De Ecclesia Christi

« Looking at redemption as the principle and source, the Church of Jesus Christ, in the purpose, will, and work of the Redeemer, is the world supernaturally transformed through divine doctrine, law, and grace; but the price of the redemption of the world and of the purchase of the Church is the blood of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. »

I. If, supposing the fall of the human race, we think of it without Christ the Redeemer, whom God in most free mercy sent into the world, what, I ask, from the principles of faith and from the very history of peoples, who, after he came, did not receive him, would be conceived to be the state of the whole human race; what « earthly city » without the « heavenly city »? Faith, and consequently by the light of faith history itself, presents to us the whole race in its first progenitor, as in the natural root and origin of the whole stock: infected with sin, stripped of all the gifts of grace, fallen from its supernatural end, still unable to tend towards this end; in the rational mind indeed, but in the darkness of ignorance, without supernatural light; in the free will, but weak, without the powers of grace; « the whole world lying in wickedness » and « in the wisdom of the flesh, which is an enemy to God, is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be »; the sons of Adam « sold under sin, under the law, in the members rebelling against the law of the mind, and captive in the law of sin »; « by nature children of wrath »; in short, the whole unhappy progeny in the servitude of ignorance and of errors, of concupiscence and depravity, of sin and damnation.

Now the Son of God, made man from this very race of Adam, came into this world, « the way, the truth, and the life », so that he might enlighten the world itself with his truth, order it into the way of salvation by his law, and sanctify it by the life of his grace. « For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son… that the world might be saved through him » Jn III. 17; « in this the charity of God was manifested in us, because God sent his only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him… because the Father sent his Son as the Saviour of the world » 1 Jn IV. 9, 14. Cf. Jn VI. 33; XII. 31, 47. This salvation of the world is accomplished, in its very effect, first negatively, so that men cease to be the world of « darkness », the world « placed in wickedness », the « condemned world » (Eph. VI. 12; 1 Jn VI. 19; 1 Cor. XI. 32): « you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world » Jn XV. 19. Then positively: the Word made flesh, enlightening against ignorance and error by the teaching of external and internal doctrine (« the light of the world »); against concupiscence and infirmity, ordering by the rule of law and strengthening by grace (« my yoke is sweet »); against sin and damnation, justifying and perfecting by the priesthood of sanctification (« for by one oblation he has perfected for ever those who are sanctified… a great priest over the house of God »). He unites all of them with himself and in himself, the elect taken out of the world by faith, hope, and charity, by doctrine, law, and divine worship, joining them to one another; and by this external and internal, visible and invisible union, transforming the world through himself and in himself, « in the dispensation of the fullness of times, restoring all things which are in heaven and which are on earth », he constitutes the kingdom of God on earth, « the holy city Jerusalem, coming down from heaven from God » (Apoc. XXI), which is the Church. Now this Church of Jesus Christ, just as it is the world saved by Christ, universal in space, « to the ends of the earth », so it is the fullness of time and universal in time, « until the consummation of the age ». And therefore there is perpetually in it, as the inner and invisible form of the gifts of grace, so also the outer and visible form, in the supernatural teaching, rule, and priesthood, which, having in Christ its own principle and end, is derived perpetually from Christ into the Church. « If anyone therefore is in Christ, a new creature¹; the old things have passed away: behold, all things are made new. But all things are from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; for indeed God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself…… and placed in us the word of reconciliation. So we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were exhorting through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ: be reconciled to God » 2 Cor. V. 17–20. « Therefore the whole world is the Church, and the whole world hates the Church. The world therefore hates the world: the enemy hates the reconciled, the condemned the saved, the defiled the cleansed. But this world, which God reconciles to himself in Christ… has been chosen out of the enemy world, the condemned, the defiled…… the world of perdition which hates the world of reconciliation » Aug., tract. 87 on John, nn. 2–4. In this same sense Origen also calls the Church the world enlightened by Christ: « Let the Church therefore be called the world, when she is enlightened by Christ » Origen, on John, tom. 6, T. IV, p. 158.

II. The term from which of this transformation, therefore, is the world to be sanctified; the term to which is the sanctified Church. The form itself is inner holiness in all the gifts of grace, in faith, hope, and charity, and outer holiness in teaching and doctrine, in rule and law, in priesthood and sacraments. The price, moreover, of all the transforming gifts, and therefore the price both of the redemption of the world and of the purchase of the Church, is the blood of the Son of God: namely the life and death, the satisfactions and merits of Jesus Christ, and finally Jesus Christ himself, the Son of God. Hence, just as Christ Jesus is said to have « given himself a ransom (ἀντίλυτρον) for all », because God « wills all men to be saved » 1 Tim. II. 6, and is himself said to be « the propitiation for the sins of the whole world » 1 Jn II. 2, so the Church is declared, as it were, the term to be constituted, the temple to be built and consecrated by the merits and blood of Christ: « the Church of God, which he acquired with his own blood » (διὰ τοῦ ἰδίου αἵματος) Acts XX. 28; « Christ loved the Church and handed himself over for her, that he might sanctify her » Eph. V. 25–27. The typical tabernacle was dedicated, and the Mosaic Church was cleansed by the typical blood of animals; the true tabernacle, the heavenly Church, is dedicated and cleansed with better victims, namely through the great priest Jesus Christ with his own blood. « Moses sprinkled the book itself (the codex of the testament) and all the people, saying: this is the blood of the testament which God has commanded to you; the tabernacle too and all the vessels of the ministry he likewise sprinkled with blood; and almost all things are cleansed with blood according to the law…… It is necessary, therefore, that the copies (ὑποδείγματα, cf. above, p. 15) be cleansed with better victims than these » Heb. IX. 19 f. For as the Apostle had said a little before, Christ is « the minister of the saints and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord set up and not man…… he has obtained a ministry the more excellent, as he is also the mediator of a better testament, which is established upon better promises…… through his own blood he entered once into the holy places, having found an eternal redemption » ib. VIII. 2, 6; IX. 12.

The Word made flesh, therefore, merited by his blood poured out on the cross, and by the doctrine of truth in the magisterium, by the law of salvation in the rule, by the sacraments of sanctification in the priesthood, by external gifts and internal graces, effected the transformation of the world. And this world, transformed and united with Christ by these visible and invisible gifts, is constituted, united within itself, as the « Church acquired by the blood of God ». Hence the redeeming price for the Church is the blood of Jesus Christ; the reward for the blood of Jesus Christ is the Church that was bought. « You were redeemed from your vain conduct inherited from your fathers, with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb unspotted and undefiled…… so that your faith and hope might be in God; purifying your souls in obedience of charity²… Coming to him (the Lord Jesus Christ) as to a living stone… you yourselves too, as living stones, are built up into a spiritual house…… a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for acquisition, that you may proclaim the virtues of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light; you who once were not a people, but now are the people of God; who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy » 1 Pet. I. 18–II. 10; Eph. II. 12–22; Col. I. 20–23.

III. Hence the blood of Jesus Christ is « the blood of the eternal testament » Heb. X. 29; XIII. 20. It is so first, as poured out once in the sacrifice of the cross, when it founded the testament of the reconciliation of the world and consecrated the Church, which for that reason the holy Fathers say was taken from the side of the second Adam sleeping on the cross³. It is so then as « the blood of the new Testament » Matt. XXV. 28; Mark XIV. 24; Luke XXII. 20; 1 Cor. XI. 25, so that, offered perpetually in the Church and, by the perpetual Church, in sacrifice, and drunk in refreshment of souls⁴, it intimately joins and unites her to her spouse Jesus Christ, by visible sacrament and invisible charity: « The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion (κοινωνία) of the blood of Christ? And the bread which we break, is it not the participation (κοινωνία) in the body of the Lord? Because the bread is one, we, the many, are one body, all who partake of the one bread » 1 Cor. X. 16. « The body of Christ cannot live except from the Spirit of Christ. Hence the Apostle Paul, expounding to us this bread, says: one bread, one body are we many. O sacrament of piety, O sign of unity, O bond of charity…… This food and drink (Christ) wills to be understood as the fellowship of his body and members, which is the holy Church, in the predestined and called and justified and glorified saints and faithful of his. For the first, predestination, has already happened; the second and third has happened, and is happening, and will happen, that is calling and justification; the fourth, indeed, is now in hope, but is future in fact, that is glorification. The sacrament of this thing, that is, of the unity of the body and blood of Christ, is prepared somewhere daily on the Lord's table, and somewhere at fixed intervals of days, and from the Lord's table it is taken by some to life, by others to destruction; but the thing itself of which it is the sacrament is for every man unto life, for no one unto destruction, whoever shall have partaken of it. » Aug., tract. 26 on John, nn. 13, 15.

« The relations between Christ and the Church are set forth most splendidly in the holy Scriptures under the aspect of spouse and body of Christ, by which is declared the intimate union of the Church with Christ according to the very nature assumed by the Word, and the love and efficacy of Christ towards the Church, and the exaltation of the Church. For the Church is the body of Christ not only insofar as in herself she is a moral body and is referred to Christ as to end and Lord; but she is the mystical body of Christ, which through supernatural joints, visible and invisible, is united to the Head himself, draws existence and life from him, and is his fullness. »

As already appears from what precedes, all the ornaments and all the properties of the Church, indeed her very formal reason and essence, flow as from a fount and origin from the intimate union of the Church with Christ. For Christ, if he is regarded according to the humanity united to the divinity, gives and bequeaths by testament to the Church his satisfactions, his merits completed in the sacrifice of the cross, his body and blood, his whole self (« this blood is the new testament »); he joins her to himself as teacher, king, and priest, and in her, with the magisterium, kingdom, and priesthood shared, he remains perpetually. If he is regarded according to the divinity united to the humanity, he pervades the Church and all her properties and all her elements, and raises, illumines, strengthens, and sanctifies her by a manifold distribution of graces. And by this very union of himself and communication of his gifts he forms, and in a certain way informs, the Church.

