De Lubac quotes Thomas a Kempis to the effect that “when the consummation comes, the sacraments will be employed no more,” and explains: “Human mediation, now indispensable and of primary importance, will have no raison d’etre in the Heavenly Jerusalem; there, everyone will . . . . Continue Reading »
Clement of Alexandria (Pedagogue, 1.6) said: “Just as the will of God is an act and is called the world, so also His intention is the salvation of men and is called the Church.” . . . . Continue Reading »
PG Lake writes that Whitgift “used a Calvinist view of the doctrine of predestination to shift much of Cartwright’s rhetoric about the glory and purity of the church from the visible to the invisible church. By doing so, he was able to clear the way for that erastian dominance of the . . . . Continue Reading »
According to Oliver O’Donovan, Book 19 of City of God “is, at the very least, an essay to demonstrate that moral philosophy must be social philosophy.” The highest good for Augustine is the peace of the city of the blessed, and this is an inherently social reality. Since virtuous . . . . Continue Reading »
The Donatists are usually seen as the sectarians of the early church but Robert Dodaro points out that for Augustine their sectarianism derived from their clericalism: “Augustine explains that cultic acts which remit sins, such as baptism, are in reality performed by Christ, who acts through . . . . Continue Reading »
Augustine on Psalm 149: “Chorus Christi jam totus mundus est.” Christ’s choir is now the whole world. . . . . Continue Reading »
Mundus reconciliatus Ecclesia (Augustine, Sermon 96). “The world reconciled is the church.” . . . . Continue Reading »
In his 1987 book on Thomas’s ecclesiology, George Sabra argues that Thomas does not teach that the church is a continuing incarnation. He definitely rejects any notion that the church is deified. If the notion of “continuing incarnation” simply means that the church continues the . . . . Continue Reading »
Thomas wrote no treatise on the church, but Yves Congar, among others, insisted that the whole second part of the Summa is about ecclesiology. Thomas is telling a story of exodus and return, and the second part of his treatise is about the return effected by Christ and worked out in the church. . . . . Continue Reading »
Calvin says “The whole world is a theater for the display of the divine goodness, wisdom, justice, and power, but the Church is the orchestra, as it were - the most conspicuous part of it.” . . . . Continue Reading »
Subscribe
Latest Issue
Support First Things
