1 La credibilite et l'apologetique, 1912, p. 220

2 Documentation catholique, 20 August 1939, col. 100 0. The Holy Father condemned this distinction once more in the encyclical Mystici Corporis Christi, A. A. S., 1943, p. 224

3 The linking up of the properties and the notes with the four causes of the Church is indicated by Pere Garrigou-Lagrange, De Revelatione per Ecclesiam Catholicam Proposita, Paris 1918, vol. II, pp. 208, 210, 211, 213

4 "Aliud quippe volumus quia sumus in Christo, et aliud volumus adhuc in hoc saeculo" (St. Augustine, In Joann. Evang., tract. 81, no. 4

5 Soloviev well says that "The Church is unsoiled by our sins"; but he errs when he adds that "she is not in us, although she is made up of us", and by reducing her to no more than a pure spiritual form that gathers up believers. Cf. God, Man and the Church, the Spiritual Foundations of Life, trans. D. Attwater, London, page 143

6 Cf. A. Palmieri, art. "Favaroni" (Augustin), Dict. de theol. cath, col 2113

7 It was Newman, who did not see himself as a "Theologian", who, in the nineteenth century was one of the first to see the whole importance which the problem of the development of dogma would acquire Before him came the "autodidact", J. A. Moehler

8 III Contra Gentes, cap. lcv III. "Just as God alone can create, so too He alone can bring creatures to nothing, and He alone upholds them in being lest they fall back into nothing. And thus it must be said that the soul of Christ had not omnipotence with regard to the immutation of creatures" III q. 13, a. 2

9 It is remarkable that the ancients, who were innocent of our views on the evolution of the universe, and believed in a certain natural immobilism, were conscious, thanks to revelation, of the law of historical development in its most eminent case—that of the spiritual salvation which was to progress from the Fall till the advent of the Messiah." The Greek cosmos is a world as it were without history, an eternal order in which time has no efficacy, whether because it leaves that order always the same, or because it produces a succession of events which always come back to the same point, through cyclical changes indefinitely repeated. The opposite idea, that reality is subject to radical changes' to fresh impulses, to genuine innovations, would have been impossible before Christianity had come to overturn the cosmos of the Hellenes" (Emile Brehier, Histoire de a philosophie, vol. 1, p. 489

10 III, q. 1, a. 3

11 "Of all this multitude [angels and men] Christ is the Head: for He stands nearer to God and He participates in the divine gifts more perfectly than men and the angels" (St. Thomas, III, q. 8, a. 4) The creation and justification of the angels, remark the Salmanticenses, who were never to make shipwreck but would always endure, "might very well have been ordered to Christ as to their end, and consequently be the term of His influence in the order of final causality" (De Incarnatione, disp. 16, dub. 5, no. 77

12 The influx of Christ, says St. Thomas "attains not only men but also the angels; for we read in the Epistle to the Ephesians [i. 20—22] that God the Father set Christ down on His right hand in the heavenly places, above all principality and power, and virtue and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come, and hath subjected all things under His feet" (III q. 8, a. 4) I think we are justified in saying of the grace of the angels what John of St. Thomas said of the grace of the just before Christ: "The influx which the Word of God, conjointly with the Father and the Holy Spirit, bestowed in a direct manner on the just of old this He continues still to bestow, now however availing Himself of the human nature with which He is clothed, as an instrumental cause" (III, q. 61, disp. 23, a. 3, no. 95; Vives Edn., vol. IX, p. 141) Men have a greater solidarity than angels have with Christ, a solidarity not merely of nature but of destiny; their whole life is drawn in the wake of His

13 III, q. 61, a. 2. Cajetan notes in his commentary on this article that if the state of innocence had been maintained, children would have been born in a state of grace and with the supernatural gifts that perfect the intelligence

14 St. Thomas, I, q. 113, a. 4, ad 2

15 ibid. a. 1, ad 2

16 "Although almighty and sovereignly good, God nevertheless permits evils to arise in the universe which He could prevent, in case He should thereby exclude a greater good or provoke worse evils" (II—II, q. 10, a. 11

17 St. Thomas, who holds that if man had not sinned God would not have become incarnate affirms nevertheless that prior to the original sin Adam was aware of the future incarnation of the Word (II—II, q. 2, a. 7) How reconcile these two views? The Salmanticenses supply the answer: Adam did not believe that Christ would be the Head of the people of God in respect of the state of innocence but he did believe—and this is something very different—that Christ would be Head of the people of God in a new order of things, which, for the rest, lay quite beyond his ken (De Incarnatione, disp. 16, dub. 4, nos. 62 and 63

18 The sacraments of the Old Law "do not cause grace"they merely signified that it would be given through the "Passion of Christ"; the sacraments of the New Law, on the other hand," contain grace, and confer it on those who receive them with the required dispositions" (Council of Florence, Denz., 695

19 To receive divine things by the ministry of men is connatural to man, in itself and essentially. It can become accidentally a great trial—think for example of a people conquered in an unjust war, to whom the Gospel is brought by their conquerors. But God can stir up heroism on ei ther side, and draw some good out of the evil, perhaps even here on earth

20" The flesh serves as the organ of the Deity" (St. John Damascene, De Fide Orthodoxa, lib. III, cap. xv; P. G. XCIV, col. 106 0)" Humana natura in Christo erat velut quoddam organum divinitatis" (St. Thomas, De Veritate, q. 27, a. 4

21" Humana natura est instrumentum divinae actionis" (St. Thomas, III, q. 43, a. 2

22 The Passion of Christ, remarks St. Thomas, being corporeal, cannot touch all men; but by reason of the Divinity united to it, it possesses a spiritual virtue and acts by spiritual contact (III, q. 48, a. 6, ad 2) The Salmanticenses were to say that although bodily contact with Christ is desirable (connaturalis) it is not necessarily required (essentialis) to produce a physical causality; a spiritual contact suffices (De Incarnatione, disp. 23, dub. 4, nos. 37 and 38

23 cf. St. Thomas, III, q. 49, a. 5, ad 1; q. 52, a. 5, ad 2, and a. 8, ad 3

24 St. Thomas, De Veritate q. 29, a. 5

25" Christus autem operatus est nostram salutem quasi ex propria virtute, et ideo oportuit quod in eo esset gratiae plenitudo" (ibid., ad 3) Cf John of St. Thomas, III, q. 8; disp. 10, a. 1, no. 45, vol. V III, p. 260. Further on John of St. Thomas explains that the grace of Christ, being of the same species as ours, is of itself incapable of causing ours physically: it is by reason of Christ in whom it is found, and because it serves as an instrument of the divine virtue, that it can become the cause of our own grace. Hence it follows that Christ as man is the instrumental physical cause, but not a second physical cause, of our grace. (III, q. 13; disp. 15, a. 4, no. 45; vol. V III, p. 460.

26" The Son of God wished to bring others into conformity with His filiation, so as not only to be Son but also the Elder of many sons. Hence He who is, by an eternal generation, the Only-Begotten, is, by the transmission of grace, the First-Born of many brothers" (St. Thomas, Comm. ad Rom., cap. v III, lect. 6

27 Scheeben considers that the purpose of sacramentality is less to overcome our wounds and weakness than to initiate a more sublime economy of salvation. We hold, without doubt, that the grace of Christ given us by the sacraments is better than the grace of Adam; so far, Scheeben's views are to be retained. But we must not forget that the sacraments—differing herein from the Incarnation—will pass away, and do not belong to the economy of the glorified Church (cf. M. J. Scheeben, Die Mysterien des Christentums, Fribourg—im—B. 1865 , ch. VII, no. 81, p. 541

28 Direct contact of agent and patient may be said to be connatural by reason of the generic exigencies of physical action: for which reason the Salmanticenses, in a passage cited above, note that it is needed" connaturally", not" essentially", in view of a" natural" but not an" essential" condition (De Incarnatione, disp. 23, dub. 4, nos. 37 and 40) But this contact may be called connatural in another way, namely on account of the particular condition of the patient: to men wounded by the first sin only action by sensible contact can bring grace connaturally. St. Thomas teaches this view when considering the suitability of the Incarnation and of the sacraments. Cf. III, q. 1, a. 2; q. 61, a. 1

29 Prologue to the fourth book of the Sentences to Annibald. This was really written by a Dominican of that name, a friend and disciple of St. Thomas. Cf. Pere Mandonnet, O. P., Des ecrits authentiques de saint Thomas d'Aquin, Fribourg 1910, p. 153

30 It is true that there is no need for the presence of the hierarchic powers in the ministers of Baptism and of Matrimony, and that is why these two sacraments continue to exist in Protestantism. And yet these sacraments are connected with the hierarchy by numerous links and that is why, in Protestantism, their validity remains, in spite of everything, precarious

31 This, for St. Augustine, was already the Baptism of the New Law. For St. John Chrysostom it was fundamentally no more than the baptism of John. Cf. M. J. Lagrange, Evangile selon saint Jean, Paris 1925, p. 91. St. Thomas follows St. Augustine (III, q. 66, a. 2): not however without hesitating (III, q. 73, a. 5, ad 4

32 Leon Chestov, Les revelations de la mort, preface by Boris de Schloezer, Paris 1923, p. xlvi

33 St. Thomas, IV Sent., dist. 18, q. 1, a. 1, quae St. 1

34 Bk. IV, ch. V

35 There are two ways in which one can be called:" First, exteriorly by the mouth of the preacher: Wisdom hath sent her maids to invite to the tower and the walls of the city [Prov. ix. 3]; thus God called Peter and Andrew [Matt. iv. 19]. The other calling is interior, and this is by way of a certain spiritual stirring, [‘quidam mentis instinctus’] by which God inclines the human heart towards the things of faith and of virtue: Who hath raised up the just one from the East and hath called him to follow him? [Isaias xli. 2 (Vulg.)]. This second calling is indispensable, for our hearts would not turn to God if He did not draw w to Himself: No man can come except the Father, who hath sent me draw him [John vi 44]: Convert us, O Lord, to thee, and we shall be converted [Lam. v. 21]" (St Thomas, Comm. in Rom., cap. V III, lect. 6

36 cf. St. Thomas, I, q. 19, a. 6, ad 1; Comm., super 1 Tim., cap. ii, lect. 1; St. Augustine, Enchiridion de Fide, Spe et Caritate, cap. c III, 27

37" Licet autem effectus dependeat a prima causa, causa tamen superexcedit effectum, nec dependet ab effectu. Et ideo praeter baptismum aquae potest aliquis consequi sacramenti effectum ex passione Christi..." (St. Thomas, III, q. 66, a. 11)" Deus.... cuius potentia sacramentis visibilibus non alligatur" (ibid., q. 68, a. 2

38" 'And other sheep I have that are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold and one shepherd' (John x. 16) The sheep in Israel, leaving their ancient fold, will join with the Gentile sheep and there will be but one flock and one shepherd. In St. John's text the word 'bring' does not mean 'take’ them to the fold (perducere, adducere), but 'lead them like a flock.' The essential thing in the parable is not 'to be in the fold' but 'to be led by the true Shepherd’" (M. J. Lagrange, O. P., Evangile selon Saint Jean, 1925, p. 281) Literally, then, it is not a question of a single fold, but of a single flock. All the sheep that are led by the true Shepherd tend to make up a single flock; and that is what matters

39 Even in a state of pure nature, and so abstracting from any injuries resulting from sin, action by contact would be better than action at a distance. For, as St. Thomas remarks (III, q. 61, a. 1), it is consonant with human nature to avail itself of corporeal and sensible things to attain to the Spiritual and the intelligible. But the state of pure nature has never existed. On the other hand there is no longer any special privilege attached to action by contact either in the state of innocence or the state of glory. In fact, therefore, it keeps this special privilege only for the state of nature injured and healed

40 St. Thomas, who made so profound an analysis of the state of original justice, went so far as to think that man had then no need of sacraments" not only inasmuch as their end is to provide a remedy for sin, but also inasmuch as their end is to perfect the soul" (III, q. 61, a. 2

41 De Imitatione Christi, lib. IV, cap. 2

42 This is the chain of causes in actual present dependence. But the apostolic body will also renew itself from generation to generation, and this will be the chain of sequence in time, or of the apostolic succession

43 On Jesus' words to the seventy-two disciples returning from their mission, "I saw Satan falling from heaven like lightning," Pere Lagrange, O. P., notes: "Nothing more forcibly expresses Jesus' intention to carry out His redemptive work through those whom He invested with His authority. The Church, along with her hierarchy, rests on this intention." Evangile selon saint Luc, Paris 1921, p. 301

44 Because its proper cause is a hierarchy invested for all time with the power conferred on the Apostles by Christ, the Church is called apostolic. Apostolicity, thus considered, marks the dependence of the Church as found in all the faithful, of the Church believing and loving, on its divine causes. Apostolicity belongs to her ratione causalitatis, secundum perseitatem quarti modi

45 Profession de foi du vicaire savoyard

46 To deny the mediation of the apostolic body without denying that of Christ, violates the organic order of salvation none the less. To invoke the text of St. Paul: "There is one God: and one Mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a redemption for all" (1 Tim. ii, 5), merely complicates the error with a textual misreading the second chapter of this Epistle to Timothy opens with a discourse on prayer. St. Paul first indicates its forms: "I desire therefore first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions and thanksgivings be made..." (v. 1); then its beneficiaries: "for all men, for kings, for all that are in high station that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all piety and chastity" (vv. 1-2); and then its motives, which are drawn either from its very nature: "For this is good" (v. 3); or from God's desire for the same: "and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour, who will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (vv. 3-4

