Deacon Steven Greydanus’ Religious Epistemic Hierarchy

Today is the second of my friend Steven Greydanus’ musing on the nature of his faith as a Catholic:

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This is a follow-up of sorts to last week’s reflections on reason and faith. For some time I’ve been mulling over the notion of trying to organize my religious beliefs in a some kind of epistemic hierarchy or ranking. That is, as a Catholic Christian, what is most foundational to me in terms of how I think and see the world, and what depends upon or follows from that foundation? What am I most centrally sure of or committed to, and what is built upon that?

What prompted me to finally take a stab at trying to produce such an epistemic ranking was a challenge a couple of months ago from a Protestant family member. “Are you convinced that Mary hears your prayers?” he asked. “Or do you do it because that’s where you are and why not?” 

In response, I dashed off a list of 17 theses, arranging them in what seemed to me a sensible order, starting with “Goodness exists” and ending with “The Virgin Mary was immaculately conceived, and at the end of her earthly life was assumed into heaven.” In between were theses of various weights, from “I love and trust Jesus” to “One becomes a part of what God is doing in the world through Jesus through Baptism, and one participates most fully in the life of Jesus in the world through the Eucharist.” (As evidence of the incompleteness of the list, I never actually specified where in the list I would put propositions like “Mary hears our prayers”!)

Then I noticed that the propositions were grouped around key themes:

• God;
• Jesus;
• Christian faith;
• Christian orthodoxy;
• Catholic faith.

So I divided the list into levels or groups around those five themes—a move I think adds significant clarity. I’ve made a few other tweaks as well.

Notes and caveats:

• This is a work in progress! I’ve gotten some feedback and made some edits, but I’m very open to additional input and revision.
• The ordering is not meant to be mathematically exact! The reality is more complex and interrelated. But I think this arrangement, particularly the division of individual theses into levels, conveys a significant amount of truth.
• This arrangement partially mirrors the Catholic idea of the “hierarchy of truths,” but it also partly departs from it. For example, the Holy Trinity and the dual natures of Christ are the most foundational of dogmas in the hierarchy of truths, yet they are listed here all the way down in level 4. (Trinitarian theology seems to me the most sublime and morally significant idea in the history of human thought, followed by the Incarnation—but epistemically I can’t begin with the Trinity or the Incarnation; I have to get there.)
• By the same token, there are apologetical angles and potentials here, but I have not constructed this list as an apologia. Within each tier there is a certain logic moving, for example, from points 1 and 2 to point 3, and from points 6, 7, and 8 to points 9 and 10—but my goal is not to argue for the move from level 1 to level 2 or level 3 to level 4. I’m simply trying to think clearly about how I think and what is most foundational to my own thought.
• Careful readers will notice that the words “I trust” appear at every level. For more on the relationship of trust and knowledge of reality, see that previous piece on faith and reason.

Much more here.