Week 1: The "Intellectual Dimension" of Faith
The act of faith includes, in the first place, an INTELLECTUAL dimension. Faith, in other words, is the act of accepting something as true-whether as a fact or as meaningful. We believe, for example, the fact that God is the creator of heaven and earth, that the existence of the world is not an accident but is a result of the loving intention of our creator God. Or, we believe in the truth of the analogy found in Psalm 23 that "the Lord is my shepherd"-that this is an expression full of meaning even though it is not factually true as such. This is what we mean by the assent of faith.
A few months ago I chanced upon an article about a speech that former British Prime Minister Tony Blair had given in which he spoke of the importance of faith for the future of the world. He insisted that without faith, people would be lost, politics would be empty, that the world would have a rather bleak future. Blair defined faith in the following way-a clear articulation, if a general one, of faith's intellectual dimension: Faith is "fundamentally a belief that there is something bigger and more important than you, that you are not only the only thing that matters, there is something that is greater and transcendent."
Pope Benedict, in the document in which he called for the Year of Faith, speaks of the intellectual dimension of faith when he says that "knowledge of the content of the faith is essential for giving one's own assent, that is to say for adhering fully with intellect and will to what the Church proposes" (Paragraph 10). This intellectual dimension of faith is what we exercise when we read, for instance, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, or when we recite the creed at Mass every Sunday. It points to the fact that, in faith, we have to believe not just "in general," but in something concrete, in doctrines, in ideas, in truths.
Questions for Reflection
- What are some of the main things in which you believe?
- Why do you think it is important for your faith to have an "intellectual dimension"?
Stephen Bevans, SVD
Stephen Bevans is currently Louis J. Luzbetak, S.V.D., Professor of Mission and Culture at Catholic Theological Union, Chicago, USA and the Faculty Moderator for Catholics on Call. He is a Roman Catholic priest in the Society of the Divine Word, an international missionary congregation, and served for nine years (1972-1981) as a missionary in the Philippines.
His publications include: Models of Contextual Theology (2002), Constants in Context: A Theology of Mission for Today (2004, with Roger Schroeder), Evangelization and Freedom (2009, with Jeffrey Gros), and Introduction to Theology in Global Perspective (2009).
He is past president of the American Society of Missiology (2006) and past member of the board of directors of the Catholic Theological Society of America (2007-2009). In 2009 he was visiting lecturer at Yarra Theological Union in Melbourne, Australia, and in 2013 he was the only Catholic to speak at a Plenary at the Tenth Assembly of the World Council of Churches in Busan, Korea.