Now, however, we must consider more distinctly how this union of Christ with the Church is presented to us in revelation.

I. The relation of love, communion, and intimate unity among men is found in marriage, where two become « one flesh », one moral person; each becomes the other's, and both, as parts of one whole, from an indissoluble society of life; and hence the love of one towards the other stands as love of oneself, and the good and evil of one are esteemed, and are, the good and evil of the other.

1°. Now Christ the Lord not only took up this unity between bridegroom and bride as an image of his love towards the Church; but, that it might be a perpetual objective representation of his union, communion, love, and protection by which he embraces the Church, he raised marriage, by superadded grace, to the supernatural order of a sacrament. He therefore, by the dignity and holiness of the sacrament, instituted and effected marriage as a supernatural likeness of his union with the Church; so that it might not only bear the image by the natural properties joined to marriage by God the Creator, as in the Old Testament, but that the supernatural holiness of the indissoluble unity between bridegroom and bride might be « a great sacrament in Christ and the Church » ¹.

The mystery is set out in detail by St. Paul, Eph. V. 23–32. According to this divine doctrine declared by the Apostle, Christ, who by his own union and by the communication of heavenly gifts forms, sanctifies, preserves, and glorifies his Church, is the archetype; the sanctified unity of man with wife is a sacred sign and likeness by which that archetype is represented.

a) The Apostle first states a complex proposition, to be explained afterwards part by part: in the sacrament, « the husband is the head of the wife »; in the archetype, « Christ is the head of the Church, he himself the Saviour of her body » ². Under this figure of head and body both the intimate unity and the outpoured communication are already comprehended, of which we shall speak separately below. Here Paul considers this symbol only in comparison with the other, that of bridegroom and bride, to whose explanation, property by property, he proceeds at once.

b) From the notion of head arises a relation not of equality but of subordination: in the archetype, « the Church is subject (ὑποτάσσεται) to Christ; so also, in the representation, wives to their husbands in all things. »

c) Subjection is not servile, but is a relation of the highest love. This love in Christ does not presuppose a Church already really existing and of herself antecedently worthy; it is rather for forming the Church, so that from love he makes the Church a bride worthy of the bridegroom's love ³. The greater the love in the divine bridegroom, which is the beginning of these holy nuptials, the greater it is in its effect, namely in the holiness and immaculate beauty of the bride. There, love, of which the holy love of the bridegroom towards the bride is the image, proceeds even to the surrender of himself to death for the Church: « Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the Church, and handed himself over for her »; and its end and effect is the Church herself, that she may be holy and immaculate: « that he might sanctify her, cleansing her by the laver of water in the word of life, that he might present to himself a glorious Church. »

d) Between man and wife the unity is not merely moral through love, but is a certain physical unity, which demands a unity of love and must be consecrated through it. This physical unity also, consecrated by the most efficacious love, joins Christ with the bride Church all the more sublimely and holily, insofar as the archetype is more excellent than its symbol; more excellent, I say, both in the bridegroom Christ and in the bride Church, and in the mode of union, and in the gifts of all the graces by which he perpetually nourishes and cherishes the Church as his own flesh. « He who loves his wife loves himself; for no one has ever hated his own flesh: but he nourishes and cherishes her, as Christ also does the Church, because we are members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones. »

This last clause, Eph. V. 30, together with the following verse 31, declares how there is between Christ and the Church a unity as it were physical, which is at the same time formed by the divine love of the bridegroom towards the bride. The first union, the foundation of the whole restoration, is the hypostatic union of the Word with human nature, by which this nature became the nature of the Word, so that « it had nothing higher to which it could be raised » (Aug., De praedestinatione sanctorum, ch. 15), and the Word was made flesh. In this nature assumed from the human race, « the whole mass was virtually tempered together with it » (Gregory of Nyssa, Contra Eunomium, T. II, p. 45; see the Treatise on the Incarnation, thesis XLVI), the mass, that is, of the whole human race to be restored; and through the nature assumed from this race the second Adam was constituted mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, so that as « Father of the age to come » he might form this same human race into the restored Church ⁴. Whence, as Jesus Christ himself, in the order of his temporal generation, is born « of the flesh and bones » of the human race (see the Treatise on the Incarnation, thesis XIV, n. III), so in the order of regeneration from the second Adam the Church is of his flesh and of his bones, that is, of his holy humanity: « Behold I and my children, whom God has given me (cf. Jn XVII. 6); since therefore the children have partaken of flesh and blood, he himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death he might destroy him who had the empire of death » (Heb. II. 13).

The whole passage of the Apostle, Eph. 30, 31, with which we are concerned, gives the interpretation of the mystical and more sublime sense contained in the other passage, Gen. II. 23, 24. In the first creation, and in the institution of marriage as the root of propagating the human race, Eve is created not only of the same nature, but to constitute the intimate union: she is created first, indeed, from the substance of man: « The Lord God built the rib which he had taken from Adam into a woman... And Adam said: this now is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh »; then, however, on this foundation, not only for the first parents but for all future time, so that marriage always corresponds to that primitive unity, the relation of bridegroom and bride is constituted by love and indissoluble union: « wherefore (because bone of bones, flesh of flesh) a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh. » Now the Apostle directly enunciates the first part, which in the literal sense concerns the formation of Eve, mother of all living things in the natural order, from the substance of Adam, in its antitypical sense concerning the formation from the second Adam of the Church, who is our mother in the supernatural order ⁵. Then he states the other part, which concerns the love and indissoluble union of bridegroom and bride, in the same words as they are in Genesis; but these are to be understood in a sense not only literal but at the same time typical, of the bridegroom Christ and the bride Church. The sense intended by the Apostle appears plainly both from the connection of the second part with the first, and from the express declaration that the literal and immediate sense, by which the matrimonial bond is signified, contains a great mystery concerning Christ and the Church. « Christ nourishes and cherishes (as his own flesh) the Church, because we are members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones. On account of this ⁶ a man shall leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh. This is a great sacrament, but I speak in Christ and in the Church » (εἰς Χριστὸν καὶ εἰς τὴν ἐκκλησίαν). This, therefore, is what I call the union of Christ with the Church by reason of the incarnation, according to the (specific) unity of nature, and in a certain way physical.

2°. From this teaching of the Apostle we shall understand the other places of Scripture in which the holy nuptials of Christ the bridegroom with the Church the bride are so often praised. In them, namely, there are foreshadowed by these nuptials the hypostatic union with our nature in the incarnation, and, through the nature assumed from us as through « our firstfruits », the conjunction with the Church; and then the origin of the Church from the incarnate Word, his indissoluble communication to the Church through his love and his gifts, and, from this communication, the fruitfulness of the Church. The whole Book of the Song of Songs, in a wholly literal sense, at least in most places, voices nothing other than Christ and the Church longing for these spiritual nuptials, then still future. Whence the Fifth Council condemned Theodore of Mopsuestia also for denying that « the codex of the Song of Songs has the prophetic dictation of the good things of the Church » (Hard. III, p. 86 sq.). Psalm XLIV celebrates the same betrothal. In the prophets the synagogue is indeed often exhibited as a bride, but as one to be repudiated; and with this divorce there is usually connected the description of the indissoluble union to come with the Church. « And I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will raise up to you an everlasting covenant » (Ez. XVI. 60). « And it shall be in that day, says the Lord, that it (my people) will call me, my husband, and will no longer call me Baali (my lord) ⁷; and I will take away the names of the Baalim from her mouth... » « And I will betroth you to me for ever; and I will betroth you to me in justice and in judgment and in mercy and in compassions; and I will betroth you to me in faith » (Os. II. 16 sq.; cf. Is. LIV. 5, 6, in the Hebrew text).

In the books of the New Testament Christ is the « bridegroom », « having the bride, the Church » (Jn III. 29; Matt. IX. 15; XXII. 2). The particular Church too « is betrothed to one husband », and is « presented as a chaste virgin to Christ » (2 Cor. XI. 2). For as there is one bridegroom, so indeed there is one bride, the queen Church; yet the individual Churches, considered in themselves, and constituting together all that one bride, are signified as virgins who are led to Christ the bridegroom (παρθένον ἁγνὴν παραστῆσαι τῷ Χριστῷ): « The queen stood at your right hand... all the glory of the king's daughter is within (in the royal halls before the king)... virgins shall be brought after her, her neighbours ⁸ shall be brought to you » (Ps. XLIV. 10 sq.). The victory and the glorification of the Church is the nuptial solemnity, in which the bride Church is adorned for her bridegroom Christ: « Let us give glory to him; for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his wife has prepared herself; and it was given to her that she should clothe herself in shining and white linen; for the linen is the justifications of the saints... Blessed are they who are called to the supper of the marriage of the Lamb » (Apoc. XIX. 7–9; cf. Matt. XXII. 2 sq.). John saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, « coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband » (ibid. XXI. 2).

