ÎTbe American
JÊcckôiastical IReview
A MONTHLY PUBLICATION FOR THE CLERGY

Cum Approbatione Superiorum

VOL. CXXIX
JULY—DECEMBER, 1953

Έρ έι>1 πνάματι, μιά ψυχτ)
avvaffkovvTts rfi πίστα του «ύαγγίλίου
Phil. 127

Published by

THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA PRESS

THE TEACHING OF THE TESTEM BENEVOLENTIAE
On Jan. 22, 1899, Pope Leo XIII sent an apostolic letter to
Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore, at that time the only American
member of the Sacred College, This document, the Testem
benevolentiae, contained one of the most important doctrinal
pronouncements of modern times. It is definitely a document
with which our priests should be familiar.
Some recent outstanding literary productions have aroused
important new interest in the subject matter of the Testem
benevolentiae. Exactly fifty years after the Testem benevolentiae
was written, Fr, Felix Klein, one of the central figures in the
controversy Pope Leo's letter set out to resolve, was printing the
volume of his autobiography dealing ivith the controversy itself
and with the pontifical pronouncement it provoked,1 Two years
previously Fr. Edgar Hocedez, S.J., had dealt with this topic
briefly but competently in the third volume of his Histoire de la
théologie au XIXe siècle? Last year Dr. John Tracy Ellis again
focussed attention on this topic when he dealt with it in his
masterly biography of Cardinal Gibbons.3 This year Msgr.
Moynihan's biography of Archbishop Ireland1 has brought about
an increased awareness of and interest in this vital pontifical
document.
Unfortunately, despite the high quality of the historical and
autobiographical writing that concerns the Testem benevolentiae,
there seems to be some danger that many of our people may fall
into a very regrettable misunderstanding of the teaching set
forth in this letter. The misunderstanding centers around the
designation “phantom heresy,” which has sometimes been ap­
plied to the teachings reproved in the Testem benevolentiae. It
would be unfortunate if our people should come to imagine that
’ Klein, La route du petit Menandiau: Souvenirs de TA bbé Félix Klein, Tctne
V, L'ne héresie fantome, Γaméricanisme (Paris: Pion, 1949).
’ Hocedez, Histoire de la théologie au XIX
*
siècle, Tome III, Le règne de Léon
XIII, 1878-1903 (Brussels: L'Edition Universelle, 1947), pp. 190-94.
1 Ellis, The Life of James Cardinal Gibbons, Archbishop of Baltimore, 18341921 (Milwaukee: The Bruce Publishing Company, 1952), II, 1-80.
■•Moynihan, The Life of Archbishop John Ireland. .4 Definitive Biography
(New York: Harper and Brother, 1953), pp. 104-35.

124

TEACHING OF THE TESTEM BENEVOLENTIAE

125

the teachings criticized adversely in this pontifical letter were
actually condemned as heretical therein. It would be much more
regrettable if they were to be cajoled into imagining that the
Holy See, in 1899 or at any other time, would mislead its people
by attacking a non-existent doctrinal deviation.
The term “phantom heresy,” applied to the teachings attacked
in the Testem benevolentiae, certainly did not originate with
Father Klein. The expression “phantom of heresy” was em­
ployed, as a matter of fact, in the Parisian newspaper Figaro5
only a few months after the issuance of Pope Leo’s letter to
Cardinal Gibbons. Hocedez himself adverts to the use of this
designation in his treatise on the history of sacred theology dur­
ing the nineteenth century.6 There can be no doubt, however,
about the fact that Father Klein popularized this designation in
a uniquely effective way by using it as the subtitle of what must
be considered as the most interesting volume of his autobi­
ography?
The rather common use of this expression in our own day has
led even as eminent and careful a scholar as Fr. Thomas Mc­
Avoy, C.S.C., to say that “in the Apostolic letter of Pope Leo
XIII there are several doctrines set forth and condemned as
heretical by the Holy Father,”K and to speak of “the heresy as
condemned by the Holy Father”9 in the Testem benevolentiae.
The use of this same terminology has tended to influence some
of our people to imagine that a highly important pontifical docu- ment was concerned with errors which no one ever actually held,
and which were thus not at all dangerous to the life of faith
within the Catholic Church.
• Cf. Klein, op. cit., p. 413. The expression was used in an article signed by
Julien de .Xarfon, who spoke of “the phantom of heresy which, during these
last years, disturbed the sleep of Canon Delassus and Father Maignen."
• Hocedez, op. cil., p. 194.
’ It must be understood that, like de Narfon, Father Klein spoke of the
"phantom heresy" as existing primarily in the minds of his theological oppo- ·
nents. It was not applied primarily to the teaching precisely as reproved by
the Testem benevolentiae.
’ McAvoy, in the article "Liberalism, Americanism, Modernism," in Records
of the American Catholic Historical Society of Philadelphia, LXII, 4 (Dec.,
1952), 225.
• Ibid., p. 228.

