Pope St. Pius X dubbed modernism as “… the synthesis of all heresies.” So it’s pretty scary yet terrifyingly easy for us to fall into this grave error, which actually plagues modern society. So I’ve made a sort-of “examination of conscience” which may help sort out if we have—in fact—adopted any modernist ideas.
Ready? Here it goes.
There is no way one could prove the existence of God from natural reason
- Have I had any ideas that the beauty of the universe and of the world probably came at random and that God had nothing to do with their creation?
- Have I ever told myself or others that faith is sufficient in believing that there is a God and that we need not look at the things around us for His existence as they present no concrete proof?
- Have I ever dismissed intellectual arguments for the existence of God by people such as Anselm of Canterbury, Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure and Jonathan Duns Scotus useless and flawed?
- Have I not held that there is indeed fine-tuning between God creating the world, why he created it and how it was created?
Revelations and miracles do not prove the origin of the Christian religion, since they are not suited to modern thinking
- Have I merely dismissed the revelations written in the Bible as merely symbolic?
- Have I also dismissed that the Bible is not divinely revealed?
- Have I doubted the resurrection of Christ and His divinity?
- Have I doubted the authenticity of the apparitions of the Blessed Mother despite being presented by concrete evidence?
- Have I doubted the promise of our Lord that He will come again to judge the living and the dead?
- Have I doubted the inerrancy of scriptures?
There was no Church founded by Christ
- Have I questioned the authority and infallibility of the Catholic Church?
- Have I dismissed the Catholic Church as being merely one of the “churches” who adhere to the universal teachings of Christ—which includes protestant and pseudo-Christian sects?
- Have I ever doubted the authenticity of the sacraments?
- Have I not believed that Christ built the Church on Peter?
- Have I dismissed the authority of the Church in proclaiming orthodox teachings in favor of the teachings of other sects?
- Have I ever held the view that Christ came down to abolish religion in order to redeem the world and to lead the people to righteousness?
- Have I ever told myself and others that faith is the only thing that matters and religion and the Catholic Church is of no importance?
- Have I deliberately and happily engaged in the services of other sects and religions?
- Have I accepted New Age teachings and have regarded them of high significance?
The structure and dogma of the Church changes from meaning to meaning
- Have I ever given personal interpretations of the texts of the Magisterium which are contrary to what the Pope or the duly delegated authority has explained?
- Have I ever supported the ordination of women despite the fact that Christ was man and so were the Apostles?
- Have I ever supported same-sex union?
- Have I ever supported the use of contraceptives, abortion, divorce, etc.?
- Have I ever believed that laypeople may become ministers and can administer sacraments themselves?
- Have I ever believed that the dogmas as defined by the Church have strayed from the original orthodox beliefs by the early Church and that this is fine by my own standards?
- Have I ever believed that the Church would someday deem things like contraception, abortion, divorce, same-sex union, euthanasia and many others as acceptable?
- Have I accepted secularism; saying that the Catholic Church has no special role in promoting the faith to the state?
Faith is merely a feeling from a will trained to morality, not a genuine assent to what has been divinely revealed
- Have I ever sought virtue by my own effort without asking for the grace of God or without hearing about God in the first place?
- Have I ever told myself or others that non-believers are capable of true virtue as defined by Christianity without hearing and accepting Christ and His bride?
- Have I dismissed the authentic messages given by God to me as part of man’s imagination?
- Have I believed that all men and women are born good despite the consequence of sin that Adam has brought to us by disobeying God’s command?
- Have I rejected the idea that we receive grace through faith that works in love?
So are we free of modernist ideas? Let’s hope so. Modernism has to be the most powerful heresy the Church has ever encountered so far, and it is very evident that we see this grave error especially in the contemporary world.
Want to add more to the list? Leave a comment and visit my blog here!
Key principal errors from “Heresy of the Month: Modernism” by Jimmy Akin, Catholic Answers “This Rock” magazine, November 1994 issue.
12 thoughts on “Are You Free of Modernist Ideas?”
excellent post
Wait, what? Surely one can believe that the existence of God can be established by reason, and yet still think that St. Anselm’s proof (or anyone else’s, but his stands out) is flawed. The Church surely doesn’t hold as dogma that any particular argument is, in fact, sound? How could that be a matter of faith? By construction, that judgment is left to the reason!
Garth,
That point speaks of intellectual arguments in general, since many would not consider them but instead turn to fideism as their basis for their belief in God. I merely gave examples.
Blessings
Intellectual Arguments do not prove the existence of the Triune God that Catholics believe in, because they are only capable of proving that there must be a “first cause”, or “a cause of the goodness of other things”, or an “unmoved mover”, etc; the God of the Bible is more than the god that can be known from philosophy alone. Therefore it is not necessarily heretical for a Catholic to recognize “that intellectual arguments for the existence of God are flawed”, because what a Catholic means by God is intellectually different from the limited conception given by these arguments.
Lay people sometimes can (and even should!) Minister one of the sacraments, Baptism, in time of emergency. Several of these are wooded a little strongly, and I would have reservations about someone using them as an Examen of sorts…mostly good content, but accuracy is crucial.
And what is meant by “virtue” here? If you mean “grace” then that might make more sense, but it isn’t true to claim that only Christians can be virtuous…”noble pagans” can still cultivate the first four virtues: prudence, justice, temperance and fortitude. Only the three theological virtues: faith, hope and charity, necessarily require grace, as we define it. Read your Dante!
Steve, you are somewhat correct. It is true that “the God of the Bible is more than the god that can be known from philosophy alone.” But no one is saying that God can be known by reason alone, but rather that the existence of God can be know by reason. Their is difference. Reason tells me that you exist: there is post that seems to be written by rational human being therefore it is rational to conclude you exist. Just because the “you” that reason leads me to believe exist, is rather incomplete picture, doesn’t mean I am wrong to conclude you exist, or that my cannot know you existence by reason. However knowing you exist and know you are to different things, I clearly do not know you. Reason can help us know that God exist and some of his characteristics, but not all of them. Even the Bible cannot help us fully know God, we need personal relationship with Him to truly “know” God, even with that personal relationship of knowledge of God will never be complete. So I would say that “what Catholic means by God is intellectually different from the limited conception given by these arguments,” rather that the conception given by these argument is only one part of what Catholic mean by God. After all we do believe God is the only “first cause” and the only “unmoved mover,” He also happens to be more than that.
May His Holiness +Pope Saint Pius X pray for us as we strugle through this modernist crisis he warned us in advance. Only a return to right thinking will help us out of this mess.
I answered “yes” to two of your questions. Does that make me a heretic?
Kathy makes you human. Only God I’d God. God loves you more than you know. Just because you question is human…look at St Thomas the Apostle, who gets a bad rap.
“My Lord and my God”, St Thomas said these words.
What a prayer Thomas gave us!
Guys,
Whoo boy. Not trying to be edgy here, but I never said anything, if you’ve noticed, that having any or some of these ideas per se makes you a heretic. However, what I am implying is that having some of them may lead to error. Also, hermeneutical reading is important here. We ought to follow the context of the principal errors of modernism instead of drawing a conclusion based on an individual point.
Blessings.
Have I questioned the infallibility of the Catholic Church? Have I?
Other questions might include:
Have I doubted the Catholic tenet that ‘There is no salvation outside the Church’? That is, only the properly baptized can be saved.
Have I doubted that those who, before death, do not confess their mortal sins to a priest will go to hell?
Have I doubted that there are souls in hell (“where the worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched”)?