"I gave my back to those who strike,
and my cheeks to those who pull out the beard;
I hid not my face
from disgrace and spitting." - Isaiah 50:6
Who was Father Coggi
Father Roberto Coggi, for those who may not already know, was an eminent Dominican theologian who served as a theology professor for several decades at the Dominican theological school in Bologna. He passed away suddenly in that convent on January 19th last year at the age of 86, having lived continuously there since joining the Order in 1965.
His exemplary figure as a theologian, perfectly aligned with what the Church demands from its theologians, first prompts us to clarify - something that is not always evident - what theology is and what the theologian's role entails. There are certain ways of understanding theology or engaging in theology that, though considered "Catholic," are foreign to the true Catholic conception. Unfortunately, some theologians are considered or consider themselves Catholic without truly or fully embodying it. So, let's begin by defining who the Catholic theologian is and what the task of the Catholic theologian entails.
The Requirements of the Catholic Theologian
Like any science, theology constitutes a body of doctrine containing a set of theses, systematically ordered, argued for, founded on certain principles or axioms of faith and reason, and deduced from them in a deductive manner.
The Church, as the custodian of the doctrine of faith and entrusted by Christ to teach it to the whole world, takes special care in the theological formation of priests, in obedience to the words of the prophet Malachi: "For the lips of a priest should guard knowledge, and people should seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts" (Malachi 3:7).
For this reason, the Church commissions theologians to teach theology on behalf of the Church and to advance theological knowledge by ensuring that their teaching is by the Church's doctrine.
The task of the theologian is not only to teach but also to advance theological knowledge through the results of their research, proposing new lines of inquiry, opinions, or new hypotheses in unexplored areas, offering better interpretations of biblical revelation, addressing theological problems of their time, or preparing doctrinal interventions of the Magisterium, or gathering theological stimuli through dialogue with the learned and cultured individuals of both the present and the past. This is the work of the researching theologian.
As mentioned, another function of the theologian is educational or academic teaching: the initiation and formation of students or seminarians in theology. This is the task of scholastic theology and the scholastic theologian. He must transmit and illustrate to the young, with gradualness and pedagogical skill, the secure, acquired, consolidated, traditional, verified, and perennial doctrinal heritage, especially if recommended by the Church, as is prominently the doctrine of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Common Doctor of the Church.
Therefore, the theologian, as a teacher or educator of theology, must know how to be a master, one who, as the etymology of the word suggests, increases the knowledge (magis) of the disciple, intellectually nurturing them. And how does the master achieve this? What is the art of the teacher or educator?
It is to bring to the disciple's consciousness, to indicate and provide them with those basic notions, judgment criteria, rational, hermeneutical, and methodological principles that enable discernment and critical judgment and stimulate and enhance in them the natural pursuit of truth and the desire to continually increase knowledge while exciting the will to put into practice the practical aspect of acquired knowledge.
Furthermore, the Catholic theologian, whether exegete or biblical theologian, or dogmatic or systematic theologian, teaches a theology that is not simply the product of natural reason but, while utilizing philosophical reason, presupposes the acceptance of the Catholic faith and therefore descends from the truths of faith contained in Scripture and Tradition interpreted by the Magisterium of the Church.
This elevated way of doing theology presupposes that the theologian not only is Catholic but also cultivates and practices an intense life of grace, in communion with the Church [1], on behalf and by mandate of which they teach, in sincere and faithful obedience to the Magisterium of the Church at all levels of its authority, not only about the solemnly defined dogmas of the extraordinary Magisterium but also those that are definable directly or indirectly, immediately or mediately, implicitly or explicitly [2].
The theologian has the task of forming theologians: this forms the basis of the existence of the school of theology and thus of scholastic theology. It is therefore necessary to distinguish the theologian from the catechist. The catechist forms the ordinary faithful, providing them with the fundamental notions of Catholic doctrine as outlined in the catechism.
