Читать книгу Catholicism For Dummies - Rev. Kenneth Brighenti - Страница 44

So, are having faith and hoping to be saved the same as believing in the Tooth Fairy and hoping for a dollar bill under your pillow? Of course not. The First Vatican Council (1869–1879; also known as Vatican I) taught that you need the intervention of supernatural revelation to be saved, but certain truths, like the existence of God, are attainable on your own power by using human reason.

In the 13th century, St. Thomas Aquinas, a philosopher, explained how the human mind seeks different kinds of truth. He said that

 Scientific truth (also known as empirical truth) is known by observation and experimentation. So, for example, you know that fire is hot by burning your finger with a lit match.

 Philosophical truth is known by using human reason. You know that two plus two equals four, for example. So, if two chairs are in a room and someone says, “I’ll get two more,” you know by using reason that the total will be four chairs. You don’t need to count the chairs after they arrive.

 Theological truth, known only by faith, is the final and highest level of truth. It can’t be observed, and it can’t be reasoned; it must be believed by faith — taken on God’s word, because He revealed it.

St. Thomas Aquinas also delineated five philosophical proofs for the existence of God in a monumental work called the Summa Theologica. Because Vatican I taught that the human mind can know some things of religion on its own without having to depend on divine revelation, it’s good to see the example given by St. Thomas. Aquinas reasoned that humans can prove the existence of God through motion, causality, necessity, gradation, and governance. Granted, you may not be able to persuade an atheist to become a missionary priest this way, but these proofs are still pretty compelling.