22 SEPTEMBER 1950, Page 16

Dogma and Fact

SIR,—Many people who are opposed to the definition of the doctrine of the Assumption would not go so far as to say that it is " divorced from intellect and reason." The real question, surely, is whether it has any foundation in fact. It is generally agreed that the logical consistency and coherence of a particular theory is by itself no guarantee of its objective truth. The Gnostic speculations of the first and second cen- turies were certainly not divorced from reason and intellect ; but they were firmly rejected by the Catholic Church because they divorced reason and intellect from fact and history ; and that is the real objection to the proposed definition.

The Christian faith is firmly rooted in history. That is one of its strongest and most distinctive features. It is constantly pointed out that stories of virgin births and redemptive deaths are common to many religions, bearing witness to the.fact that human reason sees dimly that such acts of God are somehow desirable. The difference between such legends and the Christian belief is that Christianity claims, not only that these things are desirable, but that they actually happened at a particular period to particular people, and that we have historical evidence of their happening. To waive that distinction is to debase the Christian faith to the level of the pagan legends.

We base our faith not on what we would like God to do, or think it suitable for God to do, or find it devotionally helpful to assume that God does, but on what in historic fact God has done. By all means let those who wish to do so accept the Assumption as a pious and helpful opinion ; but to try to make it a necessary part of the Catholic faith is to cut the

Church loose from the safe anchorage of fact and to cast her adrift upon sea of speculation which may end anywhere.—Yours faithfully,