The theologian can train catechists. This is the service to which Father Coggi particularly dedicated himself as a collaborator of Radio Maria for over thirty years, in addition to carrying out his role first as a professor of dogmatic theology at the Dominican school, then, starting from 2004, at the theological faculty in Bologna until the end of his term in 2007.
Father Roberto the Theologian
Father Roberto excellently fulfilled all the aforementioned duties of the Catholic theologian, a very rare case in today's prevailing climate of rampant modernism, which, as Pope Paul VI already denounced, has created what he termed a "parallel magisterium," now so overpowering that it can no longer be tamed by disciplinary measures but must be patiently endured, as one is obliged to do under dictatorial regimes.
In the fiery climate of opposing theological extremisms and conflicts between Lefebvrists and Rahnerians that arose immediately after the Vatican II, Father Coggi - in an unusual occurrence indeed - managed to maintain a position of balance in the proper interpretation of the Council, resisting both the seductions coming from the traditionalists and patiently enduring the humiliations and ridicule received from the modernists. This was due to both his horror at heresy and his trust in the Magisterium of the Church, deeply saddened by the aforementioned conflict among brethren and always striving with his charity and spirit of peace to heal it or at least diminish it.
It was during those years of the resurgence of modernism, denounced by Maritain as early as 1966, during which Pope Paul VI spoke of "secularism," while Rahner's "anthropological turn" was trumpeted, that the late Bishop Negri, an eminent figure in the Italian Episcopate, rightly spoke of a "dictatorship of relativism." In recent years, the current Pope has spoken of a "single thought" and Gnosticism.
In this atmosphere of intimidation and conformity, innocent theologians are repressed while heretical theologians are favored. There is a strong suspicion that the silence of certain bishops is dictated not by respect for pluralism but by opportunism and human respect, if not by concealed complicity with the heretic.
Pope Francis himself, as I have learned through a mutual acquaintance, once confided: "My hands are tied." As I recently had the opportunity to publish, the Papacy, since the revolutionary explosion of modernism (think of the Sixties) that followed the Council, is no longer a triumphant Papacy like that of St. Gregory the Great or Gregory VII or Gregory IX or Innocent III or St. Pius V, but it is a crucified Papacy.
Father Roberto taught dogmatic theology and philosophical cosmology or the philosophy of nature at the Bolognese Academic Theological Study (STAB) from its foundation in 1978 until its elevation in 2004 to the Faculty of Theology of Emilia-Romagna with headquarters in Bologna until his retirement in 2007. I was his student from 1972 to 1976 at the Dominican study before its elevation to Academic Study.
Father Roberto's rare virtue in the theological field, a virtue born of charity combined with truth, and his keen awareness of his responsibility as a priest-theologian towards souls to be saved, was, following the example of St. Dominic, to discern with infallible intuition, evidently guided by the Holy Spirit, amidst the current theological chaos created by the modernists, the Catholic truth; it was to know what it means to be Catholic amid so many distortions of this name; it was to resist the temptation to succeed by following the modernists; it was to uncover the snare of error beneath the appearance of truth; it was to courageously and frankly denounce the danger of error; it was not to be intimidated by this dictatorial atmosphere, not to be discouraged by the humiliations and ridicule suffered even from fellow brethren, not to be seduced by the false wisdom of the modernists; it was his perseverance for decades, with unchanged calmness, serenity, meekness, and endurance of the arrogance and haughtiness of the modernists.
Father Roberto was not a researching theologian, an explorer of still unknown territories; he did not refute old theological opinions that have now been proven false, nor did he consider any modern philosopher to find points of contact with Catholic doctrine, as the Council exhorts us to do. He preferred to concentrate entirely on understanding, explaining, and commenting, as a teacher and preacher, on the Catechism and the doctrine of the Church.
In times like those in the past, when the essential heritage of faith, around which all of Coggi's theology revolves, was a common and undisputed possession of every lay faithful, religious, or priest, Father Roberto's theology would have gone unnoticed because he would have said things that were obvious and already known to everyone.
