IN 1311 it was decreed at the Council of Vienne, in the south of France, that ‘whoever obstinately presumes to assert, defend, or hold that the rational or intellective soul is not of itself and essentially the form of the human body, is to be classed as a heretic'.

The nature of the soul is properly speaking a matter of philosophical enquiry. But it is clearly a matter which touches Christian Faith very closely. There have been and there are all sorts of Philosophical opinions about the soul and human nature which would make the Christian gospel of salvation quite meaningless; which the Church therefore does not hesitate to condemn. Nowadays one would think immediately of any form of materialism which does not allow for the immortality of the soul.

But in this condemnation the Council of Vienne was concerned With the opposite kind of error, which could well be called spititualist, and would in effect deny the body its proper place in the scheme of salvation.