present to itself in the supernatural presence of God than it would be by nature alone. Now, since humans participate in God’s infinite self-presence through four relations established by four irreducible created graces, one might suppose by analogy that

God’s absolute subjectivity is differentiated in its subsistence by four divine relations. It is granted that if reason knows God to be absolutely simple as pure act, no accidental qualities or accidental relations may be attributed to God. Yet, one could posit the existence of divine

260 relations in God if they were substantial relations that differentiated multiple manners of existential subsistence within the one divine essence. Furthermore, the nature of the four divine relations thus posited may be discussed analogically through the human experience of created grace. Although this experience of created grace per se cannot yield a demonstration that there are three divine persons in God, or even that there are four divine relations, it does provide some insight into the Trinity that is revealed as uncreated grace. Ultimately, it is humanity’s union with uncreated grace whereby the Trinity is made manifest and understood. Created grace merely facilitates this union with the divine persons.

C. Conclusion

This chapter began by noting the differences between Rahner and Lonergan in their appreciation for natural psychological analogies for the Trinity in theological tradition. Then it discussed Rahner’s view that people’s experience of grace as God’s self-communication may be used to form a stronger Trinitarian analogy than that developed from natural human psychology.

This was followed by an examination of how Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity could be used to develop a supernatural, psychological analogy. It started to construct such an analogy after having noted the possibility of transposing Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis into Rahner’s theological categories. It articulated Rahner’s understanding of the interrelationship among the four preeminent created graces, and then it indicated parallels between this and the interrelationship among the divine persons. Finally, it argued that this supernatural,

261 psychological analogy developed from the foundations of Rahner’s theology yields some analogical understanding of the Trinity.

The goal of this chapter was to reflect upon Rahner’s understanding of the four preeminent created graces and to develop them in pursuit of a supernatural, psychological analogy for the Trinity. Indeed, since the created graces which human beings experience manifest uncreated grace by their imitation of the divine persons, they were noted to enable some analogical understanding of the Trinity. However, this chapter cautioned that while the human experience of uncreated grace through created grace on earth reveals some insights about the

Trinity, there is much about the Trinity yet to be revealed that will remain mysterious until created and uncreated grace are communicated in their fullness in heaven. Yet, even in the beatific vision of the saints in which the divine persons are immediately experienced, the Trinity remains incomprehensible and an absolute mystery to human understanding.

Having taken steps toward transposing the four-point hypothesis into Rahner’s theological categories of quasi-formal causality and the supernatural existential, and having used his theological foundations to develop a supernatural, psychological analogy, it remains to be seen whether Rahner’s theology provides a stronger ontological foundation for such an analogy than that proposed in Doran’s interpretation of Lonergan. The final chapter of this dissertation will assess which foundation for a supernatural, psychological analogy is preferable by contrasting Rahner’s understanding of quasi-formal causality with Lonergan and Doran’s understanding of exemplary causality.

CHAPTER V

Comparing the Theologies of Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan as Foundations for the Development of a Supernatural, Psychological Analogy

At this point, it has been shown how the four-point hypothesis might be transposed into

Karl Rahner’s theological categories as a foundation for a supernatural psychological analogy.

Now it would be useful to inquire whether Rahner’s theology provides a stronger ontological foundation for such an analogy than that proposed in Doran’s development of Lonergan. This final chapter will use various criteria to assess whose theological categories provide a stronger foundation for a supernatural analogy. First, it will discuss whose reflections on the natural psychological analogy are better suited to serve as a foundation for a supernatural psychological analogy. Second, it will examine whose theology provides a stronger ontological foundation for the four-point hypothesis. Third, it will evaluate whose account of the relationship between uncreated grace and created grace provides a stronger ontological foundation for a supernatural analogy.

A. The Natural Psychological Analogy as a Foundation

Both Lonergan and Rahner drew from the theological tradition of Augustine and Thomas

Aquinas who developed psychological analogies for the Trinity. Yet, while Lonergan wrote several works early in his career in which he praised and developed Aquinas’ natural psychological analogy, Rahner was more critical of its shortcomings. As interpreters of

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Lonergan, Robert Doran and Neil Ormerod criticize Rahner for what they perceive as a lack of appreciation for natural psychological analogies.

Doran attributes Rahner’s criticism of traditional psychological analogies to a misunderstanding of Aquinas on emanatio intelligibilis.1 This alleged misunderstanding of the intellectual processions in God is why Doran believes Rahner’s “Grundaxiom” focuses on the economic Trinity rather than a psychological analogy as a model for the immanent Trinity.2 He also does not think that this issue is unique to Rahner, noting that “in Lonergan’s view, theologians have failed for seven centuries to understand the emanatio intelligibilis that is the principle employed to resolve the very first problem in a systematics of the Trinity, the problem of the divine processions.”3 He believes this has caused the psychological analogy for the Trinity

1 Cf. Robert M. Doran, “Intelligentia Fidei in De Deo Trino, Pars Systematica: A Commentary on the First Three Sections of Chapter One,” Method: Journal of Lonergan Studies 19, no. 1 (2001): 79: “In our own day, I fear, Rahner’s slogan-like statement of his Trinitarian Grundaxiom (‘The immanent Trinity is the economic Trinity, and vice versa’) hides what has to be judged a misunderstanding of Thomas’s emanatio intelligibilis. From this lack of appreciation of a genuine systematic achievement, some have moved all too easily (and quite contrary to Rahner’s intentions, it must be added) to collapsing the immanent into the economic Trinity.” Doran notes that Lonergan suggested on one occasion that Rahner did not understand Aquinas on the emanatio intelligibilis. Cf. ibid., 80n71:

Lonergan acknowledges this in one of his responses to questions at the 1969 Regis College institute on Method in Theology: ‘Kant does not know about insight, and neither does Maréchal. . . . Rahner asks, What does this mean, this emanatio intelligibilis? It is the action of an intelligence. A person, insofar as he is acting intelligently, rationally, responsibly, is a principle of something else that occurs because this is intelligent, or because this is rational, or because this is the responsible thing to do.’ See www.bernardlonergan.com at 51600DTE060.

2 Cf. Robert M. Doran, What is Systematic Theology? (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005), 30-1:

But it is clear that he did not understand Thomas’s emanatio intelligibilis, the basic psychological analogy for the Trinitarian processions. The Grundaxiom is built on a misunderstanding of a genuine theological achievement, namely, the notion of emanatio intelligibilis and its use in an attempt to understand the divine processions. Misunderstanding the emanatio intelligibilis means necessarily that one will not be able to appropriate the relation between divine procession and the divine missions as this relation is expressed in question 43 of the Prima pars of the Summa theologiae.