Notable theologians were instead those who, based on the common and universal knowledge of catechetical instruction, such as Capreolus, Ferrarese, Gaetano, Suarez, Giovanni di San Tommaso, Goudin, Billuart, and the Thomists of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, rose to a level of knowledge superior to catechetical knowledge. For this reason, due to their exceptional wisdom, they rightly received attention and respect from every good Catholic.
Today, however, not only do we no longer have such eminent theologians, but many theologians challenge metaphysics, ethics, natural law, gnoseological realism, Scripture, Tradition, dogmas, the Magisterium, and the Catechism. A theologian who respects these values stands as a great master and deserves this title. Such was Father Coggi for our times.
He has left us a series of publications of a catechetical nature which, in today's times of ignorance, darkness, doubt, skepticism, uncertainty, relativism, subjectivism, historicism, phenomenology, and egocentrism, stand as a salvation anchor, a beacon in the night, the path to truth, nourishing food for all, a stimulus to conversion, a source of consolation, comfort, hope, peace, freedom, security, harmony, reconciliation, and works of justice, goodness, and mercy.
Father Roberto did not teach theology only in academic settings, but his desire to communicate Catholic truth led him to teach theology also through Radio Maria broadcasts from 1992 until shortly before the year of his death, which came suddenly due to a heart attack.
These were "courses for catechists," aimed at providing catechists with the necessary preparation or competence to teach catechism. The basic text was the Catechism of the Catholic Church [3]. In 1993, Coggi published Sintesi del nuovo Catechismo ( a Summary of the new Catechism) for ESD editions in Bologna.
However, Father Roberto's lessons on Radio Maria were not catechism lessons; he did not teach catechism or act as a catechist, but as a theologian, he trained catechists, providing them with the theological knowledge necessary to conduct proper catechesis. There was therefore no comparison with the Rahnerian "Basic Course on Faith,"[4] which is not at all, as it may seem, a catechism or an exposition of the truths of the Catholic faith, but rather a haphazard narrative of Rahner's modernist Catholicism.
Many of Father Coggi's lessons on Radio Maria on the Most Holy Trinity, the sacraments, the Eucharist, the Church, and Mariology have been published in books edited by the Dominican Study Editions of Bologna.
Father Roberto, although possessing a good study method and being passionate about knowledge, was by no means an erudite or a collector of more or less interesting news; he had no time to waste. Although attentive to historical documentation, extremely sensitive to pure theory, and indeed contemplative by nature, he always kept in mind the urgent needs of souls and the intellectual and moral disaster in which they live today.
Hence the brevity and dryness of the exposition, always clear, reasoned, and precise, with appropriate terms, so that in the end, far from being bored, the listener or reader would have wanted to know more. Thus, they turned to Father Roberto for clarifications and even objections. And he, always calm, available, and charitable on the microphones of Radio Maria, responded to an audience sometimes of 20,000 listeners. They were certainly not the ten million of certain TV celebrities, but, as we know, wisdom does not lie in being many but in being much.
Furthermore, Father Roberto was not merely a scholar but also strongly felt the priestly office of pastoral care for souls, although primarily in terms of preaching. He devoted much of his time to the confessional, spiritual direction, and preaching spiritual exercises.
He loved pilgrimages to Medjugorje, generously subjecting himself to endless hours of confession. I remember that for many years, he and I, along with other brethren, would come from Bologna to the Sanctuary of Fontanellato on certain Sundays to provide reinforcements to the Fathers of the convent for confessing the numerous incoming pilgrims.
When the terrible massacre occurred at the Bologna railway station on August 2, 1980, I remember that we friars in the convent were in recreation when around 2 p.m., they called from the station asking for a priest for the wounded and dying. Father Roberto immediately rushed to the scene, while I confess I didn't feel capable of such an act of faith and courage.
It should be added that devotion to St. Thomas led Father Coggi to dedicate himself for thirty years to translating the works of Aquinas into Italian for the Dominican Study Editions, a colossal work conducted with extraordinary tenacity, diligence, and perseverance so that if today, after eight centuries, we finally have the translation of Thomas' Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, a fundamental work of Thomas, we owe it to Father Coggi.
