Saint Thomas Aquinas

Some years ago John Paul II suggested that St Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) could rightly be called ‘doctor of humanity’. He is clearly a doctor of divinity the Pope said, but his greatness consists as much in what he says about the human as in what he says about God.

Aquinas - whose liturgical feast is celebrated today - is one of the foremost representatives of a Christian humanism that has always flourished in the Church. In his understanding of creation and of grace, he draws on the resources of philosophy as well as theology to re-think the terms in which biblical, Christian doctrine may be presented. He was able to develop a mysticism of creation itself, in which God is understood to be present not only in particular people, places, or experiences, but everywhere and always. As creator, God is mightily active ‘deep down things’, for if God were not constantly willing the world’s being, and empowering its activities, there would be nothing.

Creation itself then – the nature of things as we come to understand and appreciate them – is another book in which the mystery of God is intelligible to us, however dimly.

All creatures bear a trace of their Maker but humans are created in God’s ‘image and likeness’. This is seen, St Thomas says, in our intelligence, in our moral responsibility, and in our creativity. As ‘participants in providence’ we are God’s partners in the unfolding of the world’s history. No longer merely servants, we are brought into friendship with God through Christ and the Holy Spirit.

St Thomas is very much a saint for our times. Secular humanism fears that God is a threat to humanity, that men and women cannot be truly free until they shake off God. Christian humanism knows that the truth is directly contrary to this: Christ, who is the head of humanity, leads it towards its flourishing, not towards its destruction. Christ is our way to maturity, St Thomas says, the love-breathing Word from God who finally introduces us to ourselves.

St Thomas Aquinas was an intellectual. His business was texts and translations, arguments and ideas. He shows us that holiness is also about the mind. He shows us that ‘mystery’, far from bringing thinking to an end, invites it to continue forever. He teaches us that it is in the light of God’s wisdom, as it is in the warmth of God’s love, that human beings come to their full flourishing.

The Dominican Seminar

The annual Dominican Seminar this year was held at Hinsley Hall, Leeds, from the 3rd to the 5th of January. The seminar is a chance for Dominican Friars, Sisters and Laity to meet, and have talks and discussions. This year's theme was 'Living the Good Life'. Proceedings were opened with a talk on virtue ethics by the Student Master, Fr. Vivian Boland. Other talks given were on the Transfiguration, on teaching ethics and the moral life, on being good in a world of 'spin', and on the representation of judgement and eternity in art.

The students of the English province were represented by Brs. Lawrence Lew, Romero Radix and Robert Gay. Br. Robert gave a talk entitled 'Creation, Ecology and Redemption: Seeing God in a blade of grass'. In his presentation he outlined something of the complex and intricate nature of interactions that exist in the natural world, and the dependence of human life on these interactions. He suggested how the findings of ecological study and the accounts of creation and redemption in Scripture help us to develop a sense of our stewardship of creation. He then offered some thoughts on how we might develop a more 'Catholic' understanding of environmental concerns that places them in the context of wider issues such as the sanctity of human life.

The seminar was not all work and no play. Much time was spent in informal discussion of the topics raised, and sharing time with fellow Dominicans, catching up on the latest news from around the country.

St. Rose of Lima

St. Rose of Lima was born Isabel de Flores on April 20, 1586 in the city of Lima, Peru. One day, her mother and some friends were sitting around the sleeping babe when a rose was seen to hover in the air above her head and descend to kiss her cheek. Her mother was astonished and in her joy promised never again to call her by any name but “Rose”.

When she was only six years old she began a life of mortification: fasting on bread and water alone on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. When she made her first communion and received Our Lord, Rose beheld him in a vision who told her that he would from that day forward sustain her body as well as her soul on the bread of life.

When she reached marriageable age her parents, Gaspar and Maria were terribly distraught when she turned down an offer from a wealthy man as they thought that this would be the answer to the financial problems they had had for many years. They turned on her, bullying her with words and even hitting her in their anger. However, once they realised that her mind was made up they allowed her to follow her conscience.

Rose was not content with commonplace virtue, she knew that to become a saint one must be a man or woman of penance, a victim on the altar of sacrifice. Her only food by this point was the roughest crusts of bread to which she added bitter herbs from her garden. As an imitation of Christ she also daily rinsed her mouth with the gall of a sheep and formed a crown of thorns from some pliable metal which she spiked at various points. When she wore this crown she would cover it with roses from her garden so as to disguise her penance.

Rose considered becoming a cloistered nun but was dissuaded by a heavenly voice which rendered her immovable when she tried to leave the Dominican church. She then realised that she was to be a tertiary and went on to receive the habit, which she wore at all times as was the custom for tertiaries then. Rose felt that she lacked apostolic labours and so convinced her family to allow her some rooms in the house to which she invited poor Native American women who often lived in terrible poverty and were still unconverted. Here she would tend to their spiritual as well as their physical needs

Before her death she experienced the dark night of the soul where she felt terrible despair and was beset by demonic forces. Through this, however, she was guided by Our Lord, Our Lady, St. Catherine and her guardian angel. Rose was miraculously granted knowledge of the time of her death, having been made aware that she would not live to see her 32nd year. Her last words were: “Jesus, Jesus, be with me.” After her death there were innumerable cures and a great change for the better throughout Latin America. In 1671 she was proclaimed a saint by Pope Clement IX and made special advocate of the Western hemisphere. She was the first saint of the Americas and is patroness of the whole of the Americas, as well as the Philippines.

In our time the life of St. Rose is particularly instructive. She was a lay woman who demonstrated how one can live in the world and do a great deal of apostolic work and yet still remain deeply contemplative. In this respect her life embodies the balance of the Dominican vocation to be a contemplative who ventures out to preach and to save souls. Her penance teaches us not to be attached to worldy things and her love for the Blessed Sacrament shows us that it is only by the strength we receive from Christ through his Church that we can do any good in this world.

Quodlibet 7: Is priesthood a higher, better, more spiritual calling than marriage?

Essentially it is not good to start considering the sacraments in terms of a hierarchical order: each of them has its particular role and function in the life of the Church. The seven sacraments touch the important moments in the Christian life, and this reflects a resemblance between the stages of natural life and the stages of spiritual life.