3 Doran, “Intelligentia Fidei in De Deo Trino, Pars Systematica,” 80.

264 to receive undue criticism in contemporary theology.4 In agreement, Ormerod notes, “Apart from the writings of Lonergan and those utilizing his works, modern Trinitarian theology has shown little interest in understanding the processions, or in the psychological analogy except to dismiss it for a variety of supposed short-comings.”5

Ormerod argues further that Rahner was dissatisfied with traditional psychological analogies because he sought to find necessary reasons for the divine processions in humanity’s encounter with the economic Trinity.6 He claims that Rahner preferred this to a hypothetical understanding of the immanent Trinity developed through the speculations of psychological analogies. As he states, “Rahner’s major criticism of the psychological analogy is that it remains hypothetical. It cannot be proven to be the case. It is unscriptural, except on the basis of artificial

’eisegesis’. It cannot explain the transition from essential to notional acts.”7

Ormerod believes that Rahner’s criticism of the psychological analogy is unwarranted, however. He contends that when Rahner attempts to describe the divine processions of the immanent Trinity through their self-communication as “(a) Origin-Future; (b) History-

4 Cf. Robert M. Doran, The Trinity in History: Missions and Processions (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012), 146: “The psychological analogy has fallen on hard times in theology. Part of the reason, I believe, is that it has rarely been understood. What has not been understood very well in the history of theology is how act proceeds from act in the autonomous spiritual dimension of human consciousness, and in particular how different acts of understanding ground a series of inner words.”

5 Neil Ormerod, “The Four-Point Hypothesis: Transpositions and Complications,” Irish Theological Quarterly 77, no. 2 (2012): 132.

6 Cf. Neil Ormerod, “Wrestling with Rahner on the Trinity,” Irish Theological Quarterly 68 (2003): 222: “Rahner rejects the psychological analogy on the very grounds that it fails to do what it never tries to do. It cannot prove the necessity of the divine processions and the distinction of persons. It remains hypothetical. As noted above, for Rahner the theological goal is the necessary - faith seeking necessary reasons - not a modest and reverent understanding - fides quaerens intellectum, to follow Anselm’s dictum.”

7 Ibid., 224.

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Transcendence; (c) Invitation (offer)-Acceptance; (d) Knowledge-Love,” these theological categories are just as hypothetical as those used in the psychological analogy.8

However, against Ormerod’s reasoning, it may be argued that when Rahner criticized the hypothetical speculations of psychological analogies, he did not believe that necessary reasons for the divine processions were to be found in humanity’s encounter with the economic Trinity.

Rather, he simply wanted to ground all ideas about the immanent Trinity in the way it appears in history as the economic Trinity. At no point does Rahner reflect upon the effects of the divine missions in order to rationally demonstrate the divine relations that constitute the persons in the

Trinity. In accord with his “Grundaxiom” about the identity of the immanent and economic

Trinity, his main emphasis is that the observations one makes about God’s self-communication in history must be attributed to the divine persons and their relations. Otherwise, the economic

Trinity would not be God’s self-communication.

In fact, far from finding no value in psychological analogies, Rahner explains that they can yield some insight into the immanent Trinity insofar as the divine missions are observed to relate to the spiritual acts of knowledge and love. Accordingly, one’s understanding of intellectual processions prepares one to recognize the sense in which the human soul imitates the economic Trinity. As Rahner writes,

8 Cf. ibid.:

This standard of certainty and necessity is very high, and measured against it, the psychological analogy will inevitably fail. But then Rahner’s own performance fares little better. In Chapter 3 of The Trinity, where he develops an outline for a systematics, Rahner identifies a fourfold ’group of aspects’ to promote a better grasp of the Trinitarian mystery. These emerge from the analysis of divine self-communication: (a) Origin-Future; (b) History-Transcendence; (c) Invitation (offer)-Acceptance; (d) Knowledge-Love. It is hard to see how these are any less hypothetical than the psychological analogy, and indeed the final pair of aspects clearly relates to it.

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We do not mean that a psychological doctrine of the Trinity is a pure or even unsuccessful theological speculation. The hints given in Scripture show that the two divine processions, whose reality is assured by revelation, have certainly something to do with the two basic spiritual activities of knowing and loving. Thus the starting point of an Augustinian theology of the Trinity is undeniable. Yet if, unlike scholastic theology, we wish to avoid an artificial “eisegesis” into scriptural theology, we shall have to remember that this inner conception is indicated in Scripture only insofar as, in the economy of salvation, this intra-divine knowledge is seen as self-revealing, and this intra-divine love as self-communicating.9

Furthermore, Rahner’s view of the relationship between nature and grace leads him to focus not so much on how the soul in itself imitates the Trinity, but rather on how grace makes the soul like the Trinity. He notes that it is difficult to distinguish how the soul would imitate

God in a state of pure nature from how it imitates God in the actual order of grace with its

“supernatural existential.” Indeed, when people identify parallels between the divine missions and the spiritual activities of knowledge and love, these are noted in a human situation characterized by a supernatural existential, rather than by pure nature. Accordingly, Rahner primarily focuses on the soul’s natural intellectual powers inasmuch as they inform his view on how the human soul is disposed to receive God’s self-communication as quasi-formal cause.

Consequently, his understanding of human nature is directed toward examining of the relationship between the economic Trinity and the human soul touched by grace, rather than toward developing a natural psychological analogy.

While Lonergan’s starting point for formulating the psychological analogy is the study of the intellectual powers of the human soul, Rahner’s starting point is the study of the soul as the disposition for God’s self-communication in the divine missions through created grace. In this

9 Cf. Karl Rahner, The Trinity, trans. Joseph Donceel (New York: Crossroad, 1970), 19.

267 respect, Rahner’s reflections on the natural psychological analogy more directly suggest the possibility of formulating a supernatural psychological analogy than those of Lonergan.