Another important work published in 1989 by P. Coggi, together with G. Dal Sasso, is the Compendio della Somma Teologica (Compendium of the Summa Theologica) for the Dominican Study Editions of Bologna (ESD). This work is very useful for those who wish to be initiated into the works of St. Thomas.
Many Lights, Few Shadows
Just as even great theologians are not without faults, it is possible to find good aspects even in the most perverse doctrines. I met Father Roberto in 1971, just as I entered the convent to begin the path that would lead me to become a Dominican, and I was immediately struck by the way he presented himself to me: with affability, modesty, sweetness, and kindness. He maintained this style even the very few times I expressed my dissent from things that didn't seem theologically right to me.
He never got upset with anyone, not even with brothers who disrespected him or with modernist theologians. In this way and with this style, he always behaved with me until I left Bologna in 2013 to be transferred to Fontanellato.
After that, we exchanged only a few letters. I remember that in one, I expressed concerns about the conduct of the new Pope, Francis, and he accused me of being "catastrophic." I remember, instead, the affectionate letters he wrote to me when I was in Rome working in the Secretariat of State in the 1980s.
One day, the then Monsignor Giovanni Battista Re, Assessor of the Secretariat of State, my Superior, now Cardinal Dean of the Sacred College, asked me to suggest a name for a new hiring that was planned, and I suggested Father Roberto's name.
One day I asked Father Roberto why he didn't use the righteous anger permitted by St. Thomas, also used by Christ and the saints. He replied that he feared that if he allowed anger, he would not then be able to moderate it.
However, this led his adversaries not to take seriously what he said, and I fear that Father Roberto used a repressive method of passion, more stoic than Aristotelian [5], which perhaps contributed to causing - and here Freud is right - that form of psychosis that had to be treated in the early 2000s.
Father Roberto, before becoming a friar, graduated in aeronautical engineering. He also maintained in theology the care for clarity, precision, and rationality characteristic of mathematics, which did not at all prevent him from handling the method of analogy, typical of theology and alien to mathematical knowledge.
Before entering the convent, he had a Jesuit as a spiritual director, and combining Ignatian spirituality with an engineer's mindset, in addition to being Milanese, gave him a methodical, orderly, regular way of thinking and acting, but not rigid, capable of dealing with unexpected situations by adapting with mental flexibility to the needs of the moment.
The phenomenon of modernism puzzled him. He never thought of seriously addressing the problems raised by a Rahner, a Schillebeeckx, a Küng, or existentialist moralists. Even the knowledge of the founders of modernism, such as Descartes, Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, Nietzsche, Gentile up to Heidegger, Bontadini, and Severino, was not sufficient to allow him to establish a comparison such as to be able to take the positive and reject the negative.
I cherish a dear and grateful memory of the theological formation imparted to me by Father Roberto at the Bolognese Theological Study from 1972 to 1976, a formation that I then completed at the Angelicum in Rome for the attainment of a doctorate in theology. When I entered the convent, I already knew the theology of St. Thomas, which I had acquired, with the help of Maritain and other Thomists, starting in 1960, so I felt great joy in witnessing Father Roberto's fidelity to the doctrine of the Doctor Communis Ecclesiae.
My teachers formed a community that overall agreed with the Magisterium of the Church and the School of Aquinas. The clearest and most convinced supporters of Catholic theology were Father Roberto and my then-fellow student, later teacher, the Servant of God Father Tomas Tyn.
The general intellectual approach maintained the style of Thomism, which, while faithful to the doctrines of the Council, was more in line with Garrigou-Lagrange or Schmaus or Bartmann, rather than Maritain Congar or Journet. The modernism of Schillebeeckx or Rahner was completely excluded.
Father Roberto had especially deepened two great mysteries of faith, which he knew how to explain with wonderful clarity as an incomparable master: the Eucharistic mystery and the Trinitarian mystery. I remember, regarding the Trinity, that to explain it, he resorted to the metaphysical distinction between esse in, that is, the being of the accident, and esse ad, proper to relation, to demonstrate that the divine Person is not an accident but a subsistent relation.
