The Catechism Explained: Newly Annotated with Corresponding References to the Catechism of the Catholic Church

Man after the Fall was unable to regain for himself his former holiness and justice, and all the goods that were bound up with these. A man whose body is dead cannot raise himself again to bodily life; so one who is spiritually dead cannot raise himself again to spiritual life. Man after the Fall became like a sick man who cannot move hand or foot, or arise from the bed on which he is lying. What the Good Samaritan was to the man who had fallen among thieves, Our Lord is to the man who has been wounded by the craft of the devil and robbed of his spiritual and supernatural gifts. Jesus Christ is also called Our Saviour or Our Redeemer, because He saved us from hell and brought us back at the cost of His own precious blood.

Christ freed us from the spiritual consequences of sin in the following manner: He enlightened our understanding by His teaching, inclined our will to good by His precepts and promises, and by His sacrifice of Himself upon the cross won for us the means of grace by which we once more attain to sanctification and become the children of God and heirs of the kingdom of heaven.

Christ took upon Himself a threefold office, that of Prophet or Teacher, Priest, and King. This threefold office he ascribes to Himself under various titles. He calls Himself the Light of the world (John xii. 46), because He enlightens the darkness of our understanding by His doctrine. As a light makes distant objects clear and visible, so Christ makes clear to us the most distant objects, God and His perfections, the world to come, heaven and hell, time and eternity. Before Pilate He calls Himself the King Whose kingdom is not of this world (John 18:36). He also calls Himself the Good Shepherd, Who gives His life for His sheep (John 10:11). He also often compares Himself to a guide or leader (John 14:6; Matt. 10:38). We are wanderers in this world; we have here no abiding dwelling-place, but seek one that is to come. The road is rough, steep, and surrounded with precipices, and we in our ignorance are in constant danger of wandering from the way. Christ undertakes to be our Guide. He says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6), and He promises that if we take Him for our Guide, and follow in His sacred footsteps, we shall never go wrong. St. Paul calls Christ our great High Priest (Heb. 2:17), Who needs not, like other priests, first to offer sacrifices for his own sins, and then for the people. By His obedience He atoned for Adam’s disobedience (Rom. 5:19), for He was obedient to death, even to the death of the cross (Phil. 2:8). Christ opened heaven again to us by earning for us the means of grace. By which, and especially by the sacraments and holy Mass, we can obtain sanctifying grace and be made children of God. In opening heaven to us, Christ tore away the veil which shut us out from the holy of holies (Matt. 27:51), i.e., from heaven, and by His blood gave us a sure hope of entering in (Heb. 10:19). The cross is thus the key of heaven for us.

Christ freed us also from the consequences of sin as it affected our bodies; He has died instead of us, and has thus earned for us the resurrection of our bodies; He has by His teaching and His example taught us what we must do in order to be happy in this world, to overcome the world, and so to attain to the celestial paradise; lastly He has given us the means by which we may vanquish and drive far from us the enemy of our souls.

By His own resurrection Christ insured for us the resurrection of our bodies. “By man came death, and by man came also the resurrection from the dead” (1 Cor. 15:21). By following the teaching of Christ, we shall secure true peace on earth (Cf. John 4:13), and by practicing the virtues that He taught us, especially humility, chastity, and liberality, we shall overcome the devil and the world. By the sacramentals we drive away from us the evil one. Christ has broken the power of the devil (Rev. 12:10–11), but the final victory over him will be at the end of the world (1 Cor. 15:24–25; Cf. Luke 10:18). By the death of Christ we have won back almost all that was lost by original sin, though some of its consequences still remain, such as sickness, death, and evil tendencies. Yet we have won more by the death of Christ than we lost by sin. Where sin abounded, grace did the more abound (Rom. 5:20). Hence the Church exclaims in the Office for Holy Saturday: “O happy fault, which obtained for us so great a Redeemer!”

2. THE PROMISE OF THE REDEEMER

God forgave fallen man, though He had not forgiven the angels. Man’s sin was not so grievous; he had less light and knowledge, and moreover was tempted by them. Besides, he at once to some extent confessed and lamented his sin. Lastly God would not, for the guilt of one, thrust down into eternal banishment from Himself the whole race of men.

1. Immediately after the Fall God promised man a Redeemer.¹⁶¹

For He said to the serpent, “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed; she shall crush thy head” (Gen. 3:15).

The seed of the woman here referred to is Our Lord Jesus Christ, and the woman is in all probability the Blessed Virgin Mary. There is to be a complete enmity between Our Lord and His holy Mother on one side, and the devil and his friends on the other. These words of almighty God are a promise that the power of the devil should be destroyed, and that the whole race of men, who through original sin had fallen under the power of the devil, in that he had great influence over them in persuading them to sin, should be freed from their subjection to him. These words are called the Protevangelium or first Gospel, inasmuch as they are the first promise of a Redeemer to come. Yet He was not to come at once. Man had to learn by experience and by suffering the evil of sin, and by seeing the effects of God’s anger against it, e.g., in the Flood, the destruction of the cities of the plain, in the destruction of the Tower of Babel, etc.

2. Two thousand years later God promised to Abraham that the Redeemer should be one of his descendants.¹⁶²

Abraham lived in Ur in Chaldea, and later in Haran in Mesopotamia. He preserved amid the idolatry around him the worship of the true God. God commanded him to leave his father’s house, and journey forth into a land which was to be shown him. In reward for his prompt obedience God promised him that in him all the families of the earth should be blessed (Gen. 12:2–3). He directed his steps towards the fertile land of Palestine, and promised him a numerous posterity. Abraham is called the father of the faithful (Rom. 4:11). God repeated the same promise when the three angels visited Abraham (Gen. 18:18), and again when Abraham, in obedience to God’s command, offered up his only son Isaac (Gen. 22:17).

The same promise that God had made to Abraham He repeated to Isaac and to Jacob, and one thousand years later to King David.

God appeared to Isaac when he was about to fly into Egypt on account of the famine in Palestine (Gen. 26:2 seq.), and to Jacob when he was flying from his brother Esau, and saw the ladder reaching to heaven (Gen. 28:12), and repeated to each the same promise. To King David the prophet Nathan announced, by God’s command, that He would raise up to him a son whose throne should be established forever (2 Sam. 7:13). The men who belonged to the family from which Christ was to be born were termed patriarchs. All the patriarchs reached a good old age. God had ordained this in order that they might hand down the knowledge of Him to their posterity.

3. At a later time God sent the prophets, and through their mouth foretold many things about the coming, the birth, the person, the sufferings, the death, and the final triumph and glory of the Redeemer.¹⁶³

The prophets were men enlightened by God (men of God), who spoke to the people of Israel in God’s name and with His authority. Their chief task was to keep the people from sin, and to reprove them when they had sinned, and also to prepare the mind of men for the advent of the Redeemer. They were from different classes in society; Isaiah was of royal blood, Amos was a herdsman, Elisha was called from the plough to the prophetical office. God gave them the power of working miracles, of foretelling His judgments, and also of prophesying respecting the Messiah. Most of them lived a life of penance; they were held in great veneration by the people, but were persecuted and in many cases suffered a violent death (Matt. 23:30). There were in all about seventy prophets. Moses was one of the greatest of the prophets (Deut. 34:10), and Isaiah was greater still, on account of his clear prophesies respecting the Messiah. The last of the prophets was Malachi, who prophesied about B.C. 450. Sixteen of the prophets left writing behind them. Four of these are called the greater prophets (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel); twelve the lesser prophets, on account of the smaller amount of their writings.

4. Of the advent of the Messiah the prophets have given the following account:

a. The Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem.

Micah says: “Thou Bethlehem Ephrata, art a little one among the thousands of Judah; out of thee shall come forth unto me He Who is to be the Ruler in Israel; and His going forth is from the beginning unto the days of eternity” (Mic. 5:2). Hence the three kings were informed that Christ would be born in Bethlehem (Matt. 2:5).

b. The Messiah was to come at a time when the Temple was still standing.

When the Jews after their return from captivity began to rebuild the Temple, the old men who had seen the former Temple began to weep. They saw from the character of the foundations that the new Temple would not be as large, nor as beautiful as the old one. The prophet Haggai comforted them by telling them that in this new Temple “the Desired of all nations should come, and fill it with glory” (Hag. 2:8–10). But this second Temple was destroyed by Titus seventy years after Christ, and was never rebuilt.

c. The Messiah was to come when the Jews no longer were an independent kingdom.

Jacob, in blessing his sons before his death, said to Judah: “The sceptre shall not be taken away from Judah, till He come that is to be sent, and to Him shall be the expectation of the nations” (Gen. 49:10). From this time the tribe of Judah was the leading tribe (Numb. 2:3–9). King David was of the tribe of Judah, and so were his successors up to the captivity in Babylon. Zorobabel, who brought the Jews back from captivity, was of the same tribe. When the Jews regained their liberty, they were under the rule of the Maccabees, who also belonged to Judah. It was not till the year 39 B.C. that the Jewish monarchs were deprived of their sovereignty, and Herod the Great, a foreigner and a pagan, was raised to the throne by the authority of the Romans. In the time of Herod a Redeemer was looked for all over Judea. Herod was alarmed at the inquiry of the Magi for the new-born King (Matt. 2:3); the Jewish people thought that St. John the Baptist was the Messiah (Luke 3:15); the Samaritan woman to whom Our Lord talked at Jacob’s well was looking forward to the advent of the Messiah (John 4:25). The chief priest conjured Jesus to tell them whether He was the Messiah (Matt. 26:63). As many as sixty impostors about this time gave out that they were the Christ, and deceived many. Even among the heathen there was, at the time of Christ, an expectation of a deliverer, who would banish crime and restore peace to the world (Cf. Virg., Ecl. 9).

d. The prophet Daniel (605–530) foretold that from the re-building of Jerusalem (453), until the public appearance of the Messiah, there would be sixty-nine weeks of years, and until the death of the Messiah sixty-nine and a half weeks of years.

This prediction was revealed to him by the archangel Gabriel, as he was one day offering the evening oblation, and was praying for the deliverance of his people out of captivity. Cyrus, in the year 536, gave the Jewish people leave to return to Palestine and to rebuild their city. In the year 453 the King Artaxerxes gave his cup-bearer Nehemiah full powers to fortify Jerusalem; this had not been allowed by Cyrus, on account of which the Jews had been exposed to the constant attacks of their enemies. Now if we add to 453 sixty-nine weeks of years (483 years) we have the date of the commencement of Christ’s public ministry or if we add sixty-nine and one half weeks of years (486½ years) we have the date of the crucifixion (A.D. 33½).

e. The Messiah was to be born of a virgin of the House of David.¹⁶⁴

As a sign God gave to King Achaz the following prophecy: “Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and His name shall be called Emmanuel [God with us]” (Is. 7:14). And of the tribe of which the Messiah is to be born the prophet Jeremiah says, “Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise up to David a just branch, and a king shall reign and shall be wise, and shall execute judgment and justice on the earth” (Jer. 23:5), and His name shall be “the Lord our just One.”

f. The Messiah was to be preceded by a precursor or forerunner, who was to preach in the desert, and to live an angelic life.¹⁶⁵

Isaiah says of this forerunner, that he was to be “the voice of one crying in the desert: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a path for our God” (Is. 40:3). And God says through the mouth of Malachi “Behold, I send My angel, and he shall prepare My way before My face. And presently the Lord, Whom you seek, shall come to His Temple” (Mal. 3:1). This precursor was St. John the Baptist.

g. With the Messiah a new star was to appear.¹⁶⁶

The prophet Balaam announced to the King of Moab, when the Israelites were approaching: “I shall see Him, but not now; I shall behold Him, but not near; a star shall come out of Jacob, and a sceptre shall rise up from Israel” (Numb. 24:17).

h. The Messiah was to be adored by kings from distant lands, and they were to bring Him gifts (Ps. 71[72]:10).

i. At the time of the birth of the Messiah many children were to be put to death.

We read in the prophet Jeremiah, “A voice was heard on high, of lamentation and mourning and weeping; of Rachel weeping for her children, and refusing to be comforted, because they are not” (Jer. 31:15). Rachel here represents the Jewish people. She died in Bethlehem and was buried there (Gen. 25:19).

j. The Messiah was to fly to Egypt, and to return again from thence (Hos. 11:11).

5. Of the person of the Messiah the following prophecies had been uttered:

a. The Messiah was to be the Son of God (Ps. 2:7).

Through the prophet Nathan God promises David the Redeemer, and says: “He will call Me Father and I will call Him Son” (2 Sam. 7:14). In a psalm God addresses the Messiah: “Thou art My Son; this day have I begotten Thee” (Ps. 2:7).

b. He shall be at the same time both God and man.

Isaiah says, “A Child is born to us, and a Son is given to us; and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, God, the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of peace” (Is. 9:6).

c. He was to be a great worker of miracles.

“God Himself shall come and save you. Then shall the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as the hart, and the tongue of the dumb shall be unstopped” (Is. 35:5–7).

d. He was to be a priest like to Melchizedek.¹⁶⁷

“The Lord hath sworn and He will not repent: Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek” (Ps. 109[110]:4). Christ offered bread and wine at the Last Supper, and offers it daily in holy Mass through the hands of the priests who are His representatives.

e. He was to be a prophet or teacher of the people.

To Moses God had said, “I will raise up unto them a prophet, out of the midst of thy brethren, like to thee” (Deut. 18:18). Hence the Jews named the Messiah, “the Prophet Who was to come into the world” (John 6:14). As prophet the Messiah was to teach and to prophesy. He was also to be the teacher of the nations (Is. 49:1–6).

f. He was to be King of a new kingdom (Jer. 23:5), which was never to he destroyed, and was to embrace all other kingdoms (Dan. 2:44).

This kingdom is the Catholic Church, or the Church of the whole world. Before Pilate Christ proclaimed Himself a king, and said, “My kingdom is not of this world,” i.e., His kingdom was to be a spiritual one (John 18:36).

6. Of the sufferings of the Messiah the prophets spoke as follows:¹⁶⁸

a. The Messiah was to enter into Jerusalem riding on an ass (Zech. 9:9).

b. He was to be sold for thirty pieces of silver. “And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and I cast them into the house of the Lord” (Zech. 11:12–13).

The words of Zechariah were exactly fulfilled; Judas threw down the money in the Temple, and with it was bought a field belonging to a potter, as a burying-place for strangers (Matt. 27:5–7).

c. He was to be betrayed by one who ate at the same table with Him (Ps. 40[41]:10).

Judas went out from the Last Supper to betray his Master (John 13:30).

d. His disciples were to forsake Him at the time of His Passion (Zech. 13:7).

e. He was to be mocked (Ps. 21[22]:7), beaten, spit upon (Is. 50:6), scourged (Ps. 72[73]:14), crowned with thorns (Song 3:11), and given gall and vinegar to drink (Ps. 67[68]:22).

The chief priests and Scribes at the crucifixion mocked Our Lord, and said among themselves, “He saved others; Himself He cannot save” (Mark 15:31; Cf. 15:29). In the house of Annas a servant gave Him a blow (John 18:22). In the house of Caiphas, when He declared Himself the Son of God, the servants spit upon His face, and gave Him blows; Pilate had Him scourged (John 19:1), and handed Him over to the soldiers, who crowned Him with thorns, put upon Him a purple robe (in mockery of the imperial purple), struck Him on the head with a reed, and derided Him (Mark 15:15–19). On Golgotha they gave Him to drink wine mixed with gall, which, when He had tasted it, He would not drink (Matt. 27:34).

f. For His garments lots were to be cast (Ps. 21[22]:19).

The soldiers divided His garments into four parts, and gave to each soldier a part. His coat they would not divide, for it was without seam, woven from the top throughout. They therefore cast lots for it (John 19:23).

g. His hands and feet were to be pierced with nails (Ps. 21[22]:17).

Our Lord was really fastened by nails to the cross; for He showed to St. Thomas the wounds in His hands and feet, and told him to place his finger in them (John 20:27). The usual practice was to tie condemned criminals to the cross with ropes.

h. He was to die between two evil-doers.

The prophet Isaiah says: “They shall give the ungodly for His burial, and the rich for His death” (Is. 53:9). He died between two highway robbers, who were crucified at the same time with Him (Luke 23:33).

i. He was to be patient as a lamb in His sufferings (Is. 53:7), and was to pray for His enemies (Is. 53:12).

j. He was to die willingly and for our sins (Is. 53:4–7).

7. Of the glory of the Messiah the prophets made the following predictions:

a. He was to make His grave with the rich (Is. 53:9), and it was to be glorious (Is. 11:10).

b. His body was not to undergo corruption (Ps. 15[16]:10).

c. He was to return to heaven (Ps. 67[68]:34), and was to sit on the right hand of God (Ps. 109[110]:1).

d. His doctrine was to spread from Jerusalem and from Mount Sion over the whole world (Joel 2:28; Is. 2:3).

The hall of the Last Supper, where the apostles received the Holy Spirit, was situated on Mount Sion.

e. The heathen nations of the whole earth were to be received into His kingdom, and to adore Him (Ps. 21[22]:28–29).

f. The Jewish people, who had put the Messiah to death were to be severely punished, and scattered over the face of the earth (Deut. 28:64).

