The Vicar of Christ

These days, the phrase "vicar of Christ" used almost exclusively within the Catholic Church. Among Catholics, it is applied almost exclusively to the clergy. Among the clergy, it is applied almost exclusively to the Pope.

This telescoping interpretation certainly has an impressive pedigree. As a papal honorific, it dates to the synod of 495 during the regnal years of Pope Gelasius I. As a general descriptor of the clergy (specifically the bishops), it dates back to the writings of St. Ignatius of Antioch, a student of St. John the Apostle and the third bishop of Antioch, reportedly appointed by St. Peter himself. The doctrine can be found in both the Catechism and Lumen Gentium, the Dogmatic Constitution of the Church.

But while this gloss of the phrase is certainly accurate, I find it rather inadequate.

The word "vicar" is derived from the Latin vicarius, meaning 'deputy' or 'representative.' We derive "vicarious" from the same root. A vicar stands and speaks on behalf of someone else.

But is this not the Church?  After His resurrection and ascension, Christ left His ongoing work of spreading the gospel to the twelve apostles. The twelve, and all who learned the gospel by their testimony, were commissioned (Matthew 28:18-20, Acts 1:8) as members of His Body and witnesses to His Gospel to baptize in His Name.

This is widely held as the meaning of 1 Peter 2:4-5, which reads: "And coming to him as to a living stone which has been rejected by men, but is choice and precious in the sight of God, you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." In a similar vein, after quoting Isaiah 28:16, Psalm 118:22, and Isaiah 8:14, the passage continues in verses 9-10 with a litany of Old Testament references: "But you are 'a chosen race' [cf. Isaiah 43:20], a 'royal priesthood' [cf. Psalms 110:4 and Isaiah 61:6], a 'holy nation' and 'a people for God's own possession' [cf. Exodus 19:5-6], so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvellous light."

Certainly, this principle can be found through the Christian message. Adam sinned as a representative of humanity. The high priest stood vicariously for the people of Israel to offer the annual sacrifice within the Holy of Holies. Christ came as a 'second Adam' to redeem humanity by His vicarious sacrifice. The apostles were first deputized by Christ to act as His representatives during His public ministry, then commissioned and empowered by the Holy Spirit to serve as "ministers of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God" (1 Corinthians 4:1). We participate vicariously in Christ's holiness as "sons of God" (Galatians 2), confess our sins vicariously to God through one another (James 5:16), and intercede on each others' behalf through prayer (1 Timothy 2:1).

The principle of vicariousness is at the heart of authentically Catholic teaching. Indeed, the foundational Catholic doctrine of sacramentality (the understanding that God dispenses grace through vessels of the physical world) is itself an expression of this very principle. Creation is the vicar of her Creator.

One final point: I find it interesting that the same phrase "vicar of Christ" was applied in the early Church not only to the bishops but also to the Holy Spirit itself, at least in the writings of Tertullian. For indeed the Holy Spirit is central and instrumental to the Great Commission and the Church's ongoing work. It enables the apostles to preach with boldness at Pentecost, and even today it enables us to confess that "Jesus is Lord" (1 Corinthians 12:3).

In our individual bodies, we are called "temples of the Holy Spirit" (1 Corinthians 6:19). The corporate body of the Church may be considered a temple in the same way.

Just as Christ is the Body of the Church, the Holy Spirit is indeed her soul.

The Church is empowered and ensouled by the Holy Spirit. This is the root of Catholic teachings about Scripture and Tradition, at the heart of the Sacred Magisterium itself. But I leave that subject for the next series of posts.

Holy Week: The Body of Christ

I'm not sure there's a more fitting time to reflect on the Church as the Body of Christ, as specifically that day in Holy Week that commemorates the body of Christ broken for us.

Instead of my usual essay-length reflection on a single theme, I want to reflect briefly on multiple themes that are drawn from this single image.

The Body of Christ is Eucharistic. This is the heart of the sacrament, the essence of our communion. "Take, eat; this is My body" (Matthew 26:26). When we eat of the bread and the wine, we partake of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.

It is for this reason that Romans 8:1 speaks of "those who are in Christ Jesus" and Romans 8:29 states that "those whom [God] foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn of many brethren." It is for this reason that 2 Peter 1:4 calls us to "become partakers of the divine nature." It is for this reason that Catholics speak of divine filiation -- our divine sonship -- and the Orthodox speak of deification and theosis -- literally "becoming God."

The sacrament of Eucharist is the centerpiece of our Christian identity: it defines us as a Church and as followers of Christ. Every other meaning and attribute given below flows from this central point.

The Body of Christ is empowered by the Holy Spirit. At the inauguration of His public ministry, Jesus was baptized by his cousin John. At this point, Scripture records that "while He was praying, heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon Hi in bodily form like a dove, and a voice came out of heaven, "You are My beloved Son, in You I am well-pleased" (Luke 3:21-22). In the same way, Catholics celebrate the sacraments of baptism and confirmation, Protestants celebrate the conversion experience of being "born again," and certain Pentecostals and charismatics elevate "speaking in tongues" (glossolalia) and "baptism in the Holy Spirit." There is a profound connection within the Church connecting the Body of Christ with the "soul" of the Holy Spirit.

The Body of Christ is invisible. We assert this at a Christological level in the doctrine of the Ascension. We also find in Scripture references to "vast cloud of witnesses" (Hebrews 12:1) that demonstrate that the Church is comprised not merely of the Church Militant -- we who fight and persevere on this Earth -- but also the Church Triumphant that has entered eternal life. Even in the Eucharist, we bear witness to the "marriage supper of the Lamb" (Revelation 19:9) that unites all the saints, both the quick and the dead.

The Body of Christ is begotten of God. Jesus Christ was set apart from birth, born blameless and holy before God. To repeat a point from a previous note, this is why Catholics insist on the Immaculate Conception of Mary. She is preserved from the stain of original sin and is perfected by faith so that Jesus might inherit a perfect and fully human nature Himself. As far as this applies to the Church, we assert that the Body of Christ is spotless and without fault. The Church is clothed only in the righteous deeds of the saints (Revelation 19:8): our failures do not diminish it.

The Body of Christ is visible. As a purely historical matter, Christianity asserts the fact of the Incarnation. From an eschatological point of view, Christianity asserts that Creation will be restored: that we will enjoy eternal life in the New Earth. This principle, that the Church is essentially visible, may strike Protestants as a particularly Catholic notion. But even Protestants accept that the Church is defined in the visible communities of believers that abide by the Gospel. "For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst" (Matthew 18:20).

In my opinion, Protestants tend to be fairly gnostic in this regard, though perhaps 'Neoplatonic' is the better word. We prefer the glorified Body ascended into heaven over the incarnate Body that is torn all to hell, as it were. We prefer an invisible Church, if only because the visible Church is such a mess. It is for the same reason that Protestants use crosses instead of crucifixes -- we emphasize the Resurrection over the Passion, and therefore point to the empty cross

Recently Pope Benedict issued a statement in which he referred to Protestants as "ecclesial communities" rather than a full "sister Church." Some Protestants take offense at the perceived slight, but I wonder if this isn't exactly what Protestants have defined themselves as being. Isn't this why so many Protestants go "church shopping"?  We don't consider the Church to be intrinsically visible, and must therefore search for a visible community in which to ground ourselves. Ironically, it is the Catholic emphasis on the invisible Church that lets us move beyond 'church shopping,' for we will readily endure horrid music, botched liturgies, and tedious homilies in order to celebrate Mass with the Church Triumphant.

There are a number of other elements and attributes that I might also cover, that are more explicitly salvific: for instance, the Body of Christ as both suffering and resurrected. However, I want to keep the discussion of Catholic views on salvation and atonement for a later series of posts.

May God bless this Maundy Thursday and the rest of your Holy Week.

The Bride of Christ

In my last note, I introduced the quintessentially Catholic image of the Church as God's family. Considering that Israel is a type for the Church, we might treat the Biblical images of the Jews as "the people of God" and Israel as "the nation of God" in the same breath. In the same way, standard Catholic eschatology tends to incline towards amillennialism, so they would also identify the present Church with the immanent "kingdom of God" proclaimed during Jesus' ministry on earth. Each of these titles offers a slightly altered perspective on the nature of the Church, but those variances are too subtle to be done justice here.

