Tag: Church History

8 min read

Church History

Why is Sacrosanctum Concilium Important?

Msgr. C. Eugene Morris

November 14, 2023 7:30 am November 14, 2023

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8 min read

These celebrations have provided an opportunity for the Church to properly assess the achievements of the council as well as to discuss areas in which the council may have fallen…

These celebrations have provided an opportunity for the Church to properly assess the achievements of the council as well as to discuss areas in which the council may have fallen short. In addition to articulating both the successes and failures of Vatican II, these celebrations have provided the framework by which to discuss the impact of the council on the life of Holy Mother Church as well as positing what impact the council may have on the future of the Church.

In addition to these celebrations, in his Christmas address of 2005, then Pope Benedict XVI provided a significant hermeneutic (or lens) through which to view the work of the Second Vatican Council. He spoke about the hermeneutic of continuity between the work of the council and the life of the Church before and after the council. The “hermeneutic of reform,” of renewal, sees “the continuity of the one subject-Church which the Lord has given to us. She is a subject which increases in time and develops, yet always remaining the same, the one subject of the journeying People of God.”

And then he noted that certain sectors of culture and society sought to separate Vatican II from the history of the Church and promoted a hermeneutic of discontinuity focused on the spirit of the council, not the truths of the documents themselves: “The hermeneutic of discontinuity risks ending in a split between the pre-conciliar Church and the post-conciliar Church. It asserts that the texts of the council as such do not yet express the true spirit of the council. It claims that they are the result of compromises in which, to reach unanimity, it was found necessary to keep and reconfirm many old things that are now pointless. However, the true spirit of the council is not to be found in these compromises but instead in the impulses toward the new that are contained in the texts…. In a word: it would be necessary not to follow the texts of the council but its spirit. In this way, obviously, a vast margin was left open for the question on how this spirit should subsequently be defined and room was consequently made for every whim.”

This gap between the texts themselves and the allusive spirit of the interpreter created an opportunity to respond to every whim in the life of the Church.

The framework provided by both Pope Benedict and the Church’s historical celebrations creates the context for an overview of the first document promulgated by the council fathers, Sacrosanctum Concilium, Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy. It can be rightly argued that this document more than others suffered under the hermeneutic of discontinuity presented to the world in the context of the spirit of the document opposed to what the document actually outlined and promulgated. Despite the confusion sometimes created by this misreading of the document, Sacrosanctum Concilium remains integral to the Church’s organic development of the liturgy.

The council fathers wisely began the deliberations of Vatican II with the sacred liturgy precisely because of its significance in the life of the Church. The liturgy is “the outstanding means whereby the faithful may express in their lives, and manifest to others, the mystery of Christ and the real nature of the true Church” (Sacrosanctum Concilium, No. 2).

After articulating the nature of the liturgy, which is to build up and strengthen the body of Christ, the document prepares to articulate principles whereby the liturgy may be renewed chiefly so that the liturgy may be that source which imparts “an ever increasing vigor to the Christian life of the faithful” (No. 1). Before providing concrete principles by which this renewal should be governed, the council fathers exhorted a respect for and adherence and obedience to the tradition of the Church.

Jesus’ Priestly Office

The principles used to assist the Church in liturgical renewal involve, first, an understanding of the nature of the sacred liturgy. At the heart of what the Church celebrates in the sacred liturgy is a continuation of the Paschal Mystery of Jesus Christ and an expression of His mission to bring about salvation and reconciliation for the whole world.

The Church’s perennial teaching is that the redemptive work of Christ continues in the life of His spouse, the Church, who cooperates concretely in the mission of the Savior through sacramental life. The council states: “Christ is always present in His Church, especially in her liturgical celebrations. He is present in the sacrifice of the Mass, not only in the person of His minister, ‘the same now offering, through the ministry of the priests, who formerly offered himself on the cross,’ but especially under the Eucharistic species” (Sacrosanctum Concilium, No. 7).

The council fathers are able to define the liturgy as “an exercise of the priestly office of Jesus Christ” (No. 7). Through His priestly office Christ is able to sanctify men who are in turn able to fittingly adore God. The liturgy as an action of adoration and sanctification allow men to experience here on earth a foretaste of the glories of heaven and consequently requires from the faithful knowledge and spiritual understanding of what is happening when they are present at the sacred liturgy.

Renewal

Having established foundational principles for the renewal of the sacred liturgy, the document articulates norms for its renewal based on more general aspects of the nature of the liturgy: the communal nature of the liturgy, catechetical and pastoral aspects of the liturgy.

The document concludes the articulation of norms by mapping out the adaptation of the liturgy to the cultural realities in which it would be celebrated. The remaining sections of the document are given over to a discussion of each of the seven sacraments and sacramental realities beginning with the most holy Eucharist. Here the council fathers offer a re-articulation of traditional Catholic theology regarding each of the sacraments and applying the principles set forth at the beginning of the document.

After addressing each of the seven sacraments, the document addresses the importance of sacred art and furnishings. So, too, the council fathers give attention to the liturgical year, the Divine Office and sacred music.

The significance of Sacrosanctum Concilium comes not only from the comprehensive discussion of the whole of the liturgical life but also from the various misunderstandings about the sacred liturgy that developed as a result of a misreading of the document.

Chief among these misunderstandings regards the “full, conscious, and active participation” of all the faithful. This has been understood more often than not as an exhortation to involve more lay faithful in the work of the liturgy when the document makes no specific reference to how this might be implemented.

