Volume I Part 100 (1/2)
And it is the Son of Man, or Christ in his human capacity, as whose body the Church is regarded. For as the head thereof the apostle designates him who was raised from the dead. The Church here enters into a profoundly intimate relation to the sacred humanity of Christ.
We shall seek further profit from this idea in the sequel.
Immediately after having called the Church the body of Christ, he calls her the [Greek text]. This epithet results from the foregoing.
It is because she is the body of Christ that the Church is the [Greek text]. I translate these difficult words, the fulness of him who filleth all in all. G.o.d who filleth all things with his essential presence, in whom we live, and move, and have our being, hath his fulness in the Church. The Church is entirely filled with G.o.d. But how? Is not G.o.d, in his very nature, present everywhere? How then can the Church be filled with G.o.d in a greater degree than the world without? As the body of Christ, she has this capacity. For if the Church, as Christ's body, a.s.sumes a special relation, peculiar to herself, to his sacred humanity, then, by that very a.s.sumption, she acquires a share in the [Greek text] of the Deity which dwells bodily in that sacred humanity. She thereby becomes the spot where G.o.d is especially revealed and glorified. For while G.o.d, in the fulness of his nature, is present over all the world, nevertheless this presence is more largely apparent in the Church than elsewhere. By the Church alone the manifold wisdom of G.o.d is known unto the princ.i.p.alities and powers in heavenly places. In him is glory in the Church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Thus she stands approved as his pleroma, as entirely filled with G.o.d.
But how are we to understand this repletion of the Church with G.o.d? It is well known that Moehler sees in the visible Church the ”Son of G.o.d continually appearing among men in human form, constantly re-creating, eternally rejuvenating himself, his perpetual incarnation.” In this sense he apprehends the scriptural conception of the body of Christ, the ”interpretation of the divine and the human in the Church.” This proposition, which has become celebrated, was intended, in the first instance, to afford a more profound insight into the visibility of the Church, in addition to which it is inseparable from Moehler's views on the subject of the means of grace. In this twofold light we must make it the subject of examination.
Moehler goes on to argue that, if the Church is a continuance of the incarnation, she must be, like the latter, a visible one. This can mean no more than that even as the Son of G.o.d during his stay upon earth wrought visibly for mankind in the flesh, so also the saving efficacy of Christ, abiding after his departure from the earth, requires a visible medium. Such a point, however, Protestantism is far from disputing. In the separate congregations, in their visible means of grace, and in the audible exposition of the word of G.o.d, even Protestants admit that the efficacy of Christ is visibly perpetuated, and the idea of Christianity and the Church gradually realized. Every Protestant denomination aspires to be the palpable image, the living presentment, of the Christian religion. Moehler's conception of the Son of G.o.d continually appearing among men in human form has even become a favorite theme of modern Protestant theology. This will appear from the mere perusal of the disquisitions on this head of the so-called Christological school. The advantage gained for the Catholic interpretation amounts to nothing. For the point is not that the efficacy of Christ is perpetually exercised among men in a visible manner, but it is in question whether this continued exercise ensues only in the fold of a particular inst.i.tution, and by particular means of grace.
