Pope St Pius X and the Certitude of Faith

Today marks the feast day of Pope St Pius X, who occupied the See of Peter from 1903-1914. One of St Pius’ great reforms was to lower the age of first communicants to the age of reason (usually considered to be around eight years old). As long as a child believed that the Eucharist was the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Christ – hidden under the appearances of bread and wine, that child could receive communion. This is a great thing, because it reminds us that we can be sure a doctrine is true, without necessarily having complete and total understanding of it.

For example, no one, not even the greatest theologian, completely understands the doctrine of the Trinity. And anyone who says they do is mistaken, for no one has complete understanding of the uncreated, three-in-one Godhead crammed inside one’s feeble, created mind. Yet, every Catholic can be sure it is true that God is a Trinity of Persons, because it has been divinely revealed. In the same way, I believe and know that electricity works. I have certitude about it, even though I’m not a professional electrician and can’t explain the circuitry and currents involved. For me to benefit from it, I simply need to make an act of faith in what I know to be true – by turning on the light.

One of the reasons I left the Catholic Church as a twentysomething university student was that I could never get a satisfying answer from the Catholics I knew about why certain doctrines were true. I thought this was evidence of the weakness of the faith. In reality, I was, of course, making an elementary error in thinking that, simply because a religious adherent couldn’t explain a tenet of their faith, it therefore follows that it is not true.

Although we should, as the original Pope, St Peter, encourages us, “make every effort to add to (our) faith…knowledge” (2 Peter 1:5), one can still have certitude about these things, even if we don’t have perfect knowledge of them. Why? Because we have a divinely authorized Church to teach them to us – and we need this. If each of us had to reason our own way to saving knowledge of God by ourselves, we’d be in trouble, easily led astray. God foreknew this, providing us with a Church that would be Mater et Magistra (Mother and Teacher), safeguarding Jesus’ teachings until the end of time. We thank our Lord for this today, and for providing his Church with great spiritual fathers like St Pius X.

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You may also like: Pope Pius X and the Immaculate Conception

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4 Quick Facts on the Assumption of Mary

Today is the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary, celebrating that God raised the Virgin Mary, body and soul, to the glories of heaven at the end of her earthly journey. Here are four quick facts about this teaching of the Church :

1. Catholics must believe this in order to hold the Faith.

The Assumption of Mary is one of the four Marian Dogmas (infallible teachings) that Catholics must believe (the others being the Immaculate Conception, Divine Maternity, and Perpetual Virginity of our Lady). The reason why validity of the doctrine can be trusted is that it rests on the same foundation as that of Transubstantiation or the Canon of the Bible – namely, the teaching authority of the Catholic Church.

2. There is good circumstantial, supporting evidence for the Assumption.

No Christian community has ever claimed to have the relics (bones or other mortal remains) of the Virgin Mary. When one considers how Christians venerated the relics and final resting places of important saints in the early Church period (such as St Peter’s Basilica being built over his tomb), it is remarkable that no church has ever claimed to have her relics. If the relics of the Mother of Jesus relics really did exist, they would have been prized above all others. An argument from silence isn’t always the greatest, but in this case, silence speaks volumes.

3. There is indirect, biblical support for the doctrine.

The simple fact of the matter is that, in salvation history recorded in the Bible, “assumptions happen”. Genesis speaks of Enoch, who “walked with God and was no more, because God took him” (Genesis 5:24; cf. Hebrews 11:5). Most interpreters believe that Enoch was assumed, body and soul, into heaven. Also, Elijah was taken up to heaven, body and soul, in a chariot of fire (2 Kings 2:11).

If these holy ones of old could be translated directly to heaven, why not the “Panagia” (“All-Holy”) mother of God, who “gave the Word flesh” (cf. John 1:14)? In Revelation 12, John sees the “Ark of the (New) Covenant”, Mary in heaven.

4. Christians have believed this for centuries.

Catholics did not “invent” the doctrine of the Assumption when Pope Pius XII officially defined it in 1950. All the Pope was doing was making clear that this teaching was always true and part of the deposit of faith (Jude 3) for centuries. How do we know this? Because the Church’s liturgy (including the content of liturgical prayers and feast days) included the Assumption from the earliest times. Some even believe it was the earliest of Marian feast days, originating in Jerusalem.

Many Christian practices were suppressed under the wicked reign of Emperor Hadrian, who had levelled much of Jerusalem in 135 AD, renaming the town after the pagan god Jupiter. After Constantine’s acceptance of the faith in the fourth century, many Christian feasts were revived. The Assumption began to be celebrated in Rome as early as the seventh century. It is in the liturgy that Sacred Tradition is taught most clearly, for “the Church believes as She prays” (Lex orandi, lex credendi).

We have a powerful intercessor in heaven in Mary, who precedes all of us who look forward to life in the new heaven and the new earth in a glorified humanity of body and soul. We close with a liturgical prayer asking for that intercession: Recordare, Virgo Mater Dei, dum steteris in conspectu Domini; ut loquaris pro nobis bona (“Remember, Virgin Mother of God, when you walk in the presence of the Lord, to speak well of us”).

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