Furthermore, having already articulated the importance of tradition in rooting and guiding the renewal of the sacred liturgy, this particular phrase, having already appeared in magisterial documents, involves an interior preparation and awareness and has very little to do with exterior functions.

The document speaks eloquently about the importance of the ongoing use of and formation in the Latin language (see No. 36). While allowing the use of the vernacular in the celebration of the sacred liturgy, there is a clear exhortation for the preservation of the use of Latin in the liturgy.

Finally, while it has become normative to celebrate the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass facing the congregation, nowhere in the documents was it suggested or mandated that the Church abandon the ancient practice of celebrating holy Mass ad orientem — that is, facing the east.

Clear Directions

While the spirit of Sacrosanctum Concilium has been trumpeted to allow a variety of abuses to sacred celebrations, the document itself has provided the Church with clear directions to better assist all the faithful in fruitful celebrations of the sacred mysteries.

The exhortation for better knowledge of the rites and rituals of the faithful has provided the impetus for many in the post-conciliar period to strive for greater knowledge about the rituals so that they might more deeply penetrate the mysteries celebrated therein. So, too, the exposure to more sacred Scripture has brought the richness of biblical language more comprehensively into the liturgy.

As the Church now moves beyond these historical celebrations and reflections, she is presented with an opportunity to return to the actual content of the document itself and to authentically execute the desire of the council fathers for a deeper appreciation of the Church’s liturgical life. With the pontificates of Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis, who has publically committed himself and the Church to the liturgical insights and direction of his predecessor, the Church will be able to more authentically engage the dynamics of liturgical renewal articulated by the council.

The understanding of the council fathers that the celebration of the Church’s liturgical life was the source and summit of all her activities is still very much operative today as it was at its promulgation.

What Sacrosanctum Concilium provides, within the framework of restored tradition and sound doctrine, is the opportunity to assist the faithful in experiencing more deeply and richly the incarnate wisdom and love of God.

Msgr. C. Eugene Morris, a priest of the St. Louis archdiocese.

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8 min read

The Church

What is heraldry in the Catholic Church?

Michael R. Heinlein

October 8, 2023 7:15 am October 8, 2023

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Ecclesiastical heraldry is both familiar and mysterious. Frequently seen in one form or another, coats of arms pervade our Catholic culture in numerous ways: on letters and newspapers, diocesan websites…

Ecclesiastical heraldry is both familiar and mysterious.

Frequently seen in one form or another, coats of arms pervade our Catholic culture in numerous ways: on letters and newspapers, diocesan websites and Twitter pages, in Roman churches and diocesan cathedrals. Most Catholics, though, are unaware of the significance of this time-honored practice.

Steeped in tradition, ecclesiastical heraldry is a regulated system of self-identification, adopted by the Church from medieval society, which operates as a science and an art form with its own rules and regulations.

A heraldic achievement, also called a coat of arms, is permitted lawfully for those who occupy ecclesiastical office — for example, popes, cardinals, archbishops, bishops, monsignors, priests, religious superiors such as abbots and abbesses — as well as ecclesiastical territories and institutions — for example, dioceses, religious orders, papal knighthoods, basilicas, cathedrals, parish churches, schools and other Catholic institutions. While heraldry runs the risk of being seen as haughty or pompous, in reality it simply seeks to graphically herald (or announce) — in color and symbol — who and what the bearer is.

Identification

The use of artistic elements to identify personages, locations and possessions first existed in pre-Christian societies. Pharaohs of ancient Egypt offer one of the earliest precursors of heraldic practices. Their various holdings of goods and properties were identified with the symbols found in the cartouche, an oval symbol containing personal hieroglyphics with a distinct line at the bottom indicating royalty. Likewise, the Book of Numbers provides evidence that standards and symbols were used by the tribes of the nomadic Israelites in early biblical times (see 1:2,18,52).

The papal coat of arms of Pope Benedict XVI (2005-2013). Shutterstock

Modern heraldry finds its origins with the Battle of Hastings in 1066 — illustrated in the famous Bayeux Tapestry — when knights concealed by battle armor were first identified with decorated shields. Later developments incorporated the shield design into body coats, banners and even coverings for horses. These coats of arms subsequently became synonymous with the knight’s family, especially following the Third Crusade (1189-92). The shape and character of ecclesiastical heraldry are closely tied to these developments since the Church adopted many of the customs and traditions of the culture.

As feudal and belligerent Europe shifted into the structures of nobility and royalty, familial arms were used much as in ancient Egypt — to identify themselves and their possessions. Similar measures of personal identification were incorporated into items such as seals (often part of rings), which were legally mandated for use on documents and letters as a means to provide authenticity and prevent forgery.

Because noble status and property was inherited by the oldest son through primogeniture, the youngest son was typically offered for service in the Church. Familial arms continued to be used by those appointed to such ecclesiastical positions of jurisdiction and authority, although they were typically modified for ecclesiastical use by removing warlike symbols. Many sources indicate that the first bishop known to do so was Guy of Vergy, bishop of Autun in the early 13th century. A personal papal coat of arms — other than just the standard tiara and keys indicative of papal office — was first used during the pontificate of Pope Martin V (1417-31). Use of heraldry by all ecclesiastical officeholders became a standardized means of self-identification beginning in the 17th century.

Heraldry’s Rules

Because a coat of arms seeks to identify its bearer, each must be unique — like a passport or Social Security number. Therefore, offices and methods for documentation and legislation for both secular and ecclesiastical heraldry were established, the most notable and enduring secular example being the College of Arms established in England by King Richard III in 1484. Initial codification of heraldry in the Church coincided with widespread practice by the 17th century through a system of ecclesiastical headgear developed by French heraldist and printer Pierre Palliot.

