Note: This is part four of a series of five posts about God. These were originally written as an RCIA presentation about God the Father. These posts are in an expanded form, and the presentation as given does not necessarily follow the posts exactly. I was constrained in the presentation itself to keep the time to under about 45 minutes or so, and to be somewhat conversational (sine it was their first formal session). Here is the full written transcript, which goes beyond what I did in the presentation. Here are Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

"There are two kinds of people in the world, the conscious dogmatists and the unconscious dogmatists. I have always found myself that the unconscious dogmatists were by far the most dogmatic." (G.K. Chesterton)

After hearing that faith is ultimately about a relationship, it is tempting to turn to a common objection concerning doctrines and dogma. Don’t all the ritualism and morality, the doctrines and especially the dogmas of the Church ultimately get in the way of a genuine “personal relationship” with God?

In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis relates a story about a talk he once gave to the Royal Air Force on theology:
'An old, hard-bitten office got up and said, “I’ve no use for all that stuff. But, mind you, I’m a religious man too. I know there’s a God. I’ve felt Him: out alone in the desert at night: the tremendous mystery. And that’s why I don’t believe all your neat little dogmas and formulas about Him. To anyone who’s met the real thing they all seem so petty and pedantic and unreal.”'

Lewis does not discount the old officer’s testimony, but rather affirms it by noting that when you really experience the presence of God in prayer, the creeds may seem like a hollow counterfeit. In a sense, the doctrines--from the creeds on up—are like snapshots or pictures of God: they can’t compare to the real thing. But here Lewis goes on to make an analogy:
the doctrines are like viewing a map of the ocean as opposed to visiting the real thing.

"Now, theology is like the map. Merely learning and thinking about the Christian doctrines, if you stop there, is less real and exciting than the sort of thing that my friend got in the desert. Doctrines are not God: they are only a kind of map. But the map is based on the experience of hundreds of people who really were in touch with God—experiences with which any thrills or pious feelings you and I are likely to get on our own are very elementary and very confused. And secondly, if you want to get any further, you must use the map. You see, what comes of that man in the desert may have been real, and was certainly exciting, but nothing comes of it. There is nothing to do about it. In fact, that is just why a vague religion—all about feeling God in nature and so on—is so attractive. It is all thrills and no work: like watching the waves from the beach. But you will not get to Newfoundland by studying the Atlantic that way, and you will not get eternal life by simply feeling the presence of God in flowers or music. Neither will you get anywhere by looking at maps without going to sea. Nor will you be very safe if you go to sea without a map."

Theology is therefore something practical, not merely abstract, and it is something which is here to help us in our relationship with God. Therefore, we should ask what, exactly, is a doctrine?

A doctrine is nothing more than a teaching, something which is taught by the Church. These doctrines are derived from Revelation—that is, from the Scriptures and from Tradition—through which God tells us about Himself; indeed, through which God reveals Himself. God must reveal Himself to us, since He is infinite and we are but finite; natural philosophy, natural theology—human reason—can only take us so far on its own.

Therefore, God has revealed Himself to us, first through the Patriarchs of Israel (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob/Israel), then through the prophets (Moses, Samuel, Nathan, Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, etc.), and finally by becoming incarnate as Jesus Christ, true God and true man. Again, He gave this revelation to His apostles both when He was incarnate on the earth and through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, who continues to speak to guide us today through the Church. All of this will be covered in future talks, but suffice it to say that God did not reveal everything about Himself all at once. And though Christ was really the Son of God, that is truly God enfleshed, so that God gave a complete revelation of Himself to us, we could not grasp all of Him, since all of Him is far greater—infinitely so—than all of us, and the Truth is thus more inexhaustible than our minds.

Indeed, although the Truth itself does not change, our understanding of it does. This is why doctrines develop, because as our knowledge and understanding grows an builds upon the knowledge and understanding of our forefathers—those who preceded us in the faith—we are able to unfold the Truth more and more. To paraphrase Isaac Newton, we have seen far by standing on the shoulders of giants.

Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman once liked doctrine to an oak tree—it begins as a single acorn, then takes root and sends up a trunk, which grows branches and leaves until the whole oak tree is visible. Our doctrine develops in much the same way—the kernel or seed of the doctrine contains all of the doctrine, just like the acorn contains the whole oak tree. The apostles were given the acorn, which was planted in their hearts by the Spirit. Over the centuries, this acorn has grown into the oak tree which we have in Catholic teaching today. And, as Professor Peter Kreeft reminds us, today’s oak tree is not yet done growing, but is rather still like a sapling. To the Church of the 5th millennium, we are the early Christians, just as we refer to the Church fathers of the first millennium as the “early Christians” today.

A dogma is a specific type of doctrine which is proclaimed as infallible by the teaching authority of the Church. Dogmas are ultimately conclusions, while most doctrine may be the reasoning which leads to that conclusion. It is where the doctrines come to a specific and definite point, from which the doctrines may again branch out—a conclusion which is paradoxically a new beginning. The doctrine of the Trinity—that there is one God in Three Persons—is a dogma. It is a conclusion reached after literally centuries of argument about the natures of the Son and Holy Spirit. But notice that Catholic thought does not end with the dogma of the Trinity, but rather that, as the Handbook for Today’s Catholic puts it, “The mystery of the Trinity is the central doctrine of the Catholic faith. Upon it are based all other teachings of the Church.”

The great Catholic thinker G.K. Chesterton once said that a dogma is often not so much where thinking ends, but rather where it begins. Because we can embrace this one definition, this one conclusion, this one paradox, we are therefore free to build upon it, or to build outward from it rather than wandering in a mental circle about it. Dogmas are no more constraining to thought than are definitions, which are in fact a type of conclusion—the conclusion about what a word means and how it ought to be used.

Dogmas are truths which were once often not only thought over but also fought over, truths which were questioned by heresies and defended or defined by councils. Dogmas are defined—and doctrine is developed—for a variety of reasons, but almost all doctrinal development begins with some sort of questioning. This may be the questioning of curious minds among the faithful, or it may be the questioning of the heretic who seeks to undermine and destroy. And though heresy is never a good thing, sometimes the doubts which spring from it ultimately lead to a growth of our understanding as a Church, just as the questions and even doubts which we face as individuals can lead to a growth in our own faith.

This parallel between a growth in the Church’s understanding and the growth in our faith as individuals is not a mere coincidence. This, then, is the relationship between doctrine and dogma on the one hand, and faith and love—a personal relationship—on the other hand. Saint Augustine said that he believed that he may better understand. We can take this a step further by saying that we understand so that we may better love.

This finds an analogy in our ordinary human interpersonal relationships. When I first met my wife, I did not know her at all. I was somewhat infatuated with her, entranced b and attracted to her. Yet I did not really know her yet, and so I loved mostly my conception of her, my first impressions; but the as I got to know her better, and to learn more about her, I began to love not just my first impressions or my conception, but the real her. There were some adjustments to be made for both of us, and I learned of some of her imperfections, of course, but also some delightful surprises which I would never have discovered had I not got to know her better. She also brought to light some of my own imperfections, which I had never before noticed, but which I therefore had never tried to improve.

The same thing is true about God, with one exception—He is already perfect, so all the adjustments and changes are ultimately our own. Nevertheless, the doctrines and dogmas tell us more about Him, and they help us to get to know Him better. This ultimately means that they ultimately help us to love Him better, and to love the real God and not just our fuzzy first impressions. Far from getting in the way of a simple faith relationship with God, the doctrines and dogmas help us to strengthen that relationship, to grow in that relationship.

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Continue on to Part 5: "Some Revelations of the Father to Us"

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