The sacraments of Holy Orders and Matrimony are directed towards the salvation of others, and so if they contribute towards personal salvation also, they do so through service to others - the priest in his service of the faithful, and the married person in the service of their spouse.

Through these sacraments, those who have already been consecrated by Baptism and Confirmation for the common priesthood of all the faithful receive particular consecrations. Those who receive the sacrament of Holy Orders are consecrated in the name of Christ to feed the Church with the word and grace of God. Those who are married are consecrated for the duties and dignity of their state by a special sacrament.

Ordination is not therefore a higher, better, or more spiritual calling than marriage. Nor, indeed, could the reverse be argued. Both are sacraments for the channelling of God's grace to all those who require it.

Credo 45: … and the life of the world to come.'

Maybe it is only when someone actually dies that the full strangeness of these words hits us. The creed’s words are themselves stark. They are uncompromising, and do not go into any details. There is an appropriateness to that. Talk about the ‘world to come’ has often been marked by a certain articulate sentimentality. This can be honestly or kindly intended, but it does not take account of the disturbing and complete rupture that comes with death. It often feels as though that there is a staring discrepancy between the models and schemes that people sometimes use and even the tiny insights that can be gathered about what is to come. Of course, people need some language to talk about these things. The danger is that the words become too familiar, and do not do justice to the otherness of what is called ‘eternal life’ and the ‘vision of God’.

The great theologian Karl Rahner was said to be afraid of death, though he did not lack faith. In trying to give some limited sense of what is meant by the ‘world to come’, I cannot do much better than to quote some of his words. He spoke them when he was eighty and did not have much longer to live

…when all the stars of our ideals, with which we ourselves in our own presumption have draped the heaven of our own lived lives, have burned out and are now extinguished; when death has built a monstrous silent void, and we have silently accepted this in faith and hope as our true identity; when then our life so far, however long it has been, appears only as a single short explosion of our freedom…when then we are shown in the monstrous shock of a joy beyond saying that this monstrous, silent void, which we experience as death, is in truth filled with the originating mystery that we call God, with God’s true light and with God’s love that receives all things and gives all things… - then, then I don’t actually want to describe anything like this, but nevertheless, I do want to stammer out some hint of how a person can for the moment expect what is to come…

Rahner’s speech finished soon after this point and then he made a collection for a poor priest in Africa who had written to him out of the blue, to ask for some help towards buying a motorcyle. Asking for the money, Rahner said how he felt ‘all our theological talk’ was not as important as when ‘we gave a poor person a bowl of soup’. Perhaps, after all, in these or similar gestures, you get the hint of what is meant by ‘the world to come’. In gifts freely given, with the hope of nothing in return, but with the sheer delight of the giving…there is some tiny anticipation surely of what the saints will see and adore in the vision of the one who is all in all.

Credo 44: We look for the resurrection of the dead ...

The end of the Creed – the symbol of our Faith – reflects the end towards which our faith is oriented: the resurrection of the dead.

Since we believe in the resurrection of Christ from the dead, we firmly believe that the righteous will live for ever through sharing in His resurrection. This has been a central aspect of Christian faith from the beginning. But isn’t this a little far off to consider at the moment?

Christ will raise us up on the last day; but in a sense we are all risen with Christ. By the virtue of the Holy Spirit, Christian life is already a participation in the death and Resurrection of Christ now on earth. We are united to Christ by baptism, and so we already participate in the heavenly life of the risen Christ, but this life remains ‘hidden with Christ in God’. We have already been raised by the Father to sit with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. As we are nourished with His Body in the Eucharist, we already belong to the Body of Christ. When we rise on the last day, we will also appear with Him in glory.

While we wait for that day, the body and soul of the believer already participate in the dignity of belonging to Christ. This dignity demands that both our own bodies and the bodies of all other human beings should be treated with respect. Through the justification we have celebrated in the Creed, we declare that we have been won for Christ. Our whole being and nature has been united with the Godhead. In these last days, we await the consummation of that glory.

Creed 43: '... for the forgiveness of sins'

This part of the creed — the forgiveness of sins — is quite often misunderstood or overemphasized. Indeed, this part of the creed is for some people the centre of gravity of their faith. When a fellow-monk one day repeated to Martin Luther these words of the Creed, 'I believe in the forgiveness of sins', Luther says that he saw the Scripture in an entirely new light 'and straightaway I felt as if I were born anew ...'

In fact, the need for a redeemer does not imply a sort of perverse ‘making one guilty’. First of all, it is important to note that the ‘forgiveness of sins’ occurs in the literary structure of the creed between ‘the baptism’ we acknowledge and ‘the resurrection’ we look for. In a sense, though important, the forgiveness of sins is ‘only’ a part of Christ’s mission because finiteness cannot be reduced to sinfulness. Sinfulness belongs to our frailty but this latter is larger that the former.

Secondly, it is interesting to note that for Aquinas, the three intentions of the Incarnation are “to preach the truth, to liberate from sins, and to have access through Christ to God" (ST IIIa q.40 a.1). Therefore, salvation cannot be reduced simply to the forgiveness of our sins. In a sense, we have to avoid the reaction of the prodigal son “I am no longer worthy to be called your son” (Lk 15:21). This kind of making guilty is not what we confess by saying “we acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins”. To feel sinful does not consist in a false humility or a way projecting guilt on ourselves rather than on others, in order to preserve them! Yet, to recognize our sins and to repent is absolutely necessary. Indeed, when we confess our sins, we discover that we are responsible and to consider oneself as guilty implies that we can discover the path of freedom by taking responsibility on oneself and growing in maturity and compassion.

Between our baptism and our death, we discover our frailty and we make mistakes, which turn us away from God’s love. Similarly, the Hebrews after the event of the exodus and their liberation (baptism) were in the desert (our sinful existence), hoping to enter the promised land (resurrection). In a way, in our earthly life, we are on the way to Mount Sinai, in the wilderness: looking back to God as liberator, and looking forward to the future, to a promise not completely fulfilled, to see God face to face.

Church fathers have developed this view and most of them have underlined the similarities between the wandering in the wilderness and the typological sign of the life of the Church awaiting the promised land. Therefore, in our lives, we are confronted with a dialectic between redemption as hope and redemption as a memory. Like the people of Israel in the desert, we remain a people that has been redeemed but that still awaits its redemption. On this path, we have to accept not only our sinful existence and our dependence on God but also the forgiveness given through baptism which sets us free.

