Sacramentum Mundi Online

Voluntarism is the doctrine which accords the will precedence over reason. It takes various forms, according to whether the will is regarded as spontaneity, freedom, love, act or drive, and according to the starting-point of the enquiry — theological, ontological or anthropological. 1. Theological voluntarism, which generally occurs in connection with a voluntarist theory of knowledge, dissociates the will of God from any fixed order — of being, nature or knowledge — which would be previous to the act of God’s will. Any such (apparent) …

1. Vows are a phenomenon frequently met with in the history of religion. They are pronounced in the form of a promise to the divinity, usually in order to win favour or to secure a return of gifts, but also for reasons of moral purification, of gratitude and appreciation, or of dedication to God. Moral theology accordingly describes a vow as an act of divine homage by which man freely binds himself to the performance of a good work not of general obligation, which is better than its concrete opposite; bonum possibile et melius. The validity of a vow demands therefore a corresponding cap…