St. Paul establishes that God wills the salvation of all men, Jews and Gentiles alike, by three considerations. The first is drawn from the fact that God is God over all, over Jew and Gentile together "There is one God" (v. 5: cf. Rom. III, 29) The second is drawn from the universality of Christ's mediation: "and one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a redemption for all" (vv. 5-6) The third is taken from the mediation of Paul himself, by whom Christ's redemption is brought to the Gentiles: "Whereto I am appointed a preacher and an apostle (I say the truth, I lie not), a doctor of the gentiles in faith and truth" (vv. 6-7

This text, correctly analysed, proves therefore once more that salvation comes down by successive steps: God, then the human nature of Christ, then Paul, then the Gentile peoples. Paul knows that death is near (2 Tim. iv. 6); he has laid his hands upon Timothy (2 Tim. i. 6), who is to keep safe what has been entrusted to him (1 Tim. vi, 20), and to pass it on to trustworthy men fit to teach others also (2 Tim. ii. 2), on whom in turn he is to impose hands (1 Tim. v. 22

The Epistles to Timothy and Titus tell so strongly in favour of the apostolic hierarchy that liberal Protestantism has been driven to deny their authenticity

47 Cf. St. Thomas, I, q. 103, a. 6: "Utrum omnia immediate gubernentur a Deo."

48 If authority is a service, then Paul who planted, Apollo who watered, and Cephas are all in a sense the servants of the Corinthians: "For we preach not ourselves, but Jesus Christ our Lord and ourselves your servants through Jesus" (2 Cor. iv 5

49 The Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, trans. A. Thorold, London, 1925, p. 16

50 The "greater works" here in question are not merely miracles, but the diffusion of Christianity throughout the world. Though he was too hostile to the supernatural to accept the Fourth Gospel, Loisy at least saw the meaning of this passage very clearly. "The birth, development, and entire life of the Church are here presented," he says, "as something to follow the Gospel and surpass it. Fundamentally, these are not distinct works and it will always be Christ who acts; while He lived with His disciples His activity was limited by the physical conditions and the providential necessities of His role with regard to the Jews. It will no longer be so when He has entered unto His glory, and that is why the work of His disciples was to be more marvellous than His own. (Le Quatrieme Evangile, 1903, p. 749

51 Discours sur l'histoire universelle, pt. II, ch. XXX

52 The sacraments by which Christ still makes contact with us, if they are to be validly conferred, presuppose in the minister a spiritual power connecting him with Christ the sovereign Prie St. This is the sacramental power, the sacramental character. (There is no exception save in the case of Baptism.) Marriage apart, which requires in the spouses only the baptismal character common to all Christians, the sacramental power required for validly conferring the other sacraments is the power of order, which is a reserved power, a hierarchic power

53 The term "pastor" can designate either one who feeds and leads the flock, or one who simply takes the flock to the pasturage. Hence the pastoral power can be understood in two ways. In a broad sense it designates both the power of order and the power of jurisdiction; in a restricted sense, as we take it here, the power of jurisdiction alone

54 Suppl., q. 19, a. 3

55 II-II, q. 1, a. 10

56 II-II, q. 39, a. 3

57 Suppl., q. 19, a. 3

58 III, q. 63, a. 3

59 "Vicem gerunt Christi" (III, q. 8, a. 6

60 III, q. 63, a. 2

61 III, q. 64, a. 5

62 "Minister.... comparatur ad dominum sicut instrumentum ad principale agens.... Oportet autem instrumentum esse proportionatum agenti. Unde et ministros Christi oportet esse ei conformes.... Oportet igitur ministros Christi homines esse et aliquid divinitatis ejus participare secundum aliquam spiritualem potestatem.... Haec spiritualis potestas a Christo in ministros Ecclesiae derivatur" (St. Thomas, IV Contra Gentes, cap. Lxxiv

63 III, q. 63, a. 5

64 II-II, q,. 39, a. 3

65 "Non immobiliter adhaeret" (II-II, q. 39, a. 3

66 Ibid

67 Can. 108, § 3

68 cf. R. M. Schultes, O. P., De Ecclesia Catholica, 1925, p. 294: "Ecclesia credens dicitur collectio omnium fidelium (romani pontificis, episcoporum, clericorum et laicorum) non quidem prout sunt numerus quidam fidelium, sed in quantum Ecclesiam constituunt."

69 "The Prince is said to be exempt from the law, as to its coercive power; since, properly speaking, no man is coerced by himself, and law has no coercive power save from the authority of the Prince.... But as to the directive force of law, the Prince is subject to the law by his own will.... Hence, in the judgment of God, the Prince is not exempt from the law, as to its directive force; but he should fulfil it of his own free-will and not of constraint" (St. Thomas, I-II, q. 96, a. 5, ad 3

70 "It would seem the part of a Christian to be purely passive when he enters on the common life, and receives his new being immediately from the totality of believers. But in fact this passivity involves the greatest possible activity, the greatest free and personal work conceivable. The contrary opinion is based on a narrow view of personal and independent activity, one which reduces it to giving or generating, and quite overlooks our human capacity for receiving. Receiving often makes harder demands on us than giving—that is to say if it is to be a genuinely personal act.... The personal and independent impulse that prompts us to acceptance is predominantly one of abnegation and love; and by allowing another to act on us we become active in our turn. Whoever would make of giving an activity truly his own, must first of all have learnt to receive; and it is just this which sets up and maintains relations between men. To give having received and without ever receiving, is the prerogative of God" (J. A. Moehler, Die Einheit in der Kirche, Tubingen 1825, pt. ii, ch. i, §49, no. 1, p. 198

71 "L'anima della Chiesa consiste in cio che essa ha d'interno e spirituale, cioe la fede, la speranza, la carita, i doni della grazia e dello Spirito santo e tutti i celesti tesori che le sono derivati pei meriti di Cristo Redentore e dei santi" (Compendio della dottrina cristiano prescritto da S. S. Pio X, alle diocesi della provincia di Roma Rome 1905, p. 119) "By the soul of the Church is meant the invisible principle of the spiritual and supernatural life of the Church, that is to say the perpetual assistance of the Holy Spirit, the principle of authority and internal obedience to superiors, habitual grace with the infused virtues, etc." (Cardinal Gasparri, Catholic Catechism London 1932, p. 99

72 Note in passing that when clergy and laity are opposed in Canon Law, the clergy include not only the ordained but also the tonsured; in spite of the fact that the tonsure is not an Order but a preparation for Orders

73 "Supernaturale accidens impressum animae" says Cajetan, and again: "Supernaturales potentiae" (In III, q. 63, a. 2. no. X

74 John of St. Thomas writes: "Gratia autem, aut fides, aut character, non solum sunt quid supernaturale quia productio eorum superat totam vim naturae, sed quia in seipsis entitative superant omnem naturam, quia in se sunt participationes univocae et supernaturales Dei" (In III, q. 63, disp. 25, a. 2, no. 57, vol IX, p. 336

75 L. Ponnelle and L. Bordet, Saint Philip Neri and the Roman Society of his Time, tr. R. F. Kerr London 1932, p. 151

76 Except in the case of Matrimony, in which the baptized spouses administer grace to each other. As to Baptism, if it is private it can be conferred by anyone; but if it is solemn the ordinary minister is the priest

77 "The sacraments are channels by which so to speak God comes down to us" (St. Francis de Sales, Les ways entretiens spirituels, Annecy 1895, vol. VI, p. 337) The "channel" image successfully conveys that the sacraments of the New Law really contain grace. It is however imperfect because grace is contained therein only "secundum quamdam instrumentalem virtutem, quae est fluens et incompleta in esse naturae"; whereas in a channel the water is there in Its own proper being. The beauty of a drawing passes wholly through the pencil, but it exists in the pencil in a state of becoming and is realized only on the paper. So grace, which is in a state of becoming in the sacrament, is realized only in the soul

78 John of St. Thomas, III, q. 62, disp. 24, a. 2, vol. IX, p. 283. All theologians accept two things as certain: first, that each sacrament conveys its own proper and particular grace, and secondly that the grace proper to each sacrament is not simply a more or less intense degree of habitual sanctifying grace, but adds something to this latter. If this were not so the multiplicity of sacraments would have no raison d'etre. A third point is still disputed: whether sacramental grace is an aid that is simply momentary (Cajetan) or permanent (John of St. Thomas) The conclusions we draw from the doctrine of sacramental grace in relation to the soul of the Church would remain valid even for those who consider with Cajetan that sacramental grace is not an habitual modality of sanctifying grace, but only a divine aid in the form of simple transitory impulsions

79 The expression "jurisdictional power" is here taken in Its full traditional significance. It designates the power to pronounce with divine authority in speculative and practical matters. The Church exerts it in two ways—by transmitting divine revelation or by promulgating the decisions of ecclesiastical law. Scheeben, referring to the passage where Jesus entrusts His lambs and His sheep to Peter, suggests the term "pastoral power" (Hirtengewalt) (Die Mysterien des Christentums, 1865 , no. 80, p. 529) This term may be accepted. We have already noted however that taken in a broad sense the pastoral power comprises both powers—of order and of jurisdiction

80 In Joan., tract. 26, no. 13; 27, no. 6. St. Augustine frequently says that there is no salvation outside the Church. He also makes it plain that he does not condemn ignorance in good faith, since he grants that those in error simply on account of their birth and upbringing "who seek the truth with care and prudence, who are ready to accept it when discovered, are not to be counted among the heretics" (Epist., xl III, 1) Must we say that he here applies the distinction between the soul and body of the Church? I do not think so. Mgr. Batiffol, however, while noting that "Specht was wrong in saying that the term ' soul of the Church ' is Augustinian", writes also: "We might say that Augustine glimpsed the doctrine of the soul of the Church, the soul that holds those saints whom God sanctifies, though they do not belong to the visible body of the Church" (Le catholicisme de saint Augustin, 1920, vol. I, p. 250) To talk of saints whom God would sanctify outside the visible body of the Church might be misleading. It is better to say that in this world the saints belong either re or voto to the Church which is visible by her body

81 The axiom "outside the Church no salvation" is contained equivalently in Scripture. We might cite for example Mark xvi. 16: "Go out all over the world and preach the gospel to the whole of creation; he who believes and is baptized will be saved; he who refuses belief will be condemned." It has been remarked in this connection that Jesus' condemnation "bearing solely on those who positively refuse to submit to the Church, does not touch anyone who, ignorant in all good faith of the divine authority of this Church, is not in fact subject to its teaching" (E. Dublanchy, art. "Eglise", Dict. de theol. cath., col. 2155) It was a common belief from the outset that "all who refuse to submit to the doctrinal or disciplinary authority of the Church, heretics or schismatics, lose all right to eternal salvation" (ibid., col. 2156) The first explicit texts occur in Origen, towards 249-251; "Let no one then mistake, let no one deceive himself: outside this habitation, that is, outside the Church, no one is saved—he who leaves it is himself responsible for his own death" (Hom. III, no. 5; P. G. XII, col. 841) And in St. Cyprian, in 251: "He who leaves the Church to join himself to an adulterous [sect] separates himself from the promises of the Church. He will not come to Christ's rewards, who abandons the Church of Christ. He cannot have God for his Father who has not the Church for his mother. If, outside the Ark of Noe anyone could have been saved, then might someone be saved outside the Church" (De Unitate Ecclesia Catholicae, cap. vi; P. L. IV, col. 505

82 "It must be remarked at the same time that these same [ecclesiastical] documents, when treating of our dogma (Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus) contain nothing positive in favour of a theological distinction between the soul and body of the Church. According to the tenor of these documents it is necessary for salvation to belong actually, or in re, to the Catholic Church, apart from two cases, implicitly or explicitly indicated, in which to belong in voto suffices. "The first case, provided for implicitly, is that in which Baptism cannot be effectively received; and the second, provided for explicitly, is that in which there is invincible ignorance about the Church (E. Dublanchy, art. "Eglise", Dict. de theol. cathol., cols. 2166 and 2167) On the question of a return to the traditional vocabulary, cf. Louis Caperan, Le probleme du salut des infideles, essai historique, 1934, vol. 1, p. 546

83 In what way does the distinction made by the Abbe Perreyve differ from the Protestant distinction between the invisible and the visible Church? "Theologians," he says, "understand by the soul of the Church the society of the just in whatever time and country they may have lived. Every man who, faithful to the interior promptings of grace and docile to such divine light as he is able to receive, believes, hopes and loves in the measure of the spiritual strength that is given him, lives in accordance with what he knows to be the law and desires to die in a state as far removed as may be from error and evil, belongs to the true Church by these virtues that come to him from above.... Outside the Church, no salvation: that is to say in the last analysis, outside the congregation of the just, outside of good faith responding to grace, outside of the quest for truth in a sincere and pure heart—outside of all this no salvation" (Entretiens sur l'Eglise catholique, vol. II, pp. 504 and 546, cited by L. Caperan, Le probleme du salut des infideles essai historique, 1934, vol. I, p. 476. (My italics

84 So real is the danger lurking in this distinction that it can lead such good theologians as Fr. Lemonnyer (Vie spirituelle, 1 May 1932, p. 71 et seq.) to contradistinguish "The Church visible" and the "Church invisible", the "Church visible" and the "Church in a state of grace"; the "Church visible" and "The Mystical Body of Jesus Christ", the Body of Christ is thus no longer considered as something in Itself visible, but as something in Itself invisible, of which however "The Church visible is the true home", Of course it is Fr. Lemonnyer's vocabulary, not his thought, that we are criticising here. We should not speak of a soul of the Church which extends beyond the body. Above all, we must not say that the just "without" belong to the invisible Church. Say rather, if you will, that they belong invisibly to the visible Church. It is difficult to think, however, that their supernatural charity is altogether without outward sign, and in this sense their membership of the Church is not wholly invisible. It could be said to be invisible simpliciter, but visible secundum quid. On the whole, and in practice, we might distinguish three ways of belonging to the Church, which is visible: (1) the membership, visible only, of sinful and carnal members (doubtless it is by virtue of the spiritual realities still surviving in them—the baptismal character, supernatural faith, supernatural hope—that they belong to the Church; but what is most spiritual in Christians, i. e., charity, is lacking); (2) the visible and spiritual membership of just members, and (3) the simply spiritual membership of the just "without"