i

126

THE AMERICAN ECCLESIASTICAL REVIEW

Because there are definite and important parallels between the
Testem benevolentiae and the present Holy Father’s great en­
cyclical letter, the Humani generis, it is highly important that
our contemporary Catholics should realize clearly that the letter
of Pope Leo XIII was not wasted on the condemnation of any
“phantom heresies/'
In the first place, the Testem benevolentiae stigmatizes neither
any individual opinion of which it disapproves nor the sum total
of these repudiated teachings with the note of heresy. Neither
the term “heretical’’ nor its definition is to be found anywhere in
this document. On this point alone, the designation of “phantom
heresy" cannot be applied accurately to the teachings rejected
in the Testem benevolentiae.
According to the text itself, the document deals with “certain
things to be avoided and corrected ( nonnulla . . . cavenda et cor­
rigenda}''^ The doctrines reproved are “new opinions"’1 and
some “consequences Iconsectar ia\"v- which follow from them.
These consequences are characterized as teachings of which “if
the intention seem not wrong, as We believe, the things them­
selves will not appear by any means free from suspicion."11
Furthermore, all the teachings dealt with in the Testem bene­
volentiae, taken together, are described as opinions which our
Bishops should repudiate and condemn.14 The Holy Father did
not himself condemn these teachings as heretical. There is no
indication that he expected the Bishops to do so either.
In the Testem benevolentiae, Pope Leo XIII declared that he
was writing “on account of Our Apostolic office, in order to pro­
vide for the integrity of the faith, and to guard the security of the
faithful."14 Now the integritas fidei of which he spoke is some­
thing which can be injured by the holding of propositions de­
serving of a censure less grave than that of heresy. The Sover­
141 have used the English translation published in The Great Encyclical
Letters of Pope Leo XIII, with a preface by John J. Wynne, S.J. (New York:
Benziger Brothers, 1903), pp. 441-53, and the Latin text as published in the
Codicis iuris canonici fontes, edited by Pietro Cardinal Gaspard (Vaticaa
Press, 1933), III, 535-42. The present citation is to be found in Wynne, p. 441,
and in CICF, 535.
11 Wynne, p. 442; CICF, toe. tit.
« Wynne, p. 445; CICF, 537.
’< Cf. Wynne, p. 452: CICF, 541.
11 IM.
·· Wynne, p. 441 ; CICF, 535.

TEACHING OF THE TESTEM BESETOLE.VTIAE

127

eign Pontiff wished to protect that integrity and to safeguard
the people Our Lord had entrusted to him by the process of
reproving certain definite propositions.
The principle or foundation upon which the opinions censured
in the Testem benevolentiae rested was, according to Pope Leo
XIII, the statement that “in order the more easily to bring over
to Catholic doctrine those who dissent from it, the Church ought
to adapt herself somewhat to our advanced civilization, and, re­
laxing her ancient rigor, show some indulgence to modern theo­
ries and methods (recens invectis populorum placitis ac rationibus
indulgere'i.’"-' The Pope wrote that there were “many" who hold
(arbitrantur) that this principle should be applied, not only to the
rule of life, but also to the deposit of faith.27 “For they contend,"
said Pope Leo, “that it is opportune, in order to work in a more
attractive way upon the wills of those who are not in accord
with us, to pass over certain points of doctrine, as if of lesser
moment, or so to soften them that they may not have the same
meaning which the Church has invariably held.”13
The Testem benevolentiae teaches that this general principle
as applied to the deposit of faith can be disproved by an appeal
to the Church’s teaching on the nature and the origin of Catholic
doctrine, as set forth in the Vatican Council’s constitution Dei
Filius.13 And, dismissing the opinion that some of the points of
Catholic doctrine may be passed over in bringing the Church’s
message to those outside the fold, it reminds us that all the truths
of Christian doctrine come to us from Our Lord, and that all of
them are adapted to everv age and to every nationality. This
section of the document ends with one of the most eloquent pas­
sages in modern pontifical literature.