Although the jurisprudence of secular heraldry significantly weighs upon the Church’s heraldic tradition, it was also shaped by the development of doctrinal, liturgical and canonical factors. The Church itself began to systematically regulate her heraldry in 1905, with Pope St. Pius X’s establishment of the Heraldry Commission of the Roman Curia, an office abolished in 1960 by Pope St. John XXIII.

The papal coat of arms of Pope St. John Paul II (1978-2005). He was the last pope to adopt the triple tiara of the popes. Shutterstock

At the end of the subsequent decade, with the approval of Pope Paul VI, three specialists published Rubrica Araldica Vaticana — the compendium of rules governing ecclesiastical heraldry today. Likewise, the Vatican Secretariat of State issued Ut sive sollicite in 1969, a brief instruction on coats of arms and other honorifics for cardinals, bishops and other prelates. Current scholarly interest in the field is reinforced by the laudable and exhaustive 2014 manual of ecclesiastical heraldry published by Cardinal Andrea Cordero Lanza di Montezemolo, a leading heraldic authority and designer of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI’s coat of arms.

An equally significant aspect of heraldry’s regulations is the centuries’ old linguistic components governing it. In effect, heraldry has its own language.

Even today, the artistic rendering of a coat of arms is accompanied by a lengthy explanation written in blazon — heraldry’s own language. Coming from a word from French for “shield,” blazon combines terms of Old English and French resulting in a language with a distinctive word order, vocabulary and grammar. Blazon describes a coat of arms with such detail that it is possible to be artistically reproduced by anyone familiar with the lexicon. Coats of arms are described in Latin from the bearer’s point of view, left and right for the viewer correspondingly are called dexter and sinister.

A coat of arms for each ecclesiastical order, office, rank or institution contains several symbolic elements. External elements to the coat of arms describe what office and jurisdiction the bearer holds, while interior elements describe the bearer.

Starting at the uppermost part, replacing the knight’s helmet or monarch’s crown on the crest of secular arms, most ecclesiastical arms are topped with a galero — a hat now only used in ceremonial depictions.

The unique and central part of any coat of arms is the shield. Most shields for cardinals and bishops are impaled — a combination of two parts often indicating occupation of an office — in which the arms of the bearer’s diocese are seen on the left and personal arms are on the right. Examples of those bearing only their personal arms are titular bishops such as auxiliaries, some cardinals and officials in the Roman Curia or cardinals not ordained as bishops. Behind a bishop’s shield is a processional cross denoting rank in the episcopate: one horizontal bar indicates a bishop or two indicates an archbishop. The cross is replaced by a crosier for those with ordinary jurisdiction who are not bishops, such as abbots or the ordinaries of the Anglican Ordinariates. Because they occupy positions of jurisdiction, male and female religious superiors are entitled to bear a coat of arms, although the only one of those which might be impaled is an abbot’s with the arms of his abbey.

The coat of arms of Cardinal Angelo Scola, Archbishop of Milan since 2012, and previously the Patriarch of Venice. Shutterstock

A quick glance at a coat of arms, then, provides important information. Looking at the coat of arms of Cardinal Angelo Scola depicted on Page 28, the following facts about him can be deduced by reading his coat of arms: The coat of arms is topped with a red galero, indicating he is a cardinal; there is a processional cross with two horizontal bars, indicating he is a metropolitan archbishop; there is an impaled shield, indicating he is the ordinary bishop of his archdiocese.

Personal aspects of a shield also incorporate elements of the bearer’s life, often depicting symbols representative of their particular devotions or patron saints, life events or genealogy. Additionally, below the shield is a motto chosen by the bearer, typically from Scripture.

Michael R. Heinlein is editor of Simply Catholic. Follow him on Twitter @HeinleinMichael.

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7 min read

Scripture

What We Believe, Part 9: The Earliest Church

Father Joshua J. Whitfield

August 30, 2023 7:00 am August 30, 2023

7 min read

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7 min read

Focusing on the Church first not so much as an institution or historical entity, not so much in sociological terms, we must discover the Church is in its nature: that…

Focusing on the Church first not so much as an institution or historical entity, not so much in sociological terms, we must discover the Church is in its nature: that it’s the communion the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit opened up to believers in Christ. In John 17, Jesus prayed that his disciples would be perfectly one — in and for glory, joy and love — just as the Father and Son are one (see Jn 17:11, 21, 23). This is the essence of the Church, and it is what we must grasp before thinking of the Church in any of its other aspects — historical, cultural, bureaucratic or otherwise. That we first see the Church theologically is essential.

But if this is true, we should be able to discern the Church in its essence over time in the tradition. Jesus of Nazareth prayed that his disciples — from beginning to end — be one in a communion of glory, joy and love. Yet, how is that true of today’s Church? Karl Adam, the great German theologian, offered a famous image to help us think of both continuity and change as it pertains to the essence of the Church. He said the Catholic Church relates to both the Gospel and the early Church as a great oak tree relates to the acorn (The Spirit of Catholicism, 2). That is, the Church and the Gospel are in organic continuity, two ends of a vast natural process. Which is why the best thing to do, moving on from John 17, is to read the rest of Scripture and then the tradition in order to track that very continuity — that one communion we call the Church.