Moehler arrived at his doctrine in {676} reference to the Church through the medium of his views regarding the means of grace. In his opinion ”the Eucharistic descent of the Son of G.o.d” (and the same must be inferred to apply to all the means of grace which it is the function of the Church to administer [Footnote 149]) ”is a part of the totality of his merit, wherewith we are redeemed.” The sacramental offering of Christ is ”the conclusion of his great sacrifice for us,”
and in it ”all the other parts of the same sacrifice are to be bestowed upon us; in this final portion of the objective offering, the whole is to become subjective, a part of our individual being.” But the incarnation of G.o.d, or, in other words, the work of our salvation accomplished by Christ during his walk upon earth, stands in need of no continuation or completion by a posthumous labor of Christ, const.i.tuting ”a part of the totality of his merit, wherewith we are redeemed.” The perpetual condescension of Christ, administered by the Church, to our helplessness, does not form a complement to the objective work of salvation; it is not an integral part of it, but only its continued application. ”_Christus_” says Suarez, ”_jam vero nos non redimit, sed applicat n.o.bis redemptionem suam_” [Footnote 150] If this work of redemption were even now in progress--that is to say, if ”the Eucharistic descent of the Son of G.o.d” were ”a part of the totality of his merits, wherewith we are redeemed,” then Christ would not have fully taken away the sin of the world once for all on Golgotha. Who would maintain such a proposition? Moehler would be the last man to do so. He would therefore undoubtedly have renounced the opinion in question if these, its logical results, had presented themselves to his mind. The sacramental offering of Christ, as indeed the whole of his perennial saving efficacy in the sacraments of the Church, wherewith we are saved, is only the _means_ by which it is applied to our salvation. The _ground_ of salvation for all mankind was perfected in the sufferings and death of Christ. The _realization_ of salvation for individuals is accomplished by their appropriating to themselves the salvation purchased or achieved for all mankind by the precious blood of Jesus Christ; a work in which, undoubtedly, Christ himself co-operates as the head of the Church.
[Footnote 149: For, according to St. Thomas, ”the Eucharist is the _perfectio omnis sacramenti, habens quasi in capitulo et summo omnia, quae alia sacramenta continent singillatim;_ the perfection of the whole sacrament, having as it were in an epitome and a summary all the virtues which, other sacraments contain singly.”--IV. Sent. a. 8. q. 1, a. 2, _solut_. 2 _ad_. 4.]
[Footnote 150: At present Christ does not redeem us, but applies to us his redemption. _De Incarnat., Par. I., Disp_. 39, _Sec_. 3.]
In this sense the apostle says that he fills up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ in his flesh. By faithfully following Christ, we partake more and more of the fruits of redemption. Thus is Christ likewise gradually fulfilled in the individual Christians--that is to say, he finds in them a more and more ample expression. And in the same degree in which Christ stamps himself upon the single members of the Church, the latter also is more and more filled with him.
Scarce has the apostle declared of Christ, in Col. ii. 9, that in him dwelleth all the [Greek text] of the G.o.dhead corporally, when he turns to the Colossians with the words, ”And you are filled in”--G.o.d that is to say, ”in him,” _i.e._ in Christ, in so far as ye stand in communion with him, ”which is the head of all princ.i.p.ality and power.” This communion of individuals with Christ, and their attendant partic.i.p.ation in the fulness of the G.o.dhead which dwelleth in him, is accomplished by the instrumentality of the Church, particularly by the sacrament of baptism, which incorporates the individual with the Church. Verse 10-12: ”_Et estis in illo repleti. In quo et circ.u.mcisi estis, circ.u.mcisione non manu facta, sed in circ.u.mcisione Christi, consepulti ei in baptismo._”
Thus the Church is seen to be the pleroma of the G.o.dhead in a twofold {677} point of view. First, in her members, which, being gradually filled with G.o.d, become partakers of the divine nature. In the second place, in the active cooperation of the Church herself in the performance of this work.
In the first regard, the repletion of the Church with G.o.d is not a state attained once for all. It is rather a process of measured growth [Greek text]. The measure of the age of the fulness of Christ is the goal and the objective point of the entire development of the Church.
It will be attained when every individual shall have become complete in Christ, and therewith also in his own person a pleroma of Christ.
In the edifying of the body of Christ, or in the establishment of the Church, therefore, we must work without repose till we all meet in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of G.o.d. In this sense only can it be said that there is a progress in the Church. This continued development of Catholicism the apostle regards as a gradual repletion of the single members of the Church with all the fulness of G.o.d, [Greek text].
We have as yet, however, come to know but the one phase of this relation of the Church to Christ, or to the pleroma of the G.o.dhead.
The Church is not only destined to present herself at the close of her historical development as the pleroma of him that filleth all in all; she is even now ent.i.tled to this attribute, by virtue of her essential character.