Credo 42: 'We acknowledge one baptism ...'

The literary theorist Terry Eagleton began his memoir “The Gatekeeper” with a vivid description of performing just that role, as a prepubescent altar boy, in a convent of enclosed Carmelites close to where he then lived. We might conceive of baptism then as passing through a gate, into a new territory, with novel language and customs, into, in fact, a new life, our becoming caught up into the Trinitarian life of God.

In the early church, Christians became Christians through a lengthy and profoundly humbling process of public initiation, the catechumenate. Catechumens would be instructed, tested, and observed until they were judged worthy to join the congregation in celebrating the mystery of Christ’s presence among us – something which typically took several years. They would listen to the scriptures being read and commented on, but would leave before the liturgy of the Eucharist commenced, returning for a blessing at or after communion. The practice of reciting the Lord’s Prayer in silence until the final line, still sometimes found among the Benedictines, is supposed to reflect this early restriction of the central Christian rite to those who were members of Christ’s body.

Accordingly, Baptism is the rite of initiation that imprints the fundamental pattern of Christian life on the believer, who must therefore acknowledge a fundamental dependence upon others. We are baptised into a believing community. Not only individuals but the church as a whole is thus defined as a community whose way of living is henceforth a (continual) journey from slavery to freedom, from death to life, from self-centredness to a generous love in the way of the living Lord Jesus, as guided by the Holy Spirit. Learning to live out the promise of our baptism is the work of a lifetime; nevertheless, to be Christian just is to have received this sacrament, the one all Christian churches agree is necessary. Baptism is birth into Christian life, incorporation into the life of the Triune God through Christ, and as such overrides all the scandalous divisions human sin has incorporated into Christ’s church: “we acknowledge one baptism”.

Matthew’s Gospel (which St Dominic always carried with him) concludes with the Dominical command to the eleven disciples, some or all doubting or hesitant, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…” (Mt 28:19). One does not have to be a convinced believer, or even a believer at all to baptise (Can. 861, §2), providing that the intention of the baptiser is to confer the sacrament on the recipient (because the minister of the sacrament is, in fact, Christ himself), using the Trinitarian formula with the intention of doing what the church does.

This usage is critical, as emphasised by two recent canonical decisions. The first was internal: in a somewhat over-enthusiastic effort to render church language more gender-inclusive and so supposedly intelligible to our contemporaries, an Australian priest a few years ago baptised in the name of “the Creator, the Saviour, and the Sanctifier”. These ‘baptisms’ were ruled invalid and had to be repeated. Why so? Essentially because such terminology disregards a longstanding church tradition, dating back to the Fathers, of the normative theological priority of biblical terms and their inherent biblical meaning. While it is true that such designations can be truly applied to God, that truth is limited only to God conceived as acting towards us, and does not adequately designate who God is in himself: that is, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. If one is to be incorporated into the Trinity as the Trinity is, then one must be baptised in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Similarly, externally, in 2001, the Vatican declared that the baptism of the Mormon church was invalid, because there was no real invocation of the Trinity: for the Mormons, the “Father”, “Son” and “Holy Spirit” are not three persons in which one divinity subsists, but three gods who form a divinity. Such divergence in doctrine implies that the Mormon minister does not have the intention, when baptizing, of doing what the church does when it confers baptism.

The ‘one baptism’ we acknowledge creates a radical equality among all the faithful, of whatever communion, of whatever status (although ministry in the church should, of course, always be conceived in terms of service rather than of privilege and power). All of the baptised are equal in the sight of the Lord, all are equally responsible for the body of Christ, and equally responsible to him; whether male or female, slave or free, Jew or Greek, pope or laity (cf 1 Cor 12:13). That is our glory, and our challenge.

Credo 41 - We believe in [one] ... apostolic Church

It all began with the resurrection of Christ. The apostles, called by name by Jesus himself, were those who bore witness in public to the life and mission of the Lord:

‘That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life -- the life was made manifest, and we saw it, and testify to it, and proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the Father and was made manifest to us -- that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you may have fellowship with us; and our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.’ (1 John 1:1-3).

They joined in Christ’s mission of preaching the Good News, and thus commissioned, were made pillars of the newly-born Church.

When we say that we believe that the Church is apostolic, we mean that we believe that it still participates in the same mission of Christ, through the apostles and bishops - their successors.

Even though by the laying on of hands (the apostolic succession) bishops are particularly responsible for preaching the truth about Jesus Christ and his redemptive mission, all the baptized share in various ways in the apostolic mission of the Church by virtue of the common baptism. We never stop being on the mission, until the Lord returns!

Creed 40: ... catholic...

To profess that the Church is 'catholic' is to say something about the very essence of the Church. When we say this in the Creed, we are not using the word as a title, or a proper noun. We are saying something about the nature of the Church; we are speaking of a spiritual reality rather than something geographical or statistical. The word 'katholikos' in classical Greek was used by philosophers to indicate a universal proposition. Thus, when this idea is applied to the Church, then, in the words of Pope Benedict XVI, "The translation of catholic is 'including the whole'; it signifies 'relating to the whole'. It is a way of expressing the fact that the Church belongs to the whole world, to all cultures and every age."

Why is the Church universal? Speaking of the Church, St Augustine explained: "You unite together the inhabitants of the cities, the different peoples, nay the whole human race, by belief in our common origin, so that human beings are not satisfied in being joined together, but become in some sort brothers." This belief in the fraternity of all humankind is thus rooted in the reality of God's fatherhood over all. Moreover, because of the universal salvation that Christ alone won for all creation, so "God has willed that the Church founded by him be the instrument for the salvation of all humanity (see Acts 17:30-31)." So, the Church's duty as 'catholic' is to gather all people in the Spirit of love, to reconcile the world in Christ and to bring all into communion with the Father.

This belief flows into three aspects of the Church's life. Firstly, the Church has an intrinsically missionary orientation as she seeks to serve humanity by proclaiming the Gospel, by word and deed, to all people. As the Second Vatican Council says: "Though God in ways known to Himself can lead those inculpably ignorant of the Gospel to find that faith without which it is impossible to please Him (Heb. 11:6), yet a necessity lies upon the Church (1 Cor. 9:16), and at the same time a sacred duty, to preach the Gospel. And hence missionary activity today as always retains its power and necessity." Such activity is an expression of the Church's faith in the catholicity of the Gospel.