II. Akin to this image of bridegroom and bride, and connected by the Apostle himself in Eph. V, is another, yet more explicit, for declaring the ineffable exaltation of the Church, by which she is presented as the body of Christ ⁹. According to this idea St. Paul deliberately describes the Church (1 Cor.; Eph.; Col.); whence this manner of considering the Church is not only common among the holy Fathers and Doctors, but is also familiar to the Christian people, and its excellence is therefore more manifest, so that one may almost say it is the Christian definition of the Church. Hence it is indeed of great moment to form a distinct notion of how the Church is, and in what determinate sense she is called the body of Christ, or, more fully, the mystical body of Christ.

In the first place, from all the passages in which the Apostle treats of this matter, and from the very evidence of the thing, it is plain that the expression is transferred, and indeed transferred from the organic human body; and in the same way it is plain that, in this sense, because it is transferred, the body is not to be understood as a part physically composing the human nature of Christ. Hence, to mark this difference from the physical body of Christ (not, however, solely or chiefly on this ground, as will appear a little later), an epithet is usually added: the body of Christ mystical. If this distinction is considered only negatively, namely that it is not the physical body of Christ, it could also be called the body of Christ in a moral sense; but the expression would be less apt and less effective for positively signifying the mode of the supernatural union of the Church with Christ, and through Christ in herself. This difference must therefore first be declared: how that which is a body and is called mystical excels, and what it adds, beyond a body in the moral sense alone.

There are indeed, both in the civil order, societies, and in the ecclesiastical order, particular communities, which by similitude with the physical organic body are called bodies, because they are composed of several men as members in diverse grades and functions, and all the members are bound together by a common end and by common means variously distributed, and so are united by conspiring powers; and they are preserved and directed by one or several, in the manner of one as a head, in the use of means, in attaining the end, in social life (through power and the exercise of rule). Whence, since all these bonds do not constitute intrinsically and physically one thing (as a physical body has organic unity from its own inner principle of life), but only the conspiring and directing of several individuals, distinct in person and individual nature, toward a common end, and so a certain organism of powers and functions; and since, besides, all these things, founded on rights and duties and on personal liberty, belong to the order of morals, therefore communities of this kind are called moral bodies. From this ground of union it is also plain that in such moral bodies of the natural order one member does not depend on another, nor on the head itself, physically in its being and in its innate powers, but only by moral obligation and in attaining the end, insofar as that end is to be attained by the united forces of several. Therefore, although the head and members of one moral body are spoken of analogically, no one will nevertheless say that the body or¹⁰ the members belong to the head; that the whole city is the king's body, the individual citizens the king's members, the army and its soldiers the general's body and members. Yet all these things are asserted in many places by the Apostle, and from the Apostle in universal preaching and ecclesiastical profession, of the body, the Church, and of the faithful as members in relation to the head, Christ; so that the principle of union and of the relation to the head in moral bodies is in no way sufficient to declare the mode by which the Church is the body of Christ. For the forms of speech and the express explanations of the Apostle are such that, although the Church is a collective body and the individual faithful are persons subsisting in themselves, individual in nature, distinct both among themselves and from Christ the head, and so the Church is not a part composing the human nature of Christ, and in this sense is the body of Christ not physically but morally, nevertheless the union must be understood to be not only external but altogether intimate, through the continual real communication and conservation of all the offices and institutions, all the powers and sacraments, all the graces and supernatural powers, of supernatural life, and finally of the whole being according to the invisible and visible elements, by which the Church of Christ formally is and exists. What is greatest of all is that all these relations are recapitulated as in a source, and are completed as on a summit, in the perpetual sacrifice and the perpetual sacramental presence of Christ according to his divinity and according to his humanity, in the Church and in the members of the Church. And this union by sacrifice and sacrament, which the Fathers, speaking of it, call the commixture and insertion of Christ into his Church, efficacious for the diffusion of life and grace, is called by the same Fathers physical union, by which we are made « concorporeal and consanguineous » with Christ (see the Tract. on the Eucharist, ed. 2, pp. 91, 96, 102). This intimate, real, in a qualified sense physical union of Christ the head with his Church, his body, is indeed to be believed in mystery through faith, and is rightly called mystical; and therefore the Church is the mystical body of Christ (cf. on the Eucharist, p. 146, note).

This true notion of the mystical body of Christ must be demonstrated from the very words of the Apostle, who handed it down to us.

1°. The Church considered in herself is one moral body in the supernatural order, and a body quickened by one Spirit. She must be considered according to the visible element, and according to the element which in itself is indeed invisible, but which manifests itself through the visible as its form, as spirit and life manifest themselves in a living human body. This unity of body and spirit, so long as the Church is still regarded as a moral body in herself, is first by the ordering to the one end of the supernatural vocation. « One body and one Spirit, as you were called in one hope of your calling. » Moreover, this unity is perfected by the fact that there is « one Lord (Jesus Christ), one faith, one baptism »: one Lord, to whom all are subordinated, and by this very fact are ordered into one body and one Spirit; and that through one faith, both in itself and in the sacrament of faith, according to the invisible and the visible element. « For in one Spirit (ἐν ἑνὶ πνεύματι) we were all baptized into one body (εἰς ἓν σῶμα), whether Jews or Gentiles, whether slaves or free; and we were all given to drink of one Spirit (εἰς ἓν πνεῦμα) » (1 Cor. XII. 13). Lastly, this unity of body and spirit has both its principle and its end, because « there is one God and Father of all ». One God and Father « over all », as principle and end, raising all up, from whom and to whom all are to be raised up; « through all (through all persons) », as principle and end pervading all and uniting them through himself into one body in the unity of the Spirit; « in all of us » ¹¹ dwelling as principle and end, beatifying now in hope and afterwards in reality (Eph. IV. 4–6).

2°. This whole unity of « body and spirit » is through Jesus Christ a) as through the meritorious and sanctifying cause. For through his merits the charisms and graces are poured into all the members, but, as befits an organic body, to each according to the diversity of the members, a diverse measure. « But to each one of us grace has been given according to the measure of the gift of Christ » ¹². Then b) the person of Jesus Christ himself, « filling » heaven and earth and the lower parts of the earth by his merits, grace, and the glory of his majesty, is as it were the centre uniting the whole Church: the faithful on earth; the just in the lower parts of the earth, both in the limbo of the Old Testament and in purgatory for remaining punishment; and finally the Angels and all the saints in heaven. « For he first descended into the lower parts of the earth... he is the one who ascended above all the heavens, that he might fill all things » (ibid. 7–10). By this description of the person of Jesus Christ as the centre uniting the whole Church, there is a transition from the consideration of the moral body in itself to the more distinct description of the mode by which the Church is the mystical body of Christ the head.

3°. The Church, therefore, is the body of Christ, Christ the head of this his body. The Apostle teaches us how this idea of the mystical body is.

a) First of all, from Christ the head there begin, and are spread through the whole body, joints organically disposed, as it were nerves and arteries, by which the whole body is both joined to its head and is in itself, and among its members, disposed, united, and held together: « Christ is the head, from whom the whole body, fitted and connected through every joint of supply... » Here we have indeed a metaphor, names that immediately signify the organs of the physical body transferred to signify the organism of the mystical body; but it is an apostolic metaphor, and so apt to express the truth: how Christ is the head, the Church the body of Christ, the origin and life and preservation of the Church flowing from Christ, and the union with Christ and in the members, and the inner disposition, are to be understood. Moreover, the Apostle himself resolves the metaphor into proper speech. Those joints of supply, by which the Church, the body of Christ, is united with Christ and draws from Christ her life and inner disposition, are the ministries instituted by Christ, or, concretely, the ministers instituted by him in his Church ¹³, and with these ministries are connected the charisms, the sacraments, and the means of sanctification. In these ministries and visible mysteries Christ himself dwells invisibly by his merits and by his divine power, and in the principal mystery also substantially, and is united with his Church as her head; and into her, as into his body, through those organs of ministries and mysteries, he pours out, increases, and preserves supernatural life, namely truth and charity, grace and sanctification, actively, or « according to the operation », into the measure of each member. For « he himself gave some as apostles, some as prophets, others as evangelists, others as pastors and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry... that now we may no longer be little children, tossed about and carried round by every wind of doctrine... but doing the truth in charity » (ibid. 11 sq.).

b) Whence, by the power of this supply flowing from the head through many joints, both the single members grow in holiness, and the whole body makes increase. This increase, indeed, ought to be in each taken severally, but in its actual effect it is not infallible in each, because it is free; in the whole body, however free, it is infallible, because Christ the head provides, so that the supply, according to the operation in the measure of each member, never lacks its effect in all, as far as is needed for the increase of the body. The increase is indeed both in the extension of faith, so that the universal Church grows to the furthest ends of the earth, and above all in the intensity of charity, so that the single members are conformed according to the measure of operation and cooperation, and the whole body is always conformed to, and (if it is lawful to speak so) homogeneous with, the head Christ; and so in the single members and in the whole the image of Christ is expressed and Christ is formed (cf. Rom. VIII. 29; Gal. IV. 19). In this way the body is said to grow in Christ, or (from the Greek text) into Christ the head. « But doing the truth in charity, let us grow up in him (εἰς αὐτόν) in all things, who is the head, Christ; from whom the whole body, fitted and connected through every joint of supply, according to the operation in the measure of each member, makes the increase of the body ¹⁴ unto the building up of itself in charity » (ibid. 15 sq.).

c) Hence the Church is the body of Christ in such a way that she is the fullness of Jesus Christ, the redeemer, founder, and sanctifier. Thus, indeed, Christ has the Church as his own, and constitutes with her one thing, so that, though not hypostatically, she is nevertheless one moral person and one subject of right. « For Christ whole, with his members, is on account of the Church, which is his body » (Aug., de dono perseverantiae, c. 7). The foundation of this unity is not only external, as by a certain fiction of law among men between lord and slave, but is real and inward. For he himself, first, in his human nature, « mediator of God and men », the second Adam in the order of restoration, represents the whole human race; then truly, by his merits, « father of the age to come » and « mediator of the new Testament », he has formed the Church for himself and has « acquired her with his own blood » (th. IV). In this his Church he himself perpetually exercises his power of priesthood in the sacrifice and the sacraments, of magisterium in doctrine, and of rule in government, through his ministers as through instruments, whose power is a participation flowing from him (cf. Tract. on the Sacraments in general, th. X). All grace and supernatural life, all gifts and all virtues, flow from him perennially into the Church « according to the operation in the measure of each member ».

