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| The Cathedral of San Vigilio, in Trent, home of the Sixth Session of the Council of Trent (1546-1547), in the morning of January 13, 2017 |
On this day, exactly 470 years ago, the August Fathers of the Sacrosanct Ecumenical Council of Trent, at the end of the sixth session, issued one of their most decisive and extensive documents, the Decree on Justification.
Justification, of course, had been the central issue of the Protestant heresies ravaging the Church in Europe since the malevolent actions of the renegade monk Martin Luther, thirty years earlier. After long debates, the Conciliar Fathers clarified all points and reaffirmed the unchangeable doctrine of the only Church of Christ on the Salvation of Souls.
The full text of the Decree is available here. The main points dealt with in the Decree can be summarized thus:
1. The Catholic Faith is the foundation of all Justification.