Secondly, when the psalmist says in Psalm 87:5, "Zion shall be called 'Mother' for all shall be her children", these words have been seen in the light of Christ to refer to the Church who has been constituted by Christ as 'mother' of all peoples. As such, Vatican II also teaches that "In virtue of her mission and nature [the Church] is bound to no particular form of human culture, nor to any political, economic or social system." Rather, in the universality and diversity of the Church, she expresses more clearly her motherhood over all people. As Pope Benedict has said: "[The Church should] bring the whole wealth of human existence, in all its languages, to God - and should be thereby herself a power for reconciliation among people." So, the Church's diversity and expanse is a mark of her catholicity.

Thirdly, in the work of reconciliation that the Church is engaged in, by the Christian unity that she constantly strives for, and by the peace among all people that she mediates, the Church becomes an ever clearer sign of universal salvation in Christ under the one God and Father of us all (see Ephesians 4:6). For the sign she displays through such activity is ultimately one of charity, and such charity is itself a mark of the Church's intimate union with God. It is this same communion with the living God that she offers to all humankind by virtue of her being catholic.

Credo 39 - We believe in [one] holy ... Church

If one were to consider the Church as a merely human institution, it would be hard to assert that it is holy, for all too often we encounter signs of the sinfulness of its members. Moreover, it would make little sense to profess belief in a human institution. However this article of the Creed does just those things, so it must challenge us to go beyond this limited view of the Church. Rather, it invites us to make a declaration of faith in the very nature of the Church, which the Scriptures refer to as Christ's Mystical Body (see Col 1:24), the Bride of Christ, called to be "holy and without blemish" (Eph 5:27), and a "holy people" consecrated to God (see 1 Pet 2:9). What does it mean, then, to say that the Church is holy?

With faith, we profess this because Jesus Christ, her Head, is holy. Where Jesus has gone, we hope to follow (see Preface of the Ascension), but as yet we are clearly still very much engaged in fighting the good fight against sin. For this reason, the Church on earth is also called the Church Militant. In this struggle, God's holy Church is our refuge, our help and our inspiration, for in the Church, we have the abiding Presence of Christ, and through the Church Jesus continues to feed and teach sinners, and he persists in his mission to call those who are tired and burdened to himself.

This is the mystery of the Church which clasps both sinners and saints to her bosom. When we profess the Church to be holy, we do not ignore the sinfulness of her members, but rather we joyfully proclaim that God has given her the gift of the sacraments through which her members are sanctified. In spite of human sinfulness, and indeed, because of it, God provides the means for holiness in the Church and this has been eloquently attested to in the life of her saints. As Cardinal Ratzinger said, "the Church is the institution sanctified by [Christ] forever, an institution in which the holiness of the Lord becomes present among men." Indeed, the holy Church transcends the sinfulness of her individual members and so in the Mass we ask the Lord to "look not on our sins, but on the faith of your Church".

However, the final fulfillment of the promise of holiness given to the Church belongs only to the saints in heaven, whom we call the Church Triumphant, for they, by God's grace, are victorious over sin and death. That is the end towards which we all strive; as St Thomas Aquinas explains: "to be a glorious Church, with neither spot nor wrinkle, is the ultimate end to which we are brought by the Passion of Christ. Hence, this will be the case only in the heavenly homeland, not here on the way of pilgrimage, where 'if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves'..." (Summa theologiae III 8,3). As such, each of us in the Church is called to strive for holiness, to reform and to renewal in the Spirit, but at the same time, we should not be too surprised that sin exists in the Church. We need only examine our own lives as Christians to realize how we are still very much in the process of becoming sanctified.

Baptism is just the first step of this journey. As we undertake Life's pilgrimage, we have the witness of the saints who have gone before us and we have the Church, our Mother and Teacher, whom Christ has endowed with "every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places... [so] that we should be holy and blameless before him" (Eph 1:3-4).

* * * * *

If you are interested in more on this fascinating topic, you may want to read Memory and Reconciliation: the Church and the faults of the past.

Quodlibet 6 - Vows and Sacraments

'Why is religious profession a sacramental and not a Sacrament? Similarly, a priest is eternally a priest...is a religious eternally a religious and why...is it because the vows are eternal and it is a realization of God's call, or is there some other reason?’

The simple answer to the first question is: because the Church has discerned that profession is not a sacrament. But this in itself can tell us a lot. The seven sacraments that have been defined by the Church deal with stages in our life as Christians, which, in a sense are not unconnected with the biological and psychological stages of our life. Our Baptism is the beginning of our Christian lives, Confirmation marks Christian maturity, the Eucharist nourishes us on our journey. When we are weakened in body or soul we receive strength and healing through Anointing of the Sick and Confession. All humans are made to seek God in communion with one another, and need to be guided and lead. For this we have Marriage and Holy Orders. The Church’s discernment is that these are the seven special gifts of Christ to the Church, by which the Church becomes more perfectly Christ-like, and that have permanent value in the Church.

Sacramentals, on the other hand, ‘bear a resemblance to the sacraments’ (CCC, 1667). Religious profession is a particular means of living out our baptism in such a way that we become conformed to Christ, but (and this may be shocking for religious amongst us) is not necessary for the survival of the Church in the way that sacraments are. It is a sobering thought that religious will continue to exist as long as they are useful to the Church in their prayer, witness and ministry. It is nevertheless a ‘gift from [the] Lord’ so that the Church can ‘show forth Christ and acknowledge her to be the Saviour’s bride’ (CCC, 926).

Credo 38 - We believe in one [...] Church

Belief is necessary. The word of the LORD from the mouth of the prophet Isaiah demonstrates this. During the reign of king Ahaz of Judah, Israel and Damascus were trying to attack the House of David. Isaiah says that his 'heart and his people's hearts shook like forest trees shaking in the wind' (Isaiah 7:2). The LORD told Isaiah to go and tell the king of Judah to be calm, for the attack was not going to happen. However, there was a condition. Ahaz had to believe and trust in the word of YHWH before the attack could come to nothing. 'Lord Yahweh says this...if you will not take your stand on me you will not stand firm' (Isaiah 7:9). The RSV puts it: 'If you will not believe, surely you shall not be established'. Even though God had made a promise to David that his house was not going to pass away, here, we see, the fulfilment of that promise depended on the king believing. If the king had not believed, the words of God would have come to nought. This is the power that we have.