85 III, q. 68, a. 2

86 Speaking of the way in which one can be deprived of Baptism, St. Thomas opposes the terms re and voto; cf. III, q. 68, a. 2. Speaking of the way in which one can be incorporated in Christ, he opposes the words sacramentaliter and mentaliter (ibid.) or corporaliter and mentaliter: "Adulti prius credentes in Christum sunt ei incorporati mentaliter; sed postmodum, cum baptizantur, incorporantur ei quodammodo corporaliter, scilicet per visibile sacramentum, sine cujus proposito nec mentaliter incorporari potuissent" (III, q. 69, a. 5, ad. 1

87 It is in fact to these distinctions made by St. Thomas in connection with the necessity of Baptism that St. Robert Bellarmine and later theologians have recourse to explain the axiom "outside the Church, no salvation", St. Robert Bellarmine, speaking of catechumens, begins by saying that they are of the Church, not "actu et proprie, sed tantum in potentia, quomodo homo conceptus sed nondum formatus et natus non dicitur homo nisi in potentia", and it is easy to see from this example—borrowed, he believes, from St. Augustine—that the in potentia of St. Robert Bellarmine is equivalent to what we have called a virtual act: the man already conceived but not brought forth, although not man in accomplished act, is man in act begun. St. Robert continues: "Quod dicitur: Extra Ecclesiam neminem salvari, intelligi debet de iis qui neque re ipsa, nec desiderio sunt de Ecclesia, sicut de baptismo communiter loquuntur theologi. Quoniam autem catechumeni, si non re, saltem voto sunt in Ecclesia, ideo salvari possunt" (De Ecclesia Militante, lib. III, cap. 3) Suarez has the same doctrine: "Melius ergo respondendum juxta distinctionem datam de necesitate in re vel in voto ita enim nemo salvari potest, nisi hanc Christi Ecclesiam vel in re, vel in voto saltem et desiderio ingrediatur" (De Fide disp. 12, sect. 4, no. 22) Billuart notes that catechumens "non sunt re et proprie in Ecclesia"; yet when they have charity, they are in the Church proxime et in voto as if one should say that a man under the porch was already in the house, they belong to the Church "inchoative et ut aspirantes.... et ideo salvari possunt. Nec obstat quod extra Ecclesiam non sit salus; id namque intelligitur de eo qui nec re, nec in voto est in Ecclesia" (De Regulis Fidei, dissert. 3, a. 2, 3) See on this point E. Dublanchy, art. "Eglise", Dict. de theol. cathol., cols. 2163-2165

What is to be gained by substituting some new explanation of the axiom: Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus for this traditional exegesis? "The result is that the apologists are out of accord with the theologians and deviate from the traditional teaching. When it is introduced simply as it stands into the formula 'outside the Church, no salvation" the distinction between the body and soul of the Church might easily falsify its meaning.... When the Fathers and the Councils made use of this formula, they did so to convey that all who would be saved must not only belong to the soul of the Church but must enter the external communion. It was without any detriment to the truth of the formula that the theologians reconciled it with the universality of grace and the universal possibility of salvation. They distinguished, like their predecessors, a real adhesion and an implicit adhesion to the visible Church" (L. Caperan, Le probleme du salut des infideles, essai historique, vol. I, p. 477) Happily, not all the apologists are here incriminated. In his 36th conference at Notre Dame de Paris, for example, Pere de Ravignan made admirably clear that the dogma "outside the Church, no salvation" condemns those who live in "voluntary and culpable error", but not those who have at least "The implicit aspiration and desire for the Church and for Baptism"

In his very stimulating book on the Church A. D. Sertillanges, O. P., more perspicacious than the apologists here criticised, clearly sees what is in fact obvious to every Thomist, that the soul and body of the Church must be coextensive, but to reconcile this truth with the doctrine of the possible salvation of those in Invincible ignorance of the Church, he looks in a direction which seems at first sight contrary to that followed here. He does not reduce the soul of the Church to the dimensions of its normal body by the distinction between grace simply sanctifying, which certainly overflows this normal body, and the sanctifying grace that comes of the sacramental power and is ruled by the jurisdictional power, which is the very soul of the Church, conformed to her normal body. On the contrary he leaves the expression "soul of the Church" an undifferentiated and universal significance, and enlarges the concept of the body of the Church so as to make it universal like the soul. "In the measure in which these organizations [pagan religions] favoured not vice and error as they did too often, but virtue and true religious feeling, they were, through God and His Christ, salutary; they were so to speak occasional uncovenanted supports for the universal soul of the Church." And again: "Just as the soul of our Catholic Church envelops all souls that belong to God no matter where they live, so does her body envelop as extrinsic dependencies, all other religious forms [dissident religions are here meant] which in themselves are her antagonists, but also partially, and n the way I have just described, her servants" (L'Eglise, 1917, vol. II, pp. 112 and 119. My italics) These views should surely be made more precise. What has to be determined is this: what is there of the soul of the Church outside the Church, and what is there of the body of the Church outside the Church?

88 We may here recall the 29th proposition of Quesnel condemned by Pope Clement XI: "No grace is to be had outside the Church, Extra Ecclesiam nulla conceditur gratia" (Denz., 1379

89 Here, without wishing to proscribe their use everywhere, I avoid of set purpose such phrases as salvation of infidels, pagans, or heretics in good faith. Infidels are saved in so far as they are among the faithful, pagans and heretics by that in them which is neither heretical nor pagan

90 Explaining an authentic passage of St. Augustine which puts the catechumens within the Church—"Futuri erant aliqui in Ecclesia excelsioris gratiae catechumeni" (In Evang. Joan. tract. 4, no. 13), St. Robert Bellarmine writes: "Voluit ergo dicere, esse in Ecclesia non actu sed potentia, quod idem ipse explicuit initio libri II De Symbolo [but this text is not St. Augustine's] ubi comparat catechumenos hominibus conceptis, non natis" (De Ecclesia Militante, lib. III, cap. 3) For E. Mersch, on the contrary, the catechumens would be members of Christ without being members of the Church, and he concludes that there need be no identity between the Mystical Body of Christ and the Church (The Whole Christ, London 1939, pp. 487 and 564

91 "Perceptio baptismi est necessaria ad inchoandam spiritualem vitam; perceptio autem eucharistiae est necessaria ad consummandam ipsam" (St. Thomas, III, q. 83, ad. 3

92 St. Augustine, In Joan. Evang., tract. 26, no. 13

93 The marriage of Protestants is not a sacrament in the eyes of the Protestant Church, but it is so in those of the Roman, Codex Juris Canonici, can. 1099 , 2. The two sacraments really retained by traditional Protestantism are not, as they themselves hold, Baptism and the Last Supper but Baptism and Matrimony

94 Why are Anglican Orders invalid? "The words which until quite recent times have been generally held by Anglicans to be the proper form of priestly ordination—'Receive the Holy Ghost'—certainly do not signify definitely the order of the priesthood or its grace and power which is, above all else, the power to consecrate and offer the true Body and Blood of the Lord in that sacrifice which is no mere commemoration of the sacrifice accomplished on the Cross.... Not only is there in the whole ordinal no express mention of sacrifice, of consecration of priesthood, of the power to consecrate and offer the sacrifice, but, as we have already indicated, every trace of these and similar things remaining in such prayers of the Catholic rite as were not completely rejected, was purposely removed and obliterated" (Leo X III, Apostolicae Curae, 1896

95 cf. St. Thomas, I-II, q. 89, a. 6

96 id., De Veritate, q. 14, a. 11, ad. 1

97 Divided Christendom, London, 1939

98 In so far as this is so, it is by reason precisely of what they have taken from the true Church or received from the loving kindness of the Holy Spirit, never by reason of the principle of their dissidence, but in spite of it

99 Divided Christendom, London, 1939, p. 41

100 ibid., p. 42

101 ibid., p. 256. This is perhaps the passage which P. Cordovani was summarising in the expression "lo scisma possiede quello che manca a noi", and which he notes as open to criticism in the Osservatore Romano, 22 March, 1940

102 cf. Etudes Carmelitaines, Oct. 1937, p. 183

103 Divided Christendom, p. 246

104 cf. the chapter "The Paradoxes of Christianity", in G. K. Chesterton's Orthodoxy: "It is true that the historic Church has at once emphasised celibacy and emphasised the family; has at once (if one may put it so) been fiercely for having children and fiercely for not having children. It has kept them side by side like two strong colours, red and white, like the red and white upon the shield of St. George. It always had a healthy hatred of pink.... It hates that evolution of black into white which is tantamount to a dirty grey... All that I am urging here can be expressed by saying that Christianity sought in most of these cases to keep two colours co-existent but pure."

105 See Appendix X of this same work of Moehler's which deals with some of St. Augustine's comments on St. Paul's words: Nam oportet et haereses esse (1 Cor. xi. 19

106 Moehler says "in the Church

107 Jacques Maritain, "Qui est mon prochain?", Vie intellectuelle, August 1939, p. 177.

108 Translator's note. This pouvoir cultuel (also here in the original called the pouvoir sacramentel) is a generic term for all the powers and characters conferred by the sacraments—the highest of these being the character conferred by the sacrament of Holy Orders and the corresponding power to offer the eucharistic sacrifice. There is perhaps no really satisfactory English equivalent for pouvoir cultuel, rituel, liturgique. We shall call it throughout the sacramental power. The French culte we have generally rendered as "cultus", reserving "cult" for non-Christian systems of religion.

109 St. Thomas writes that "The state of the New Law is intermediate between the state of the Old Law whose figures are fulfilled in the New, and the state of glory, in which all truth will be openly and perfectly revealed, and where there will be no sacraments" (III, q. 61, a. 4, ad 1) The priesthood of Christ is eternal, not as regards the offering of the sacrifice, but as regards the end and consummation of the sacrifice, that is to say as regards the glory which the elect will receive from Christ (q. 22, a. 5, and ad 1) "After this life the exterior cultus will not remain, but the end for which this cultus exists" (q. 62, a. 5, ad 3)

110 God's dominion extends to all things, but it is exercised either principally by way of justice or principally by way of mercy, and in the latter case it is called the Kingdom of God

111 Non-sacramental sanctifying grace is, as we have seen, but an initial participation in the sanctity of Christ

112 "Proprie officium sacerdotis est esse mediatorem inter Deum et populum, inquantum scilicet divina populo tradit..., et iterum inquantum preces populi Deo offert et pro eorum peccatis Deo aliqualiter satisfacit" (St. Thomas, III, q. 22, a. 1)

113 "If Christ could merit for others, this was radicaliter et praesuppositive in virtue of the grace of union, but also formaliter et proxime in virtue of habitual grace, inasmuch as this last was united to and completed by the grace of union. In the absence of habitual grace the grace of union would have sufficed to enable Christ to merit for others; but His soul would not then have been able to give birth to meritorious acts in so connatural a manner" (John of St. Thomas, III, q. 8, disp. 10, a. 1, no. 50; vol. V III, p. 261)

114 "Grace was bestowed upon Christ, not only as an individual but inasmuch as He is Head of the Church, so that it might overflow into His members; and therefore Christ's works are referred to Himself and to His members in the same way as the works of any other man in a state of grace are referred to himself" (St. Thomas, III, q. 48, a. 1, "Utrum passio Christi causaverit nostram salutem per modum meriti?")

115 From the standpoint of the perverse will of the Jews the death of Christ was certainly no sacrifice; His executioners had no thought of offering a victim to God, but sinned grievously. From the standpoint of the will of Christ freely accepting His passion, it had the character of a sacrifice. cf. St. Thomas, Ill, q. 22, a. 2, ad 2; q. 48, a. 3, ad 3."

