When Protestants Cross the Tiber
A Reformed Perspective
Protestantism has been rattled by a surge of conversions to Roman Catholicism over the past few years. Though it isn’t hemorrhaging members to Rome overall—the data indicate that far more people are leaving Rome for Protestantism—it may be losing some of its most influential ones, especially in political and intellectual circles. While this can be partially ascribed to the somewhat meager offerings of modern evangelicalism, there’s also been a concerted effort by online Catholic apologists and clergy such as Bishop Robert Barron and Father Mike Schmitz to convert individuals to Catholicism, especially Protestants.
The latest conversion in the intellectual milieu came with Ryan Hurd’s announcement earlier this week that he and his wife are heading to Rome. Hurd taught many Davenant Institute courses on Thomas Aquinas’s theology, among a variety of other topics, and edited Volume 5 of William Perkins’s works published by Reformation Heritage Books. Though not that much of a surprise when considering Hurd’s love of Aquinas, a sense of sadness still comes to the fore when Reformed Protestants hear that one of their own has crossed the Tiber.
To Hurd’s credit, rather than blasting Protestantism on the way out, he gave a short explanation about why he went to Rome. Aquinas’s “moral goodness,” as well as his “knowledge in science,” was the initial cause that prompted Hurd to side with the Roman church rather than the Protestant church on the consequential theological disputes that separate them.
Though I was raised Roman Catholic, since I have only a layman’s understanding of theology, I won’t be getting into the particular differences between Catholicism and Protestantism, which are real and profound (but probably not as well understood as they should be). Instead, I will offer my general advice for Protestants for when these situations arise.
For starters, pray that the convert would return to the Protestant fold. Presbyterian Inn, an anon, has discussed his entrance to and exit from the Roman church, and has since come back to the Reformed faith. He’s now a wise and well-read Protestant who has immersed himself in the depths of Reformed theology, including its aesthetics.
Additionally, you shouldn’t throw pearls before swine. Social media is awash in the lowest-common-denominator “apologetics,” endless strawmen, bad logic, poor reasoning, and a complete unfamiliarity with the primary sources—and I’m not talking only about Catholics here. This isn’t necessarily a criticism of social media in principle. It’s always been more of a battlefield than a place where disputes can be mediated through calm speech. And good people and quality accounts are out there. But that’s certainly not the norm. You must understand the medium and tailor your strategy accordingly.
This also leads to another point: do not get defensive. Simply because a well-known Catholic has confident, harsh criticisms of Protestantism, that doesn’t mean the accusations have to be answered. Or that they have any merit. Protestants must understand that, for whatever reason, things seem to be heating up between the different theological tribes. We must know when to avoid taking offense, which hills to die on, and defend ourselves when need be against attacks. Use wisdom, grace, and wit, but also think through how to occupy and keep the morally superior position. Muting and sometimes blocking—the main defensive weapons at your disposal—will likely be necessary in this quest.
Part of rejecting the defensive mindset involves rejecting the idea that seems to be percolating in certain corners: that seriously engaging with Aquinas’s teachings means one is already on the way to Rome.
Protestants can, of course, profit from Aquinas. You can think someone is a useful theologian without hitching your wagon to them. And you’re not a Thomist merely if you find useful or true arguments in Aquinas’s theological writings. After all, the Reformers read Aquinas, agreeing with certain arguments while rejecting others, without making the journey across the Tiber.
Though Martin Luther once wrote that Thomas Aquinas is “the source and foundation of all heresy, error, and obliteration of the Gospel,” Reformed theologians benefited from reading Aquinas and even mentioned him approvingly.