The city of Jerusalem was to be destroyed as well as the Temple; the Jewish sacrifices and the Jewish priesthood were to cease, and the Temple was never to be rebuilt (Dan. 9:26–27; Hos. 3:4).

g. In every place throughout the world, a “clean oblation” (holy Mass) was to be offered to Him (Mal. 1:11).

h. He will one day judge all men (Ps. 109[110]:6). Before the Day of Judgment Elijah will be again sent on the earth (Mal. 4:5).

8. The Messiah was announced through many types.¹⁶⁹

The twilight announces the approach of the sun; so the lives of the patriarchs announced and foreshadowed the coming of Christ. Almost all the ceremonies of the tabernacle foreshadowed the ceremonies of the religion of Christ (Col. 2:16–17). The relation of the whole of the Old Testament to the New is that of the shadow to the substance (Heb. 10:1), of the image to the object that it represents. The ancient covenant was the veil which concealed the new. The persons and things which thus represent in the Old Testament the persons and things of the New, are called types.

The types of the Messiah were as follows: Abel, Noah, Melchizedek, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, David, Jonah, the archangel Raphael, the paschal lamb, the offering on the Day of Atonement, the brazen serpent, and the manna.

Abel was the first of just men; Christ the first of the saints; Abel was a shepherd and offered to God an acceptable offering; he was gentle as a lamb, but he was hated by his brother and murdered by him. Noah was the only just man among all those around him; Christ alone was without sin. Noah amid his course of preaching built the ark; so Christ the Church. Noah saved the human race from temporal death; so Christ from eternal death. Noah’s sacrifice on his quitting the ark was the beginning of a new covenant; so Christ’s on leaving the world. Melchizedek, i.e., king of justice, was King of Salem, i.e., King of peace; Christ was both King and Priest; He offered to God bread and wine. Isaac was the only-begotten and well-beloved son of his father. He himself carried the wood on which he was to be sacrificed, and offered himself willingly; he was restored to his father, and from him sprang a countless offspring. Jacob was persecuted by his brother, but afterwards was reconciled to him. Though the son of a rich father he wandered in a strange land and there won his bride by long service; so Christ the Church. He had twelve sons, of whom one was the beloved son; so Christ had twelve disciples, of whom St. John was the beloved disciple. Joseph, the well-beloved son of his father, was hated by his brethren, and sold by them for a few pieces of silver; after great humiliation he was raised to the highest honor, and by his counsel saved the whole people from death. Heralds proclaimed that all should bow the knee before him and he was reconciled to his brethren. Moses when a little child, escaped the cruel command of the king, spent his youth in Egypt, fasted forty days before the publication of the ancient law, freed the Israelites from slavery, and brought them to the Promised Land, worked miracles in proof of his divine mission, interceded for the people to God (Exod. 32:11; Numb. 14:13); appeared on Mount Sinai with a shining countenance (as Christ on Thabor), and was the mediator of the ancient covenant. David was born in Bethlehem, spent his youth in a humble state, vanquished the giant Goliath, the enemy of the people of the Lord; was King of Israel, had much to suffer, and triumphed over all his enemies. Jonas was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale (Matt. 12:40), and preached penance to the Ninivites. The archangel Raphael came down from heaven to conduct safely on his journey one of the children of men; delivered Tobias from blindness, and Sara from the devil. The paschal lamb was slain just before the departure of the Israelites from Egypt, and therefore on the Friday preceding the paschal Sabbath; it was offered to God and afterwards eaten; it was to be without spot, and in the prime of its age; not a bone of it was to be broken (John 19:36); its blood sprinkled on the posts of the door preserved from temporal death, as the blood of Christ from spiritual death. It was eaten on the eve of the departure of the Israelites to the Promised Land; so Our Lord is given as Viaticum on our departure for heaven. The emissary goat on the day of expiation was presented by the high priest before the Lord, and the priest then laid his hands upon its head, in order thereby to signify that the sins of all the people were transferred to it, and it was then driven out to die in the desert (Lev. 16:10). So Christ had the sins of the whole world laid upon Him, and passed from heaven into the desert of this sinful world to die for us. The brazen serpent in the desert was set up on a piece of wood, and all who looked upon it were healed of the bite of the fiery serpents (Numb. 21:6–9). So Christ was raised up on the wood of the cross, and all who look to Him with faith and hope are saved from the deadly effects of sin. Hence Our Lord says: “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whoever believeth in Him may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:14–15). Lastly the manna is a type of Christ in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar; it was white and small, came down from heaven every day, was to be consumed in the early morning, was given only during the journey through the desert, and contained in itself all sweetness. In all these things it resembles the Blessed Sacrament. Our Lord says that there is this difference between the manna and the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar: that Moses did not give the Israelites bread from heaven, but that the Blessed Sacrament is the bread that came down from heaven, and giveth life to the world (John 6:32–33).

3. PREPARATION OF MANKIND
FOR THE REDEEMER

1. God chose for Himself a special nation, and prepared it for the coming of a Redeemer; this chosen people was the seed of Abraham, usually called by the name of Israelites, or Jews.¹⁷⁰

Cf. the call of Abraham (Gen. 12); the Jews to be a priestly nation (Exod. 19:6). No rejection of the other nations is implied in this election of the Jews, for every renewal of the promise of a Redeemer recalled a blessing that all the nations were to share (Gen. 12:3; 26:4; 28:14).

The ways by which God prepared His chosen people for the Redeemer’s advent were: the infliction of heavy trials, the imposition of severe laws, the performance for them of miracles, and the giving of a series of prophecies.

The sensuality of the chosen people had to be combated by many trials, such as hunger and thirst in the desert, the fiery serpents, the attacks of their enemies, and their long exile. This same sensuality and insensibility required that the law should be promulgated with the awe-inspiring accompaniments of thunder and lightning. Idolatry was another sin to which the chosen people were prone, as we see in the incident of the golden calf (Exod. 32:1), so miracles were called in to strengthen their faith and trust in God, such as those performed in Egypt, in the passage of the Red Sea and the Jordan, the manna in the desert, the water drawn from the dry rock, and the falling down of the walls of Jericho, etc. The prophesies tended in the same direction, as well as to maintain the desire of the coming Redeemer.

Of the history of the Jewish people the following facts are known to us:

a. The descendants of Abraham first dwelt in Palestine, and went later to Egypt, where they remained for the space of four hundred years, and were cruelly oppressed.

About the year 2000 B.C., God called Abraham and bade him settle in Palestine; here he had a son, Isaac, who was the father of Esau and Jacob; Jacob secured Esau’s birthright and had to fly in consequence. Jacob (also called Israel) had twelve sons, of whom one was Joseph, who being sold into Egypt became the ruler of the land under the king, invited his relatives, some sixty-six in number, to join him, giving them the fertile district of Goshen, lying eastwards of the Nile delta, to dwell in (about 1900 B.C.). Here the Jews increased greatly in numbers and had much to endure later from the Egyptian kings.

b. Under the leadership of Moses, the Israelites left Egypt and wandered in the desert for forty years.

Some 2,000,000 people crossed the Red Sea (about 1500 B.C.) into the Arabian desert, where they were fed with manna and received the Ten Commandments. Moses died on Mount Nebo.

c. Under Joshua they entered the Promised Land, but had to fight under their Judges for over three hundred years, against their enemies (1450–1100 B.C.).

Joshua, the successor of Moses, divided the land among the twelve tribes. The Judges were men raised by God for times of special need, such, for instance, as Gedeon, Jephte, Samson and Samuel.

d. The Israelites were then ruled over by kings, Saul, David, and Solomon being especially famous (1100–975 B.C.).

Saul was unhappy in his career and died a suicide. David, his successor (1055–1015), was distinguished for his piety; he composed many of the Psalms and received from God the promise that the Redeemer should be of his family. On two occasions he fell into grievous sin and was visited with severe chastisements. His son and successor Solomon built the Temple of Jerusalem (1012), and was known far and wide for his wisdom and splendor.

e. After Solomon’s death the kingdom was divided into two parts, forming the kingdom of Israel in the north (975–722) and Judah in the south (975–588).

Solomon’s son, Roboam, alienated the ten northern tribes by his taxations, and only the two southern tribes, Judah and Benjamin, remained to form the kingdom of Judah.

f. Both kingdoms fell away from the true God, and were in consequence destroyed, and their inhabitants led away into captivity.

Israel had nineteen kings, who led the people into idolatry in spite of the efforts of the prophets. At last, Salmanasar, in 722, destroyed the kingdom and carried the people away into the Assyrian captivity; the fall of the Assyrian power brought the exiles under the dominion of the Babylonians and in 538 under that of the Persian king Cyrus. The kingdom of Judah had twenty kings, and held out longer, but was finally reduced by Nebuchadnezzar; the people were led away into captivity (606 and 599) and Jerusalem and the Temple destroyed.

g. After the return from the captivity (536) the Jews lived in peace until they came, in 203, under the power of Antiochus, King of Syria.

From the year 606 the inhabitants of Judah and Israel dwelt under the same ruler, and came to be known indifferently as Jews. Cyrus, who obtained possession of the Babylonian kingdom in 538, gave permission two years later to the Jews to return and rebuild their Temple; some 42,000 Jews availed themselves of this concession to return under Zorobabel to Jerusalem, where they raised a new Temple after twenty years of work; in the year 453 Artaxerxes allowed them to build walls; they still remained for about two hundred years under Persian dominion and were well treated. Alexander the Great and his successors then had the mastery, till the time of Antiochus Epiphanes IV., who began a religious persecution, putting the Machabean brothers and Eleazar to death, and placing idols in the Temple.

h. The Jews regained their freedom after a bloody war, and were again ruled for one hundred years by Jewish kings, from 140 to 39 B.C.

Maccabeus and his five sons helped the Jews to shake off the Syrian yoke. Simon, one of the Maccabees, reigned as high priest and king in 140, and was succeeded by his descendants till the advent of Pompey in 64, who reduced the Jewish king to the subjection of Rome.

i. In 38 B.C., a Gentile, Herod, became King of Judea.

As Judea was always a focus of rebellion, the Jewish king was deposed and replaced by Herod, the first of the kings who was not a Jew. He it was who massacred the children at Bethlehem. At his death he was succeeded by his son Herod Antipas, who put John the Baptist to death and treated Our Lord as a fool. His successor was his uncle Herod Agrippa the Great, who beheaded St. James the Elder, and cast St. Peter into prison. He usurped the name of God and died a miserable death, eaten by worms, in 44 A.D. In 70 A.D. Jerusalem was destroyed by Titus, and the Jews scattered among the nations.

2. The other nations of the earth were prepared for the coming of the Redeemer by contact with the chosen people, or by the influence of exceptionally gifted men, or by other extraordinary methods.¹⁷¹

The ordinary intercourse of trade, as well as the enforced exile, afforded means of contact with the heathen, and that this was not unfruitful we learn from Tobias. “Give glory to the Lord, ye children of Israel … because He hath therefore scattered you among the Gentiles, who know not Him, that you may declare His wonderful works and make them know that there is no other almighty God besides Him” (Tob. 13:3–4). Such men as Socrates, in Greece, had their mission in decrying the cult of idols, and exhibiting in their persons the virtues of courage, gentleness, and moderation; we might enumerate also Job in Arabia, Joseph in Egypt, Jonah in Ninive, Daniel in Babylon and others. The virtues of such men, their courage in confessing the true God, and the miracles by which their profession was verified, as, for instance, the cases of the children in the furnace of Nebuchadnezzar and Daniel in the lions’ den, furnished abundant motives to the heathen for discerning the true God; and that this was the case is corroborated by the numbers of proselytes. Besides all these, other methods were not left untried; e.g., the miraculous star which led the three Magi to Bethlehem (Matt. 2:2), the angel’s message to Cornelius the centurion (Acts 10:3), the mysterious handwriting on the wall of the palace where Baltassar was profaning the sacred vessels (Dan. 5:2), the dream of Nebuchadnezzar (Dan. 2), the prophecy of Balaam’s ass, etc.

3. Before the arrival of the Redeemer God permitted that mankind should experience the deepest misery, in order to rouse it to a longing for a Redeemer.¹⁷²

The greatest dissension reigned among the Jews; three different sects claimed precedence: the Sadducees, the moneyed class, denied eternal life; the Pharisees adhered rigidly to the written law; the Essenes withdrew entirely from the world and led a life of strict penance. Among the heathen there was a general ignorance of any religious life, together with monstrous immorality. The gods, according to Hesiod, were too numerous to be counted and were indifferently idols, or men of abominable lives, or even animals, whose worship was signalized by scenes of debauchery and human sacrifices; heathens were not wanting who recognized the sad state of affairs; Horace, for instance, in one of his odes bewails the civil wars, and prays the virgin-born Son to come and reign among His people. Long before him Socrates had expressed the wish that some mediator should come from heaven to teach man his duty to God. Jacob (Gen. 49:10) and the prophets (Hag. 2:8) only echoed the popular feeling when they called the Redeemer “the expectation of the nations.” As in nations, so is God’s action to be seen in individuals, and the struggles of a St. Paul and a St. Augustine served to make them more open to the action of the Holy Spirit and more zealous in their conversion to God.

4. THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE REDEEMER

1. The Redeemer lived some nineteen hundred years ago and remained thirty-three years on the earth.¹⁷³

In the early Christian times the date was reckoned by the consuls of the year.

From the time of the great Christian persecution under Diocletian, the Christians began to reckon their years from the accession of that tyrant (the era of the martyrs). Dionysius Exiguus, in 525, was the first to reckon from the Annunciation of Our Lady, i.e., the conception of Christ. Charlemagne introduced the custom of dating from the birth of Christ. There is an error, however, of four years, so that Christ was actually born four years before the year 1 of the Christian era.

The time preceding Christ is known as that of the Old Testament or the Old Law, that following as the New Testament or New Law (Heb. 9:15–17).

The word testament is appropriate as expressing the will of God, recalling the legacy of the Promised Land to the Jews, and to Christians, the one sealed with the blood of animals, the other with the blood of Christ.

2. The work of the Redeemer was confined for the most part to Palestine.¹⁷⁴

Palestine is the ancient Canaan, known later as Judea or the “land of promise” or the “holy land,” made holy by the presence of Christ. Its small extent (it was only about half the size of Switzerland) had many counterbalancing advantages; its central position adapted it for the spreading of the true religion, its fertility in the midst of the surrounding desert made it independent of other nations, and secured its inhabitants from undesirable intercourse with the heathen. The population in the time of Our Lord was about 5,000,000, of whom 1,000,000 lived at Jerusalem. At the present day the whole population is only half a million, and in Jerusalem hardly 25,000.

Palestine is situated on the Mediterranean, and includes both banks of the Jordan.

The boundaries of Palestine are: Phœnicia on the north, the desert on the east, Arabia on the south, and the Mediterranean on the west. The Jordan, a river varying from eighty to one hundred and fifty feet in width, the scene of the passage of the Jews and the baptism of Our Lord, flows in a turbid, yellow current, and passes through the little lake of Merom and the lake of Genesareth, the scene of so many of Christ’s labors, and finally into the Dead Sea, the site of Sodom and Gomorrha. On its way it receives the brooks Karith and Cedron.

The divisions of Palestine are: in the south, Judea; in the centre, Samaria; in the north, Galilee, and in the east, beyond the Jordan, Peræa, Ituræa, and the district of Trachonitis.

The inhabitants of Judea were the firmest adherents of the true faith; those of Samaria had given themselves up to the worship of idols, and the Galileans, especially in the north, were in part pagans, despised by the Jews as well on that account as for their uncouth dialect.

The most important city of Palestine was Jerusalem, where the Temple stood.

Jerusalem (i.e., City of Peace), is situated on four hills, of which the highest is Sion, lying westward of the hill of Acre, with the pool of Siloe lying south; to the north is Mount Moriah, on which the Temple stood, and further still to the north is the hill of Bezetha and the modern town. Westward of Moriah is Golgotha or Calvary. These hills lie between two valleys, of which the westward is called Hinnom (or hell, because there the Jews used to sacrifice their children to Moloch), and the eastern, the valley of Josaphat (or judgment of God, on account of the tradition that God would judge the world there). To the east of the valley of Josaphat is the Mount of Olives and the Garden of Gethsemane. Jerusalem was in existence at the time of Melchizedek, who reigned there about 2000 B.C.; it became, under David (about 1000 B.C.), the residence of the Jewish kings; about four hundred years later (in 588 B.C.) it was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, restored again about fifty years later (536 B.C.), and again destroyed by the Romans under Titus in the year 70 A.D. The Temple in Our Lord’s time was a magnificent and imposing building (Cf. Mark 13:1) of white stone; it had an outer court, the court of the Gentiles, and an inner, the court of the priests, containing the altar of burnt offerings. Within this court again was the Temple proper, a building of about thirty metres in length, ten in breadth, and fifteen in height, with a flat roof of cedar. The Temple proper consisted of the vestibule, the holy place, and the holy of holies; the walls of the two last places were covered with solid plates of gold and the two chambers were separated by a veil, the veil of the Temple. In the holy of holies, between two great golden cherubim, lay the ark of the covenant containing the tables of the law, Aaron’s staff, and the manna; and here in a cloud rested the majesty of God, the Shechinah. The Temple was built by Solomon about 1000 B.C., was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar in 588 B.C., and in 516 was rebuilt by Zorobabel on the return from the Babylonian exile (though the ark was no longer there), and was restored again by Herod in the time of Christ. In the year 64 A.D., the restoration was complete, till the Romans came in 70 A.D., and destroyed the building. Julian the Apostate endeavored to rebuild it in 361, but an earthquake cast down the works, and fire coming from the earth drove away the workmen. The Temple will never be rebuilt till the end of the world (Dan. 9:27).

