The second opinion, which limits the _necessitas medii_ to the New Testament, lacks solid proof. The Scripture texts cited in its support merely prove the efficaciousness of belief in Christ,(805) or the duty of embracing that belief on the strength of the Apostolic preaching,(806) or, finally, the impossibility of redemption except through the mediation of Jesus;(807)—all truths which in themselves have nothing to do with the question under discussion.
The third and most probable opinion is that even under the New Covenant, explicit faith in Christ, and _a fortiori_ in the Divine Trinity, cannot be regarded as an indispensable medium of justification and salvation, (1) because St. Paul does not mention these two dogmas in the decisive passage, Heb. XI, 6; and (2) because a supernatural act of justifying love and contrition may be inspired by belief in the existence of God and divine retribution; and (3) because this latter belief implicitly, by way of desire (_fides in voto_), includes belief in Christ and the Trinity.(808) Nevertheless it must be held that an adult who desires to be received into the Church and is baptized in the name of the Most Holy Trinity, is bound to believe in the Trinity and the Incarnation by more than a mere _necessitas praecepti_, namely, by what is technically called _necessitas medii per accidens_, a necessity from which God dispenses only in exceptional cases, when it is either physically or morally impossible to elicit an act of explicit faith.(809) It is for this reason that the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office decided, February 28, 1703, that missionaries are bound to explain to all adult converts who have the use of reason, even though they be near death, those mysteries of the faith which are necessary for salvation _necessitate medii_, especially the Trinity and the Incarnation.(810)
Section 2. The Necessity Of Other Preparatory Acts Besides Faith
1. HERETICAL ERRORS AND THE TEACHING OF THE CHURCH.—Martin Luther, to quiet his conscience, evolved the notion that faith alone justifies and that the Catholic doctrine of the necessity of good works is pharisaical and derogatory to the merits of Jesus Christ. This teaching was incorporated into the symbolic books of the Lutherans(811) and adopted by Calvin.(812) It has been called one of the two basic errors of Protestantism. The Tridentine Council solemnly condemns it as follows: “If anyone saith that by faith alone the impious is justified, in such wise as to mean that nothing else is required to coöperate in order to obtain the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.”(813) Other acts that dispose or prepare the soul for justification, according to the same Council, are: the fear of divine justice; hope in God’s mercy; charity, which is the font of all righteousness; detestation of sin, and penitence.(814)