Blessed John Duns Scotus

Blessed John, the Scot

Drawing on the work of John Duns Scotus, Pope Pius IX solemnly defined the Immaculate Conception of Mary in 1854. John Duns Scotus, the “Subtle Doctor,” was beatified in 1993.

With the Latin Church we pray, Lord God, source of all wisdom, in Blessed John Duns Scotus, priest and champion of the Immaculate Virgin, you have given us a master of life and thought. Grant that enlightened by his example and nourished by his doctrine, we may remain faithful followers of Christ, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.

I am grateful to J. Michael Thompson for alerting me to a comment made by Father Charles Balic, O.F.M., the foremost 20th-century authority on Scotus, who wrote: “The whole of Scotus’s theology is dominated by the notion of love. The characteristic note of this love is its absolute freedom. As love becomes more perfect and intense, freedom becomes more noble and integral both in God and in man” (New Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, p. 1105).

In another place it is said, “Intelligence hardly guarantees holiness. But John Duns Scotus was not only brilliant, he was also humble and prayerful—the exact combination St. Francis wanted in any friar who studied. In a day when French nationalism threatened the rights of the pope, Scotus sided with the papacy and paid the price. He also defended human freedom against those who would compromise it by determinism.”

Today when thinking is at an all-time-low, especially in the Church, it may be worth our time to remember that “Ideas are important. John Duns Scotus placed his best thinking at the service of the human family and of the Church.”

Blessed John Scotus

Blessed John Duns Scotus is liturgically remembered today but because it is Sunday his memorial is skipped this year. Sad really. As you know, Blessed John was born in Scotland in 1266, studied and taught in London and Paris and spent the end of his life in Cologne having died in 1308. His sarcophagus in the Minoritenkirche. At Scotus’s sarcophagus is the plate showing us that he was declared to be “blessed” when John Paul II visited Cologne.

Blessed John is widely known as the high point of medieval philosophy. Martin Heideggers did his second doctorate to teach in the university (the “Habilitationsschrift”), on a topic from the philosophy of John Duns Scotus. The modern era of philosophy is credited for being full of errors, especially for the errors of modernity (the univocity of being). Blessed John seems to be at the heart of the controversy.

Philosophically, I remember Scotus for two things: 1.) his exposition on the Blessed Virgin Mary and 2.) haecceitas.

It was his work, the year before his death, on the Virgin Mary that led the Church under Pope Pius IX to define the dogma of the Immaculate Conception.

On this second point develops a theory of haecceitas, or this-ness –the metaphysical cause of individual being. Haecceitas speaks to what makes this rhubarb (or cat or dog or human being) different from that other plant (or car or dog or human being). This metaphysical cause was picked up by Jesuit Father Gerard Manly Hopkins in his poetry.

At any rate, Blessed John’s philosophy is not what he’s liturgically remembered for, it is his holiness of life. Let us pray that Blessed John Duns Scotus mediates for us before the Throne of Grace.

Blessed John Duns Scotus

The memory of one of the great Franciscan theologians is venerated today, Blessed John Duns Scotus (1266 – 1308). His bones rest in Cologne but he hails from the Scotland. Known to the theological world as the Doctor Subtilis, one of his claims to fame was his advocacy of the dogma of Mary’s Immaculate Conception. Pope Pius IX used Scotus’ theology in helping to frame what we believed in terms of the Immaculate Conception of Mary in 1854.

One of the Scholastics, John taught in the school of thought of the Augustinian-Franciscan tradition, who also had a rich appreciation for the works of Aquinas, Aristotle and the Muslim philosophers.

Church clearly thinks well of Scotus and his Franciscan heritage of dependance on the goodness and beauty of God, the value of learning and the reverence for mystery. As the Preface for the Mass offered in his name, the Church prays to God the Father that Scotus be “… acclaimed [as teaching] the universal primacy of your Son, the masterpiece and perfect manifestation of your eternal love enfleshed in Christ the New Adam, the King of all creation” that in his teaching we learn “… to praise Mary, conceived without sin, untarnished and resplendent in her immaculate beauty, your intended Model for creating us in dignity and goodness.”

Blessed John Duns Scotus

The Preface for the Mass of Blessed John Duns Scotus

Father, all-powerful and everliving God, we do well always and everywhere to give you thanks, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

You give the Church great joy as she celebrates the memory of John Duns Scotus, in whom the spirit and ideals of our seraphic father Francis burned brightly and came to light and life.

You led him to see that virtue was of greater value than learning, and taught him the pre-eminence of love over all worldly knowledge.

You chose him to be the subtle unravler of reality, enabling his sharp mind to penetrate more deeply into the mystery of the depths of your love for us.

He acclaimed the universal primacy of your Son, the masterpiece and perfect manifestation of your eternal love enfleshed in Christ the New Adam, the King of all creation.