Besides Jerusalem the towns of Bethlehem and Nazareth deserve mention.

Places of interest in Judea: South of Jerusalem lies Bethlehem, the birthplace of Christ; further south still is Hebron, where dwelt Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the parents of St. John the Baptist; east of Jerusalem is Bethany, the village where Lazarus dwelt, and the desert of Quarantania, where Our Lord went through His forty days’ fast. Northeast of Jerusalem is Jericho, the city of palms, the abode of Zacheus, the penitent tax-gatherer; north of Jerusalem is Emmaus, where Our Lord appeared to His two disciples after the resurrection; on the seacoast is Joppe, famous in the annals of the crusades, where Peter restored Tabitha to life and was summoned to receive the Gentile centurion, Cornelius; further to the south and extending along the coast is the district which was formerly the land of the Philistines, with its towns of Gaza and Ascalon; westward of the Dead Sea is the desert of Inda, otherwise called the desert of St. John. Places of interest in Samaria: The capital Samaria is situated near the centre of the district; south of it is Jacob’s well, near Sicham, where Our Lord spoke with the Samaritan woman; eastward is Garizim, where the Samaritans had a temple dedicated to the service of idols; in the south is Siloe, where from the time of Joshua, the tables of the law were kept for over three hundred and fifty years; along the coast of the Mediterranean stretches the fertile plain of Sharon; by the sea is situated Cæsarea, the residence of the governors. In the northwest, close by the sea and on the boundary, is Mount Carmel, rising some thousand feet, its fertility, beauty, and numerous caves making it peculiarly adapted to the wants of the hermits who dwelt there; it was the scene of the sacrifice of Elijah and of the priests of Baal. Places of interest in Galilee: Nazareth, or the city of flowers, the residence of the Mother of God at the time of the Annunciation, and of Christ till His thirtieth year. South of it is Mount Thabor, where the transfiguration took place, and Naim, where Christ restored the young man to life. East of Nazareth is Cana, where Christ performed His first miracle at the wedding-feast. On the lake of Genesareth are situated: Capernaum, “Christ’s own city,” in which He dwelt and where He worked so many miracles, e.g., the cure of the centurion’s son, and the raising of the daughter of Jairus; here, too. He promised the institution of the Blessed Sacrament and called the apostle Matthew; to the south is Bethsaida, whence came the apostles Andrew and Philip; then comes Magdala, the dwelling-place of the sinner Magdalen; Tiberias is also a town on this lake. In the north of Galilee is Cæsarea Philippi, where Peter received the power of the keys. Quite beyond the boundaries of Galilee, in Phœnicia, on the coast, are the two cities of Tyre and Sidon, more than once visited by Christ. On the borders of Galilee is the range of the Lebanon, ascending to 10,000 feet, and covered with perpetual snow; not more than three hundred cedars remain of its once famous forest; to the east is Hermon, rising about 9500 feet; and still further east is Damascus, in the neighborhood of which St. Paul was converted. Places of interest in Peræa: Close by the Dead Sea, and eastward of the mouth of the Jordan, near to Bethabara is the place where St. John baptized; here he pointed out Christ and called Him the Lamb of God; further to the east is Mount Nebo, on which Moses died; south of the lake of Genesareth is Pella, the refuge of the Christians during the siege of Jerusalem in the year 70 A.D.

5. JESUS OF NAZARETH IS THE
REDEEMER OR CHRIST

The Jews called the coming Redeemer the Messiah (in Hebrew), or the Christ (in Greek), i.e., the Anointed One. The “anointed of the Lord” was the usual epithet among the Jews for prophets, high priests, and kings, because they were anointed in sign of their mission on their appointment to office, and this anointing symbolized the light and strength of the Holy Spirit, and reminded them of the duty of clemency. The coming Messiah was to be prophet, priest, and king, all in one, and the greatest of them all, hence it was usual to call Him simply, “the anointed of the Lord.” This unction of the Messiah was not a physical, exterior act, but the interior dwelling of the Holy Spirit (Ps. 44[45]:8; Acts 10:38).

1. Jesus of Nazareth is the Redeemer, because all the prophecies have their fulfilment in Him.¹⁷⁵

Jesus often appealed to this circumstance (John 5:39; Luke 18:31), especially in His conversation with the two disciples on the way to Emmaus (Luke 24:26). St. Matthew points out in his gospel how the prophecies are fulfilled in Christ. Many Jews have been converted on comparing the life of Christ with the prophecies.

2. Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah, because the kingdom founded by Him on earth has been enduring.¹⁷⁶

The success of many of those who claimed to be the Messiah has ever been merely temporary; but Jesus of Nazareth has had His followers in every age. Had His kingdom, the Church, been the work of men, it would have been destroyed long ago. That it has survived, in spite, too, of so much persecution, is a proof that it is God’s work, and that its founder must be the heaven-sent Messiah (Cf. the words of Gamaliel, Acts 5:38).

3. Jesus Himself claimed the name of Redeemer.¹⁷⁷

On the occasion of His conversation with the Samaritan woman, and in presence of the high priest Caiphas.

The Samaritan woman said to Christ at the well: “I know that the Messiah cometh Who is called Christ,” and Christ replied: “I am He Who am speaking with thee” (John 4:25–26). The high priest Caiphas said to Christ: “I adjure Thee by the living God that Thou tell us if Thou be Christ the Son of God,” and Christ answered: “Thou hast said it” (Matt. 26:64). On another occasion St. Peter was commended for calling Him “the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matt. 16:16).

4. The angels announced Him as the Redeemer.¹⁷⁸

When they appeared to the shepherds near Bethlehem, and in St. Joseph’s vision.

An angel stood by the shepherds and said: “Fear not, for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy that shall be to all the people; for this day is born to you a Saviour, Who is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:10). When St. Joseph was thinking of dismissing our blessed Lady, an angel appeared to him in sleep and announced the birth of Christ: “Thou shalt call His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins” (Matt. 1:21). Since Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ or Messiah, He is called Jesus Christ, and this is the name He Himself uses in John 17:3.

6. THE LIFE OF CHRIST

The Childhood of Christ

The birth of Christ was announced by the archangel Gabriel to the Blessed Virgin Mary at Nazareth (Luke 1:28).¹⁷⁹

This event is commemorated by the feast of the Annunciation, which is kept on the twenty-fifth of March, by the Angelus, and in the first words of the Hail Mary. After the angel’s salutation Our Lady set out to visit her cousin, St. Elizabeth, who greeted her with the words contained in the second part of the Hail Mary, and Our Lady replied in the solemn words of the Magnificat (Luke 1). The visitation is kept on the second of July, immediately after the octave of the nativity of St. John Baptist. St. Joseph also was warned of the birth of Christ by an angel (Matt. 1:18–25), when debating on the advisability of putting away Our Lady.

1. Christ was born of the Blessed Virgin Mary in a stable at Bethlehem.¹⁸⁰

Mary and Joseph had to repair to their native place of Bethlehem to be enrolled in the census which was being held by command of the Emperor Augustus. They were obliged to seek refuge in a stable, because there was no room for them in Bethlehem (Luke 2:7). As in the conception, so in the birth of Christ, was exception made to the ordinary course of nature. Mary was free from the penalties described in Gen. 3:16, because, as St. Bernard says, she alone had conceived without carnal pleasure. St. Augustine exclaims: “Behold He Who rules the world lies in a manger. He Who feeds the angels is suckled by His Mother. Strength becomes weak, that weakness may be made strong;” and again, “A great Physician came down from heaven to heal a great disease on earth; He healed in a way hitherto unheard of, for He took our ills on Himself.” “Being rich He became poor, that through His poverty we might be made rich” (2 Cor. 8:9). Every circumstance attending the birth of Christ has a deep meaning. Christ was born at Bethlehem (the house of bread) because, as St. Jerome says, He is the living bread. He is born far away from His home in Nazareth because He descended from heaven, His true home, and is a stranger among men. He is born amid the shepherds and their flocks, because He is to be the “Good Shepherd” (John 10:11) of a great flock. He is born in a stable, because the earth in comparison of heaven is but a stable. He is born not in a house, but in a stable, that all might have confidence and approach Him, says St. Peter Chrysologus. He is born in obscurity, because He is the “hidden God” (Is. 45:15), Whom we cannot see in this life, and Who loves good deeds done in secret. He is laid in a manger, where cattle feed, because He was to be the food of man; and He is laid on the wood to recall to us that He came down from heaven to die on the cross. So too He dwells in our tabernacles. He is born at midnight, because the greater portion of mankind was buried in darkness, and knew nothing of the true God. He is born in the winter season, and at night (notice that the nights in Palestine are particularly cold), because the hearts of men were cold, unwarmed yet with the fire of charity. Christ drops from heaven in the night time like the dew (Cf. Is. 45:8), to refresh the hearts of men. At the time of His birth the temple of Janus in Rome was closed, and there was peace over all the earth, because Christ was the Prince of peace (Is. 9:6); and the God of peace (1 Cor. 14:33), i.e., Our Lord, came as a little child that man might approach Him with more confidence; had He come as a great king, men would have shrunk away, while as a child He invited, not awe, but sympathy. Christ comes in poverty and renunciation to teach us that the road to heaven is the way of suffering and self-conquest, not of pleasure and self-indulgence. Besides this He would show that He is the Friend of the poor to whom He is appointed to preach the Gospel (Luke 4:18). A light appeared to the shepherds to remind us that the Light of the world is come (John 8:12), Who is to shine in the midst of the darkness (John 1:5). The hymn of the angels is the keynote of His mission, to glorify God (John 13:32), and to give peace to men (John 14:27), especially peace with God, reconciling man to God by His death on the cross, peace with self, the true peace which comes from the knowledge and practice of the Gospel, and peace with the neighbor by the virtues of brotherly love, love of one’s enemy, and meekness. He announced His birth by the voice of an angel to the shepherds, and not to the proud Pharisees and Scribes, because He would hide His mysteries from the wise and prudent and reveal them to the little ones (Matt. 9:25); because He gives His graces to the humble and resists the proud (1 Pet. 5:5). Such, too, is the disposition of God’s providence in all time; to the proud, whatever their learning, the teachings of Christ are a sealed book, while the lowly and humble receive God’s light. The first to receive the call to the crib were the Jews in the person of the shepherds, and after them the Gentiles, in the persons of the three kings; all to signify that Christ would first call into His Church the Jews (Matt. 15:24), and afterwards the Gentiles by means of His apostles. The wonderful star in the East was to announce that Christ “the wonderful” (Is. 9:6) had come down from heaven. The census of the people at the time of His birth reminds us of the great enrolment which will take place at His second coming. “Christ begins to teach us in His birth even before uttering a word.” “The deeds of the Lord are commands; if He does anything in silence, He means that we should imitate Him,” is the comment of St. Gregory the Great.

In the liturgy of the Church we celebrate Our Lord’s birth on the twenty-fifth of December (Christmas Day). On that day every priest has the privilege of saying three Masses, which recall the threefold birth of Christ: the eternal birth from God the Father, the birth in time from the womb of Mary, and His spiritual birth in our hearts. A crib is generally erected in most churches, a practice originated by St. Francis of Assisi. In many households there is kept up the custom of the Christmas-tree, a reminder of the fatal tree of paradise, and also of the tree of the cross. The Christmas-boxes recall to our minds the gifts of God the Father to mankind on this day. Immediately following Christmas are the feasts of St. Stephen, St. John, and the Holy Innocents, as though the Church would say: “If you would follow Christ, you must become a martyr like St. Stephen, if not to the shedding of blood, at least to the denial of self and the bearing of suffering. You must love God and your neighbor like St. John, and do works of mercy; and finally you must be like a child with God.”

The new-born Child is adored first by the shepherds and then by the Magi.¹⁸¹

The shepherds were told by an angel of the birth of the Saviour (Luke 2:9); the three kings were led to Him by a star (Matt. 2:9). This star was something exceptional, for it had a proper motion of its own in the heavens; according to St. John Chrysostom, it may have been an angel, under the appearance of a star. Catherine Emmerich, in her revelations, says that this star had various aspects; at times it appeared as a child carrying a cross, or a woman with a child; again as a chalice with grapes and wheat ornamenting it, as a church, or forming the word Judea, etc. St. Irenæus remarks that the presents indicated their esteem of Him to Whom the three kings offered them. Gold, the symbol of homage, is offered to Him as King; incense, the symbol of prayer, because He is God; and myrrh, the symbol of mortification, because as Our Redeemer, He was to suffer. The Magi returned to their homes by another way, “to show us,” says St. Gregory the Great, “that if we wish to reach our true home in paradise we must forsake the path in which we have hitherto walked, and tread in the way of penance, obedience, and self-denial.” The shepherds represented the Jews and the poor; the three kings the Gentiles and the rich. The relics of the three kings were taken from the East to Cologne in 1162 by Barbarossa, and now repose in the Cathedral there. The feast of the three kings is held on the sixth of January. In many countries there, still exists the custom of blessing on this day the water of the three kings, and the blessing of chalk and salt is not unusual. The initials of the names of the three kings are sometimes marked on the doors of houses to claim their patronage. This feast is called also the Epiphany, because in former times the birth of Christ, or appearance of Christ to mankind, was celebrated on this day. Hence in the Greek Church the season of Advent is prolonged till the Epiphany. This day is also celebrated as the one on which Christ was baptized in the Jordan, and performed His first miracle at Cana.

When the Child was eight days old He was circumcised, and received the name Jesus (Luke 2:21).¹⁸²

Jesus (in Hebrew Joshua or Josue) means Saviour. This name is, as St. Paul says, above all names (Phil. 2:9), for it was chosen by God Himself and revealed to the Virgin Mary (Matt. 1:21). Moreover the holy name has great virtue; its invocation brings help in temptation and affliction; the powers of hell shrink from it (Mark 16:17). The name usually given by the prophets was Emmanuel, i.e., “God with us” (Is. 7:14). The feast of the Circumcision on the first of January is also New Year’s Day. The Church would thus teach us to begin everything in the name of Jesus. Innocent XII., in 1691, was the first to order the practice of beginning the New Year on the first of January; previously it had been Christmas Day. It is a pious custom in many places to have a solemn thanksgiving service and to sing the Te Deum on the last day of the year, in thanksgiving for past favors.

When the Child was forty days old, He was presented in the Temple (Luke 2:39).¹⁸³

Mary complied with the law of Moses (Lev. 12), though, being free from sin, she needed no purification. The feast of the Purification is called also Candlemas; on that day candles are blessed, and carried in procession in memory of these words of holy Simeon calling Our Lord the “light for the revelation of the Gentiles” (Luke 2:32).

2. Christ spent the first years of His childhood in Egypt, and after that lived at Nazareth till He was thirty.¹⁸⁴

An angel told Joseph to fly because Herod was seeking to kill the Child (Matt. 2:13). In Egypt there is still to be seen the dwelling-place of the Holy Family in a suburb of Cairo, the ancient Heliopolis. The land so sanctified by the presence of Our Lord became later the abode of thousands of monks, who led lives like to those of the angels; men such as, for instance, St. Anthony and St. Paul of Thebes; here St. Pachomius founded the first monastery, on an island of the Nile. After His return from Egypt Christ went to live in Nazareth, a place of little esteem among the Jews, therefore useful in teaching us the lesson of humility; and for thirty years He stayed there that we might learn from Him the lesson of detachment from the world.

When Christ was twelve years old He went up to the Temple in Jerusalem.¹⁸⁵

It was on this occasion that He made the doctors of the law marvel at His wisdom (Luke 2:47).

When Christ was grown up John the Baptist began to preach His coming in the desert.¹⁸⁶

We have the following facts about John the Baptist. The archangel Gabriel announced his approaching birth to Zachary at the hour of sacrifice in the Temple; and when the latter was incredulous he was struck dumb (Luke 1), regaining his speech at the birth of St. John and using it to proclaim the noble canticle of the Benedictus (Luke 1:68–79). St. John spent his life in the desert in penance and preparation for his office as forerunner of the Redeemer. When Christ had reached His twenty-eighth year (Luke 3:1), the Baptist came from his solitude, and preached to the Jews who flocked to him on the banks of the Jordan, the doctrine of penance and baptism (Matt. 3). It was he who pointed out Christ: “Behold the Lamb of God Who taketh away the sins of the world” (John 1:29). His courageous rebuke to Herod caused him to be cast into prison (Matt. 14:4), and later to be beheaded (Matt. 14:10). He, like Elijah, is the forerunner and the type of hermit life.