Paul understood this principle. Addresing the Hebrews, he says, 'for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him' (Hebrews 11:6). What I want to highlight here, is that, in the kingdom of God one of the pre-requisites for getting things done is believing.

In our modern world it might seem an irrational thing. It seems very difficult for modern man to function on the level of belief. But belief is basic to human existence. When a farmer sowers his seeds, he does so with the belief that the seeds will grow and produce fruit. There is an element of belief operating here in this basic physical phenomenon. Now, since creation reflects the glory of God, the ways of God, why then when it comes to matters relating to God do we find believing to be such a bizarre notion?

When God asks us to believe he is not asking us to do anything beyond ourselves. It is well within our power to do so. So, saying ... oh ... I just cannot bring my self to believe, as if to say, I am too sophisticated to do such a thing, is not putting forward a sound justification for not exercising belief. The question in life is always: what do you choose to believe? Just as a farmer chooses to believe that his seeds will grow, so too you can choose to believe, to put your trust in the Word of God and see if it will not do what it promises.

Whatever God asks us to believe we have the power to choose to do and it is necessary to do so. One such thing is to believe that the Church is the single community of all the saints.

Credo 37 - He has spoken through the Prophets

Perhaps we should start our exploration of God’s speaking through the prophets by asking what the word ‘Prophets’ might mean. Some clues can perhaps be found by looking at the origin of the word. In modern usage, anyone who makes predictions about the future is labelled a prophet. Our English ‘prophet’ comes from the Greek word prophētēs, which in turn comes from the Greek verb ‘to say beforehand’. Anyone who says something about an event beforehand is someone who makes a prediction about the future. But does this give us a full enough account of its meaning for us?

In the Old Testament, both Abraham and Moses are described as prophets, and so some insight as to what a prophet is might be gained by looking at what they did. In Abraham’s case, we meet a man who was spoken to by God, and who also spoke directly to God. Through his interactions with God, Abraham receives word of God’s desire to enter into Covenant with him. God reveals his promise to give him land, and to make him the father of many nations (cf. Gen 15:18-17:4). In Moses we have an a man to whom is revealed God’s desire to free the people of Israel from slavery, and who leads them out of Egypt, across the Red Sea, to defeat of Amalek (cf. Ex 14:21-15, 17:11-12). Through Moses, God also gave the Law to the people of Israel, acted as Judge of that Law, and who spoke with authority about future events (Deut 34:9-12; Ex: 18). By looking at Abraham and Moses we get a picture of prophets as ones who proclaim and interpret God’s message, who intercede on behalf of the people, and who are given insight into future events.

‘The Prophets’ also refers to a series of books in the Old Testament written by prophetic writers. Of these, perhaps the most famous are what have been termed the Greater Prophets, namely the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel, although there are a number of other prophetic works, termed the minor prophets. These books provide us with revelations related through prophecy, whose purpose was to provide the people of Israel with a deeper and clearer understanding of the will of God, and foretell the unfolding of Salvation. For Christians, these writings are of immense value, since they proclaim the unfolding of God’s promise, a promise brought to its fulfilment in Christ.

Credo 35: ... and the Son ...

This phrase is misleadingly simple. The controversy it generated – usually referred to by its Latin form, Filioque – occasioned the first great schism in Christianity between the churches of the Latin West, which accepted its inclusion in the creed, and the churches of the (largely) Greek East, which did not. What was disputed concerned who God has revealed Himself to be.

The New Testament texts that speak of the relationship between the Spirit and the Son are concerned with God’s act of revelation in the Word incarnate; even John 15:26 “When comes the Paraclete whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of Truth, which from the Father proceeds, that one will testify about me.” This of course is the reference par excellence in favour of the procession of the Spirit from the Father alone; but the word “alone” is not found in this text; rather what it deals with is the temporal mission of the Paraclete. The Latin Fathers appealed frequently to two other texts in John: 16:14-15 “That one [the Spirit of Truth] me will glorify, because of mine he will receive and will announce [it] to you. All things which has the Father mine are. Therefore I said that of mine he receives and will announce [it] to you”, and 20:22 “And this having said he breathed on [them] and says to them receive [the] Spirit Holy”. If we are sons able to call God ‘Father’ that is because we have received the Spirit of his Son. Hilary of Poitiers thought that ‘of mine he will receive’ (Jn 16:14) might have the same meaning as ‘proceeds from the Father’ (De Trin. VIII, 20), while Augustine and Anselm believed that the breathing on the disciples (Jn 20:22) implied the procession of the Spirit from the Son.

The source of Latin reflection on the mystery of the Trinity was largely Augustine who developed his teaching by a rigorous exegesis of scripture. Here he is quoting himself (Tr. In Joh. Evang.99, 8-9) “I had been teaching from the evidence of the holy scriptures that the Holy Spirit proceeds from them both. I then went on to say: So if the Holy Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son, why did the Son say He proceeds from the Father (Jn 15:26)? Why indeed, do you suppose, unless it was the way he was accustomed to refer even what was his very own to him from whom he had his very self? For example, that other thing he said, My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me (Jn 7:16). If in this case we can accept that it is his teaching, which he says however is not his but the Father’s, how much more should we accept in our case that the Holy Spirit proceeds also from him, seeing that he said He proceeds from the Father without also saying ‘He does not proceed from me’?”

The doctrine that the Holy Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son began to be proclaimed as official church teaching in the church of Spain. It was regarded as a necessary counter to a kind of Arianism prevalent among the ruling Visigoths, which regarded the Holy Spirit as a creature of the Son just as it regarded the Son as a creature of the Father. The aim of the church there was to safeguard the consubstantiality of the Word incarnate with the Father. The Spanish church’s doctrine was shared by the churches of France and England, where by the late eighth century the term Filioque is found in the creed recited at Mass each Sunday, and where moreover it was assumed that the word had always been part of the creed of Nicaea. Things rapidly became polemical, for political as well as theological reasons. In 1014 the Roman church, under pressure from the Bavarian emperor, introduced the Frankish creed, containing the Filioque, into the Mass. When the definitive break with Constantinople occurred exactly forty years later the difference over the Filioque was one of the central points of dispute.