To begin, then, we should notice what I called earlier the mission for glory — the great trajectory of the evangelical movement beginning in the Trinity. That is, the Father sends the Son while the Son sends the disciples (as the Spirit is also sent by the Father and the Son), who in turn send their disciples, who in turn send theirs, and on and on. This mission for glory is discernible immediately after the Resurrection, first in Jesus’ words to Mary Magdalene to “go to my brothers and tell them” (Jn 20:17). Later that first Easter evening, Jesus speaks of the mission for glory again, echoing his prayer to the Father, saying to the disciples, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you,” just before giving them the Holy Spirit and the mission of reconciliation (Jn 20:21-23). The other Gospels describe this mission as well, most famously perhaps in Matthew — in the so-called Great Commission — where just before his Ascension, Jesus tells his disciples to “make disciples of all nations” (Mt 28:19). Both Mark and Matthew’s version say that preaching, teaching and baptism are how disciples are to be made, and Mark even talks about accompanying charismatic signs (Mk 16:15-18). That is, how the Church is gathered into one is by means of preaching and sacraments. While more will be said later in this series, when we will explore Scripture, Tradition and the sacraments, at this point it suffices simply to point out that the mission for glory — beginning in the Trinity and which we learned about in John 17 — continues immediately after the resurrection of Jesus. That is, Jesus’ desire that his disciples be one does not end with John 17. Rather, it begins.

And it is important to note also that the mission for glory is also geographic. We see this right away in Acts of the Apostles, in Jesus’ instructions to the disciples to bear him witness “throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). The command, basically, is to go north and beyond. Here the various traditions of apostolic missions begin — Peter and Paul to Rome, John to Ephesus, Thomas to India, and so on. Now, this is important because it shows us that the mission for glory involves a double movement. That is, as the apostolic mission extends outward, enveloping in time the entire globe, God, by that same mission, gathers everyone to him. To put it simply: As the Church spreads out, God gathers in. This belongs to the very mechanics of mission and evangelism. It is why the Church still seeks to bear witness to Christ in all things, from foreign missions to parish preaching to small acts of personal charity and testimony. It is how we share our faith in Christ, how the Church grows — the one communion of glory, joy and love that Jesus prayed for. This is how it happens.

Now Luke describes what this communion looked like, at least ideally at the start, in Acts of the Apostles. There he tells us the earliest Christians “devoted themselves to the teaching of the apostles and to the communal life, to the breaking of the bread and to the prayers” (Acts 2:42). This, Luke says, is what the first Christians were up to. First, they were committed to apostolic teaching and fellowship, that is, to the message that the Father sent the Son and that the Son, Jesus of Nazareth, died, rose again, ascended, and will return; and also that the risen Jesus calls us into communion, into oneness. Second, they were devoted to the “breaking of the bread,” that is the Eucharist — to be explored further later. And then, they were devoted to “the prayers,” again, something else to explore later. At this point we should remember the first Christians were also good Jews, so they would have been faithful in their daily prayers in the Temple, or at least in direction of the Temple.

Luke also says, “All who believed were together and had all things in common” (Acts 2:44). Now what this exactly means is debated, which is an argument well beyond our discussion. Remember, though, what we are trying to discover — traces of the mission for glory and signs of the oneness Christ prayed for. How was that oneness lived out as Church at the beginning? They held “all things in common.” Now, again, we need not get sidetracked by questions as to what exactly this meant, for example, whether this was some form of early Christian communism (which it is not by the way, as we’ll discover later). The simple point here is that the early Church had a strong and tangible notion of what it meant to be one. They prayed together, celebrated the Eucharist together, and shared their material resources — it was a real tangible communion and not merely a construct of conceptual or ideological agreement. The Church at this point was lived more than it was conceived. And they lived it “every day,” Luke tells us, gathering in homes, for there were as yet no churches. Yet, increasing in numbers and in the Lord’s favor, the Church grew — because of what they believed and in whom they believed.

Father Joshua J. Whitfield is pastor of St. Rita Catholic Community in Dallas and author of “The Crisis of Bad Preaching” (Ave Maria Press, $17.95) and other books. Read more from the series here.

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11 min read

Scripture

What We Believe, Part 13: The One Early Church

Father Joshua J. Whitfield

July 26, 2023 7:55 am July 26, 2023

11 min read

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11 min read

If the Church is one because it’s rooted in the oneness of the Trinity — as John 17 suggests — then the Church must still be one, even today. This…

If the Church is one because it’s rooted in the oneness of the Trinity — as John 17 suggests — then the Church must still be one, even today.

This is not to deny the reality of Christian division. Rather, it is to make a claim about the essence of the Church. I’m talking about theological reality, which, undoubtedly, ought to convict believers mired in, accustomed to and even protective of their divisions. Jesus prayed to his Father that his believers would be one “just as we are” (Jn 17:11), the origin of the notion that the Church is the oneness of the disciples rooted in the oneness of the Trinity — in love, joy and glory.

Now if this is true, we should be able to detect this one Church beyond the New Testament. We should be able to trace the oneness that is the Church throughout history. Which is why we now turn to writings beyond Scripture, to those of the Church Fathers.

However, before turning to these patristic (patristic as in “of the Fathers”) sources, it’s first helpful to think a little about how best to explore Christianity — or the obverse, how not to explore it. One of the worst things to do when studying Christianity, for instance, is to read the Bible as if two millennia of Christian history didn’t happen. That ruins one’s understanding of Christianity instantly. It’s critical to grasp that the Christian faith is mediated not just scripturally, not just by means of individual enlightenment, but by a variety of means and in different ways — by history, art, culture, and so on. To explore the Christian and Catholic faith and the Church well at all, one must consider as broadly as possible all these various phenomena — the Tradition and traditions of the Church, movements and controversies, eras of trial and renewal. Only then can a person truly discover the Church; only then can one follow the biblical reality of the Church through history. “To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant,” St. John Henry Newman wrote (An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine I.5). This is what he was talking about — the need to widen the scope of one’s exploration of Christianity in order to discover Christianity genuinely. But, of course, as the quote from Newman suggests, be careful because it’ll make you a Catholic! The grace and knowledge of Jesus is something both spiritually immediate and mediated. That is, the Catholic faith is faith given to believers in the Holy Spirit, by the Scripture, but culturally too. Which is why things like tradition and history matter, because they, too, deliver the Faith.