The Public Life of Christ

1. When Christ was thirty years old, He was baptized by John in the Jordan (Matt. 3:13), and fasted forty days in the desert, where He was tempted by the devil (Matt. 4).¹⁸⁷

All apostolic men have sought retirement before entering on their mission, e.g., Moses, John the Baptist, and the apostles before the coming of the Holy Spirit. By His fasting and His victory over the devil Christ would satisfy for Adam’s self-indulgence and defeat in the garden of paradise. The number forty has a special significance; it rained forty days on earth at the Flood, Moses and Elijah fasted forty days, the Ninivites had forty days in which to repent, Christ dwelt on earth forty days after His resurrection, the Jews wandered forty years in the desert. The forty days of Lent are intended to commemorate the fasting of Christ; they begin with Ash Wednesday and continue till Easter. During this time those who are of age should take only one full meal a day,¹⁸⁸ and all Christians should avoid boisterous amusements and meditate on the sufferings of Christ. Thus sermons are preached on the sufferings of Christ; on Passion Sunday the images in the church are veiled and the priest says Mass in purple vestments. The three days before Ash Wednesday are called Shrovetide, and in order to divert the faithful from vicious pleasures it is usual in some places to have Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament.

2. Christ taught for about three and a half years, gathered some seventy-two disciples, and from these chose twelve apostles.¹⁸⁹

His first miracle was at the wedding-feast of Cana, to teach mankind that the heaven to which He would lead us is a wedding-feast (Matt. 12:2). He often addressed large crowds, counting four or five thousand, as in the case of the miraculous multiplication of loaves; thus Zacheus had to climb a tree in order to see Him among the crowd. The constant companions of Christ were the apostles and disciples, who heard His words and saw His deeds and published them later to the world. The bishops of the Church are prefigured in the apostles, and the priests in the seventy-two disciples. The teaching of Christ is rightly called Evangelium, “good tidings,” or by our English name Gospel, i.e., God’s spell or narrative. Christ is the Master among teachers. He taught as one having power, so that the people marvelled at His doctrine (Mark 1:22; Matt. 7:29).

Christ taught so that all might understand Him without difficulty; He used plain, homely words, and illustrated His teaching with signs and parables and by references to natural objects.¹⁹⁰

Christ’s teaching is likened to the treasure buried in a field (Matt. 13:44). The language of apostolic men has always been simple, their object not so much to please as to be understood and to be useful. The signs which Christ made use of were breathing on the apostles when He gave them the Holy Spirit, lifting up His hands (Luke 24:50) when He gave them power to teach and baptize, spitting on the earth and making clay, with which He touched the eyes of the man born blind (John 9:6), and sending him to wash in the pool of Siloe. All this signified that the living doctrine which is imparted to man, the creature of earth, from the mouth of God, is to clear his spiritual sight, and even after that the washing of baptism is still necessary. The parables used were, for example, the prodigal son, the Good Samaritan, Dives and Lazarus, the wise and foolish virgins, the good shepherd, the lost sheep, the lost groat, the fig tree, the laborers in the vineyard, etc., and the seven figures of the kingdom of heaven, such as the pearl of great price, the buried treasure, the seine, the grain of mustard-seed, the cockle and wheat, the sower, the leaven. The objects in nature on which He drew for illustration were, among others, the shepherd with his sheep, the lilies of the field, the crops, the vineyards, etc. It is only reasonable that nature and religion should have many resemblances, coming as they do from the same God.

The poor were the especial objects of Christ’s mission.¹⁹¹

His own words to the disciples of John were: “The poor have the Gospel preached to them” (Matt. 11:5). And in the synagogue at Nazareth He applied to Himself as the Messiah (Luke 4:18), the words of the prophet: “to preach the Gospel to the poor He hath sent Me.”

The leading idea in the teaching of Christ was: “Seek the kingdom of God.”¹⁹²

His own words in the Sermon on the Mount were: “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matt. 6:33). The Evangelists sum up His teaching in the words: “Do penance and believe the Gospel, for the kingdom of heaven is nigh” (Matt. 4:17; Mark 1:15).

Christ taught a new rule of faith, gave new commandments, and established a new system of means of grace.¹⁹³

For example He taught the mystery of the Blessed Trinity, His own divinity, the Last Judgment; He gave the two precepts of love, and extended the Ten Commandments (forbidding rash anger and harsh words). He instituted the Mass and the seven sacraments and taught us the Our Father.

3. Christ proved His divine mission and the truth of His doctrine by many miracles, by His knowledge of all things, and by the holiness of His life.¹⁹⁴

Christ Himself appealed to His miracles: “Though you will not believe Me, believe the works” (John 10:38). Nicodemus was convinced of the divine mission of Christ by His miracles: “No man can do these signs which Thou dost, unless God be with Him” (John 3:2). Christ of His own power worked miracles; others in the name of God or of Christ. Christ knew all things—the most hidden sins of men, those of the Samaritan woman, those of the Pharisees who dragged before Him the woman taken in adultery; He knew of Judas’ plot against Himself, of Peter’s coming denial, and related many incidents of His Passion just as they afterwards happened. We see in Christ the highest holiness; never were seen before or since, such patience, gentleness, love, etc. How could such a one say anything but the truth?

The Scribes and Pharisees hated and persecuted Him because He failed to realize their carnal views of the Messiah, and because He publicly rebuked their sins; after the raising of Lazarus they resolved to seek His death.¹⁹⁵

They tried to stone Him in the Temple (John 10:31), and at Nazareth to cast Him over the cliff; they calumniated Him, calling Him an agent of the devil (Matt. 12:24), a leader of revolt, a Sabbath-breaker; they tried to catch Him in His speech, as in the case of Cæsar’s coin. The majority of Jewish people thought that the Messiah was to be an earthly being, who would free them from the Roman yoke, and raise them above the nations of the earth. Instead of which He came in poverty and lowliness and taught self-denial, mercy, etc. Besides He accused the Pharisees of hypocrisy, calling them whitened sepulchers (Matt. 13:27), and children of the devil (John 8:44).

The Sufferings of Christ

1. On the Sunday preceding the feast of Easter Christ made a solemn entry into Jerusalem and taught in the Temple during the days following.¹⁹⁶

The Church celebrates this solemn entry by the blessing of palms and the procession on Palm Sunday. In the course of the High Mass the history of the Passion as related by St. Matthew is read by the celebrant and sung by the choir. During the blessing of the palms the priest prays that God may preserve from sin and danger those who receive these palms and keep them in their houses. The week following Palm Sunday is called Holy Week.

2. On Holy Thursday evening Christ ate the Pasch with His disciples, instituted the Blessed Sacrament, and then went out to the Mount of Olives, where He suffered His agony and bloody sweat.¹⁹⁷

Before the institution of the Blessed Sacrament He washed the feet of His apostles to teach us humility. His conduct in the Garden of Gethsemane was a lesson of humble prayer, conformity to God’s will, and patience under suffering. In the words of St. Ambrose: “The Lord took my griefs on Him that He might share His joys with me.” In many places it is the custom to ring a bell at eight o’clock in the evening to recall the agony in the garden. The following ceremonies are in more general use: The Pope washes the feet of twelve priests—a practice kept up since the time of Gregory the Great. The bishops and governors in many places wash the feet of twelve old men. During the Gloria in the High Mass all the bells are rung, and the priests and laity go to communion to commemorate the institution of the Blessed Sacrament. The procession of the Blessed Sacrament to the altar of repose is to recall Our Lord’s journey to the Mount of Olives. The stripping of the altars and the silence of the bells are signs of the Church’s sympathy with her Saviour. The blessing of the oils which takes place in the Cathedral churches, which is of ancient institution, suggests that Christ may have instituted some of the sacraments at the Last Supper.

Christ was seized by the soldiers in the garden, led before the high priest, and condemned to death.

On the Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday of Holy Week, Tenebræ is celebrated in the evening. On a triangular frame in front of the altar there are placed fourteen candles of unbleached wax, and at the upper angle one of white wax; the white candle represents Our Lord and the unbleached candles His apostles and disciples. At each of the antiphones which recur at intervals during the recital of the psalms, a candle is extinguished to represent the flight of the disciples after the capture of Our Lord. At the end of the service the white candle is hidden for a time behind the altar, a noise is made, and the candle replaced on the stand; all signifying the death and resurrection of Our Lord with the accompanying convulsions of nature.

From the court of the high priest Christ was led by the Jews before Pontius Pilate, to receive the ratification of the death-sentence.¹⁹⁸

The Jews had no power to put any one to death, so they were obliged to have recourse to the Roman governor (John 18:31). Pilate could see no reason for condemning Christ, and made several attempts to set Him at liberty; he sent Him to Herod and offered to give up Barabbas in exchange; to enlist the sympathy of the Jews, he caused Our Lord to be scourged and crowned with thorns and in that state to be presented to the crowd, but they clamored only the more for the blood of Jesus, and threatened to accuse Pilate to the emperor.

Pilate, alarmed by the threats of the Jews, condemned Our Lord to the death of the cross.

The devotion of the Stations of the Cross commemorates all these details of the Passion. The distance to Calvary was some thirteen hundred paces.¹⁹⁹

3. On Good Friday at noon, Christ was nailed to the cross on the hill of Calvary, just outside Jerusalem, and died on the cross about three o’clock.

Cicero is our authority that crucifixion was at that time the most shameful and terrible of deaths, to which none but the greatest criminals were subjected. Hence the doctrine of the Crucified was a scandal to the Jews and folly to the heathen (1 Cor. 1:23). Yet today the cross is the badge of honor, worn in the crowns of kings, and on the breasts of men proud of the decoration. In the words of St. Athanasius sin was repaired on the tree where sin was committed; and where death began there life arose, as the Church sings in the preface of the Mass. Christ was not beheaded, nor His body dismembered; so are we taught that His mystical body, the Church, should remain ever undivided. Christ bent His head to kiss us, spread His arms to embrace us, and opened His Heart to love us (St. Augustine). The Heart of Jesus was opened that its wounds might reveal to us the hidden wounds of His love for us (St. Bernard). It was not the soldiers, but His love for us, which nailed Christ to the cross (St. Augustine).

During these three hours the sun was darkened over the earth, though an eclipse was impossible at the time of the full moon.

As St. John Chrysostom says, the sun hid his rays that he might not behold the sufferings of his Maker. This darkening of the sun is mentioned by heathen writers.

At the death of Christ the earth opened, the rocks split, the veil of the Temple was rent, and many of the dead arose and appeared in Jerusalem.

All creation was in sympathy with Christ, excepting man, for whom Christ was suffering (St. Jerome). These marvels caused many to acknowledge the Godhead of Christ, as in the case of the centurion, who exclaimed: “Indeed, this was the Son of God!” (Matt. 27:54.) One may still see on Calvary a rent in the rock between the site of Our Lord’s cross and that of the thief on His left.

Christ spoke on the cross the seven last words.

These words were: (1). “Father, forgive them.” (2). “To-day thou shalt be with Me in paradise.” (3). “Behold thy Mother.” (4). “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me!” (5). “I thirst.” (6). “It is consummated.” (7). “Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit.” The great cry which Christ gave before His death was a sign that He gave up His life of His own free will, and that He had strength enough to go on living. The cross, as St. Augustine says, is no longer the instrument of Christ suffering, but the pulpit of Christ preaching; from it He teaches the lessons of love of our enemies, gentleness, patience, obedience, God’s mercy, goodness, justice and power, the immortality of the soul, the Last Judgment and the resurrection. In many churches it is the custom to toll the bells at three o’clock on Fridays in memory of Christ’s death; and since Christ crucified His flesh for our sins on that day the Church has forbidden the eating of flesh meat. On Friday of Holy Week the Church is in mourning: the altars are stripped, the lights put out, and the bells silenced, and the sacred ministers in their black vestments lie prostrate at the foot of the altar. The celebrant prays for all conditions of men, even for heathens and Jews, since Christ died on this day for all men. The crucifix is unveiled. Then the celebrant lays it on the ground and kisses the feet of the image, and the people come up in turn to offer the same homage. On Good Friday there is no Mass, properly so called, but the ceremonies are gone through with a Host consecrated for the purpose on the preceding day. An altar of repose (or sepulcher) is chosen in the church where the Host is kept in the interval.

In the evening Our Lord’s body was taken down from the cross and laid in the grave which belonged to Joseph of Arimathea.

4. During Easter Saturday, that is, on the greatest feast day of the Jews, Our Lord remained in the sepulcher.²⁰⁰

On Holy Saturday fire is struck from a flint, and blessed outside the church doors, and from this fire the triple candle, the paschal candle, and the sanctuary lamp are lit. Each branch of the triple candle is lit separately, one at the door, another in the middle of the church, and the third in front of the high altar, to represent the gradual development of the knowledge of the Blessed Trinity. The paschal candle is also blessed on this day, and the five grains of incense imbedded in it remind us of the wounds of Christ. The baptismal font is also blessed, a relic of the times when the catechumens used to be solemnly baptized, and solemn High Mass follows.

The Exaltation of Christ

Christ humbled Himself, “becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. For which cause God also hath exalted Him” (Phil. 2:8–9). As St. John Chrysostom warns us: “The exaltation of Christ referred only to His humanity. As God He possessed all earthly happiness and needed no further exaltation.” And St. Cyprian confirms him when he says that it was not the Almighty but the humanity of the Almighty which was exalted.

1. Immediately after the death of Christ His soul went down in triumph into the place where the souls of those justified under the Old Law were detained (Fourth Council of Lateran).²⁰¹

This place is called limbo, and is quite distinct from purgatory, though the two places had this feature in common, that in neither place is there the vision of God; for while there is pain to be suffered in purgatory, there was none in limbo; nor was limbo the same as hell, where the pains are eternal; on the contrary the souls in limbo had some consolation (Luke 16:25), though entrance to heaven was deferred (Heb. 9:8); hence they longed for the coming of the Saviour to open to them the gates of heaven. Limbo is called in Scripture the “bosom of Abraham” (Luke 16:22); the “prison” (1 Pet. 3:19). Our Lord called the place “paradise” (Luke 23:43), because by His arrival the prison-house would be turned into paradise. After the death of Christ limbo ceased to exist. There were in that place among others, Adam and Eve, Abel, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, David, Isaiah, Daniel, Job, Tobias, the foster-father of Christ, and many others, including those of Noah’s contemporaries who had done penance and repented at the Flood (1 Pet. 3:20).

Christ went down into limbo to announce to the souls detained there the news of the redemption, and to set them free.

Christ went down to announce to the souls in limbo that He had accomplished the redemption (1 Pet. 3:19). St. Epiphanius tells us that the soul of Christ, united with the Godhead, went down into limbo, and St. Irenæus says that the Lord spent three days there. According to St. Ignatius of Antioch, Our Lord returned with a large company of souls. “He went,” says St. Cyprian, “like a great king who delivers his subjects from a prison where they have been kept in durance.” Christ revealed Himself also to the souls in hell, and they were compelled to bow the knee to Him (Phil. 2:10).

2. On Easter Sunday before sunrise Christ rose glorious from the tomb by His own almighty power.²⁰²

Christ often foretold that He would rise again on “the third day” (Luke 18:33); He compared Himself to Jonah (Matt. 12:40); on the occasion of His driving the money-sellers out of the Temple, He said of His own body: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:19); He claimed the power of laying down His life and taking it up again (John 10:18). When it is said in Holy Scripture that the Father raised Him (Rom. 6:4; 8:11), it is meant that as Christ is one with the Father all that Christ does the Father does also. The resurrection is a most undoubted fact. The Jews asserted that the disciples had stolen the body of Christ (Matt. 28:13). Such an act was far beyond their power. The great stone that covered the sepulcher could not have been moved without waking some, at least, of the guards; “besides,” as St. Augustine says, “these could not be accepted as witnesses if they were asleep;” and it is a remarkable circumstance that the soldiers were not punished for their breach of duty. Many free-thinkers urge that Christ was dead only in appearance, and after an interval recovered from His swoon and left the grave. The pain and loss of blood following on the scourging and crowning with thorns would have been enough to cause death, and the wound in the side alone, so great that St. Thomas could thrust in his hand, would have been fatal. Even when Christ was going to the place of execution, He was too weak to carry His cross; how could He, after thirty-six hours in the tomb, remove the long wrappings of His grave-clothes, roll away the stone, and make His way out on feet yet fresh from the wounds of the nails? The death of Christ was officially verified and reported to Pilate (Mark 15:45), and His bones were not broken by the soldiers because they saw that He was dead (John 19:33). The blood and water which flowed from the side of Christ after the piercing with the lance, were a sign of death (John 19:34). His holy Mother and His friends would never have placed Him in the tomb unless He had been dead. All the Evangelists agree in testifying to the death of Christ.

The risen Lord bore in His body the five wounds, and it had the properties of agility, subtility, clarity and impassibility.²⁰³

Christ retained the five wounds, for He ordered the unbelieving apostle to place his finger in the wounds of the nails, and his hand in the wound of the side (John 20:27). Our Lord would keep the marks of the wounds in heaven to show us that He would not forget us, bearing in His hands, as St. Bernard says, the writ of our redemption written in His own blood; and St. Ambrose adds, that Our Lord bore these wounds to be a perpetual reminder to His heavenly Father of the price of our redemption, to renew the sacrifice of the cross forever in heaven (Heb. 8:1–6).

