In his 2013 book The Father’s Will: Christ’s Crucifixion and the Goodness of God (Oxford University Press), Fr. Nicholas E. Lombardo, O.P., launched several severe critiques against St. Anselm’s model of the atonement. “Anselm’s solution not only fails to solve the problem of God’s apparent injustice; through his narrative of Trinitarian decision-making, he also creates new problems.”
The first problem, says Fr. Lombardo, is that Anselm says nothing about the Father willing our salvation, and instead “his entire narrative depends on the Father not setting it in motion.” Only in this way does the Son freely (without any pressure or command by the Father) volunteer to go to the Cross.
The second problem created by Anselm’s theory follows from the first: “the Father and the Son act independently of each other.” The Father wanted the world to be saved only in this way, but he did not will it; only the Son positively willed to suffer and die to save us. For Lombardo, “[t]his narrative paints a very strange picture.”
The third problem is that Anslem does not account for the incarnation, says Fr. Lombardo. If the Father sent the Son to take on flesh, it must have been for some other purpose than to suffer and die. “To preserve the coherence of Anselm’s narrative, we can only conclude that the Son was instead sent for some initial objective other than our redemption.” This could logically work out if, with Scotus, we posit the primary purpose of the Incarnation with (say) the restoration of creation and only secondly with man’s redemption. The Father willed the incarnation to restore all of creation, but while he was incarnated the Son decided He might as well will the salvation of humanity on the side. Something like that would have to be posited for Anselm’s theory to work out, but even here, says Fr. Lombardo, you have two wills acting independently of one another.
But Fr. Lombardo isn’t buying it. The whole purpose of Cur Deus homo is to give an account of why God became man, and Anselm’s answer is to provide a necessary mechanism of man’s redemption. Why did God become man? Well, to do this other thing Jesus was sent by the Father to do, but on the side, there is this other thing we call redemption that he did and that’s kind of part of the reason.
Having given his best effort at following Anselm’s own logic, Fr. Lombardo concludes that it is “profoundly incoherent” and that “[i]t does not hang together”.
Fr. Lombardo thinks that Anselm wasn’t please by his own account either, which is why the latter introduces his next chapter by suggesting “[a]nother way in which the same passages can be understood correctly.” “It is as though,” says Lombardo, “he wants a fresh start in tackling the issue.”
Anselm speculates that it might have been with an “interior desire” to go to the Cross for the sake of justice. Lombardo responds that “even if the Father were to have inspired Christ with an interior desire to go to his death, then the Father would also have necessarily caused that death.”
Thus, Fr. Lombardo concludes: “Anselm’s solution to the problem of God’s apparent injustice in Book I.8–10 is tortuous, confusing, and maddening.” And that, when he finally finishes saying all he has to say, Anselm “cannot avoid the implication that God intends the death of his Son and thus wills the crucifying of Christ and its associated moral evil.”
What’s at stake in all this is quite clear. The Anselmian model of the atonement is by far the most popular theory among Catholics today and has been for several hundred years. Fr. Lombardo’s critique has major pastoral and practical consequences. Have we been misunderstanding what happened on the Cross? Do we have a distorted image of the Father, and, therefore, of the Trinity, because of this? And, if this has been going on for centuries, how can we wrap our minds and hearts around such a possible truth of the matter?
So influential has Anselm’s “satisfaction theory” been that Joseph Ratzinger, in his Introduction to Christianity, says it “molded the Western consciousness more and more exclusively.” Ratzinger criticizes the unfair situation in which precedence has been given to Anslem’s model over others (say Augustine’s, for example). “Even in its classical form,” says Ratzinger, “it is not devoid of one-sidedness, but when considered in the vulgarized form that has to a great extent shaped the general consciousness, it looks cruelly mechanical and less and less feasible.”
How can a view of the meaning of the cross that has dominated the minds and hearts of Catholics for centuries suddenly become “less and less feasible”? Along with Fr. Lombardo, Ratzinger, after finding whatever good he can in Anselm’s model, is forceful in his conclusion: “But even if all this is admitted, it cannot be denied, on the other hand, that the perfectly logical divine–cum–human legal system erected by Anselm distorts the perspectives and with its rigid logic can make the image of God appear in a sinister light.”