There is another set of images that run parallel to those given above: the Church as the Bride of Christ. John the Baptist hinted at it in his final sermon: "He who has the bride is the bridegroom, but the friend of the bridegroom who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's voice. So this joy of mine has been made full" (John 3:29). Later, in responding to the Pharisees, Christ compares His actions to those of a bridegroom (Matthew 9:15) and later analogizes the day of judgment to a marriage feast for the bridegroom (in the parable of the ten virgins, Matthew 25:1-9).

The mystical union -- indeed, the marriage -- of Christ and the Church has its forbears in Jewish literature. "Song of Songs" has long been understood not simply as erotic poetry, of the longing of a lover and His beloved, but also as allegory for God's love of His people. It is for this reason that "Song of Songs" can boast of more commentaries than nearly any other book in the Old Testaments. It was and remains a favorite text of Christian saint, such as the Cistercian abbot St. Bernard of Clairvaux (the 'mellifluous Doctor'), who composed 86 separate sermons on first three chapters "Song of Songs" alone.

The apostle Paul was also prolific in his comparisons between Christ as the bridegroom and the Church as His bride. Paul makes the comparison explicit in Ephesians 5:25-32:

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, do that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the Church, because we are members of His body. "For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh" [Genesis 2:24]. This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the Church.

It is precisely this imagery, of the Church as the Bride, that is at the heart of Catholic teachings on sexual ethics. After all, marriage is a reenactment writ small of our salvation history, of Christ's mystical union with the body of believers. A number of Christians mystics go further and apply imagery of marriage to the mystical union of the Trinity Itself, of the relation of God to the Son and the Holy Spirit. At the very least, Catholics define marriage as a sacrament, a vessel of God's sanctifying grace, completed through the marital act. Just as Catholics wouldn't dream of using the consecrated hosts of the Eucharist as snack food, so too the Church would teach us not to devalue the 'elements' of marriage: the physical act of sex.

One particular attribute of the Church as Bride deserves mention: its spotlessness. Paul is pretty clear on this score in the passage above, as is St. John the Seer in Revelations 19:7-9:

Let us rejoice and be glad and give glory to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready" It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteousness of the saints. Then he said to me, "Write, 'Bless are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.'" And he said to me, "There are the true words of God."

This particular imagery, of a Divine bridegroom approaching a pure and spotless Bride, stands in pretty stark contrast with the actual conduct of both Jews and Christians throughout salvation history. God Himself commented on this to the prophet Hosea: "Go, take for yourself a wife of harlotry and have children of harlotry; for the land commits flagrant harlotry, forsaking the Lord" (Hosea 1:2). Through the book, God laments the continued unfaithfulness of His people, yet still promises to redeem her: "Go again, love a woman who is loved by her husband, yet an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the sons of Israel, though they turn to other gods..." (Hosea 3:1). Hosea's marriage to the unfaithful Gomer is a sign of God and His people. Yet Christ's marriage to the spotless Bride is a sign of God and His church.

This is the paradox at the heart of Catholic ecclesiology. As Gomer treated her husband, we who live in Christ treat God pretty abysmally. We are often unfaithful. Yet the Church remains spotless, and while we remain in the Church we remain spotless ourselves. This is why Catholics find the Lutheran dictum simul justus et peccator ("both justified and a sinner") incomprehensible. This is the reason for the Catholic dictum extra Ecclesiam nulla salus: "outside of the Church, there is no salvation."

For the Church is more than the Bride of Christ. She is the Body of Christ as well.

The Family of God

In my study of Catholicism, I've come to a realization.  Having traced many of the innumerable differences in the schism between Protestants and Catholics, I believe there is one that defines the schism at its core, in its totality. Every other difference are traced to this root.  I believe the difference is this: Protestants emphasize soteriology, and Catholics emphasize ecclesiology.

What do I mean? Soteriology means "the doctrine of salvation." Protestants fixate on the event of salvation, the moment of conversion, when one comes to know Christ Jesus as Savior and Lord. Our faith is personal, our culture individualistic. We typically disdain church authority, because it might interfere with our connection with Christ. We shy away from Mary because we fear the honor we give her might eclipse the glory we ought to give to God. We do not call upon the saints because we have Jesus as our one mediator before God.

The Catholic response, in contrast, is much less atomistic. I do not mean less individualistic, for individualism (as with most of Western culture) is drawn from Catholic tradition. But while Catholicism does emphasize the dignity and worth of the individual, this is only the foundation, when Catholics would prefer to admire the cathedral built on top of it.

Ecclesiology means "the doctrine of the Church." It is in the Church that the Catholic lives and breaths. Catholics focus on the experience of salvation, the context of conversion, when one comes to live with Christ Jesus as Father and Redeemer. The faith and the culture are not tied up in an individual's relation to God, but in the relation of God to His family, and thereby to each member of the family.

Throughout the New Testament, Christ is referred to as "the firstborn" (Heb. 1:6), "the firstborn of the dead" (Rev. 1:5), "the firstborn of all creation" (Colossians 1:15), and perhaps most significantly "the firstborn among many brethren" (Romans 8:29). This is one of the titles of the Christ, hearkening at a deep-seated reality: that, as a result of the Cross and the Resurrection, we have been joined to Christ and can call ourselves true sons of God. In Galatians 3:26-29, Paul tells us that "you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourself with Christ.... And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's descendants, heirs according to the promise."

This doctrine is one of the essential truths of the faith, retained by Catholics though in my experience forgotten by many Protestants. Salvation is bigger than forgiveness: it is our familial relation to God. We do not address God as "Our Father" simply because He's humble enough to listen. It's a statement of fact, a new reality that by the power of Christ He really is our Father. He descended, to raise us with Him.

Over the next few notes, I'll be exploring a few other Catholic images for the Church. However, this doctrine of divine filiation, and this understanding of the Family of God, is foundational to all the others, and indeed is one of the cornerstones of Catholic teaching.

Mary, Mother of the Church

Over the last several posts I've examined Catholic teachings on Mary, from Old Testament typologies to New Testament references to the early church traditions and the four major Marian dogmas.

Yet these will seem insufficient for most Protestants to explain Mary's centrality in actual Catholic practice. It is easy to see the unprecedented distinction of the Annunciation and the magnificent faith in her Fiat. I can also readily concede her essential function in salvation history, for Mary was in a sense the gatekeeper of the Incarnation. But that only scratches the surface, only gets us as far as doctrine. Whence the rosaries, prayers, devotions, and apparitions?

The answer, naturally enough, lies in another set of typologies.

In my post on the Immaculate Conception, I wrote that Mary's "justly-celebrated fiat is one of the defining moments of Creation: the pinnacle of all the patriarchs, of all the prophets, and all the people of God." This is true on its own, but hints at a deeper truth.

On the one hand, the nation of Israel may be seen as a typology of Mary.

My Bible's study notes on Revelations 12:1 states that the image of the woman in labor, giving birth to the child Christ, is "probably a symbolic reference to the believing Messianic community." This is, on its face, a pretty clear attempt to avoid a Marian interpretation of the passage. However, that doesn't mean they aren't both true. Mary is the fulfillment of Israel -- she is prefigured not only by the Ark of the Covenant and by the Temple, but also to a certain extent by all the key women of Israel's history: Miriam, Rahab, Deborah, Hannah, and Bathsheba, among others. They are the threads in the tapestry of Mary's life.

The people of Israel were prepared from the days of Abraham precisely for the arrival of the Messiah. They were to be the nation through which all nations would be blessed. In the same way, Mary was prepared from before her birth to be the vessel of Christ's Incarnation, to be the woman through which all of humanity would be blessed.

There is another sense in which Israel prefigured Mary, for the history of the Jews is one of slavery and suffering, of a painful purification and ultimately redemptive suffering. Israel typifies Jesus, for He is the ultimate example of suffering unto goodness. But we cannot forget the words of Simeon when Mary brought the child Christ to the Temple:

Behold this child is appointed for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and for a sign to be opposed -- and a sword will pierce even your own soul -- to the end that thoughts from many hearts will be revealed (Luke 2:34-35).

This, incidentally, is what Catholics mean when they address Mary as "co-redemptrix." It is not a title to diminish Christ's sacrifice, nor to imply that Mary was in any way responsible for our atonement or salvation. It merely indicates that Mary shared in the suffering of her Son's agony. Can we begin to fathom the mother's anguish, as she watched them torture her Son, as she stood before Christ hanging on a cross (John 19:25) and watched Him take His final breaths?  Her soul was pierced by sword just as surely as his side was pierced by spear. 