Wherefore, while he is regarded as redeemer, sanctifier, and consummator, full in the very effect, he includes in this his fullness the Church, his redeemed, sanctified, and consummated body; and therefore Christ is said to be formed and to grow in his members, in his body, and at last to be consummated, when God shall be all in all ¹⁵; « whom I again bring forth in labour until Christ be formed in you »; « for the building up of the body of Christ, until we all come to the unity of faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the age of the fullness of Christ ¹⁶; « he put all things under his feet, and gave him as head over the whole Church, which is his body and the fullness of him who is fulfilled in all things »; « and when all things shall have been subjected to him, then the Son himself (the head with the body) shall be subject to him who subjected all things to him, that God may be all in all » (Gal. IV. 19; Eph. I. 23; IV. 13; 1 Cor. XV. 28). The perfection, therefore, the increase, and the glory of the Church is the glory of Christ himself, and the fullness with which Christ is filled: « let us grow up into him in all things »; just as, conversely, the persecution of the Church is the persecution of Christ in his body and in his fullness: « Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? » (Acts IX. 4). Evidently Christ is considered together with the Church as one moral person and one subject of right ¹⁷, so that Christ, the head, is put simply for the head and the body together in predicating those properties which belong only by reason of the mystical body. « Just as... all the members of the body, though they are many, are yet one body: so also Christ » (1 Cor. XII. 12).

d) Lastly, sacramentally, the Church is not only signified but is made one mystical body, one in herself and intimately united with Christ the head, through the eucharistic union of the substantial body and blood, and of the whole Christ, in the sacrifice and in the sacrament. « The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? And the bread which we break, is it not the participation (κοινωνία) of the body of the Lord? Because there is one bread, we the many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread » (1 Cor. X. 16).

The preaching of the holy Fathers, Latin, Greek, and Syrian, on this unity of the Church, as mystical body, in herself and with the head through the substantial body of Christ in the sacrament, is inexhaustible; their doctrine we have set out in the Treatise on the Eucharist, th. VIII, collated with th. X, n. III. « If the Word was truly made flesh, and we truly take the Word made flesh in the Lord's food, how is he not to be thought to remain in us naturally?... If we truly receive under the mystery the flesh of his body, and through this shall be one, because the Father is in him and he in us, how is only a unity of will asserted, when the natural property through the sacrament ¹⁸ is the sacrament of perfect unity... so that while he is in the Father through the nature of divinity, we are on the contrary in him through his bodily birth, and he again is believed to be in us through the mystery of the sacraments? » Hilary, de Trin. VIII, nn. 13–17. « If therefore you are the body of Christ and members, your mystery is placed on the Lord's table; your mystery you receive. » Aug., serm. 272. « The bread which we break, is it not the communion (κοινωνία) of the body of Christ? Why did he not say participation (μετοχή)? Because he wished to signify something more, and to indicate a great conjunction. For we communicate not only by participation and by taking, but also by union; for just as that body is united to Christ, so also we are united to him through this bread... Having said communion of the body, he sought again to say something closer (ἐγγύτερόν τι); therefore he added: because there is one bread, we the many are one body. For what, he says, do I call communion? We are that very body. For what is bread? The body of Christ. And what do those who partake become? The body of Christ, not many bodies, but one body. For just as bread, composed of many grains, is united..., so we are joined together with one another and with Christ; for it is not that you are nourished from one body and another from another, but all from the same. » Chrysostom, in 1 Cor., hom. XXIV. « Paul says: for we are all one body in Christ, because we are one bread, we the many; for we all partake of one bread. For let someone tell us the reason, and teach us in another way the power of the mystical Church. For why is she inserted in us? Is it not that she may make Christ dwell in us also bodily, by the participation and communion of his holy flesh?...

It is worth taking most careful note that Christ does not say he will be in us merely according to affective relation, but also through physical participation (κατὰ μέθεξιν φυσικήν). » Cyril of Alexandria, in Jn, l. X, T. IV, p. 862. « Invited to the bodily nuptials, he performed the stupendous miracle (of changing water into wine); and shall we not much more confess that he gave to the sons of the bridal chamber (the Church) his body and blood to be enjoyed?... In the figure of bread is given to you his body, and in the figure of wine is given to you his blood, so that, having received the body and blood of Christ, you become concorporeal (cf. Eph. III. 6) and consanguineous (σύσσωμος καὶ σύναιμος αὐτοῦ) with him. » Cyril of Jerusalem, Catech. IV, n. 3. « As often as we approach the body and blood and take them upon our hands, so we believe that we embrace the body, and that we are of his flesh and of his bones, as it is written. » Maruthas, in Assemani, Bibl. Orient., T. I, p. 180.

According to the divine teaching of the Apostle and the explanation of the holy Fathers, therefore, the Church is to be called not only the moral body of Christ, but is the mystical body of Christ, through the union of the operation of the charisms and graces from Christ the head into the body; hence in turn, through the increase in supernatural life of the body toward Christ the head; through the unity of the moral person, or through one subject of right, insofar as honour and injuries are referred from the body to the head (κατ' ἀναφορὰν), and the value and efficacy of the ministries flow from the head into the body (κατ' ἐνέργειαν); and finally through the communication and indwelling of Christ the head in the Church, his body, through the sacrifice and the sacrament of the real body and blood, which the Fathers call the « natural property » of the head with the members, the « physical participation, » and the « concorporation and consanguinity » of the members with the head.

« The Church, expressed according to her visible and invisible element, is to be understood as conformed to the incarnate Word as to her exemplar. This conformation of the Church with Christ is to be considered both in her constitution in general, and in her offices and sacraments, and finally in her glorification, as well begun as consummated. »

« The Word was made flesh; » and « although he was in the form of God, he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, made in the likeness of men. » Thus one and the same Jesus Christ is God, begotten of the Father in the divine and invisible nature, and man, from men, in the human and visible nature; invisible in his own, he became visible in ours; the divine descends that the human may be raised up; God became man that man might become God. See the Fathers as collected by Petavius, Incarn., l. II, c. 8. Therefore a) there is one person of the twofold nature. The divinity, invisible in itself, manifests itself through its visible humanity: « we saw his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father; » « what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life, and the life was made manifest. » The humanity, through the divine person whose proper nature it has become, has been infinitely exalted above the natural order; and from this divine person all adorable dignity and holiness, and all the treasures of gifts, are derived into his humanity; nay, the divinity itself is the treasure of the humanity: the mystery of Christ Jesus, « in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge... because in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily » ¹ Col. II. 3, 9. Wherefore b) from the divine person also comes the infinite dignity of the priesthood, magisterium, and rule of Christ the man, the infinite price of his sacrifice and of his merits, and the theandric dignity of all his human operations (ἐνέργεια θεανδρική). Finally, c) from the same divine person is owed to his humanity the supreme exaltation in glory at the right hand of God the Father (see on these the Treatise on the Incarnation).

I. Now it is certain that the very end of the incarnation was that the human race might be restored. This restoration, however, was so accomplished that God the incarnate Word would form for himself, from fallen nature, that is from the human race, a Church in his own image and likeness, just as human nature was at first made, both natural and supernatural, according to the image and likeness of God the Word, the firstborn of every creature ².

This formation of the image and likeness, first considered in general, is clearly declared in the Scriptures. For the God-man, the man Christ Jesus, the mediator of God and men, joining the human race to himself, and by joining transforming and raising it, constitutes the Church as homogeneous with himself, as the body in the head: « but you are the body of Christ and members from member » ³ (1 Cor. XII. 27); in himself, as on a foundation, he builds and holds the Church: « the foundation has been laid... which is Christ Jesus » (ib. III. 11); from himself, as from a seed, he sprouts forth the Church as his abundant fruit: « the hour has come that the Son of man should be glorified... if the grain of wheat has died, it bears much fruit » ⁴ (Jn XII. 23 sqq.); from himself, as from a vine, he brings forth and vivifies the branches of the Church: « I am the vine, you are the branches » (ib. XV. 5); from himself he brings forth and derives the Church, as the second Adam the mother of all living: « of his flesh and of his bones » (Eph. V. 30). The firstborn himself gives the power and participation of divine sonship and of co-inheritance to all believers in his name: « he predestined them to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren » (Rom. VIII. 17, 29; Heb. II. 10 sq.; Jn I. 12, 13). He himself is the light that clarifies; the Church is clarified and, as it were, the splendour of his glory ⁵, and is united in this light with him and in herself: « and I have been glorified in them (whom you have given me, δεδόξασμαι ἐν αὐτοῖς)... and the glory which you have given me I have given to them (τὴν δόξαν, ἣν δέδωκάς μοι, δέδωκα αὐτοῖς), that they may be one, as we are one: I in them and you in me, that they may be perfected in one » (Jn XVII. 22). Finally, he himself, rising and glorified, is as exemplar and efficient cause the resurrection and glorification of his Church, the heavenly Jerusalem in all the saints: « the head of the body, the Church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead » (Col. I. 18); « Christ has risen from the dead, the firstfruits of those who sleep, since by man came death and by man the resurrection of the dead; and as in Adam all die, so in Christ all shall be made alive; therefore as we have borne the image of the earthly, let us also bear the image of the heavenly » (1 Cor. XV. 20, 49) ⁶

II. A generic description of this kind certainly does not suffice for a fuller understanding of the matter we treat in this thesis. It must therefore be asked, part by part, how the incarnate Word is set before us according to his invisible and visible nature, not only as the cause through which, but above all as the exemplar and original form, to which the Church of Christ is expressed and formed as its copy: the exemplar, I say, not separate and external, but comprising an image derived from himself, configured to himself and joined to himself, the Church being, as it were, the splendour of his glory.