Although Lonergan certainly developed a more robust account of the natural psychological analogy, Rahner’s emphasis of its limits may serve as a better starting point for developing of a supernatural psychological analogy.10

B. The Four-Point Hypothesis as a Foundation

While Rahner most often spoke of incarnation and grace as the two modes of God’s self- communication to human beings, Lonergan went beyond this by discussing human participation in the four divine relations. For this reason, Ormerod and others consider Rahner’s theology difficult to reconcile with Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis.11 Nevertheless, the belief that each

10 Cf. Jordan Matthew Miller, “You Loved Me before the Foundation of the World: An Examination of Karl Rahner’s Doctrine of Trinity and Comparison to that of Hans Urs Von Balthasar” (PhD. diss., Fordham, 2014), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview /1562902315/fulltextPDF/ 52ABA5A66B5B4FEBPQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 108-9:

Rahner highlights several serious problems and dangers in the Scholastic account of Trinity. Yet it would be difficult not to see his own systematic proposal as in continuity with the ‘psychological’ doctrine of Augustine and Thomas [emphasis is Miller’s]. According to Rahner’s axiom, the four pairs/dyads must describe not only the economic Trinity but also the immanent Trinity, as these are one and the same. Therefore by including knowledge and love as the last of his four dyads, summing up the others, Rahner is effectively claiming that knowledge and love characterize the Logos and the Spirit as they are in God’s own internal being, not only as they are for us. He has thus affirmed a ‘psychological’ doctrine of Trinity, yet with a different starting point. This difference of starting-point is very significant; it determines whether one has a legitimate psychological doctrine or a problematic one.

11 Cf. Ormerod, “The Four-Point Hypothesis: Transpositions and Complications,” 128:

The purpose of this hypothesis is to provide a unifying structure for Christian doctrines of the Trinity, Incarnation, grace, and the beatific vision. This unification is a remarkable achievement, and as I have indicated elsewhere, is a far richer structure for attaining a desirable unification than the approach of Karl Rahner, which is overly compact. Whereas Rahner’s unification is based on the two Trinitarian

268 of the four divine relations has an external term in history has been argued in this dissertation to be agreeable with Rahner’s theological foundations. This view aligns with Lonergan’s claim in his four-point hypothesis that God’s self-communication has resulted in the bestowal of four created graces that imitate the four divine relations.

Lonergan’s correlation of the four created graces with the four divine relations does something similar to Rahner’s “Grundaxiom” by establishing non-appropriated relations between human beings and the divine persons. Drawing from Lonergan, Doran makes the four-point hypothesis the starting point of his systematic theology, with the result that it identifies the economic Trinity with the immanent Trinity from the very beginning. Doran writes, “We are bringing the four-point hypothesis forward to join the understanding of the processions and relations from the beginning. This is our way of honoring Karl Rahner’s Trinitarian Grundaxiom,

‘The immanent Trinity is the economic Trinity, and vice versa.’”12

processions, Lonergan’s is based on the four Trinitarian relations. The richness of this structure allows for more differentiation than that of Rahner, without collapsing various categories into one another.

Also, cf. Neil Ormerod, “Two Points Or Four?—Rahner And Lonergan On Trinity, Incarnation, Grace, And Beatific Vision,” Theological Studies 68, no. 3 (2007): 668:

Does Rahner's theology of grace in terms of the divine self-communication of the Spirit adequately reflect all the distinctions needed for a proper account of the reality of grace? Rahner made much of the

distinction between created and uncreated grace and was critical of the Scholastic position, which focused attention on created grace to the neglect of uncreated grace. However, there is little in his writings on the debate about the distinction between sanctifying grace and the habit of charity, a distinction that was a matter of dispute between Franciscan and Dominican schools [Emphasis is Ormerod’s].

12 Doran, The Trinity in History, 183.

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Doran believes that the four-point hypothesis reflects much that Rahner’s “Grundaxiom” intended to convey about the Trinity in history.13 Rahner believes that unless human beings have a non-appropriated relation to each of the divine persons through the created terms of the divine missions in history, then the economic Trinity could not be said to be a self-communication of the immanent Trinity. Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis complements Rahner’s “Grundaxiom” inasmuch as it clarifies that such non-appropriated relations require a participation in the divine relations.

Yet, while Lonergan notes that the four created graces imitate the four divine relations, he does not claim that God’s self-communication had to take place through the gift of these four created graces. This is most evident when considering the esse secundarium of the Son’s incarnation. In the actual order of providence, the Son’s esse secundarium is the source of all other created graces.14 Despite this, Lonergan believes that the Father or the Holy Spirit could have become incarnate in place of the Son.15

13 Cf. ibid.: “While Lonergan’s understanding of the unity of processions and missions is, I believe, far more differentiated and far more satisfactory than Rahner’s rather thin Trinitarian theology, it is also closer to Rahner’s real intention, I believe, than some of the applications that have been made of the Grundaxiom would suggest.” Also, cf. Darren Dias, “The Contributions of Bernard J.F. Lonergan to a Systematic Understanding of Religious Diversity” (PhD diss., St. Michael’s College, 2008), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com.proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/304411979/fulltextPDF /8552C2E3EED74387PQ/ (accessed January 23, 2018), 149: “Lonergan's definition of the divine missions and the four-point hypothesis is perhaps the most lucid technical expression of what Rahner's Grundaxiom that the immanent Trinity is the economic Trinity and vice versa means.”

14 Cf. Neil Ormerod, “‘For in Him the Whole Fullness of Deity Dwells Bodily’: The Trinitarian Depths of the Incarnation,” Theological Studies 77, no. 4 (2016): 821: “Each of the subsequent three participations flows from the very first aspect, Jesus’s participation in paternity. It is because Jesus is the Word of the Father spoken into human history as Logos incarnate that he enjoys the light of glory, that the Spirit descends on him and remains, and that he is empowered to give himself over to the work of building the kingdom of God. He is also the type and exemplar of all grace for us.”

15 Cf. Bernard Lonergan, The Ontological and Psychological Constitution of Christ, vol. 7 of Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, eds. Frederick E. Crowe and Robert M. Doran, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto:

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In the actual order in which the Son became incarnate, the esse secundarium of Christ’s humanity has a created relation to the Son that imitates the Father’s paternal relation to the Son.

Accordingly, the esse secundarium participates in paternity. However, if either the Father or the

Holy Spirit had become incarnate instead of the Son, the esse secundarium of that person’s humanity would not imitate paternity by having a created relation to the Son. Rather, it would have a created relation to the divine person that had become incarnate. In this respect, it would imitate whichever divine relation is opposed to that of the divine person in which it subsists. Yet, if the esse secundarium were equally suited to participate in any of the divine relations, this would imply that the esse secundarium is not inherently disposed to imitate any of the notional properties of the divine persons in particular. Therefore, if any of the divine persons could have become incarnate, this would appear to weaken any analogy between the esse secundarium and paternity suggested by Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis.

