No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
Salvation through Implicit Faith: A New Defence
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 November 2024
Abstract
The once-popular thesis that non-Christians who are inculpably ignorant of the gospel can be saved through ‘implicit faith’ in Christ has fallen on hard times. In this paper, we consider objections raised against this position by a range of Catholic critics, including Thomas Crean, Augustine DiNoia, Gavin D’Costa, and Stephen Bullivant. In our judgement, criticisms of ‘implicit faith’ often suffer from a lack of clarity about the nature of such faith, although admittedly this ambiguity was present even in original Scholastic uses of the term. However, in the past few decades, analytic philosophers have explored many forms of belief, which one might call ‘implicit’. Accordingly, we draw on both Scholastic and analytic epistemology to arrive at a more attractive characterisation of implicit faith. We argue that once implicit faith is understood in this way, recent objections to the claim that non-Christians can be saved soluble.
- Type
- Article
- Information
- Copyright
- © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers.
References
1 Stephen Bullivant, The Salvation of Atheists and Catholic Dogmatic Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 60–7; 80–3.
2 We cannot here specify what constitutes ‘invincible’ or ‘inculpable’ ignorance of the gospel – i.e., the circumstances under which someone can non-culpably lack explicit Christian faith. For detailed commentary, see Bullivant, Salvation of Atheists, pp. 131–47. Bullivant shows that while Aquinas held that only complete unfamiliarity with the gospel suffices for invincible ignorance, later Dominicans, including Vitoria and Las Casas, allowed that faith is only mandatory for those who receive a credible presentation of the gospel. Similarly, Pius IX suggested that one can hardly ‘designate the limits of [invincible] ignorance, due to the reason and variety of peoples, regions, natural dispositions, and a great many other things’ (Singulari Quadam, 1854), suggesting a broader scope for ‘inculpable ignorance’ which influenced the Fathers of Vatican II. We too hold that explicit Christian faith is only obligatory for those who can reasonably judge that faith is intellectually and morally prudent. But a wide variety of circumstances may mean that even those who have encountered the gospel cannot prudently make an explicit act of Christian faith. Relevant circumstances include their broader beliefs, the presentation of the gospel to them, and the behaviour of Christian contemporaries.
3 See Francis Sullivan, Salvation Outside the Church: Tracing the History of the Catholic Response (London: Chapman, 1992); Bullivant, Salvation of Atheists, pp. 43–76.
4 Sullivan, Salvation Outside the Church, pp. 14–43.
5 Aquinas, Summa Theologiae (ST) II.II q2. a. 6–8; Bonaventure, In Sent. III d.25 a.1 q.2 in Opera Omnia, vol. III (Rome: Quaracchi, 1887), pp. 539–41.
6 Francisco Suárez, Tractatus de Fide, d.12 sec. 4 in Opera Omnia, vol. XII, ed. by C. Breton (Paris: Vives, 1858), pp. 350–60; Juan de Lugo, Tractatus de Virtute Fidei Divinae d.12, sec.1–4 in Disputationes Scholasticae et Morales, vol. I, ed. by J. B. Fournalis (Paris: Vives, 1868), pp. 385–426.
7 Holy Office, Letter to the Archbishop of Boston (1949), in Symbolorum Definitionum et Declarationum De Rebus Fidei et Morum, 32nd edn, ed. by Henricus Denzinger and Adolfus Schönmetzer (Barcelona: Herder, 1963) para. 3870, p. 771. Hereafter, ‘Denzinger’. Whilst this document represents an advance on the views of Aquinas and some Scholastics, it does not explicitly allow that implicit faith is sufficient for salvation.
8 Catechism of the Catholic Church: Revised Edition (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1999), para. 161. Hereafter, ‘CCC’.
9 CCC, para. 851.
10 Bullivant, Salvation of Atheists, pp. 82–3.
11 D’Costa, Christianity and World Religions, p. 29.
12 ST II.II 2.6-8.
13 Thomas Crean, Alan Fimister, and John Joy, ‘Can a Person Be Justified by “Implicit Faith” in Christ?’, Divinitas, 2023-1 (2023), 145–69.
14 Augustine DiNoia, ‘Implicit Faith, General Revelation and the State of Non-Christians’, The Thomist, 47 (1983), 209–41; Gavin D’Costa, Christianity and World Religions: Disputed Questions, in the Theology of Religions (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009), pp. 19–25; Bullivant, Salvation of Atheists, pp. 77–114.
15 Crean et al., ‘Can a Person Be Justified?’, pp. 151–4.
16 Denzinger, para. 1351, p. 342.
17 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Romans 26:3–4; Pope Pelagius I, Letter to Childebert (Denzinger, para. 443); Pius X, Acerbo Nimis (1910), para. 2.
