Conclusion

MUCH more might be said of Modernism. What has been said is perhaps enough to indicate its radical error, and the effect of that error upon the Modernist endeavour to readjust Catholicity to modern thought. The initial error of Modernism is the error of Kant, that God and the supernatural are unattainable by intellectual knowledge. It has been pointed out in the foregoing lectures how that theory reappears again and again in Modernist teachings. But it is a theory which is fatal to the Catholic doctrine of faith, for faith is intellectual assent to supernatural truth revealed. Other heresies have attacked this or that particular object of faith, now the Incarnation, now the Virgin Birth, now the Real Presence, now the Papal claims; Modernism strikes at faith itself. Hence, in his process of readjusting Catholicity to modern thought, the Modernist is driven to this conclusion: "It is not the articles of the creed, but the word 'credo' that needs adjustment."^{1} Precisely, it is the very notion of faith that needs readjusting to suit the Modernist. The same writer calls that "a theological revolution."^{2} And so it is, but it is a theological revolution for which Catholics at least are not prepared.

THE END

{1} "Life of Fr. Tyrrell," ii., p. 220.

{2} Ibid.