ATTRITION (from Lat. attero = I strike down, crush). — It is the act by which man detests sin for a supernatural motive inferior to pure love. There is, in fact, a twofold love of God: the love of concupiscence, by which one adheres to divine goodness not on account of its intrinsic perfections, but because it is beneficial toward us; and the love of benevolence, by which one desires union with God not because he is good to us, but because he is infinitely lovable in himself. Now, if sin is detested because one loses the friendship of the Being who is perfect in himself, contrition (v.); if, on the other hand, sin is hated because one loses God’s benefits by falling under his vengeance, one makes an act of a. Since God’s punishment is manifested above all in eternal damnation, the most common motive that leads the sinner to repentance is fear of hell (Conc. Trid., sess. XIV, cap. 5; cf. Denz-U, 896). Now this fear is called simply servile if it detaches the sinner not only from the act but also from affection for sin; it is instead called servilely servile if it prevents the material action but does not suffocate attachment to evil in the heart.
According to Luther, fear, even simply servile fear of hell, is dishonorable and makes man a hypocrite; the Jansenists, on the other hand, regard it as a «vitiosa cupiditas», while the liberal Protestants stigmatize it with the nickname «Galgenreue», that is, gallows repentance.
The Church, however, both in the Tridentine definitions (sess. VI, can. 8; sess. XIV, can. 5; Denz-U, 818, 915) and in the condemnations of the Jansenists (Denz-U, 1304-1305; 1410-16; 1525), affirms that a. conceived through fear (simply servile fear, it is understood) of hell is a good act and capable of uprooting every attachment to sin. This doctrine is well founded in Scripture, which presents the Prophets (Ier. 31, 18-20; Ez. 36, 31-32; Dan. 3, 38-40), Jesus Christ (Mt. 5, 20-30; 10, 28-33; 13, 41; Lc. 7, 44; 3, 5; Io. 6, 14), and the Apostles (Act. 8, 23; II Pt. 3, 3-9) as preachers of penance, relying above all on fear of eternal punishments. The Fathers of the Church follow the same path when they regard fear of hell as an effective remedy for every evil and as the key to Paradise. Typical is the expression of s. Agostino: «This fear is good, indeed useful, even though it is not yet that chaste fear which will endure forever in heaven.» (Enarr. in Ps. 127, n. 8: PL 47, 1682).
Moreover, reason itself demonstrates the soundness of this doctrine. In fear of hell, three moments may be considered: the will to avoid the punishment, sincere detestation of sin as a means of escaping it, and the subordination of this means to the desired end. Now all three acts are honorable: it is good to wish to avoid damnation; it is also most honorable to detest sin; and finally, it is lawful to subordinate detachment from sin to flight from punishment, because even if the means (hatred of sin) is nobler than the immediate end (avoiding hell), this imperfect end is not thereby excluded from the intimate relationship it has with the higher end, namely, possession of God, who is infinitely lovable and can be attained only by avoiding hell.
As for the place occupied by a. in the process of justification, a domestic controversy has prevailed for seven centuries. Some theologians say that a. is sufficient for obtaining grace when it is joined to the sacrament of Penance (they are the attritionists); others, on the contrary, affirm that contrition is also required in the Sacrament (contritionists). Before the Council of Trent, Pietro Lombardo, Riccardo di S. Vittore, s. Alberto Magno, and Gabriele Biel were declared contritionists; s. Tommaso, although strongly inclined toward contritionism, laid down certain principles favorable to the other tendency (for example, the great value attributed to absolution), of which Scoto, Durando, Aureolo, and Cano proved ardent followers, though they were opposed by Gaetano. Thus the controversy was brought before the Council of Trent, which, while refraining from taking a definite position, indirectly favored attritionism, which was expounded by Vega, Soto, Vásquez, Bellarmino, Suárez, Gonet, Ripalda, and Lugo. In the seventeenth century the Jansenists arose, whose rigid contritionism, Calvinist in flavor, exercised some influence on Morin and Launoy, rekindling the fire of the dormant controversy. Indeed, in 1666 the Lovaniensian Hermits Cristiano Wolf (Lupus) and Francesco Farvaques resumed the vigorous defense of contritionism in the name of s. Agostino. The Jesuit Massimiliano Le Dent replied immediately and with some vehemence. The matter was referred to Rome: Alessandro VII, by a decree of the Holy Office (5 May 1667), ordered the parties to refrain from mutual insults and at the same time affirmed that attritionism was more common among theologians (Denz-U, 1146).
In the judgment of Benedetto XIV, the decree so greatly favored attritionism that it became universal, finding in s. Alfonso its greatest advocate. At the same time, however, the Dominican Billuart indicated a middle way between the two extremes, asserting that the Sacrament requires a love of benevolence (against the attritionists), but that this was not to be identified with charity, since it lacked reciprocity on God’s part (against the contritionists). But the Dominican’s teaching remained a dead letter until it was taken up again in our own age and expounded with great erudition by Hugon, Diekamp, Perinelle, Garrigou-Lagrange, and Dondaine. This attempt, however, seems destined to fail, first because, by failing to take account of the doctrinal development matured through the long controversy and the constant practice of three centuries, it causes penitential theology to retreat to its timid beginnings; and then because attritionism is founded on bases that are difficult to undermine. Indeed, apart from the arguments drawn from the Council of Trent (sess. XIV, cap. 5-4; Denz-U, 896, 898), which all the manualists develop and which De Blic has recently brought into new light, the fundamental observation always remains that, on the hypothesis of contritionism, absolution would be almost useless, Penance would become a sacrament of the living, and the way of salvation would be more arduous under the law of love than under that of fear. Moreover, the distinction introduced by Billuart between the love of benevolence and charity, in the light of the thought of s. Tommaso, is untenable, as Galtier demonstrated against Perinelle. As for the passage in the Council of Trent, sess. VI, cap. 6: «Disponuntur (peccatores) fide, timore, spe et Deum tamquam omnis iustitiae fontem diligere incipium» (Denz-U, 798), which the contritionists often raise as an objection, the reply is that it also finds a plausible explanation in attritionism, because in every love of concupiscence there is an innate tendency toward perfect charity; indeed, whoever wishes to avoid hell necessarily aspires to paradise, where charity reigns supreme. Besides, it is historically well known that A. Vega and P. Soto themselves, who were among the drafters of that formula, did not discern in it the necessity of perfect love.
Once attritionism is admitted, the celebrated saying «in confession attrition becomes contrition: ex attrito fit contritus» is to be understood not in the sense that a. changes its nature and becomes contrition, but in the sense that, when Grace supervenes, together with the infused charity connected with it, attrition finds itself in the same condition as contrition: that is, it is justified and capable of making an act of perfect charity, because from the infused habit to the act the transition is easy.
Extrait des Mélanges de science religieuse, Lilla 1946 (risponde con brio e dottrina al Dondaine). Per una visione complessiva cf.: A. Beugnet, s. V. in DThC, coll. 2235-58; P. Galtier, De poenitentia, Parigi 1931, pp. 64-77; 287-97; A. García, El P. Hernández O. P. y la doctrina atricionista en el Tomismo, Manila 1936 (tesi dell'Angelico); C. Boyer, De poenitentia, Roma 1942, pp. 327-28; A. Piolanti, De sacramentis, 2ª ed., Torino 1946, pp. 348-54. Antonio Piolanti