So, back to our exploration. The one early Church — where is it? To find it, it’s best to assemble a small patristic anthology, a “florilegium” to use the old term. That is, where did the Fathers describe the Church as described in the New Testament, as oneness? One of the earliest places to look is in St. Clement of Rome’s First Letter to the Corinthians. St. Clement is usually listed fourth in the list of the bishops of Rome — a list beginning, of course, with St. Peter. Dying at the close of the first century, the letter bearing his name is all about the oneness of the Church. The letter begins lamenting “the odious and unholy breach of unity” (1 Clement 1). Writing to the Corinthians, as did Paul before him, he begs them to “get back to the state of tranquility which was set before us in the beginning.” In the same breath he invites readers to think of the peace of God, practicing forbearance so that their community may be one, without “any friction” (1 Clement 19). The letter calls the Corinthian community, beset by divisions and bad leadership, to struggle for oneness as set forth in the New Testament. Important for Jesus and for Paul, it remained important for St. Clement, too.

A century on we meet St. Irenaeus of Lyons. He was an early champion of Catholic belief — correct belief, orthodoxy — in an age of multiple rival accounts of Christianity, when what constituted genuine Christian teaching and belief was for many unclear. St. Irenaeus, in his day, helped Christians navigate those troubled waters, and one of the ways he did so was by reminding Christians what the Church was in its essence. He described the Church not merely in historical or organizational terms, but spiritually and organically. “Where the Church is, there is the Spirit of God,” he wrote. And “where the Spirit of God is, there is the Church.” Not just history or institution, St. Irenaeus sees the Church as something essentially spiritual. Like Paul, he uses bodily imagery. “Those,” he said, “who do not partake of Him, are neither nourished into life from the mother’s breasts, nor do they enjoy that most clear fountain which issues from the body of Christ” (Against Heresies 3.24.1). St. Irenaeus uses earthly, organic and sensual imagery to describe not only the Church’s nature but also what it means to belong to the Church. Believers belong to the Church, not as registered members of a club, but as children of one mother. We’re born to the Church. This image of Church as mother is ancient. Even Jesus used it at the end of Matthew’s Gospel when he said that he desired to gather Jerusalem like a mother hen (Mt 23:37). The point of such imagery is to emphasize that the Church is not like other institutions — merely manmade or functional. Instead, it’s an organic communion. Thus, how we relate to the Church is different — organically, sacramentally, not contractually. When we think about the Church, we must think primarily in these organic terms — body, bride, mother — otherwise we won’t understand the Church at all.

And if belonging to the Church is, in a sense, organic, then belonging is necessary. If to be a Christian, one must be born, then we must be born of some mother — mother Church, the body of Christ, to use these biblical images. It makes sense, too, that there is one mother of Christians. The logic of such imagery is that the bond of believers is like family, a bond that is not just biological but spiritual — yet always tangible and visible. This is how fathers like St. Cyprian of Carthage, an early bishop and martyr from the third century, can say the rather hard things he did. “He who has turned his back on the Church shall not come to the rewards of Christ: he is an alien, a worldling, an enemy,” he wrote. “You cannot have God for your Father if you have not the Church for your mother” (On the Unity of the Catholic Church 1.6).

Today, many find this offensive because it cuts at our modern sense of individualism, and that’s understandable. Yet a few things should be said in St. Cyprian’s defense. First, he was a martyr writing during brutal years of persecution when belonging to the Church was quite dangerous. That by itself— I’ve always thought — calls for respect. Christianity wasn’t a pastime for him as it is for many of us. Second, St. Cyprian was writing in a time, because of persecution, when many Christians forsook the Faith because they feared death. To avoid persecution, all Christians had to do was offer a little incense in honor of the Capitoline gods and be on their way, silencing for just a moment their professed absolute obedience to Christ. Christians flaked left and right, and the question of what to do with these “lapsed” believers tore the Church in two, literally. Persecution gave way to schism. And St. Cyprian — thinking people’s souls in jeopardy because of it simply did not share our carefree view of Christian division — had to put things in the starkest of terms: “You cannot have God for your Father if you have not the Church for your mother.” Yes, harsh, but if what we’ve said about the Church is true, what else could St. Cyprian have said? St. Cyprian is not speaking in institutional or bureaucratic terms or in modern terms of choice or affiliation but, like St. Irenaeus, organically. He’s not talking about institutional loyalty but about birth and life. People are mystically born into the Church; they don’t just join it, he believed. Thus, belonging to the Church is a life-and-death business, St. Cyprian assumed. One cannot renounce it and hope to survive, just as a child would not survive without the nurturing care of his or her mother. This may not be how a lot of people think about Christianity or the Church today, but it is the ancient way of thinking about it and nearer the biblical way, too. And, with some nuance, it’s also the Catholic way, even today.