116 cf St. Thomas, III, q. 48, a. 3: "Utrum passio Christi operata sit per modum sacrificii?" Christ, as Scheeben remarks, "could have merited grace and glory for us without having to suffer; but satisfaction, on the contrary, absolutely demanded suffering. For without self-alienation and renunciation, without destruction, the honour filched from God could not have been restored to Him; but merit demands simply that something be done for God's honour and glory out of love for God. Since however the most excellent gift of love is to offer oneself to the beloved, and since the most perfect adoration of God consists in really bringing oneself to naught before His infinite majesty, it must be concluded that Christ's merit attained its highest point with His passion and death" (Die Mysterien des Christentums, 1895, no. 67 p. 439)

117 Sacrifice, unlike offering, is "an essentially latreutic symbol", it is "in its essence a rite significative of that homage which is due to God alone. It is this that distinguishes it from other acts of religion and gives it its special moral value" (I. Mennessier, O. P., La notion de sacrifice, in his translation of St. Thomas' De Religione (II-II, q. 80, et seq.), Paris 1932, vol. I, p. 350) "The latreutic character of the sacrifice of Christ is seldom strongly emphasised. Sacred Scripture itself usually presents it as simply propitiatory, but with no other intention, as is clear, than to set forth the divine cultus in general in relation to the benefits it brings us. If the cultus draws down God's rewards on the creature, its supreme end is nevertheless not the beatification of the creature, but the glorification of God; and that indeed is the end of the beatified creature himself. Similarly Christ's sacrifice is assuredly ordained to reconcile the creature and restore it to grace, yet it is not the less willed for itself as a latreutic sacrifice directed to the glory of God; and in that precisely we must seek its deepest essence and highest significance. We believe indeed that the propitiatory and impetratory character of the sacrifice of Christ cannot be fully brought out save when its latreutic character is properly appreciated" (M. J. Scheeben, op. cit., no. 65, p. 416)

118 St. Thomas, I-II, q. 102, a. 3—and ad 10

119 cf. St. Thomas, III, q. 48, and q. 49, a. 4. The Passion of Christ effected our salvation by way of satisfaction and of redemption; it reconciled us with God. The various characteristics distinguishable in the Passion are all closely bound up with each other; they are so many aspects of one and the same reality. Just as Christ "by the satisfactory virtue of His sacrifice delivered us from the infinite debt to God we had contracted; so by the meritorious virtue of His sacrifice He made God our debtor, presenting Him with a price so high that henceforth the high grace of filiation would be granted by God to man not only out of pure favour and free love, but as of right; and precisely m that appears the supreme and mysterious significance of Christ's sacrifice" (M. J. Scheeben, op. cit., no. 67, p. 347) St. Thomas wrote: "Per passionem Christi est sublata odii causa: tum propter ablutionem peccati; tum propter recompensationem acceptabilioris boni" (III, q. 49, a. 4, ad 2

120 cf. St. Thomas, III, q. 48, a. 6; cf. ad 3: "Passio Christi, secundum quod comparatur ad divinitatem ejus, agit per modum efficientiae"; and q. 49, a. 1, ad 3

121 The sacrifice of Christ is opposed, in the Epistle to the Hebrews (x), to the sacrifices of the Old Law which no longer pleased God, both because the time was at hand when figures had to make way for the reality, and because they were offered hypocritically and without love. Such sacrifices, so offered, were what Jesus condemned in the Pharisees when He reminded them of the text of the Prophet Osee: "Go then and learn what this meaneth: I will have mercy and not sacrifice" (Matt. ix. 13; xii. 7

122 St. Thomas, III, q. 22, a. 3, ad 1

123 Jesus is called "priest according to the order of Melchisedech "for two reasons. First, as the Epistle to the Hebrews (vii) explains, because the levitical priesthood, finally eclipsed by the perfect priesthood of Christ on the cross, had been of old momentarily effaced by the better priesthood of Melchisedech. The book of Genesis (xiv. 20) represents Abraham, from whom the levitical priesthood was to issue, as paying tithes to Melchisedech, king of Salem and priest of the Most High. Secondly, as noted by the Council of Trent (cf. Denz. 938), because, just as Melchisedech, going before Abraham, brought bread and wine (Gen. xiv. 18), so Jesus, at the Last Supper, offered His Body and Blood under the appearances of bread and wine. In connection with those passages of the Epistle to the Hebrews which oppose Jesus the one Priest to the succession of the levitical priests, we note that the power of "The priests "today is not there to supplant the supreme mediation of Jesus, but to make it present. He alone is the perfect Prie St. They are His priests, that is to say mere ephemeral ministers dispensing His eternal redemption to all ages

124 Since Christ's cultus was ordered to His grace we could bring these two consecrations together and attribute them to Christ as Priest (or, on the other hand, to Christ as Saviour) We speak more strictly in attributing the first to Christ as Priest and the second to Christ as Saviour. A third privilege will concern Christ as King

125 All the sacraments, says St. Thomas, confer the consecration of grace. But three of them, Baptism, Confirmation and Holy Order, confer a sacerdotal consecration as well: "Sanctificatio autem duobus modis accipitur. Uno modo pro emundatione, quia sanctum est mundum. Alio modo pro mancipatione ad aliquod sacrum, sicut dicitur altare sanctificari, vel aliquod hujusmodi. Omnia ergo sacramenta sunt sanctificationes primo modo.... Sed quaedam sunt sanctificationes etiam secundo modo, sicut patet praecipue in ordine, quia ordinatus mancipatur ad aliquid sacrum.... Quicumque autem mancipatur ad aliquid sacrum spirituale exercendum, oportet quod habeat spiritualem potestatem, et solum talis. Et ideo non omnia sacramenta novae legis characterem imprimunt, sed quaedam, quae etiam secundo modo sanctificationes sunt" (IV Sent., dist. 4, q. 1, a. 4, quae St. 2

126 On incorporation into Christ, the King and Prophet, by the preaching of the truth, and on incorporation with Christ the Redeemer by sacramental grace, cf. below, pp. 511 and 513

127 The whole evangelical mystery of the Eucharist is faithfully expressed in the prayer of the Missal where it is said that: "As often as the commemoration of this offering is celebrated, the work of our redemption is carried out [quoties hujus hostiae commemoratio celebratur, opus nostrae redemptionis exercetur]" (Dom., IX post Pent.

128 The Mass is Christ bringing us the bloody sacrifice of the cross in a bloodless rite.

In a little work on the sacrifice and the rite of the Mass (Opuscula, Venice 1612, vol. III tract. 10) which he addressed on the 3rd May 1531 to Pope Clement VII and directed against the Lutherans Cardinal Cajetan seems to have got deeper than other theologians into the thought of St. Thomas (III, q. 83, a. 1) concerning the essence of the sacrifice of the Mass

Luther, as we know, held that the Eucharist truly contains the Body and Blood of Christ. But in opposition to the universal belief of the Roman Church and of the dissident Oriental Churches he denied that it is a sacrifice. He therefore also denied that it is an expiatory rite for the living and the dead

To establish that the celebration of the Eucharist contributes to the expiation of sins, Cajetan had only to cite the words of Jesus in the account of the Last Supper as given by St. Matthew: "This is my blood of the New Testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins" (xxvi, 28)

He shows next that the sacrifice of the Mass, far from derogating from the sacrifice of the cross is one with it, and prolongs it to our own day. Christ offered Himself on the cross in a bloody manner and offers Himself on the altar in a bloodless manner. But the daily repetition of the bloodless rite does not make a new sacrifice. First, because the reality present, on the cross and on the altar is identically the self-same Christ. Next, because the bloodless rite is not juxtaposed but subordinated to the bloody sacrifice. Far then from supplanting it, it is but the vehicle of that remission of sins which Christ then obtained for us

Here, in the original text, are some lines of the delicate discussion in which, thirty years before the Council of Trent, this great theologian treated the mystery of the Mass: "Hostia cruenta et incruenta non sunt hostiae duae, sed una hostia. Quia res quae est hostia est unamet res; non enim Christi corpus in nostro altari est aliud ab illo Christi corpore quod oblatum est in cruce, nec sanguis Christi in nostro altari alius est ab illo Christi sanguine qui fusus est in cruce. Modus vero hanc unam eandemque hostiam immolandi, alter e St. Quia ille unicus substantialis ac primaevus immolandi modus, fuit cruentus, utpote in propria specie, corporis fractione, in cruce sanguinem fundens; iste vero quotidianus, externus, accessoriusque modus est incruentus, utpote, sub specie panis et vini, oblatum in cruce Christum, immolatitio modo repraesentans

Quodcirca, Novi Testamenti hostia cruenta et incruenta, unica est ex parte rei oblatae. Et ex parte modi offerendi, licet sit diversitas, quia tamen iste modus (scilicet incruente immolare) non est, secundum seipsum, tanquam disparatus modus immolandi institutus, sed dumtaxat ut refertur ad cruentam in cruce hostiam, consequens est apud sapientes et penetrantes quod 'ubi unum nonnisi propter alterum, ibi unum dumtaxat est" consequens, inquam, est, non posse affirmari proprie loquendo, duo sacrificia, aut duas hostias, aut duas oblationes, immolationes et quovis nomine appelles, esse in Novo Testamento ex hoc quod est, in hostia cruenta Christus in cruce et in hostia incruenta, Christus in altari; sed esse unicam hostiam, semel oblatam in cruce, perseverantem, modo immolatitio, quotidiana repetitione, ex institutione Christi, in Eucharistia.

In Novo Testamento non repetitur sacrificium, seu oblatio, sed perseverat immolatitio modo unicum sacrificium semel oblatum; et in modo perseverandi intervenit repetitio, non in ipsa re oblata; nec etiam ipse, qui repetitur, modus, concurrit ad sacrificium propter se, sed propter oblationem in cruce commemorandam incruente.

Absit a fidelium mentibus etiam cogitare quod ad supplendam efficaciam hostiae in cruce oblatae celebretur missa: celebratur enim tanquam vehiculum remissionis peccatorum per Christum in cruce factae; ita quod, quemadmodum non est alia hostia, ita non aliam affert remissionem peccatorum."

The sacrifice of the cross suffices of itself to intercede for the men of every age. And yet, as Scripture witnesses, it does not make useless the perpetual intercession of Christ in heaven—"he is also able to save for ever them that come to God by him: always living to make intercession for us" (Heb. vii. 25) The glorious intercession ratifies the sorrowful intercession by which it continues to save the world. The bloodless rite of the Mass, which brings down into our midst the glorious intercession of heaven, and ratifies the sorrowful intercession of the cross which is efficacious throughout all time, derogates from neither of these intercessions: it is subordinated to them. Cf. my opusculum La sainte messe ou la permanence du sacrifice de la loi nouvelle, in the series La Pensee catholique, Liege 1937

1291 Cor. xi. 23-32. Pere Allo in an excursus entitled Synthese et origine de la doctrine eucharistique de Saint Paul, minutely studies this text and that of 1 Cor. x, 14-22 from an exegetical standpoint, and establishes that they expressly contain the whole doctrine that has remained the Catholic doctrine, "which thus takes the Catholic dogma of the sacrifice of the Mass back to St. Paul, contrary to all the various Protestant theories". He adds: "The 'realism" the 'sacramentalism" and in a word the Catholicism of St. Paul, is no longer in doubt for any of those whose minds have shaken off the dissident confessions of faith. As for the question of the eucharistic sacrifice, which along with transubstantiation was the old subject of controversy between Catholics and Protestants, it seems that we are on the way to an agreement with critics emancipated from the Churches.... The historical evidence more and more inclines them to recognize that St. Paul presents all the essential lines of the dogma of the Eucharist—as also of others. Thus St. Paul is more or less openly given back to us, and that is no small thing" (Premiere epitre aux Corinthiens, Paris 1935, pp. 305 and 307 ) Of course, if Catholicism is in St. Paul, the rationalist critics do not therefore conclude that Catholicism is right, but that St. Paul is wrong

130 cf. E. B. Allo, O. P., Premiere epitre aux Corinthiens, pp. 239-243, and 302 et seq.: also Hebrews x III, 10: "We have an altar whereof they have no power to eat who serve the tabernacle."

131 The infinite meritorious virtue of the death of Christ is due radically and presuppositively to the "grace of union": it is due proximately and formally to "habitual grace", Even without habitual grace the grace of union would have sufficed to invest all Christ's actions with an infinite value Cf. John of St. Thomas, III, q. 8, disp. 10, a. 1, no. 50; vol. V III, p. 261. Cajetan said that the sacrifice of the Mass, being the very immolation of Christ, has an infinite impetratory, meritorious and satisfactory value of itself and absolutely—but is in fact applied to us in proportion to the devotion of the Church which offers it, and of those for whom it is offered (Opuscula, vol. II, tract. 3, q. 2) See Nova et vetera, 1932, p. 193

132 L. E. Rabussier, S. J., "Quelques notes sur le 'mariage spirituel’", Revue d'ascetique et de mystique, 1927, pp. 289 to 291. I have slightly altered the text. The author wrote: "God wills that all heaven's interventions here below shall find a fulcrum on earth." As for the Church in purgatory, we shall see later on that it remains dependent, in a way, on the Church in time

133 "O Father, why do you tarry? So long ago it was that my beloved poured forth his blood. I approach you in the interests of my Spouse.... You will keep your word, O Father, for you have promised him all nations" (Ecrits spirituels de Marie de l'Incarnation, Ursuline, ed. Dom Jamet, vol. II, p. 311) "Every night between Thursday and Friday you shall share this mortal distress which indeed I wished to undergo in the Garden of Olives, and which will reduce you, without your being able to understand it, to a kind of agony harder to support than death. And to accompany me in the humble prayer I then addressed to my Father in the midst of all my anguish, you are to rise between eleven o'clock and midnight to prostrate yourself for one hour with me, with your face to the earth, as much to soften the divine anger by asking mercy for sinners as to sweeten the bitterness I felt when abandoned by my Apostles, a bitterness that forced from me the reproach that they could not watch one hour with me" (Life of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, written by herself) To another Visitandine, Sister Marie-Marthe Chambon, Jesus showed His wounds, saying: "My daughter, behold the world's treasure. The world does not want to recognize it. Here is something that can pay all debts", and He taught her this prayer which she pledged herself to say lovingly every ten minutes "Eternal Father, I offer you the wounds of Our Lord Jesus Christ, to heal those of our souls" (Vie de la soeur Marie-Marthe Chambon, Chambery 1928, pp. 62 and 63

134 Revue d'ascetique et de mystique, p. 291. In connection with the text of St. Peter, addressed to all Christians—"be you also as living stones built up, a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ"—(1 Peter ii, 5), Cajetan writes in his third Jentaculum: "The Victim of the New Testament surpasses all others because He is Christ Himself, our God. But the offering of His sacrifice, if we consider those who offer it, is not always better than 'spiritual victims'—there are times, alas, when it is very inferior." The "spiritual victims" are acts of virtue performed in God's honour.