Yet Mary does not suffer alone. She suffered just as all Christians are called to "take up their cross daily" (Luke 9:23), and for the same reason that Paul wrote, "in my flesh I do my share on behalf of His Body, which is the Church, in filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions" (Colossians 1:24).  Christ redeemed suffering, and conquered death. The stain of sin, the evil of fallen nature, has become in His hands a vehicle of perfect love. This is why the Church glorifies the martyrs, and why the lives of the saints are marked with suffering.

In this way, Mary is herself a typology of the Church.

This extends far beyond an understanding of redemptive suffering. Mary is truly the archetypal Christian. From her first appearance she expressed the Fiat, those undying words of faith: "Behold, the handmaid of the Lord; may it be done to me according to your word" (Luke 1:38). "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior," she cries in the remarkable Magnificat (Luke 1:46-47). Luke repeats several times during his early chapters that Mary "treasured all these things, pondering them in their heart" (Luke 2:19, 2:51, et al.), holding firmly on to the deposit of the faith.

Perhaps most notable is Mary's role at the beginning of the Gospel of John:

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there; and both Jesus and his disciples were invited to the wedding. When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to Him, "They have no wine." And Jesus said to her, "Woman, what to me and to you? My hour has not yet come." His mother said to the servants, "Whatever he says to you, do it (John 2:1-5).

Some Protestants have claimed that Jesus' words in this passage actually marginalize and diminish Mary. This strikes me as an error, if only because Christ could not have violated the commandment to "Honor thy father and mother." His address to Mary as "Woman" is actually considered evidence for the typological reading of Mary as a second Eve, and this passage is sometimes considered in that light. The question itself is sometimes translated as an almost bemused "What does that have to do with us?" (NASB) or the more notoriously dismissive "What have I to do with thee?" (as in the King James translation). In fact, the literal translation -- "What to me and to you?" -- is a well-worn Hebrew idiom that is basically an open-ended interrogative, meaning "Why are you here?" or "What is your question?" In this case, especially in light of Mary's response, the likeliest interpretation would seem to be a simple "What are you asking of me?"

Just before the Transfiguration, Jesus asks His disciples, "Who do the people say that I am?" (Luke 9:18) They respond with a litany of long-dead prophets. "But who do you say that I am?" The question is open-ended, and (importantly) precedes any statement by Jesus Himself that would provide an answer. This is the moment of the Petrine confession, the first point in the Gospels in which Jesus is revealed to be divine. "You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God" (Matthew 16:16). Peter's confession was a leap of faith.

In the same way, Jesus' question to Mary at Cana is not leading but open-ended, allowing room for Mary's response of faith.  In this moment Mary does not presume to direct her Son, but merely expresses her reliance on His will and her readiness to obey, by placing her servants at His disposal. As a result of this, Christ directs the servants to fill the massive jugs with water and pour them for the guests, turning the water into wine. It is once again Mary's expression of faith that propels the next movement of the Incarnation: His first miracle, that launches His public ministry.

Mary is a typology for the church. But she is also the mother to another Type: Christ Himself.

Is it really necessary to cite the many passages in which Christians are called to model ourselves after Christ, to live in Christ, to clothe ourselves with Christ? Let it suffice to say, that as His disciples we walk in His steps.

If indeed Christ lived without sin, and if indeed we take Him at His word that He came "not to abolish but to fulfill" the Law and the Prophet, then we see that Christ obeyed the precepts of the Law. Specifically, He obeyed the commandment to honor His father and mother. This, then, is why Catholics honor Mary, for they seek to imitate His life in that manner too.

John never names himself in his Gospel, but only identifies himself as "the disciple Jesus loved." I suspect this is partly out of an almost coy modesty, but it is at least partly done to invite other Christians to walk beside Christ for themselves, to see through his eyes and bear witness to the Gospel. This invitation should help us understand a passage from John's account of the Passion. Hanging on the cross before His death, "when Jesus then saw His mother and the disciple whom He loved standing nearby, He said to His mother, 'Woman behold, your son!" Then He said to the disciple, "Behold your mother!" From that hour the disciple took her into his own household" (John 19:26-27).

Christ is a type for the Church, for the life of a disciple, and He gave to the great disciple the command to take the Mother of God into his household and honor her accordingly. This is Catholics mean when they speak of Mary's "spiritual motherhood of the Church." If we live in Christ, we will live out His respect for her, and treat her with the love and devotion proper for a child to give his mother. Mary is the mother of the Church.

Mary, Queen of Heaven

In my earlier post on Mary's perpetual virginity, I mentioned how the Roman Catholic Church interprets the Ark of the Covenant as a typology, an Old Testament prefiguration of Mary in her role as Theokotos. There are two New Testament references to the Ark of the Covenant. The first, found in Hebrews 9:4, contains a description of the Ark and a brief explanation of its significance.  The second is found in the Apocalypse of St. John, better known as the book of Revelations. The seventh trumpet has sounded, and the twenty-four elders worship God "because You have taken Your great power and have begun to reign" (Rev. 11:17).

And the temple of God which is in heaven was opened; and the ark of His covenant appeared in His temple, and there were flashes of lightning and sounds and peals of thunder and an earthquake and a great hailstorm. A sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; and she was with child; and she cried out, being in labor and in pain to give birth (Rev. 11:19-12:2).

The Ark of the Covenant was the single holiest object in the Jewish faith, which had disappeared after the destruction of Solomon's Temple. Its recovery was, next to the long-awaited Messiah, the most anticipated event of the Jewish people. Yet here, as the Ark is being unveiled, John swiftly transitions into describing a woman in the throes of labor pains, about to give birth "to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron" (Rev. 12:5) -- a universally acknowledged reference to Christ. Is this a coincidence?  The Ark of the Covenant is revealed in the same breath as a woman giving birth to the son of God. Indeed, the entire chapter can be read as the story of the Nativity, seen in a cosmic light. Even the Holy Family's forced exodus to Egypt and Herod's slaughter of the innocents (recorded in Matthew 2:13-18) are obliquely referenced.

The most straightforward interpretation of this passage is that John is speaking of Mary. Both her prefiguration in the Ark of the Covenant and her status as Mother of God are directly referenced in this passage. In what exalted light do we now perceive Mary: clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, with a crown of twelve stars? Indeed, this is the very imagery employed in the iconography of the early Church.

Veneration of Mary as the "Queen of Heaven" relies on an Old Testament typological reading of the Davidic monarchy. Even from the first verse of the New Testament, Jesus is identified as "the Son of David." This title is most frequently used in the Gospel of Matthew, which focused on Christ's role as King of the Jews. One of the common elements shared by monarchies in the Ancient Near East, including the Davidic line, was a respect and veneration for the "Queen Mother." This was partly out of practical necessity, what with the prevalence of polygamy, but it was also derived from the tremendous respect and value these cultures located in families and in elders. This is, after all, the very culture from which we learned the Commandment to "Honor thy father and mother."

There are a few passages which hint at the role of the Queen Mother in court politics; the one cited most often is 1 Kings 2:12-20. After the death of David, Solomon ascended to the throne, "and his kingdom was firmly established."

Bathsheba went to King Solomon to speak to him for Adonijah. And the king arose to meet her, bowed before her, and sat on his throne; then he had a throne set for the king's mother, and she sat on his right. Then she said, "I am making one small request of you; do not refuse me." And the king said to her, "Ask, my mother, for I will not refuse you" (1 Kings 2:19-20)

There are several noteworthy elements of this story. First, Bathsheba was interceding on behalf of Adonijah, the king's brother, and the text indicates that the Queen Mother was regarded as an advocate for others. Indeed, Adonijah himself said that if Solomon would not refuse him if  Bathsheba made the request (2:17). Second, when Bathsheba entered, Solomon stepped down from his throne and bowed to meet her, demonstrating a degree of respect for the Queen Mother that would be inconceivable if applied to anyone else. Third, Solomon gave his mother a throne and set her up at his right hand, confirming her elevated rank and his filial devotion to her. Fourth and finally, he encourages her request and reinforces her intercessory role.