David Sytsma has noted that Martin Bucer cited Aquinas positively in his commentaries on the Psalms and Romans. Peter Martyr Vermigli and Girolamo Zanchi were indebted to Thomistic thought in their theological training, with Vermigli citing Aquinas more than any other Medieval scholastic except for Peter Lombard, according to John Patrick Donnelly. Surprisingly to some, per Presbyterian pastor Francis B. Cavalli, there were even areas of important agreement between John Calvin and Aquinas. Cavalli writes that they agreed in broad strokes, for instance, on the “cause, extent, and end of election, namely, God’s unmerited favor toward a select number of individuals freely chosen for eternal life for the purpose of manifesting his goodness in their redemption.”
We should follow our Reformed forefathers in how they used Aquinas, appropriating him and rejecting him when necessary. It does no good to reject a theologian completely who has had a profound influence on the Christian church for well over a millennium. After all, the Christian church did not begin with the 95 Theses in 1517. Reformed theologians well understood this point, which is why they were in constant conversation with the great thinkers and writers throughout church history.
Part of the apprehension toward engaging with Aquinas in certain circles seems to revolve around the claim that, since he had an entire theological system, you must necessarily have to agree with all his conclusions. But as Caleb Dixon Smith rightly notes, based on Aquinas’s own theology, there is “no necessary bridge from accepting his views on natural theology/metaphysics to accepting his views on, say, transubstantiation or elements of Mary.” This is due to “the strict distinction” Aquinas drew “between what is known by natural or supernatural revelation.” So the “system” bogeyman is simply not true.
Complicating this is when the term “scholasticism” is used as a cudgel. Rather than being about accepting the doctrine of the Medieval church, scholasticism is best understood as a method of theological inquiry. It is not a set of conclusions derived from a particular theologian. Reformed scholasticism is not a contradiction in terms but a way to think through a theological subject with precision and accuracy, as the Reformed theologians and their heirs did.
Helpful books on these points include The Orders of Nature and Grace: Thomistic Concepts in the Moral Thought of Franciscus Junius (1545–1602) and Aquinas Among the Protestants, which guide readers on how to assess and learn from Aquinas’s theology without casting aside Reformed theology itself. While one should be thoroughly catechized in the basic doctrines of the Reformed theology before studying other thinkers outside of our tradition, theologians from other traditions should be studied. After all, the Reformers’ libraries were chock full of volume upon volume of Catholic tomes written by Bellarmine, Suarez, and Albert Pighius, among others.
We must break away from an oftentimes wooden and highly anachronistic account of the Christian church that can creep into the Reformed world. The church was not essentially gone from the earth from the end of the apostolic age until Luther.
As Mark Jones recently wrote, there is even a tendency to shrink the circle of acceptable people to cite and read, even within Reformed circles:
What was especially concerning to me was that I was told that certain views were not Reformed, and yet many Early Modern Reformed theologians held to some of the views that were apparently wrong. I could give several examples: hypothetical universalism, presumed seed faith in infants of believers, the necessity of good works for salvation, judgment according to works, etc.
You can believe in these doctrines and remain thoroughly within the Reformed tradition. After all, the idea that disagreement with the specific conception of Reformed theology Jones outlines—say, if you accept the English conformist Reformed tradition of Jewel, Hooker, and Davenant—is a movement toward Rome is simply not true. It is not Roman Catholic to believe strongly in the efficacy of the sacraments, that good works are the means to heaven, that grace is infused in sanctification, or that the civil magistrate has a duty to uphold Christianity as the true religion.
Neither is one on the road to Rome if he positively cites the best of the scholastics on theological questions. This is because rather than being followers of Calvin’s theology, the Reformed were sui generis. They accepted a diverse metaphysics that owed itself to a number of traditions within the church. Thinking seriously about the Reformers’ metaphysical and theological distinctives, Brandon Corley has made the case that they should be categorized as “eclectic Scotistic/Suarezian-Aristotelians.”
As Scott Swain has written, “Being Protestant means you don’t have to take an oath of loyalty to any single thinker or school within this discourse. Loyalty to the truth, even above one’s friends, is what matters.” And that should be our outlook when plumbing the endless depths of the Reformed tradition in its most catholic and capacious sense. The riches are already here for our taking. We just have to know where to look.