Moreover, Lonergan suggests that if human beings had never sinned, the Son might not have become incarnate for the purpose of their supernatural elevation. He argues that in the actual situation of grace, the Son only became incarnate as a solution to the problem of sin. Even then, the incarnation of the Son is not necessary, but a free and unexacted gift. Although

Lonergan does not presume to know “what would have happened in some other order in which

Adam did not sin,”16 he claims that “in the present dispensation there would have been no

University of Toronto Press, 2002), 137: “Since the divine act of existence is common to the three persons, the potency to enter into the hypostatic union is also common to all three.”

16 Bernard Lonergan, “The Notion of Fittingness: The Application of Theological Method to the Question of the Purpose of the Incarnation,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Vol. 19: Early Latin Theology, eds. Robert M. Doran and H. Daniel Monsour, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), 531.

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Incarnation had Adam not sinned.”17 Given God’s will to bestow grace upon humanity, he reasons that the incarnation of the Son is not necessary because “God could in other ways with supreme wisdom decree the gift of grace or its restoration.”18

However, by interpreting the actual order of grace in this manner, he weakens the association of the esse secundarium with the gifts of sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory. His argument appears to suggest that God’s original plan might have been to give humanity only three created graces without bestowing a fourth as their source. Yet, based on the assumption in the four-point hypothesis that humans participate in the divine relations through distinct created graces, God’s self-communication could not enable participation in all four divine relations through only three created graces. Even if one presumed that God would have bestowed a fourth created grace other than Christ’s esse secundarium if humanity had never sinned, one is left to ponder what created grace other than the esse secundarium could have enabled humanity to participate just as much in the Father’s paternity.19 Indeed, if one assumes

17 Ibid.

18 Ibid., 525.

19 Ormerod speculates briefly about other possible created graces that might have allowed people to participate in the divine relations, but he does not indicate how paternity might have been participated if there were no incarnation. Cf. Ormerod, “The Four-Point Hypothesis: Transpositions and Complications,” 134-5:

Lonergan’s task is then to find correlations between these two sets of four realities. The complicating fact lies in Lonergan’s identification of the four absolutely supernatural realities. Certainly the four identified are existing realities affirmed by faith. However, they are not the only possible realities. If, for example, we adopt the position of Aquinas, that any of the three persons could have been incarnate, one could also affirm other possible absolutely supernatural realities, such as an incarnation of the Father or the Spirit. While we have no reason to affirm the existence of such realities, their possibility implies other possible modes of imitation of the divine substance apart from the four absolutely supernatural realities that Lonergan identifies. Otherwise Lonergan would seem to be implying that only the Son can be incarnated, a position proposed by Rahner, but explicitly rejected by Lonergan in his Christological writings.

272 that the esse secundarium could have been replaced equally by any number of things, this limits one’s ability to perceive the unique qualities of the esse secundarium whereby it imitates the

Father in his relation to the Son. Hence, Lonergan’s views about the relation between the Son’s incarnation and God’s original offer of grace to humanity seem to weaken any supernatural analogy rooted in his four-point hypothesis, which presumes strong associations among the four created graces that imitate the four divine relations.

In contrast to Lonergan, Rahner maintains that only the Son could have become incarnate. He argues that incarnation could only be a proper manifestation of the Son in history.

In accord with his “Grundaxiom,” he believes that God’s self-communication through the created terms of the divine missions must express the notional properties that are particular to each divine person. Now, since the self-communication of the Son took place through an incarnation, he concludes that a hypostatically assumed human nature could only have a non- appropriated relation to the Son by its esse secundarium. Hence, the esse secundarium is a grace that could only be created as the self-communication of the Father’s paternity on account of its necessary relation to the Son.

Rahner also believes that in the actual order of providence, the Son’s incarnation was not planned by God only as a solution to the problem of sin, but was also planned as the cause of the grace offered to humanity even before sin.20 He does suggest on at least one occasion, in

20 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Order, III. Supernatural Order,” in Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi, eds. Karl Rahner, et al. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), 1115-6:

273 agreement with Lonergan, that God could have redeemed humanity by some means other than the Son’s incarnation.21 However, he believes that when Lonergan suggests the incarnation was not planned in a manner antecedent to humanity’s original sin, he weakens the association between the incarnation and the offer of grace to humanity. One cannot take for granted that the

Trinity’s self-communication could have been manifested just as clearly without the incarnation.

He finds it best to assume that “Christ’s ‘human nature’ is not something which happens to be there, among many other things, which might equally well have been hypostatically assumed, but it is precisely that which comes into being when God’s Logos ‘utters’ himself outwards.”22

While Lonergan’s theology affirms many implications of Rahner’s “Grundaxiom,” he does not connect the self-communication of the Father with the esse secundarium of the Son’s humanity as strongly as the “Grundaxiom” would suggest. If Rahner is correct that the esse secundarium could only be created as the external term of the Father’s self-communication in his relation to the Son, his theology would provide a more robust defense of the four-point

because of sin takes place through death, both manifests the supernatural order absolutely in history and definitively establishes it in the world. In other words, it is permissible to assume with Scotism that even supralapsarian grace was the grace of Christ, and that the supernatural order as such is Christological. Christ does not become and remain head and goal of saving history only when he enters into it because of sin. The supernatural order present in the history of salvation is from the outset of such a kind that God willed to communicate himself to the world in Christ in the Incarnation.

21 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Current Problems in Christology,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 178-9:

22 Rahner, The Trinity, 89.

274 hypothesis. Accordingly, it would also offer a firmer foundation to any supernatural analogy that might be developed from the four-point hypothesis.

C. The Relationship between Uncreated and Created Grace as a Foundation

According to Rahner’s view of the “supernatural existential,” God’s offer of self- communication constitutes the concrete existence of the human quiddity with a supernatural end as its “quasi-formal cause.” He notes that human nature has an obediential potency to be modified by God’s quasi-formal causality because of its asymptotic orientation toward God in transcendence. When God’s self-communication activates this obediential potency, the concrete human quiddity is marked with a supernatural existential that transcends the parameters of pure human nature. On account of his distinction between pure nature and concrete quiddity, Rahner notes that God is not “an inner essential constitutive element belonging to the essence of the finite being,”23 but that God is the innermost constitutive element of human transcendence in its concrete quiddity.24 This occurs through God’s quasi-formal causality.