135 In Joannis Evang., tract. 80, no. 3.

136 We could say the perfect means and even, in a sense, the universal means, of grace, cf. above P. 12

137 St. Thomas, III, q. 62, a. 2.

138 I should like to recall in this connection the very just remark of a rationalist exegete: "The notion of 'worship in spirit and in truth' commonly held by Protestant theologians, is no more rational than it is evangelical.... Christ's reference to ' worship in spirit and in truth, (John iv. 23-24) does not oppose a purely interior to an exterior worship; but a worship that can be called inspired, spiritualized, the Christian worship which the Evangelist knew, and which is quickened with the Spirit given to believers, the worship that can be carried out everywhere, is substituted for the localised worship at Jerusalem or on Mount Garizim. The Evangelist who gives us the formula of worship in spirit and in truth is the same who gives us the formula of the Incarnation. The two correspond God is Spirit, and so also is His Word; the true worship is spiritual, because founded on the communication of the divine Spirit; but as the God-Spirit manifests Himself in the incarnate Word, the life of the Spirit communicates and sustains itself by the spiritual sacraments, the water of baptism, the bread and wine of the Eucharist" (Loisy, L'Evangile et L'Eglise, p. 258)

139 IV Con. Gen., cap. Lxxiv

140 "Per omnia sacramenta sanctificatur homo secundum quod sanctitas importat munditiam a peccato, quae fit per gratiam sed specialiter per quaedam sacramenta, quae characterem imprimunt, homo sanctificatur quadam consecratione, utpote deputatus ad cultum divinum" (St. Thomas, III, q. 63, a. 6, ad 2) Scheeben (Die Mysterien des Christentums, 1865, 83, pp. 550 and 557), wrongly calls Baptism, Confirmation and Order the "hierarchic" sacraments; the hierarchy begins only with the sacrament of Order. On the other hand Scheeben distinguishes four "consecratory" sacraments; and that is too many if we think only of those three consecrations which are characters, and too few if we admit that Matrimony and Extreme Unction confer a kind of consecration: for they actualise the receptivity of the baptismal character, so that it becomes impossible to repeat them during, respectively, the life of the spouses or during the same danger of death.

141 "Baptism, inasmuch as it generates children of adoption has the quality called grace for its principal effect. But inasmuch as it generates a Christian, that is to say a member of the Christian religion, of the Christian family, its principal effect is the character" (Cajetan, In III, q. 69, a. 10 no. iv.) We add that sacramental grace makes us members of the Christian family much more intimately still than the sacramental character.

142 The signs are visible. If the character, which is invisible, can be a sign, that is because it is stamped upon us by a visible sacrament. We know, for example, that someone has the baptismal character, if we know that he has received the sacrament of Baptism (St. Thomas, III, q. 63, a. 1, ad 2)

143 Contra Epist. Parmeniani, lib. II, nos. 28 and 29.

144 It is well known that the persecuted Japanese Catholics lived without priests for a century and a half, and remained faithful to their Church. Baptism maintained sacramental grace among them along with an initial sacerdotal power which enabled them to perform certain acts of the Christian cultus, for example to contract sacramental marriage. But it was deprived of its highest exercise.

145 op Cit., § 84, P. 560

146 III, q. 63, a. 4, ad 1.

147 Pere Louis Chardon, O. P., La Croix de Jesus. Introduction by R. P. F. Florand, O. P., Paris 1937, p. civ.

148 It is itself "effect", but yet the "sign" of an ulterior effect: "res et sacramentum",

149 III, q. 84, a. 1, ad 3

150 The character is likened by St. Thomas to a form which produces its effect, namely grace, as soon as any contrary dispositions are removed (III, q. 69, a. 10) That, says Cajetan, is a mere comparison.

151 Without the baptismal character the other sacraments are received materially in genere entis but not validly, in genere sacramenti.

152 St. Thomas however writes: "In case of necessity, when even a layman can baptize, he who baptizes without being in a state of grace does not sin; for his intention is to do a service, not to act as a minister of the Church. But this solution would not apply to those sacraments which are less necessary than that of Baptism" (III, q. 64, a. 6, ad 3)

153 In Evang. Joannis, tract. 5, nos. 15 and 18.

154 The two capital texts of Scripture concerning the sacrament of Confirmation (Acts v III, 4-24; xix, 1-20) are discussed in the study "Confirmation dans la sainte Ecriture" in the Dictionnaire de theologie catholique, col. 975-102 6. The author, Mgr. Ruch, establishes that the communication of the Holy Spirit then made "consecrates the disciple as a prophet of the New Times and enables him to bear witness to the Messiah according as circumstances dictate or the Saviour wills". Being meant for all, "The ministry for which the gift of the Spirit makes the recipient apt carries no hierarchic grade, but involves nevertheless a participation in public functions. Does not the witness, as such, speak in public and for the public?" The extraordinary graces, such as the gift of tongues are merely accidental effects; they are not received by all "because all do not need them in order to bear witness", but they were given to some "because the words and works of the public man should, at the outset more especially, be confirmed by the power of God". The fact is that in the confirmed, as such, the confession of faith has rather the significance of an act of cultus than that of the gift of prophecy

155 "In a sense all the sacraments bring some participation of the priesthood of Christ because they dispense some of its fruits; not all of them however give the power to do or to receive anything from the cultus of which Christ is priest, but those only that impress a character on the soul" (St. Thomas, III, q. 63, a. 6, ad 1) If it be admitted that the two texts of the Apocalypse: "He hath made us a kingdom and priests to God and his Father" (I. 6) and "thou hast made us to our God a kingdom and priests" (v. 10) refer, not to each particular soul but to the Christian people as a whole, we could say, as Cajetan does, that in these texts the word "priests" is already taken in its proper sense to designate the power of order. cf. Cajetan, Jentaculum tertium. The same applies to 1 Peter ii. 9. While 1 Peter ii. 5 would, on the contrary, designate the priesthood in the metaphorical sense.

156 The human nature of Christ is conjoined to the Person of the Word in the order of being. Incorporation with Christ makes us separated instruments of the Person of the Word in the order of being, and conjoined with Him only in the order of action.

157 "The sign of Christian Baptism, when it remains unaltered, suffices even among heretics to confer a consecration, though not participation in eternal life" (St. Augustine, Epist. XCV III, 5) To the three Consecrations which are characters we could, as we have said, link the physical modifications produced in the baptized by reception of the sacraments of Matrimony and Extreme Unction. Their negative role will be to prevent the valid repetition of these two sacraments during, respectively, the life of the spouses or the continuance of the same danger of death. Their positive role will be to serve as instruments of the divine omnipotence in the event of the reviviscence of these sacraments, and also to consecrate Christians temporarily or momentarily for the duties of marriage or the struggles of the death agony.

158 The consecrations of Baptism and of Confirmation are participations of the priesthood of Christ; but since they are conferred on all they cannot be degrees of a sacramental hierarchy. This latter begins only with the sacrament of Holy Order, and with it of course the differences of level. This said, it is easy to understand the words of a dissident Russian theologian: "The laity have their place and value in the Church as well as the clergy. The lay state is not to be defined negatively as the mere absence of ecclesiastical order—it is rather a special order, conferred in the sacrament of unction" (Discourse of P. Serge Bulgakov, to the Congress of Churches at Lausanne, 1927) Let us say with greater exactitude that the lay state involves, not the absence of the sacerdotal or sacramental power, but the absence of the power of Order. It supposes the first degrees of the sacramental power, but not the first degree of Order, which is the beginning of the hierarchy.

159 Denz., 852

160 ibid., 853, 920

161 ibid., 961

162 ibid., 938

163 ibid., 855

164 ibid., 920. 165 ibid., 852

166 ibid., 960, 964. According to the Reformers, ordination was not a sacrament conferring a sacramental power, a consecration, but a simple designation of ministers by the Church, ministers who could, at will, become laymen again. That consecration which the Protestants of the Reformation took away from the priests, the modern liberal Protestants take away from Jesus Himself. They no longer believe that He stands before God as the Priest of all mankind. It was, they say, only in the minds of certain of His disciples that he was the High Priest according to the order of Melchisedech, that His death was a redemptive sacrifice, that He has washed away our sins in His Blood, that the Last Supper is the memorial of a sacrifice. cf. A. Reville, Jesus de Nazareth, 1897, vol. II, p. 350, et seq.; A. Sabatier, La doctrine de l'expiation et son evolution historique, 1903; J. Reville, Les origines de l'eucharistie, 1908; Harnack, Das Wesen des Christentums, 1920 p. 98 et seq. This last is not the least categorical, but the most adroit, of them all: "If we penetrate into history we recognize that the world's salvation comes from the sufferings of the just and the innocent, in the sense that it is not words but acts, nor even acts but acts of oblation, nor even acts of oblation but only the voluntary gift of life itself, which decides the great moments of historical progress. In this sense, I believe that in so far as any theory of substitution can seem acceptable to us, few among us will fail to recognize the inner justice and truth of a drama such as that of Isaiah l III: Surely he hath borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows. None hath greater love than he who lays down his life for his friends. That is how the death of Christ was understood from the beginning. The more delicate is a man's moral sense the more surely he will discover in history, whenever some great thing is done, the part played by the suffering of substitution; and the more lessons he will know how to draw from it. Did Luther in his cloister fight only for himself, was it not for all of us that he inwardly battled and bled in the cause of the religion confided to his hands? But in the Cross of Jesus Christ mankind could recognize the power of a purity and of a love so proven by death that it could never be forgotten, and the experience marked a new epoch in our history."

167 Denz., 852

168 The deacon is the extraordinary minister and the priest the ordinary minister of "solemn" Baptism, that is to say of Baptism conferred according to the prescriptions and ceremonies of the ritual (Cod. Jur. Can., can. 737, §2; 738, §1; 741)

169 Contra Epistolam Parmeniani, lib. II, no. 28

170 cf. P. Batiffol, L'Eglise naissante et le catholicisme, Paris 1911, p. 351

171 "Hoc sacramentum datur principaliter ad actus aliquos agendos. Et ideo, secundum diversitatem actuum, oportet quod ordinis sacramentum distinguatur," (St. Thomas, Suppl., q. 37, a. 1, ad 1) "Tota enim plenitudo sacramento hujus est in uno ordine, scilicet sacerdotio, sed in aliis est quaedam participatio ordinis" (ibid., ad 2)

172 The Council of Trent did not intend to define that all three of these Orders are of divine institution, so that we cannot attempt to establish the fact by citing the words of the Council: "If any one shall say that there is not in the Catholic Church a hierarchy instituted by divine ordinance and comprising bishops, priests and ministers, let him be anathema" (Session XXIII, can. 6: Denz. 966) Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that this is the teaching of the Code of Canon Law: "By virtue of a divine institution, the sacred hierarchy comprises in the line of order bishops, priests and ministers..." (Can. 108 §3) See below Excursus II on some recent views on the sacrament of order

173 The term "Mystical Body" was first used in the ninth century to designate the sacramental Body, the eucharistic Body, of Christ; then, since the twelfth century, to designate its proper effect namely the "Body which is the Church", cf. Henri de Lubac, S. J., Corpus Mysticum, l'eucharistie et l'Eglise au moyen age, Paris 1944, p. 15.

174 The episcopate and the presbyterate, in which are equally exercised the principal act of the power of order, which is to consecrate the real Body of Christ, are often brought together under the name of the priesthood primi et secundi Gradus.

175 "In primitiva Ecclesia, propter paucitatem ministrorum, omnia inferiora ministeria diaconis committebantur.... nihilominus erant omnes praedictae potestates, sed implicite, in una diaconi potestate. Sed postea ampliatus est cultus divinus; et Ecclesia, quod implicite habebat in uno ordini, explicite tradidit in diversis. Et secundum hoc dicit Magister.... quod Ecclesia alios ordines sibi instituit" (St. Thomas, IV Sent., dist. 24, q. 2, a. 1, quae St. 2, ad 2: cf. Suppl., q. 37, a. 2, ad 2)

176 A letter written in 251 by Pope Cornelius to Fabrius, Bishop of Antioch, shows that the Roman Church then recognized priests, deacons, sub-deacons, acolytes, exorcists, lectors and doorkeepers. cf. Denz. 45.

177 It was the teaching of St. Thomas (Suppl., q. 37, a. 1 and 2) that the sub-diaconate and the Minor Orders were true degrees of the power of order. It would appear that such was also the teaching of the Council of Florence: when speaking of the way in which Orders are conferred, the Council mentions not only the presbyterate and diaconate but also the sub-diaconate and other Orders (Denz 701 ) But it would seem that the Church's intention has been modified since. It could be held that by the Apostolic Constitution on the Holy Orders of the Diaconate, Presbyterate and Episcopate (30 Nov. 1947), His Holiness Pope Pius XII, by returning to the primitive rite of the imposition of hands an essential and exclusive part in the ordination, also reduced to the rank of simple sacramentals the sub-diaconate and the Minor Orders, which are conferred without the imposition of hands. See Excursus II: Some Recent Views on the Sacrament of Order (no. 9)

178 In the first days of the Church we have to recognize, alongside the hierarchy, a missionary and itinerant organization composed of prophets, doctors, etc., and engaged in apostolic work. cf. P. Batiffol, Etudes d'histoire et de theologie positive, Paris 1920 p. 260

179 An indication of Jesus' intention to distinguish between bishops and priests later on, could be found in the two missions mentioned in the Gospel: that of the twelve Apostles, who were to be succeeded by bishops, and that of the seventy-two disciples, who were to be succeeded by simple priests. ("Cum sacerdotes succedant in locum septuagintaduorum discipulorum, episcopi vero in locum duodecim apostolorum, ut dicitur in glossa" St. Thomas, Contra Impugnantes Dei Cultum et Religionem) For the mission of the seventy-two was not merely transitory: "Behold I have given you power to tread upon serpents and scorpions and upon all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall hurt you" (Luke x. 19) Pere Lagrange writes: "But although the disciples had gone before Jesus on this occasion, they will have to carry on His work after Him. Hence the Master bestows on them as a permanent gift the power which they have just used so well. Before sending out His disciples He had already laid the foundations of the hierarchy involving the principle of obedience and discipline by which the Church is governed: 'He that heareth you, heareth Me, and He that despiseth you despiseth Me. And He that despiseth Me despiseth Him that sent Me’" (The Gospel of Jesus Christ, London 1938, vol. II, p. 6)

180 J. Tixeront, L'ordre et les ordinations, Paris 1925, p. 61. According to Batiffol the name of "presbyters" would, at the outset, have been used alike for laymen and for the ordained. The liturgical and social functions were reserved for deacons and for episcopoi. The episcopoi or presbyter-bishops had the power of bishops. They formed a college in each Church. At the death of the Apostles the plural episcopate was dismembered, so as to give birth to the sovereign episcopate of the bishop, and the subordinate priesthood of the priests. However, the plural episcopate subsisted for a long time at Alexandria: the whole presbyterium was composed of bishops; but only one of them, designated by election, exercised the power of ordaining. cf. Etudes d'histoire et de theologie positive, Paris 1920, pp. 266 and 280. But Duchesne observes that if things began in more than one place with the collegiate episcopate, the unitary episcopate was not unknown to the primitive institutions; we find it in the mother-church at Jerusalem, at Antioch, Rome, Lyons, Corinth, Athens, and in Crete (The Early History of the Church, London 1914, vol. I, pp. 63-9) See Excursus II, no. 5.