Christ rose again to prove to us that He is God, and that we, too, are to rise again.²⁰⁴

Christ is the first-fruits of them that sleep (1 Cor. 15:20), and as Christ, our Head arose, so shall we all rise again (St. Irenæus). He called first His own body to life; later He will call the members of His mystical body to share its life (St. Athanasius). The hope of the resurrection was Job’s consolation in his trouble (Job 19:25). Throughout Christendom Easter is celebrated as the feast of the resurrection. In the Old Testament the Paschal Sabbath was kept in remembrance of the delivery from the Egyptian yoke. Among Christians, in accordance with a decision of the Council of Nicæa, 325 A.D., the feast is celebrated on the first Sunday after the full moon which comes next after the spring equinox. In consequence Easter may fall anywhere between the twenty-second of March and the twenty-fifth of April. The heathen wakes to a new spiritual life in the waters of baptism; hence the blessing of the font on Holy Saturday; and all those who perform their Easter duties have a spiritual resurrection from the dead (Rom. 6:4). In the words of St. Ambrose, if we are to rise from the grave of the flesh we must first rise from the grave of our sins. The Paschal candle, which is blessed on Holy Saturday is, on account of its five incense grains, which represent the five wounds, a figure of Our Lord; and it is lighted at all services till Ascension Thursday. The Easter eggs are a type of the resurrection: just as the young bird breaks from the shell, so will mankind arise again from the earth. The season itself is typical of the new life in the reawakening of nature.

The risen Lord remained forty days on earth, and appeared frequently during this time to His disciples.²⁰⁵

St. Ambrose tells us that Christ appeared first to His holy Mother. St. Peter was the first of the apostles to see the risen Lord (Luke 24:34). Early in the morning of Easter Sunday Christ appeared to Mary Magdalen by the sepulcher (Mark 16:9; John 20:15), and then to the holy women as they were leaving the grave (Matt. 28:9); in the evening He appeared to the two disciples who were going to Emmaus (Luke 24), and immediately after to the assembled disciples in the cenacle. He ate fish and honey in their presence, and afterwards gave them the power of forgiving sins (John 20). On the following Sunday He appeared again in the same house and reproved Thomas for his want of faith (John 20). He again appeared to seven of the disciples on the lake of Genesareth and gave St. Peter authority over the apostles and the faithful, telling him at the same time what death he should die (John 21). A more solemn occasion was the appearance to five hundred disciples on a mountain in Galilee, when He gave them the command to go forth into the world, teaching and baptizing (Matt. 28:16). He spent there forty days in speaking to the disciples of the kingdom of God (Acts 1:3). The last appearance was on the occasion of His ascent into heaven. He appeared not in the night, but in the full light of day, not once only but repeatedly, not in some one place but in many places; nor were they instantaneous apparitions, but He remained some time, and spoke with His apostles. The resurrection was a point on which the apostles testified in person. They gave no credit to the women who came from the grave with their account of the angel (Luke 24:11). They doubted the evidence of their own senses when Christ Himself appeared to them; then it was that He showed them His wounds, and allowed them to touch Him, and ate in their presence (Luke 24:42). Thomas refused to believe the ten apostles (John 20:25), and this unbelief of St. Thomas is a greater help to our faith, to use the words of St. Gregory the Great, than the belief of all the rest. There was nothing of which the apostles had a stronger conviction than of the reality of the resurrection, and this they preached on the feast of Pentecost, before the Council, in the Temple, etc.

3. Forty days after His resurrection Our Lord ascended into heaven from the Mount of Olives, and now sits at the right hand of God the Father.²⁰⁶

Before ascending Christ raised His hands and blessed His apostles, enjoining on them to preach the Gospel to all nations, and promising to be with them all days, till the end of the world (Matt. 28:18; Luke 24:50). After the ascent two angels appeared and consoled the apostles (Acts 1:10). St. Jerome tells us that the impress of Christ’s sacred feet used to be shown to pilgrims; there remains now only the trace of the left foot, that of the right having been removed by the Turks. Christ made His ascent from the Mount of Olives, where He began His Passion, to show us that the road to heaven must be through suffering. He ascended into heaven by His own power, not like Elijah borne on a chariot (2 Kings 2:11), or like Habakkuk carried by an angel (Dan. 14:36). His escort into heaven was formed of the souls released from limbo (Eph. 4:8). The Fathers are of one mind in teaching that Christ has never descended in the flesh from heaven since then, except during holy Mass. Forty days after Easter the feast of Ascension Thursday is kept, preceded by the three Rogation days with their processions, symbolic of the going out of Christ with His apostles to the Mount of Olives.

Christ ascended into heaven in order, as man, to enter into His kingdom (Eph. 4:10), to send down the Holy Spirit (John 16:7), to intercede for us with the Father (John 16:16), to prepare a place for us there (John 14:2).

Christ is the mediator between God and man (1 Tim. 2:5), and our advocate with the Father (1 John 2:1). “If,” says St. Bernard, “you fear to go to God the Father, turn to Jesus Christ, Who has been given to us as a mediator. What can such a Father refuse to such a Son?” Christ is often likened to the sun, which sheds its light and warmth the higher it rises in the heavens.

Christ sits on the right hand of God, that is, as man He has power over all creatures.

To sit on the right hand was a mark of special honor (1 Kings 2:19); hence the expression “Christ sits on the right hand of God” is equivalent to: “Christ is next in honor to God.” He is therefore above all the angels (Eph. 2:21). God the Father has no body; so that when we speak of the right hand of God, we mean, as St. John Damascene tells us, the glory of His Godhead, of which Christ took possession in the flesh. The expression, “sits,” is significant of His royal and judicial powers. The words of Christ Himself were: “All power is given to Me in heaven and on earth” (Matt. 28:18). Hence all creatures owe Him divine homage (Phil. 2:9–11).

4. On the tenth day after His ascending into heaven Christ sent down the Holy Spirit on the apostles.²⁰⁷

The Holy Spirit descended on a Sunday, about nine o’clock in the morning (Acts 2:15). The signs accompanying His descent were symbolical of His action; the rush of wind represented the strengthening of the will, the fire the illumination of the understanding, the tongues the gift of tongues to the apostles and the teaching of the Gospel to all nations. Pentecost is the day of foundation of the Church, because it began on that day by the baptism of three thousand new members. Pentecost is celebrated fifty days after Easter—Pentecost meaning fifty. In the Old Law this day was celebrated fifty days after the Exodus, in memory of the promulgation of the commandments on Mount Sinai. On Mount Sion as on Mount Sinai was God’s will declared amid lightning and thunder, and in both cases fifty days after the release in one instance from bodily, in the other from spiritual slavery. It is the custom to bless the font in memory of the three thousand who were baptized on this day. The Saturday preceding was always observed as a fast day, that like the apostles we might prepare for the coming of the Holy Spirit. The Sunday following Whitsunday is Trinity Sunday, and on the Thursday following is kept the feast of Corpus Christi.

At the end of the world Christ will come again to judge all men.²⁰⁸

7. THE PERSON OF THE REDEEMER

Jesus Christ, Our Redeemer, is the Son of God made man; hence He is God Himself.

The Incarnation of the Son of God

The heathen had very early conceived the idea that God had descended from heaven and mixed with men; the Greek mythology is full of it. Now God has actually come down to earth (John 3:13) at the moment of the Annunciation (Luke 1:26–38).

1. The second divine person became man in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary by the action of the Holy Spirit at the moment of the Annunciation.²⁰⁹

Louis of Granada writes: “Just as the sun must be wrapped in clouds if we are to gaze upon it with eyes undimmed, so God wrapped Himself in flesh as in a cloud, so that the eyes of our soul might bear to look upon Him.” Human thought must be clothed in words to reach our ears; so God clothed Himself in human nature to reach the souls of men. “The Word [i.e., the Son of God] was made flesh [i.e., became man] and dwelt amongst us” (John 1:14). The Incarnation took place in the instant when Our Lady uttered the words: “Be it done unto me according to thy word” (Luke 1:38). They err who think that the human nature was first formed and afterwards united to the divine person, just as the Valentinians were wrong in asserting that Christ brought His human body from heaven. Christ received His body from the Virgin Mary. He was made from a woman (Gal. 4:4), and was of the seed of David (Rom. 1:3). The Son of man came down from heaven, it is true (John 3:13), in regard of the divine person, but not in regard of His human nature; we must not, however, imagine that the divine essence came down from heaven and united itself to the human nature; this would mean that all three persons of the Blessed Trinity has assumed our human nature. Such a thing is impossible, for such a union would require a change in the divine essence, which is incapable of change. Only one of the divine persons, the Son of God, assumed our human nature. God (i.e., a divine person) not the Godhead (i.e., the divine essence) became man. There is, however, an intimate union between the nature of God and the nature of man in the person of the Son; and it is certain that all the divine persons had their share in the work of the Incarnation, for in the work which God does outside Himself all three persons of the Trinity have their share.

The Incarnation is in a peculiar manner the work of the three divine persons.

The three divine persons formed a human soul and a human body and united to them the Second Person of the Trinity. As St. Augustine puts it: “In the guitar the sound seems to come from the strings alone, yet three elements are wanted, the human hand, the skill of the player and then the string.” Or as St. Fulgentius explains it: “Body and soul are necessary for a man to profit by his food, yet the body alone receives the nourishment.” So the three persons of the Trinity co-operated in the Incarnation, but the Second Person only was united to the flesh. The Incarnation is ascribed in a special manner to the Holy Spirit, because it is the greatest work of God’s love. The Church teaches that the works of love are ascribed to the Holy Spirit, Who is the love of the Father and the Son. According to the Fathers there is no doubt that either God the Father or the Holy Spirit might have become man; but it was meet that He Who is the Son of God from all eternity should become the Son of man; that He Who is the perfect image of God should restore to mankind that supernatural image which had been lost by sin.

2. The Father of Jesus is therefore God the Father in heaven; Joseph, the spouse of Mary, is only the foster-father of Jesus.²¹⁰

St. Gregory the Great tells us that Christ is the Son of God, not only because He is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, but also because God formed His sacred humanity. In the first promise of the Redeemer as we read it in the Protevangelium Christ is called, not the seed of man, but the seed of the woman (Gen. 3:15), and in the genealogy of Christ recorded by St. Matthew, no mention is made of His descent from Joseph, but only from Mary (Matt. 1:16). Yet Christ was commonly thought to be the Son of Joseph (Luke 3:23). Mary was espoused to St. Joseph that no accusation might be made against her by the world, and that she might have in him a protector. About St. Joseph we have the following facts: He was a carpenter (Matt. 13:55); he was a just man (Matt. 1:19). St. Jerome tells us he was perfect in every virtue, and St. Thomas Aquinas gives as the reason for his holiness that he was so close to the fount of holiness, just as the spring is clearer as we approach its source. St. Francis de Sales tells us that St. Joseph was conspicuous for his purity, and therein surpassed all the saints and even the angels. To him was granted the honor which kings and prophets sighed for in vain; he might take his Lord into his arms, kiss Him, speak with Him, clothe Him, protect Him (St. Bernard). He was called father by Him Whose Father was in heaven (St. Basil). Many saints assert that St. Joseph has a very high place in heaven as the spouse of the Blessed Virgin, and that he will be called upon by men in the last days of the world and give signs of his great power. St. Joseph is the patron of the Church (Pius IX., Dec. 8, 1870); i.e., his prayers for the Church have great efficacy at the throne of God. He is also the patron of a happy death, dying as he did himself in the arms of Jesus and Mary. He is also invoked for temporal wants, since his care on this earth was the support of the Holy Family. St. Thomas Aquinas says that St. Joseph received power from God to help in all necessities; and St. Teresa declared that no prayer of hers to St. Joseph in temporal or spiritual need was ever left unanswered. The Catholic Church has always honored St. Joseph in a special manner, after Our Lady and above the other saints.²¹¹

3. The Incarnation of the Son of God is a mystery which we cannot understand, but only admire and honor.²¹²

The conception and Incarnation are as little understood by us as the flowering of the rod of Aaron (Numb. 17). “Shut thy eyes, O Reason,” says St. Bernard, “for under the veil of faith thou canst see the sheen of this mystery, just as the eye of the body can bear the light of the sun when shaded by a cloud.” “I know that the Son of God became man, but how I do not know” (St. John Chrysostom). The following are illustrations which have been used to convey the idea of the union of the Godhead and the human nature in Christ: The divinity and the humanity are united in Christ as body and soul are united in man (Athanasian Creed). If spirit and matter, so essentially distinct, are united in man, all the less matter of surprise is it that the divinity and humanity, which after all have their points of resemblance, are found united in Christ. “Speech is a sort of incarnation,” says St. Augustine. “At first the word is conceived as a mere thought, something purely spiritual. If that thought is to be conveyed to another, it is put in words; yet, though it appeals to the senses, it is none the less produced from the soul. So the Word of God has appeared to many and ceases not to remain with the Father.” Other illustrations to show the action of the Holy Spirit in Christ’s conception: St. Isidore tells us that Christ was formed from Mary just as Eve was formed from Adam. The Incarnation resembles in some respects the creation, when everything was produced by God’s almighty power without co-operation of man.

The mystery of the Incarnation is commemorated by the ringing of the Angelus bell.

The words of the Angelus recall in the most lively way the scene of the Annunciation. At the words in the Credo of the Mass: “He took flesh in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit” the celebrant always kneels, also at the words in the Last Gospel: “And the Word was made flesh.” On Christmas Day and the Annunciation (the twenty-fifth of March), the sacred ministers at High Mass kneel on the altar steps and bow their heads at the “Et incarnatus est” of the Credo. The angels also venerate the mystery of the Incarnation.

4. The Incarnation of the Son of God was necessary to give perfect satisfaction to the injured majesty of God.

God might have chosen some other means for redeeming man. He might, by special exercise of His goodness, have been content with an imperfect satisfaction, or have remitted the guilt without demanding any satisfaction at all. St. Augustine on this subject writes: “There are some foolish people who think that God could not have redeemed mankind otherwise than by Himself taking flesh, and suffering at the hands of sinners. He might have followed quite another plan.” As we shall see in treating of the death of Christ God wished to have perfect satisfaction, to display His justice as well as His mercy. Perfect satisfaction could be given only by a God-man. The greatness of an injury is measured by the dignity of the person who suffers; hence the offence given to God is infinitely great. No finite being, not even the most perfect angel, could atone for an offence against God, only God Himself. “So that,” to use the words of St. Anselm, “to redeem man it was necessary that God should become man.” As God only He could not suffer; as man only He could not redeem; hence the Godhead assumed a human nature (St. Proclus). If a valuable portrait be damaged beyond recognition it cannot be restored unless the sitter present himself to the artist; thus God had to come down on earth to restore His likeness in man (St. Athanasius).

The God-man could satisfy perfectly the injured majesty of God by appearing on earth in a state of lowliness.

Had He appeared in His majesty men would never have dared to crucify Him (1 Cor. 2:8). Like Codrus, the Athenian king, He secured victory to His own by dying for them. The oracle had promised the Athenians victory if their king died by the hands of the enemy, and Codrus, disguising his royal dress, marched into the enemy’s camp and was by them put to death. The prophets had foretold that mankind should be saved by the death of its King, and Christ, taking on the form of a slave, was put to death. The evil spirits fled when they saw Whom they had killed. “If,” as Louis of Granada says, “a king would prove his courage in battle, he must put away all symbols of his rank, to proclaim them only when he is victor;” and this is what Our Lord did. He will come again with great power and majesty (Matt. 26:64). St. Thomas says that we cannot affirm with certainty that God would have become man had man not sinned; it certainly would not have been beyond His power.

5. The Second Person always remained God though He became man, and by the Incarnation He lost none of His dignity.²¹³

When we assert that the Son of God came down on earth, we do not mean that He left heaven. So a star may become visible to us without leaving the firmament. As St. Ambrose says, the divinity of Christ is not destroyed, but only hidden by His human nature, just as the sun is not put out, but veiled only by the clouds. And as the thought, because spoken, does not cease to be a product of the soul, so the Word of God did not cease to be with the Father (St. Augustine). As a word, though spoken only for the benefit of one person may be heard by all the bystanders, so the divine Word was not limited by the body which He assumed, but still fills heaven and earth. Moreover God lost none of His dignity by the Incarnation. The sunlight which plays over filth is not defiled; still less is the Godhead defiled by taking flesh from the pure womb of Mary (St. Odilo). If a prince put on a slave’s dress and in it picked a precious ring from the gutter to place it on his finger, there is no loss of dignity; so, too, the Son of God was not degraded by taking on Himself the form of a slave, and coming down on earth to save souls and gain them to Him (Tert.). When the Apostle says that Jesus Christ debased Himself by taking the form of a servant (Phil. 2:7), he does not mean that God lost anything, but only that He assumed a nature lower than His own, and gave us thereby an example of humility. “He humbled Himself” (Phil. 2:8).

6. By the Incarnation of the Son of God all the members of the human race have acquired a special dignity.²¹⁴

The human nature of the Son of God is like the yeast which leavens the whole mass (Matt. 13:33). Christ is the vine, and we are the branches (John 15). The angels even fall short of us in this respect, for though they are exempt from sickness and death they cannot claim God for their Brother; were they capable of envy, they would envy us that honor. As St. Ambrose says: “The Almighty took the form of a slave that the slave might become a king.” “The Son of God became the Son of man that the children of men might become children of God” (St. Athanasius). “Oh, what a wondrous redemption is that where man is, as it were, put on a par with God!” (St. Hilary.)

What Truths Follow from the Mystery of the Redemption?