Rahner also believes that God’s self-communication acts as an “exemplary cause” inasmuch as its gift of created grace enables humans to achieve their supernatural end by imitating the uncreated grace of the Trinity. This created grace is the material disposition of

23 Karl Rahner, “Natural Science and Reasonable Faith,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 21: Science and Christian Faith, trans. Hugh M. Riley (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1988), 36.

24 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 121-2: “In transcendence as such, absolute being is the innermost constitutive element by which this transcendental movement is borne towards itself, and is not just the extrinsic term and extrinsic goal of a movement.”

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God’s self-communication whereby people receive a non-appropriated relation to each of the divine persons. The esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory each participate in the divine relations inasmuch as all created grace is the material effect of God’s quasi-formal causality. Hence, a four-point hypothesis adapted to Rahner’s theology would focus on how these created graces dispose the human soul to God’s self-communication as a “quasi-formal cause.”

Lonergan agrees that God is the “exemplary cause” of all created graces whereby human beings have non-appropriated relations to the divine persons. He also concurs with Rahner about the priority of uncreated grace over created grace.25 However, he does not share Rahner’s view that God acts as a “quasi-formal cause” that constitutes humanity’s concrete quiddity with a

“supernatural existential.”26 Wishing to emphasize that the divine missions do not ontologically

25 Cf. Robert M. Doran, “Consciousness and Grace,” Method: Journal of Lonergan Studies 11, no. 1 (1993): 71: “It seems clear, then, that Lonergan wrestled with the same question that occupied Rahner in the article we discussed above, and that during this 1947-1948 course (and so a year or so after he wrote ‘De ente supernaturali’) he changed his position on the understanding of the relation between created and uncreated grace.”

26 Lonergan first appears to have developed this view in the revised proposition 22 from his 1947-1948 course notes. For Doran’s recording of this proposition, cf. Doran, “Consciousness and Grace,” 71: “The uncreated gift, as uncreated, is constituted by God alone, and by it God stands to the state of the justified person not only as an efficient principle but also as a constitutive principle; but this constitutive principle is present in the just not as an inherent form but as the term of a relation.” For Doran’s commentary on Lonergan’s position, cf. Robert M. Doran, “Social Grace and the Mission of the Word,” (paper presented at Colloquium on Doing Catholic Systematic Theology in a Multireligious World, Marquette University, November 2010), http://lonerganresource.com/pdf/books /1/37%20-%20Social%20Grace%20and%20the%20Mission%20of%20the%20Word.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 6: “The triune God assumes a constitutive role in our living, not as an inherent form or quasi-form, but as the term of a set of created relations.” Also, for Doran’s comparison of Lonergan and Rahner’s views, cf. Doran, “Consciousness and Grace,” 72:

For Rahner the new relationship has to be a form of formal causality, whereas for Lonergan God is a constitutive principle of the person receiving grace, not as a formal cause, but as the term of a relation. Nor does Rahner’s use of the expression ‘quasi-formal causality’ minimize the difference, since for Rahner, while the form abides in its absolute transcendence and so is not what Lonergan would call an inherent form (what is explicitly negated by Lonergan in the second version of thesis 22), its formal causality ‘must be taken really seriously.’

276 change God, but only creatures, Lonergan prefers to describe God as the “exemplary cause” of human participation in divinity.27 He does not share with Rahner the concept of a “supernatural existential” because it presupposes a distinction between human nature and human quiddity that he does not acknowledge.28 Instead, he describes humanity’s supernatural orientation to God in the current order of grace in terms of “vertical finality.”29 In his view, since humanity’s obediential potency for supernatural elevation is activated by God as an external agent, grace does not change human nature in its concrete quiddity.30

27 Cf. L. Matthew Petillo, “The ‘Experience of Grace’ in the Theologies of Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan” (PhD diss., Boston College, 2009), in ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, https://search-proquest-com .proxycu.wrlc.org/pqdtglobal/docview/304848745/fulltextPDF/DF71704BA1F41CCPQ (accessed January 23, 2018), 128: “The fact that God freely chooses to send his Spirit does not involve an entitative change in God but a terminative change in creatures. According to Lonergan, the infusion of grace effects a qualitative change in the creature.” Also, cf. Neil Ormerod, “The Metaphysics of Holiness: Participation in the Divine Nature,” Irish Theological Quarterly 79, no. 1 (2014): 73: “Given the general framework here is one of exemplary causation (they are external imitations of the divine substance) the problematic category of quasi-formal causality is not needed.”

28 Cf. J. Michael Stebbins, “Rahner and Lonergan on the Natural-Supernatural Distinction: Some Differences and Why They Matter,” in Grace and Friendship: Theological Essays in Honor of Fred Lawrence, from His Grateful Students, eds. M. Shawn Copeland and Jeremy D. Wilkins (Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University Press, 2016), 267: “Lonergan sees no need to appeal to anything like Rahner’s supernatural existential.” Also, cf. Petillo, “The ‘Experience of Grace’ in the Theologies of Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan,” 126: “For Lonergan, there is not a real distinction between ‘human quiddity’ and ‘human nature.’ Lonergan agrees with Rahner that grace is constitutive of personal existence but, unlike Rahner, conceives the supernatural order to be beyond human nature and thus, beyond the human quiddity.”

29 Cf. Stebbins, “Rahner and Lonergan on the Natural-Supernatural Distinction,” 267: “Obediential potency (in the form of the natural desire to know God) and vertical finality suffice to account for the openness of human nature to God and to explain why the divine self-gift can be seen as the harmonious, definitive fulfillment of our specifically human potential.”

30 Cf. Petillo, “The ‘Experience of Grace’ in the Theologies of Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan,”130:

For Lonergan, since grace is understood to be distinct from the human quiddity, its infusion, though not a disturbance to human nature, is expressed, in experiential terms, as a change in orientation. Lonergan describes grace as a qualitative change that happens to a person; it occurs. It is not part of the quiddity of the person—not simply an ever present undertone in consciousness—but rather an event, a change, a transformative actualization of a potency (the human spirit). It is an actualization of vertical finality—a fulfillment of the self-transcending dynamism of the human subject.