18 Basil of Caesarea, Shorter Rule, reply to question 224; Chrysostom, Homilies on Romans 26:3–4.
19 Augustine, On Rebuke and Grace, 4–5.
20 Denzinger, para. 2380, p. 488.
21 Denzinger, para 1526, p. 370.
22 Denzinger, para 1526, p. 370.
23 D’Costa, Christianity and World Religions, pp. 29–30.
24 Crean et al., ‘Can a Person Be Justified?’, p. 158.
25 DiNoia, ‘Implicit Faith’, pp. 222.
26 Ibid., p. 223.
27 Ibid., p. 224.
28 Ibid., p. 227.
29 Bullivant, Salvation of Atheists, pp. 99–100.
30 Ibid., p. 106.
31 Ibid., pp. 107–10.
32 DiNoia, ‘Implicit Faith’, p. 229.
33 Ibid., p. 224.
34 Ibid., p. 240; D’Costa, Christianity and World Religions, pp. 161–211.
35 D’Costa, Christianity and World Religions, p. 179.
36 Bullivant, Salvation of Atheists, pp. 149–80.
37 CCC, para. 1814.
38 ST II.II q1. a3. Translations from English Dominican Province, trans., The ‘Summa Theologica’ of St Thomas Aquinas, 2nd rev. edn (London: Burns, Oates & Washbourne, 1922–35).
39 Aquinas, De Veritate 14.11, co.
40 Suárez, De Fide d.6, sec. 3, n. 8 (Opera Omnia vol. XII, pp. 173).
41 Aquinas, De Veritate 14.11, co.
42 John Jenkins, Knowledge and Faith in Thomas Aquinas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), p. 12.
43 Aquinas, ST II.II 2 a5, resp.
44 E.g., Suárez, De Fide, d. XII, sec. 4, n. 19 (Opera Omnia Vol. XII, p. 357), ‘explicit faith is virtually contained in implicit [faith], and in the will’s commitment to fulfil everything necessary [for salvation]’ (our translation).
45 Scotus, Lectura III, d. 25, q. un., n. 19, in C. Balic, ed., Opera Omnia Vol. XXI (Vatican City: Vatican Press, 2004), p. 163.
46 Richard Cross, ‘Baptism, Faith and Cognitive Impairment in some Medieval Theologies’, International Journal of Systematic Theology, 14 (2012), 420–38, p. 433.
47 Scotus, Lect. III, d. 25, q. un., n. 19 in Opera Omnia Vol. XXI, p. 163.
48 ST III q.68 a8 ad2.
49 Suárez, De Fide d. 10, sec. 2, n. 10.
50 Elisabeth Camp, ‘Thinking with Maps’, Philosophical Perspectives, 21 (2007), 145–82.
51 Eric Schwitzgebel, ‘A Phenomenal, Dispositional Account of Belief’, Noûs, 36 (2002), 249–75.
52 Jerry Fodor, Psychosemantics (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1987); Daniel Dennet, Brainstorms (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1978).
53 Ted Poston and Trent Dougherty, ‘Divine hiddenness and the nature of belief’, Religious Studies, 43 (2007), p. 185.
54 Robert Audi, ‘Dispositional Beliefs and Dispositions to Believe’, Noûs, 28 (1995), 419–34.
55 William Lycan, ‘Tacit Belief’, in Belief: Form, Content and Function, ed. by Radu Bodgan (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986), p. 65.
56 Perhaps tacit beliefs can be grounded in other cognitive habits, but we set this aside.
57 On intellectual virtue, see Heather Battaly, ‘Virtue Epistemology’, Philosophy Compass, 3 (2008), 639–63.
58 Scotus, Lect. III, d. 23, q. un., n. 38 in Opera Omnia Vol. XXI, pp. 111–2; cf. Cross, ‘Baptism, Faith’, pp. 434–4.
59 Aquinas, ST II.II q.5 a.3; Scotus, Lect. III, d. 25, q. un., n. 23–4 in Opera Omnia Vol. XXI, p. 164.
60 E.g., Ludwig Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma (Rockford, IL: TAN, 1974), p. 311.
61 Denzinger, para. 2380, p. 488.
62 Suárez, De Fide, d. XII, sec. 4, n.18–19 (Opera Omnia Vol. XII, p. 357); De Lugo, De Virtute Fidei, d.12, sec. 4, n.106–7 (Disputationes, pp.425–6).
63 E,g,, Matthew Benton, ‘God and Interpersonal Knowledge’, Res Philosophica, 95 (2018), pp. 421–77.
64 Our thought experiment is consistent with – though does not require – Rahner’s concept of anonymous Christianity. Perhaps, those without explicit Christian faith can foster an unconscious relationship with Christ through the practice of non-Christian religions. However, just as Gerald eventually attains a conscious relationship with Gavin, so such ‘anonymous Christians’ would come to know Christ explicitly after death and thus enjoy a conscious relationship with Him.
65 Karl Rahner, Theological Investigations, vol. XIV (New York: Seabury, 1976), p. 286.
66 D’Costa, Christianity and World Religions, pp. 177, 179.
67 DiNoia, The Diversity of Religions: A Christian Perspective (Washington, DC: CUA Press, 1992), p. 105.
68 D’Costa, Christianity and World Religions, p. 191.
69 Bullivant, Salvation of Atheists, pp. 172–4.
70 Karl Rahner, Theological Investigations, vol. XII (New York: Seabury, 1976), pp. 166–74.
71 Holy Office, Letter to the Archbishop of Boston (1949), Denzinger para. 3870, p. 771.
72 Eleonore Stump, Aquinas (London: Routledge, 2003), p. 403; cf. Aquinas, ST I.II q.113 a.7.
73 We are grateful to members of the Centre for Philosophy of Religion and Theology at the University of Leeds, and two anonymous reviewers, for helpful comments on earlier versions of this paper.