1. Christ is true God and true man; hence we call Him the God-man.²¹⁵

Every being gets its nature whence it has its origin; thus a child gets its human nature by being born of man. Christ, therefore, having His origin from God the Father, derives from Him His divine nature, and by being born of Mary, derives from her His human nature. He claimed both divine and human attributes. He said, for example, “The Father is greater than I” (John 14:28), and yet on another occasion: “The Father and I are one” (John 10:30). As God He calls Mary “woman,” as on the occasion of the wedding-feast at Cana, and as man He calls her “Mother.” He called Himself at times “Son of God” and again “Son of man.”

Christ, as man, is like to us in all things except sin (Council of Chalcedon).²¹⁶

Christ became like to His brethren (Heb. 2:17); He was made in the likeness of man and in habit formed as a man (Phil. 2:7). Christ had a human body, with all its consequent needs of eating and drinking and sleeping, as well as of suffering and dying; and He had a real body, not a fictitious one, as the Docetæ taught. Christ had a human soul, and so a human intellect, and a human will, for He prayed in the garden: “Father, not My will, but Thine be done” (Luke 22:42). At His death Christ gave His soul into the hands of His heavenly Father (Luke 23:46). St. Paul (1 Cor. 15:47) calls Christ the “heavenly” man, in opposition to the “earthly” man, Adam; his meaning being that Christ’s body was heavenly in the sense that it was formed supernaturally in the womb of a virgin by the action of the Holy Spirit and that it displayed on earth some of the properties of glorified bodies, as on Mount Thabor and the walking on the waters.

2. In Christ there are two natures, human and divine, which despite their intimate union are quite distinct.²¹⁷

The nature or essence is the total of the powers belonging to a being. The person is the possessor of this nature; or perhaps more strictly, that which is common to all men is the nature and that which constitutes man an independent individual is the person. Thus the nature may embrace many individuals, but not so the person. Just as iron and gold may be welded into one solid mass, and still remain with all their individual properties distinct, so are the two natures united in Christ. Nor is the human nature changed into the divine nature, as the water was changed into wine at Cana; nor again is the human nature, as Eutyches thought, absorbed into the Godhead as a drop of honey might be lost in the expanse of the ocean; nor have the two natures combined to form a third, as hydrogen and oxygen combine to form water.

Hence Christ has a twofold knowledge, human and divine.²¹⁸

As God He knew all things, even the thoughts of men; and He also knew all things as man on account of the hypostatic union; the reason why He denied all knowledge of the day and hour of the Last Judgment was because He was not entrusted with His knowledge to communicate it to man (Mark 13:32).

Hence also Christ has a twofold will, human and divine, the human being subject to the divine (Third Council Constant.).²¹⁹

We learn from the prayer in the garden that Christ had a human will: “Not My will but Thine be done” (Luke 22:42), subject however to the divine will: “I seek not My own will but the will of Him that sent Me” (John 5:30). So a patient may shrink from the pain of an operation, and yet submit himself to the hands of the surgeon.

Thus Christ has a twofold activity, human and divine (Third Council Constantinople, A.D. 680).

To His divine activity belong the miracles and prophesies, to the human principle of action the operations of sleeping, eating, drinking and suffering. The three persons of the Blessed Trinity have only one nature and so one principle of action.

3. In Christ there is only one person, and that person is divine.²²⁰

Ænobius compares this with the two eyes forming only one image, or the two ears conveying one sound. In the words of the Athanasian Creed: “As the rational soul and the flesh is one man, so God and man is one Christ.” The human nature in Christ, though completed by a divine and not a human personality, is for that very reason more perfect; just as in man the body is more perfect on account of being informed by a human soul, than in the lower animals. Moreover as in man the body is an instrument by which the soul acts, so in Christ the human nature is the instrument by which the divine person acts; nor is Christ’s body a lifeless tool, like a pen in the hand of a writer, but it is full of life and has its own special activity. The humanity of Christ is, it must be remembered, not an instrument of God’s action in the same way as were the prophets or the apostles, etc. Its union and action are far more intimate, just as the eye and the hand of the workman are more concerned in his work than the tools. We must avoid the error of Nestorius, condemned at the Council of Ephesus, in which he taught that in Christ the Godhead dwelt in a distinct person (i.e., that the God Christ dwelt in the man Christ) as in a temple.

Since in Christ the divine and human natures are inseparably united by His divine personality, the following propositions are true:

a. Christ is, as man, the true Son of God.²²¹

St. Paul’s words on the subject are: “He spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all” (Rom. 8:32).

b. Mary, the Mother of Christ, is really Mother of God.²²²

St. Elizabeth called her the Mother of God (Luke 1:43). Nestorius’ heresy that Mary should be called only the Mother of Christ, was condemned at the Council of Ephesus in A.D. 431. “If,” as St. Cyril says, “Our Lord Jesus Christ is God, how can it be that the holy Virgin who bore Him is not Mother of God?” Though the mother does not give the soul to her offspring, she is none the less called the mother; so Mary is called the Mother of God, though she did not give to Christ His divine nature.

c. Christ, as man, could neither sin nor err.²²³

Christ did no sin either in word or in deed (1 Pet. 2:22); or, in the words of St. Gregory the Great: “As light permits no darkness in its neighborhood, so the Son of God admitted no sin in His human nature.” Christ had from His birth all wisdom and knowledge (Col. 2:3). The words “Christ grew in wisdom and grace” (Luke 2:52), mean that with the passage of time He ever showed more of the wisdom and grace of God in His speech and conduct. There must have been in His person something majestic (Ps. 44[45]:3); St. Jerome says that the glory and majesty of the Godhead was reflected on His face, and gave it a beauty which attracted and subjected all those who had the happiness of gazing upon Him.

d. All Christ’s human actions have an infinite value.²²⁴

What Christ did as man was a human action, and also a divine action, inasmuch as He was God. St. John Damascene says: “Just as iron raised to a glow burns not because burning is a property of the iron itself, but because it has acquired the property from the fire, so the human actions of Christ were divine, not of their own nature, but on account of the intimate union with the Godhead.” The very least prayer or suffering of Christ might thus have redeemed all men.

e. Christ’s humanity is worthy of adoration.²²⁵

This adoration is directed, not to the human nature, but to the divine person. Thus a child kissing the hand of its parent is paying homage to the parent, not to the hand. As St. Thomas says: “We pay honor to the king and the purple which he wears; so in Christ we adore the humanity along with the Godhead, since they are inseparable.” St. John Damascene points out that we do not adore mere flesh, but the flesh as united to the divinity. Thus the Church adores the five wounds, the Sacred Heart, the precious blood, etc.

f. Human attributes may be predicated of Christ as God, and divine attributes of Christ as man (the so-called communication of characters or idioms).²²⁶

Hence St. Peter’s reproach: “The Author of life you have killed” (Acts 3:15), and St. Paul’s words: “If they had known it they would never have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor. 2:8), as well as St. John’s “Therein do we know the love of God, that He laid down His life for us.” Since the second divine person and the man Christ Jesus are one and the same person, whatever is said of Christ as God may also be said of Him as man (e.g., this man is omniscient or almighty), and what we say of Christ as man may be said of the second divine person (e.g., God suffered for us, died for us, etc.). When a man is both good and rich, we may say without error: “This rich man is good,” or “This good man is rich,” because we are talking of the person who is rich and good. We may do the same in regard of the divine person Who is at the same time God and man, and in consequence has the attributes proper to God and man. So we might say “This sufferer is God,” “This dying man is almighty.” But we cannot say “The Godhead suffered or died,” because the word “Godhead” means the divine nature, and it never suffered. Hence St. John Damascene wrote: “Though the Godhead was in a suffering form, the Godhead did not suffer. The sun is not hurt, though the tree on which it shines is felled.”

Jesus Christ Is the Son of God

Christ called Himself the only-begotten Son of God (John 3:16), and this because He and He alone is the Second Person of the Trinity, begotten of the Father. In addition He is far removed above the angels and mankind, who are likewise called the children of God. For to these latter God has not communicated His own nature (Phil. 2:6) and has adopted them only by a special grace (Gal. 4:5).

1. Jesus Christ solemnly declared before the high priest that He was the Son of God (Matt. 26:64).²²⁷

And He called Himself the Son of God also on the occasion of His healing of the man born blind (John 9. 37).

2. God the Father called Jesus Christ His Son on the occasion of His baptism in the Jordan and of the transfiguration on Mount Thabor (Matt. 3:17; 17:5).²²⁸

3. The archangel Gabriel called Jesus Christ the “Son of the Most High” when he announced His birth to Mary (Luke 1:32).²²⁹

4. St. Peter also publicly addressed Jesus Christ as “Son of the living God,” and was commended by Christ for this confession (Matt. 16:16).²³⁰

5. Even the devils cried out: “What have we to do with Thee, Jesus, Son of God? Art Thou come hither to torment us before the time?” (Matt. 8:29.)

Jesus Christ Is God Himself

It had already been foretold: “God Himself will come and will save you” (Is. 35:4), and Isaiah said that the Child Who was to be born for the redemption of men was God Himself (Is. 9:6). The heretic Arius denied Christ’s Godhead; his heresy was condemned at the Council of Nicæa in A.D. 325, and it was expressly defined that Jesus Christ was of the same nature as God and therefore Himself God. Our whole position rests on this doctrine, hence its great importance. When the rich disciple addressed Christ as “good master,” Our Lord answered at once, “Why dost thou call Me good? None is good but God alone” (Luke 18:19); He would thereby teach us that we must before all things recognize Him as God.

1. That Jesus Christ is God we learn from His own words and from those of His apostles.²³¹

When ascending into heaven He said: “All power is given to Me in heaven and on earth” (Matt. 28:18); and again: “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30). These last words were treated by the Jews as blasphemy, and they threatened to stone Our Lord for them (John 10:33). Christ claimed in a special manner attributes and works such as belong to God alone. He proclaimed His eternity when He said: “Glorify Thou Me, O Father, with Thyself with the glory which I had before the world was, with Thee” (John 17:5). And again: “Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58). He claimed the power of forgiving sins as in the case of Magdalen (Luke 7:48), and the man sick of the palsy (Matt. 9:2). He laid claim to awaken the dead (John 5:28), to judge the world (Matt. 15:31), to be the Author of life (John 11:25). On another occasion He said: “If any man keep My word, he shall not see death forever” (John 8:51). The apostles believed and solemnly proclaimed that Christ was God, St. Thomas for instance, in the words: “My Lord and my God!” In St. Paul’s epistles we read: “In Christ dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead corporally” (Col. 2:9), and “In Him were created all things … and He is before all, and by Him all things consist” (Col. 1:16–17).

2. That Jesus Christ is God we conclude from His miracles and prophecies.²³²

The numerous miracles which Christ wrought in His own name testify to His almighty power.

The miracles may be divided into five classes. (1). Those performed on inanimate substances, such as the changing of the water into wine, the calming of the storm, etc. (2). The healing of the sick, the blind, and the lame (Matt. 9:3–5). (3). The raising of the dead to life, for example, in the case of the daughter of Jairus, of the son of the widow of Naim, of Lazarus. (4). The expelling of devils from possessed persons. (5). The miracles on His own person, as the transfiguration and the ascension. Moreover Christ proved that He had power over all creation as no other had. Others did miracles in the name of God, as, for example, when St. Peter and St. John cured the man at the gate of the Temple. Christ did not appeal in God’s name. He said simply: “Young man, I say to thee, arise!” (Luke 7:14.) “I will. Be thou made clean” (Matt. 8:3); “Peace, be still.” Benedict XIV is careful to tell us that if Christ prayed to the Father it was to dispel the notion that His miracles were from the devil. The miracles attributed to the founders of false religions are often very absurd and childish; that Buddha rode on a sunbeam, that Mohammed caused the moon to pass through his sleeve, that Apollonius of Tyana raised a storm in a barrel, etc. So different from the majesty displayed by Christ!

The prophecies of Christ with respect to His own fate, the treachery of Judas, and the denial of St. Peter, the death of St. John and St. Peter, the destruction of Jerusalem, the fate of the Jews, and the career of the Church, all show His omniscience.

Christ foretold that He would be put to death in Jerusalem (Luke 13:32), that He would be scourged and crucified, and would rise again after three days (Matt. 20:17–19). At the Last Supper He foretold the treachery of Judas (John 13:26), and that Peter would deny Him thrice before the cock would crow (Matt. 26:34). After His resurrection He prophesied to Peter his death on the cross, and to John that he should die a natural death (John 21:18–22). After His triumphal entry into Jerusalem (Luke 19:41, 44), and during His discourse on the Last Judgment on the Mount of Olives (Matt. 24) He foretold how Jerusalem should be surrounded by her enemies and destroyed. He also knew that the Jews should be scattered among the nations (Luke 21:24), that His Church should spread rapidly among the nations of the earth (John 10:16; Matt. 13:31) in spite of the persecution of His apostles (John 16:2).

3. That Jesus Christ is God we conclude from the elevation of His teaching and His character.²³³

The teaching of Christ surpasses that of the wisest who have ever lived on earth, and is far removed from the teaching of all other religions.

Christ’s doctrine answers all the needs of the human heart, and is adapted to all, whatever be their station, age, sex, or nation; the greatest philosophers, even men like St. Augustine, found in it the peace they longed for. Christ’s doctrine is a perfect revelation of the highest end of man and of the creation, besides inculcating the loftiest virtues: such as love of one’s neighbor, humility, gentleness, patience, love of one’s enemies, poverty, which up to the time of Christ had been quite unknown. Kant confesses that reason would not, even at the present day, have discovered the universal moral law unless Christianity had taught it. Christ’s teaching, besides being lofty, was so simple, and announced with such clearness, that the people marveled to hear Him (Matt. 7:28). Even Strauss does not hesitate to declare that to surpass the teaching of Jesus is an impossible task for all time. There is absolutely nothing in the Christian religion that is opposed to sound reason, or can lower the true dignity of man. Of how many of the other forms of religion can that be said? Mohammedanism teaches fatalism and is propagated by the sword. Even the Talmud contains a large mixture of very imperfect doctrine.

Christ was free from all sin, and was so conspicuous for virtue that for all time He must remain the model for all men.

The traitor Judas confessed that he had shed “innocent blood” (Matt. 27:4); Pilate could find no cause in Christ (John 18:38); Christ Himself challenged the Jews: “Which of you shall convince Me of sin?” and none of them dared reply (John 8:46). He was quite free from all prejudices and narrow-mindedness, which are the result of surroundings and nationality. We see this in His relations to the Samaritans and Romans, more especially in the beautiful parable of the Good Samaritan (Matt. 10:30–37). The following virtues were most conspicuous: His love of His neighbor: “He went about doing good” (Acts 10:38) and laid down His life for others; His humility, which was seen in His associating with the most despised among the people; His gentleness in His forbearance with His enemies and even with the disciple who betrayed Him; His patience in suffering the greatest tortures; His clemency in His conduct towards sinners; His love of His enemies in His praying for them on the cross; His love of prayer in spending whole nights praying to the Father. His whole character is one of the wonders of history. His greatest enemies even felt awe in His presence; no one, for instance, dared resist Him when He drove the buyers and sellers out of the Temple (Matt. 21:12). When the Pharisees wished to stone Him for claiming to be God, He went through their midst and they made way for Him (John 10:39). The soldiers in the garden fell to the ground at a word from His lips (John 18:6).

4. That Jesus Christ is God we conclude from the rapid spread of His teaching and from the miracles which accompanied this teaching throughout the world.

His teaching was propagated in spite of the greatest obstacles, and by the simplest of means.

The obstacles among the heathen were: The laws condemning to death or banishment those who professed a new religion. Calumnies the grossest were uttered against the Christians, accusing them of being godless, of cannibalism, attributing to them various misfortunes such as wars, pestilence, and famine. All this led to a persecution extending over some three hundred years; up to the edict of Constantine the Great there are reckoned about ten persecutions. The doctrines of the Christians afforded another series of obstacles; the reverence paid to One Who had suffered the death of the cross was accounted a folly, added to which this doctrine was introduced by Jews, a sect held in the lowest esteem by the Romans. No less repulsive to the sensual and pleasure-loving heathen were the restraint and self-denial inculcated by the Christian religion. The means employed for converting the world were twelve poor fishermen, unequipped with eloquence to persuade, or with the countenance of the great ones of the earth to support their mission. They did indeed work miracles, but, as St. Augustine says, the spread of Christianity without miracles would have been the greatest miracle of any. On Pentecost five thousand were baptized; two thousand more after the miracle at the gate of the Temple, and in the year A.D. 100 Christianity had extended over the whole Roman world. Pliny, the Governor of Bithynia, reported to the Emperor Trajan that the heathen temples were left empty because all were becoming Christians in the towns and villages. St. Justinus, the philosopher, wrote in A.D. 150: “There is not a nation where prayers are not offered to the heavenly Father in the name of the Crucified.”

The effect of Christ’s teaching was that idolatry with its horrible abuses disappeared, and that the whole life of man was reformed and ennobled.