181 According to St. Clement, God sends Christ, who sends the Apostles, and these, having made trial of their first-fruits, institute them as bishops and deacons for the believers, laying down this rule, that after their death other tried men shall succeed in the same ministry. Those who have thus been placed in charge by the Apostles, or later on by other eminent persons with the approbation of the Church, cannot justly be deprived of the ministry (XLII, 2-4; XLIV, 2-3) Evidently then the community approves but does not institute, and hence it cannot dismiss. If Clement blames the Corinthians for having unjustly dismissed blameless presbyters, he nowhere says that he recognizes any right to dismiss unworthy presbyters. And even then a dismissal would deprive them of the exercise of their functions, not of the radical power to exercise them

182 De Sacramentis, lib. IV, cap. 4; P. L. XVI, col. 440. (It is well known that Dom Germain Morin restores the De Sacramentis to St. Ambrose.) This distinction, emphasized by St. Ambrose, between the words uttered by the priest on behalf of Jesus, and those he utters on behalf of the Church, corresponds to the two parts played by the priest in the celebration of Mass. As regards the validity of the sacrifice the priest at the moment of consecration is the minister, the instrument, through whom Christ Himself acts as true God and true Man. As regards the application of the sacrifice the priest acts as minister of the Church which partakes, according to her devotion, of the infinite value of the sacrifice it is as minister of the Church that he disposes, in a special measure, of the fruits of the sacrifice of the Mass, for various specified good intentions

183 "Penance and Extreme Unction prepare man worthily to receive the body of Christ" (St. Thomas, III, q. 65, a. 3) Note that a single power may have several distinct acts ordered to one another. Fire heats, and also expands. Thus the power of order, which is a power to consecrate, carries also a power to baptize, and—granting the jurisdiction of the Church—to absolve. The power to absolve, in its turn, has two subordinate acts: it is a power to take cognizance of the sin and then to pronounce the sentence that binds or looses. Hence the two keys—that is to say, the two powers—of the sacrament of Penance, the key of knowledge and the key of power. This traditional doctrine of the two keys, summed up by St. Thomas Aquinas (Suppl., q. 17, a. 2, ad I, art. 3: and IV Con. Gen., 72), is illustrated by Dante in the ninth Canto of the Purgatorio:.. "Trasse due chiavi. L'una era d'oro e l'altra d'argento: Pria con la bianca, e poscia con la gialla Fece alla porta si ch'io fui contento."

184 Protestants were for a long time obliged to maintain that according to this text sins are remitted by the simple preaching of the Gospel, and not by any judgment passed on the dispositions of the sinner, as happens in the sacrament of Penance. The Apostles preached; those who believed were forgiven, the others not. But, as Pere Lagrange notes, "What then becomes of the apostolic power to bind and to loose? We do not think that those exegetes who make a point of being critical will be very long content with this Lutheran subterfuge" (Evangile selon saint Jean, 1925, p. 516) Today it is much more readily granted that the Catholic interpretation is correct, but then the passage is supposed to have a flavour of paganism. When Protestantism comes to see that the Gospel that speaks of "worship in spirit and in truth", of the flesh "that profiteth nothing", is the same Gospel that speaks of the Word made flesh, of the water that regenerates, of the Body and Blood that is meat and drink, of the sentence that remits or retains sins, that is to say of the Incarnation, Baptism, the Eucharist and Penance, then it will either have to change some of its teaching or mutilate the text of St. John.

185 "The concession, the delegation, by which the Pope authorizes a simple priest to confer Confirmation and Minor Orders, is not meant to give the physical power to dispense these sacraments, but simply to furnish the necessary circumstances for their valid dispensing. In virtue of his episcopal power, the bishop has a divine title to confer Confirmation; the priest, in virtue of his sacerdotal power, can confer it if he is authorized so to do by the Sovereign Pontiff. The physical power of the priest cannot be validly exercised save in certain moral conditions—authorization, juridical delegation, and so forth—but the power of the bishop is free from any such restrictions. For example the priest as such has the physical power to administer the sacrament of Penance—but he can exercise it only if he has jurisdiction. Need we be astonished to find in the extraordinary minister of Confirmation what we find in the ordinary minister of Penance? Thus the sacerdotal power makes its possessor the ordinary minister of the Eucharist and of Penance, and the minister of Confirmation and Minor Orders extraordinarily, that is to say in dependence on delegation from the Sovereign Pontiff" (John of St. Thomas, III, q. 63; disp. 25, a. 2, no. 98; vol. IX, p. 345) The bishops are the ordinary ministers of Confirmation; for it was the Apostles, Peter, John Paul, who are represented in Acts as imposing hands: Peter and John on the Samaritans (v III), Paul on the Ephesians (xix) The delegation necessary to enable simple priests to confer Confirmation validly is generally possessed by the Oriental Catholics, and even, as I shall say further on by the Oriental dissidents. cf. below p. 506. The Decree Spiritus Sancti Munera issued by the Sacred Congregation for the Sacraments on 14 Sept. 1946 grants to parish priests, parochial vicars and certain other clergy the power of validly and licitly conferring the sacrament of Confirmation on those of the faithful who are in grave danger of death from illness (Acta Apo St. Sedis, 1946, pp. 349 et seq.)

186 Suppl, q. 37, a. 2.

187 The episcopal power is higher than the sacerdotal power as to the secondary act of the priest, which is to prepare the people of God to receive the Eucharist, but not as to the first act, which is to consecrate the Body of Christ (St. Thomas, IV Sent., dist. 24, q. 3, a. 2, quae St. I; cf. Suppl., q. 40, a. 4)

188 It is a debated question, whether the Pope can delegate a simple priest to confer not only the sub-diaconate and diaconate, but also the priesthood itself. It would seem that the answer is affirmative. See Excursus II, no. 7.

189 "On this point there can be no controversy, that the episcopate, envisaged as the plenitude of the priesthood, is and remains a sacrament. The question debated by the theologians is whether the episcopate is a sacrament adequately distinct from the simple priesthood, and whether it imprints on the soul a new character.... Many of the old theologians, while admitting that episcopal ordination extends and heightens the sacerdotal character by giving the bishop powers which the priest has not, nevertheless deny that the episcopate is an order distinct from the priesthood That was the view of the great scholastics; after the Council of Trent the Thomist school as a whole remained faithful to it.... But modern theologians and canonists, especially after Bellarmine, have taken up a position clearly opposed" (A. Michel, art. "Ordre", Dict. de theol. cath., col. 1383) The same author adds: "It is of no importance from a dogmatic standpoint whether one admits seven or eight orders," and in this connection he cites a passage from Benedict XIV (Epist. In postremo 20th Oct. 1756, §17): "Let no one forbid discussion as to whether the episcopate is an order distinct from the presbyterate, whether the character impressed by episcopal consecration differs from the presbyteral, or whether it is only an extension of it." See Excursus II, no. 3

190 That is to say, divino-human. All the acts that came from the human nature of Jesus can be called theandric. Even hypothetically supposing them not to have been supernaturalized by habitual grace, the divinity of His Person would give them a dignity that was infinite. But the term might be reserved for those acts alone which Christ's human nature produces as the instrument of His divinity.

191 In an address delivered in 1922, Karl Barth went so far as to declare with deep conviction, that according to the Catholics the priest is creator Creatoris (Parole de Dieu et parole humaine, Paris 1933, pp. 139 and 154. English trans. D. Horton, The Word of God and the Word of Man, London 1928, pp. 113 and 131)

192 "Character.... est qualitas permanens, ut instrumentum constituat hominem debito modo, id est ut homo ita sit ordinatus ut habeat sibi connaturalem et debitum concursum instrumentalem ad exercendum sacramentales effectus.... Hoc tamen non ponit in ipso activitatem per modum permanentis, sed tota activitas datur quando datur ei elevativus concursus ad instrumentaliter operandum.... non tamen ponenda est in Christo talis qualitas, quia illa solum constituit potentiam ministerialem respectu Christi; et ideo ipsa non debet esse in Christo, sed aliquid illa altius et excellentius. Igitur, habens characterem, ad producendam gratiam habet se sicut calamus praeparatus, qui est instrumentum proportionatum ad connaturale scribendi; aliae autem res quae elevari possunt a Deo ad causandam gratiam, habent se sicut calamus non praeparatus ad scribendum, vel sicut aliquid aliud ad id non proportionatum" (John of St. Thomas, III, q. 63; disp. 25, a. 2, nos. 122 and 144, vol. IX, pp. 350 and 356) The power that most resembles that of the priest is that of all baptized persons at the moment when they contract a sacramental marriage, since then, but in a more limited way, they become the mutual ministers of grace.

193 The Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena, trans. Algar Thorold, London 1925, p. 246

194 The Christian cultus consists above all in the presence among men, thanks to the bloodless rite of the Mass, of the bloody sacrifice of the cross, and in the administration to each man of the greatest of the sacraments, that of the Eucharist. It consists secondarily in the administration of the sacraments preparatory either to the consecration of the Eucharist (sacrament of Order) or to the reception of the Eucharist (and here, as St. Thomas explains (III, q. 65, a. 3), we must put all the other sacraments, not even excluding Matrimony)

195 "The minister is compared to his master as an instrument to the principal agent.... But the instrument should be proportionate to the agent. Therefore Christ's ministers should be conformed to him.... Consequently Christ's ministers need to be men, and to share in his Godhead by a kind of spiritual power: since the instrument shares in the power of the principal agent" (St. Thomas, IV Con. Gent, cap. lxxiv, De Sacramento Ordinis)

196 "Once the nature of character is understood we must surely see that the doctrine of the three sacramental characters is implicitly contained in the two Pauline texts, Ephesians iv. 16, and Colossians ii. 19" (Bernardus Durst, Abbas Ord. St. Bened., "De Characteribus Sacramentalibus" Xenia Thomistica, 1925, vol. II, pp. 555 and 578)

197 It will always be so as regards women. Here recall the following points:

1. No woman can validly receive the sacrament of Order. cf. St. Thomas, Suppl., q. 39, a. 1. That is a provision of "divine law" revealed by way of the tradition and attested by the constant custom of the Church, so that "all the Fathers have condemned as heretics those who in various sects have admitted women to holy orders and to the priesthood" (Gotti, De Sacramento Ordinis, q. 3, dub. 1: Theologia, Bologna 1734, vol. XV, p. 73)

2. What are the reasons for this divine ordinance? Theologians have looked for them in Scripture and produce the well-known passages of St. Paul: "Let women keep silence in the churches: it is not permitted them to speak, but to be subject, as also the law saith" (1 Cor. xiv 34) "But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to use authority over the man: but to be in silence"; (1 Tim. ii 12) These texts and others like them, should contain the answer to our question; but since on the other hand they incontestably refer to the historical and contingent situation of women in the ancient world, their interpretation is a delicate matter. St. Thomas does not overlook the fact. He does not use them to conclude to any spiritual inferiority in the woman. He knows that "in reality, in what concerns the things of the soul, the woman does not differ from the man, and it sometimes happens that the woman, in matters concerning the soul, is superior to many men" (Suppl., q. 39, a. I, ad 1) He knows that, after the example of Debora, a woman can occupy the highest rank in the government of temporal or political things. What he takes from St. Paul is that, things of the soul apart, the woman is, as regards exterior things, in a state of general subordination (mulier statum subjectionis habet) Gertrude von Le Fort, who has made a profound study of the true greatness of women, does not deny it; she contents herself with the remark that "The passive and receptive side of the feminine being, which antiquity took purely negatively, appears in the Christian order of grace as the positive thing that decides all"; she writes of the veil that "on earth it is the symbol of mystery", and also, "The symbol of femininity", that "all the great manifestations of feminine life make the woman appear as veiled" (Nova et vetera, 1938, p. 58) That does not mean that women are unfitted for external action in the temporal order or even in the religious—to those who cited St. Paul against her St. Teresa could but reply as the Lord directed her: "Tell them they are not to be guided by one part of Scripture alone, but to look at others; ask them if they suppose they will be able to tie My hands" (Spiritual Relations, in Complete Works of St. Teresa of Jesus, trans. A. Peers, London 1946, vol. I, p. 344) It does however mean that apart from the always possible case of an exceptional mission such as that of Joan of Arc, women have their own peculiar type of aptitude—which is, in general, veiled. When this observation, valid for all times though its importance may vary with the times, and implying nothing humiliating, is seen in relation to the general principles of sacramental theology, it enables St. Thomas to explain the suitability of the divine ordinance that reserves ordination for men. The sacraments, he says, being essentially signs, are not validly conferred save when their symbolism is safeguarded (q. 39, a. 1) just as Extreme Unction therefore, which should be given as a spiritual medicament (q. 30, a. 1) does not retain its symbolism, and is invalid, save when conferred on a sick person (q. 32, a. 1, ad 1): so Order, which confers a hierarchical superiority, retains neither its symbolism nor its validity save when applied to the man and not to the woman, who is, outwardly, in a state of subordination (q. 39, a. 1) Thus, for the things of the soul the woman is pronounced to be man's equal, but as to certain external activities she is, as such and in general, weaker; and that is enough to prevent the symbolism of the sacrament of Order being verified in her.

