

























21 

3 

HERMENEUTIC OF CONTINUITY AND 

THEOLOGICAL FORMATION 
 

Francis ‘Kunle ADEDARA, STL, Ph.D 
Seminary of Ss. Peter and Paul 

P.M.B. 5171, Secretariat P.O., Ibadan, Oyo State 
fradedara@gmail.com 

 
Abstract 
The foundation of theology is Scripture.  In an attempt to give a 
necessary clarification of this statement, I allude to the words of Anthony 
Akinwale: “The Bible contains the word of God.  But the word of God is 
not contained by the Bible…”  Since theology is fundamentally a speech 
about God, that speech has to be first of all ‘a speech from God’ before it 
can be ‘a speech about God’.  In other words, theology is a reflection on 
God who speaks (Word – Logos) and about his word that he speaks in 
Scripture and Tradition.  This is the sense in which one understands 
Akinwale’s statement, and how one ought to understand the basis of 
theology in Scripture.  Hermeneutics is the branch of theology that deals 
with the principles of Biblical interpretation.  Correct hermeneutical 
approach is therefore essential to a proper understanding of the truth 
revealed by God.  For example, it is essential to the full understanding of 
the OT to employ a hermeneutic that many OT texts are types or 
prefigurements of Christ and his fulfilment of Scripture in the NT.  One 
very important interpretive principle that Augustine enunciates in his De 
Doctrina Christiana is that one text of Scripture cannot be preferred to 
another or played off against another.  The real truth conforms to 
everything that has been revealed.  What this paper attempts to do is to 
apply this same principle of interpretation to how theology is done.  In 
this understanding, Scripture cannot be reflected upon to the exclusion 
of the Magisterium and the tradition of the Christian faith, rooted in the 
Apostles and reflected upon by the Fathers of the Church. 
 
Keywords: Hermeneutic, Magisterium, Apostolic Faith, Fathers of the 
Church, Continuity 
 



22 Formation of the Human Person in the 21st Century 

Introduction 
It is important to note that one cannot sufficiently discuss the subject of 
theological formation without also broaching the subject of theological 
method.  In this sense, theological formation is formation in method.  In 
his epic work, Method in Theology, which reflects on the operations 
theologians perform as they do theology, Bernard Lonergan says: “A 
Theology mediates between a cultural matrix and the significance and 
role of a religion in that matrix.”1  Two things stand out in this 
statement: firstly, ‘a cultural matrix’, which is loosely interpreted as that 
from which a culture originates, develops, or takes form, and secondly, 
‘role of a religion’, which can be here understood as the function of 
religion in the process of forming, shaping, and developing a culture.  In 
this regard, religion plays a significant role in shaping a culture.  What 
Lonergan proposes in his statement shows that theology mediates the 
role a religion plays in shaping a culture.  The question is, with what 
special tool does theology carry out this mediation?  Theology mediates 
as a speech about God.  Therefore, how religion shapes a culture must 
necessarily relate a people and their cultural terrains to God as their 
beginning and their end.  And since theology is fundamentally a speech 
about God, that speech has to be first of all ‘a speech from God’ before it 
can be ‘a speech about God’.  In other words, in theology we seek 
explanation and understanding of what God has revealed.  In this context 
of mediation, theology sheds light on how religion shapes culture, so that 
in forming and shaping culture, the practice of religion is a response to 
what God has revealed.  Consequently, every religious speech is a speech 
about God because it is a response to the word of God. 

In laying out the framework for speaking about method in 
theology, Lonergan says: “Method is not a set of rules to be followed 
meticulously by a dolt.  It is a framework for collaborative creativity. It 
would outline the various clusters of operations to be performed by 
theologians when they go about their various tasks.”2  He highlights eight 
distinct tasks for contemporary theology: research, interpretation, 
history, dialectic, foundations, doctrines, systematics, and 
communications.  What he refers to as functional specialties explains 
how he arrives at this list of eight distinct tasks.  Again, when Lonergan 
speaks of method, he is not referring to a set of rules to be followed 
blindly but a framework for creativity.  Within such dynamism, what is 
underscored is not ‘writing theology’ but ‘method in theology’.  
According to him, the task of writing method in theology is not 
concerned with objects that theologians expound but with the operations 
that theologians perform.  One must, however, avoid a hasty 
interpretation of Lonergan that opposes object of theology to theological 
method.  No matter the method, there is always the fundamental object 



Section 1: Ecclesiastical/Theological Perspectives And Seminary Formation    23 

of theology that method must not detract from, namely, the First Truth.  
Whatever the operation of the theologian, his task is denominated by the 
First Truth.  In this way, theological method is not opposed to the object 
of theology, because the object determines the operation.  As a matter of 
fact, God is not the object but subject of theology, and he determines the 
operation of the theologian. 