In Christ himself as exemplar we have considered three things: the exaltation of human nature through the hypostatic union with the Word; the theandric functions consequent upon it; and finally his glorification. According to these, therefore, the assimilation of the Church must be considered: first in general, in the sanctification and elevation of the visible through the invisible; then specifically in the hierarchy and the sacraments; and finally in glorification.

1°. The Church is understood as the image of her founder and head, Christ, in her intimate constitution, by which she has been expressed to the likeness of the incarnate Word. As Christ is God-man, the Word made flesh, so his body, the Church, in her members, in her hierarchy, in her sacraments and institutions, consists of a twofold element: an element that is in itself human, visible, and external, and a divine and invisible and internal element, by which the human is informed and raised, and so is formally constituted ecclesiastical. Hence by the conjunction of each of these, the human and the divine, both the single parts, as it were, of the Church are constituted, and from all of these together the whole Church consists as human-divine. The gifts of the Holy Spirit are in her, so to speak, as if incarnate: the invisible becomes visible, not indeed in themselves, but in the joined visible element, which they inform and through which they are manifested.

The whole Church is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who dwells in her with his gifts and graces, informing and forming the members of the Church by faith, hope, and charity: the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of power ⁷, the Spirit of sanctification. « For you are the temple of the living God, as God says: I will dwell in them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people » (2 Cor. VI. 16; 1 Cor. III. 16, 17). Just as this one Spirit, with his gifts, joins all the members by interior sanctification « in the measure of each member »; so also, by the external visible effects through which he manifests himself, through the unity of profession of faith, of communion, and of the sacraments, he forms the one body itself ⁸. « One body and one Spirit, as you were called in one hope of your calling » (Eph. IV. 4). But all these external and visible things have their own proper character and value from the internal gifts from which they proceed and by which they are informed. The body is quickened by the Spirit: « for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God » (Rom. VIII. 14). The exemplar in Christ the head is evident, insofar as his visible nature is exalted and sanctified through the Word, and the Word manifests himself in it and through it.

2°. According to the offices and theandric operations of Christ, the image must be considered specifically in the hierarchy and the sacraments.

a) Christ, as head and founder, instituted the Church, and through the Paraclete Spirit abiding in her perpetually makes her an organic body. For many members, diverse among themselves, do not all have the same act; yet they are all members one of another, and by their nature belong to one whole, and by their acts conspire to the one end of the whole; and therefore there is one body (Rom. XII. 4, 5; 1 Cor. XII. 18–20). Hence there are diverse grades: not only of the laity, who lack active power whether over the real body or over the mystical body of Christ, and of the clergy, in whom this power resides; but also, as we now consider, by the institution of Christ and the operation of the Holy Spirit, there are diverse hierarchical orders, from one supreme (who immediately represents Christ in the whole Church, and from him participates in the properties of the supreme confirmer of all the brethren, the shepherd of all the sheep, the foundation of the whole Church), down to the inferior ones. In these, by their mutual conjunction and the subordination of inferiors to superiors, one magisterium, one rule, and one priesthood is constituted, derived in some with greater and in others with lesser fullness from the one head Christ, through the communication⁹ of the one Spirit of truth, power, and sanctification. Many are one body in Christ; yet each one individually has « gifts (χαρίσματα) according to the grace that is given to us, differing » (Rom. XII. 6); for « there are diversities of graces, and diversities of ministries, and diversities of operations; but all these one and the same Spirit works, dividing to each one as he wills » (1 Cor. XII). Moreover, all these things have this end: that the whole Church, teaching and hearing (τῇ ὑπακοῇ τῆς πίστεως), governing and governed, sanctifying and sanctified, may perpetually be, and be preserved as, the bulwark of truth, the kingdom of Christ, the temple of the Holy Spirit. All things are given « for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ » (Eph. IV. 12; 1 Cor. III. 22, 23).

Therefore, just as Christ is the truth and the one teacher of truth, just as all power in heaven and on earth has been given to him, just as he is priest for ever of his own order because he is the incarnate Word: so in the hierarchy, which is expressed as an image to Christ as its exemplar, and flows from Christ the fountain as a participation, the magisterium is of truth, the rule is of salvation, and the priesthood is of consecration and sanctification, because the human and visible is penetrated by the divine and invisible charism of the Spirit of truth, power, and sanctification ¹⁰.

b) The sacraments are one of the essential and vital elements by which the Church of Jesus Christ is constituted on earth, and is nourished and cherished by her own bridegroom, Christ (Eph. V. 29). In the sacraments the members of the Church are also prepared materially (namely in Christian marriage), and formally the Church is perpetually reborn and renewed in her members through the sacraments, healed, sanctified, and her hierarchy grows and is conserved. Hence these same sacraments are understood to be among the principal « joints of supply » by which the whole body, joined and connected both in itself and with the head Christ, « makes increase of the body unto the building up of itself in charity ». Now from this very fact, that the sacraments are essential parts in the organism of the Church, they show forth the nature of the whole Church, and consequently are copies assimilated to Jesus Christ himself, their institutor and founder. The « great mystery of piety » abiding, which is the incarnate Word, is understood as the foundation, origin, and exemplar of all the sacraments, which for the sanctification of the Church are perpetually repeated in new acts (cf. Tract. on the Sacraments in general, ed. 2, p. 34).

In these mysteries the visible and material nature is raised to the supernatural order of instruments of grace: by conjunction with the merits of Christ according to his humanity, with the sanctifying omnipotence of Christ according to his divinity, and with his priesthood as institutor and principal administrator of the sacraments, « not by the ministry of the body but by the invisible work of majesty » (Aug., contra litt. Petiliani, l. III, c. 49). The invisible divine sanctifying power is the proper character by which the sensible sign, natural in itself, is raised and constituted as a supernatural sacrament. The Holy Spirit « hovers over the waters, sanctifying them from himself, and so the sanctified waters soak up the power of sanctifying » (Tertullian, de baptismo, c. 4); « the oil becomes efficacious through the presence of the divinity of the Holy Spirit » (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catech. 21, n. 3); just as the incarnation of the Word was effected by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit upon the Blessed Virgin, so « the power of the Most High and the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, which made Mary bear the Saviour, the same makes the water regenerate the believer » (Leo the Great, Sermons 4 and 5 on the Nativity of the Lord; see the Treatise on the Sacraments in general, th. VI, n. III).

If this conjunction of the divine and earthly, of the invisible and visible element, in the other sacraments reflects the image of the Word incarnate who instituted them, a much fuller likeness, and a perpetual representation of the incarnation, is in the sacrament of sacraments, namely, I say, the most holy Eucharist, where « in sensible things, indeed, all intelligible things (πάντα δὲ νοητά, to be understood by mind and faith) have been handed down by Christ » (Chrysostom, in Matth., hom. 82, al. 83). This likeness is so true that the holy Fathers have often taken this very sacrament as a better-known term of comparison for explaining and defending the incarnation itself (Treatise on the Eucharist, th. IX, X).

Just as the Word, in the incarnation, was manifested in flesh through the assumed nature, so the Word incarnate, constituting himself in the sacramental state according to the humanity itself, is made manifest invisibly through the alien appearances of bread and wine. As, then, there one Christ is to be believed by faith according to his divinity, and to be seen also by the senses according to his humanity; so here that same one Christ is to be believed by faith alone according to humanity and divinity, and to be seen also by the senses according to the formal character of the sacrament in the sacramental species ¹¹. There, the emptying of the divine person was not by laying aside the form of God, but by taking the form of a servant (Phil. II. 7); here, a certain emptying of the humanity itself, not by laying aside the glory by which it is exalted at the right hand of the Father in the Church triumphant, but by assuming the state of victim in the Church militant (Treatise on the Sacrament of the Eucharist, th. IX, Coroll. 3; on the Sacrifice of the Eucharist, th. XVI, n. II). There: appearance in the flesh through birth, the Holy Spirit operating; a hidden life for thirty years in the not yet glorified humanity; public preaching by the sensible word and manifest miracles in the order of nature; the bloody sacrifice for the consummation of redemption; and all these for founding the Church. Here: a perpetually renewed presence through transubstantiation, the Holy Spirit transmuting the creatures ¹²; a hidden life in the humanity now glorified, until he comes again; spiritual preaching by the interior word in souls, and miracles in the supernatural order itself; the unbloody sacrifice for the application of the consummated redemption; all of which are accomplished in the founded Church. There: the cross, the tree of life, to generate from the side of Christ the Church living by the life of grace; the resurrection, the cause and exemplar of our resurrection and of the glorified Church. Here: from that tree the food of life, to nourish and conserve the life of grace, the pledge and preparation of resurrection and glorification. The tree of life in paradise had a bodily food and a spiritual sacrament, but a typical one, pointing to Christ on the tree of the cross and in the Eucharist ¹³; in the Eucharist itself the sacrament is the antitype, containing in itself the bodily and the spiritual, the human and the divine, sanctifying the members of the Church with the body and blood of God the Word, toward the future glorious and immortal life of those same members in soul and body.