277

Lonergan stresses that no finite substance can be absolutely supernatural. If any substance, defined in reference to itself, were absolutely supernatural, it would be identical to

God.31 Thus, the divine nature is the only substance that subsists of itself as absolutely supernatural. Yet, while the human quiddity cannot be made absolutely supernatural in itself, people can supernaturally imitate God if their existence (esse), accidental qualities, or operations are modified in their relation to God through created grace.32 He argues that such created graces are infinite in a certain respect inasmuch as they order the creature in which they inhere to the attainment of God.33 Accordingly, God bestows “vertical finality” upon humanity through God’s offer of the four preeminent created graces and their consequent supernatural operations. The absolutely supernatural character of these created supernatural realities enables them to give

31 Cf. Bernard Lonergan, “The Supernatural Order,” in Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Vol. 19: Early Latin Theology, eds. Robert M. Doran and H. Daniel Monsour, trans. Michael G. Shields (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011), 97: “Since, then, a substance is defined only in terms of what it is in itself, it follows that a substance defined in terms of God as he is in himself is God and is infinite.” Also, cf. Bernard Lonergan, “Notes on the Grace of Justification and the Indwelling of the Holy Spirit,” Bernard Lonergan Archive, Marquette University, http://www.bernardlonergan.com/pdf/16000DTE040.pdf (accessed January 23, 2018), 27: “A substance cannot be absolutely supernatural and still finite.”

32 Cf. Lonergan, “The Supernatural Order,” 97:

33 Cf. ibid., 95:

278 humans a created relation to God’s uncreated grace as their exemplary cause.34 Lonergan finds sufficient reason to claim that created grace is absolutely supernatural in the fact that it “exceeds the proportion not only of human nature but also of any finite substance.”35 Accordingly, he argues that created grace can be absolutely supernatural, without being identical with God, so long as its mode of being is that of esse, an accidental quality, or an operation.

34 For Ormerod’s explanation of Lonergan’s view about how the four created graces establish a relation to each of the divine persons, cf. Neil Ormerod “Two Points or Four?—Rahner and Lonergan on Trinity, Incarnation, Grace, and Beatific Vision,” Theological Studies 68, no. 3 (2007): 673:

The logic of Lonergan's position is as follows. To understand how there can be a real relation between a created reality and one of the divine persons, we must understand it in the same manner as the real relation between the creature and God, since “a divine subsistent reality is really identical with the immutable divine essence.” All that is needed for the truth of the relation is an “appropriate created term outside God” that exists if (and only if) God wills to create such a term. Thus the mystery of created participations of the divine nature is an extension of the mystery of creation itself. Created participations of the divine nature “extend” the relationship between Creator and creature by drawing the creature into the inner divine relations. The appropriate created term thus “stands for” each possible term of the relation; since there are four terms, one for each of the four subsistent relations, there are four created participations of the divine nature.

For Doran’s critique of the difference between Lonergan and Rahner’s views on the causal relationship between uncreated and created grace, cf. Doran, “Consciousness and Grace,” 73-4:

Thus, what Lonergan came to account for through a consequent condition, Rahner accounts for through a created disposition, but with at least the difference that the latter is a material disposition for the reception of a formal (or quasi-formal) cause, whereas the former has to do with the truth of a relation established in the person, one term of which is the uncreated gift of God; the relation is established consequent upon the gift, and so by reason of the divine initiative alone, but it is also the condition of the possibility of the truth that God dwells in us. He understands the divine self-communication in such a way that God is present to us and constitutively dwells in us as the term of a relationship that God has constituted. This seems to me preferable to Rahner’s quasi-formal causality. The created grace caused by the divine self-communication can, I believe, still be referred to as a disposition to receive the uncreated gift, but not as a material or quasi-material cause in relation to a formal or quasi-formal cause, but rather as a real relation of the creature to the creator consequent upon the divine self-communication and participating in the relations constitutive of the inner life of God, and conditioning the possibility of us having the truth that God dwells in us.

35 Lonergan, “The Supernatural Order,” 79.

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However, according to Rahner’s view of quasi-formal causality, created grace is only absolutely supernatural inasmuch as uncreated grace belongs to its constitution.36 He argues that created grace cannot be absolutely supernatural per se apart from uncreated grace, just as prime matter does not exist without form. Unless uncreated grace belongs to the constitution of created grace, it would be impossible to show that God could not create a being for which it would be connatural.37 Indeed, if created grace were simply a purely created accident, it could not be absolutely supernatural for every conceivable created substance. The only reality that could make created grace absolutely supernatural is uncreated grace, since it is proper to God alone.38

Furthermore, created grace would be insufficient to give people non-appropriated relations to the divine persons in the order of exemplary causality were it not for its union with God’s uncreated grace as its quasi-formal cause.39

36 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship Between Nature and Grace,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 310n: “Grace is only then conceived in its true essence when it is recognized to be not just the created ‘accidental’ reality produced by God’s efficient causality ‘in’ a (natural) substance, but includes ‘uncreated grace’ in its own concept in such a way that this may not be conceived of purely as a consequence of created grace.”

37 Cf. Karl Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 1: God, Christ, Mary and Grace, trans. Cornelius Ernst (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1961), 333n24: “Given a [created] grace which on the one hand is ontologically an accidental reality and on the other remains as such purely in the created order, it is really impossible to show why to such an accident there should not correspond a created substance as possible, from which such an accident could proceed connaturally.”

38 Cf. Rahner, “Concerning the Relationship between Nature and Grace,” 310n: “There is no essence of a creaturely kind which God could constitute for which this communication could be the normal, matter-of-course perfection to which it was compellingly disposed.”

39 Cf. Rahner, “Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept of Uncreated Grace,” 333n24: “Thus it becomes possible to say in what the strictly supernatural character of a created grace (here primarily the light of glory) consists: while in the created entity in general its relation to the divine cause does not belong to the inner distinguishing features of its essence (Ia 44.1 ad 1), created grace, as ultima dispositio to an immediate communication of the divine Being itself in the mode of formal causality – a communication which can only exist in terms of this formal causality – involves a relation to God which belongs to its very essence.”

