Development of doctrine is the Church’s growing understanding of what was handed on: “there is a growth in the understanding of the realities and the words which have been handed down”. It comes through “the contemplation and study made by believers”, “a penetrating understanding of the spiritual realities which they experience”, and “the preaching of those who have received through Episcopal succession the sure gift of truth”. Revelation is complete but “has not been made completely explicit”, and it remains for faith “gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries”. The meaning of a dogmatic formula “remains ever true and constant in the Church, even when it is expressed with greater clarity or more developed”. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith described the 2018 wording of CCC 2267 as “an authentic development of doctrine that is not in contradiction with the prior teachings of the Magisterium”.
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