3. Was Our Lady a priest? That could be maintained, even while the sacerdotal character is denied to women. We should then say that she was priest in an eminent and untransmissible way, by reason of her divine maternity, without having any communicable priesthood, and without formally possessing the character of Order. Thus the plenitude of the sacerdotal power resides in Christ, but not the sacramental character, which is no more than a participation of it (St. Thomas, III, q. 68, a. 5) The two questions therefore have no necessary connection. But those who say, like St. Epiphanius, that Our Lady herself was not a priest, conclude from that, a fortiori, that no other woman can be so either. cf. Panarion, haer. 79; P. G. XLII, col. 744.

All Our Lady's privileges are a consequence of the great Gospel privilege which made her the worthy Mother of a saviour God; so that if we recognize priesthood in Our Lady this will be in virtue of that first privilege. The question is, are we so to recognize it? The priest is someone who is consecrated in order to give God to men and men to God in union with the redemptive sacrifice of the Cross. But according to St. Thomas (III, q. 63, a. 3) there are two sorts of consecration: first, that of the sacramental characters, which ensures the unbroken continuity of the Christian cultus in the line of validity (particularly that of the hierarchical character of order, which ensures the permanence of the redemptive sacrifice under the eucharistic species); and second, that of the grace and charity of Christ, more deep-reaching and more precious, to which the preceding consecration is ordered, and which ensures the sanctity of the cultus in spirit and in truth. Just as we distinguish in the Church two sorts of greatness, that of the hierarchy and that of charity, so also we may recognize (as does the Roman Catechism, pt. ii. ch. vii. nos. 23-4) two sorts of priesthood; the first external, reserved to certain individuals and conferred by the sacrament of Order (which we will call the hierarchic priesthood), and the second internal and common to all the faithful (Apoc. I. 5-6: 1 Pet. ii. 5) which we will, if the expression be permitted, call a priesthood of love. The question then is, how are we to accord the first kind of priesthood to Our Lady, and how could we not accord to her the second kind? Now, the doctrine concerning the Church and Our Lady which I have expounded in the second volume of the present work leads us to view Our Lady on Calvary as present as co-Redemptrix of the whole world, wholly hidden within the greatness of sanctity. In my view, therefore, it is the mystical and interior priesthood of love alone, which is fittingly accorded to Our Lady. As long as these distinctions have not been made there will continue to be conflict among theologians on this point, some denying Our Lady any kind of priesthood and others recognizing in her a priesthood of the most eminent kind. The history of this dispute has been dealt with almost exhaustively by Rene Laurentin (Marie, l'Eglise et le sacerdoce, Essai sur le developpement d'une idee religieuse (Sorbonne doctorate thesis), Paris 1952: vol. II (Etude theologique), 1953), who puts the solution to the problem with admirable clarity, especially in vol. I, pp. 651 ff. However, instead of following St. Thomas in distinguishing within the Church herself the ministerial greatness of the hierarchy and the terminal greatness of sanctity the author prefers to distinguish between virility and femininity, activity and passivity, even divine grace and human nature—all of which is less satisfactory. For what can be more active, more enterprising and more daring than co-redemptive love? And what does Our Lady's co-redemptive mediation mean if not her mystical priesthood at the foot of the cross? The theological problem once solved, there remains only the choice between two expressions—that of "co-redemptive mediation" and "mystical priesthood"—and if the second expression seems liable to become equivocal in the course of time, the obvious choice is the first If a magisterial definition is one day given on this subject, it will concern Our Lady's mediation, or mediatory intercession, either as co-Redemptrix in the acquiring of the graces of salvation or co-dispenser in the distribution of them, rather than her priesthood

198 "The Sacraments are universal and wholly divine in this sense also, that they sanctify man's physical as well as his moral and spiritual life; and more, they consecrate and bring back to God the elemental principles of the material world. Thus in Baptism the Holy Spirit, which in the beginning of creation 'moved upon the face of the waters" renews its hidden action on water as a primordial and representative element of the material world. In Confirmation and Anointing a pure product of vegetable life is consecrated to become a vehicle of the action of grace upon the human body.... etc." (Vladimir Soloviev, God, Man and the Church, the Spiritual Foundations of Life, trans. D. Attwater, J. Clarke and Co., London, p. 167)

199 These considerations are borrowed from Scheeben, Die Mysterien des Christentums, ch. v III: "The Mystery of the Church and the Sacraments", According to this theologian, character is, in us, distinguished from grace, as, in Christ, the substantial grace of union with the Word is distinguished from habitual grace. The character elevates our hypostasis by uniting us to the hypostasis of Christ, in us it is a similitude and a participation of what the hypostatic union is in Christ; but grace elevates our nature by bringing us into community of life with God. From this principle Scheeben deduces that if the hypostatic union is, in Christ, the root of habitual grace, the character is, in us, the root of sanctifying grace, not as containing it in a latent state but as morally demanding its presence in the soul. And when it supervenes in dependence on the character, grace is invested with a higher dignity, not only because it then adorns a member of Christ, but also because its gold enshrines the precious stone of the character, and because the robe of the child of God, when united to the seal of incorporation in the natural Son of God, shines out in greater splendour. So noble a thing is the character that it cannot be confined to any one of the powers of the soul as subject it overflows them all, reaches the soul's very substance and calls for the presence of grace throughout it. Scheeben profoundly concludes that in the Mystical Body the configuration to Christ resulting from the impression of the character has the same significance as the configuration of the members to the head in biology; in both cases the identity of configuration is the necessary condition of the unity of inner life and of outward action. But however seductive these views of Scheeben's may be, they clearly cannot all be reconciled with the positions taken up by John of St. Thomas and by St. Thomas himself. How does the matter look from their standpoint? No dignity of the hypostatic order can be communicated to any mere creature. Besides this grace of union, Christ possessed another incommunicable privilege; for, from the fact that it is really united to the Word and is an organ of the Divinity, habitual grace in Him has unique perfection: it is in the nature of capital grace, it becomes the source whence grace flows to all the members of Christ. But Christ is Head of the Church not only because He communicates sanctifying grace, but as High Priest and Founder of the Christian cultus. The sacerdotal power of Christ is a created quality residing not in the essence of His soul, nor in His will, but in His intelligence. Now it is in this sacerdotal power that the character makes us participate, and that is why its immediate subject is the intelligence. "Si ergo sacerdotium Christi debet esse aliquid ad intellectum pertinens, character qui est participatio talis sacerdotii, exequens ministerialiter id quod sacerdotium Christi principaliter, debet etiam ad intellectum pertinere", writes John of St. Thomas (III, q. 63, disp. 25, a. 4, no. 12; vol. IX, p. 369) St. Thomas says expressly that the character, from the fact that it is an instrumental virtue, cannot reside in the soul in the manner of grace (III, q. 63, a. 5, ad 1) The capital grace of Christ might, in a broad sense, be taken to cover both sanctifying grace and His sacerdotal power. "Character.... derivatur a sacerdotio Christi et potestate excellentiae quam, ex vi gratiae capitis, habet supra totam Ecclesiam; quae aliquid physicum est", writes John of St. Thomas once more (ibid., a. 2, no. 121, p. 350) Although it is the common effect of the three divine Persons, the character, being a participation in the priesthood of Christ, can be called "character of Christ," and since Christ is hypostatically united to the Word, it could be said that the character conforms us to the Word rather than to the Father and the Holy Spirit. But it is not superior to grace: it is referred to the priesthood of Christ and therefore to Christ as Man; whereas grace is an immediate participation of the divine nature: "In exemplaritate et participatione character respicit sacerdotium Christi, et consequenter Christum secundum quod homo; in quo differt a gratia, quae est immediata participatio naturae divinae" (ibid., a. 3, no. 4, p. 366) Can one say, after that, that grace is ennobled by the character as gold by a diamond? Following John of St. Thomas I prefer to say that what enriches grace is the sacramental modality it gains when conferred through the sacraments. We are conformed to Christ more by grace than by the sacramental character. The latter remains intact in hell. It will no longer be needed in heaven, where our exterior worship will have ceased, as St. Thomas says (III, q. 63, a. 5, ad 3); it will therefore not be partaken by all the elect. But in all the elect grace will have attained its sacramental flowering. Here, undoubtedly, we are in the presence of two great divergent conceptions of the character. We must choose. The one seems to admit a sort of participation in the hypostatic union and, in a way, to raise the order of the hierarchy above the order of sanctity. The other, that of St. Thomas, fully safeguards the primacy of the order of love in time and eternity

200 Matrimony is a sacrament only if contracted by the baptized. Baptism can, of course, be administered even by the unbaptized.

201 "The maternity of the Church in the strict sense is the prerogative, not of all her members, but only of the depositaries of her fecundity and of her pastoral power by which the children of the Church are begotten, cared for, educated. It belongs, in a word, to the fathers of the Church. We naturally call them fathers on account of their sex, since Christ ordained that the high functions of the Church should be carried out by men. But if we consider their place in the Church formally and on its supernatural side, if we look rather at their dignity than at their persons, then it is the character of maternity that specially appears in them. United to the God-man in a particular way in the Holy Spirit, they appear in fact as the intermediary by which the God-man, like a father, begets, cares for and educates his children. What precisely has to be taken into account from this standpoint, is not the multiplicity of their persons but the unity of their relation to Christ and to the Holy Spirit, a unity which finds its genuine expression in the jurisdictional dependence of all Christians with regard to the depository of the full pastoral powers" (M. J. Scheeben, op. cit., 80, p. 533)

202 For example, Isaac of l'Etoile

203 The above views the Church's motherhood from the standpoint of the greatness of the hierarchy; the motherhood arising from her sanctity is more mysterious yet.

204 In 1 Cor., Homil., xxi; P. G. LXI, col. 180.

205 In illud Vidi Dominum.... Homil., iv; P. G. LVI, col. 126

206 Epist., 208, 2 and 5.

207 "Dicimus in primis certum esse primos tres gradus esse divinae institutionis, nempe episcopatum, presbyteratum et diaconatum. Id definivit Concilium Tridentinum.... Hierarchia divina ordinatione instituta constans episcopis, presbyteris et ministris indicat clare episcopatum, presbyteratum et ministerium (quod saltem erit diaconatus), esse divinae institutionis" (Tractatus Canonicus de Sacra Ordinatione, Paris 1893, vol. I, no. 31, p. 18. Cf. vol. II, nos. 1148-50, pp. 301-2)

208 Stephanus Ehses, Acta Concilii Tridentini, Freiburg-i-B 1924, vol. IX, p. 5

209 ibid., pp. 228, 231. cf. p. 40

210 ibid., p. 602, n. 1

211 ibid. The final wording omitted the word "other" (p. 622)

212 ibid., p. 602, n. 1

213 ibid., p. 616, n. 6.

214 Paleotti, Acta Concilii Tridentini, ed. Gorres, vol. III, 1931, p. 691. Cited by H. Lermerz, S. J. De Sacramento Ordinis, Rome 1947, p. 86, no. 150.

215 Ehses, op. cit., p. 3; p. 4, n. 1; p. 32, n. 6; p. 40, n. 3 and 4; p. 49 etc

216 ibid., p. 228 p. 49

217 ibid., p. 4

218 ibid., pp. 55 et seq.

219 ibid., p. 54, lines 9-19. On p. 4, line 12 and p. 181 lines 33-5, the question arises of clerics exempted by the Pope from the jurisdiction of their bishops. A formula affirming the divine Institution of bishops and at the same time their dependence on the Sovereign Pontiff was to be proposed finally, only to be rejected (ibid., p. 107, note 2)

220 ibid., p. 622, n. 4, p. 623, lines 16-19

221 A. Michel, art. "Ordre", Dict. de theol. cath., cols. 1361-2. See the same texts from the same author in Hefele-Leclerq, Histoire des Conciles, vol. x, pt. I, pp. 491 and 493

222 ibid

223 Corrado Baisi, Il ministro straordinario degli ordini sacramentali, Rome 1935, p. 69

224 H. Lennerz, op. cit., p. 86, no. 150. We cannot follow theologians who hold the contrary view—for example St. Robert Bellarmine (De Clericis, cap. xiv): "The Catholic Church recognizes the distinction and teaches that under divine law the episcopate is greater than the presbyterate as regards either the power of order or jurisdiction. This is, in practice, the teaching of the Council of Trent, Session XX III, Chap. 4, and Canon 6."

225 According to St. Thomas (In IV Sent., d. 24, q. 3, a. 2, quae St. 2, and d. 25, q. 1, a. 2, ad 2), the episcopate supposes, apart from the power of jurisdiction, a power of order conferred by means of consecration and impossible to lose. But since this power is not related to the Eucharist it represents neither a sacrament nor a sacramental character: "An Order does not depend on the preceding Order as to its validity; but the episcopal power depends on the sacerdotal power since nobody can receive the first if he does not possess the second."

226 St. Robert Bellarmine, De Sacramento Ordinis, cap. 5: "Episcopal ordination is a sacrament.... The episcopate includes the priesthood in the scope of its concept and in its essence.... The full and perfect episcopal character is not a simple quality but comprises a twofold character.... It is impossible to ordain a bishop who either is not a priest already or does not receive at the same time the twofold ordination which is the essence of the episcopate."