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Rahner concludes that created grace is not purely created through efficient causality alone, but is also constituted quasi-formally by the uncreated grace to which human beings relate in their supernatural existential.40 While created grace is efficiently caused as the material disposition for God’s self-communication, it imitates the divine persons only by God’s quasi- formal causality.41 Accordingly, human beings may receive created grace as an absolutely supernatural accident only because uncreated grace has become the innermost constitutive element of their concrete human quiddity.42 In the following passage, Rahner explains how the human quiddity can be both the prior condition and the consequence of God’s quasi-formal causality:

The nature of the spiritual creature consists in the fact that that which is ‘innermost’ to it, that whence, to which and through which it is, is precisely not an element of this essence

40 Cf. ibid.: “If there is something supernatural simply speaking which is absolutely mysterious, then God himself must belong to what constitutes it, i.e. God in so far as he is not merely the ever transcendent Creator, the efficient cause of something finite which is distinct from him, but in so far as he communicates himself to the finite entity in quasi-formal causality.” Also, cf. P. de Letter, “Divine Quasi-Formal Causality,” Irish Theological Quarterly 27, no. 3 (1960): 223: “The self-gift of the Uncreated Grace to the soul, transforming and divinizing it, of necessity ‘produces’ created grace, a new form inherent in the soul, uniting it to God and making it like unto him. The quasi-formal causality of God which by itself does not produce any effect, but only unites the soul to himself, of necessity goes together with an efficient causality which effects the transformation of the soul or produces created grace.”

41 Cf. Karl Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith: An Introduction to the Idea of Christianity, trans. William Dych (New York: Crossroad, 1978), 121: “In efficient causality the effect is always different from the cause. But we are also familiar with formal causality: a particular existent, a principle of being is a constitutive element in another subject by the fact that it communicates itself to this subject, and does not just cause something different from itself which is then an intrinsic, constitutive principle in that which experiences this efficient causality.” Also, cf. ibid., 122: “This self-communication of God to what is not God implies the efficient causation of something other and different from God as its condition.” Some, such as Doran, have interpreted Rahner to mean that created grace is not efficiently caused in any respect. Cf. Doran, “Consciousness and Grace,” 72: “For Rahner the new relationship constituted by God’s gift of God’s own self is not to be thought of at all, it seems, in terms of efficient causality, whereas for Lonergan it cannot be thought of only in these terms.” However, Rahner is clear that created grace is an efficiently caused disposition for God’s self-communication that is made absolutely supernatural by God’s quasi-formal causality.

42 Cf. Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 116: “God in his own proper reality makes himself the innermost constitutive element of man.”

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and this nature which belongs to it. Rather its nature is based upon the fact that that which is supra-essential, that which transcends it, is that which gives it its support, its meaning, its future and its most basic impulse, though admittedly it does so in such a way that the nature of this spiritual creature, that which belongs to it as such, is not thereby taken away from it but rather obtains from this its ultimate validity and consistency and achieves growth and development because of it. The closeness of God’s self-bestowal and the unique personality of the creature grow in equal, and not in converse measure. This self-bestowal of God, in which God bestows himself precisely as the absolute transcendent, is the most immanent factor in the creature. The fact that it is given its own nature to possess, the ‘immanence of essence’ in this sense, is the prior condition, and at the same time the consequence, of the still more radical immanence of the transcendence of God in the spiritual creature, this creature being considered as that which has been endowed with grace through the uncreated grace of God.43

In response to Lonergan’s reasons for denying that grace modifies human quiddity, it may be noted of Rahner’s view that God is only an inner constitutive element of the human quiddity in the mode of quasi-formal causality, and not in the mode of strict formal causality whereby grace would make human nature identical with the divine nature. Even though God’s self-communication is the ground of human transcendence in the order of grace, and is not external to human beings, the two remain distinct. Thus, Rahner’s position does not imply that by modifying the concrete human quiddity, grace alters human nature in itself by making it identical to God as its formal cause. Yet, the concrete human situation is fundamentally transformed in its transcendental horizon by God’s absolutely supernatural grace. Accordingly, he notes that “the distinction between God and creature which rejects pantheism therefore does not exclude a determination of a finite being by God himself as such.”44

43 Karl Rahner, “Immanent and Transcendent Consummation of the World,” in Theological Investigations, Vol. 10: Writings of 1965-1967, trans. David Bourke (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1973), 281.

44 Karl Rahner, “Natural Science and Reasonable Faith,” 36.

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Rahner agrees with Lonergan that created grace is an efficiently caused disposition for

God’s self-communication. Yet Rahner’s theology points to the insight that created graces could not be absolutely supernatural unless uncreated grace belongs to their constitution through quasi- formal causality. This quasi-formal causality is also the only way in which created graces can terminate in God’s uncreated grace and ground non-appropriated relations to the divine persons.

Furthermore, God’s uncreated grace must make human beings able to receive absolutely supernatural created graces by becoming their innermost constitutive element. This elevation of human nature is experienced in people’s concrete quiddity as a supernatural existential. By comparison, Lonergan’s theology does not explain how God’s exemplary causality can create absolutely supernatural imitations of the divine persons. It does not appear that anything purely created through efficient causality can be absolutely supernatural, regardless of how much it naturally imitates God’s exemplary causality. Therefore, Rahner’s theology provides a more accurate ontological foundation for understanding the relationship between natural and supernatural reality, uncreated and created grace, and human and divine persons. It would thus be a better framework within which to develop a four-point hypothesis and a supernatural psychological analogy for the Trinity.

E. Conclusion

This chapter compared Rahner and Lonergan’s views of natural psychological analogies,

God’s self-communication, and the causal relationship between uncreated and created grace. It argued that there are various respects in which Rahner’s theology would provide a stronger

283 ontological foundation for the four-point hypothesis and a supernatural, psychological analogy than does the theology of Lonergan and Doran. It focused on three areas of comparison.

Firstly, it claimed that Rahner’s reflections on the natural psychological analogy provide greater insight into the possible structure of a supernatural psychological analogy. This is because Rahner’s starting point for formulating the psychological analogy is the study of the soul as the disposition for God’s self-communication through created grace. Secondly, it maintained that Rahner’s theology of grace as God’s self-communication provides a more solid foundation of the four-point hypothesis and draws conclusions from it more clearly. For instance, while

Lonergan believed that any of the divine persons could have become incarnate, Rahner held that the esse secundarium could only be created as the external term of the Father’s self- communication in his relation to the Son. Rahner’s conclusion strengthens the analogy between the esse secundarium and paternity suggested by the four-point hypothesis. Thirdly, it contended that Rahner’s view of the causal relationship between uncreated grace and created grace better explains the possibility of absolutely supernatural participation in the notional properties and relations of the divine persons. Rahner argues persuasively that created graces are absolutely supernatural only because uncreated grace belongs to their constitution through quasi-formal causality. By contrast, Lonergan’s theology cannot explain why absolutely supernatural imitations of the divine persons are possible since he understands them to be purely created through efficient causality. Rahner’s theology is thus better suited as a framework within which to develop a supernatural psychological analogy from the four-point hypothesis.