The fundamental Orthodox objection seems to be that it is a mistake to think of the persons of the Trinity as constituted by the relationships of their origins: their distinctness as hypostases is prior to their relationships; somehow, both the distinctness and the unity of the three hypostases are derived from the first person, the Father, who is the sole beginning and the only cause of divinity, which he communicates wholly to the Son and to the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, the inter-personal relationships of the three are richer and more dynamic than just considering their relationship in terms of origin allows – summed up in the Greek term perichoresis – in terms of which modern Orthodox theologians explain statements of the Greek Fathers that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son. Aquinas decided that we can also say this, with suitable qualifications: it is a way of stating, he says, what Augustine held, that the Son receives from the Father the power of being joint origin or ‘breather forth’ of the Holy Spirit; further, he saw it as a gesture of goodwill towards the Greek position. The concern in the West is that to omit the Filioque is to play down the fact that to name the Holy Spirit is to name not only the Father but also the Son, for the Spirit is necessarily constituted within their relationship and so related to both. The one God is the Father begetting the Son in the love of the Spirit and the Son loving the Father in the same Spirit in whom he is lovingly begotten. The Son and Spirit are both ‘God of God’ and the point of the doctrine of the Filioque is to remind us of this teaching.

Credo 34 ...who proceeds from the Father...

‘The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters’ (Gn. 1.2).

‘But when the Counsellor comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me’ (Jn 15.26).

‘God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For what person knows a man's thoughts except the spirit of the man which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God’ (1 Cor. 2.11-12).

There are many allusions to the Spirit of God in the scriptures. It is through the teaching of Christ and the experience of St Paul and the other Apostles in the early church that the Counsellor, the Advocate, the Paraclete is known as the third Person of the Trinity. That is, the Trinity is revealed to us by its missions, by the fact that the Son and the Spirit are sent from God, the Father: the Son from the Father and the Spirit of God whom the Son sends from the Father.

But these Persons do not begin to exist when they are sent in these missions, for then God would have some parts that are not eternal and we would have divided God. The Father, Son and Spirit are eternally related, for God is simply one.

The language we received from Jesus helps us to understand these relations. The first is clear: the Son is begotten by the Father. That is, the Son finds his eternal origin in the Father as the names suggest. But the Spirit too, as the Spirit of God is eternally generated in God, a generation which Jesus calls procession.

When we say that the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life proceeds from the Father, we are simply stating the revelation that the Holy Spirit sent by God is simply God from all eternity. God sends himself into the world to dwell in humanity. It is in the light of this astonishing thought that we must continue to address St Paul’s question to ourselves: ‘do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?’ (1 Cor. 3.16).

Credo 33: ... the giver of life ...

Only God gives life. Creatures can nurture or manipulate his gift, but the gift is always his. When we confess that the Spirit is the ‘giver of life’, we recognise that the Spirit is God, like the Son and the Father. The Spirit gives life, just as the Father and the Son give life.

In the beginning of Genesis, the world is welter and waste. In the expressive Hebrew phrase, it is tohu wabohu, a kind of futile chaos. The Spirit of God ‘hovers’ over the surface of the waters, like an eagle fluttering over its young. This Spirit miraculously and incomprehensibly helps bring forth life from the sterile salt-waste (1.2). This creation happens not just once, but again and again, constantly. In his hymn to the glory of creation, the psalmist sings about the Spirit’s presence in the gift of new life and nurture

You take back your Spirit and living things die,
returning to the dust from which they came.
You send forth your Spirit, they are created
and you renew the face of the earth (104. 30)

The continued existence, the passing away, and the origination of all beings are conditioned by God’s Spirit. The Spirit is like a hand, providing for all things and upholding them. Or it is like God’s breath, animating things and renewing them.

One of the main meanings of the doctrine of the Trinity is that it is the same God who makes the universe, who comes among us as a man, and who is continually present to the world. Creation and redemption are a single act, proceeding from a single God. Likewise, the same Spirit which is involved in making the world, is also involved in remaking it. The Spirit gives life in the first place, and also gives new life.

When St Paul calls the Spirit ‘the giver of life’ he means primarily this re-creation. The Spirit comes to those who are spiritually dead, through sin, and raises them to the new life of faith, hope and charity.

The coming to us of the Spirit is the deepest and most unanalysable meaning of conversion. We do not know what the Spirit is; we cannot grasp it. We do not know where he comes from or where he is going. But we know that we are sharing again in this new life of the Spirit when we have his gifts. The writers of the New Testament say that his face is seen especially in the readiness to love and to forgive.

8 Deadly Sins?

The Catholic Truth Society has just published another booklet by Fr Vivian Boland, the master of students at Blackfriars. Once again the booklet originated in talks given to the students, this time during Michaelmas 2006 and Hilary 2007. Yes, he knows that the tradition came to settle on '7' but read what Evagrius, John Cassian and Gregory the Great have to say about them and why they think there are 8. The scriptural texts in the background (understood allegorically) are Deuteronomy 7:1 which names the seven nations the Hebrews are to drive out of Canaan (and don't forget the Egyptians from whose land they have just escaped!) and Luke 11:26 which tells of an unclean spirit driven out of a man who returns to the tidied house with seven spirits more evil than himself (but he comes back with them!).

The booklet consists of an introduction - why 7 or 8? what does it mean to speak of them as 'deadly'? - and continues with individual chapters on each in turn, covetousness, envy, sloth, gluttony, lust, anger, pride and vainglory. Fr Vivian concludes:

A first step in countering their influence is to understand their psychological and spiritual roots in human experience. This is what this booklet has tried to do. If we stand, humbly, in the truth about ourselves, we will appreciate the power of God's love to heal and strengthen our nature, for love is not jealous or boastful, not arrogant or rude, not irritable or resentful. If we understand the origins and nature in us of these 'generic thoughts', these 'phantasies' or 'demons', we are already in possession of a truth that sets us free. For that understanding assures us, in case we are tempted to doubt it, that our wellbeing and our salvation consists only, and always, in love. This will then sustain us in the discipline and practices of the spiritual life.