From all these things we understand how the Church, from this eucharistic sacrifice and sacrament as from the heart and centre of her whole life, participates in herself in the conjunction and penetration of the human and the divine, while nature is informed, sanctified, and clarified through grace, the earthly through the heavenly, the visible through the invisible.

3°. As Christ constituted his Church, militant and labouring on earth, an image of himself, as he lived and suffered in his mortal life, so the glorified Church is the image and expression of Christ the glorified head; the resurrection and glory of Christ is the exemplar form and cause from which the Church participates in resurrection and glory.

The Church now indeed exhibits the image of Christ who rose from the dead, looking at once both at the supernatural life of grace on earth and at the blessed life of souls in heaven; but the perfect expression of the resurrection of Jesus Christ the head will be completed at last in the glorious resurrection of the flesh. The assimilation of the Church to the glory of Christ is therefore in a twofold stage, and the sacred books describe it to us under a twofold resurrection, regeneration, renewal.

a) Through spiritual resurrection we reproduce the image of our head, Christ, who rose from the dead. According to this still incomplete idea, Paul says: « we were buried together with him (Christ) by baptism into death (dead to sins), so that as Christ rose from the dead through the glory of the Father, so also we should walk in newness of life » (Rom. VI. 4); and to the same sense: « if therefore you have risen together with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God... for you are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God » (Col. III. 1, 3). This same is called in Apocalypse XX. 5, 6 « the first resurrection », considering at once the souls of the martyrs in heaven and the holy Church on earth.

But with this symbolic resurrection and incomplete glorification there is joined, in all places, the bodily resurrection of the members of the Church, and in it the complete glorification of the Church itself, as the perfect expression of the glorified Christ. In the cited passage of Rom. VI the Apostle immediately adds: « if we have become planted together (σύμφυτοι) with the likeness of his death, we shall be so also of his resurrection » (planted together, that is, homogeneous) (Rom. VI. 5). Undoubtedly, from the imperfect image of symbolic death and of newness of life in the first resurrection there follows the perfect likeness in the resurrection and final glorification. More expressly still, in the other passage, Col. III, there is shown the transition from « your life hidden with Christ in God » to life made manifest in the resurrection and conformed to Christ in his supreme manifestation: « when Christ shall appear (φανερωθῇ, be manifested), your life (the exemplar and cause of your glorified life), then you also shall appear (φανερωθήσεσθε) with him in glory » (Col. III. 4). The head, manifested in glory exemplarily, will manifest the still hidden life of the members in glory efficiently: « the whole is the head and the body. » In the same way many places join both assimilations to Christ: imperfect in the Church militant through the first resurrection, perfect in the Church triumphant through the final resurrection. « But if Christ is in you, the body is indeed dead because of sin, but the spirit lives because of justification (first resurrection); but if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Jesus from the dead will also quicken your mortal bodies, because of his Spirit dwelling in you » (Rom. VIII. 10, 11). A little after, the Apostle there speaks expressly of those whom God « predestined to be conformed (συμμόρφους) to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren »; and he says that this predestination to conformity embraces vocation and justification, and also glorification, which he calls the (complete) adoption of the sons of God, the redemption of our body, and the revelation (ἀποκάλυψιν) of the sons of God (Rom. VIII. 29, 30; cf. 17, 19, 23). So also elsewhere in Scripture: « our citizenship (πολίτευμα, our life through the first resurrection) is in heaven; whence also we await the Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ, who will refashion the body of our lowliness, conformed (σύμμορφον) to the body of his glory » (Phil. III. 20, 21). « Beloved, now we are sons of God; and it has not yet appeared (οὔπω ἐφανερώθη) what we shall be; we know that when it shall appear (ἐὰν φανερωθῇ) we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is » (1 Jn III. 2).

There is therefore a twofold stage of the configuration of the Church to Christ the head and exemplar. For the first stage it is said: « planted together in the likeness of his death »; « buried together with Christ »; « newness of life », « conversation in heaven », « life with Christ in God », but still hidden; « we are sons of God, but it has not yet appeared what we shall be »; « we have received the Spirit of adoption of sons, but still all creation awaits the revelation of the sons of God, and we groan within ourselves, awaiting the adoption of sons, the redemption of our body » ¹⁴. For the second stage it is said: « planted together with his resurrection »; « the mortal bodies made alive »; « configured to the body of his glory »; « when he shall appear, we shall appear with him in glory »; « when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is ».

b) This twofold resurrection is at the same time a twofold regeneration of the Church after the exemplar Jesus Christ: the first in adoption, which already is but has not yet appeared; the other, final, which will appear « in the redemption of our body ». Of the former it is said: « unless one is born (ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ) of water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God » (Jn III. 5); « he saved us through the washing of regeneration (παλιγγενεσίας) and renewal of the Holy Spirit » (Tit. III. 5); « in Christ a new creature » (καινὴ κτίσις) (2 Cor. V. 17; Gal. VI. 15); « that he might create in himself the two (circumcision and foreskin) into one new man (κτίσῃ ἐν ἑαυτῷ εἰς ἕνα καινὸν ἄνθρωπον), making peace, and reconcile both in one body to God » (Eph. II. 15); « you are all sons of God through the faith that is in Christ Jesus; for as many of you as were baptized into Christ (εἰς Χριστόν) have put on Christ... for you are all one in Christ Jesus » (Gal. III. 26 sq.; Eph. IV. 25, 24; Col. III. 10, 11).

Christ names the other regeneration: « in the regeneration (ἐν τῇ παλιγγενεσίᾳ) ¹⁵, when the Son of man shall sit on the seat of his majesty (ἐπὶ θρόνου δόξης αὐτοῦ), you also shall sit upon twelve thrones » (Matt. XIX. 28). This final glorious regeneration would have been, in the state of original justice, in the manner that Paul says: « we would not be stripped but clothed upon, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life » (2 Cor. V. 4). Now, however, as to the thing itself, the same final regeneration indeed takes place, on account of the Holy Spirit dwelling in us from the first regeneration: « but he who has made us for this very thing (ὁ δὲ κατεργασάμενος ἡμᾶς εἰς αὐτὸ τοῦτο), God, who gave us the pledge of the Spirit » (ib. v. 5; cf. Rom. VIII. 11). But according to the exemplar Christ it is not done except by death intervening, through resurrection: « for this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality... then shall come to pass the word that is written: death is swallowed up in victory » (1 Cor. XV. 52 sqq.). This is the image of the last Adam, the heavenly man, in glorification, which follows upon the same image in justification: « therefore, as we have borne the image of the earthly (Adam the first), let us also bear the image of the heavenly (Adam the second); but this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot possess the kingdom of God, nor corruption possess incorruption » (ib. vv. 42–50).

c) This resurrection and regeneration, for both stages, is also called renewal, as already appears from the texts cited, and a new age. Concerning the time of the New Testament and the renewal of the world through grace it is written: « Behold, I make new things, and now they shall spring forth... I will set in the desert a way, and in the trackless place rivers... this people I have formed for myself » (Is. XLIII. 19). Paul says the same more distinctly: « if therefore in Christ there is a new creature, the old things have passed away; behold, all things are made new » (2 Cor. V. 17). Among the Jews, not without foundation in the Scriptures of the Old Testament, the times of the Messiah are called « the age to come » ¹⁶, which time of grace the sacred books call « the fullness of time » and « the last or ultimate time » (Acts II. 17; 1 Cor. X. 11; Heb. I. 1; 1 Pet. I. 20; 1 Jn II. 18; Gal. IV. 4; Eph. I. 10; Tit. I. 3); and « the world to come » (ἡ οἰκουμένη ἡ μέλλουσα, Heb. II. 5). With this is connected the new age of final regeneration. In the cited passage of Matt. XIX. 28, the Syriac version renders « in the regeneration » as « in the new age » ¹⁷, just as in the parallel places Mark X. 30 and Luke XVIII. 30 it is called « the age to come » (ἐν τῷ αἰῶνι τῷ ἐρχομένῳ). Then: « the creature itself also shall be freed from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the sons of God » (Rom. VIII. 21); « but we await new heavens and a new earth according to his promises » (2 Pet. III. 13; Apoc. XXI. 1). For this new heaven and new earth, in the fuller sense now and in final glorification, « he who sat on the throne said: behold, I make all things new » (Apoc. XXI. 5).

Thus, having considered all that we have said, we have in revelation itself the Church most splendidly described as the copy and likeness of the Word incarnate subsisting in the divine and human nature, according to the stage of mortal life and according to the state of glorified life. This image and likeness of the Church is seen expressly in her members, by the sanctification of nature through grace; in her ministries, where visible powers are formed through the invisible charism of truth, power, and sanctification in the magisterium, the sacred rule, and the priesthood; in the sacraments, by the elevation of the natural element to the supernatural force and efficacy of the sacrament, chiefly in the sacrament of sacraments, which substantially contains and really represents Christ himself in his mysteries from the incarnation to the sacrifice of the cross; and it is seen finally in the assimilation of the life and passion, and thence of the glorification, of the Church configured to the brightness of the body of the glorified Jesus Christ.

