Volume 1 — Translated from Der Katholik. THE TWO SIDES OF CATHOLICISM. [Third and concluding Article.]

IV. THE HEART OF THE CHURCH.

Christ approves himself as the head of the Church inasmuch as her individual members are subject to his guidance, and live and move in him. [Footnote 151] This protracted influence of Christ is exercised by means of an innate harmonizing and vivifying principle of the Church. We have arrived at the heart of the Church. Our ancient theology bestows this epithet on the Holy Ghost. [Footnote 152] The Church receives the Holy Ghost through Christ. Such is the doctrine of Scripture, clearly expressed. Jesus promises his disciples to send them after his departure the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, in whom they will find a compensation for the Master. For it is the function of the Spirit to testify of Christ, and to bring all things to the remembrance of the Church, whatsoever Jesus has said. Thus are all things taught unto the Church. This efficacy, which has the glory of Christ for its aim, the Holy Ghost derives from the fulness of Christ's Godhead, de meo accipiet. The Holy Ghost was not given until after Jesus was glorified. Christ being exalted, and having received the Holy Ghost promised of the Father, sheds forth the Spirit upon the Church. Even the prior inspiration of the apostles was the result of an act of Christ. Jesus breathed on them and said unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost.

The Spirit acts as the heart of the Church under the control and influence of the head. The fundamental theological reason of this is not difficult of demonstration. The external relations {742} of the several divine persons, or their relations to the works of God, such as the one just described of the Holy Ghost to the Church, are intimately connected with the intro-divine relations of the members of the most Holy Trinity to each other. It is in this sense that Holy Writ makes mention of a mission of the Son and of the Spirit. The expression implies that the person concerning whom it is used, occupies toward the remaining divine persons a position admitting of the giving of a mission by them or one of them, that is to say, of a particular work done by the one by the power and at the delegation of the other. For one person of the Trinity to act in a mission, therefore, it is requisite that the power and the will to act must emanate from the person conferring the mission. Thus Jesus says that his doctrine is not his own, but the doctrine of him by whom he was sent. But one person of the Trinity can be a recipient from another in so far only as the recipient issues from the giver for ever and ever, or only in respect of the eternal procession. It follows that a divine person can receive a mission only in emanating from another, that is to say, none but the personae productae, the Son and the Holy Ghost, can be sent; while, on the other hand, only the personae producentes, the Father and the Son, can confer a mission. Hence the fundamental reason why the sway of the Spirit in the Church is exercised under the influence of Christ, is to be found in the manner of the eternal procession, i.e., in the coming of the Spirit from the Father and the Son.

The essence of Christianity consists in spiritual intercourse and spiritual influence. As distinguished from the old covenant, the characteristic of the New Testament dispensation consists in this: that it is done by the agency of the Holy Ghost, sent down from heaven. The Spirit of Christ was in the prophets; but the same Spirit manifests a new activity since the mission from heaven. When the apostle desires to make the true foundation of faith clear to the Galatians, he contents himself with asking them whence they had received the Spirit? By its descent the blessing of Abraham came on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, in fulfilment of the prophecies. The pouring out of the Holy Ghost is the crowning work of Christ's mediation.

But what is the badge of this more profuse dispensation of the Spirit, thus recognized in Scripture as the peculiar mark of Christianity? Under the ancient covenant, answers St. Gregory of Naziance, the Holy Ghost was present only by its efficacy ( ); now it abides among us i.e., in its essence, or substantialiter, as our theologians phrase it. The efficacy of the Spirit in the prophets is described by St. Cyril of Alexandria as a mere irradiation [ ]; they received only the effulgence of the light, as those who follow a torch-bearer [ ]; while the Spirit in proper person enters into the souls of those who believe in Christ, and dwells therein [ ]. It is only since the ascension of Christ that the inhabitation of the Spirit in the souls of men has reached its completion as . This is the reason assigned by St. Cyril for the declaration of the Lord that he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than John the Baptist, than whom there hath not risen a greater among them that are born of women. He interprets the kingdom of heaven here referred to to be the impartment [ ] of the Holy Ghost. From this interpretation he deduces the reason wherefore the humblest citizen of the kingdom of heaven is above the Baptist. For the latter is born of woman, the former of God. In consequence of this regeneration we are partakers of the divine nature, which St. Cyril interprets to mean neither more nor less than the dwelling of the Holy Ghost in our souls. [Footnote 153 ]

