Pope Benedict XVI, following in the footsteps of his predecessor, has said much about the importance of understanding the relationship between faith and reason. Benedict’s understanding and teaching on this relationship is evident in the address he gave to the U.S. bishops during the recent [March 2012] Ad Limina visit.
With her long tradition of respect for the right relationship between faith and reason, the Church has a critical role to play in countering cultural currents which, on the basis of an extreme individualism, seek to promote notions of freedom detached from moral truth. Our tradition does not speak from blind faith, but from a rational perspective which links our commitment to building an authentically just, humane and prosperous society to our ultimate assurance that the cosmos is possessed of an inner logic accessible to human reasoning.Here it seems that His Holiness is presenting morality not from a top-down model, which could require “blind faith”, but rather from a within model: the makings of right living are within us and within the universe, like a language of righteous living imprinted on our very being, and we can use our ratio (rational powers) to decode this language. This language is accessible to us, because it is part of our makeup. Furthermore, it is accessible to all people of good will, not only to “religious” people or only to Catholics; although the Church has an indispensible role in teaching some of the more complicated matters in moral theology and ethics. Yet the basics are available to all. Unless one has killed his conscience by repeated and vicious sins, he knows in his heart that murder, stealing, lying, and cheating are morally wrong.
