« DEUS SCIENTIARUM DOMINUS ». — Apostolic constitution, beginning with words taken from I Sam. 2:3, promulgated on Pentecost, 24 May 1931, to regulate teaching in all ecclesiastical universities and faculties (AAS, 23 [1931], pp. 241 ff.).
It begins with a preamble in which the right to teach entrusted to the Church by her Divine Founder is asserted, and the work carried out over past centuries by the Church herself in the field of higher education is recalled. This is followed by 58 articles divided into 6 titles.
Attached to the constitution are the Ordinaciones, issued by the S. Congregation of Seminaries and Universities of Studies on 22 June 1931, in 49 articles, to regulate the proper observance of the pontifical prescriptions.
The constitution establishes as the purpose of universities and faculties the provision of higher education and initiation into scientific work as a means of advancing the ecclesiastical sciences. Admission to the faculties is permitted only after suitable prior formation, in accordance with the faculty concerned: attendance at lectures is required before presenting oneself for academic degrees, so that, for example, one may not proceed to the degree in theology before completing the fifth year in the corresponding faculty. The degrees are: the baccalaureate, the licentiate, and the doctorate. No one may aspire to the doctorate before having obtained the licentiate. The doctorate is necessary in order to teach in a faculty. The subjects of instruction are assigned according to the criterion of ensuring, on the one hand, an in-depth knowledge of the fundamental doctrines and, on the other, sufficient information concerning the numerous disciplines that have arisen or developed more recently. Accordingly, the disciplines in a given faculty are divided into principal, auxiliary, and special disciplines. Indeed, among the principal disciplines there is one that is the most principal, called praeclypa, to which everything else must be coordinated. The special disciplines “must be treated and practiced in such a way that they harmoniously accompany and complete the principal disciplines, but do not in themselves require too much work and never cause even the slightest detriment to the careful and truly supreme study of the foremost doctrines” (Address of Pius XII to the ecclesiastical students of Rome, AAS, 31 [1939], p. 246).
Before the licentiate, the characteristic subject matter of the faculty (in theology, all the treatises; in canon law, the entire Code; in philosophy, all the parts, etc.) must be explained in its entirety. After the licentiate, study becomes more specialized, and, for the attainment of the doctorate, the writing of a scientific thesis is prescribed, at least part of which must be published. An attempt has thus been made to harmoniously reconcile the requirements of speculative and positive formation, of a solid and general education and of specialization.
All ecclesiastical faculties are subject to this legislation (although suitable adaptations to certain local conditions have here and there been authorized) and are under the authority of the S. Congregation of Seminaries and Universities of Studies.