You taught him to praise Mary, conceived without sin, untarnished and resplendent in her immaculate beauty, your intended Model for creating us in dignity and goodness.

You instruct us by his teaching and by the holiness of his life, and give protection in answer to his prayers. Therefore, with the angels and all the saints we join in their unending hymn of praise.

The essence and undivided nature of charity by John Duns Scotus

The second reading in the Office of Readings from today’s liturgical memorial [even though it is Sunday in 2009 and Sunday takes precedence over saints’ memorials] of Blessed John Duns Scotus bears posting here. What appears to be vague really is dead-on in thinking about charity and justice. Emphasis mine.

Charity is defined as the habit by which God becomes the object of our love. However, God could become the object of a kind of private love, such as that of a lover intolerant of any other lovers besides himself (as for example in the case of a jealous man in love with a woman). But a habit of this kind would be both inordinate and imperfect.

It would be inordinate because God, the good of all, does not want to be the private good of any one person, not does right reason allow one person to appropriate to himself this common good. It follows that a love that tends to regard this common good exclusively as its own property, neither to be loved nor possessed by any other, is an inordinate love.

It would also be imperfect because a person who loves perfectly wants his beloved to be loved. Therefore God, in infusing the habit of charity by which the soul tends towards Him in an orderly and perfect way, gives a habit by which He is loved as the common good to be co-loved by others as well. And thus this habit which is of God, leads an individual to want God to be held dear and to be loved also by others.

Therefore, just as this habit leads a person to love God in Himself in an orderly and perfect way, so also it leads him to want God to be loved not only by the person himself but also by anyone else whose friendship is pleasing to Him.

It is clear from this how the habit of charity must be single and undivided, because it does not concern itself in the first instance with a plurality of objects, but with God alone as the primary object and as the first good. Secondarily it then wants God to be loved and to possessed in love by everyone else to the utmost of his power, because it is in this that a perfect and orderly love of God consists. And in willing this, I love both myself and my neighbor in charity, willing, that is, for both of us the desire and the possession of God in Himself through love.

Hence it is evident that it is by one and the same act that I want God and that I want you to want God. And in this my love is a love of charity, because out this love I desire a good for you which is due to you in justice.

For this reason, my neighbor is not to be regarded as a second object of charity but rather as an object that is entirely incidental, because he is someone who is capable of co-loving the Beloved with me in a perfect and orderly way; and I love him precisely so that he can become a co-lover. In this I love him as it were incidentally, not for himself, but because of the object which I want to be co-loved by him. And in wanting that object to be co-loved by him, I implicitly want what is good for him because it is due to him in justice.

Blessed John Duns Scotus

The learned will shine like the brilliance of the firmament, and those who train many in the way of justice will sparkle like the stars for all eternity. Heavenly Father, You filled John Duns Scotus with wisdom, and through his life and teaching gave us a witness of Your Incarnate love. May we come to understand more deeply what he taught so that we may live in ever growing charity.

Prayer for the Canonization of

Blessed John Duns Scotus

O Most High, Almightily and gracious Lord, Who exalts the humble and confounds the proud of heart, grant us the great joy of seeing Blessed John Duns Scotus canonized. He honored Your Son with the most sublime praises; he was the first to successfully defend the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary; he lived in heroic obedience to the Holy Father, to the Church and to the Seraphic Order. O most holy Father, God of infinite love, hear, we beseech You, our humble prayer, thorough the merits of Your Only-Begotten Son and His Mother, the Gate of Heaven and Spouse of the Holy Spirit.

Blessed John Duns Scotus: A model for maintaining faith & reason

Pope Benedict XVI wrote a letter to the Archbishop of Cologne and those participating in the International Scientific Congress on the occasion of the seventh centenary of Blessed John Duns Scotus’ death. What relevance does a letter was written in October 2008 by the pope have for us today? Why remember Blessed John at all? Faith and reason working together in the heart of the Church!!! They are not in opposition to each other. Catholics are known to work intimately with faith and reason and Scotus is a prime example of the tradition. But you don’t need me to tell you that.

Read the pope:

Rejoice, City of Cologne, which once welcomed within your walls John Duns Scotus, a most learned and devout man, who passed from this life to the heavenly Homeland on 8 November 1308; and, whose remains you preserve with great admiration and veneration.

Our Venerable Predecessors, the Servants of God Paul VI and John Paul II, exalted him with lofty praise; we too would like to surround him with the praise he deserves and invoke his protection.

Thus the seventh centenary of his pious passing is now being celebrated, as is only right. And while articles and entire works in honour of Bl. John Duns Scotus are being published in various parts of the world and congresses are being held, including the solemn Congress currently being prepared that will take place in Cologne from 5 to 9 November 2008, we consider it a duty of our service in this circumstance to say a few words about this most illustrious man who so distinguished himself by contributing to the progress of the doctrine of the Church and of human science.