In this particular case, Bathsheba was being used by Adonijah as an unwitting foil in preparation for a rebellion.  However, the principle remains, as did the power of the Queen Mother. The 'lamenting prophet' Jeremiah is commanded to "speak to the king and the queen mother" (Jer. 13:18). This verse is commonly interpreted as referring to Jehoiachin and his mother Nehushta, the same queen mother who is given primacy of rank when Nebuchadnezzar exiled them to Babylon in 2 Kings 24:15.

The Catholic Church teaches that Jesus, as the rightful heir to the Davidic kingdom, had a throne set for his mother Mary. This elevated station is confirmed by John's vision in Revelation, which reveals Mary in undeniably regal imagery. Her active role as the Queen Mother is seen and reinforced by a third Catholic dogma: the Assumption of Mary.

The assumption is the most recent of Marian dogmas to be defined, in the Apostolic Constitution of 1950, and it is the only one defined by the Pope speaking ex cathedra (that is, following the Vatican I formula of papal infallibility. In this work, titled Munificentissimus Deus, Pope Pius XII declared

By the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.

I'll leave discussion of papal infallibility for a later post, but for now a few pointers.

The first thing to note is that this dogma does not affirm that Mary was taken up into heaven before her natural death. The Eastern Orthodox Church explicitly confirms the death of Mary in their parallel dogma ("the Dormition of Theokotos) and this understanding is actually shared by most Catholics.

The second point is that this doctrine affirms Mary's special relationship with her son Jesus, and also her son's steadfast devotion to the Law. Jesus sought to truly honor His mother, and her bodily assumption into heaven is a testament to that.

The third point, and this cannot be repeated enough, is that Christianity has always affirmed a bodily resurrection. The only special privilege allotted to Mary is that her bodily resurrection preceded the final resurrection shared by all believers. Indeed, as far as I can tell, this is the only reason for a separate dogmatic definition. The dogma of the Assumption affirms that Mary prefigures the whole body of believers, the entire family of God.

In this way, Mary is herself a typology for the Church.

Mary, Full of Grace

In my last post, on Mary's perpetual virginity, I discussed the typological significance of the Ark of the Covenant, which contained the law of Moses -- the written Word -- as a prefiguration of Mary, who would bear the Word made flesh.

Exodus 34:29 tells us that when God wrote the words of the Law on the stone tables and gave them to Moses, "the skin of his face shone because of his speaking with" God. Moses' face shone so greatly from His Presence that he was obliged to wear a veil, to avoid blinding his terrified countrymen who gathered at the base of the mountain. 2 Samuel 6:7 reminds us that when these words were placed in a vessel of acacia wood, the resultant Ark of the Covenant was so unimaginably Holy that to touch it meant instant death.

With such passages in mind, what should we then think of the Jewish girl in whose womb the immortal Word (from whom the words of the Law had been derived) was made present in the flesh? What words can possibly begin to express the holiness of this, the Mother of God, the Ark of the New Covenant?

Catholics understand two categories of honoring a person or thing.  Latria is the worship and adoration due solely to God, and dulia the respect and veneration proper to created things. Mary obviously falls under the latter category, and yet she outranks almost everything else. No prior consecration of the patriarchs, the judges, the kings, the prophets, or the nation of Israel itself can compare to the honor and distinction bestowed on Mary, the Mother of God. She is utterly unique in Scripture. It is for this reason that Catholics consider Marian devotion to be hyperdulia -- proper to a created being, but beyond what would be accorded to almost anything else.

Even the angels accorded her exceptional honors. When the archangel Gabriel appeared at the Annunciation, the closest literal translation of his greeting is: "Hail, full of grace, the Lord with you." This is why "she was very perplexed at this statement, and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was" (Luke 1:28-29). Mary may be the only individual who isn't immediately struck dumb at the sight of an angel, and for whom the immediate reassurance of "Do not be afraid" isn't actually necessary. She is certainly the only one to be greeted by a title rather than a name.

The title itself is a linguistic mouthful. The original text, in Greek, is kecharitomene, which is the perfect passive participle of charitoo (grace, blessing, favor). The perfect tense has a pretty specific meaning in Greek: it connotes a present state of completeness, contingent upon a past action. Thus the phrase "it is written" uses the perfect tense: it was written in the past, but brought to perfection in the present (in the person of Jesus Christ). For those who want to research further, I found this article to be particularly valuable. Essentially, the salutation kecharitomene indicates a state of unique and perfected grace which had already been bestowed upon Mary and which would now be brought into completeness.

Confused?  So was Mary.

To understand this unique grace which had been bestowed, and was about to be brought to fruition, it's necessary to understand another typology with which Mary is usually associated. Jesus Christ often referred to Himself as "the Son of Man" and is often compared to the first Man, Adam. Indeed, Romans 5:14 explicitly states that "Adam... is a type of Him who was to come" -- that is, that Adam is a typology of Christ. "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive" (1 Cor. 15:22).

Just as Adam was a type for Jesus Christ, so the early Church treated Eve as a type for Mary

Consider again the significance of the Annunciation. God sought to come into flesh, to incarnate Himself and redeem humanity as Man. But this could not occur without the consent of Mary. By the very principle of free will that had caused Adam's fall in the first place, the divine plan of redemption was placed at the mercy of the young Jewish girl from Nazareth.

When Adam sinned, it was Eve who preceded him. Her sin led to his Fall. Thus, by that same typology, it would be the second Eve's faithfulness that would anticipate the second Adam's sacrifice. Her obedience at the Annunciation would enable His obedience in Gethsemane, even unto death.

Can we begin to fathom the cosmic pyrotechnics that accompanied her response to Gabriel? "Behold, the bond-servant of the Lord; may it be done to me according to your word." Her justly-celebrated fiat is one of the defining moments of Creation: the pinnacle of all the patriarchs, of all the prophets, and all the people of God. By the free will of the first Adam, man separated himself from the Presence of God. Now, by the free will of the second Eve, God was made Present to again walk among men. This is the meaning of St. Jerome's dictum: "Death came through Eve, but Life has come through Mary."

This typology should explain Gabriel's salutation of Mary. She was full of grace, given in anticipation of this very moment. Eve had chosen the apple of her own free will, in a state of innocence. In this moment, this second chance for humanity, Mary was endowed with the same grace and freedom.

This is the Catholic dogma of the Immaculate Conception. Protestants, take note: the Immaculate Conception refers to the conception of Mary, not the conception of Jesus (an event celebrated as the Annunciation or the Incarnation). I'm rather ashamed at how long it took me to recognize the distinction.

The history of this dogma is particularly interesting. Though it was defined in 1854, the teaching that Mary had by the grace of God lived a sinless life had been held long before that time, arising from the early Church and recognized by both Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christians. The reason it took so long to define dogmatically is because, for most of its history, this teaching appeared exclusively in the liturgy of the Church, and wasn't discussed in academic settings.

When Eadmer, companion to St. Anselm, published a tract on the subject in the early eleventh century, the long-standing teaching moved from the realm of doxology to the field of theology. This was especially the case at the University of Paris, where the doctrine was subject to heated debates between the Dominicans (best represented by the Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas Aquinas) and the Franciscans (notably the Blessed John Duns Scotus).

The debate focused primarily on three questions.  First, in what way was Mary sinless? Was she preserved from "original sin" (sin nature in toto) or merely from "actual sin" (that is, sinful deeds)?  It is for this reason that the Eastern Orthodox Church recognizes Mary as "spotless" without agreeing to the Immaculate Conception as Catholics define it. Second, what were the consequences of this sinlessness? This discussion mostly focused on whether Mary was subject to the usual sufferings of humanity -- especially the labor pains of childbirth -- and whether she ever entertained sinful thoughts or temptations.

The third question, however, was the bigger point of contention: at what point did her sinlessness take effect? Virtually everyone agreed that this sanctifying grace was endowed to Mary before her birth, but there was a good deal of controversy whether it was given at the moment of physical conception, or some indeterminate time after conception but before birth. Ultimately, the scholarly consensus arrived at a middle position. Relying on the insights of medieval scholasticism, and in contrast to the sometimes dualistic approach of the post-Enlightenment West, Catholic theology defines man as a holistic union of body and soul.  For this reason, Catholic theology distinguishes between "conception" simpliciter, in the purely physical sense, and "conception" in the broader sense, the moment at which the body is fused with a rational soul. Mary's immaculate conception is therefore interpreted as applying to the latter (sometimes called "animation"), since original sin is transmitted by flesh but pertains to our souls.

