Chapter IX (7)

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.

[Footnote 154: _St. Augustinus, de Trinit._, lib. v., cap. 14:
_Exiit enim non quomodo natus, sed quomodo datus; et ideo non
dicitur filius._ Cap. 15: _Quia sic procedebat ut esset donabile,
jam donum erat et antequam esset cui daretur_. Cap. 11: _Spiritus
sanctus ineffabilis est quaedam Patris Filiique communio. . . . hoc
ipse proprie dicitur, quod illi communiter: quia et Pater spiritus
et Filius spiritus et Pater sanctus et Filius sanctus. Ut ergo ex
nomine, quod utrique convenit, utriusque communio significetur,
vocatur donum amborum Spiritus sanctus._]

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.

[Footnote 155: This is the interpretation of this passage by the
council of Chalcedon, in its missive to Pope Leo the Great. Compare
_Ballerini, op. S. Leonis_ t. i., p. 1087.]

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.

[Footnote 156: Hase, _Handbuch der prot. Polemik_ (Manual of
Protestant Polemics), p. 42. ]

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.

[Footnote 157: The means of grace administered by the Church
sometimes exert their influence beyond the pale, _i.e._, outside of,
her historical image. This is seen in the validity of the baptism of
heretics. ]

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.

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From The Month.

SONNET.

UNSPIRITUAL CIVILIZATION.

We have been piping, Lord; we have been singing;
Five hundred years have passed o'er lawn and lea,
Marked by the blowing bud and falling tree,
While all the ways with melody were ringing:
In tented lists, high-stationed and flower-flinging,
Beauty looked down on conquering chivalry;
Science made wise the nations; laws made free;
Art, like an angel ever onward winging,
Brightened the world. But, O great Lord and Father!
Have these, thy bounties, drawn to thee man's race,
That stood so far aloof? Have they not rather
His soul subjected? with a blind embrace
Gulfed it in sense? Prime blessings changed to curse
'Twixt God and man can set God's universe.

AUBREY DE VERE.

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{748}

From The Month

CONSTANCE SHERWOOD.

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON.