TH04: CHURCH AND SACRAMENTS

21 January 2025
Tuesday | 1pm – 4pm

WHAT IS THE CHURCH?

 The Church is the community of those who confess the lordship of Jesus (that He
is “the way, the truth, and the life” – John 14:6) and who strive to live their lives in
accordance with His example and teachings.

 The Church is also known as the People of God, the Body of Christ, and the
Temple of the Holy Spirit among other names. Those three names, however,
highlight the Trinitarian context for an understanding of the Church, a context that
is also employed by Vatican II’s Dogmatic Constitution on the Church.

 The Eternal Father, by a free and hidden plan of His own wisdom and
goodness, created the whole world. His plan was to raise men to a
participation of the divine life. He did not leave men to sin but ceaselessly
offered helps to salvation, in view of Christ, the Redeemer “who is the
image of the invisible God. He planned to assemble in the holy Church all
those who would believe in Christ. . . At the end of time it will gloriously
achieve completion, when, as is read in the Fathers, all the just, from
Adam and “from Abel, the just one, to the last of the elect,” will be
gathered together with the Father in the universal Church.” (LG 02)

 The Son, therefore, came, sent by the Father. To carry out the will of the
Father, Christ inaugurated the Kingdom of heaven on earth and revealed
to us the mystery of that Kingdom. This inauguration and this growth are
both symbolized by the blood and water which flowed from the open side
of a crucified Jesus (John 19:34) and are foretold in the words of the Lord
referring to His death on the Cross: “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth,
will draw all things to myself.” (John 12:32) All men are called to this union
with Christ, who is the light of the world, from whom we go forth, through
whom we live, and toward whom our whole life strains. (LG 03)

 The Holy Spirit was sent on the day of Pentecost in order that He might
continually sanctify the Church, and thus, all those who believe would
have access through Christ in one Spirit to the Father.” “I pray that the
eyes of your hearts may be enlightened, that you may know what is the
hope to which he has called you.” (Eph. 1:18) He is the Spirit of Life, a
fountain of water springing up to life eternal. The Spirit dwells in the
Church and in the hearts of the faithful, as in a temple. (1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19)
 Thus, the Church has been seen as “a people made one with the unity of
the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.” (LG 04)

 Yves Congar describes the Church as “the whole body, or congregation, of

persons who are called by God the Father to acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus,
the Son, in word, in sacrament, in witness, and in service, and, through the
power of the Holy Spirit, to collaborate with Jesus’ historic mission for the sake of
the Kingdom of God.

THE MISSION OF THE CHURCH

 The mission of the Church, which for the sake of the Kingdom, or Reign of God,
is fourfold: word, sacrament (or worship), witness, and service. The Church is
“sent” to confess and proclaim that Jesus is “the way, the truth, and the life”
(John 14:6) the classic missionary text in Matthew 28:19-20, “Go, therefore, and
make disciples of all nation. Baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the
Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”

 Second, its whole sacramental and devotional life, at the center of which is the
Eucharist. (Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian Life, LG 10)
Indeed, the Church itself is a sacrament. The liturgy, or public worship, of the
Church consists of its participation in Christ’s eternal worship of his Father. (Pope
Pius XII, Mediator Dei. nn. 3, 20)

 Third, the Church has been “sent” to give witness to the validity of Christ’s
teaching and his own personal and compelling example of how one should live a
fully human life. The Church, therefore, has a missionary obligation to practice
what it preaches and teaches.

 Finally, the Church exists to share its own limited material resources to assist the
poor, the sick, the socially marginalized, and others in need of aid. (The Spirit of
the Lord is upon me, because He anointed me to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to captives, and recovery of sight to the
blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the favorable year of the
Lord. Luke 4:18-19) This encompasses the whole of what was once commonly
called the social apostolate of the Church. It includes not only assistance to
individuals, but also involvement in institutional change in the causes of social
justice, human rights, and peace.
THE CHURCH’S ORIGIN, FOUNDATION AND MISSION
 A plan born in the Father’s heart. (CCC 759) Back to the Trinitarian context for
an understanding of the Church.

 The Church – prepared for in the Old Covenant. (CCC 761) the gathering
together of the People of God began at the moment when sin destroyed the
communion of men with God, and that of men among themselves. The gathering
together of the Church is, as it were, God’s reaction to the chaos provoked by
sin. This reunification is achieved secretly in the heart of all peoples: “In every
nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable” to God. (Acts
10:35)

 The Church – instituted by Christ Jesus. (CCC 763) The Lord Jesus inaugurated
His Church by preaching the Good News, that is, the coming of God, promised
over the ages in the scriptures. (LG 5) “The time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of
God is at hand” (Mk. 1:15) To welcome Jesus’ word is to welcome “the Kingdom
itself.” (CCC 764)

 Did Jesus intend to “found” a Church? Yes, we mean “lay the foundations for” the
Church in various indirect ways, that is, by the gathering of disciples, which set
him apart from the rabbis of his day, and by the establishment of a communal
meal in direct continuity with the Eucharist. In that case, it would be preferable to
speak of the Church as having its origin in Jesus rather than as having been
directly and explicitly founded by Him. (McBrien, The Church: The Evolution of
Catolicism)

 The Church – revealed by the Holy Spirit. (CCC 768) So that she can fulfill her
mission, the Holy Spirit “bestows upon the Church varied hierarchic and
charismatic gifts, and in this way directs her. Henceforward the Church,
endowed with the gifts of her founder and faithfully observing his precepts of
charity, humility and self-denial, receives the mission of proclaiming and
establishing among all peoples the Kingdom of Christ and of God, and she is on
earth the seed and the beginning of that Kingdom.”

THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH

 The Church – both visible and spiritual. Christ, the one Mediator, established
and continually sustains here on earth His Holy Church, the community of faith,
hope and charity, as an entity with visible delineation through which He
communicated truth and grace to all. The Church is at the same time: a.) a
“society structured with hierarchical organs and mystical body of Christ; b.) the
 visible society and the spiritual community; c.) the earthly Church and the Church
endowed with heavenly riches.” (LG 8)

 The Church – mystery of men’s union with God. It is in the Church that Christ
fulfills and reveals his own mystery as the purpose of God’s plan: “to unite all
things in him.” (Eph. 1:10) St. Paul calls the nuptial union of Christ and the
Church “a great mystery.” Because she is united to Christ as to her bridegroom,
she becomes a mystery in her turn. (CCC 772) “This is a profound mystery – but
I am talking about Christ and the Church.” (Eph 5:32)

 What is MYSTERY? The Greek word mysterion was translated into Latin by two
terms: mysterium and sacramentum. In the later usage the term sacramentum
emphasizes the visible sign of the hidden reality of salvation which was indicated
by the term mysterium. (CCC 774) Therefore, Christ himself is the mystery of
salvation. His saving work to sanctify humanity is the sacrament of salvation,
which is revealed and active in the Church’s sacraments.

 The Church, in Christ, is like a sacrament – a sign and instrument, that is, of
communion with God and of unity among all men.” (LG 1) The Church’s first
purpose is to be the sacrament of the inner union of men with God. At the same
time, the Church is the “sign and instrument” of the full realization of the unity yet
to come. (CCC 775) The Church “is the visible plan of God’s love for humanity,”
because God desires “that the whole human race may become one People of
God, from one Body of Christ, and be built up into one Temple of the Holy Spirit.”
(CCC 776)

THE CHURCH – PEOPLE OF GOD, BODY OF CHRIST, TEMPLE OF THE HOLY

SPIRIT.
 During the first half of the twentieth century, prior to the theological revival in the
aftermath of World War II and the convening of the Second Vatican Council,
Catholic ecclesiology did not generally link the mystery of the Church with that of
the triune God. At popular levels, the Church was seen through a kind of
Unitarian prism (a metaphor used to describe Unitarian universalism, a religion
that celebrates the diversity of human experience. The prism refracts light into a
spectrum of colors, similar to how Unitarian Universalists are united in their faith
but have many different beliefs.) that is a prolongation of the Incarnation.

 Slightly more sophisticated binarian renderings emphasized the role of God the
Father as the One who called the Church into being to continue the work of the
Son. The Holy Spirit, however, was often referred to at this time as “the forgotten
 Person of the Blessed Trinity,” remembered mainly on the feast of Pentecost, at
Confirmations, and when young Catholics were taking difficult exams.

 The Second Vatican Council’s Dogmatic Council of the Church led the way by
explicitly lingking the mystery of the Church with that of the triune God. The
Father gathered together “all the just” in the Universal Church, entrusted it to the
Son “to restore all things,” and then sent the Holy Spirit on Pentecost to sanctify
the Church continually “so that believers might have access to the Father through
Christ in the one Spirit.”

 The intimate relationship between the Church and the triune God is expressed in
three major biblical images, or metaphors: People of God, Body of Chirst, and
Temple of the Holy Spirit.

 The Church – People of God. The image of the People of God is derived initially
from the Hebrew Scriptures, or Old Testament. Israel understood itself as the
People of God because of its conviction that God had called it together as such.
“I will take you as my own people, and you shall have me as your God.” (Exod.
6:7) That call to peoplehood was linked with the covenant: “I will look with favor
upon you. . . I will set my dwelling among you, and will not disdain you. Ever
present in your midst, I will be your God, and you will be my people” (Lev. 26:9-
12).

 Christ instituted this new covenant, the new testament, that is to say, in His
Blood, calling together a people made up of Jew and Gentile, making them one,
not according to the flesh but in the Spirit. This was the new people of God. For
those who believe in Christ, who are reborn not from a perishable but from a
imperishable seed through the word of the living God, not from the flesh but from
water and the Holy Spirit, are finally established as “a chosen race, a royal
priesthood, a holy nation, a purchased people . . . who in times past were not a
people, but are now the people of God. (LG 9)

 Characteristics of the People of God. (CCC 782)

-It is the People of God: God is not the property of any people. But he
acquired people for Himself from those who previously were not a people:
“a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation.”
-One becomes a member of this people not by a physical birth, but by
being “born anew,” a birth “of water and the Spirit,” that is, by faith in
Christ, and Baptism.
-This People has for its Head Jesus the Christ (the anointed, the
Messiah). Because the same anointing, the Holy Spirit, flows from the
head into the body, this is “the messianic people.”
 -The status of this people is that of the dignity and freedom of the sons of
God, in whose hearts the Holy Spirit swells s in a temple.”
-“Its law is the new commandment to love as Christ loved us.” This is the
“new” law of the Holy Spirit.
-Its mission is to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world. This
people is “a most sure seed of unity, hope and salvation for the whole
human race.”
-Its destiny, finally “is the Kingdom of God which has been begun by God
himself until it has been brought to perfection by him at the end of time.”

 The Church – the Body of Christ.