Once this consensus was reached, the dogma was solemnly defined by the Council of Basel, held between 1431–1449, and was recognized by all Catholic theologians. However, some time later it was determined that the Council of Basel was not a proper ecumenical council according to canon law, and therefore unable to promulgate dogma, and so the question was left up in the air for some time.  It wasn't until the mid-nineteenth century that, with the nearly unanimous consent of the College of Cardinals and the bishops of the Catholic Church, Pope Pius IX defined the dogma in his apostolic constitution of 1854, Ineffabilis Deus:

We declare, pronounce and define that the doctrine which holds that the Blessed Virgin Mary, at the first instant of her conception, by a singular privilege and grace of the Omnipotent God, in virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of mankind, was preserved immaculate from all stain of original sin, has been revealed by God, and therefore should firmly and constantly be believed by all the faithful.

By the atoning blood of Jesus Christ shed on the cross, Mary was conceived and born free of original sin. This was not accomplished out of her own power, for she was still in need of a Savior (Luke 1:47), but was accomplished by the timeless and eternal God, in anticipation of the momentous choice she would face.

The dogma of the Immaculate Conception is considered theologically necessary not only in light of her role as the New Eve, but also in light of her role as Theokotos, Mother of God. Christians profess that Jesus Christ was a single person with two natures, human and divine. His divine nature was inherited as the only begotten Son of God. His human nature was inherited from His conception in the womb of Mary. If Mary existed in a state of original sin, that stain would have been inherited through the flesh by her son Jesus.

We might hypothesize that Jesus was Himself the subject of the sanctifying grace, to be preserved from original sin, but that would be tautological: could Jesus' blood have preserved His own state of sinlessness in vitro? Moreover, such a teaching would greatly diminish His humanity, since He would only be human in a cleansed and rarefied manner.

Rather, the Church teaches that God preserved Mary from conception in a state of innocence -- though it should be noted that this preservation was not yet perfection. By allowing her the chance to recapitulate Eve's fateful decision, to triumph in the face of temptation, Mary's humanity was glorified, as human nature would have been but for the Fall. It was this amplified and renewed form of human nature -- fully endowed with the sanctifying grace of God and perfected in the cooperative merit of Mary's faithful fiat -- that was inherited by Jesus Christ.

Mary, Ever Virgin

The miracle of the Virgin Birth is a lynch-pin of orthodox Christian faith. If you deny that Christ was born of a virgin, you deny that He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and thereby deny that He was born the Son of God.  You reject the miracle of the Incarnation, you reject the purpose of His life on earth, and you reject the meaning of His death on the cross. The Church stands united on this issue, overcoming all schismatic division: the Virgin Birth is one of the essential truths of the faith.

But many Christians are content to leave it at that. Most Protestants in my experience defend the virgin birth, but don't find anything particularly objectionable in the idea that Mary went on to marry Joseph and have other children (citing the brothers of Jesus, to which Scripture sometimes refers). As a Protestant I too wondered why Catholics insisted on her perpetual virginity.

There are some indicators of this doctrine even in the Scriptural account. At the Annunciation, the archangel Gabriel informs Mary: "Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus." Mary's response is perplexing: the literal translation reads "How will this be, since I know no man?" As St. Gregory of Nyssa (younger brother to Basil the Great) pointed out, we should wonder why Mary didn't make the connection to her impending marriage to Joseph. The archangel only told her that she would conceive, in the future, and her response is to wonder how that would be possible -- even in the future. The Roman Catholic and Orthodox understanding is that Mary had pledged herself as a lifelong virgin, and that her betrothal to Joseph was in fact his pledge of guardianship.

It should be noted that this doctrine does not conflict with other passages in Scripture. There are several oft-quoted proof-texts that cite the "brothers of Jesus" (Matthew 28:10, Mark 6:3, Luke 8:19, and John 20:17, among others) as clearly contradicting this doctrine. But this reading fails to recognize that the Hebrew word translated as "brother" (adelphoi) was in fact a catch-all word for male kinsmen, which would include half-brothers, stepbrothers, first cousins, and quite possibly third cousins once removed.

As a brief side note, I sometimes marvel at those who think any verse could be an authoritative rebuttal to the dogma of perpetual virginity (or any other dogma, for that matter). Given the brilliance of the Fathers and the exegetical rigor of the Doctors who gave us Catholic tradition, don't we imagine that the early church would have noticed any obvious contradictions and not made such claims in the first place? Isn't it rather absurd to imagine that it took nearly two millennia for Christians to notice such verses?

The dogma of perpetual virginity arose out of the tradition of the early Church. The earliest reference to the dogma appears, somewhat obliquely, in a letter from Ignatius of Antioch (circa 108 AD). The earliest defense to the dogma appears in the second century, in a pseudo-epigraphical text now referred to as "The Protoevangelium of James." While the work is not canonical, it is cited approvingly by Origen in the third century as confirmation that the perpetual virginity of Mary was an accepted doctrine in the early church. Before this point, the only recorded dissent was voiced in the second century by Tertullian, who denied that Mary's virginity was preserved in partu (during birth), in order to affirm the physical reality of the Incarnation against the Docetist heresy. However, even the fact that Tertullian had to actively deny Mary's perpetual virginity would seem to corroborate Origen's conclusion that it was a widely held belief. By the fourth century, the dogma was attested by most of the Church Fathers, including Athanasius, Ambrose, and Jerome, and it would not be questioned until well after the Protestant Reformation.

None of this, however, addresses the question of how the early church arrived at this dogma in the first place. The answer to that relies primarily on a particular mode of Scriptural exegesis called "typological." This hermeneutic is best understood by St. Augustine's well-known dictum: "The New Testament lies hidden in the Old and the Old Testament is unveiled in the New."

If there is a single defining characteristic of the Jewish faith during the time of Christ, it was the Temple.  The original Temple was built by Solomon, the archetypal son of David, as the center of religious observance for the nation of Israel. But the Temple was not considered holy in and of itself. Its holiness was rather derived from the object it was built to house: the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark was placed in the Holy of Holies, the inner sanctum of the Temple that only the High Priest could visit only once a year to offer a single sacrifice of blood and incense.

What then was this Ark of the Covenant? According to Hebrews 9:4, it was a vessel "covered on all sides with gold, in which there was a golden jar holding the manna, and Aaron's rod which budded, and the tables of the covenant." The Ark was constructed by Moses to hold the bread which gave life to Israel in the desert (Exodus 16:32), the rod of the the Priest who stood before God on behalf of the people (Numbers 17:10), and the stone tables on which the Word of God was written (Deuteronomy 10:1-5). Scripture and tradition confirm that the early church treated these three items as typologies of Jesus Christ. He is "the bread of life" (John 6:35), "the High Priest of our confession (Hebrews 3:1), and "the Word made flesh" (John 1:14). The Ark of the Covenant bore within itself the typologies of Jesus Christ.

If true, then by the same typological reading, the Ark of the Covenant would itself be a typology for the one who bore Jesus Christ come in flesh.  The Ark of the Covenant prefigures the Virgin Mary.

Do we begin to understand why the early church insisted on Mary's perpetual virginity? To borrow an analogy from Scott Hahn, a Presbyterian-turned-Catholic apologist, Catholics believe in the perpetual virginity of Mary for the same reason that most people wouldn't bring their fine china on a picnic. It's a matter of propriety.

For a period of nine months, the womb of Mary was quite literally the Ark of the New Covenant, the vessel which bore God in bodily form. Mary herself may be considered the Holy of Holies, as she was overshadowed by the power of the Most High (Luke 1:35). Yet, by the typology of the Temple, only one person was permitted to enter the Holy of Holies, and that was permitted only for a single purpose. That purpose was fulfilled when the Holy Spirit came upon her to conceive the Son of God.

It would have been inappropriate, then, for Joseph to perform the same duties as a husband, for this would have diminished the living Temple that was his virgin wife. The logic of this teaching does not imply, as some have said, that marriage is not a sacrament or that sex is not a blessing. It merely recognizes the specifically sacred function of this particular woman and this particular womb.

Mary, Mother of God

Of all the practices and principles in the Roman Catholic Church that are objected to by modern Protestants, the centrality of Marian devotion will almost always top the list. Not even the doctrine of papal infallibility can compete for that dubious honor. In the centuries following the Protestant Reformation, cries of "popery" and "Romanism" among anti-Catholic groups were often accompanied by accusations of "Mariolatry," and the charge is repeated to this day.