On this head we derive instruction from a nearer contemplation of the process of development in which the erection of the Church is completed. ”The whole body,” says the apostle, meaning the body of Christ himself, ”maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in charity.” The Church therefore carries within herself, in the inmost recesses of her being, the principle and the germinal power of her whole development. This fundamental principle of Catholicism is Christ himself, who pervades the Church as his body.
There is a subjective and an objective repletion of the Church with Christ. The former progresses gradually, in so far as the single members of the Church a.s.similate themselves more and more to Christ.
The latter is a given state of things from the first. In it consists the most subtle essence of the Church. This objective presence of Christ in her approves itself as the vital power of her growth. The gradual ripening of the Church therefore grows up into Christ ([Greek text], Eph. iv. 15) on the one hand, and proceeds from him ([Greek text]) on the other. From him--that is to say, by means of the vivifying influence of the Son of G.o.d, present in the Church, she maketh increase of herself unto the edifying of herself in charity.
It is the same idea, when the apostle characterizes the growth of the Church as an [Greek text], an _augmentum Dei, i.e._, a growth emanating from G.o.d. G.o.d effects it, but by the instrumentality of the Church, within her and as issuing from her. For this purpose G.o.d hath installed her as his pleroma. Precisely because the Church is filled with G.o.d, or is his pleroma, the members of the Church may gradually become complete in him. Thus there is a development and a progress only for the individual members of the Church. She herself, by virtue of her essential character, is superior to development, and acts as the impelling force of this development. Christianity _has_ a history, but it _is_ not itself a history. The essence of Christianity, which is that of the Church, is not a thing in process of formation, it is a thing accomplished and perfect from the beginning.
The scriptural idea of the body of Christ presents the principle of Catholicism in a new light. The Church alone has Christ for her head.
It is her exclusive privilege to be the body of Christ. This gives her a fellows.h.i.+p of life with Christ, by which she is distinguished from the world, the {678} latter sustaining to him no relation but that of subjection and dependence. But upon what rests this privilege of the Church? Why is she alone the body of Christ, the pleroma of the G.o.d-head?
Christology must supply the fundamental reason. According to the Catholic dogma of the person of Christ, he filleth the universe only by virtue of his G.o.dhead. With his life as the Son of Man he filleth only the Church, his body. But how much more largely does G.o.d reveal himself by his personal inhabitation of the sacred humanity of Christ than by the creative power wherewith he penetrateth and filleth all in all! Here a single ray, a faint reflection of his glory, flutters through the veil of created nature, there the fulness of the G.o.dhead dwelleth bodily.
The idea of Catholicism, therefore, coincides with that of fulness. As the pleroma of him who filleth all in all, the Church harbors in her bosom a treasure, the richness of which is inexhaustible. Every created thing, every single period, every particular phase of the culture of the human mind, has some good attribute. Yet this attribute is a mere special advantage, a peculiar quality, a feeble reflex of the chief good, a single ray of the s.h.i.+ning sea of goodness inclosed in the unfathomable abyss of the divine essence, of the fulness of the G.o.dhead. The completeness of the revelation of G.o.d's goodness is found only in the sacred humanity of Christ, and therefore in the Church.
Hence the Church is the highest good that is to be found on earth. Let the productions of the human mind, at a given stage of its development, be ever so glorious and sublime, they can never supplant the pleroma of the Church. Her wealth is fraught with all the possible results of the human intellect and imagination; and these, in the fulness of the Church, are intensified, raised, as it were, to a higher power of goodness. Every production of the human mind is more or less in danger of falling short of the requirements of later ages.
The metal of all such fabrics needs to be recast from time to time, as forms and fas.h.i.+ons change. In default of this, it gradually degenerates into mere antiquity, or, in the most fortunate event, it preserves only the character of an honored relic. From this fate of all that comes into existence the Church is exempt. She alone is ever young, and always on a level with the times. This qualifies her to be the teacher of the world from age to age. Hence, also, she is enabled to minister an appropriate remedy for the disease of every generation.
How, then, can a movement which makes war on the Church claim to be an advance of the human mind in the right direction? The interests of true civilization will never interfere with those of the Church.