For the purpose of this paper, we shall attempt to transpose the 
idea of Lonergan on how method works generally to how ‘hermeneutic 
of continuity’ functions in theological method and formation.  According 
to Lonergan, “A method is a normative pattern of recurrent and related 
operations yielding cumulative and progressive results.”3  Two things are 
fundamental in this assertion: ‘distinct operations’ and ‘relatedness of the 
operations.’  From these two, Lonergan describes the function of method 
in such a way that shows the integrity and continuity of operations, 
yielding cumulative and progressive results.  He says: 
There is a method, then, where there are distinct operations, where each 
operation is related to the others, where the set of relations forms a 
pattern, where the pattern is described as the right way of doing the job, 
where operations in accord with the pattern may be repeated indefinitely, 
and where the fruits of such repetition are, not repetitious, but 
cumulative and progressive.4 

What Lonergan states here gives the broad framework for 
speaking about hermeneutic of continuity and method in theology.  
Every authentic theological method must explore the interrelatedness of 
the distinct approaches to understanding the reality that is revealed and 
proposed for belief.  This paper aims to show that hermeneutic of 
continuity in theological method and formation entails proper 
interpretation of scripture, tradition of the faith, and ecclesiastical texts, 
in order to emphasize their unity.  The task of theology is to work for 
this unity rather than the too prevalent “hermeneutic of rupture.”  In this 
understanding, “Sacred tradition and sacred Scripture make up a single 
sacred deposit of the Word of God,”5 and its authentic interpretation has 
been entrusted to the teaching office of the Church.  For this reason, 
“sacred tradition, sacred Scripture and the Magisterium of the Church 
are so connected and associated that one of them cannot stand without 
the others.”6 Thus, interpretation of the word of God is a task of the 
Magisterium of the Church: it is a task it carries out in fidelity to the 
tradition of the Christian faith; in fidelity to the sensus fidei of the whole 
people of God; with fidelity to the apostolic origins of Christianity; and 
with profound reference to the reflections upon the Christian faith by 
the Fathers of the Church. 

 
 



24 Formation of the Human Person in the 21st Century 

The Function of Hermeneutics in Theological Method 
The fact that Scripture is the foundation of theology shows that every 
theological enterprise is a reflection on the Word of God.  It means 
theology is a reflection on God who speaks (Word – Logos), and about his 
word that he speaks in Scripture and Tradition.  Hermeneutics is the 
branch of theology that deals with the principles of Biblical 
interpretation.  Correct hermeneutical approach is therefore essential to a 
proper understanding of the truth revealed by God.  This approach 
underscores the integrity of the whole of Scripture, and how theological 
interpretation functions in fidelity to the unity of the truth that is 
revealed.  It is along this line that St. Augustine, in his On the Christian 
Doctrine7, recommends that when interpreting Scripture, one text cannot 
be preferred to another or played off against another. Since everything 
the Holy Spirit intends to teach in Scripture is true, all texts which relate 
to a given problem must be examined for what they say about it, and the 
correct understanding will necessarily be an understanding which 
permits every text to retain its full force—that is, the real truth will 
conform to everything that has been revealed. Working against this 
“hermeneutic” is any tendency to interpret Scripture according to the 
“plain meaning” of a favorite text, while ignoring other texts which 
provide additional light on the same subject.  This is the practice of 
quoting the scripture in isolation, and it is tantamount to “hermeneutic 
of rupture.” 

In order to highlight the function of hermeneutics in theological 
method, the correct principle of interpretation does not only apply to 
Scripture, but also to everything that God has revealed in the Christian 
tradition.  Describing the interrelatedness of different scriptural passages, 
and the relation of scripture to magisterial texts, Jeff Mirus says: 
Because the Magisterium of the Church teaches with the same authority 
as Sacred Scripture (after all, the same Holy Spirit inspires and 
guarantees both), a Catholic can properly understand a Christian 
teaching only if he takes into account everything that both Scripture and 
the Magisterium have said on a subject. Any understanding which fastens 
on what Scripture says to the exclusion of the Magisterium (as 
Protestants typically do) or which fastens on this or that statement of the 
Magisterium in preference to others (as Traditionalists typically do) is 
doomed to be incorrect. The proper interpretation will always be the one 
which allows for the truth of all the relevant Scriptural and Magisterial 
texts.8 

