THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA Personal Religion in the Apologetic Christology of Léonce de Grandmaison A DISSERTATION Submitted to the Faculty of the School of Theology and Religious Studies Of The Catholic University of America In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree Doctor of Sacred Theology by Ignazio Michael Bellafiore Washington, D.C. 2013 Personal Religion in the Apologetic Christology of Léonce de Grandmaison Ignazio M. Bellafiore, S.T.D. Director: Joseph A. Komonchak, Ph.D., Director Jesuit Père Léonce de Grandmaison (1868–1927) was a leading Catholic apologist in France during the Modernist crisis. In 1908, the year after Pascendi Dominici Gregis was published, he became editor of Études; in 1910, he founded Recherches de Science Religieuse. Never losing sight of his lifelong ambition to write a work on Christ, Grandmaison treated in occasional writings the crucial issues raised by Modernists: historical criticism of the Bible, the philosophy of religion, development of dogma, religious psychology, and religious ethnology. The dissertation aims to show that “personal religion” was the linchpin of Grandmaison’s apologetic Christology. Relevant occasional works by Grandmaison are examined, particularly a series of articles in Études (1913) entitled “La religion personnelle,” an article on Christ in the Dictionnaire apologétique de la Foi catholique (1914), and Grandmaison’s chief work, Jésus Christ: sa personnage, son message, ses preuves (1927). Chapter one gives a biographical introduction and an overview of Grandmaison’s formative influences and qualities as an apologist. Chapter two examines the challenges posed by Modernism as Grandmaison saw them. In Grandmaison’s eyes, Modernism has rendered Christ inaccessible. Although Modernists strove to understand anew the subjectivity of faith, their misguided approaches and teachings attacked the foundations of Christianity. Chapter three explores how he answered these challenges regarding Catholicism. For Grandmaison, personal religion referred to the commerce of God and believer. Personal religion also referred to the Church that Christ founded, the Catholic Church, which was the true religion of the Spirit. Chapter four examines Grandmaison’s Christology vis–à–vis the notion of personal religion, which, in its fundamental sense, is Jesus’ relationship to the Father in the Holy Spirit. Grandmaison tried to demonstrate by a direct examination of biblical texts that Jesus was, and knew himself to be, the Son of God. The dissertation concludes that Grandmaison’s apologetic Christology presented a convincing answer to many issues posed by Modernism. Taking their questions seriously, he managed to show how the traditional belief in Jesus as the Son of God could secure the subjectivity of true religion as found in Catholicism. This dissertation by Ignazio M. Bellafiore fulfills the dissertation requirement for the doctoral degree in Systematic Theology approved by Joseph A. Komonchak, Ph. D., as Director, and by John P. Galvin, Dr. Theol., and Paul G. McPartlan, S.T.L., D. Phil., as Readers. ________________________________________ Joseph A. Komonchak, Ph. D., Director _________________________________________ John P. Galvin, Dr. Theol., Reader _________________________________________ Paul G. McPartlan, S.T.L., D. Phil., Reader ii DEDICATION For the Successors of St. Peter, especially Pope St. Pius X and the Popes who have shepherded the Church during my lifetime iii TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION…………………………………………………………………………...……….iii TABLE OF CONTENTS……………………………………………………………………..…..iv ACKNOLWEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………………...vii CHAPTER INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………………………...1 A. Modernist Crisis 1 B. Léonce de Grandmaison, S.J. 3 C. Question 5 D. Methodology 8 I. THE MAKING AND MARKS OF AN APOLOGIST…………...………………............11 A. Childhood, 1868–1886 11 B. Jesuit Formation, Professorship in Fundamental Theology, 13 and Tertianship, 1886-1901 Intellectual and Spiritual Formation An Apologist’s Debut and an Apologist’s Manifesto C. Professor of Fundamental Theology, 1899–1908 37 Coursework Confronting Modernists From Afar The Roman Interventions of 1907 The Deposit of Faith and the Development of Doctrine D. Editor, Formator, Scholar, and Theologian, 1908-1927 66 Director of Études and Founder of Recherches de Science Religieuse Religious Ethnology and the Genesis of Personal Religion Dictionnaire apologétique de la foi catholique Article on Jesus Christ The Struggle with the Integralists From Director of Études to Author of Jésus Christ (i) Pastoral Ministry (ii) Defending the Existence of Jesus (iii) Jésus Christ (1927) E. Death and Legacy 119 F. Conclusion 120 iv II. MODERNIST CHALLENGE TO PERSONAL RELIGION……...