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We can\u2019t\u00a0\u201ccrack\u201d the mysteries of theology and the incarnation and God\u2019s nature by using purely intellect. Mere intellect is inadequate to resolve it by solely its own methods of reason and logic.\u00a0Intellect alone cannot completely conceive of the mystery of the Holy Trinity or the mystery of transubstantiation. Why would we think it would be otherwise in this<\/i> instance? We\u2019re dealing with some of the most mysterious and mind-boggling teachings of the Catholic faith. <\/span><\/p>\nIt\u2019s like the theological\u00a0method of Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses (my first theological opponents back in the early 80s), who maintain that the Holy Trinity is eminently unreasonable because three cannot equal one. For them it is all rationalism, and that trumps faith and the Bible, biblical paradox and mystery, and actual historical tradition.<\/span><\/p>\nWe can sit here all day and try to figure out what none of us can fully comprehend\u00a0(not being both God and man as Jesus is), and, failing that, decide whether we accept various\u00a0doctrines or not. But the bottom line is that we must accept what the Church teaches<\/i>, as can best be determined.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nSeven-year-old Jesus was<\/i> \u201cthe Person of [God the] the Son\u201d and so He knew this as a Divine Person. How He did that in (specifically) His \u201chuman way of knowing\u201d may be difficult to figure out or relate to, but in any event, Jesus is a Divine Person and not merely a nature. Therefore, He (the Divine Person) knew this, and yet this was denied in The Young Messiah<\/em>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"[Pixabay \/ CC0 public domain] *** This was from a private dialogue about whether Jesus\u2019 possessed the Beatific Vision in this life, as related to discussions of the knowledge and consciousness of Jesus and the Hypostatic Union (Two Natures of Christ), as discussed in two previous papers of mine [one \/ two], related to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2331,"featured_media":6750,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[112,172],"tags":[2473,459,2579,465,469,2580,470,2577,2578,2575,2576,1446],"class_list":["post-6749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-philosophy-science","category-trinitarianism-christology","tag-beatific-vision","tag-christology","tag-consciousness-of-jesus","tag-hypostatic-union","tag-incarnation","tag-jesus-human-knowledge","tag-kenosis","tag-mystery-in-christianity","tag-paradox","tag-systematic-theology","tag-theology-reason","tag-two-natures"],"yoast_head":"\n
On Mystery and Reason in Theology<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The mysteriousness of a doctrine is no reason to reject it. There are a host of doctrines in Catholicism that we can't totally comprehend or understand.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2016\/04\/on-mystery-reason-in-theology.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"On Mystery and Reason in Theology\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The mysteriousness of a doctrine is no reason to reject it. 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Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \\\"This Rock\\\" (now called \\\"Catholic Answers Magazine\\\"), \\\"Envoy Magazine\\\" (Patrick Madrid), \\\"The Catholic Answer,\\\" \\\"The Coming Home Journal,\\\" \\\"Gilbert Magazine\\\" (American Chesterton Society), and \\\"The Latin Mass.\\\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \\\"The Michigan Catholic\\\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. 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Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \\\"Surprised by Truth\\\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \\\"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\\\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \\\"The Catholic Verses\\\" (2004), \\\"The One-Minute Apologist\\\" (2007), \\\"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\\\" (2009), \\\"The Quotable Newman\\\" (editor: 2012), and \\\"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\\\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \\\"The New Catholic Answer Bible\\\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \\\"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\\\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \\\"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\\\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \\\"Quotable Wesley\\\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. They have three sons and a daughter, and reside in southeast Michigan (metro Detroit).\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/\",\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@LuxVeritatisApologetics\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/author\/davearmstrong\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"On Mystery and Reason in Theology","description":"The mysteriousness of a doctrine is no reason to reject it. 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Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \"This Rock\" (now called \"Catholic Answers Magazine\"), \"Envoy Magazine\" (Patrick Madrid), \"The Catholic Answer,\" \"The Coming Home Journal,\" \"Gilbert Magazine\" (American Chesterton Society), and \"The Latin Mass.\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \"The Michigan Catholic\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \"Envoy Magazine.\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \"Catholic Answers Live\" (twice), \"Faith and Family Live\" (Steve Wood), \"Kresta in the Afternoon,\" \"Son Rise Morning Show,\" \"Catholic Connection\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \"The Catholics Next Door.\" His large and popular website, \"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \"Envoy Magazine.\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \"index\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \"Surprised by Truth\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \"The Catholic Verses\" (2004), \"The One-Minute Apologist\" (2007), \"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\" (2009), \"The Quotable Newman\" (editor: 2012), and \"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \"The New Catholic Answer Bible\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \"Quotable Wesley\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. 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