What the statement of Jeff Mirus attests to is the unity of 
scripture, tradition and the magisterium.  In chapter II of the Dogmatic 
Constitution on Divine Revelation, Dei Verbum, where it discusses 
Transmission of Divine Revelation, the document states that all that God 



Section 1: Ecclesiastical/Theological Perspectives And Seminary Formation    25 

had revealed for the salvation of all peoples should remain in their 
entirety, throughout the ages, and be transmitted to all generations.9  
“Therefore, Christ the Lord, in whom the entire Revelation of the most 
high God is summed up (cf. 2 Cor. 1:20; 3:16; 4:6) commanded the 
apostles to preach the Gospel, which had been promised beforehand by 
the prophets, and which he fulfilled in his own person and promulgated 
with his own lips.”10  The apostles transmitted what they received from 
the Lord to succeeding generations.  In order to preserve the living and 
full Gospel in the Church, the apostles left bishops as their successors.  
They gave them “their own position of teaching authority.”11  The 
transmission of the faith from the apostles is the characteristic feature of 
the apostolicity of origin, since the Church was first organized by the 
apostles chosen by Christ; it is the feature of apostolicity of teaching, because 
what the Church teaches now is essentially what was taught by the 
Apostles; and it is the feature of apostolicity of succession in office, since there 
has been an unbroken historical transmission of episcopal powers, 
through ordination, from the Apostles to all the Bishops in communion 
with the Bishop of Rome today.  This does not only guarantee 
faithfulness to revelation, but also to its continuity.  Theology, which is a 
speech about God, because it is a reflection on God’s word, must 
therefore employ, in its method, the principle of interpretation that 
functions on the unity and continuity of the Christian faith tradition.  
According to the fathers of the Second Vatican Council, “This sacred 
Tradition, then, and the sacred Scripture of both Testaments, are like a 
mirror, in which the Church, during its pilgrim journey here on earth, 
contemplates God from whom she receives everything, until such time 
as she is brought to see him face to face as he really is (cf. Jn 3:2).”12  In 
this regard, Sacred Tradition and sacred Scripture are bound closely 
together, and communicate one with the other; they make up a single 
sacred deposit of the Word of God, which is entrusted to the Church.13   

The Council fathers further state that the task of giving an 
authentic interpretation of the Word of God, whether in its written form 
or in the form of Tradition,14 has been entrusted to the living teaching 
office of the Church alone.15  The authority of the magisterium in this 
matter is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ.  It is not superior to the 
Word of God, but is its servant.  It teaches only what has been handed on 
to it.  The document Dei Verbum concludes the section on the 
“Transmission of Divine Revelation” with the profound statement of 
unity of Sacred Scripture, Tradition, and the Magisterium: “It is clear, 
therefore, that, in the supremely wise arrangement of God, sacred 
tradition, sacred Scripture and the Magisterium of the Church are so 
connected and associated that one of them cannot stand without the 
others.  Working together, each in its own way under the action of the 



26 Formation of the Human Person in the 21st Century 

one Holy Spirit, they all contribute effectively to the salvation of souls.”16  
Theologians have important task to perform in giving authentic 
interpretation of the Word of God.  Since theirs is a service of the truth, 
whatever method they adopt must always work for the continuity of 
what God has revealed in Christ, which is rooted in the apostolic faith, 
and which is correctly interpreted and taught by the Magisterium.  
Therefore, the theologian does not engage in reckless scholarship that 
emphasizes his subjective views over the inherent truth of the Christian 
tradition; rather, he functions within the hermeneutic environment that 
is subservient to the teaching office of the Bishops.  It must be noted 
here that “Both the teaching office of the Bishop and the teaching office 
of the theologian are at the service of the truth.  For this reason, they are 
not at variance.   However, the teaching office of the theologian is at the 
service of the teaching office of the Bishop.”17  A more specific scrutiny 
of the mission of the theologian is necessary to see how his service of the 
truth works for continuity rather than rupture. 