…………….122 A. Tragic Oscillation of Modernism: Between Rationalism & Sentimental Religion 123 The Problem Sentimental Religion and the Case of Auguste Sabatier Rationalism and the Case of Ernest Renan B. Modernism’s Philosophical Ruin of Personal Religion 148 Agnosticism Immanentism Evolutionism C. Modernism’s Doctrinal and Pastoral Devastation of Personal Religion 179 Devastation of Deposit of Faith: Fragmented Christ, Church, and Believer Flight to Mysticism: Modernism’s Failed Spiritual Escape D. Conclusion 207 III. CATHOLICISM: THE PERSONAL RELIGION THAT JESUS FOUNDED………..........209 A. The Form of Grandmaison’s Case for Catholicism 210 B. The Holy Spirit as Principle of Personal Religion 218 C. How Catholicism Resolved the Contraries of Personal Religion 223 Divine Transcendence vis-à-vis Divine Immanence Grace vis-à-vis Nature, the Supernatural vis-à-vis the Natural The Social vis-à-vis the Individual The Deposit of Faith vis-à-vis the Development of Doctrine Ecclesiastical Authority vis-à-vis the Holy Spirit Asceticism vis-à-vis Mysticism D. Social Catholicism as a Development of the Social Dimension of Catholicism 288 Social Catholicism as Anticipation of the Religious Destiny of Humanity Church as Servant of the Temporal Order E. Conclusion 300 v IV. JESUS CHRIST AS SOURCE AND EXEMPLAR OF PERSONAL RELIGION……....…302 A. Personal Religion as Grandmaison’s Wager: Aims & Strategies of Christology 303 Jésus Christ (1927) vis-à-vis the DAFC article (1914) Aims and Objectives Strategy: Grandmaison’s Wager Integrating Principle of Grandmaison’s Christology: Personal Religion Use of the Historical-critical method B. Books One and Two of Jésus Christ: The Sources of the Life of Christ 335 and the Gospel Milieu C. The Message, Person, and Works of Jesus 348 Book three: Jesus––the Message Book four: The Person of Jesus: His Personal Religion The testimony of Christ to himself The Person of Jesus (i) The Religion of Jesus (ii) His Conversation with his Brothers (iii) His Intimate Life The Problem of Christ: The solutions and the Solution Book five: The works of Jesus D. Jésus continué dans l’Église (1): The Establishment of the Religion of Jesus……………...412 Le Mystère chrétien et les mystères païens The Religion of Jesus Christ from its Origins till the Apostolic Age E. Jésus continué dans L’Église (2): The Witnesses of Jesus in History 440 F. Conclusion 451 CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………………………...…..455 A. Evaluation 456 B. Theological and Pastoral Consequences 461 BIBLIOGRAPHY……………………………………………………………………...………..465 vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my Jesuit superiors, especially Fathers Robert Levens, S.J., Thomas Regan, S.J., Myles Sheehan, S.J., and James Shea, S.J., for missioning me to doctoral studies. I owe a special debt to Fr. J. Michael McDermott, S.J. for suggesting that I take a look at the writings of Fr. Léonce de Grandmaison, and to formation director Fr. Richard Deshaies, S.J., for shepherding and supporting me through much of the process. My dissertation director Fr. Joseph Komonchak and readers Fr. John Galvin and Msgr. Paul McPartlan deserve special praise for their insight, discernment, and patience. I am grateful to the Jesuit communities at Gonazaga High School, Fairfield University, and the University of Scranton, without whose prayers, encouragement, and assistance this work would not have been possible; and to the brother Jesuits who so selflessly undertook to proofread this work. I thank the administration at the University of Scranton and my colleagues at the Department of Theology and Religious Studies there, especially Chair Dr. Charles Pinches, for their support. Last but not least, I would like to thank the many benefactors of the Society of Jesus, including my family, for their generous support of my education and of this dissertation. May it have been worth the work and the wait. vii INTRODUCTION In the synoptic gospels, Jesus Christ posed this question to his disciples: “But who do you say that I am?” (Mt. 16:15; Mk. 8:28; Lk. 9:20).1 He sought to know not only what the disciples heard by way of report about him, but also about what they professed him and his mission to be. The mystery of Jesus was not merely a question of academic inquiry. The truth about Jesus was relevant to the truth about God, the Church, and the individual believer. Indeed, the entire analogy– –the unity––of faith depended upon the answer to the question. The disciples’ personal profession of faith in Christ also animated their following of him. Heartfelt worship and a good life were meant to follow from the declaration that “Jesus is Lord!” (1 Cor. 12: 3). The Church’s worship, discipleship, and express beliefs in turn were meant to give witness to the truth about Jesus. A. Modernist Crisis The interrelationship between Christ, the Church, and the Christian were concerns of many decrees of the Second Vatican Council. Yet the urgency of these concerns was keenly felt decades earlier during the modernist controversy. As a broad intellectual and social movement within the Catholic Church in Western Europe, modernism extended roughly from the last quarter of the nineteenth century to the first quarter of the twentieth century. The crisis that modernism precipitated within the Catholic Church, especially in France, its geographical epicenter, was most intense from around the time of the publication of Loisy’s L’Évangile et L’Église in 19022 till shortly after the interventions of the Vatican in 1907. During the modernist era, Catholic biblical scholars, historians, and theologians delved into biblical exegesis, the development of doctrine, and the comparative study of religions in ways that aroused controversy. The process of researching the origins of Christianity raised a number of 1 Unless otherwise indicated, all biblical quotations will be from the Revised Standard Version. 2 Alfred Loisy, L’Évangile et L’Église (Paris, [published by author], 1902). 1