Far be it, then, for any one to diminish or for any reason whatever
to pass over any of this divinely revealed doctrine; whosoever would
do so, would rather wish to alienate Catholics from the Church than
to bring over to the Church those who dissent from it Let them return ;
indeed, nothing is nearer to Our heart ; let all those who are wandering
far from the sheepfold of Christ return; hut let it not be by any
other road than that which Christ has pointed out10
JFyanc, p. 442; CICF, 535.
” Ibid.
«ΙΜ.

1}The passage is found in DB, 1800.
-r W’jww, p- 443; CICF, 536,

128

i

THE AMERICAS' ECCLESIASTICAL REVIEW

It is interesting to note that a very similar task was accom­
plished by Pope Pius XII in the writing of his encyclical, the
Humani generis. The present Holv Father speaks of those who
aim “at adapting ecclesiastical teaching and methods to modern
conditions and requirements.” He states that this can be done
correctly, “through the introduction of some new explanations,’1
but also warns that “some, through enthusiasm for an imprudent
eirenism, seem to consider as an obstacle to the restoration of
fraternal union things founded on the laws and principles given
by Christ and likewise on institutions founded by Him, or which
are the defense and support of the integrity of the faith, and the
removal of which would bring about the union of ail, but only to
their own destruction.''-1
Clearly, then, the fundamental doctrinal fault reproved in the
Testem benevolentiae is intimately related to one ot the basic errors
condemned in the Humani generis. The men Pope Leo set out to
correct believed that, even in doctrines in which the deposit of
faith is contained, the Church ought to adapt itself to contem­
porary theory and practice. They likewise held it expedient and
legitimate, in their statements of the Catholic message, to pass
over points of doctrine to which their non-Catholic contempo­
raries were presumed to be unsympathetic. Pope Pius, on the
other hand, spoke of men who thought that Catholic theology'
and the traditional theological methods should be completely
reformed “in order to promote the more efficacious propagation
of the kingdom of Christ everywhere throughout the world
among men of every culture and religious opinion.”- In both
cases the Vicar of Christ was faced with a situation in which
some of his children believed that certain statements contained
in the body of Catholic doctrine would repel those outside the
Church and that therefore these teachings should be changed or
eliminated. Pope Leo wrote to protect the integrity of the Faith,
and Pope Pius blamed the innovators of our day for their opposi­
tion to truths in which the defense and the support of the in­
tegrity' of the Faith is to be found.
Pope Leo taught that people must be brought to Our Lord
11 The X'CWC translation, p. 6. The Latin text is found in Λ ER, CXXUi,
5 (Nov. !951i, 386.

» rw.