227 The question was left open by Leo X III in his Apostolic Letter on Anglican Ordinations, 15 Sept. 1896: "This is not the place to go into the question whether the episcopate is complementary to the priesthood or an Order distinct from it, or the question whether the episcopate produces its effect when conferred per saltum, that is to say on a subject who is not a priest."

228 H. Lennerz, op. cit., p. 84, no. 147. See the texts which support this conclusion, though not all with equal force: pp. 23, 25, 26, 42, 43, 47, 55, 57, 62, 84, 85: nos. 43, 48, 50, 76, 79, 86, 97, 99, 100, 113, 148, 149. Lennerz's conclusion is much clearer than that of Tixeront, (L'ordre et les ordinations, etude de theologie historique, Paris 1925, p. 233): "Morin thinks that there is no example of a bishop consecrated without being ordained priest beforehand. Martene, Mabillon and D. Chardon are of a different opinion however.... These facts and texts seem to prove that on several occasions ordinands who had not previously received the priesthood have been consecrated bishops. But it should also be noted that many of these consecrations, at least, have been strongly censured or even considered null."

229 It does not follow that there are eight Orders. The seventh Order in the priesthood, which comprises two degrees: it is full in the superior degree and partial in the inferior degree. Moreover, the Council of Trent did not define the number of Orders.

230 In IV Sent., d. 24, q. 3, a. 2, quae St. 1 and 2: d. 25, q. 1, a. 2, ad 2

231 According to John of St. Thomas "The character is a power ordering men to the divine cultus, either by action or reception.... But three sacraments order men to action or reception. Therefore they imprint a character.... The sacrament of Order concerns action, for by it men are prepared to consecrate the Eucharist and to dispense to others this sacrament and the other sacraments, and all this is concerned with action" (III, q. 63, disp. 25, a. 6, no. 4; Vives ed., vol. ix, p. 381)

"Episcopal ordination", says St. Robert Bellarmine, "is a ceremony which imprints a spiritual character and confers grace; therefore it is a sacrament. That it imprints a character appears from the facts that (a) it is not repeatable, (b) it gives the power to confer Confirmation and Holy Orders" (De Sacramento Ordinis, lib. I, cap. 5) According to Bellarmine, it does not greatly matter whether the effect of episcopal consecration be the imprinting of a new character or simply the extension of the priestly character; the argument holds good in both cases. Further on, he proves that the diaconate is a sacrament, from the fact that it cannot be repeated. To those who claim that non-repeatability proves the existence of a consecration but not necessarily that of a sacramental character, he replies that "The non-repeatability of certain sacraments is the principal reason which allows Catholics to hold that they imprint a character" (ibid., lib. I, cap. 6

232 II-II, q. 185, a. 1, ad 2

233 Papal delegation can be given permanently and quasi a jure

234 Council of Trent, session xx III, cap. I, can. 1; Denz., 957 and 961.

235 op. cit., p. 96, nos. 102 and 163

236 ibid., p. 98, no. 167

237 Ehses, Acta Concilii Tridentini, vol. ix, p. 76, line 33. According to St. Augustine (De Haeresibus, no. 53), Aerius held, among other errors, that "There is no difference that distinguishes the priest from the bishop", St. Epiphanius (Adversus Haereses, bk. I, vol. I, haer. 75, P. G. XLII, col. 508 ) speaks of Aerius as a madman because he said that "The bishop and the priest are equal. How could this be possible? For the order of bishops has for its end the engendering of fathers."

238 Ehses, op. cit., vol. ix, p. 100, lines 35 et seq.

239 The Council of Trent anathematized, for example, those who should deny that the Church can institute a liturgical feast in honour of the Eucharist, or carry it in procession (session x III, canon 6: Denz., 888)

240 St. Jerome was cited at the Council of Trent by the Archbishop of Rossano, who was to become Pope Urban VII, and opposed definition of the superiority of bishops as jure divino. Cf. Ehses, op. cit., p. 55. These texts from St. Jerome will be found in Lennerz, op. cit., pp., 38-41, nos. 72-5

241 These replies were provided by Bellarmine, among others (De Clericis, cap. 15) Lennerz has the texts of St. John Chrysostom and St. Jerome maintaining that the names of "priest" and "bishop" were in fact used interchangeably, and also the texts of Theodoret (op. cit., pp. 26, 41, 46, nos. 50, 75, 85)

242 J. Lecuyer, "La grace de la consecration episcopate" in Revue des sciences philosophiques et theologiques, 1952, p. 404.

243 Texts in C. Baisi, op. cit., pp. 28-35

244 Cf. St. Thomas, III, q. 62, a. 11, ad 1.

245 Decretum Pro Armenis, Denz., 697

246 ibid., 701.

247 Louis Saltet, Les reordinations, Etude sur le sacrement de l 'ordre, Paris 1907, pp. 102-4. He is not sure whether the Council considered Constantine as truly bishop

248 ibid., p. 143

249 ibid., pp. 148-52

250 ibid., pp. 155-6

251 ibid., pp. 169-70

252 ibid., p. 183

253 ibid., pp. 239-244. We need not put too much weight on the text in which Innocent III declares valid the sacraments administered by even a sinful priest "provided that the Church recognizes it" (Denz., 424)

254 "From the origins of Christianity, there are two different traditions. That of Rome states that Baptism administered outside the Church can, under certain conditions, be valid and need not be repeated. The Asian tradition considered Baptism administered outside the Church as null, and also that administered inside the Church by ministers of a certain degree of unworthiness; and it admitted the repetition of such a Baptism. At this early date there was almost always question of Baptism alone; but these decisions were based upon an idea which could hardly fail to be extended, later, to the other sacraments.... The African Church first of all followed the Roman usage but later on adopted the Asian. In the middle of the third century under Pope Stephen a conflict arose between the Churches of Rome and Africa, and this was the baptismal controversy" (Saltet, op. cit., p. 387) In 692 the attitude of the Quinisext Council shows that "The Greek Church did not admit the reordination of heretics either. This conclusion is justified in the Greek theology of the succeeding period" (ibid., p. 58)

255 The Donatists having admitted that "he who leaves the Church loses not Baptism but the power of conferring it", St. Augustine answered that neither the one nor the other was lost: "These two things are in fact a sacrament. Both are given by way of a consecration, the one to him who is baptized, the other to him who is ordained. Thus it is forbidden, in the Catholica, to repeat either the one or the other" (Contra Epistolam Parmeniani, lib. ii, cap. 13, no. 28)

256 St. Thomas replies to the question "Can heretics and those who are excluded from the Church confer Orders?" (In IV Sent., d. 25, q. 1, a. 2) by enumerating four opinions: (1) They can confer Orders insofar as they are tolerated by the Church and not after their exclusion: (2) If they have been consecrated bishops within the Church, they retain the power to confer Orders, but the bishops ordained by them will not have this power: (3) They confer Orders validly, and even sacramental grace, on those who culpably have recourse to their good offices: (4) They validly confer Orders but not sacramental grace on those who culpably have recourse to them. This last view is the only correct one.

257 Saltet, op. cit., pp. 76-7

258 ibid., p. 267.

259 Cf. Leo X III in his Apostolic Letter on the subject of Anglican ordinations: "Since the Church has always held it a constant and inviolable principle that it is forbidden to repeat the sacrament of Order, it would be impossible for the Apostolic See to allow and tolerate in silence a custom of this kind."

260 "Is so general and protracted an obscuring of dogma admissible in the Church? These authors seem to have a somewhat original idea of the infallibility of the Pope and the Church in general. For my own part I believe that if in a matter of this kind the Pope made a mistake, and the bishops too, and that for so long a time, then it must be said that the Church made a mistake in her ordinary magisterium. Yet we know that the Church is infallible in her ordinary magisterium. Ergo..." (Baisi, op. cit., pp. 152-3) There was no obscuring of dogma here. But we are not obliged to adopt Baisi's theory that in the above-mentioned cases all the Popes' ordinations were valid

261op. cit., pp. 151-8

262Leo X III, Letter on Anglican Ordinations: "In his letter of 8th March 1554 to the Apostolic Legate, Julius III makes a formal distinction between those who, having been elevated in a regular manner and according to the rite, should be upheld in their orders, and those who, having not been elevated to Holy Orders, could be so elevated if they were worthy and fit. There is here a clear distinction of two real categories of men. To the first belong those who had really received Holy Orders, either before Henry's schism or after it, through ministers attached to error or schism, but according to the accustomed Catholic rite; to the second, those who, being ordained according to the rite of King Edward, had received an invalid ordination and therefore could in due course be raised to Holy Orders.... This principle provides the basis for the doctrine that all sacraments conferred according to the Catholic rite are valid even when the minister is a heretic or tin the case of Baptism] unbaptized."

263cf. Baisi, op. cit., p. 32.

264 The texts of these two Bulls were published and discussed by Baisi, op. cit., pp. 7-28 and 104-16.

265 cf. Yves Congar, O. P., "Faits, problemes et reflexions a propos du pouvoir d'Ordre et des rapports entre le presbyterat et l'episcopat", in Maison-Dieu, Paris 1948, no. 14, p. 114. See also Lennerz, op. cit., p. 146, no. 240.

266 Cf. V. Zubizaretta, O. C. E., Theologia Dogmatico-Scolastica, Bilbao 1928, vol. iv, p. 407. This is the explanation which I had Adopted

267 cf. E. Hugon, O. P., "Etudes recentes sur le sacrement de l'ordre", in Revue Thomiste, 1924, pp. 481-93. The Bull's importance is on the contrary emphasized by M. J. Gerlaud, O. P., "Le ministre extraordinaire du sacrement de l'ordre", in Revue Thomiste, 1931, pp. 874-85.

268 op. cit., p. 146, nos. 240 and 241

269 As opposed to Yves Congar, who writes in the article cited from Maison-Dieu, p. 125: "It is clear that if the episcopate and the presbyterate are strictly distinct Orders by virtue of divine institution, the acts proper to the bishop cannot be carried out by a simple priest who remains a simple priest, and it does not appear how a papal authorisation would change his quality of simple priest." My answer would be: "The power of confirming and ordaining of simple priests is in itself extraordinary and subject to limitation as to its validity; in removing the limitation, the Pope does not change its nature. The bishops' power of confirming and ordaining is in itself ordinary and not subject to limitation—and this is enough for us to declare, with the Council of Trent, that bishops have a power which they do not hold in common with priests. And this difference can be, as the Code of Canon Law envisages, of divine institution."

270 "When, for example, Stephen II, in 753, declares valid a baptism administered with wine..." (Yves Congar, ibid., pp. 120 and 121) I do not think that a Pope can declare such a Baptism valid: "If any one shall say that true and natural water is not a necessity for Baptism.... let him be anathema" (Council of Trent, session vii, De Baptismo, canon 2, Denz., 858) And I do not think that Stephen II did this. See the eleventh of the "Replies of Pope Stephen II", published under the year 754 by Mansi, vol. xii, col. 561 : "Si in vino quis, propterea quod aquam non inveniebat, omnino periclitantem infantem baptizavit, nulla ei exinde adscribitur culpa. (Infantes sic permaneant in ipso baptismo.) Nam si aqua adfuit praesens, ille presbyter excommunicetur, poentientiae submittatur, quia contra canonum sententiam agere praesumpsit." It is clear, as Mansi notes, that the words in parentheses, which do not agree grammatically with what goes before, are an interpolation; it appears to be due to the influence of the replies preceding and following this one, in which similar expressions are found: "in hoc baptismo permaneant," "in eo permaneant baptismo", and in which the Pope concludes to the validity of baptism given by unworthy or ignorant priests, provided it has been according to the rites of the Church.

271 "It would appear that because of the development of our theology and perhaps the demands of polemic also, we have been led to make too radical a distinction—and one which allows of no third alternative—between an order of things divinely determined and a discipline which is the legitimate field of a law which is purely positive and ecclesiastical, a law of circumstances and opportunity. But there is surely between them, and joining them, a considerable domain where realities stemming from Christ Himself are under the canonical power of the Church: an area in which many things represent neither formal determinations of Christ nor simple instances of a purely positive and variable law, but rather ecclesiastical traditions" (Congar, op. cit., p. 126) It will be agreed without difficulty that one and the same institution can stem, under one aspect, from divine and unchangeable law, and under another aspect, from canonical and changeable law. A little further on (p. 127), we read "Moreover, since the Middle Ages were not dominated, as we are, by the idea of revelation as closed at the deaths of the Apostles, and had not reached in this matter ideas as clear-cut as ours, they took a freer and larger view of the inspirational role of the Holy spirit in the life of the Church. "But these formal distinctions between the power of order and the power of jurisdiction, divine law and canon law, the deposit of God's revelation and its unfolding by the Church, are all medieval

272 Billuart, De Sacramento Ordinis, dissert. 1, a. 3, 1: Brunet's edition, vol. vii, p. 320; Lennerz, op. cit., p. 116, no. 185

273 Billuart, Lennerz, etc. Also Baisi op. cit., p. 51, where he writes of Cajetan "Ha pero la veramente strana idea che il diaconato non sia stato immediatamente istituito dagli apostoli", Now Cajetan says exactly the opposite

274 Cajetan, Opuscula, vol. I, tract. x1" De Modo Tradendi seu Suscipiendi sacros Ordina",

275 A. A. S., xl, 1948, pp. 5-7

276 Denz., 695

277 Denz., 701.

278 P. Galtier, art. "Imposition des Mains", in Dict. de theol. cath., cols. 1408-12. Lennerz is more hesitant (op. cit., p. 138, no. 2