These are the kinds of statements and conclusions that keep many an SSPX priest up at night! Not least for reasons pertaining to the effect such conclusions have on our understanding of the Sacrifice of the Eucharist. For many, Anselm is the one who gives us the true meaning of the Sacrifice of the Cross and thus the true meaning of the Sacrifice of the Mass, since both sacrifices are, of course, one and the same. Throw Anselm out and we are back to square one, attempting to understand what exactly the Mass is all about.
Was not Anslem’s model canonized at Trent? How are Catholics expected to stomach the idea that many Catholics have been picking up a puzzle piece that doesn’t quite fit the true picture of the Cross?
For many, not only SSPX priests, Anselm’s model was indeed canonized at Trent and is the only model that adequately explains both what happened on the Cross and what happens in the Eucharist. To explain what happened on the Cross is to give an account of what goes on in the Mass. Atonement theology really is the science of which liturgical theology is a branch or subdiscipline. There are, then, major implications here.
If Ratzinger’s (popular level) and Lombardo’s (more thorough) critique of Anselm’s model is correct, where does the Church go from here? The amazement that comes with the idea that we have quite possibly been misunderstanding what actually happened on the Cross, along with a distorted image of the Father’s will, is paralyzing at first. And one wonders still more if the Protestant Reformation, whose Anselmian framework was used to launch its novel understanding of salvation, was (and still is today) one of those moments in history in which heresies surfaced and flourished due to the church’s unpaid debts to her own Tradition. In this case, a tradition of unanimous consent by the Fathers, who, for Lombardo, understood the meaning of the Cross as a ransom liberating man, not from a debt to God, but bondage to the devil.
For Lombardo, that Tradition, which has been forgotten, lost, and devalued over the centuries–not least of which is the only model that can logically keep safe the goodness of God–is the ransom theory of the atonement.
Lombardo’s thesis needs to be taken seriously. The Council of Trent did indeed state that the Cross made satisfaction for our sins, but in what way and in what sense? Did Trent have in mind Anselm’s, Aquinas’s, or Augustine’s (patristic representative) model of satisfaction? These questions and others like them will continue to challenge the next generation of Catholic theologians. Lombardo’s work, I believe, marks the beginning of a recovery of the patristic account of redemption, and for that one can be grateful for his witness and scholarship.
(Editor’s note: Margaret M. Turek’s new book Atonement: Soundings in Biblical, Trinitarian, and Spiritual Theology, just published by Ignatius Press, is a detailed study of atonement in Scripture and Tradition, drawing on the work of several theologians, including Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI. CWR will be publishing an interview with Professor Turek in the near future.)
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Thanks Christopher for a most interesting sketch of the complex interactions of many generations of atonement and eucharistic thinking.
Could it have been a source of confusion for the Church fathers, and even up to today, that scant attention has been paid to the Apostolic revelation?
John tells us Christ was the Lamb Slain from (and for) the creation of our universe. Peter tells us that what has existed from before the universe was created is what was actualized on the Cross of Calvary. Paul tells us of Christ’ pre-existence and comprehensive administration of the cosmos in several remarkably powerful texts.
When we take this Apostolically-affirmed reality and contextualize it under the omnibenevolence of God (who alone is good) and the definitional omnicompetence of God, a degree of the prevailing confusion may be dissipated.
In our scientific age, we then need to bring this theological understanding into consonance with what we have learned to be true about the complex structure and deep history of space-time/energy-matter.
Few have the multi-disciplinary training or the opportunity to research this. Over some decades, I’ve had a go at it and made a few baby-steps. Even that little, though, has attracted considerable interest from academics around the globe.
If you are interested, please Google ‘Ethical Encounter Theology’; or ‘Ethical Ontology Harmonizes Science, Revelation & Human Lives’; to see what (small) progress has been made. There’s also a short version accessible under ‘Creatio ex Ethica or the ethical cause of our universe: a brief account’; – all of these are free.
As you so rightly indicate, Christopher, until we get a reasonable grasp on what our omnicompetent and omnibenevolent God has been and is doing in Christ, The Lamb of God, we are limited in our capacity to deeply comprehend the foundation of The New Covenant that He gave to us in His Most Holy Flesh and Blood.
Hoping this is a positive response to you very nice article.
Ever in the love of Jesus Christ; blessings from marty
Atonement, as historically initiated in practice, and theologically by Moses per God’s command is indeed to pay debt to God [The Fathers, who, for Lombardo, understood the meaning of the Cross as a ransom liberating man, not from a debt to God, but bondage to the devil] a debt of satisfaction for sin redeemed only by shedding of blood regardless of our bondage by the Devil.
