John 5:30
I can do nothing on my own authority; as I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.
Many people have the idea that because Catholic teaching warns against “private judgment of revelation” the Church must therefore somehow demand that people never make any judgments about anything whatsoever. Such people often think it a telling “rebuttal” of the Church when they point out that every person who decides to become Catholic has, in fact, exercised their critical faculties in coming to a decision. But this is, of course, to completely misunderstand what the Church means in warning against Private Judgment. Jesus gives us a clue about this in today’s verse. Jesus judges: that is, he weighs reality and comes to conclusions about what is so. But then, he also does something striking: he refers that judgment to his Father. It is precisely that referral that makes his judgment “just” and not simply arbitrary and subjective. In the same way, the Catholic must, of course, make judgments about lots of things every day. That’s called “real life.” The difference, however, is that in matters of faith, our judgment is always a referred judgment. We refer our judgment to the judgment of the Church and check to see if our opinions conflict with what God has spoken through her authoritative voice. If our judgment does conflict, we assume it is our judgment that needs correction, not the Church, which St. Paul calls the “pillar and bulwark of the truth” (1 Timothy 3:15).
