Whether Mohammedans Adore the True God
There is no doubt that the modern Church has been infiltrated by religious indifferentism since the Second Vatican Council, and that many conciliar and post-conciliar documents treat false religions and their adherents very favorably. For example, para. 16 of Lumen gentium teaches that Mohammedans, along with Christians, “adore the one and merciful God, who on the last day will judge mankind.” This statement is repeated in para. 841 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. At first glance, it is tempting to dismiss this passage as blatantly erroneous and nonsensical, but the true situation is more complex and nuanced, and it is reflective of a presumptuous attitude which is far more dangerous than any specific theological error.
Objectively speaking, the “god” of Mohammedanism is not the true God: the identity of God is the Holy Trinity, and any religion that explicitly rejects the Trinity rejects the true God. Now, the Trinity can only be understood and believed through the lumen fidei, because the lumen rationis cannot conceive of this great mystery without it being divinely revealed.1 Each person must be taught the truths of faith, and it is quite possible for one to be ignorant of the content of revelation. However, even for one in such ignorance, the existence of God and some truths about Him can be proven through philosophical science alone. These truths, which require only natural reason to grasp, “are not articles of faith, but are preambles to the articles.”2
It is quite possible that an individual Mohammedan could be ignorant of the Trinity, and yet have arrived at the conclusion that there is one true God who created the world and sustains its existence, and who will one day judge all mankind. In such a case, he could theoretically render worship to the true God in the same way that the Old Testament Jews did during the times when the Trinity had not yet been revealed. In this way, God can be correctly conceptualized in a non-Triune way while still necessarily being Triune. However, a person who is not in ignorance, and yet deliberately chooses to reject the doctrine of the Trinity, has—by a positive act of the will—rejected the very identity of God, and consequently does not find himself in the same state as the ignorant individual. Mohammedans who belong to this latter category cannot be worshiping the true God.
There cannot be a “yes” or “no” answer to the question of whether Mohammedans worship the true God, although it must be unequivocally proclaimed that the “god” of Mohammedanism, as taught by the Koran, is a false “god.” As for adherents of this false religion, some may very well be adoring the true God, but only if those persons happen to be ignorant of the doctrine of the Trinity and have not personally rejected it. However, this ignorance cannot be presumed, because the Church does not have access to the conscience of an individual and cannot judge the internal forum.
And here, the insidious spirit that rests beneath this proposition of Vatican II can be discerned. The concept of invincible ignorance is over-extended, and its presence is presumed to the point where the Council can simply speak of Mohammedans as a group, essentially assuming that all—or at least a large number of them—are simply ignorant. On the contrary, this statement is misleading, because the Church can only assess the objective fact that Mohammedanism is a false religion which professes a false “god,” the consciences of individual followers notwithstanding. While para. 16 of Lumen gentium is not heretical or erroneous, as explained above, it is certainly misleading and poorly worded.
Summa Theologiae I, q. 12, art. 13, ad. 1.
Ibid., q. 2, art. 2, ad. 1.