“If the Father were to have inspired Christ with an interior desire to go to his death, then the Father would also have necessarily caused that death” (C Plance citing Saint Anselm).
A profound query on the heart of our faith presented by Christopher Plance, apparently leaning toward Fr Lombardo’s analysis and seemingly consistent with that of Benedict XVI. A recent question was posed to me here by a commentator, asked the similar question whether God caused Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross God having abandoned his Son as a sinner. He [the questioner] cited Mother Teresa of Calcutta’s admonition to her nuns allegedly documented in a letter.
Can God reject his own Son? No. Can God nevertheless reject his own son? Yes. As implied in the capitalization Son it references his divine nature, as another commentator rightly responded, she said God cannot reject himself. Although Plance raises the paradox of two wills in the one divine Person of Christ one divine the other human [the Church since Chalcedon and Cyril of Alexandria has insisted on Christ’s possession of a complete sans omission human nature]. A human nature that can indeed be commanded by God as cause [we cannot fully comprehend the exchange between both wills]. Not my will but your will be done. Herein is the paradox, a mystery we can never fully articulate because we cannot contain the fullness of God’s incomprehensible intellect. Although what is necessary for salvation is revealed, subject to articulation, but it always must remain a mystery [we tend in our day toward effeminate softness rather than manly rectitude regarding this mystery].
“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21). We place this in context of the Son of Man who willingly sought our salvation, experienced as a man would, with all our weaknesses, doubts, questioning, My God, my God! Why have you forsaken me?
Certainly, the innocent Lamb of God was slaughtered as the Passover atonement for sin, his blood the priceless ransom, cause, and power of our redemption willed by the Father realized by the love of his Son for his sheep.
It’s of far greater merit to surrender one’s will and suffer out of obedience than to elect to suffer. As was Christ obedient to the Father’s eternal plan for our salvation. Sin, Adam’s disobedience, is the supreme insult against the infinite goodness of God. Evil the greatest polarity to good. Reparation that had to be made to God, not to a third party such as the Devil in ransoming man.
God’s love is supremely magnified in Christ’s obedience because he, the Son of Man, is also the divine second Person of the Trinity, wherein the divine plan is formed and from and through which it unfolds. God cannot be understood as causing Christ’s crucifixion and death, rather as creating the conditions, requiring the loving obedience of his son by which he, Christ, is the cause of our deliverance.
Correction, “God cannot be understood as [simply] causing Christ’s crucifixion and death”.
Insofar as Saint Thomas Aquinas on the purpose and nature of Atonement I submit the following:
The evil of punishment is imposed to coerce and to order the evil of guilt. (De Malo, q. 1, a. 5, ad 7)
After the remission of sin, punishment is needed for two ends: to settle the debt, and to provide a remedy (In IV Sent., dist. 20, q. 1, a. 2, qa. 1)
Good question with possible ecumenical ramification.
The basic conundrum, then, is — the meaning of the Cross as a ransom liberating man, not from a debt to God, but bondage to the devil. Fr. Lombardo’s concern is not directly addressed in Romanus Cessario’s “The Godly Image: Christian Satisfaction in Aquinas,” but there is insight into St. Thomas’ work on satisfaction (which necessarily treats both St. Augustine’s and St. Anselm’s conceptions). The book (CUA, 2020) contains a chapter or two on Thomas’ commentaries on St. Paul’s letters and on the Gospels; these contain snippets of the Fathers’ understanding of satisfaction.
Looking forward to Dr. Turek’s book.
There has been recent scholarship that St. Anselm has been misunderstood and that what he wrote can be harmonized with patristic theories of atonement; he merely chose to do it in the language of honor, justice etc. that was used by his contemporaries. If Latin theology had a need for Ressourcement anywhere, it would be soteriology with respect to atonement, and by extension sacramental theology and moral/spiritual theology.
Definitely agree with this article’s analysis. The penal substitution model of the atonement which traces back to Anselm in one form or another has done enormous damage to the faith of millions by giving us an image of a monstrous God not worthy of love and worship. It destroys the coherence of Christian doctrine on the goodness of God, His Triune nature, and the consubstantiality of the Father and Son, as the article well illustrates. Not to mention that it doesn’t even make any sense on its own terms.