Indeed, combining piety with scientific research, in accordance with his invocation: “May the First Principle of things grant me to believe, to understand and to reveal what may please his majesty and may raise our minds to contemplate him”, with his refined brilliance he penetrated so deeply the secrets of natural and revealed truth, and found in them a doctrine which led him to be called Doctor Ordinis, Doctor Subtilis, and Doctor Marianus, becoming a teacher and guide of the Franciscan School, a light and example to the entire Christian People.

Thus we desire to remind scholars and everyone, believers and non-believers alike, of the path and method that Scotus followed in order to establish harmony between faith and reason, defining in this manner the nature of theology in order constantly to exalt action, influence, practice and love rather than pure speculation; in fulfilling this task he let himself be guided by the Magisterium of the Church and by a sound critical sense regarding growth in knowledge of the truth and was convinced that knowledge is valuable to the extent that it is applied in praxis.

Firmly anchored to the Catholic faith, Duns Scotus strove to understand, explain and defend the truth of the faith in the light of human reason. Thus he strove to do nothing other than show the consonance of all truths, natural and supernatural, that come from one and the same Source.

Alongside Sacred Scripture, divinely inspired, is the authority of the Church. Duns Scotus seems to follow St Augustine’s words: “I would not believe the Gospel, except that I [first] believe the Catholic Church”. In fact, our Doctor often gives a special emphasis to the supreme authority of the Successor of Peter. As the Blessed said: “Although the Pope cannot dispense with natural and divine law (given that his power is inferior to both), being the Successor of Peter, Prince of the Apostles, he still has the same authority as had Peter”.

Therefore, the Catholic Church whose invisible Head is Christ himself, who left as his Vicars the person of Blessed Peter and his Successors guided by the Spirit of truth, is the authentic custodian of the revealed deposit and the rule of faith. The Church is the firm and permanent criterion of the canonical dimension of Sacred Scripture. Indeed, she “established which books of the biblical canon were to be held authentic”.

Elsewhere he states that “the Scriptures were revealed in the same Spirit in which they were written, and in this way one must consider that the Catholic Church has presented them in that same Spirit with which the faith has been passed down, guided that is, by the Spirit of truth”.

After having proven with various arguments taken from theological reason, the very fact that the Blessed Virgin Mary was preserved from original sin, he was absolutely ready also to reject this conviction should it not be in harmony with the authority of the Church, saying: “We can with probability attribute to Mary all that has the greatest perfection, provided it is not opposed to the authority of the Church or the Scriptures”.

The primacy of the will sheds light on the fact that God is charity before all else. This charity, this love, Duns Scotus kept present when he sought to lead theology back to a single expression, that is to practical theology. According to his thought, since God “is formally love and formally charity”, with the greatest generosity he radiates his goodness and love beyond himself. And in reality, it is for love that God “chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. He predestined us in love to be his adoptive sons through Jesus Christ” (cf. Eph 1: 4-5).

A faithful disciple of St Francis of Assisi, Bl. John contemplated and preached assiduously the Incarnation and the saving Passion of the Son of God. However, the charity or love of Christ is expressed in a special way not only on Calvary, but also in the most holy Sacrament of the Eucharist, without which “if not for being able to render supreme adoration unto God through the veneration of the same Sacrament every mercy would disappear in the Church”. This Sacrament moreover is a sacrament of unity and love; through it we are led to love one another mutually and to love God as a common good and to be loved at the same time by others.

And as this love, this charity, was the origin of all things, so too our eternal happiness will be in love and charity alone: “Eternal life is simply the desire as well as the will to love, blessed and perfect”.

Since at the beginning of our ministry we first of all preached love, which is God himself, we see with joy that the unique doctrine of this Blessed keeps a special place for this truth, which we consider principally worthy to be researched and taught in our time. Therefore, willingly complying with the request of our Venerable Brother Cardinal Joachim Meisner, of Holy Roman Church, Archbishop of Cologne, we are sending this Apostolic Letter with which we desire to honour Bl. John Duns Scotus and invoke his heavenly intercession upon us. Lastly, to those who are taking part in any capacity in this International Congress and in other initiatives concerning this outstanding son of St Francis, we cordially impart our Apostolic Blessing.

Given in Rome, at St Peter’s on 28 October 2008, the fourth year of our Pontificate.

BENEDICTVS PP. XVI

The epitaph at Blessed John’s grave is rather fun:

Scotland bore me, Scotia me genuit,

England received me, Anglia me suscepit,

France taught me, Gallia me docuit,

Cologne holds me. Colonia me tenet.

Can we think of advancing his cause for sainthood? Its taken too many years to get to “Blessed”!!!!

footnotes in the original, see vatican.va