As the head of the Church, the Son {743} of man, being lifted up from the earth, draws all men unto him. The Scripture concludes the narration of the miraculous events of the first Christian Passover and of their immediate results with the remark that the Lord added to the Church daily such as should be saved. Therefore, immediately after the outpouring of the Holy Ghost, began the daily increase of the Church through the fructifying influence of the grace of its head. They were multiplied in proportion as they walked in the comfort, the [Greek text], of the Holy Ghost. By one Spirit the Church of Christ is baptized into one body, which Spirit overflows it and saturates it with its essence. In him we were sealed as the possession of Christ, and we know that he abideth in us by the Spirit which he hath given us. On being received into the Church the members are built into an edifice, the foundation of which has its cornerstone in Christ. By this incorporation they are united into a mansion of God in the Spirit. In so far as we are joined unto the Lord we are one spirit with him, and our bodies are temples of the Holy Ghost.

On account of its intimate relations with Christ, the Spirit is called the Spirit of Christ. Even the Lord himself is directly called the Spirit. By him, the Spirit of the Lord, we are transformed into his image, the image the Lord. Thereby the Spirit evinces itself the principle of our liberty.

The main result of the action of the Spirit in the Church is, therefore, the union of the latter and of her individual members with Christ, the Christ who is within us. The union between Christ and the Church is effected by the Spirit, who acts as the connecting link, while Christ himself is the efficient cause of the union, in so far as he sends his Spirit to accomplish it. How, then, is the inhabitation of the Spirit, which is identical with that of Christ, in the Church brought about? The answer to this question involves results decisive of the present investigation.

If the Church were an unattained ideal, according to the Protestant acceptation, the promise of Christ to be with his followers even unto the end of the world would admit of no more profound interpretation than that, after his personal departure, the Lord would continue to occupy the minds of his disciples, thus giving their thoughts a right direction through all time. The presence of Christ in the visible Church would no longer be vouchsafed by a substantial pledge, making the repletion of the Church with Christ, which is the ideal of that institution, a historical reality even at the present day, in so far as the pledge is actually present. If, on the other hand, the latter view is the only scriptural one, then the true Church is not to be handed over exclusively to the future and to the realm of ideas. She is herself within the sphere of reality, she belongs to the living present, if the inmost principle of her being is even now actually at work, as a gift coeval with her establishment, not the mere object of search and speculation.

The idea of Catholicism presupposes one thing more. Such a principle dwelling in the Church as a reality must necessarily exercise its functions in a single individual image only. Both of these positions are the necessary results of the teachings of Holy Writ.

The Scriptures describe the Holy Ghost, by whom the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, as something conferred upon us, per spiritum sanctum qui datus est nobis. In the capacity of abiding in our souls as something bestowed upon us, as donum, the fathers distinguish a personal attribute of the Holy Ghost, having its foundation in the peculiar manner of its eternal emanation from the Father and Son. This emanation is wrought as a common infusion of being from Father and Son, as an intro-divine overflowing of love. [Footnote 154] Together {744} with the Holy Ghost that is given unto us, that is to say, by means of the love shed abroad in our hearts through him, the two other persons of the Trinity likewise come and take up their abode within our souls. The unity of the three divine persons is not only the antetype of the unity of the Church, but is at the same time its fundamental principle. In his high sacerdotal invocation the Lord prays that all those who believe through the word may be one, even as the Father is in him and he in the Father; and that we may be one in the Father and the Son, ut et ipsi eis nolis unum sint. The unity of the Father and the Son, who take up their abode within us simultaneously with the Holy Ghost, is the foundation of our own ecclesiastical unity. There is the fundamental, the ultimate principle of Catholicism. In it, through the Holy Ghost, we have a fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.

The other functions ascribed to the Spirit by Holy Writ are also of such a nature as to constrain us to assume that the essence of the true Church is a reality even at this day. By the Holy Ghost we receive even now an earnest of the inheritance in store for us. Its testimony assures us that we are the children of God. We have become such even now, and through him. We are born of the Spirit. The renewal accomplished by him is a bath of regeneration, the putting on of a new man. In the hearts of believers he is a well of water springing up into everlasting life. In this sense our justification may be regarded as a glorification in the germ. Christ has anointed the Church with a chrism which abides and exerts itself in her as a permanent teacher.

