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men! is at all startling it may be because it seems almost spastic, a. compulsive growth that seems intent on compressing into a few years a process that might have taken a century in some other era. Because its source is the confluence of a dozen tri· butaries that have been converging for a century, the current of modern theology is moving at a dismaying pace. What is more, it is doing so under the fascinated gaze of a considerable part of the Catholic world. The intense public interest surrounding the present develop· ment is something brand new. Not too many years ago theo· logians could carry on-a discussion in their recondite journals, observed by none bttt their colleagues. Today their mono· r,raps may be ferret~d out of Tijdschrift or Zeitschrift, reported by Time, translated by Cross Currents, and discussed lly the Saturday Evening Post. "Information," said Paul VI, is a "universal, inviolable and inalienable right of modern man" (Address of April 17, 1964). And modern man's ap· petite for theological information has compounded the impact of the present development. This vast interest makes it im· perative that we understand, in broad terms at least, what is happening today. For ,unless both priests and people see the present development as one of the vital functions of the Church, we may witness more of the "crises of faith" so much discussed today. THE FACT OF DOCTRINAL DEVELOPMENT
Doctrinal development is so obvious a part of the Church's life that Vincent of Lerins described the phenomenon fifteen centuries ago. "Is not religion capable of any advance?" he asked. "Of course, there must be advance and notable advance. Who would be such an enemy of mankind, so hostile to God as to try to oppose this? (Commonitorium, 23). A millenium and a half after Vincent the milestones of this advance are clearly in evidence. The Marian dogmas are a clear example of it, as are those of papal primacy, purgatory, and the beatific vision. Increasingly theologians are turning their efforts to tracing the various routes this development has taken. In the early chapters of his Problem of God John Courtney Murray