CONCLUSION

In summary, this dissertation brought Karl Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity into conversation with Bernard Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis, which his interpreter Robert

Doran has used to develop a supernatural, psychological analogy for the Trinity. Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis is that there are four created graces by which people participate in the four divine relations of paternity, active spiration, passive spiration, and filiation. These four created graces are, respectively, Christ’s esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the lumen gloriae. This dissertation argued that Rahner’s theological categories provide a stronger ontological foundation than those of Lonergan for the four-point hypothesis and a supernatural, psychological analogy. It consisted of five chapters.

The first chapter began by studying Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis in its original context. The origins of this hypothesis in Lonergan’s early Latin theological writings were examined. Lonergan’s first formulation of his four-point hypothesis was found in his notes for his course on grace in 1951-1952, and his final formulation of it was identified in his Divinarum personarum (1957), which was revised into his De Deo trino: Pars systematica (1964). This chapter also discussed how Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis lays the groundwork for a supernatural, psychological analogy for the Trinity. Afterwards, it reviewed the development of this hypothesis in current scholarship, especially by Doran who has made it the foundation for his systematic theology. It further detailed how Doran has developed a supernatural analogy from the four-point hypothesis by examining the human experience of the supernatural order. It concluded by discussing the opinions of different scholars about the significance of the four- 284 285 point hypothesis for theology going forward, especially in reference to Doran’s work. It studied some of Doran’s objections against his critics who reject the four-point hypothesis, in particular

Charles Hefling and David Coffey.

The second chapter noted that Doran seeks to transpose the four-point hypothesis into the categories of a methodical theology that addresses the concerns of modern philosophy. Although

Doran believes the most appropriate categories for such a transposition are those developed by

Lonergan, this chapter suggested that Rahner’s theological categories could be more useful in developing a contemporary analogy for the Trinity based upon the four-point hypothesis. It initiated the process of transposing the four-point hypothesis into Rahner’s theological categories by introducing Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity. It emphasized those aspects of it which pertain to the issues discussed in Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis and in Doran’s development of it into a supernatural analogy. The dimensions of Rahner’s thought discussed included the philosophical foundations of his theology, his distinction between pure nature and historical nature, his understanding of the relationship between uncreated grace and created grace, his view of God’s self-communication as a quasi-formal cause, his “Grundaxiom” that identifies the immanent Trinity with the economic Trinity, and his belief that people have non- appropriated relations to the divine persons through grace. These theological categories of

Rahner were studied in order to show how they could ground the four-point hypothesis and serve as a foundation for a supernatural, psychological analogy.

The third chapter identified areas of agreement between Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis and Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity. It discussed the manners in which Rahner

286 distinguishes four created graces and correlates each of them in a non-appropriated way with a participated divine relation. It examined Rahner’s reflections upon Christ’s esse secundarium, sanctifying grace, the habit of charity, and the light of glory. In accord with Rahner’s theology of human beings’ non-appropriated relations to the divine persons, it argued that these four created graces facilitate distinct manners of participation in the uncreated grace of the divine persons.

Therefore, it contended that the four-point hypothesis could be transposed into Rahner’s theological categories, especially those pertaining to God’s quasi-formal causality as the determining principle of humanity’s supernatural existential. This observation laid some groundwork for transposing the four-point hypothesis from Lonergan’s methodical theology to

Rahner’s transcendental theology.

The fourth chapter began by noting the differences between Rahner and Lonergan in their appreciation for natural psychological analogies. It discussed Rahner’s belief that the human experience of grace as God’s self-communication may be used to develop a stronger Trinitarian analogy than that constructed from natural human psychology. Then it examined how Rahner’s theology of grace and the Trinity could be used to develop a supernatural, psychological analogy.

It began to construct such an analogy after having noted the possibility of transposing

Lonergan’s four-point hypothesis into Rahner’s theological categories. It indicated Rahner’s understanding of the interrelationship among the four preeminent created graces, and then it identified parallels between this and the interrelationship among the divine persons. This supernatural, psychological analogy developed from the foundations of Rahner’s theology was argued to yield some analogical understanding of the Trinity.

287

The fifth chapter compared Rahner and Lonergan’s views of natural psychological analogies, God’s self-communication, and the causal relationship between uncreated and created grace. It argued that there are various respects in which Rahner’s theology would provide a stronger ontological foundation for the four-point hypothesis and a supernatural, psychological analogy than does the theology of Lonergan and Doran. First, it contended that Rahner’s reflections on the natural psychological analogy are better suited to serve as a foundation for a supernatural psychological analogy. Since Rahner’s starting point for formulating the psychological analogy is the study of the soul as the disposition for God’s self-communication through created grace, his reflections on the natural psychological analogy suggest the possibility of formulating a supernatural analogy more directly than those of Lonergan. Second, it reasoned that Rahner’s theology provides a stronger ontological foundation for the four-point hypothesis.

It explained that Lonergan’s belief that any of the divine persons could have become incarnate weakens the analogy between the esse secundarium and paternity suggested by his four-point hypothesis. By contrast, Rahner’s emphasis that the esse secundarium could only be created as the external term of the Father’s self-communication in his relation to the Son strengthens the

Trinitarian analogies drawn from the four-point hypothesis. Third, it claimed that Rahner’s account of the relationship between uncreated grace and created grace provides a stronger ontological foundation for a supernatural analogy. Rahner recognized that created graces are absolutely supernatural realities with non-appropriated relations to the divine persons because uncreated grace belongs to their constitution through quasi-formal causality. However,

Lonergan’s theology fails to explain how God’s exemplary causality can create absolutely

288 supernatural imitations of the divine persons because he understands them to be purely created through efficient causality. In each of these respects, this chapter concluded that Rahner’s theology is better suited as a framework within which to develop a supernatural, psychological analogy from the four-point hypothesis.

If this assessment of Rahner’s theology is correct, then future reflections upon the possibility of a supernatural, psychological analogy for the Trinity ought to seriously engage his thought, not only that of Lonergan and Doran. The four-point hypothesis is not merely a niche topic that is only of interest to Lonergan scholars. Rather, it has far-reaching implications for theology as a whole. In particular, this study has drawn from Rahner’s theological insights to make a significant contribution toward the development of a supernatural analogy from the four- point hypothesis that Lonergan and Doran have initiated. It has articulated the four-point hypothesis and a supernatural analogy in Rahner’s theological categories in order to offer a fruitful starting point for systematic theology.

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