In this small florilegium we move now, a few centuries on, to St. Augustine, the great fifth century bishop from northern Africa. Writing in his City of God, St. Augustine echoes the Letter to the Hebrews: the “immortal and blessed beings” in heaven — the angels — love us. They are compassionate toward us, for “their aim is for our immortality and blessedness.” And that’s because the angels “with us make one City of God.” They too belong to the Church. “Part of this City, the part which consists of us, is on pilgrimage; part of it, the part which consists of angels, helps us on our way” (City of God 10.17). Remember the Sanctus at Mass. Remember the Church cosmic. Again, we’re not talking about some mere human institution, some sociological happenstance, but the City of God — a body, a bride, a mother, one communion born in the Trinity.

But, of course, this oneness, this communion, will not be perfected in this life. This is not to say the reunion of Christians is impossible; rather, it’s to remember that the communion of the one Church will be perfected only in heaven. It’s to remember that ultimately this one Church we seek is God’s work and not ours. St. Augustine often thought of Christian communities in terms of Acts 4:32, that the Church was a people of one heart and one soul. He thought of monks and nuns that way, the priests who lived with him, and married couples, too. “Out of many souls there will arise a city of people with a single soul and a single heart turned to God,” he wrote. But, of course, the “perfection of our unity will come about after this pilgrimage” when, finally, “no longer will anyone be in conflict with anyone about anything” (The Excellence of Marriage 18.21). It’s a beautiful thought, really — the Church, an organic communion of peace, perfected ultimately in heaven. This is the Church, the body of Christ, the bride, mother. There are so many other images we’ve not even hinted at, yet the truth each image evokes is the same. The Church is no mere human institution, but a communion, the oneness of the Father and the Son in the Spirit. This is Catholic belief, what we believe.

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8 min read

Scripture

What We Believe, Part 14: A Conciliar Church

Father Joshua J. Whitfield

July 19, 2023 11:59 pm July 19, 2023

8 min read

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8 min read

Beginning with Jesus, as is only right, and then looking at the New Testament and at a few representative texts from early Christianity, we’ve discerned, just a little, the essence…

Beginning with Jesus, as is only right, and then looking at the New Testament and at a few representative texts from early Christianity, we’ve discerned, just a little, the essence of the Church. We now shift focus to explore the Church today.

But first, a brief review. The Church, remember, is ecclesia, the called body of believers. Its essence belongs to the communion of the Trinity, opened to believers in Jesus Christ, to those who by faith believe him to be the incarnate Son of God. When believers live in Jesus, he lives in them, which is how believers in Christ find themselves in communion with God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. That’s how the Church is holy.

But this communion with God is also at the same time communion with other believers — with the adelphoi — all those with faith sharing in Christ together. It’s a communion grown by means of the Apostles’ preaching; what John saw and heard he proclaimed to others, for instance, creating fellowship, as he said, both “with us” and “with the Father” (1 Jn 1:3). That is, the communion of the Church is both divine and human, not just holy but also catholic and apostolic. It’s built upon the preaching of the Apostles and fellowship with them, and it includes all believers. But it’s also a communion characterized always by the oneness Jesus prayed for in John 17, which, as we saw when exploring that passage in depth, meant something more than mere esprit de corps, more, too, than metaphor. Jesus spoke in terms much more demanding than just conceptual or sentimental unity; his followers were to be one. Now of course, we have yet to flesh out how the Church remains one, but we will elsewhere in exploring the sacraments and also the papacy.

But for now, that’s the Church — unam, sanctam, catholicam et apostolicam. Whatever we think of it historically, sociologically, politically, bureaucratically, that is the Church in essence — this divine and human communion. And it’s important to remember this for several reasons. First, it helps us remember that the Church is something more mysteriously enduring and more beautiful than what we may see of the Church at any one time. When the Church isn’t beautiful, this is really important to remember. But it’s also important because it challenges our sometimes overly individualistic accounts of Christian belief. It helps us remember that the Lord’s Prayer is prayed always to “our Father” and not “my Father.” It helps us retain a more biblical understanding of Christian belief and belonging, remembering that the Church is, to use Paul’s imagery, the body of Christ; or to use John’s imagery — echoing the Song of Songs — that it’s the bride of Christ. Now there are, as we’ll see, many more images given to this mysterious communion, yet the underlying truth is the same: the Church is ecclesia, the body and the bride of Christ, a single communion rooted in God. As the great theologian Henri de Lubac put it, “The Church of God is unique: there is only a single Body of Christ, a single Spouse of Christ, a single fold, a single flock under a single Shepherd” (The Motherhood of the Church, 171). This is the truth I’ve slowly tried to describe, a truth about the essence of the Church that endures even today, and that we’ll need to remember as we continue our exploration of Catholicism. Now, however, our task is simply to find it in the present, in the Church of today.

So, fast forward. To understand the Catholic Church today, one must understand the Second Vatican Council — what it was and in a certain sense still is. It was announced by Pope St. John XXIII on Jan. 25, 1959 after Mass at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls in Rome. The Council opened three years later in 1962 and ended in 1965. However, in 1959, when only 10 weeks into his pontificate John XXIII called the council, it shocked the Church and the world, too. Now John XXIII was himself a surprise. Quite old when elected, many thought he’d simply keep the papal seat warm until a younger pope came along. Little did anyone expect he was going to shake things up like he did. A joyful man — humble, hilarious and holy — he said himself how the idea of calling an ecumenical council was sudden and unexpected. And not only did news of the council shock many, it changed the world. It was a meeting of massive importance for all Christians, not just Roman Catholics, and whether you know it or not, you’ve been influenced by Vatican II.