 
Mission of the Theologian and Formation in Method18 
The profound mission of the theologian is silence and contemplation.  
This seems both strange and paradoxical, since theology is fundamentally 
a speech.  Yet, this is the primary mission of the theologian, because the 
purpose of silence and contemplation, as Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, 
once said, is that “they serve, in the distractions of daily life, to preserve 
permanent union with God.”19  He stressed further that the purpose is so 
that “that union with God may always be present in our souls and may 
transform our entire being.”20  The theologian is one who is first and 
foremost called to a union with God.  In contemplating God who is the 
First Truth, the theologian is transformed by the truth that he seeks to 
understand.  It is only in this way that he can relate the fruits of his 
contemplation to others.  Silence and contemplation are therefore the 
essential mission of the theologian.  This is his mission if, in the 
loquacity of his every day, in the plethora of words, he makes the 
essential words heard.  Through words, he makes present the fruits of 
his contemplation; he makes present the Word, the Logos who comes 
from God, the Word who is God.  The theologian lives in a world where 
there is the possibility of the distractions that come from so many words.  
If he is to make the Word who comes from God present, it has to be 
through a process of purification of his thoughts, which in addition must 
be above all a process of purification of his words. 

John the Evangelist says of the Word of God that was coming 
into the world that he was the true light that enlightens every man.  “He 
was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world 
knew him not” (Jn 1:10).  The world did not know him because the 



Section 1: Ecclesiastical/Theological Perspectives And Seminary Formation    27 

world did not enter that silence in which John was privileged to know 
the Logos of God and made him known.  We cannot open the world and, 
indeed ourselves, to the Word without entering into the silence of God 
from which his Word proceeds.  And as Benedict XVI says: “For the 
purification of our words, hence, also for the purification of the words of 
the world, we need that silence which becomes contemplation, which 
introduces us into God's silence and brings us to the point where the 
Word, the redeeming Word, is born.”21  To enter into silence and 
contemplation always means to hear something, to hear a speech.  The 
one who enters into this silence is not the one who speaks, but he listens.  
In this regard St Thomas Aquinas, with a long tradition, says that in 
theology God is not the object of which we speak.  This is our own 
normal conception.  God, in reality, is not the object but the subject of 
theology.  The one who speaks through theology, the speaking subject, 
must be God himself.  And our speech and thoughts must always serve 
to ensure that what God says, the Word of God, is listened to and finds 
room in the world.  For this reason, the practice of true theology cannot 
be the substitution of our words for the Word of God.  In theology God 
speaks, and in the process the theologian must learn to forfeit his own 
words, so that through this process of purification his words may be 
nothing but the instrument through which God can speak, and, hence, 
that God may truly be the subject and not the object of theology. 

When the theologian enters the silence in which God alone 
speaks, he must be attentive and seek the true word of God.  A phrase 
from the first chapter of the First Letter of St. Peter easily comes to 
mind: “Animas vestras castificantes in oboedientia veritatis” (1 Pet 1:22).  Here 
Peter speaks of the purification of the soul that comes from obedience to 
the truth.  Obedience to the truth must "purify" our souls and thus guide 
us to upright speech and upright action.  The lesson in this, as it relates 
to the mission of the theologian, is that when there is obedience to the 
truth, the theologian will avoid what Benedict XVI calls prostitution of 
words and of the soul.  According to the Pope Emeritus, “speaking in the 
hope of being applauded, governed by what people want to hear out of 
obedience to the dictatorship of current opinion, is considered to be a 
sort of prostitution: of words and of the soul.”22  He explains further that 
the "purity" to which the Apostle Peter is referring means not submitting 
to these standards, not seeking applause, but rather, seeking obedience to 
the truth.  In other words, the theologian must not only learn to forfeit 
his own words, but he must also constantly seek to be at the service of 
the true word of God.  Such service to the word of God is only authentic 
when opinions are not substituted for the truth.  This can sometimes be 
the danger in the theological enterprise.  This is why the mission of the 



28 Formation of the Human Person in the 21st Century 

theologian should draw its proper life and derive its impetus from the 
obedience to the truth.   

The words of Benedict XVI aptly convey the authentic content 
and method of the theological enterprise when he says: 

And I think that this is the fundamental virtue for the 
theologian, this discipline of obedience to the truth, 
which makes us, although it may be hard, collaborators 
of the truth, mouthpieces of truth, for it is not we who 
speak in today's river of words, but it is the truth which 
speaks in us, who are really purified and made chaste by 
obedience to the truth. So it is that we can truly be 
harbingers of the truth.23 