Credo 32: … (the Holy Spirit), the Lord …

‘Lord’ in this case refers to the Holy Spirit, to whom this particular section of the Creed is dedicated, this particular prolongation being formed at the Council of Constantinople in 381 AD. Previously, the creed had ended with the words ‘We Believe in the Holy Spirit’, followed by an anathema statement directed at those who declared either the second or third persons of the Trinity to be made, or that there was a time when the Holy Spirit was not.

Why would we call the Holy Spirit by the title which the generally reserve to Jesus Christ? It appears to be a contradiction, as we earlier said that we believe in ONE Lord, Jesus Christ. Why then do we acknowledge yet another Lord?

This is done to signify that the One whom the Father has sent into our hearts, the Spirit of His Son, is truly God. The Holy Spirit is consubstantial with both the Father and the Son, and is inseparable from them in both the inner life of the Trinity and in the gift of love that God gives to the world. When the Father sends His Word, he also sends His Breath. And so the two Lords, the Son and the Spirit, are distinct while remaining inseparable in their joint mission. It is Christ who is seen, but it is the Holy Spirit who reveals Him.

Jesus is Christ, ‘anointed’, because the Spirit is His anointing, and each event that follows the Incarnation derives from this fullness. When Christ is glorified, He can send the Spirit from his place with the Father to those who believe in Him. he communicates His glory to them, that is the Holy Spirit who glorifies Him. From then on, the joint mission will be manifested in the children adopted by the Father in the Body of His Son. The mission of the Spirit of adoption is to unite them to Christ and make them live in Him.

Creed 31: We believe in the Holy Spirit

Here starts the third section of the creed, which deals with the Holy Spirit. Whilst the first section spoke about God the almighty and the second about Jesus, the third section affirms our faith in the Holy Spirit. In a sense, the creed does not try to explain the mystery of these three persons. The doctrine of the Trinity simply states that there is only one God while, at the same time, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are God. The creed tries neither to explain nor to prove this doctrine, which is beyond our understanding. In fact, the only explanation has to be found in our lives: the Spirit can ‘inspire’ our lives. Indeed, the Greek word for spirit is the same word as for ‘breath’ or ‘wind’. In the Book of Genesis, the Spirit is the agent of creation, “a wind from God swept over the waters” (Gen1:2). Similarly, the creation account tells us that the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed life into him (2:7). It is the Spirit which gives wisdom to man (Gen 41:38).

A glance at the liturgical calendar could help us to understand better the centrality of the Holy Spirit in our lives. The feast of Pentecost celebrates the day, 50 days after the resurrection, when the Church received the Spirit (Acts 2). In that respect, we are living in the time of the Spirit, who continues to inspire the Church, the men and women of our time. The Holy Spirit ‘dwells’ in us and guides us. This does not mean of course that there are three Gods, or chronologically that the Father sent the Son and the Son the Spirit. More profoundly, the Holy Spirit is given to us so that we may not be left ‘orphans’. The time of the Spirit in which we live means that God does not leave us alone. It even transcends our confessions. In the world, the Spirit, by his gifts, inspires people to good and to speak as prophets, “moved by the Holy Spirit” (2Pet 1:21). Therefore, it is the Spirit who helps us to work for peace and to work for the Kingdom of God, which is “righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom 14:17).

Credo 30: ... and his kingdom shall have no end.

A fundamental tenet of Jesus’ preaching, and its urgency, was the proclamation of the imminent coming of the Kingdom of God. The parables of Jesus are a challenge to make a radical choice; to give up everything else “for the sake of the Kingdom of God”; while his miracles, linked to this preaching, are signs of the Messiah, of the foretold King anointed with the power of God: “But if it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come to you” (Mt 12:28).

In giving an assertion of God’s rule over his creation, Scripture frequently employs images of God as ruler, as analogous to the most powerful humans in these ancient cultures. Proclamation of the kingdom of God, building on the tradition of YHWH’s rule over all creation, is fundamental to Jesus’ mission as depicted in the Gospels. The kingdom is not a geographical place; rather, it is a relationship of power, in which God and creature are properly aligned. That Jesus participates in God’s rule over creation as a result of his resurrection is the corollary of his “exaltation, glorification, ascension, and enthronement” at God’s right hand “The Lord says to my lord ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool’” (Ps 110.1).

That his kingdom is eternal would seem to follow logically from the fact that the kingdom is God’s own rule over creation, which Jesus assumes because of his enthronement (Ps 110:1), and which is by definition eternal. The creed is specific here because of a concern raised by St Paul in his first letter to the church in Corinth (1 Cor 15:20-28). There, Paul is responding to those who deny the resurrection of the dead (15:12). He wants therefore to emphasise two things – first, they cannot yet be ruling, because the kingdom of God is not yet completely established, so sin and death are still ‘powers and authorities’ that must be conquered (1 Cor 15: 53-56). They are living only at the first stage, that of Christ’s being raised, but the second stage, which is coming, has not yet occurred. Hence, there was no evidence then – or now - for a bodily resurrection apart from Christ’s – this hasn’t yet happened to anyone else (although Mary's assumption body and soul into heaven is a unique participation in the new life Christ has won for us). Later, grappling with the Arian controversy, the pro-Nicene theologians were concerned lest this complex passage from Paul be read in a way that so emphasised the Son’s subordination to the Father that he might seem to be only a creature. Thus, they emphasise in the creed that his kingdom shall have no end.

This, too, is the crux of our contemporary problem – how can the kingdom be professed to have no end when it doesn’t seem to have begun? While the kingdom was “definitively established through [the events of] Christ’s cross” (Catechism §560), we are still caught between the already and the not yet, the continuing reign of injustice and sin in the world and the apparent absence, indifference or impotence of God in the face of all this. Yet we pray each day ‘thy kingdom come’; and we perhaps need to re-engage with the insight of Lumen Gentium (Vatican II) that we are presently pilgrims, travelling in the hope of arrival, where we will find the fulfilment of the kingdom in union with Christ. Such a profession, here as elsewhere, isn’t to be disparaged as deluded, wishful thinking, but seen rather as a challenge to enact what it says, seen also as a witness of our failure to live by God’s rule.