Regarding the Eucharist, I remember how accurately he illustrated the dogma of transubstantiation and explained, for example, that Christ is present in the consecrated host ad modum substantiae, while the substance of Christ's body is now in heaven. When I was no longer in Bologna, I often phoned him for clarification on this sacrament, always receiving enlightening answers.
Explaining the Mass ritual in class, he once stated that, in addition to wine, three drops of water should be put in the chalice. Every time I celebrate Mass, I remember these three drops, which of course I never manage to pour. Perhaps he could.
His special interest was also in ecclesiology and Mariology. In ecclesiology, he admired Journet. Regarding Christology, his preaching was not abundant. Likewise, despite having great respect for mystical theology and mystics, the treatment of this theme was limited. I remember he appreciated Dagnino's treatise.
He rarely contradicted his fellow teaching brothers. But if there were stakes of faith truths, he did not hesitate to decisively defend the Catholic truth. I remember witnessing a strong reprimand to a distinguished colleague biblical scholar who questioned the holiness of the Church. Another time, with the same colleague, he strongly opposed his thesis that Mary did not experientially know her virginity but it was an object of faith for her.
However, Father Roberto unwittingly paid tribute to benevolence by admitting the distinction between corrective divine punishment and afflictive punishment, that is, infernal punishment, but then claiming that the existence of damned souls is not a fact but a mere possibility. Moreover, the theme of the demon is scarce in his teaching, although he professed belief in the existence of angels. Similarly, the theme of the Apocalypse was scarce.
When I argued in 2016 on Radio Maria for the existence of divine punishments in human history, he did not step forward to defend me against the attacks I received. I understand and forgive him.
The Question of Panentheism
One day, while discussing with Father Roberto about a theologian in whom I had detected pantheism, Father Roberto, who knew him, told me that it was not pantheism but panentheism, a doctrine he deemed reconcilable with theism. "He," he said to me, "does not identify the world with God; he makes the distinction; he only says that the world is in God, as St. Paul does: 'In him we live and move and have our being'" (Acts 17:28).
At the time, I said nothing, but I felt that something was wrong. I have reflected at length on Father Roberto's speech and realized that he did not realize the ambiguity hidden behind the term panentheism. Panentheism means "everything, every being is in God." But in God, in what sense? With this expression, two things can be understood: either being in God as an accident exists in a substance or that we live in Him because He is our support in being, and gives foundation to our being. In this case, the world is distinguished from God and therefore outside of God.
Certainly, St. Paul means this second thing. If, however, with Spinoza, the world is conceived as subject to God, therefore belonging to the essence of God, then certainly one falls into pantheism: God is pure substance without accidents. And even the world belongs to the category of substance, although here it has accidents.
According to St. Thomas the divine essence, the finite creatable being, conceived by the divine mind, as thought by such an idea, coincides with the divine being itself [6] since divine thinking coincides with its being [7] so that the knowledge that God has of the idea of things or the idea that God has of them coincides with the very being of things if it is true that God, absolute creator of things, must contain virtually in Himself the very being of the things He creates.
Father Roberto and Luther
Luther is the only author to whom Father Roberto has dedicated two books [8]. In Rethinking Luther, we find a good historical synthesis of the main Lutheran theologians starting from Kant, and moving on to Schleiermacher, Barth, Bultmann, Brunner, Tillich, and Schmidt. It shows the influence of Heidegger.
Coggi neglects Kierkegaard and Hegel, who, along with others, influence and infect Catholic theology today. There is a lack of sufficient emphasis on the points of contact between Luther and Catholicism, resulting from ongoing ecumenical work since the Second Vatican Council.
Coggi then discusses the Protestant influence on today's Catholics, but he only touches on generalities and limits himself to citing Von Balthasar's criticism of Rahner. There would be many other theologians, pseudo-theologians, improvised theologians, or journalist-theologians to call into question. Still, since they have appeared in recent decades, they could not be studied by Coggi.