Scholion. That a double resurrection is described in Apoc. XXI in the sense we have stated, which among the Fathers Augustine above all, in De civ. Dei XX, cc. 6 sqq., set out at length, is in our time often called into doubt by some, and is vehemently denied by all those who would revive the obsolete opinion of a millennial kingdom from that chapter XXI of the Apocalypse. (See the Treatise on Tradition, th. XVI.) But the distinction and connection of this double resurrection, spiritual and bodily, is most openly preached in the Scriptures. As Paul in the passages cited above called justification and life in righteousness, after the exemplar of Christ's resurrection, resurrection, and distinguished it from the resurrection of glory: so the same Apostle elsewhere recalls that first resurrection: « rise, you who sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall enlighten you » (Eph. V. 14). Christ the Lord himself first speaks directly of the resurrection to the life of grace, which now belongs only to those who have obeyed his voice. « Amen, amen I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed (μεταβέβηκε) from death to life. Amen, amen I say to you, the hour comes, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear (namely, not all hear) shall live » ¹⁸. After some transition interposed, he then connects the final resurrection, which will be of all men; but of some to the life of glory, of others to the judgment of condemnation, according as that earlier resurrection of justification has preceded or has not preceded. « Do not wonder at this (which had gone before), because the hour comes in which all who are in the tombs shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who have done good shall go forth to the resurrection of life, but those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment » (Jn V. 24–29).

Now in the same way the double resurrection of the Church is described in the Apocalypse. To the first resurrection there belong, considered together as one, both the souls of the saints, namely of the holy martyrs in heaven, and the Church sanctified on earth; by these two parts of the communion of saints one kingdom of Christ is constituted for a thousand years, while the members live in this first resurrection and reign with their head, Christ ¹⁹, whether the « thousand years » are taken for the fullness and the whole time of the New Testament, or are understood as determinate years for the special manifestation of the kingdom of Jesus Christ through his Church among the nations and peoples of the earth, until Satan is loosed. « And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given to them; and the souls of those beheaded for the testimony of Jesus... and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not live until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is he who has a part in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no power » (Apoc. XXI. 4–6). Entirely distinct from this is the resurrection of bodies, which is described in v. 11 sqq. Through this resurrection the final glorification of the Church will be completed, which is celebrated partly under symbolic images and partly in proper words in the two last chapters of the whole book.

To find a probable explanation of the number of the millennium, we may consult the same St. Augustine. Between the double sense, whether the divine number of fullness is to be understood, as it is said, « a thousand generations », « one day as a thousand years », or whether it is a human arithmetical number, the holy doctor hesitated, l. c., ch. 7. But lest he should seem, with the millenarians, to transfer the kingdom which will be in eternal triumph into this land of warfare, he advised two things to be noted. a) The binding of the devil for a thousand years is understood not as absolute, but by comparison with his earlier free dominion over the nations. « For this, therefore, the devil is bound and shut into the abyss, that he may no longer seduce the nations, out of which the Church consists, which he held seduced before, before there was a Church. For it is not said that he should seduce no one, but that he should not seduce, it says, the nations, in which without doubt the Church was meant to be understood... The binding of the devil is that he is not permitted to exercise the whole temptation which he can use, whether by force or by guile, to seduce men to his side, forcing them violently or deceiving them by fraud » (ibid., cc. 7, 8). Whence b) this kingdom of Christ on earth is far different from that of which he will speak at the end of the ages: « come, blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you. » « Meanwhile, while the devil is bound for a thousand years, the saints of God reign with Christ also for the same thousand years, to be understood, without doubt, in the same way, that is, in this present time of his first coming... So his saints also reign with him even now, otherwise indeed than they will reign then... Of this kingdom of warfare, in which still we contend with the enemy, and sometimes we resist as the vices resist, sometimes they yield and we rule, until we come to that most peaceful kingdom where we shall reign without an enemy; and of this first resurrection, which is now, that book speaks thus » (ibid., c. 9).

If these things are true, and if then, by the human arithmetical number, the thousand years are assumed, during which the Church, the new Jerusalem, is to be made manifest on earth in a special glorification among the nations, not indeed yet fully, but as far as is fitting for this « kingdom of warfare », perhaps there will not be lacking those who, from history, may call to mind certain probable limits of this Christian millennium. At the starting limit they will observe a certain progress up to a height; and conversely, at the ending limit, they will seem to see a certain decline of that manifestation in the public life of kingdoms and peoples, until « the falling away (ἡ ἀποστασία) comes » (2 Thess. II. 3), namely the falling away of the public life of nations from the whole Christian order, and consequently the dissolution of the whole social order ²⁰.

From the principal epochs, this progress of the kingdom of Christ manifested in the public life of nations could be considered from the beginning of the fourth century to the close of the eighth and the opening of the ninth, and so on thereafter; while at the other limit the defect of the Christian public life, gradually growing strong, would be seen from the beginning of the fourteenth century to the close of the eighteenth and our nineteenth, with what is to follow, which is not yet open in history but still closed in the book of the knowledge and providence of God (cf. Apoc. V. 1–9). The degrees, moreover, of each inverted process, from darkness to light and from light to darkness (in the sense declared), could thus be discerned. At the beginning of the fourth century: Christian emperors; the persecutions of the idolatrous empire ended (the woman drunk with the blood of the saints and of the martyrs of Jesus shall go to destruction, cf. Apoc. XVII). At the end of the fourth century to the middle of the fifth: vengeance for the blood of the martyrs through the barbarian kings, who themselves for a short time still remain in idolatry (cf. Apoc. XVII. 12–14). At the end of the fifth century, from the sixth to the ninth: the barbarians are conquered by the Lamb and united to the kingdom of Christ (cf. Apoc. XVII. 14). At the end of the eighth and the beginning of the ninth century: the Christian empire is constituted, Christian life and the Christian commonwealth; sword under sword, the spiritual to be drawn by the Church, the temporal to be drawn for the Church: « because the Lord our God the Almighty has reigned » (cf. Apoc. XIX. 6; XX. 1–6). This whole constitution of the manifestation of the kingdom of Christ in the public life of nations proceeds indeed successively in time, but in the counsel of God it stands as one term of the reigning Church on earth. In the same way, at the other extreme, the falling away (ἡ ἀποστασία) has its degrees and its epochs, each of which corresponds, at the interval of a thousand years, to the epochs we indicated in the manifestation of the kingdom of Christ. At the beginning of the fourteenth century: by the usurpations and tyranny of secular power, in the Avignon captivity, the preparation of the schism. At the end of the fourteenth and the beginning of the fifteenth century: the great schism. From what was connected with the schism, at the end of the fifteenth century: the proximate preparation; in the sixteenth century: the completion of the great heresy of Protestantism. From the principles of this archheresy, Protestant, against all religious authority and therefore against the very existence of the visible Church, at the end of the eighteenth century and in the nineteenth: deism, pantheism, atheism; rebellion, first French, then universal; the Christian empire destroyed; the political state and its public life throughout the whole world without God, without Christ, without the Church. Satan was bound for a thousand years, « that he should no longer seduce the nations, until the thousand years are finished; and after these things he must be loosed for a little time... And when the thousand years are finished, Satan will be loosed from his prison, and he will go out and seduce the nations which are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog ²¹; and he will gather them to battle... and they surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city » (Apoc. XX. 3, 7, 8).

But such calculations of the thousand years, as is plain, are wholly uncertain, so that it is much more convenient to understand the thousand years, according to the other opinion, as the divine number of the whole time of the New Testament, whatever its duration may be.

« The whole Church, both in the state of warfare and in the state of triumph, is ordered intrinsically, from her essence, to the glory of Jesus Christ as to her end; whence there is understood both the exaltation of the Church herself and the innermost bond of the Church of the Old Testament with the Church of Christ on earth, and of this with the Church finally consummated in heaven. »

As from the incarnate Word as institutor and efficient cause, as head and in a certain way formal cause, and as exemplar cause (of which we have treated so far), so from the same Christ as final cause the nature, life, and exaltation of the Church itself is determined in itself and can be understood by us.

The Church of the Old Testament was a preparation and a pedagogy to Christ (Gal. III. 24; Heb. VII. 19). Hence, first indeed, all the graces and the whole value of the institutions in her depended on Christ, still to come, as on their end: « for the end of the law is Christ » (Rom. X. 4; III. 25; Heb. IX. 15). Then indeed the whole history, the institutions, sacrifices, and sacraments received their form from Christ to come as from their end, since they were shadows and types prefiguring and foretelling Christ himself and the works and institutions of Christ: « which are a shadow of things to come, but the body is Christ »; they stand to Christ as a shadow to the body (Col. II. 17; 1 Cor. X. II; Heb. X. 1).

