The Infallible Exegete and the Magisterium of the Church

The infallible exegete can be found in multiple locations throughout the world and lives like a parasite in every host that is willing to provide safe lodging. This entity is available instantly with the stroke of a keyboard or the click of a mouse. Unlike Superman’s Fortress of solitude in a singular location, this mysterious being enjoys secrecy and protection in any corner or crevice of cyberspace and is ever at the ready to weigh in on matters of faith and morals.  

Despite the Church’s clear voice of divine truth, the exaltation of personal interpretation and opinion has provided a platform for the proliferation of subjective truth in the blogosphere. The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains how the judgment of the Church prevails:

It is the task of exegetes to work, according to these rules, toward a better understanding and explanation of the meaning of Sacred Scripture in order that their research may help the Church to form a firmer judgment. For, of course, all that has been said about the manner of interpreting Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgment of the Church which exercises the divinely conferred commission and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God. (CCC 119)

It is tempting to claim a personal view as the final word on any subject. But claiming to speak for God by necessity requires the “divinely conferred commission” the Church has been given. Once God’s existence is acknowledged, it is only logical to seek the counsel of the Almighty by every means possible. The objective truth of any matter can only be found in the One who is the way, the truth, and the life. The fullness of revelation, Jesus Christ, is readily available in Sacred Scripture and Tradition. These two streams that proceed from one divine source are preserved and protected by the Magisterium of the Church:

The mission of the Magisterium is linked to the definitive nature of the covenant established by God with his people in Christ. It is this Magisterium’s task to preserve God’s people from deviations and defections and to guarantee them the objective possibility of professing the true faith without error. Thus, the pastoral duty of the Magisterium is aimed at seeing to it that the People of God abides in the truth that liberates. To fulfill this service, Christ endowed the Church’s shepherds with the charism of infallibility in matters of faith and morals. (CCC 890)

Personal interpretation of scripture can be useful so long as it is kept within the confines of individual prophetic imagination and personal growth. True prophecy, spoken under the influence of the Holy Spirit and safeguarded by the Church, has the binding authority in matters of faith and morals. This authority is rooted in scripture:

If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won over your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that “every fact may be established on the testimony of two or three witnesses.” If he refuses to listen to them, tell the church. If he refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector. Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. (Matthew 18:15-18)

The infallible exegete and his close cousin the infallible blogger would do well by checking their respective egos at the door of the objective truth found only in Church teaching. Far too many claim to speak in the name of the Church while foisting their personal opinion and biases on any reader who crosses their path. Cyberspace has become something akin to a town in the Wild West that works out its governance amid little more than mob rule.

The blogosphere, particularly the Christian “territory,” may one day be more regulated, but vigilance must always be exercised in evaluating any teaching that doesn’t conform to Church doctrine. The Catechism explains:

“… [The] infallibility promised to the Church is also present in the body of bishops when, together with Peter’s successor, they exercise the supreme Magisterium,” above all in an Ecumenical Council. When the Church through its supreme Magisterium proposes a doctrine “for belief as being divinely revealed,” and as the teaching of Christ, the definitions “must be adhered to with the obedience of faith.” This infallibility extends as far as the deposit of divine Revelation itself. (CCC 891)

May all exegetes and seekers of truth be blessed with humility and acknowledge the limitations that fallibility brings to all engaged in theological inquiry and postulation.