It is an entire misapprehension of the creative power of Christianity to ascribe to the Spirit of Christ which governs the Church no more profitable efficacy than the barren, resultless chase of an ideal which constantly eludes realization. The very idea that a law of steady development is to be traced in Christianity itself, this very favorite view of all the advocates of an ideal Church, ought to have led to a more profound appreciation of the essence and history of the Church. If the Church is to undergo a development, the realization of her ideal should not be postponed to the end of time. What is its course in history? This point is decisive of our position respecting the ideal Church.

The doctrine relies upon Matt, xviii. 20. Here the Catholic acceptation of a realization of the essence of the Church, historically manifested, would appear to be directly excluded. The passage adduced makes Christ abide among us, and accordingly makes the true Church come into being simply in consequence of the casual assemblage of two or three, so that it takes place in his name—a condition the performance or breach of which is a matter by no means patent to the senses. But these words are to be read in connection with what precedes them. Verses 17 and 18 allude to the authority of' the Church as historically manifest. The resolutions of that authority are ratified in heaven, and are valid before God. For—such is the logical thread of the discourse of Jesus—what the Church, as historically manifested, ordains, is at the same time ordained by the Holy Ghost dwelling within her. That such is actually the case, the Lord then proceeds to show by the concluding illustration. The agreement of two is alone sufficient to secure a fulfilment of the prayer: for where two or three are assembled together in the name of Christ, there is he in the midst of them: how much more amply then is the presence and the countenance of Christ assured to the entire Church, and to the organ intrusted with the execution of her {745} power! [Footnote 55] True, Christ is present even where only two or three are assembled in his name; but the result of his presence corresponds to the extent of the assembly. There Christ simply effects the fulfilment of the common prayer. That the arbitrary concourse of a few individuals in the name of Christ is the realization of the essence of the Church, nowhere in the whole passage is there a word to confirm such an interpretation.

The advocates of the ideal Church also cite Eph. v. 27. [Footnote 156] There the Church is called holy and without blemish, not having spot or wrinkle; a description supposed to be applicable exclusively to the Church that is to be, and by no means to the Church as it is. The remark is an idle one, and does not touch the real question. In our view it is the work of the present to lay the foundation for the future glory of the Church. This position is fully borne out by the words of Scripture. For in verse 26 the apostle points out the sanctification of the Church as the immediate object of the sacrifice of Christ, and at the same time indicates the means by which the Church is to be sanctified. This is done by the washing of water, which owes its purifying efficacy to the simultaneous utterance of the word. The presentation of the Church in unblemished holiness and glory, the object of the sacrificial death of Christ, is therefore gradually effected in the present world in proportion as the purification by the sacrament, under the continued influence of Christ, exerts its efficacy in he Church.

If the apostle were here speaking simply of a remote future holiness of the Church, his whole course of reasoning would lose its point. The love of Christ is here presented to husbands and wives as a model for their own connubial relations. As the self-sacrifice of Christ for the Church has for its object the sanctification of the latter, so the mutual self-devotion of husbands and wives is to invest their lives with a higher grace. It is not the mere act of the self-sacrifice of Christ which is to be emulated in marriage. No admonition would be needed for such a purpose. Marriage is necessarily a type of this relation. The discourse of the apostle tends, on the contrary, to recommend the motive of the sacrifice of Christ, and its influence upon the sanctification of the Church, to husbands and wives for imitation. How feeble, how little calculated to fortify the admonition of the apostle, would be their reference to the relation of Christ to the Church, if the sanctification of the Church by Christ, thus held up to husbands and wives for emulation, were something totally unreal, a mere creature of reflection! If the purpose of the sacrifice of Christ, the sanctification of the Church, were still unattained, how could husbands and wives be expected to make their intercourse bear those moral fruits by which it is to approve itself a type of the relation of Christ to the Church?

The holiness of the Church, then, has its origin in the sacraments. But that which makes the Church holy appertains to her essential character. It follows that this character also is evolved by means of the sacraments. This proves, finally, that this evolution of the character of the true Church is only possible in a single, individual historical manifestation, that is to say, only within, or at least by the agency [Footnote 157] of, that visible body politic which is in possession of the sacraments.