This fact is understandable: Father Roberto did not have the opportunity to study them because, in the last twenty years, he was unable to tackle them. In fact, in the early 2000s, he was subject to a latent illness that had been present for years.
Father Roberto recovered but paid for his restored health with the cessation of publications and, in general, public activity in defense of Catholic doctrine, an activity that had been a great merit of his theology for many years. He spent his last years in a room in the infirmary of the convent of Bologna. The modernists breathed a sigh of relief to have gotten rid of a troublesome meddler.
The fact is that Father Roberto, by his confession, somehow found himself in Luther due to a certain psychological affinity, having suffered similar sufferings, as he acknowledges in the Preface to his book Rethinking Luther. Coggi does not specify what this affinity consists of, but I, who lived with him in Bologna for 30 years, have also been his disciple, penitent, friend, and advisor, and I know his soul well, as far as intimate matters go, but I believe I can say with certainty what this affinity consisted of. I must add that I have known Luther for 40 years and therefore I have no difficulty in interpreting or making a comparative diagnosis.
This affinity lies therefore in what was in Coggi and Luther a perfectionistic claim continually frustrated by the constantly renewed bitter realization of one's impotence to carry it out, with consequent anguish caused by repeated insurmountable failures.
Perfectionism is a too rigid and demanding pursuit of one's perfection, for which the subject, judging himself meticulously and harshly, conflicting with the emotional-affectionate orientation of his person, does not accept and cannot bear his fragility. Faced with repeated defeats, falls, and failures, he becomes discouraged, and takes it out on himself, and on God. He judges God too demanding.
He is in a continuous state of anxiety and anguish because he fears being always in sin [9]. It is the phenomenon of scruple. He would like to know with absolute certainty whether he is in sin or grace. He is terrified by the idea that God is angry with him and that hell awaits him. He believes himself to be a hypocrite and that his repentance is false. It seems impossible for him to love God with a sincere heart.
Father Roberto found himself in Luther in this sense, although certainly not with that dramatic intensity with which Luther experienced this psychological situation.
Perfectionism depends on an excessive demand for certainty, where instead there can only be probability. It is a form of unreasonable harshness with oneself. It is necessary to distinguish between intellectual certainty and moral certainty. The first is absolute because it is based on the principle of non-contradiction and is necessary and necessitated.
Nothing and no one can shake this certainty. It cannot be replaced at all, as Descartes believed, by a decision of the will - I doubt (cogito), therefore I exist - because it would result in a false and forced certainty. This is the vice of voluntarism, from which Ignatian spirituality seems to suffer in a certain way, at least if misunderstood, with its exaggerated and militaristic emphasis on obedience to the superior, while forgetting that the first and original obedience is not that of the will – nihil volitum nisi cognitum (nothing is willed unless known) -, but that of the intellect to reality: adaequatio intellectus et rei. Now precisely Father Roberto, before becoming a Dominican, had a Jesuit spiritual guide.
Intellectual certainty is that of objective evidence - sensory or intellectual - or scientific conclusion. The second, instead, is the firmness of the will in adhering to an opinion or probability. Here lies the question of whether we are in grace or if we are guilty. Here the Church teaches us, following Saint Paul, that certainty cannot be demanded. But for this reason, there is no reason to be anxious: we must confidently place ourselves in God's hands after having done what is possible, as Saint Paul says: "Though I am not aware of any guilt, I am not thereby justified. My judge is the Lord" (1 Corinthians 4:4).
Luther questioned himself: am I sincere in judging myself innocent? Or is it rather that I am guilty and do not want to acknowledge it? Can I truly avoid falsehood and ill will? Can I overcome concupiscence or is it invincible? Can I experience grace? Can I obtain mercy and feel that I am in grace? Can I feel forgiven? Is God with me? Have I received mercy?