An ecumenical council is simply a great meeting of bishops and others in the Church, and it belongs to a long tradition of councils. The Church has held councils since the beginning, since the so-called Council of Jerusalem in Acts 13. Then, the question was about what to do with all the Gentiles coming into the Church. Should they follow the dietary laws of Judaism? Should they be circumcised? These were serious controversies, leading to quite heated debates. And really, ever since, the Church has been arguing, coming together informally and formally in what the tradition came to call councils — some large, some small — to argue important points of theology or discipline and sometimes a whole lot more. And we’ve gained much from this tradition. The Creed we say every Sunday, for instance, is a product of two councils — the Council of Nicaea in 325 and the Council of Constantinople in 381. The Catholic Church calls some councils ecumenical councils, which means those that relate to the entire Church. Different traditions count ecumenical councils differently — some count only seven, some only three. The Roman Catholic Church counts 21 ecumenical councils.

Now, generally speaking, until Vatican II, ecumenical councils were called in response to some controversy, either of theology or discipline. The Council of Nicaea, for example, was called in response to the controversy caused by a rather eloquent priest from Alexandria in Egypt named Arius who was going around preaching that Jesus was a “creature,” that he was “made” and “created,” not God quite like the Father is God. And so, the Church gathered at Nicaea to refute Arius. And, if you know anything of the history of the Arian controversy, to listen to the Nicene Creed is to hear the Church basically scold Arius. For example, that the Creed says “begotten, not made” is really quite a specific dig at Arius. We no longer hear it that way, but bishops in the fourth century certainly did. The Council of Ephesus in the fourth century responded to Nestorius, the Council of Trent in the sixteenth century to the Protestant Reformation and so on. Or, for matters of discipline, as again at Nicaea when the council fathers declared that castrated clergy couldn’t be promoted — a quite odd but also quite serious issue at the time!

Yet when John XXIII called the Second Vatican Council, there really was no urgent problem afoot. There were certainly in the first half of the 20th century both creative tensions and uncreative tensions in the Church. The modern world was rapidly changing, and there was significant argument within the Church about how best to confront such changes. Catholic theologians and leaders in France, for instance, wanted to engage the world quite differently than those in Italy. And there was even some talk of another council under Pius XII — whose papacy, by the way, very much reflects the wider tensions in play at the time — but it was not an idea that had gained much traction. Catholics by and large were getting on just fine, most thought. Whatever tensions existed were being managed well enough by the ordinary means of debate, censure and old-fashioned Church politics. And so, when John XXIII called the Council in 1959, most wondered what for. It’s a spiritual question, in fact, that’s still being asked today. But more on that next week.

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9 min read

Church History

The Holy Grail

Stephanie Mann

July 4, 2023 7:52 am July 4, 2023

9 min read

18934 views

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9 min read

If you’re aware of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table — if you’ve heard Richard Wagner’s opera Parsifal or seen movies such as “Indiana Jones and the…

If you’re aware of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table — if you’ve heard Richard Wagner’s opera Parsifal or seen movies such as “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade” — you’ve heard of the Holy Grail.

That object of quest and romance, providing supernatural nourishment and healing, has a long history in literature and legend. Tales about the Holy Grail — as a stone or gem, as the chalice Jesus used, or as the platter on which the Passover lamb was served at the Last Supper before Jesus suffered and died on Calvary — appeared in French, English, German and Italian during the 12th and 13th centuries. The stories include mysterious connections with Joseph of Arimathea, the spear of Longinus (the centurion who pierced Christ’s side on the cross) and even the conversion of England. The Grail was also sometimes described as the cup in which Joseph of Arimathea caught the blood and water that poured from Christ’s side after Longinus pierced Him as He hung dead on the cross, a mysterious sign of the Sacraments of Baptism and the Eucharist and their source in the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

In these early versions of the quest for the Holy Grail, the imagery clearly reflects Catholic belief in the real presence of Jesus Christ in the Precious Body and Blood of the Holy Eucharist. In spite of all these sacramental and doctrinal images and interpretation, the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages did not participate in or emphasize the quest for the Holy Grail. While the medieval Church is often criticized for taking advantage of miracles and shrines for pilgrimage, she did not use this seemingly perfect opportunity for donations and bequests to venerate the Holy Grail, among other relics of Jesus’ life and passion. Yet, in the same era, the Church developed even greater devotion to the holy Eucharist through the institution of the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, the Body and Blood of Christ, in 1264. Pope Urban IV asked St. Thomas Aquinas to write the Divine Office for this great feast, and he composed the great hymns and sequences we sing today on Holy Thursday and Easter Sunday and at Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. The legend of the Holy Grail coincides with this focused devotion and adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, which including the Corpus Christi processions.

Journeys of the Grail

The story of the Holy Grail begins with Joseph of Arimathea, the member of the Sanhedrin who went to Pontius Pilate for permission to remove Jesus’ body from the cross on Good Friday. Joseph and Nicodemus — who had come to Jesus secretly — prepared His body for burial in Joseph’s own new tomb. Imprisoned by the Jewish authorities for his proclamation of Jesus’ resurrection, according to the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, Joseph receives the Grail from our Savior to nourish him — then miraculously escapes from his cell without disturbing the seals on the door. Leaving the Holy Land, he travels to France and then to England, bringing the Grail with him to Glastonbury in Somerset, England. As Glastonbury is also claimed by some legends to be the burial place of King Arthur and his queen, Guinevere, the legends of Avalon or Camelot and the Holy Grail become entwined.