The same message is communicated in the words of St. Ignatius of 
Antioch: "Those who have understood the Lord's words understand his 
silence, for the Lord should be recognized in his silence."24  We grasp the 
true significance and depth of the words of Jesus only when we attain 
that silence of the Lord, his being with the Father from which words 
come.  The words of Jesus are born in silence on the Mountain, as is 
often said that he withdrew to the mountain to pray.  The theologian, 
who has the mission to convey the words of Jesus, must also take his 
instance from this communion of the Son with the Father.  Indeed, 
“words are born from this silence of communion with the Father, from 
being immersed in the Father, and only on reaching this point, on 
starting from this point, do we arrive at the real depth of the Word and 
can ourselves be authentic interpreters of the Word.  The Lord invites us 
verbally to climb the Mountain with him and thus, in his silence, to learn 
anew the true meaning of words.”25  It is when the words of the 
theologian are born from the silence of communion with the Father and 
with Christ, the Logos of the Father, that it can be truly said of him: 
“Anyone who hears you hears me” (Lk 10:16).  The content and context 
of Evangelization is the Word of God.  If it is therefore true that those 
who hear us hear the Lord, then the task of evangelization already has its 
true force and its assurance of success, since the word of God stands for 
ever, and it accomplishes the purpose for which it is spoken (Cf. Is 48:8; 
55:11).  It is the word that is born from the silence of communion with 
the Father through the Son and in the Holy Spirit that is the force of 
Evangelization.  The theologian must always enter this silence and 
contemplation. 

However, the nature of authentic theology is that it is both a 
quest and a speech.  Hence, it is the mission of a theologian that he 
searches and that he speaks.  The quest and speech is primarily about 
God, and also about every creature in its relation to God as its first 
beginning and its last end.26  In proposing what the nature and task of 



Section 1: Ecclesiastical/Theological Perspectives And Seminary Formation    29 

theology is, I allude to the words of Anthony Akinwale: “This search and 
this speech can only be undertaken by one who encounters God, human 
beings, and the universe in an attentive, intelligent, reasonable and 
responsible manner.  Each and all of these four levels of conscious 
intentionality must be sustained in prayer such that, in this encounter, 
the theologian is prayerfully attentive, prayerfully intelligent, prayerfully 
reasonable, and prayerfully responsible.”27  It follows that in its method, 
theology must always apply the principle of fides quaerens intellectum, 
where faith both informs and sustains the task of theology, and where 
the theologian does not yield to the recklessness of relativism. 

We have considered how silence and contemplation are 
profoundly the mission of the theologian.  Yet, because theology is also 
authentically a speech, the mission of the theologian is also essentially to 
speak about God.  However, the one who endeavours to speak about 
God must also have a profound desire for God.  Here is the meeting 
point of theology as speech and quest, because there can be no speech 
about God where there is no quest for God.  Thus, in the larger picture 
of the mission of the theologian, as he speaks about God, his speech 
must be grounded in the silence and contemplation that we have talked 
about.  The God who has placed in every human being the natural desire 
for him (desiderium naturale in Deum)28 is at the heart of the quest that 
theology is.  The quest is not a blind quest, but one that is born out of a 
sincere desire for God.  In Athens the Greeks erected an altar “to an 
unknown God” (cf. Acts 17:23).  As it were, they had a desire for what 
was unknown; and this is absurd.  In Book VIII of his De Trinitate, St. 
Augustine establishes the principle that no one loves what he does not 
know.  Thus, we do not love the unknown, but love to know the 
unknown.  Here is how Augustine puts it: 

For, since ‘we walk by faith, not by sight’ [2 Cor 5:7], we 
certainly do not yet see God, as the same one has said: 
‘face to face’ [1 Cor 13:12].  Unless we love him now, 
we shall never see Him.  But who loves that which he 
does not know?  For something can be known and not 
loved; but what I am asking is, whether something can 
be loved that is not known?  If that is impossible, then no 
one loves God before he knows Him.  And what does it 
mean to love God, except to see Him and to perceive 
him steadfastly with our mind?  For He is not a body to 
be sought for with bodily eyes.29 

It follows that to speak about God is to have a desire for God; and 
one cannot have a desire for what one does not known.  Hence, we speak 
of the task of theology as a speech and a quest.  And since one speaks 
about a person or thing to the extent that one knows the person or thing, 



30 Formation of the Human Person in the 21st Century 

then the validity of what the theologian says about God must come from 
his deep knowledge of God.  Such knowledge comes from the silence 
and contemplation into with the theologian enters.  As a result, the 
knowledge is the fruit of both faith and reason.   

The Church teaches that “God, the first principle and last end of 
all things, can be known with certainty from the created world by the 
natural light of human reason.”30  The Catechism of the Catholic Church 
states further: “In the historical condition in which he finds himself, 
however, man experiences many difficulties in coming to know God by 
the light of reason alone.”31  Consequently, the knowledge of God that 
comes from reason must be from reason that is ennobled, enlightened, 
empowered and elevated by faith.  What the Church teaches in the two 
instances is true and valid.  In the first instance, from the things that have 
been made (cf. Rom 1:20), any reasonable and intelligent person can 
come to the conclusion that God exists.  On the other hand, there are 
reasonable and intelligent people who have not been able to come to the 
conclusion that God exists.  For the latter group, what is missing is faith.  
That God exists is self-evident in itself since the predicate is included in 
the essence of the subject.  But it is not self-evident to us because we do 
not know the essence of God.  It is for this reason that the proposition 
needs to be demonstrated by the things that are more known to us, 
though less known in their nature – namely, by effects.32  From what we 
have said, it is true and valid that God can be known by the natural light 
of human reason from the created world.  But because God is Mystery – 
not in the sense that God is unintelligible, but in the sense that who God 
is cannot be exhausted – to attempt to know God by the light of reason 
alone is fraught with so many difficulties.  Reason must be enlightened 
and elevated by faith.  The God whom the theologian seeks to speak 
about is a mystery, so the theologian must recognize that the created 
intellect cannot know God perfectly.  God is knowable, and he is 
knowable infinitely.  Yet the infinitely knowable God cannot be known 
infinitely by the finite intellect of the creature.  And because the 
theologian cannot exhaust the meaning of who God is, he must fall in 
love with the mystery that God is, so that he may be purified, and so that 
his speech may truly be about God whom he has fallen in love with.  He 
is called to live a holy life by constant conversion to God.         

Furthermore, when the theologian speaks about God out of 
desire for God, it means “God is the subject matter of the speech that 
takes its inspiration from the natural desire for God and the God who 
fulfills that desire by revealing himself, and who gives the Church’s 
Magisterium as a gift to ensure that what is revealed is rightly 
interpreted.”33  Theology is, therefore, a quest to understand God and 
what God has revealed about himself, and it is also a speech about God 



Section 1: Ecclesiastical/Theological Perspectives And Seminary Formation    31 

who reveals himself.  In this regard, “It is a search for understanding and 
a speech about the search, a speech in which the speaker seeks to 
understand for himself and seeks to explain to his audience the One he 
has found, or rather, the One who has found him.”34  If in the task and 
mission of theology, quest, speech and desire are interwoven, the 
mission of the theologian, vis-à-vis the task of interpretation and 
evangelization, must flow from a profound encounter with the God 
whom he has found and whom he loves, and his attempt to make this 
God known to others so that they too may love him.  His speech will 
always be about the God of love so that those who listen to his 
explanation of the true word of God may also come to the knowledge 
and love of the God who speaks and is spoken about. 
 It must be noted that though theology is a speech about God, it is 
also a speech about creatures.  However, theology cannot be reduced to 
discourse about creatures.  As a matter of fact, when it is said that 
theology is a speech about creatures, that speech cannot be isolated from 
the speech about God.  For this reason Thomas Aquinas teaches that 
theology is not concerned with creatures in se, but only as they are related 
to God as their beginning and end.35  Thus, when the theologian speaks 
about creatures he is not to use the methods of the natural or social 
sciences – though he does not ignore the findings of these other branches 
of knowledge – he must speak about them as a theologian.  In other 
words, it is in his speech about God that he must speak about creatures.  
As much as other branches of knowledge can be of help to theology, the 
office of theology must not be usurped by these other branches of 
knowledge.  The implication of this is that the theologian must engage in 
the task of interpretation and evangelization as one who primarily and 
essentially speaks about God.  What he does in his speech about God is 
seek to understand the God who has created all things, and this desire to 
understand the mystery of God gives theology its character as a quest.   
St. Anselm of Canterbury speaks of this effort of the human mind to 
understand the mystery of God when he wrote:  

I am not trying, O Lord, to penetrate thy loftiness, for I 
cannot begin to match my understanding with it, but I 
desire in some measure to understand thy truth, which 
my heart believes and loves.  For I do not seek to 
understand in order to believe, but I believe in order to 
understand.  For this too I believe, that “unless I believe, 
I shall not understand.”36 

 It is clear then that, in his speech about God, the theologian does not 
first seek to understand before he believes, but he believes so as to 
understand (credo ut intelligam).  These words of Anselm have given 
theology the classical character of “faith seeking understanding” (fides 