I’m very much attracted to the ransom to Satan theory, especially when read through the lens of Rene Girard’s mimetic theory. I like the idea of Christ freely choosing to put Himself in the place of shame and victimization that we have created from the foundation of the world, in order to explode the whole satanic system from within and offer us a new way of being human, bringing us back to the Father’s house. It is a rescue operation conceived by a God who loves us immeasurably, not a payment in blood to a god who otherwise wants to destroy us. Which is the problem in penal substitution: ultimately Jesus does not save us from sin, death, or the devil so much as save us from God Himself.
George MacDonald said in his great unspoken sermon “Justice” that it is not we who make sacrifice to God on the cross but God who makes a sacrifice to us, by giving Himself into our hands. I think there’s something profoundly right about that, insofar as we are understanding sacrifice in the archaic history of religions sense. We are the angry deity in this picture, whose wrath needs to be appeased.
How do we square all this with Trent? Maybe by beginning to recognize that for Christians (as Augustine saw) sacrifice has to mean something radically different. It is “any act by which we are united to God in holy fellowship” (City of God X). In other words, being drawn up into the life of the Trinity, where the ultimate eternal meaning of sacrifice is to be found in the kenotic self giving of Father and Son to each other in the Holy Spirit. If on the Cross Christ is destroying the power of sin, death, and the devil and leading us back to the Father, drawing us into His own self gift, that’s a much less impoverished idea of sacrifice than an extrinsic payment made on our behalf.
This reader wonders about what the mystical Julian of Norwich (b. 1343) has to add to these conundrums…
For starters, she understands atonement as a not so sequential “at-one-ment.” And while not discounting the nature of sin, she also perceives that our understanding of God is different from His own. That is, we perceive the need to remove the “wrath” [Middle English “wroth”] of God, while our expectation of Divine blame (as distinguished from our actual guilt) comes from ourselves, rather than being in God who does not ever change (!)—as from blaming to forgiving. God is love. At one point Julian reports that Christ would have freely and willingly suffered more—if it were at all possible.
Is there a parallel between the mystical insights of Julian who spent twenty-five years trying to explain her sixteen visions (showings or “shewings”) received in as many hours, and the Gospel of John, so different from the earlier Synoptics, and likewise written only after decades more of stunned reflection?
John was the only apostle who witnessed the Transfiguration and remained to also witness the Crucifixion, both. Likewise, Julian’s visions take her through the Crucifixion to the embedded Transfiguration. For both writers, these seemingly two sequential events (in time) are different faces of one Presence in historical fact and from eternity.
More should be said about the mystical contribution, and about eternity entering into time, but I am not the one equipped to do it. (And possibly complementary to or even different from Dr. Rice’s considerable work on a more merged [?] “complex structure and deep history of space-time/energy-matter”.)
Peter, Julian of Norwich was correct, God doesn’t act in sequence since he’s pure act and love itself. Although as pure act he’s the efficient cause of all change in creation [as efficient cause we cannot attribute direct formal causality to him, as Plance suggests in Anselm, since creation has its own causality ]. Our ‘conundrum’ however is that as God is infinitely good, he’s also just, and justice requires reparation [atonement] for injury [evil]. Eternal punishment is a clear indication of the demands of justice. A good prima facie for making that case is found in an essay by Nikolaus Breiner:
“According to Eleonore Stump, Thomas Aquinas rejects a ‘popular’ [roughly, penal substitutionary] account of the atonement. For Stump’s Aquinas, God does not require satisfaction or punishment for human sin, and the function of satisfaction is remedial, not juridical or penal. Naturally, then, Aquinas does not, on this reading, see Christ’s passion as having saving effect in virtue of Christ substitutionally bearing the punishment for human sin that divine justice requires. I argue that Stump is incorrect. For Aquinas, divine justice does require satisfaction; satisfaction involves punishment [poena] and has a penal function; and one way Christ’s death has saving effect is in virtue of his satisfying that requirement on people’s behalf. Christ saves by paying our debt, bearing in the place of humans the penalty or punishment required by divine justice. My argument implies that Aquinas’s account of satisfaction in the atonement significantly resembles key aspects of Stump’s popular account—and of the Penal Substitution Theory it represents” (Nikolaus Breiner Punishment and Satisfaction In Aquinas’s Account of The Atonement. A Reply to Eleonore Stump in Faith and Philosophy).
This article and subsequent comments would have been much more accessible and interesting for many readers if a synopsis of Anselm’s argument had been given at the beginning.