Much more sublimely, therefore, the Church of the New Testament, to which that old one was an « introduction », and which is the sum of all the works and charisms of Christ the founder, is understood, essentially, in herself, in her form, in her gifts, in her institutions, priesthood, kingdom, magisterium, sacraments, laws, and doctrine, and finally in her whole internal and external life, to have as her end the glorification of Jesus Christ, her redeemer, acquirer, and institutor through his own blood, her head and exemplar. The Church has this end, the glory of Jesus Christ, both in the present stage of warfare and in the future state of full triumph; and from this unity of end, though not from this alone, there arises the mutual relation and connection between the Church of wayfarers tending to the end and the blessed resting at the end, which is the glory of Christ and of God. « He dwells in Sion, which is interpreted as speculation ¹, and Sion bears the image of the Church that now is, just as Jerusalem bears the image of the Church that is to be, that is, of the city of the saints already enjoying angelic life, because Jerusalem is interpreted as vision of peace. Speculation indeed precedes vision, as this Church precedes that which is promised, the immortal and eternal city... But unless the Lord dwelt in this very Church which now is, speculation, however most studious, would go astray. And to this Church it has been said: for the temple of God is holy, which you are; and that Christ dwells in the inner man through faith in your hearts. Therefore we are commanded to sing psalms to the Lord who dwells in Sion, so that we praise in harmony the Lord, the inhabitant of the Church, announcing among the nations his wonders. And it has been done, and it will not cease to be done » St. Aug., on Ps. IX, or. 12.

I. We understand the glory of Jesus Christ as the end of the Church in the present stage of mortal life from what is said of the redeemer himself, of the redeemed faithful, and of the Church as the objective manifestation of Jesus Christ.

1°. Christ the redeemer shed his blood to sanctify the Church: « that he himself might present to himself (αὐτὸς ἑαυτῷ) a glorious Church » (Eph. V. 27). Hence the Apostles, in propagating the Church, betroth her as paranymphs, « to present a chaste virgin to Christ » (2 Cor. XI. 2). Still more expressly, the same Apostles, by gathering the nations into the Church through the gospel, offer the nations themselves in the Church, and indeed the Church gathered from the nations, as priests to Jesus Christ, « an oblation accepted and sanctified in the Holy Spirit » ² (Rom. XV. 16; cf. Phil. II. 17).

2°. Proceeding from the other term, which is the faithful in the Church, the Apostle says that the faithful themselves are the proximate end of the whole natural order and of the institutions of the supernatural order; and that the end of the faithful, and so of the Church, is Jesus Christ, to whom they owe themselves wholly and to whom they are fully consecrated; Christ, the man, finally, together with his body the Church, is wholly God's. « All things are yours, whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; and you are Christ's, and Christ is God's » (1 Cor. III. 22). The faithful are therefore dedicated and consecrated entirely to Christ, also formally as redeemer: « for whether we live, we live to the Lord (τῷ κυρίῳ); or whether we die, we die to the Lord; whether therefore we live or die, we are the Lord's; for to this end (εἰς τοῦτο) Christ died and rose again, that he might be Lord of the dead and of the living » (Rom. XIV. 7–9; 1 Cor. VI. 19, 20; 2 Cor. V. 15; 1 Pet. I. 18, 19). Hence, just as all the good things of the Church are from him as from an exemplar, meritorious, and efficient cause, so they are also to him as to a final cause: Christ Jesus « was made to us wisdom from God, and justice and sanctification and redemption, that... he who glories, let him glory in the Lord » (1 Cor. I. 30, 31).³

3°. The supreme manifestation of the manifold wisdom of God, and of the counsels which were hidden from eternity in God, is in the incarnation of the Word, in the unsearchable riches of Jesus Christ, in the economy of salvation of all nations. Now the effect of the incarnate Word, indeed the sum of his supernatural works, the « rich depository » of the riches of Jesus Christ ⁴, the concrete reality of the economy of salvation, is the Church. Hence the Church is, even to the heavenly spirits themselves, the objective manifestation of all these riches of Jesus Christ, and consequently of the manifold wisdom and counsels of God; so that, just as the end of the work in the created world is the manifestation of the invisible things of God, which are known naturally (Rom. I. 20), so in the sanctified world, that is in the Church, the end of the work is the manifestation of the invisible things of God, which in Christ have been made visible and are known supernaturally. « To me this grace has been given, says the Apostle, to evangelize among the nations the unsearchable riches of Christ ⁵ and to enlighten all, what is the dispensation of the mystery hidden from the ages in God ⁶, who created all things, that there may be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places ⁷ through the Church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the predetermination of the ages, which he made in Christ Jesus our Lord » ⁸ (Eph. III. 9–11).

As the objective manifestation of the glory of Jesus Christ, the Church is constituted in this, that Christ communicates his brightness to her, and from Christ the participated brightness is diffused into her as from the sun into its planet. The Father glorifies the Son by generating him in divinity, and by exalting him in humanity; conversely the Son is the glorification of the Father, in the paternal substance communicated to him, and in the humanity assumed, made obedient unto death and exalted above every name ⁹; and so in both respects, though in a different mode, he is « the splendour (ἀπαύγασμα) of his glory ». The Son, Jesus Christ, glorifies the Church by redeeming her by his death, and by sanctifying and exalting her through participation of his brightness in internal charisms and external offices; and by this very brightness communicated to her, conversely the Church is the splendour of the glory of Jesus Christ. We have all this declared by our Lord himself with divine sublimity, in the last prayer to the Father, offered in the presence of the Apostles: « Glorify your Son, that the Son may glorify you; as you gave him power over all flesh, that to all that you gave him he may give eternal life... they are yours, and all mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I have been glorified in them... And for them I sanctify myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth... And the glory which you gave me I have given to them... I in them and you in me, that they may be perfected in one » (Jn XVII. 1 sqq.).

II. Now the glorification of the Church in Christ Jesus, and of Christ in his Church, has not yet reached its end, but is increased by continual increments, according to the measure of the sanctity and brightness advancing in the Church. Finally, when the number of the saints is complete, when we all meet in the measure of the age of the fullness of Christ, the exaltation of the name and the glorification of Jesus Christ will be consummated through the final glorification of the members. This is that « revelation » and « appearing » and « glorious presence » of Jesus Christ the Son of God (ἀποκάλυψις, φανέρωσις, ἐπιφάνεια, παρουσία), which is so often celebrated in the sacred letters. « In the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven... when he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be wondered at in all who have believed... so that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in us ¹⁰ and you in him, according to the grace of our God and Lord Jesus Christ » (2 Thess. I. 7 sqq.).

The end, therefore, to which all things are ordered is the Church, to be carried through the state of warfare into the state of the triumphant Church, so that in her and through her the ultimate end of all, which is the glory of God and of the Lamb, may be consummated. All the angels, and those who are « redeemed to God by his blood, from every tribe and tongue and people and nation », and « every creature that is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and that are in the sea », with a loud voice give all glory to him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb who was slain (Apoc. V; XXI; XXII).

III. This very ordering and continual progress of the Church of wayfarers toward the Church of the consummated constitutes and contains within itself the same relation of the Church of the New Testament to her Saviour, at the second coming of glorification, which the Church of the Old Testament had to the first coming of redemption. Just as the inner reason and life of the old Church consisted in preparation, hope, and desire for that first coming, as for its end, so the Church of the New Testament, having her redeemer already present and her redemption complete, tends by continual advances toward her end, and is carried with all desire toward « the revelation of the sons of God » and toward the manifestation of the glory of Jesus Christ at the second coming, where the last enemy (ἔσχατος ἐχθρός), death, will be destroyed, and when all things shall have been subjected to him, Christ himself, the head with his whole body, now glorified in all the members, will be subjected to him who subjected all things to him, that God may be all in all (1 Cor. XV. 24 sq.).

In the Old Testament the future one is foreshown to the patriarchs and the prophets: « in whom all the nations of the earth shall be blessed »; he who is to come, « who is the expectation of the nations »; to arise from Jacob, whom they see, « but not now », they gaze upon, « but not near »; the root of Jesse, who stands as a sign of the peoples, to whom the nations shall supplicate; to be given « for a light of the nations, salvation to the end of the earth »; it is said « to the daughter of Sion: behold your Saviour comes... and his work with him »; « the desired of all nations shall come, and I will fill this house with glory »; « and suddenly the lord whom you seek shall come to his temple, and the angel of the testament whom you desire », etc. (Gen. XII. 3; XXII. 18; XXVI. 4; XLIX. 10; Num. XXIV. 17; Is. XI. 13¹¹; XLIX. 6; LXII. 11; Hag. I. 8¹²; Mal. III. 1).

In the New Testament the possession of these promises is joined with the expectation of their consummation at the second coming. « The grace of God our Saviour has appeared (ἐπεφάνη) to all men... waiting for the blessed hope and the coming of the glory (ἐπιφάνειαν τῆς δόξης) of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ » (1 Cor. I. 7¹³). « Our conversation is in heaven, whence also we await the Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ, who will refashion the body of our lowliness, conformed to the body of his glory » (Phil. III. 20, 21). « Your life is hidden with Christ in God; when Christ shall appear, then you also shall appear with him in glory » (Col. III. 3, 4). ¹⁴ See the rest in the preceding thesis.

Hence, just as the faith and hope of the saints of the Old Testament invoke the first coming as the end of all desires, « drop down dew, you heavens from above, and let the clouds rain the just » (Is. XLV. 8), so the sighs of the Church of the New Testament long for the glorification of Jesus Christ at the second coming. « I am the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star; and the Spirit and the bride say: come; and let him who hears say: come! » Indeed the final recapitulation and the last words of all that has been written for our teaching, that through patience and the consolation of the Scriptures we may have hope, is the cry of the Spirit and the bride: « Come, Lord Jesus! » (Apoc. XXII. 17, 20).