Credo 29 - ...to judge the living and the dead

The belief that Christ has the authority to judge the living and the dead is frequently repeated through the New Testament (e.g. Matthew 16:27, Acts 10:42, Romans 14:7-10, etc.). The judgement belongs by right to Christ, as he is the Lord and Redeemer.

What does it mean, then? It means that Christ paid the highest possible price to ransom us from the slavery of death and evil. Being God, 'he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross' (Philippians 2:8). We belong to Christ by right, not only as our Creator but also as our Saviour.

It is the mercy of Jesus that is the principle of his judgement, ‘for God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.’ (John, 3:17).

We are all equal also in this respect, that we are all in position to accept Christ's mercy or reject it! Christ calls Judas his friend, even though he betrayed him. Let us then not pass judgement on our sisters and brothers, as we shall all stand before Christ (Romans 14:10).

Credo 28: He will come again in glory ...

In many of his parables Jesus taught his disciples to live towards the future. They were to be faithful servants, busy with their work, but always ready and alert for the moment when the master of the household would return. Life is to be lived fully in the present but always also with an orientation towards what is yet to come. Christians live within this tension between the present and the future. Each time Mass is celebrated we say that are 'waiting in joyful hope for the coming of our Saviour, Jesus Christ'. The acclamations after the consecration of the Mass illustrate how the mystery we celebrate belongs not only to the past and to the present but also anticipates the future: 'Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again', 'When we eat this bread and drink this cup we proclaim your death Lord Jesus until you come in glory'.

During his trial Jesus provoked the wrath of his accusers by referring to himself as the Son of Man who would come in glory on the clouds of heaven. In this he was identifying himself with his Father's purposes and with the promises of the Father for the future of Israel. He was saying that these purposes and promises were being fulfilled in what was happening to him - that God would take what was happening to him and make it to be the definitive revelation of the glory of God.

The glory that is to be revealed - a glory of light and life and love, a re-shaping of the earth and a shaking of the world to its foundations, a revelation of God's holiness and the radiance of those who belong to Him - all this is already mysteriously revealed in the glory of the crucified one. Already we have seen his glory, St John says, the glory that is his as the only Son from the Father. What we have come to, the Letter to the Hebrews says (and it seems to be referring to the Christian community gathered for the Eucharist), is Mount Zion and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, with innumerable angels gathered for the festival, to an assembly where everyone is a firstborn citizen of heaven, to the spirits of just people made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, to the sprinkled blood, to a judge who is God of all.

We are already the children of God but what we are to be in the future - when he comes again in glory - has not yet been revealed. Now we see in a glass darkly - in mystery, sacramentally - but then face to face. When he comes again in glory we shall see him as he really is. And in seeing him we shall become like him. If we have shared in his sufferings then we will share also in the glory that is to be revealed.

Credo 27 - ... and is seated at the right hand of the Father

Anthropologists have noted that in many cultures, the right side of the body is considered to be of greater importance and this is true of the cultural milieu of the Scriptures. Repeatedly in the Old Testament, the right hand is the one of victory, power, strength and the Gospels indicate that Jesus also employs such symbolism (see, for example, Matthew 5:29-30). As such, the right side of the body was understood symbolically to be good, precious, important. It is also the right hand that is associated with authority, might and dominion. Consequently, it is significant that Christ is raised to the right hand of the Father.

The key Scriptural text is Psalm 110:1 – “The Lord says to my lord: ‘Sit at my right hand, till I make your enemies your footstool’” – which the Church sings in her liturgy every Sunday. Inspired by this, we find nascent expressions of belief in Christ seated at the Father's right in the New Testament letters attributed to St Paul (e.g. Ephesians 1:20; Colossians 3:1). This psalm verse is the most cited Old Testament text in the New Testament and it also has the distinction of being the only one commented upon by Jesus in the Synoptic gospels (Mt 22:41-46; Mk 12:35-37; Lk 20:41-44). Here, the point being made is that Jesus, the Messiah, is both greater than David and is Lord. As we have seen earlier in this series of posts, to call Jesus ‘Lord’ indicates his divinity. Hence St John Damascene explains that this article of the Creed confirms the significance of the Ascension by confessing that Jesus, in his risen and glorified flesh, shares the Father’s “glory and honour of divinity”, which is also his from all eternity.

In addition, this article of the Creed also affirms Christ’s authority as Messiah, as revealed in the prophecy of Daniel: “And to him was given dominion and glory and kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed” (7:14). Jesus himself alludes to this text and makes a connection to Psalm 110 in Mark 14:62 when he answers affirmatively that he is the Christ. As such, the authority given to Christ is for the establishment of God’s Kingdom: “a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love, and peace” (Preface of Christ the King).

Finally, in the ‘Gloria’, we implore Christ, who is seated at the Father’s right hand, to receive our prayer and to have mercy on us. Such imagery of priestly intercession again finds a resonance in Psalm 110 which evokes the eternal priesthood of Melchizedek. Therefore, in affirming that Christ is seated at God’s right hand, we can call upon him as our mediator and our intercessor, for he is our great High Priest. Thus, when he comes as Judge and to rule over his Kingdom, as the Creed goes on to declare, we can rely on his merciful compassion: “For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:15-16).

Credo 26: He ascended into heaven ...

'No one has ascended into heaven but he who descended from heaven, the son of man' (John 3: 13. RSV). The son of man must be understood here to mean Jesus the Christ. Rufinus, an early Christian writer, commenting on the Apostles' Creed, says, that when Jesus ascended to heaven He did not go to a place where God the Word had not previously been. For, He, Jesus, the Word Incarnate, had existed from all time with the Father, who is in heaven. What was new, is that, the Word made flesh is now seated in heaven, as had never happened before. It was the culmination of prophecy. King David uttered these words centuries earlier: ' The LORD says to my lord: " Sit at my right hand, till I make your enemies your footstool" ' (Ps 110:1). This ascension was a glorious ascension. The first man Adam, under the counsel of the evil one, dragged human beings captive down to hell; but, this Jesus, when he ascended to heaven restored human beings to heaven. All the heavenly host were astonished. The angels looked with awe as the Great I AM clothed in flesh made his way on high. How much more should we, who are the ones to have been redeemed, jump for joy!