However, Father Coggi's way of freeing himself from this psychosis differed profoundly from Luther's: Luther believed he could free himself by indulging in pleasure with a vain trust in grace and divine mercy, discarding penances, sacrifices, efforts, self-control, religious vows, austerity, renunciations, asceticism, disciplines, canon law, sacraments, and the Church's Magisterium, resolving all Christian life in the conviction that God was with him no matter what sin he committed.
Father Roberto understood that this was not the solution and carefully avoided following Luther, despite the extensive success he achieved, which brought him the fame of a reformer and an immense number of followers until today.
Instead, Father Roberto, remaining faithful to his baptismal and religious promises, maintained discipline and moral effort, mastery of passions, penitential practice, and religious vows.
I recall once he entered my room in great alarm, showing me a book by a follower of Severino who claimed that time does not exist, he, who taught cosmology, had the task of explaining what time is. I explained to him how Severino had fallen into such an incredible error, having wanted to reduce all things, like Parmenides, to eternal being.
The Example of a Saint
The model of holiness that is widespread today is that of the Catholic devoted to social assistance in all its numerous forms. Mercy is attention and assistance to the poor, the marginalized, the persecuted, prisoners, exploited women, victims of the mafia or drugs, immigrants, earthquake victims, the unemployed, the hungry, the sick, the disabled, wayward youth, orphans, the elderly, and single mothers.
Father Roberto highly appreciated all these forms of mercy and human solidarity. He did not fail to deal with cases of this kind as far as possible. However, it is clear that God distributes His gifts as He wills and to whom He wills. The Dominican mission is that of preaching the saving truth. Dominican mercy therefore primarily involves works of spiritual mercy. "The greatest work of mercy," says Saint Thomas, "is to lead a brother from the darkness of error to the light of truth."
Today, more than ever, we need holy theologians. Despite social injustices, the phenomenon of poverty needs created by natural disasters or wars or human wickedness, evils against which we must fight with all our strength, aided by the grace of God, and as urgent as we must fight these evils, it is even more important to fight the evils that are their first and deepest causes: ill will, vice, sin, and demonic forces.
To overcome these forces, material and economic resources are not enough, the use of force is not enough, physical, medical, political, and human actions and interventions are not enough, but a work of enlightening souls is necessary, much doctrine and charity are necessary, wise discernment is necessary, instructing those who are ignorant of the word of God is necessary, preaching the Gospel is necessary, persuading unbelievers, admonishing and converting sinners, offering sacrifices of expiation and reparation, advising the doubtful, giving certainties, warning wrongdoers, refuting the erring, unmasking hypocrites, making oneself available to the Holy Spirit, thwarting the snares of the devil, praying to God for the living and the dead, administering the sacraments, divine worship is necessary. It is here that God had endowed Father Coggi, it is here that he gave the best of himself and produced an abundance of fruits. "Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God."
Exemplary was the way Father Roberto celebrated Mass: with diligence, precision, slowness, devotion, exactness, and recollection, in full and intelligent respect of the norms. His homilies were very nourishing: clear, brief, succulent, substantial, with propriety of language, and well-argued, useful, stimulating, explanations of biblical texts.
He was very scrupulous in purifying the paten after the consecration. He would linger for a long time with the utmost care to ensure that no fragments, however small, of the host remained.
I chose Father Roberto as my confessor for the last years I was in Bologna. I had a wise confessor. What he taught, he put into practice first. In these encounters, Father Roberto appeared perfectly serene to me, without the slight agitation that marked his tendency to scrupulosity. On the contrary, his words and advice gave me serenity and certainty.
Father Roberto was an example of a perfect religious: poverty, chastity, and obedience.
Poverty. Extremely simple life, moderate in food, faithful in wearing the Dominican habit, sparse and orderly room, averse to expenses and waste, even in books, and careful in preserving his belongings.
He had the habit of eating leftovers so they wouldn't be wasted. I remember one day, when I was a novice, hearing a brother report to another that Father Roberto, out of scruple, had eaten six hard-boiled eggs that were left over after the meal in the refectory. On Wednesdays, he would only eat bread and water, in obedience to the invitation of the Madonna of Medjugorje. He owned neither a laptop nor a mobile phone.