rEACIHN'G OF THE TESTEM BEXETOl.ESTI.tE

jjy

only by rhe way that He had indicated. Pope Pius warned that
attempts to procure religious unity at the expense ot truths per­
taining to the body of Catholic doctrine could only result in a
unity that would be ruinous to those who found it.
After considering the principle according to which the Church
should modify its position in the face of contemporary cultural
conditions, and after discussing the application of that principle
to truths contained in the deposit of divine faith, the Testem
benevolentiae goes on to deal with the application of this same
principle to the field of law, Church, discipline, or the rule of life,
it reminds its readers that those who presume to usurp the right
of the Church to modify its laws or who hold that the existing
discipline of the Church is useless or too rigid to be obeyed are
holding a doctrine that is “injurious to the Church and to the
Spirit of God which governs her.”-J Pope Leo wrote that such
individuals are in danger of incurring the censure which Pius VI
inflicted upon the 78th proposition of the Synod of PiAtoia.-'1 It
is interesting, incidentally, to note that of the seven censures
given to this proposition, all were below the grade of heresy.55
The Testem benevolentiae then goes on to explain that this late
nineteenth-century movement for a change in Catholic discipline
is in some measure worse than that manifested by the Pistori­
enses. The men tvhose teaching Pope Leo set out to correct held,
as rerum novarum sectatores, “that a certain liberty ought to be
introduced into the Church, so that, limiting the exercise and
vigilance of its powers, each one of the faithful may act more
freely in pursuance of his own natural bent and capacity.” Pope
Leo noted that they claimed that “this is called for in order to
imitate that liberty which, though quite recently introduced, is
now the law and the foundation of almost evert' civil com­
munity.
The Testem benevolentiae simply refers to the Immortale Dei
for a discussion of the civil liberties to which the rerum novarum
;ι
p. 444; CICF, 537.
«Cf. M, 1578.
Ά The proposition was qualified as ‘‘falsa, temeraria, scandalosa, perniciosa,
piarum aurium offensiva, Ecclesiae ac Spiritui Dei, quo ipsa regitur, iniuriosa,
,id minus erronea.’’
« IPvHHr, p. 444; CICF, 5,37.

130

TriE AMERICAN ECCLESIASTICAL REVIEW

sectatores appealed.27 It took cognizance, however, of another
argument which had been alleged in favor of the proposition
which it had already condemned. According to that process of
reasoning, there is, since the Vatican Council’s definition of papal
infallibility, no more need for many of the previous restrictions
which had been imposed upon Catholics and that thus “a wider
field of thought and action is thrown open to individuals.”18
Pope Leo repudiated this sort of reasoning, and showed that the
problems of the time called for the exercise of that pontifical
authority of which the Vatican Council had spoken so effec­
tively?9
All of the above material had been concerned with the basic
opinions of the innovators. The rest of the letter deals with the
consectaria or consequences of these teachings. The first of these
was a certain abuse of devotion to the Holy Ghost, according to
which all external guidance or direction was depicted as dis­
advantageous for those who desire to devote themselves to the
acquisition of Christian perfection. According to the men who
erred along this line, the Holy Ghost “pours greater and richer
gifts into the hearts of the faithful now than in times past ; and
by a certain instinct teaches and moves them with no one as an
**
intermediary."
Pope Leo first dealt with the assertion that the graces of the
Holy Ghost were more plentiful in his time than at any previous
period by asking who would dare to say that the primitive Church
of the Apostles and the martyrs, and the Church of the past ages
with its saints, had a lesser outpouring of the graces of the Hedy
Ghost than the Church of his own time. He briefly summarized
the Catholic teaching on the place of the Holy Ghost and the
function of human direction in the spiritual life. He then as­
serted that those who rejected this doctrine did so rashly and at
their own peril (temere profecto ac periculose).
*
1
He then dealt with the error of those who exalted the natural
virtues above the supernatural virtues. He explained why that
position was incorrect, and stated that it was difficult to under­
stand how a man imbued with Christian principles could come
• no.
• Wynne, p. 445; CICF, 537.
•Λϋ

*· Wynne, p. 446; CICF, S3&
« Wynne, p. 447; C/CF, 538.

TEACHING OF THE TESTEM BENEVOLENTIAE

131

to hold it,32 He then adverted to an error according to which
some men classified some virtues as active and others as passive/
claiming that, as the latter had been better suited to former
times, the former were more in keeping with the present. He
noted that these so-called passive virtues were genuine evangeli­
cal virtues, and taught that “there is not and cannot be a virtue
which is really passive.”33
Against those who disapproved of religious orders or congrega­
tions taking vows, the Holy Father spoke out in forthright fash­
ion. He noted that there were other kinds of communities foster­
ed and encouraged in the Church, but insisted upon the pre­
eminence of those “who have left all things and have followed
Christ.”3*
Finally, the Testem benevolentiae takes up the position of those
who held “that the way and the method which Catholics have
followed thus far for recalling those who differ with us is to be
abandoned and another resorted to."36 It indicates the impru­
dence of giving up methods which the Church has always em­
ployed. It teaches about the obligation of the faithful and of the
priests to engage, in their own ways, in this missionary work.
.And it commends and cautions those who employ new techniques
in the work of conversion.
We can sum up, accurately, even though inadequately, the
opinions reproved by the Testem benevolentiae, under the follow­
ing headings.
(1) The Church should adapt itself to contemporary civiliza-.
tion even with respect to doctrines in which the deposit of faith
is contained.
(2) In bringing Catholic teaching to non-Catholics, it is op­
portune to pass over certain statements contained in it.
(3) The Church should adapt itself to contemporary civiliza­
tion in the matter of its discipline.
(4) A new liberty ought to be introduced into the Church.
(5) The Vatican Council’s definition of papal infallibility has
thrown a wider field of thought and action open to individual
Catholics.
» Wytme, p. 447; CICF, 539.
■
p. 44S ; CICF, 539.