32 Formation of the Human Person in the 21st Century 

quaerens intellectum).  Long before Anselm, the Fathers of the Church, 
especially Augustine, demonstrated the truth in these statements.  From 
the outset of his most profound theological work, De Trinitate, Augustine 
impressed on his reader that the starting point of his quest for the 
immaterial imago Dei was faith in the Trinity, and that throughout the 
quest he was going to be guided by faith.  “The De Trinitate is a search, an 
inquisitio, as Augustine puts it.  It is the embodiment of a principle of 
Catholic theology that Augustine constantly invoked and that St. Anselm 
later formulated: fides quaerens intellectum.  Faith is, therefore, the starting 
point for Augustine.  We cannot come to an understanding of the 
mystery of the trinity without the initium fidei.37  The theologian who 
speaks about God must always have this initium fidei.  The initium fidei of 
the theologian is not an isolated private revelation, nor is it a rupture 
from what the Christian community believes to be revealed through 
Jesus Christ, which the Apostles taught and passed on to succeeding 
generations of Christian disciples, the deposit of faith (depositum fidei).  
Thus, the mission of the theologian, in his task of interpretation, is to 
constantly work hermeneutic of continuity in the understanding and 
explanation of the Christian faith.  His mission as theologian is one that 
he undertakes personally but on behalf of the believing community.  In 
his regard, “The task of theology is to show that the act of faith and the 
act of good use of the human intellect are not incompatible.”38  And to 
have great impact in the task of interpretation, the theologian must be a 
man of faith, he must be intelligent and he must be reasonable.   
 
Conclusion 
This paper examined hermeneutic of continuity as the proper principle 
of interpretation, in which the unity and integrity of the faith tradition is 
the task of theology.  Theological formation must therefore consist in the 
proper formation of theological method, so that the one who is thus 
formed recognizes his mission and his teaching office to be at the service 
of the truth and in obedience to the truth.  For the theologian to be at the 
service of the truth is for him to work for continuity rather than rupture 
in the tradition of the Christian faith.  As principle of interpretation, 
hermeneutic of continuity allows for the truth of the relevant scriptural 
and magisterial texts, mediated by the faith tradition that goes back to the 
apostles.  This principle is opposed to any interpretive technique which 
severs one or more Magisterial texts, or one or more passages of 
Scripture, from other texts.  Such a technique is a “hermeneutic of 
rupture”.  The right principle is a “hermeneutic of continuity”, and this 
principle lies in the heart of true theological formation and theological 
method.  For over two centuries now, “Western intellectual life, with the 
deep influence of modernism, has been dominated increasingly by a 



Section 1: Ecclesiastical/Theological Perspectives And Seminary Formation    33 

“hermeneutic of rupture”, a broad principle of interpretation of the 
Good which dismisses tradition and opts instead for the latest ideas, as if 
by the very fact of coming later in time, these ideas must be superior—a 
misconception arising largely from the Western notion of “progress”.”39  
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, this hermeneutic of rupture was 
imported into Catholic theology by those who fell victim to Modernism.  
Modernism essentially finds religious truth in the current lived 
experience of Christians.  As a remedy, this paper proposes proper 
theological formation that is rooted in “hermeneutic of continuity”, and 
in which the theologian sees his task as that of service to the integral 
truth of Scripture, sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium.  The study of 
the Fathers of the Church must be an integral part of this theological 
formation.   
 
Endnotes  
 
                                                      
1 Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 

1971), xi 
2 Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology, xi 
3 Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology, 4 
4 Bernard Lonergan, Method in Theology, 4 
5 Vatican II, Dei Verbum, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, 10 
6 Vatican II, Dei Verbum, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, 10 
7 The following insight is an explanation of the thoughts of St. Augustine provided 

by Jeff Mirus in his article “Benedict’s Hermeneutic of Continuity”, written and 

uploaded for CatholicCulture.org, January 30, 2009. https://www.catholicculture.org 

/commentary/benedicts-hermeneutic-continuity/. Retrieved on December 30, 2019.   
8 Jeff Mirus in his article “Benedict’s Hermeneutic of Continuity”, written and 

uploaded for CatholicCulture.org, January 30, 2009. https://www.catholicculture.org 

/commentary/benedicts-hermeneutic-continuity/. Retrieved on December 30, 2019. 
9 Vatican II, Dei Verbum, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, 7 
10 Vatican II, Dei Verbum, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, 7 
11 St. Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses, III, 3, 1 
12 Vatican II, Dei Verbum, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, 7 
13 Vatican II, Dei Verbum, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, 9, 10 
14 Cf. First Vatican Council, Dogmatic Constitution on the Catholic Faith, c. 3 (on 

Faith): Denz. 1972 (3011). 
15 Vatican II, Dei Verbum, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, 10. Cf. Pius 

XII, Encyclical Humani Generis, 12 August 1950: Denz. 1972 (3886). 
16 Vatican II, Dei Verbum, Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, 10 
17 Francis Adedara, “Marriage and Family Life in Service of Truth: Theological 

Perspectives on Reception of the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia” in Abuja 

Journal of Philosophy and Theology, 7 (2017) 80-81.  



