Folia Theologica 1. (1990)

Péter Erdő: The Theological foundations of Canon Law according to the works of John Henry Newman

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P. ERDŐ

also disciplinary ones that propose, explain, and concretize the divine and natural precepts. They accept with full conviction the validity of natural laws even in the Church.6

2. Conscience and obedience in the Church

With regard to the office of the legislator and of conscience in the foundation of obligations in the Church, Newman starts from the analogy between obedience and conscience in natural religions and obedience to the Church, the Pope, the bishops in revealed religion. In his Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine he argues that "What conscience is in the system of nature, such is the voice of Scripture, or of the Church, or of the Holy See, as we may determine it, in the system of Revelation."68 69 He therefore shares that position, according to which revealed religion must be structured in an authoritative way, and he sees the difference between natural religion and revealed religion in the fact that the first has a subjective authority, while the second follows an objective authority.70 If in the order of nature one obeys one’s conscience, although it is not infallible, in the Church one must obey ecclesiastical superiors without excluding the possibility that they may be mistaken.71 All this does not mean, however, that conscience, remains excluded from the Church. As we said above, for Newman the hierarchical authority does not completely substitute for natural conscience, but it integrates, authorizes and verifies it.72 The analyses of the rich problematic of the relationship between authority and conscience goes beyond the scope of this lecture. It is enough to simply note that the source of obligation of norms in the Church is, for Newman, unique and different from that which is found both in natural religion and in civil powers. Revelation establishes another type of power, which nevertheless in the social order presents itself as the true power of an independent community. At the same time the natural forces that operate the institutionalization of human society do not cease to be at work in the Church.

68. Cf. e.g. VECCHIOTTI I, 14-15.

69. Dev 86; cf. ibid. 352.

70. Ibid.

71. Dev 87.

72. COULSON 168-170.