At the very least, a Christian organization that is distinguished primarily in public perception by devotion to a human woman cannot be as effective a witness for the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Moreover, if the members of that Christian community mark their own faith principally by such devotions, I consider it a near-certainty that their faith would suffer as a result.

And yet... none of the above says anything against the truth of Catholic teachings on Mary nor against the moral quality of actual Catholic practice. Growing up in a Protestant community, I have often been concerned by the appearance of idolatry in certain Catholic dogma. But I had no way of knowing whether such teachings are informed by a genuinely Christ-centered attitude.

For the Ten Commandments direct to us to place no other god before the One God, and to not fashion idols for ourselves.  If idolatry is elevating a created thing above the Creator, then that definition would not apply to an offering of respect or devotion to a created thing as such, when offered to the extent it reflects the glory of its Creator.  Indeed, such respect may indeed be quite wholesome as spiritual practice: witness the Protestant devotion to the written Word of God.

The question thus remains: is this indeed the case with Catholic devotions to Mary?

One of the earliest title applied to the virgin girl from Nazareth was officially recognized by the Church at the First Council of Ephesus in 431 AD. Nestorius, the Archbishop of Constantinople, was on record supporting a recognition of Mary as Christotokos -- that is, as the "bearer" or "birth-giver of Christ." This was part of his broader theological platform, in which he argued that the human person of Jesus Christ was distinct from (but unified with) the divine person of the Son of God.

Nestorius' teachings were declared heresy and anathema by the Council at Ephesus, because it tried to separate the twin natures of Jesus Christ into two distinct persons, almost as a inversion of the Docetist heresy. Rather, the Council asserted, Christ is identified with the Son of God, the human and divine natures being unified in a single person.

Therefore, Mary's role cannot be limited to that of birth-mother of merely the human component, but must be treated in light of the entirety of her Son's being. In sum, Mary could not be merely Christotokos, but must be treated and recognized as Theotokos, the "bearer" or "birth-giver of God."

This conciliar decision defined a Marian dogma which was already in common circulation: the earliest known usage is in Origen's commentary on Romans in the third century, and the term appears throughout the works of the early Christian Fathers, including St. Athanasius and St. Augustine . It is an apostolic tradition in the sense most recognizable to a Protestant audience: it originated out of the common understanding of the early church, was defended by the highest bishops of the Church, and was declared to be dogma by conciliar degree.

This particular dogma should point those of us from the Protestant traditions to two particular realizations.  First, the doctrine that Mary was indeed the Mother of God should go a long way in elevating her in our eyes.  She was a young peasant girl from Nazareth who by God's grace was permitted to bear the immortal, inscrutable, transcendental Word Made Flesh. Her distinction is unique in Scripture, her role utterly unique in all of Creation, yet most Protestants don't seem to pay her that much attention.

Second, this dogma of Theotokos should help Protestants understand that every Catholic teaching on Mary arose out of a similar process, from consideration of her relationship to her Son, Jesus Christ.

Over the next several posts, I hope to considering Roman Catholic devotion to Mary from several perspectives.  Each post will explore a particular Marian dogma defined or set forth in the Catholic Church.  Each post will consider this dogma in light of a particular title accorded to Mary.  Each post will cover Mary's actual role in various New Testament passages, especially those considered important to the early Church. Finally, and crucially, each post will look at her typological role foreshadowed throughout the Old Testament. Most of these exegetical readings were unknown to me until recently, but they are the furthest thing from original, for they flow from the traditions of the early Church. I only hope I may do justice to them.

Veneration of the Saints

Back when I was in first grade, my elementary school would celebrate the end of the school year with a demonstration of the sixth graders' science projects. It was awesome. It was particularly cool because I knew that one day I would be a sixth grader, and the prospect excited me.  See, from the perspective of a first grader, sixth graders fall into the same category of Big People as teenagers and adults, but unlike those two, being a sixth grader actually seems attainable.  Adolescence was just as distant a dream as adulthood at that point.

I bring this up because I think it provides some necessary perspective on our concept of "the saints." God has destined us for greater things than we can possibly dream. He created us, He called us, He justified us, and He will glorify us (Romans 8:30). We are therefore in the position of first graders in the cosmic scheme: even 'adolescence' (the interim glory of the intermediate heaven) is beyond our comprehension, let alone the 'adulthood' of the New Heaven and New Earth.

Fortunately, God gave us role models for our encouragement, that they reflect His glory in ways we might not have been able to otherwise comprehend, to allow us to glimpse even through the veil our future fate in His Presence. The saints are, by this analogy, in the position of the sixth graders: the testimony of their astoundingly holy lives gives us hope, for they are not so far removed from our own experiences as to be out of reach. Naturally, by now they've moved on to adolescence, but we remain children, and we can only see the testimony of their mortal lives.

One of the five "solas" of the Protestant Reformation was "Soli Deo gloria" -- "Glory to God alone," as opposed to glory to any created being. This is a noble idea, as far as it goes, but it can be easily taken to extremes.

Some virulent anti-Catholics cite Matthew 23:9 to attack Catholics who call priests "Father" as a term of respect. Yet they seem to forget the the passage ostensibly condemns any use of the word "father," presumably including its application to our biological male parent. This is nonsense.  Matthew 23 was a discussion of how to respond to the authority of the rabbis and Pharisees -- who, though they sinned against the commands of the Law they promulgated, still sat on Moses' seat and still commanded authority under Jewish tradition. Jesus' words were a call to humility and a reminder that authority owes its own legitimacy to God, and that pride has no place among those who are called to greater responsibility. His words do not undermine the commandment to "Honor thy father and mother," nor could Christ have contradicted the words of the Law, for by the Shema, "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One."

The modern instinct for egalitarianism is necessary in a legal sense, for a free society requires an impartial rule of law. But in its cultural applications, this modern instinct is disastrous.  Peter Kreeft described it as a new manifestation of pride: rather than elevating oneself above all others, it would tear down all others who would dare to be elevated above oneself.

In a society such as ours, respect for authority is a practical necessity, just as respect for tradition is necessary in an age that venerates modernity at the expense of the past.

Glory belongs solely to God, but God has chosen to glorify us, His children.  Only Christ was the Son of God, but by His wounds we have been made sons of God, and brought into our inheritance.  Clearly we ought not worship anything other than the One True God, for that would be idolatry. But Catholic doctrine distinguishes between dulia (honor and veneration for anything created) and latria (worship and adoration pertaining to God alone), and surely this distinction should seem natural to us.  For I respect and admire Pixar studios for their near-unfailing ability to craft comic and dramatic masterpieces, but this is a far different kind and level and admiration compared to that which I bear towards my God.  There are degrees of honor and veneration that are appropriate to created things, to the degree that they bear witness to their Creator.

The Church has no power to make or declare saints.  The process of beatification and canonization are processes of recognizing saints -- that is, recognizing those whose lives were a dynamic testimony to the manifested fruits of the spirit, such that we know with certainty that they live now in the Presence of God. This understanding helps us understand why veneration to the saints is appropriate.

In the book of Revelation, John is visited by an angel, one who dwells in the very Presence of God.  The appearance of this angel is enough to drive him to his knees in awestruck wonder.  The angel cautions him not to worship him, for worship belongs to God and not to His servant, but surely John's reaction was understandable.  Our weak eyes are easily blinded by the sun.

The saints are those who lived to reflect the glory of the Lord, and God's glory shone through them.  How could we not respect and honor their witness? Those of us who grew up in a Protestant background understand the oppressive fear of committing idolatry, the fear of offending God by offering to others what is due solely to Him.  But when we see that honor is due to the saints precisely because of they manifested the glory due solely to the Lord, we should feel safe in offering our respect and appreciation for their lives.  Christ was the firstborn, but we have plenty of older brothers and sisters who, in following Him, lead the way for us.

Intercession of the Saints

A few days ago, one of my spiritual mentors died. He was a great man, a good man, both considerate and eager to laugh, and I flatter myself to consider him a good personal friend. The last time I saw him before he passed away, I asked him to pray for myself and one of my friends.

There is perhaps no Catholic doctrine that has been easier for me to accept than that of the intercession of the saints. For there is perhaps no practice more natural for someone from my background than the habit of requesting prayer from others, especially from spiritual elders. In this case, I had witnessed the fruits of the Spirit in his life, and I knew his wisdom was greater and prayer life more active than my own.  There is no shame in asking for help from someone who can give it willingly.

