Christian faith is based on reason, Pope tells audience
November 21, 2012
Faith in God is fully rational, Pope Benedict XVI told his weekly public audience on November 21.
Rejecting the idea that faith involves a leap beyond logic—a “will to believe beyond reason”--the Pope told the group in the Paul VI auditorium that the Church has always insisted on the reasonableness of belief. “The Catholic faith is therefore rational and also nurtures trust in human reason,” he said.
“God has sought mankind and made Himself known, bringing Himself to the limits of human reason,” the Pope said. God’s action “opens our eyes and allows us to know all reality beyond the limited horizons of individualism and subjectivism which distort our awareness.”
Christian faith, the Pope continued, is not only based on reason but pursues reason and knowledge. “Therefore, faith is a continuous stimulus to seek, never to cease or acquiesce in the inexhaustible search for truth and reality.” The Pope underlined the need for proper cooperation between religious faith and scientific learning, saying that “faith does not enter into conflict with science but co-operates with it, offering fundamental criteria to ensure it promotes universal good, and asking only that science desist from those initiatives that, in opposition to God's original plan, may produce effects which turn against man himself.”
During the Year of Faith, the Pope said, the Christian world should be working at “rediscovering joy at believing and our enthusiasm for communicating the truth of faith to all.”
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