Protestantism is untrue to its own principle in representing the administration of the sacraments according to their institution as an index of the true Church. The whole force of this position lies in the presumption of a {746} distinct historical organization as the necessary exponent of the inward essence of the true Church. A contrary doctrine is in danger of bestowing the name of the true Church on a society which may possibly be composed exclusively of hypocrites. The inference is obvious. If the essence of the true Church is only to be found in the domain of the mind, or if it even remains a mere ideal, where is the guarantee that the mantle of the sacramental organization covers that silent, invisible congregation of spirits in which alone the Protestant looks for the essence of the true Church? The reformer's idea of the Church is here entangled in a contradiction in terms. On the principle of justification by faith alone, the character of the true Church must be wholly expressed in something incorporeal. And yet the true Church is to be recognized by the use of the sacraments according to their institution. Where is the connecting link between the external and the internal Church? The congruence of the Spirit and the body of the Church, if it occurs, is purely accidental. The visible Church, taken by itself, is a mere external thing, possibly void of all substantial essence. The doctrine of sola fides is incapable of a profound appreciation of the visible Church. This, taken in connection with the old Protestant theory that the phase of the Church manifested in preaching and in the sacraments is of the essence of the Church, makes it clear that the attempt of the reformers to spiritualize Christianity leads on the contrary to a materialization of the idea of the Church.

The modern Protestant theology was far from being deterred by its reverence for the reformers from laying bare this unsound portion of their system. They attempted to make up for it by the well known theory of the ideal Church, which begins by renouncing, in entire consistency with the Protestant principle of justification by faith alone, every outward manifestation of the essence of the Church.

The manifold forms in which Christianity becomes palpable as a power in history are here treated as something purely accidental, easily capable of severance from the essence of the true Church. How does this explanation comport with the doctrine of Scripture just expounded?

The Church of Christ, says Holy Writ, receives her unseen bridal ornaments by means of the palpable sacraments. In consequence of their efficacy she conceals the germs of her future glory under the guise of her temporal image. The most profound and super-sensual characteristic of the Church is, therefore, closely though mysteriously allied with the palpable exterior. It is not our present task to show how this alliance is formed. We simply inquire into the foundation of this necessary combination of the spirit and the form of the Church. This foundation we claim to discover in the sublimity of the principle heretofore recognized by us as the marrow, the heart of the Church.

If that which constitutes the heart of the Church is supernatural, and beyond the reach of the natural powers of the human mind, its impartment and preservation necessarily presuppose a peculiar influence of God upon man, different from the creative power. Under these circumstances, the precise method of the divine influence pervading the Church is only to be learned with certainty from revelation. And here we find the most explicit teachings on this subject. According to the testimony of Scripture, the Lord promotes the growth of the Church by means palpable to the senses. This suggests inquiry into the laws under which these means of grace find their application. Those laws are derived from the object of their institution. It consists in the adhibition of instrumentalities in the production of a divine effect. Consequently the means employed, or the sacraments, can manifest their efficacy only under certain conditions divinely ordained.

The correct understanding of the {747} mutual relations subsisting between the spirit and the body of the Church is further assisted by reference to another idea also derived from the Church. The regular growth of the Church is made intelligible to us as a self-edification in love. The means required for the attainment of this purpose have been given into the hands of the Church herself. For this end Peter received the keys of the kingdom of heaven. He is not only the thread of the historical development of the Church, but the interior organization also necessarily presupposes a union with Peter. The organs of this organization are the sacraments. But they manifest their saving efficacy on those only who have not knowingly interrupted the chain of union between themselves and Peter, and their use is totally void of effect if the party by whom they are administered is not actuated by the desire of doing that which is done in sacramental ceremonies by the Church, united with Peter (intentio faciendi quod facit ecclesia.)

The inmost principle, the heart of the Church, is inseparably connected with these visible actions, which are efficaciously administered only according to the intention and in the name of the visible Church, and in virtue of their efficacy the latter approves herself as holy. Thus the present inquiry leads to the same result already reached by other investigations. The spirit and the body of Catholicism are not to be separated. The connecting link which binds them together is Peter, the bearer of the keys of the kingdom of heaven, who still lives in his successors. But the fountain-head of this necessary relationship is in the vital principle of the Church, in her supernatural principle.

The idea of a supernatural principle, and that of the papacy, together constitute the principle of Catholicism. In the former we behold its fundamental essence, in the latter the cement of its historical unity, as well as the connecting link between the interior and the exterior catholicity of the Church.