The sacrifice of human victims was abolished, and the bloody spectacles of the gladiatorial shows. All kinds of charitable institutions arose for the blind, the poor, the sick, etc., owing their existence to the teaching of Christian mercy. Polygamy died out, and woman regained her dignity. Order was established in the family life by the Christian doctrine of the indissolubility of the marriage tie. Slavery was gradually abolished, for every man saw in his neighbor the image of God. The cruel laws against malefactors became milder, and wars became less frequent. Trade, science, and art were cultivated more, and labor acquired a new dignity. Even Julian the Apostate counselled the heathen to imitate the Christians in the generosity and purity of their lives. A religion which produces so much good must be from God. It is sometimes urged that Christ’s teaching has been the cause of many religious wars and schisms. The answer to this objection is that it is not Christ’s teaching but man’s perversity in not following that teaching, or wresting it to his own destruction, which causes so much evil.

Jesus Christ Is Our Lord.

Christ’s words at the Last Supper were: “You call Me Master and Lord, and you say well, for so I am” (John 13:13).

We call Christ “Our Lord” because He is our Creator, Redeemer, Lawgiver, Teacher, and Judge.²³⁴

Christ is our Creator: “In Him were all things created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible” (Col. 1:16), and by His Son God made the world (Heb. 1:2). St. John calls Christ the Word, and says: “Without Him was made nothing that was made” (John 1:3). Christ is our Redeemer. By Him we are set free from the slavery of the devil (1 Pet. 1:18). Hence the Apostle says: “Know ye not that … ye are not your own, for you are bought with a great price” (1 Cor. 6:19). He is also our Lawgiver, for He developed the teaching of the Ten Commandments, and gave the two precepts of love. He called Himself the “Lord of the Sabbath” (Luke 6:5). Christ is our Teacher, because He taught men to be like to God, and in John 13:13, He calls Himself our Master. Christ is also our Judge, for He will come again in glory to summon all mankind before His judgment-seat and separate the sheep from the goats (Matt. 25:31–32). Then will the just as well as the wicked address Him, saying: “Lord, when did we see Thee hungry or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison?” (Matt. 25:37, 44.) “He is the blessed and only mighty, the King of kings and Lord of lords … to Whom be honor and empire everlasting. Amen” (1 Tim. 6:15–16).

EIGHTH ARTICLE OF THE CREED:
THE HOLY SPIRIT

1. THE GRACE OF THE HOLY
SPIRIT IS NECESSARY TO US

1. The Holy Spirit is the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, and is therefore God Himself.²³⁵

Hence He is eternal, omnipresent, omniscient, almighty.

“The Holy Spirit,” says Tertullian, “is God of God, as light is of light.” St. Cyril of Alexandria compares the Holy Spirit in His likeness to the Father and the Son, to the vapor arising from water, which is like in its nature to the water producing it. St. Isidore, commenting on these words of Christ: “I drive out devils through the finger of God,” says that as the finger is of the same nature as the body, so the Holy Spirit is of the nature of God. St. Athanasius writes that the Holy Spirit is called the finger of God, because it is only through Him that the Father and the Son enter into communication with man. Through Him it was that the tables of stone were written. In the second General Council of Constantinople in A.D. 381, it was defined that the Holy Spirit is eternal, omnipresent, etc., in opposition to the heresy of Macedonius. The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. The Greeks, who denied this article of faith and fell away from the Church in A.D. 867 and A.D. 1053 fell under the Turkish yoke in the year 1453 A.D., and strangely enough on the feast of Pentecost.²³⁶

2. The Holy Spirit dispenses the graces which Christ merited by the sacrifice of the cross.²³⁷

The Holy Spirit produces nothing in addition to what Christ gained for us. He only increases and perfects that work of Christ; just as the sun when shining on a field does not sow new seed, but develops that which is already sown. A grace is a favor granted to a person who has no claim to the favor. If a sovereign grants a reprieve to a criminal under sentence of death, that reprieve is a grace. So, too, God acts with regard to man, granting Him numberless favors without any merit on the part of man (Rom. 3:24). These favors or graces may be temporal, such as health, riches, station; or spiritual, such as forgiveness of our sins. It is with the latter class of favors that we are dealing now, and it was to secure these for us that Christ consented to die on the cross.

3. Hence the assistance of the Holy Spirit is absolutely necessary for salvation.²³⁸

No mere natural act of a man can gain for him eternal salvation. The following illustration may help us. A little boy longs to reach some fruit on a tree; he stretches out his arms to the utmost, but the fruit is still out of reach; the child’s father then lifts him up, so that he can pluck the fruit for himself. Thus man cannot attain salvation by his own efforts till the Holy Spirit gives him the supernatural strength. Just as the eye cannot discern distant objects without a telescope, and the arm cannot lift heavy weights without a lever, so the natural powers of man require supernatural help in order that salvation may be obtained. Hence the words of Christ: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God” (John 3:5).

Without the help of the Holy Spirit we cannot do the least work deserving of salvation.²³⁹

We can do nothing without God’s help. “Our sufficiency is from God” (2 Cor. 3:5). As St. Thomas Aquinas says, we are, since the Fall, like a sick man who cannot leave his bed without help. The following may serve as illustrations. A man cannot work without light; thus too he cannot do any good work without the light of the Holy Spirit. The body is helpless unless animated by the soul; in like manner man can do no good unless the Holy Spirit, Who is the life of the soul, come to his aid (St. Fulgentius). Our souls bring forth no fruit unless they are watered by the rain of the grace of the Holy Spirit (St. Hilary). As grace can do nothing without the co-operation of the will, so neither can the will achieve any result without grace. Compare the action of earth; it can produce no fruits without rain, and the rain cannot produce without the earth (St. John Chrysostom). As ink is required for the pen, so the grace of the Holy Spirit is necessary to inscribe the virtues in our souls (St. Thomas Aquinas). Every good work is the effect of two co-ordinate principles: the Holy Spirit and our own free will (1 Cor. 15:10); we may compare the action of the schoolmaster who guides a boy’s hand while he writes. Thus we can never ascribe the merit of our good works to ourselves. The earth does not bring forth flowers, but rather the sun by means of the earth. As we ascribe the activity of the body to the soul, so we should ascribe our good works to the grace of God. We might put down our good works to our own account with as much truth as a soldier might claim the victory without reference to his commander.

With the help of the Holy Spirit we can carry out the most difficult works.

St. Paul says: “I can do all in Him Who strengtheneth me” (Phil. 4:13).

2. ACTION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

The graces conferred by the Holy Spirit are as follows:

1. He gives to all men actual graces.

2. He gives to some men sanctifying grace.

3. He usually gives the seven special gifts, and occasionally quite extraordinary graces.

4. He sustains and guides the Catholic Church.

Actual Grace

1. The Holy Spirit influences our lives by enlightening the mind and strengthening the will. Such passing influence of the Holy Spirit is called “actual grace.”²⁴⁰

Before Pentecost the apostles were still ignorant; “slow of heart,” as Our Lord expressed it (Luke 24:25); the Holy Spirit in descending upon them enlightened their understanding and strengthened their will; the fear which had caused them to keep in concealment was now changed into undaunted courage. The fiery tongues symbolized the enlightenment of their minds, the whirlwind the strength which they received. The Holy Spirit is like the sun, giving light and warmth. When the sun begins to shine, the stars which were visible before begin to wane, and we see nothing in the firmament but the sun. When the Holy Spirit enlightens our souls we despise all earthly objects which formerly attracted our love, such as eating, drinking, playing, etc., and all our thoughts are turned towards God. Moreover the light of the sun reveals to us the true form of objects, the stones which we have gathered, the various roads before us. The light of the Holy Spirit shows us the true value of earthly things, our own sins, and the true goal of life. When the sun comes the ice begins to melt and the plants to blossom. So, too, the Holy Spirit warms our hearts, stirring them with the love of God and of our neighbor, and helps us to do actions deserving of heaven. The Holy Spirit is therefore a light, descending from the Father of light (Jas. 1:17); as St. Augustine says: “Actual grace is a light which enlightens and moves the sinner.”

There are many and various channels through which the Holy Spirit makes His influence act; for instance, sermons, the reading of good books, illness and death, the good example of others, religious pictures, the advice of superiors and friends, etc.

The people were moved by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost when they heard the preaching of the apostles; so too St. Anthony the Hermit (356), on hearing a sermon on the rich young man; St. Ignatius of Loyola (1556), by the reading of the lives of the saints; St. Francis of Assisi (1226) during an illness; St. Francis Borgia (1572) on seeing the dead body of the Queen Isabella; St. Norbert (1134) on seeing a death by lightning, etc., etc. In all these cases there was a sudden interior change, which the Holy Spirit took occasion of to speak to their hearts. All of them might have said with St. Cyprian: “When the Holy Spirit came into my heart, He changed me into another man.” Often God sends us suffering, before the Holy Spirit speaks to us. Just as wax must be subjected to the flame and the stamp before receiving an impression, so the heart of man must be softened by suffering in order to receive the impress of the Holy Spirit. Before paper can be used for writing, it must be prepared and finished; in a similar manner man must be purified from his evil desires before he is fit for the working of the Holy Spirit in his soul.

2. The action of the Holy Spirit sometimes makes itself perceptible to the senses.²⁴¹

For example, the appearance of the dove and the voice from heaven at the baptism of Christ, the fiery tongues and the rushing as of wind on Pentecost. We might reflect also how Christ instituted the Sacraments with forms appealing to the senses.

3. The Holy Spirit does not force us, but leaves us in perfect possession of our free will.²⁴²

The Holy Spirit is, as it were, a guide Whom men may follow or not as they list. He is the light proceeding from God, to which man can, if he will, close his eyes; as St. Augustine says: “To obey the voice of God or not is left to a man’s free will.” God does not act upon us as if we were inanimate objects without intellect or free will. Man’s freedom is very sacred to God, nor will He deprive him of it even when he uses it to his own perdition. In the words of St. Gertrude: “As God would not allow our great enemy to deprive us of our freedom, so neither would He take it from us Himself.”

Man can co-operate with actual grace or reject it
(Ps. 94[95]:8).²⁴³

Saul of Tarsus co-operated with grace, the rich young man (Luke 18:18–25) rejected it. The people who on Pentecost reviled the apostles rejected grace (Acts 2:13), as also those who mocked at St. Paul when he spoke to them on the Areopagus of the Gospel and the resurrection of the dead (Acts 17:32). Herod, too, when he heard of the birth of Christ from the Magi, failed to co-operate with grace. St. Francis de Sales draws an illustration from marriage: When a man wishes to marry he offers his hand to some suitable person, and that person may accept or reject the offer; thus God acts. He offers us His grace and we may accept it or reject it. Whoever constantly resists actual grace, and dies in that resistance is guilty of grave sin against the Holy Spirit, a sin which cannot be forgiven. Such a man resembles the devil, who is ever resisting the truth.

Whoever co-operates with actual grace acquires greater graces; but he who resists loses other graces and must answer at the judgment for his obstinacy.²⁴⁴

The first grace, if responded to, brings with it a string of other graces. The servant who employed well his five talents received five talents more (Matt. 25:28). Hence the words of Christ: He that hath, to him shall be given and he shall abound (Matt. 25:29). The punishment which fell on the city of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 is a terrible example of the rejection of grace, because it did not know the time of its visitation (Luke 19:44). To him who rejects grace apply those words of Christ: “The unprofitable servant cast ye out into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matt. 25:30). It is an insult to a great lord to refuse his gifts, all the more if he be the Lord of heaven and earth and God Himself. He who rejects graces has as little chance of getting to heaven as the traveler of reaching his destination who should neglect to enter the train while it is in the station. The moment of actual grace is like the crisis of a sickness, when a little carelessness may cause death. Many people give a poor reception to the Holy Spirit when He comes to them on the occasion of a death, the reception of the sacraments, or the celebration of great feasts, by giving way to worldly distractions and following their inclinations. They should then seek solitude and time for recollection and prayer, or purify their souls from sin by confession. Thus acted St. Ignatius of Loyola when after his conversion he retired into the cave at Manresa; thus too St. Mary of Egypt who retired into the desert. “Sailors put out to sea,” says Louis of Granada, “as soon as they see that a favorable wind is blowing; with like promptitude ought we to act when we feel the influence of the Holy Spirit.” If we delay God will withdraw His graces, just as in the case of the Israelites. Those who failed to rise in the early morning to gather the manna found it had melted away after sunrise. “The greater the graces we receive,” says St. Gregory the Great, “the greater is our responsibility.” Christ’s own words are: “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required” (Luke 12:48).

4. The Holy Spirit acts on every man, on the sinner as well as on the just; and more on Catholics than on non-Catholics and unbelievers.²⁴⁵

God is the Good Shepherd (John 10), Who seeks the lost sheep till He finds it (Luke 15). Christ, the Light of the world, enlightens every man that comes into the world (John 1:9). God’s will is that all men be saved, and come to the knowledge of the truth (1 Tim. 2:4). Besides all this God has a very special love for the souls of men. “My delight is to be with the children of men” (Prov. 8:31).

The Holy Spirit was even from the beginning of the world active in promoting the salvation of mankind, but on Pentecost He came into the world in a much more efficacious manner.²⁴⁶

While the Jews were in exile in Babylon, the Holy Spirit was working in the heathen by the many miracles which were wrought to demonstrate God’s power; as in the incident of the three children in the furnace and Daniel in the lions’ den. He was working not only in the patriarchs and prophets, but even in heathens like Socrates (who taught the existence of one God, and for that reason was condemned to death in 399 B.C.). Just as the sunrise is preceded by the dawn, so the sun of justice, Christ, is preceded by the dawn of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit does not distribute His gifts equally to all men; the members of the Catholic Church receive the richest share.²⁴⁷

One servant five talents, another two, and another one talent (Matt. 25:15). The Jews received more than the heathen; the blessed Mother of God more than all other men. The towns of Corozain and Bethsaida received more graces than Tyre and Sidon, Capernaum more than Sodom (Matt. 11:21, 23). There are ordinary graces which are given to all men without distinction, and there are special graces which God grants only to a few souls, and that with a view to some special work. Many graces may be obtained, especially by the prayers of others and by co-operation with the first grace. St. Augustine received many more graces than other men in consequence of the prayers of St. Monica; so, too, St. Paul through the dying prayer of St. Stephen. The holy apostles obeyed the first call of Our Lord, and thus obtained many other graces.

The action of the Holy Spirit on the souls of men is not constant, but occasional.²⁴⁸

Hence the exhortation of St. Paul: “How is the acceptable time; behold now is the day of salvation” (2 Cor. 6:2). Compare the parable of the vineyard where the workmen received only one summons (Matt. 20). Times of special grace are the seasons of Lent or when a mission is being given, or the jubilee year. These times of grace are like the market-days when things are easier to obtain; with this difference, that no money is required. “Come buy wine and milk, without money, and without any price” (Is. 55:1).

5. Actual graces are obtained by the performance of good works, especially by prayer, fasting, and almsdeeds; and more especially by the use of the means of grace provided by the Church, by hearing of holy Mass, worthy reception of the sacraments, and attendance at sermons.²⁴⁹

God’s grace cannot be merited by our own good works alone, otherwise it would not be grace (Rom. 11:6), yet these good works are necessary, for, as St. Augustine says: “God, Who created us without our co-operation will not save us without our co-operation.” Not according to the works which we have done but out of His mercy has God saved us (Tit. 3:5). The Holy Spirit gives to each one as He wills (1 Cor. 12:11), with regard, however, to the preparation and cooperation of each individual (Council of Trent, 6, 7). Hence it is that a man receives more actual grace as he is richer in good works. In particular we know that prayer to the Holy Spirit is very efficacious, for the Father in heaven gives the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him. Prayer to the Mother of God is also very efficacious: for she is “full of grace,” and “the dispenser of all God’s gifts.” “Let no one,” says St. Alphonsus, “consider this last title extravagant, for the greatest saints have so spoken of her, and the saints, as we know, were inspired by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth.” Prayer to the Blessed Sacrament also confers many graces. So, too, retirement from the world, or the solitude in which God speaks to the heart (Hos. 2:14), and the mortification of the senses are excellent means of drawing down grace; a good example is found in the conduct of the apostles during the time preceding Pentecost.