If we accept the dogma of the active communion of the saints, then it is no great leap to treat the one as you treat the other. The universal Church is comprised both of the Church Militant among the living and the Church Triumphant among those asleep.  Protestants have a habit of sending prayer requests to any among the living who will listen.  Shouldn't we do the same to the saints of the Church Triumphant?

This understanding even clarifies certain aspects of Catholic canonization practices that initially struck me as 'off.'  For instance, I always wondered about the idea of "patron saints."  But there is a very simple explanation.  If you have a prayer request for a particular issue, you go to the person who knows something about it.  This is not just for the sensation of camaraderie and espirit de corps, but because they would know what to pray for even if you didn't.

If, for instance, I needed prayer support for a ministry to at-risk youth in downtown Seattle, I would probably ask for prayer from the person in my church who dealt with such things.  If I needed prayer for family concerns, I'd ask someone else. If I needed prayer for a particularly challenging line of theological reflections, another person would be in the line of fire.

Individuals created in the image of God are each given the grace to reflect a particular aspect of God's nature in a manner totally unique to them. It shouldn't surprise us that, at different points in our lives, we may particularly need or desire to see one aspect of God more than another, and that the person who most reflected that would be most able to minister to us.

A while back, one of my friends was having trouble with her family. I've grown up with a pretty stable home life, so I didn't have any particular insight or any particular advice to share. As she spoke, she mentioned that her now-deceased grandmother had formerly filled that role that she was now filling, and told me how much she missed her grandmother.

If I had not felt the nudge of the Holy Spirit, I would have fled for the hills, but in that moment I knew instinctively what was about to happen. To be sure, I asked if her grandmother had been a Christian; my friend's immediate answer was "Yes."  I then asked her if I could pray for her family situation.  Specifically, I was going to pray about to her grandmother.

That was, without a doubt, the most carefully constructed prayer in my life.  I knew the 1 Samuel passage about Saul and the witch of Endor, and I took very seriously the idea that anything resembling communicating with the dead was fraught with spiritual danger. But my friend needed prayer, prayer that I didn't feel capable of offering, prayer from someone who could relate to her struggle.  She needed the prayer from her family's patron saint.

That was the first time I asked for prayer from a member of the Church Triumphant.

Why should we consider such prayers off-limits? Especially in light of my Protestant upbringing, I had both the knowledge and the desire to avoid such manifest spiritual dangers, so there was little danger of turning this intercessory request to a saint into anything resembling idolatry. I prayed with such trepidation, such fear of offending the holiness of God that I doubt I could have offended in that way.

This is not to mention the manifold benefits of such prayer requests.  Saints of the Church Triumphant dwell in the constant and immediate Presence of God. There are advantages to living in such a Presence, and total communion with God is certainly one of them. At this point, with this knowledge, you'd think most of our prayer requests would be directed heavenward.

My deceased mentor, a former pastor of my church family, is now living in glory. We may mourn for the separation, and mourn for his family, and at the hole that only reunion with him can fill. But you have to remember that he's probably skipping with sheer Joy at this point, so we can't really mourn for him. If anything, the natural reaction should be to envy him.  The Tenth Commandment said nothing against coveting thy neighbor's salvation!

In the meanwhile, though, as we wait and struggle (ecclesia expectans et militans), we still have friends and allies among those brothers and sisters in Christ who have preceded us. It might be nice if we could remember some of them.  Dan Dungan, pastor of my church family.  Stan McKnight, elder and deacon of the church. C.S. Lewis, one of the most thoroughly converted men in England. Frederic Bastiat, the man who taught me to see God's glory reflected among human communities.  St. Thomas of Aquino, patron saint of theology nerds.

Life of the Saints

The communion of the saints, living and dead, is present and ongoing.

Some Protestant denominations, including Anglicans and Adventists, oppose this doctrine on the basis of "Christian mortalism" (sometimes called "soul sleep"). They point out that our Western notion of "the immortality of the soul" are predicated not on Scripture but on Platonic dualism, which treats the soul as pure and the body as corrupt, and which therefore imagines the human person as a good charioteer riding and reining in an intractable and diseased horse.

The kernel of truth in this objection must be noted: the Judeo-Christian understanding of the human person bears little resemblance to this Platonic imagery. We are embodied souls, both the "dust from the ground" and "the breath of life" (Gen. 2:7), and the resurrection promised to us is a resurrection of the body and soul. On this basis Christian mortalists argue that the soul, though alive in Christ, enters a state of sleep until woken with the bodily resurrection at the end of days, at the creation of the New Heaven and New Earth.

Though the doctrine of soul sleep has its modern adherents, it is an ancient heresy. It has existed since the earliest days of Christianity on the outskirts of Church teaching, and has never been considered orthodox. The early theologian Origen once spoke against the doctrine of soul sleep so strongly that an entire sect of Arabian dissenters was persuaded to return to the orthodox understanding (according to the church historian Eusebius).

The nearest it came to official recognition was by a pronouncement by Pope John XXII on a separate issue that might have potentially been consistent with soul sleep. Upon discussion with the College of Cardinals, the Pope corrected his statement, and his successor Pope Benedict XII recognized that corrected teaching to be ex cathedra doctrine.

Soul sleep only received a general hearing among the Protestant reformers (especially Wycliffe, Tyndale, and Luther), mostly as a utilitarian counter to the veneration of the saints. Yet even John Calvin wrote strongly against such novelties in the tract "Psychopannychia," and today, most Protestant denominations share this perspective, joining the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church in asserting the active communion of the saints.

Ultimately, the Christian doctrine of an active communion is not rooted in a Grecian notion of an immortal soul, but in the Biblical notion of an intermediate heaven preceding the New Heaven and New Earth which will become our eternal home. This is the essence of the doctrine: the saints are preserved not by some intrinsic power of our own humanity, but by the grace of God and the spirit of Christ's sonship which they share and by which by they are claimed.

Communion of the Saints

One of the most admirable traits of Islam, in my opinion, is the unity of the global Muslim population.  Five times a day rings the call to prayer, and five times a day every Muslim is called to face Mecca and pray to God. When I first understood this, I looked and found nothing comparable in my own background, nothing to echo the sweeping grandeur of a worldwide church united in a single act of devotion to God. To be honest, it was more than a little disappointing.

From this relatively recent appreciation of the Eucharist, I see what I was missing. For Christ Himself said of the bread that "This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me" (1 Cor. 11: 24), and the earliest descriptions of the Christian church incorporate the centrality of the Eucharistic meal.

In the first post-Resurrection appearance recorded by Luke, Jesus walked with two of His disciples on the road to Emmaus, and when they arrived and "He had reclined at the table with them, He took the bread and blessed it, and breaking it, He began giving it to them. And their eyes were opened and they recognized Him" (Luke 24:30-31). When the two disciples returned to Jerusalem to share this with the eleven, "They began to relate their experience on the road and how He was recognized by them in the breaking of the bread" (Luke 24: 35). Likewise, after the events of Pentecost, the members of the early Church "were continually devoting themselves to the apostle's teachings and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer" (Acts 2:30).

But Scripture does not merely treat the Eucharist as a sacrament shared only among the living. Christ declares that "I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father's kingdom" (Matt. 26:29).

Indeed, Scripture bids us to "rejoice and be glad and give the glory to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready.... Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.... These are the true words of God" (Rev. 19:7-9). The Eucharist is shared among all the saints of God: it is the sign of our unity as the Body of Christ, that we partake of that body together.

Communion is by this measure more than a memorial and in a sense even more than a sacrament.  It is a pillar of our Christian identity, allowing us to anticipate the marriage supper of the Lamb, sharing the celebration "with so great a cloud of witnesses" (Heb. 12:1) and with the triumphal cries of the host of heaven.

This is the "new covenant in My blood" (1 Cor. 11:25) instituted by Christ. This is the communion of the saints.

The Real Presence

My first encounter with Catholicism was at an international conference on religion and economics in Michigan. Because many attendees were Catholic, daily Mass was administered by the local parish priest, who was also the President of the hosting institution. I attended one morning, and found it an interesting though unfamiliar spectacle.  Later that day, however, I had a chance to converse with a number of devout Catholics who explained to me some of the Catholic doctrines that were so foreign to my Protestant ears.