34 Formation of the Human Person in the 21st Century 

                                                                                                                         
18 What I discuss in this section is the variation of a section of the paper I read at a 

Conference of the Southwest Association of Nigerian Catholic Theologians.  See 

Francis Adedara, “The Mission of the Theologian and the Task of Evangelization: A 

Reflection on the Nigerian Context”, in The Theologian and the New Evangelization 

in the South-West of Nigeria, Conference Proceedings, vol. I (Ibadan: A Publication of 

Southwest Association of Nigerian Catholic Theologians, 2014).  The section on 

Mission of the Theologian is adopted and adapted for the purpose of this paper.  
19 Benedict XVI, Homily at the Eucharistic Celebration with the members of the 

International Theological Commission, Redemptoris Mater Chapel, Apostolic 

Palace, October 6 2006 
20 Benedict XVI, Homily at the Eucharistic Celebration with the members of the 

International Theological Commission. 
21 Benedict XVI, Homily at the Eucharistic Celebration with the members of the 

International Theological Commission. 
22 Benedict XVI, Homily at the Eucharistic Celebration with the members of the 

International Theological Commission. 
23 Benedict XVI, Homily at the Eucharistic Celebration with the members of the 

International Theological Commission. 
24 Ignatius of Antioch, Letter the Ephesians, XV, 2 (Sources Chrétiennes 10, pp. 84-

85). 
25 Benedict XVI, Homily at the Eucharistic Celebration with the members of the 

International Theological Commission. 
26 See Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologia I, q. 1, a. 7 
27 Anthony Akinwale, “Catholic Theology and the Church in Nigeria,” a paper 

presented at Graduate Theology Students; Colloquium, Ave Maria University, FL, 

September 14, 2007, p. 4 
28 The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches: “The desire for God is written in 

the human heart, because man is created by God for God; and God never ceases to 

draw man to himself.  Only in God will he find the truth and happiness he never 

stops searching for” (n. 27).  The Second Vatican Council says in this regard: “The 

dignity of man rests above all on the fact that he is called to communion with God.  

This invitation to converse with God is addressed to man as soon as he comes into 

being.  For if man exists it is because God has created him through love, and 

through love continues to hold him in existence.  He cannot live fully according to 

truth unless he freely acknowledges that love and entrusts himself to his creator” 

(GS 19).  
29 Augustine, De Trinitate, VIII.6 
30 Catechism of the Catholic Church, 36. See Vatican Council I, Dei Filius 2: DS 3004; 

cf. 3026; see also Vatican II, Dei Verbum 6 
31 Catechism of the Catholic Church, 37; see Pius XII, Humani Generis, 561, where 

this historical condition is rooted in the consequences of original sin. 
32 See Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 1, a. 1 for a discussion of whether 

the existence of God is self-evident. 
33 Anthony Akinwale, “Catholic Theology and the Church in Nigeria,” p. 4 
34 Anthony Akinwale, “Catholic Theology and the Church in Nigeria,” p. 4 



Section 1: Ecclesiastical/Theological Perspectives And Seminary Formation    35 

                                                                                                                         
35 Cf. Summa Theologiae I, q. 2, prol.: “principalis intentio huius sacrae doctrinae est 

Dei cognitionem tradere, et non solum secundum quod in se est, sed etiam secundum 

quod est principium rerum et finis earum, et specialiter rationalis creaturae.” 
36 Anselm of Canterbury, Proslogion, Ch. 1 in A Scholastic Miscellany: Anselm to 

Ockham, edited by Eugene Fairweather (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1956). 

Cf. Is 7:9, as read by Augustine in the Old Latin version, and frequently quoted by 

him, for example, Epist. 120:1 (CSEL, 34, 706); Sermo 89:4 (PL, 38, 556). 
37 Francis Adedara, “The Image of God in Man and Original Sin in Augustine’s De 

Trinitate” (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, 2011), see pp. 4-5 
38 Anthony Akinwale, “Catholic Theology and the Church in Nigeria,” p. 7 
39 Jeff Mirus in his article “Benedict’s Hermeneutic of Continuity”, written and 

uploaded for CatholicCulture.org, January 30, 2009. https://www.catholicculture.org 

/commentary/benedicts-hermeneutic-continuity/. Retrieved on December 30, 2019. 