The Holy Grail of Arthurian legends becomes the great object of a chivalric quest, as the Knights of the Round Table set out to find the chalice and the Holy Blood (the sangreal) — and fail or succeed according to their purity and holiness. Thus the great Lancelot fails because of his adulterous affair with Guinevere, while Percival, Bors or Galahad, depending on the version, succeed because of their purity, or in the case of Galahad his virginity. Literary historians have often surmised that the ideals of chivalry were inspired by medieval devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. Arthur’s knights strove to be brave, to defend women, and to be chastely devoted to their chosen Lady. When a knight failed in this ideal, as Sir Lancelot failed, the Holy Grail became a catalyst for his repentance as he recognizes his unworthiness and does penance for his sins of adultery and disloyalty.

Although Thomas Malory’s 15th century Le Morte d’Arthur included the quest for the Holy Grail in his influential summation of the Arthurian legends, the fascination of the Grail legend faded at the end of the Middle Ages. The story of the Holy Grail was revived by Romantic and Victorian era interest in what many called the “Age of Chivalry,” with Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s “Idylls of the King” (1869) and Richard Wagner’s Bayreuth festival piece Parsifal (c. 1880), although both the Anglican Tennyson and the mystical Wagner eliminated the background of the Real Presence in their Grails. In the 20th century, “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” tells a ridiculously comic version of King Arthur’s knights and their quests, while John Boorman’s 1981 film, “Excalibur,” based on Thomas Malory’s work, included Percival’s successful quest for the Holy Grail, healing Arthur and the land because “the land and the king are one.”

Myths and Theories

Joseph of Arimathea removes Jesus from the cross. Shutterstock

This mysterious link between the legend of the Holy Grail and Britain, or England, became an argument for the English Reformation in the 16th century. Queen Elizabeth I cited Joseph of Arimathea’s presence in England long before Pope St. Gregory the Great sent St. Augustine of Canterbury to Kent as important to the tales. She informed the Catholic bishops who protested against the establishment of the Church in England at Parliament in 1559 that Joseph of Arimathea was the “first preacher of the Word of God” in England, and that the country already had bishops and priests when Rome “usurped” their authority. Elizabeth was citing the authority of the sixth-century monk Gildas, whose shrine at Glastonbury Abbey had been destroyed when King Henry VIII suppressed all the monasteries, convents and friaries in England, Wales and those parts of Ireland he ruled.

Near the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey today, the annual Glastonbury Festival celebrates music and New Age, neo-pagan spirituality during the summer solstice. Although the most reliable historical research indicates that Glastonbury Abbey was founded in the seventh century, the legends of King Arthur, Joseph of Arimathea, the Holy Grail, Avalon and even the Glastonbury Thorn, a tree that magically grew from Joseph’s staff, become a confusing tangle of mystery and secret knowledge.

Conspiracy theorists have even woven the legend of the Holy Grail into their webs of arcane and unknowable history, presenting a story that Dan Brown infamously adopted in “The Da Vinci Code.” This version claims that the Holy Grail was really the womb of Mary Magdalen, or her descendents from her marriage with Jesus, who had not really died on the cross, nor risen from the dead — and who, according to Brown and his sources, is not really the Incarnate God, the Second Person of the Trinity, who came to earth to redeem us and establish His Church.

The Real Presence

As noted in the 2006 book “The Grail Code: Quest for the Real Presence” (Loyola Press), Adolf Hitler did search for the Holy Grail just as “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade” depicts. He and Heinrich Himmler were fascinated by the promise of great and secret powers they could obtain by possessing the Grail; Hitler believed the blood of the Grail was the original, pure Aryan blood. Himmler, according to “The Grail Code,” was “nuts for Grail lore and the Arthurian legends in general” (p. 223), and he both re-created the Round Table at the SS headquarters and searched for the Holy Grail in southern France, the enclave of the medieval Cathars, Gnostic heretics who surely would not have valued the Holy Grail in connection with the Eucharist. The Cathars rejected belief in the Real Presence in the Eucharist because of their absolute dualism, believing that all matter is evil, and since each of the seven sacraments involve matter (bread and wine, water and oil, etc.), they refused baptism and all the human elements of the Catholic Church.

But all these false views of the Holy Grail cannot diminish the true mystery of the real presence of Jesus Christ in the holy Eucharist. We have found the Holy Grail; Jesus Christ gave it to the Church the night before He died and told the apostles to “do this in memory of me” (Lk 22:19). At every Mass the words of consecration make the Lord present in holy Communion, our sacramental source of nourishment and healing.

Stephanie A. Mann writes from Kansas.

Thomas Aquinas and the Grail

When he wrote the Divine Office for the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, St. Thomas Aquinas also wrote prayers to prepare for and rejoice after receiving holy Communion. As the Holy Grail healed and made whole the knight who was worthy to find and receive it, St. Thomas shows how much we need the healing grace of holy Communion: “Almighty and ever-living God, I approach the sacrament of Your only-begotten Son Our Lord Jesus Christ, I come sick to the doctor of life, unclean to the fountain of mercy, blind to the radiance of eternal light, and poor and needy to the Lord of heaven and earth. Lord, in your great generosity, heal my sickness, wash away my defilement, enlighten my blindness, enrich my poverty, and clothe my nakedness. May I receive the bread of angels, the King of kings and Lord of lords, with humble reverence, with the purity and faith, the repentance and love, and the determined purpose that will help to bring me to salvation. May I receive the sacrament of the Lord’s Body and Blood, and its reality and power. . . . Amen.”

Like knights of old we seek the Holy Grail, finding it at Mass each Sunday or weekday, praying to be prepared to receive the Lord’s Body and Blood worthily and devoutly.

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