The single doctrine that struck me as simultaneously the most objectionable and the most defensible was the doctrine of Eucharistic Adoration. After the communal hosts have been consecrated by the priest, but before they are set out to be consumed at Mass, the elements are sometimes set aside in a chapel, where devout Catholic may go to worship before them.

From a Protestant perspective, this practice is tantamount to institutionalized idolatry. However, as my Catholic friend was describing it, he noted that, by the Catholic teaching of transubstantiation, the consecrated hosts are no longer merely bread and wine, but are in reality the body and blood of Christ. With such an understanding, worship or adoration of the elements can only be seen as worship or adoration of Christ.

The doctrine of transubstantiation is often misunderstood among both Protestants and lay Catholics, mostly because it relies on Aristotelian concepts foreign to modern ears. From his mentor Plato, Aristotle inherited notions of the world of forms -- the objective reality that undergirds the realm of subjective perception.  Loosely speaking, when you sit on a chair, you are sitting on a corrupted image of a Perfect chair, on a physical (and therefore inconstant) manifestation of the Form of a chair. Aristotle's concept of forms was modified slightly from Plato, but he still argued that there is a real distinction between reality and the realm of the senses.

This distinction, in the Aristotelian system, is between substances and accidents.  Substances are the thing itself, its essence or "quiddity" (a Latinate word roughly meaning its "what-ness"). Accidents are properties of the thing that we use to identify or describe it, but which aren't essential to its definition. For instance, this chair is made of wood.  Is wood essential to the substance of a chair?  No, because a chair might also be made of metal or plastic. Accidents belong to the realm of the senses, but substances are the thing itself.

Therefore, when Catholics speak of transubstantiation, they speak of the accidents (the outward appearance and physical reality) of the bread and wine remaining the same, while their substances are supplanted by the substance (inner reality, essence) of the body and blood of Christ. Under the Catholic hermeneutic, the words "this is my body" and "this is my blood," are not merely metaphorical but in fact definitional: Christ stated that the bread and wine were to be substantially identified with Himself.

This is the foundation for the Catholic dogma of the Real Presence, and the Catholic discipline of Eucharistic adoration.

One common Protestant objection to the Real Presence is the argument that, if it's necessary for Christ to be present in the host and to be broken each time Mass is celebrated, that would severely undermine the sufficiency of the atoning grace that arose from His sacrifice on the cross.

This objection is well taken, but it seems to hinge on a rather crucial misunderstanding. As created beings, we live our whole lives in the contexts of time and space, and find it quite impossible to imagine anything outside them. But time and space are properties of the created order, and thus God as Creator transcends such limitations. In the original celebration of the Lord's Supper, Jesus referred to His body broken, and His blood poured out, prior to His crucifixion, yet He asked His disciples to eat and drink in remembrance of that future act. No wonder the disciples were confused!

God exists in what we might consider a timeless present: this is the meaning of His Name, the Tetragrammaton "I am that I am." In every moment He experiences and observes everything. This is, incidentally, the solution to the problem of divine foreknowledge and predestination. For now, it also resolves the issue of competing sacrifices. It seems to me that God is sacrificially present in the act of communion, not in addition to His sacrifice on Calvary, but in the same divine moment.

We partake of that single sacrifice, and share the same Holy Meal, without regard to our differences in space and time from the rest of the Church, because God is present throughout space and time.

This is, incidentally, a necessary counterpoint to the doctrine of the Real Presence. After all, as Christians we must concede that God is present everywhere and such presence is indeed real. But there is a difference in the act of communion.  There is a visceral sacredness, an almost oppressive sense that this is truly a Holy Meal, just as surely as the ground beneath Moses' feet was holy ground. The transcendent Lord of the Universe is peeking out, as though from from behind the veil, and even that partial and opaque glimpse can still unravel the strings of our soul.

The Eucharist

A few months ago, I was attending the morning service at my church on communion Sunday. As the pastor read from one of the standard passages and prayed over the elements, a little girl behind me started asking her mother: "Mommy, what are we doing?"  After some hushed conversation, presumably in a failed attempt to answer the daughter's questions quickly, I heard the mother finally say in muted exasperation: "We're just pretending."

I fought the urge to turn around and make a scene. This little girl's first lesson on the Holy Eucharist was that it was a game of make-believe, along the lines of playing house. I tried to remind myself that the answer was perfectly understandable -- after all, how would I explain communion to a young child?  But I still felt like the mother's response was profoundly wrong, as though it were a blasphemy against the Church and the people of God.

I grew up accepting the common Protestant definition of communion as an ordinance, a memorial done in remembrance of the sacrifice of Christ. But I had grown increasingly discontented with this answer as I grew older and wrestled with other theological traditions.

The Psalmist's words that "the heavens declare the glory of God" began to strike me as something more than mere poetry -- they hearkened at a reality, that Creation itself was imprinted with the fingerprints of God.  In Aristotelian terms, the final cause of Nature as a thing created is to magnify and glorify its Creator. Once you accept this view of reality -- once you realize that the world is invested with more meaning that subsumes and transcends the level of the senses -- it is almost impossible to think differently. The world is too colorful to think in hues of gray; the melody of nature is too sweet to ever compare to cold monotone. 

When Christ spoke the words over the bread and wine, that "this is my body" and "this is my blood," He changed those elements into something almost infinitely more.  Even if the words were purely metaphorical, we can see that the words would magnify and glorify the elements, because He allowed them to represent and reflect Him. Similarly, by choosing to represent Himself and His relation to the Church through the imagery of marriage, God transformed the nature of marriage into a profound testament to His love. Thus, even by the loosest standard of Protestant interpretation, the act of communion must be seen as a sacrament: a vessel of God's holiness.

God is present when we celebrate communion. The rest is semantics -- theologically profound semantics, but considerably less valuable than this foundational understanding.  Just as the mode of baptism ("sprinkle, dip or dunk") matters considerably less than the condition of the heart that receives it, the question of whether God is present locally within the elements (as in the Catholic and Orthodox understandings of transubstantiation, and the Lutheran doctrine of consubstantiation), or present generally in the ritual or the act itself, is of comparatively little importance.

But the sacred aspect of the Eucharist goes further.  For, when He spoke those words, He did not merely make the elements reflect His divine nature.  The blood of Christ is the blood of atonement, the forgiveness of sins, the essential act of atonement operating by the grace of God for the redemption of the individual soul and of a fallen Creation. And how can we forget that the bread does not merely reflect the body of Christ broken on the cross, but also the resurrected body, emanating glory, as well as the Body to which we all now belong? For the Church is the mystical Body of Christ.

Therefore, by partaking of the Eucharist, we do not merely participate in a memorial to His work, and we do not merely eat of glorified elements that reflect His nature.  We partake of the blood by which we are forgiven, and the body by which we are made whole.  We partake of our individual salvation and our corporate identity as the Church. Indeed, the Eucharist is how we are known as the Church -- for the sacrament of baptism is done for individuals, but communion defines us as a Body.

Since I was 18 months old, I've been diagnosed with severe anaphylaxis (allergy) to peanuts. Whenever I see that communion will be administered on a Sunday service, my first reaction is to get up, find an usher, and make sure that there are no peanut contaminants in the bread so I can participate.  Even if it's in the middle of the worship time, this takes first priority.  Communion is probably one of the most important elements of my Christian walk, and certainly one of the most sacred rituals in which I participate as a believer.

Dialectic on Catholicism: Introduction

I grew up an evangelical Protestant, which is perhaps as far removed from Catholicism as you can get within the Christian community.  However, I recently came to the realization that I share a fundamentally Catholic approach to certain doctrines and issues in Christian theology, which made me take a second look at Catholic doctrines and disciplines (particularly those I don't particularly agree with) to see what I might learn from their tradition.

I'm calling this series a "dialectic" because I hope to reflect that process in these notes: state my background and my original beliefs on a given issue (thesis), engage the Catholic approach to the same issue (antithesis), and identify my preferred approach based on the comparative strengths of both (synthesis).  I'd also like to identify any commonalities that might reliably point us to the rudiments of "mere Christianity," that wonderful phrase coined by C.S. Lewis that must be at the heart of any efforts at ecumenical unity and dialogue.

The series will wrestle with the teachings on the Eucharist and other sacraments, the principles and practice of canonization, the dogma of Mary, papal authority, and (if time permits or interest prevails) other issues such as church structure, eschatology, and purgatory. Sounds like fun, at least to the ears of a theology nerd.