Chastity. As far away as possible from Freudian hedonism, there was some trace of Origenism in him. Extremely available and wise in guiding women and religious, he was devoid in words and gestures of any expression or manifestation of affection or intimacy. I am not aware of any friendship with any woman who was not a disciple of his theological teaching or his spiritual guidance.
Father Roberto explained the sentence of Alexander VII (Denz.2060), affirming that seeking a kiss for sexual pleasure is a mortal sin, specifying that the Pope implies that this kiss is implicitly ordered towards sexual union and that kissing remains lawful as an expression of love or spiritual union.
Obedience. Extremely diligent in carrying out the orders of superiors. Father Roberto understood obedience as simply being at the disposal of superiors or carrying out their orders, similar to how in theology he refrained from advancing his own new opinions for fear of error. It was like a kind of car parked in the garage ready to be used by anyone who needed it.
Perhaps he had an excessive need for security that led him to teach only what the Church has established with certainty or authors explicitly approved by the Church. However, all his very intense, calm, and methodical activity arose from obedience.
The last years of Roberto's stay in a room in the infirmary of the convent in Bologna were the Via Crucis, the "passive purification," to say it with St. John of the Cross, which prepared him for paradise, years in which Father Roberto perfected himself in humility, patience, acceptance of God's will and therefore in sacrifice, charity, and self-offering for the good of the Church and souls.
With suffering, we "complete in our flesh what is lacking in Christ's afflictions" (Colossians 1:24). God reserves it for His beloved souls, those whom He most desires to make sharers in His passion. Well, God reserved it for Father Roberto.
I do not doubt that, at the same time, as happens in these circumstances, Father Roberto had mystical experiences that comforted him and made him anticipate the joy of paradise, strengthening him in that certainty he has always desired without finding it in Cartesian voluntarism, probably absorbed by Jesuit guidance.
All the brethren who visited him in these last years have told me that they found Father Roberto very serene, completely freed from scruples. I am convinced that in this last step of his earthly spiritual life, he truly became sure of the truth, realistic, Thomist, Dominican.
Fr. Giovanni Cavalcoli OP
Fontanellato, March 24, 2024
Source:
https://padrecavalcoli.blogspot.com/p/ricordo-di-un-maestro-la-testimonianza.html
https://padrecavalcoli.blogspot.com/p/ricordo-di-un-maestro-la-testimonianza_4.html
[1] These concepts are extensively illustrated in the Instruction on the Ecclesial Vocation of the Theologian by the CDF of 1990.
[2] These two degrees correspond to the 2nd and 3rd in the ranking established by the Explanatory Note of the CDF to the Apostolic Letter Ad tuendam fidem by St. John Paul II of 1998.
[3] This text seems too broad and scattered (p.788). Certainly, it should be noted that it was written primarily for the bishops with the purpose that they, at the level of the Episcopal Conference, prepare catechisms suitable for various ages and cultural situations. However, I observe that the catechism must essentially be an easy and practical text, suitable for the common faithful, an explanation of the Creed, and contain the doctrine of the Church. Therefore, it is not necessary to draw from the Fathers and Doctors, but it is sufficient to draw from the collection of Denzinger, adding the important documents absent from it. This is the work I have done with my book Le verità della fede (The Truths of Faith), Fede&Cultura Editions, Verona 2021 (pp.259).
[4] Paoline Editions, Rome 1978.
[5] In the Stoic conception, passion is an evil motion to be eliminated. In Aristotle, passion is a sensible impulse that serves to strengthen human action, so it must be reasonably moderated.
[6] Summa Theologica, I, q.15, a.3,
[7] Summa Theologica, I, q.14, a.4.
[8] The Protestant Reformation (2 volumes) and Rethinking Luther, both published by the Dominican Study Editions of Bologna.
[9] Heidegger in Being and Time describes well this state of anguish (Angst), this feeling of guilt (schuldig), which entails a continuous concern (Sorge) and constitutes a being-towards-death (sein zum Tode).