The statements of the fathers.
The statements of the fathers.
§ 131. Bellarmine (in ch. 9) produces the statements of the fathers.
We respond. (1) Very many statements of the ancients address the canonical satisfactions which were part of public penance, but we saw earlier [§§ 122, 128] how far from these the Papists’ satisfactions stand.
(2) In some statements they are speaking about fraternal request for pardon and restitution for the loss that one’s neighbor has incurred. This is a kind of satisfaction before men but not before God.
(3) In some statements they use the word “satisfaction” to mean correction of life by transferring the word from the public ritual of satisfactions to the fruits of repentance. (Among secular writers, “to make satisfaction” is the same thing as proving themselves to someone in their responsibilities. Cicero, Letter 1 ad famil.: “I satisfy the rest in every duty and still more, in piety toward you, but I never satisfy myself.”) So, too, the ancients mean that people are commending themselves to God to the extent that they can by working in faith. When they ask for pardon for their sins, they are in some way cleansing themselves and making satisfaction. It is the same as if, when someone hurts another, he usually makes satisfaction to him by grieving, by employing prayers, by offering his services. The injured party says, “Now I have been satisfied,” though he has not yet been repaid for the injury he received. Augustine (or whatever other author, De dogmatibus ecclesiast., ch. 54), cited by Gratian (De poenit., dist. 3): “The satisfaction of repentance is to cut out the reasons for sins and not to grant an entrance for their suggestions.” Chrysostom (on Matthew 10, homily 3): “How shall we be able to produce fruits worthy of repentance? Surely if we do things opposed to sins. You have taken away another’s property: begin now to give him your own goods. You have fornicated for a long time: suspend yourself from the lawful use of the marriage bed, etc. You have done someone an injury by deed or word: speak words of blessing to those who revile you, and hurry now with your services and good deeds to appease those who strike out at you.” “You see that an upright life helps more than all the rest. I do not call an upright life the task of fasting nor the bed of hair cloth and ashes, but if you despise money as nothing beyond a necessity, if you burn with love, if you feed the hungry with your own bread, if you overcome your wrath, if you do not desire immense glory, if envy does not hold you back” (on Matthew, homily 47).
(4) In order to recommend the rituals of satisfactions to people more highly, the ancients often spoke exhortatively and panegyrically about them, using the words “redemption,” “compensation,” “satisfaction,” etc., quite freely. Therefore their statements must be drawn back to the analogy of faith. But no battle should be waged against the free remission of sins on the basis of them. In a certain way Bellarmine himself acknowledges this, for he writes (De poenit., bk. 4, ch. 1): “If the ancient fathers at times seem to say that human actions turn God from enmity to friendship and even make satisfaction by expiating fault, we must interpret this to refer to congruous satisfaction, not worthy satisfaction.” And anyone can see what should be attributed to Irenaeus’s argument (bk. 3, ch. 37) where he deals with Adam’s repentance and says: “In brief he in fact shows his repentance by covering himself with fig leaves and much other foliage which could scarcely have irritated his body less [Gen. 3:7]. Yet he made a covering worthy of his disobedience, terrified as he was by his fear of God and weakening the petulant assault of his flesh.”
** Augustine is more correct in writing (De civit. Dei, 13, ch. 13): “They covered their private parts, which were perhaps the first noticed by the troubled [pair], with fig leaves.” **
So, too, he tore this out from Cyprian (Sermon de eleemosyn.): “Christ’s blood and satisfaction cleanse sins which one has committed before Baptism, but the giving of alms washes away sins committed afterward.” Origen (on Leviticus, homily 12) says that “a very full satisfaction is required for repentance before Christ enters the soul which is aware of its sin.”
(5) Finally, in some passages they speak more suitably and more in harmony with Scripture, as we have seen above. Chrysostom (on Psalm 50, homily): “When someone pleads earnestly for mercy, wrath ceases. When someone asks for mercy, there is no place for punishment.” “This is the place for medicine, not for punishment. Repentance gives not punishments but the forgiveness of sins” (De poenitent., homily 9). “I bear witness and I command by faith that if anyone of us who is guilty of sins departs from his former ways and deliberately and truly promises to God that he will never again return to them, God requires nothing else for further satisfaction, for He is kindly” (Homily de Philogonio).
The gloss of the Ius canonicum (dist. de poenit., p. 355): “Penance is imposed for sin so that humility may be exercised and the discipline of the church may not be abandoned and that he may make satisfaction to the church, which he has offended.”
Biel (Sent., 4, dist. 40, q. 1, dub. 1) asks why satisfaction is still imposed since sins have been remitted. He answers: “This is done so that the penitent will be careful not to slide back and will become accustomed to good works.” (Yet a caution is one thing; a remedy is something else.)
This concludes our discussion about satisfaction. Whether or not Bellarmine’s counterarguments (which he provides from ch. 11 to the end of his book) satisfy the arguments of our people can be determined from the above and from a comparison of the two.