*· Wymte, p. 451; CICF, 541.
· IHA.

132

THE AMERICAN ECCLESIASTICAL REVIEW

(6) In the spiritual life, external guidance is to be rejected as
superfluous,
(7) The Holy Ghost gives richer graces now than in times past.
(8) The natural virtues are to be preferred to the supernatural.
(9) The active virtues are to be preferred to the passive.
(10) Religious vows and the religious life are no longer ad­
vantageous to the Church.
(11) Old methods for bringing the faith to non-Catholics are
to be abandoned and replaced.
The last six of these teachings are represented by Pope Leo as
consequences or consectaria of the first five. The first five, in the
context of the document, are applications of one general or funda­
mental principle.
The first and second of these repudiated teachings are un­
doubtedly the most important. Yet they were definitely not
condemned in the Testem benevolentiae (or, for that matter, in
the Humani generis), as heresies. They were rejected, however,
as errors that would effectively militate against that integrity of
the Catholic Faith which it is the duty and the prerogative of
the Roman Pontiff to defend.
The third proposition is not condemned outright at all. It is
presented as erroneous only when it is understood as granting to
individuals, rather than to the authority of the Church itself, the
right to modify the discipline imposed upon Our Lord's faithful.

The fourth proposition, as it is fully explained in the text of the
Testem benevolentiae, is reprehensible, and is duly reprehended.
It is said to be worse than the offending and similar teaching of
the Synod of Pistoia which was stigmatized by Pius VI as nd
minus erronea. Yet it must be understood that there is no direct
or indirect assertion in the Testem benevolentiae that this fourth
proposition is heretical.

The fifth proposition had little doctrinal importance. It was
mentioned and reproved merely because it was one of the reasons
alleged in favor of the previous assertion. Obviously neither this
nor any of the consectaria are designated as heretical by Pope
Leo in the document with which we are concerned.

The Testem benevolentiae dealt, then, with inaccurate proposi­
tions, but was definitely not a document that condemned heresies.

TEACHING OF THE TESTEM EESECOLESTIAE

133

The errors with which it was concerned, however, were far from
being “phantoms,”
It attributed the first two propositions we have listed to
“many” people. Fifty-one years later, the present Holy Father
felt himself obliged, in carrying out his supreme doctrinal work
within the Church, to condemn much the same errors.
Like the Humani generis half a century later, the Testem bene­
volentiae carefully' avoided attributing the errors it condemned
to any individual or to any group. Pope Leo said that he was
writing, out of Christian charity, to put an end to certain conten­
tions which had then recently arisen among us, in our country'.36
He likewise adverted to the controversies which had developed
around the book to which Father Klein had contributed a pref­
ace.w He did not accuse either the defenders of the book or its
opponents of doctrinal inaccuracy. Neither did he blame any'
group or faction on this side of the ocean. He was engaged in
teaching the truth and in putting down error. He did not want
to expose or to hurt those who had taught incorrectly.
To assert, however, that what he condemned in the Testem
benevolentiae was some phantom error would be seriously to abuse
the kindness of a great Pontiff. It would likewise constitute a
rather dangerous misinterpretation of a highly' important papal
document and would serve as a completely' undesirable precedent.
Joseph Clifford Fenton

The Catholic University of America
Washington, D. C.

« Wynne, p. 441; CICF, 53?
* Ibid.