Sanctifying Grace

1. When the sinner co-operates with actual grace, the Holy Spirit enters his soul and confers on it a brightness and beauty which claim the friendship of God. This indwelling beauty of the soul is due to the presence of the Holy Spirit and is called “sanctifying grace.”²⁵⁰

Iron placed in a fire becomes heated, and glows like the fire itself; so the Holy Spirit, entering into a soul and dwelling there (1 Cor. 6:19), gives it a new nature, a light and glory which we call “sanctifying grace.” That God is drawn to men by their co-operation with His grace appears from God’s own words: “Turn ye to Me…. and I will turn to you” (Zech. 1:3). Sanctifying grace is like a new garment, so it is represented by the wedding-garment and the parable of the supper (Matt. 22), and of the prodigal son (Luke 15). “The soul acquires a great beauty by the presence of the Holy Spirit,” says St. John Chrysostom. “He who enters into the state of grace, is like a man bowed down with infirmities and age, who, by a miracle, has been transformed into a beautiful youth dressed in purple and carrying a sceptre.” “If,” says Blosius, “the beauty of a soul in the state of grace could be seen, mankind would be transported with wonder and delight.” Just as a palace must be beautifully furnished when the king comes to dwell in it, so the soul of man must be made into a beautiful temple by the Holy Spirit before God can dwell in it. After the resurrection the appearance of the body will be determined by that of the soul. “Let us therefore,” says St. John Chrysostom, “give all our care to the soul; for this is the true interest of our bodies, which otherwise will perish with the soul.” Sanctifying grace is not merely a gift of God (Council of Trent, 6, 11), but God gives us of His Spirit (1 John 4:13). The Holy Spirit penetrates us through and through like fire; He is not in us merely like a ray of sunshine in a room. In consequence of this supernatural beauty the soul is enriched with the friendship of God. St. Mary Magdalene of Pazzi says that if a man in the state of sanctifying grace knew how pleasing his soul is to God he would die of excess of joy. We are, in consequence of sanctifying grace, no longer the servants of God but His friends (John 15:15). The expression “friendship” implies of itself a certain likeness; and this elevation from the state of sin to that of friendship with God is called “justification” (Council of Trent, 6, 4), or regeneration (John 3:5; Tit. 3:4–7), or the putting off of the old man and the putting on of the new (Eph. 4:22). Examples: As soon as David, Paul, and the prodigal son repented, they received the Holy Spirit and the gift of sanctifying grace; otherwise they would never have accomplished their great sacrifice. David and Saul spent many days in fasting and prayer, and the prodigal son faced the humiliation of returning to his father’s roof. It is quite certain that whoever has perfect contrition receives the Holy Spirit even before confessing. Thus the patriarchs and prophets had sanctifying grace in consequence of their penitential spirit, and their belief in a Saviour. We know, too, that the Holy Spirit resides in some men even before Baptism, as in the case of the centurion Cornelius, and the people assembled in his house (Acts 10:44).

2. Usually, however, the Holy Spirit makes His entry on the reception of the Sacraments of Baptism or Penance.²⁵¹

The sinner under the action of the Holy Spirit begins to believe in God, to fear Him, to hope in Him, and love Him; then to bewail his sins, and finally decides to seek the means of grace in the Sacraments of Baptism or Penance. Then only is his conversion perfect. And actual experience goes to prove that Baptism or confession is in most sinners the beginning of a new life. Even in children their baptism is the beginning of a new spiritual life.

3. When the Holy Spirit enters into us, He brings with Him a new spiritual life.²⁵²

God is the God of life, and His presence diffuses life. His presence in our souls is like the presence of the soul in our bodies. Our souls have a natural life of their own, and by means of the intellect and the will learn to appreciate the true, the beautiful, and the good. But this natural life, compared with the life imparted by God, is like the statue compared to its living original. This divine life is acquired by the soul when the Holy Spirit takes possession of the soul with His grace, and it enables the soul to know, love, and enjoy God; this is the supernatural life. Just as Elijah (1 Kings 17) and Elisha (2 Kings 4) restored the dead children to life by measuring their bodies over that of the child, mouth to mouth, hand to hand, member to member, so does the Holy Spirit breathe the divine life into us, giving us to see with His sight, to work with His power; and thus our soul is born to a new life (1 Pet. 1:3–4). Grace is, in the words of Our Saviour, “a fountain of water springing into life everlasting” (John 4:14). “A heavenly seed is sown in us,” says St. Peter Chrysologus, “destined to spring up to everlasting life. We are of a heavenly family, and Our Father is throned in heaven. See to what heights grace has raised thee!” While our bodies decay from day to day, our souls become daily more full of the strength of youth by virtue of grace (2 Cor. 4:16). Even in our bodies God’s grace lays the germ of everlasting life: “And if the spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwell in you; He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead shall quicken also your mortal bodies, because of His spirit that dwelleth in you” (Rom. 8:11).

The following are some of the effects of the Holy Spirit when He acts upon us by His grace:

a. He purifies us from all mortal sin.²⁵³

As metals are purified by fire from their dross, so are our souls cleansed of their sins when penetrated by the fire of the Holy Spirit. Sanctifying grace and mortal sin are incompatible. The Holy Spirit dwells in all who are free from mortal sin, and the evil spirit in those who are guilty of mortal sin. Although the grace of God brings a cure to the soul of man, it does not cure the body; in his flesh is left the remains of sin, or concupiscence. Thus in great saints even, there remains the inclination to evil against which must be waged a lifelong struggle. Hence the words of St. Paul: “I know that there dwelleth not in me, that is to say, in my flesh, that which is good” (Rom. 7:18). “Concupiscence,” says St. Augustine, “may be lessened in this life but not destroyed.” It remains with us as an object lesson of the deadly effects of sin, and to give occasion, by our resistance to it, of gaining merit in heaven.

b. He unites us to God and makes us into temples of God.²⁵⁴

He who has the Holy Spirit is united with Christ, like the branches with the vine (John 15:5). In the words of St. Gregory Nazianzen, our nature is united with God by the virtue of the Holy Spirit, like a drop of water poured into a measure of wine; it acquires the color, the taste, and the smell of the wine. The Holy Spirit makes us sharers of the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4). “By the action of the Holy Spirit,” says St. Thomas Aquinas, “we are transformed into gods”; and St. Maximus: “The Godhead is conferred on us with grace,” and “As iron glows when heated in the fire, so is man changed by the Holy Spirit into the Godhead” (St. Basil; St. Thomas Aquinas). Hence men are often called gods (John 10:34; Ps. 81[82]:6). Lucifer and the first man wished to be as God, but independently of Him. God wills that we should strive to be as He is, but in union with Him. The presence of the Holy Spirit makes us temples of God. “The Holy Spirit,” says St. Augustine, “dwells primarily in the soul, and gives it its true life; and since the soul is in the body, the Holy Spirit dwells therefore in our bodies.” St. Paul insists on this point: “Know you not that you are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Cor. 3:16); “You are the temple of the living God” (2 Cor. 6:16). In the Our Father we say “Our Father, Who art in heaven”; “the heaven,” says St. Augustine, “is the just man on earth, because God dwells in him.” Christ Himself said that the Father and He would take up their abode with the man who loves Christ (John 14:23).

c. He illumines the mind, and makes the divine and moral precepts possible.²⁵⁵

He strengthens our faculties of the intellect and will, just as a ray of sunlight passing through a crystal turns it into a mass of light. More especially does He give the light of faith (2 Cor. 4:6), and kindle the fire of divine love (Rom. 5:5). In short He gives the three theological virtues (Council of Trent, 6, 7). He also makes us able and willing to co-operate with the inspirations of the Holy Spirit; that is, He gives us the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. Just as iron softens in the fire, so the soul of man under the influence of the Holy Spirit is inclined to good works; this we see exemplified in St. Paul, for hardly had the Holy Spirit acted upon him when he asks: “Lord, what wilt Thou that I do?” (Acts 9:6.) Through this inclination of the will towards what is good, the moral virtues are present as possibilities; practice is all that is required to make them facts. Thus the whole spiritual life is changed, and we see how far apart is the inner life of a saint and that of a worldling. The latter thinks only of his own satisfaction in eating, drinking, the pursuit of ambition and pleasure; in short, he loves the world. The man in whom the Holy Spirit dwells, directs his thoughts for the most part to God and tries to please Him; that is, he loves God. He can say with St. Paul, “I live, now not I; but Christ liveth in me” (Gal. 2:20). Such a man despises the things of this world, and whatever be his sufferings he enjoys peace from within and unspeakable consolation; for the Holy Spirit is the Comforter (John 14:26).

d. He gives us true peace.²⁵⁶

Through Him man acquires the peace which surpasses all understanding (Phil. 4:7). The man who has the light of the Holy Spirit in him is like a traveler performing his journey in sunshine and fair weather; quite otherwise is the case of him from whom that light is cut off by the clouds of sin; he is like the unwilling traveler, forced to make his way through wind and storm.

e. He becomes our Teacher and Guide.²⁵⁷

He instructs us in the teachings of the Catholic Church. The unction which we have received from Him teacheth us of all things (1 John 2:27). Whoever has not the Holy Spirit may indeed study the truths of the Christian religion, but their significance escapes him; it is an unfruitful knowledge. Just as a book cannot be read in the dark without the help of a light, so the Word of God is unintelligible without light from the Holy Spirit. Though it is quite true that whatever the Holy Spirit imparts to us is free from error, yet we require to be certain that what we have received is indeed imparted by the Holy Spirit. Hence, no matter what a man’s lights may be, he must keep fast hold of the teaching of the Church; and whoever fails to do this has not the Holy Spirit in him (1 John 4:6). The Holy Spirit is our Guide, “leading us,” says Louis of Granada, “as a father who leads his child by the hand over a difficult path.” Those who are in the grace of God are led in a special manner. Such can say: “No longer do I live, but Christ lives in me.” It is in this manner that the just have the kingdom of God within them (Luke 17:21).

f. He inspires us to do good works and makes them meritorious for the kingdom of heaven.²⁵⁸

Just as the Holy Spirit brooded over the waters of the deep, and created plants, animals, and men, so too does He hover over the souls of men, bringing forth fruits that are to last forever. As the flower expands when touched by the sun, so is the heart of the most hardened sinner expanded by the grace of the Holy Spirit, and breathes out the perfume of virtue and piety. The Holy Spirit is ever active, like fire, and always inciting to good works. As the wind keeps the windmill ever in motion, so the Holy Spirit is ever moving the heart of man. And He makes our actions meritorious. As the soul raises our ordinary and merely animal operations to the level of rational and intellectual acts, so the Holy Spirit elevates the acts of our soul to a supernatural and divine plane. The Holy Spirit is, as it were, the gardener of our souls. A gardener grafts a good branch on to an uncultivated stock, which then brings forth sweet fruit, in place of its former sour and poor fruit; so the Holy Spirit engrafts upon us a branch from Christ, the tree of life, and we bear no longer our merely natural fruit, but supernatural. When we are in the state of grace, we are the branches united with the vine, Jesus Christ (John 15:4). Good works done in the state of mortal sin obtain for us only actual graces to help towards our conversion.

g. He makes us children of God and heirs of heaven.²⁵⁹

When the Holy Spirit enters our souls it is with us as with Christ at His baptism, when the Holy Spirit descended upon Him; God the Father receives us as His well-beloved children, and the heavens are opened to us; we have no longer the spirit of slavery, but the spirit of adoption of sons whereby we cry “Abba, Father” (Rom. 8:15). All who are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God (Rom. 8:14). If we are sons of God, we are also heirs: heirs indeed of God, joint heirs with Christ (Rom. 8:17), for children have a claim to their heritage from their parents. “We know if our earthly house of this habitation be dissolved that we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in heaven” (2 Cor. 5:1). The Holy Spirit will remain with us forever (John 14:16). “To be numbered among the sons of God,” says St. Cyprian, “is the highest nobility.” Such is man’s privilege when in the state of grace, but like the uncut diamond, all the glory of his soul is not yet visible. Well might David cry out: “Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, ye just” (Ps. 31[32]:11). He who has the Holy Spirit has the greatest of kingdoms, the kingdom of God in himself (Luke 17:21). Alas! that so many men should neglect this, their privilege, and give themselves up to the lusts of their flesh, the food of worms.

4. Sanctifying grace is secured and increased by doing good works and using the means of grace offered by the Church; it is lost by a single mortal sin.²⁶⁰

Sanctifying grace can always be increased in the soul: “He that is just let him be justified still; and he that is holy, let him be sanctified still” (Rev. 22:11). By good works the sanctifying grace which we have received may be confirmed and increased in us (Council of Trent, 6, 26). Thus, for example, St. Stephen was a man “full of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 6:5). Stones and weeds prevent the sun from reaching the earth and giving it increase; so do our sins hinder the Holy Spirit from acting on our souls; hence they must be removed by the sacraments of confession and communion; and as the soil must be prepared, so must our souls be nourished with the teaching of Christ in order to receive the action of the Holy Spirit. This was the case even with the apostles. One mortal sin is enough to rob us of sanctifying grace, for it is by mortal sin only that the soul is separated entirely from God. “God never deserts him who has once been sanctified by His grace, unless He Himself be first deserted.” Hence the warning of the Apostle: “Extinguish not the Spirit” (1 Thess. 5:19). In the instant of committing mortal sin, storm clouds arise between God, the Sun of justice, and our souls, the brightness of which is at once extinguished. With the departure of the Holy Spirit are united the darkening of the understanding and the weakening of the will. “When the sun goes down,” says Louis of Granada, “the eye is darkened and can no longer make out objects. So when the light of the Holy Spirit is taken from the soul, it is filled with darkness, and loses the knowledge of the truth.” Whoever has lost sanctifying grace can recover it by means of the Sacrament of Penance, but not without an earnest effort; for the wicked spirit has entered into such a man and has taken with him seven more spirits more wicked than himself (Matt. 12:45). It is impossible for those who were once illuminated and are fallen away to be renewed again to penance (Heb. 6:4–6).

5. He who has not sanctifying grace is spiritually dead and will suffer eternal ruin.²⁶¹

St. Augustine says that as the body without the soul is dead, so the soul without the grace of the Holy Spirit is dead for heaven. He who has not the Holy Spirit sits “in darkness and in the shadow of death” (Luke 1:79); he cannot understand the things of the Spirit, for they are to him foolishness (1 Cor. 2:14). He who has not on the wedding-garment, that is, sanctifying grace, is cast into outer darkness (Matt. 22:12). And as the branch which is not united to the vine withers and is cast into the fire, so is he cast off who does not remain united to Christ by His grace (John 15:6). If any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is not of Christ (Rom. 8:9).

6. No one knows for certain whether he have sanctifying grace or will receive it at the hour of death.²⁶²

Man knows not whether he is worthy of love or hatred (Eccles. 9:1). Even St. Paul says of himself: “I am not conscious to myself of anything, yet am I not hereby justified” (1 Cor. 4:4). Solomon even became an idolater before his death; and St. Bernard warns us: “Even if a man have the light of grace and the love of God, let him remember that he is still under the open sky and not in the house, and that a breeze may put out this holy light forever.” “We carry our treasure in earthen vessels” (2 Cor. 4:7), and in the words of Theophylact, “Our hearts are like earthen vessels, easily broken and prone to spill the water in them; so may the Holy Spirit be lost by one sin.” No wonder St. Paul warns us: “Work out your salvation in fear and trembling” (Phil. 2:12). We may indeed have confidence that we are in the grace of God, but without a special revelation we cannot have absolute certainty (Council of Trent, 6, 6). It may be surmised from the good works which a man does that he is in the grace of God, for an evil tree cannot bring forth good fruit (Matt. 7:18).

The Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit and the Extraordinary Graces

1. The Holy Spirit gives to all who have sanctifying grace the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, that is, seven virtues of the soul, by which it easily responds to His light and inspirations.²⁶³

The light of the sun is split up into seven distinct colors, and the seven-branched candlestick in the Temple was a type of the seven gifts. These seven gifts embrace the four cardinal virtues. They remove entirely the barriers which divide us from God, especially by subjecting our concupiscence to the dictates of reason (St. Thomas Aquinas). The seven gifts give us a definite movement towards God; they perfect the powers of our souls, so that the Holy Spirit can easily move them. Just as teaching in the elementary school prepares the scholar for higher forms of instruction, so the seven gifts prepare the soul for the higher influence of the Holy Spirit. The three theological virtues are higher than the seven gifts, because the latter only give us a movement towards God, while the former unite us intimately with Him. These gifts are lost by mortal sin, restored by confession, and increased as one advances in perfection. Confirmation also increases these gifts.

The seven gifts of the Holy Spirit are: Wisdom, understanding, knowledge, counsel, fortitude, piety, and the fear of God.²⁶⁴

The first four enlighten the understanding, the others strengthen the will. These gifts are enumerated by Isaiah as belonging to the Redeemer of mankind (Is. 11:2).

a. The gift of wisdom enables us to recognize the emptiness of earthly things, and to regard God as the highest good.

St. Paul counts all that the world loves and admires for loss (Phil. 3:8). Solomon, after tasting of the joys of this world calls them “vanities” (Eccles. 1:2). St. Ignatius of Loyola used often to exclaim: “Oh! how poor are the things of earth when I look at the heavens.” Compare, too, the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi, “My God and my all.”

b. The gift of understanding enables us to distinguish Catholic teaching from all other doctrine, and to rest in it.

Blessed Clement Hofbauer, the apostle of Vienna (A.D. 1820), though he began his studies very late in life, and had only just enough knowledge of theology to be ordained, was often consulted by the dignitaries of the Church on the accuracy of the doctrine taught in the books passing through the press. A very short examination enabled him to detect at once what was unsound. St. Catherine of Alexandria (A.D. 307), reduced some fifty pagan doctors to silence, and made them into Christians. Our Lord’s own promise was: “I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries shall not be able to resist and gainsay” (Luke 21:15).

c. The gift of knowledge enables us to obtain a clear grasp of the teaching of the Catholic Church without special study.

The Curé of Ars had done but little study, yet his sermons were so remarkable that even bishops were eager to hear them, and marveled at his knowledge. St. Thomas Aquinas used to say that he learned more at the foot of the altar than out of books; and St. Ignatius of Loyola declared that he had learned more in the cave at Manresa than all the doctors in the world could teach him. How did the old man Simeon know that the child in the Temple was the Messiah (Luke 2:34)? Were not the apostles, after the coming of the Holy Spirit, “endowed with power from on high” (Luke 24:49)? Was not St. Paul rapt into paradise to hear words such as no man had heard (2 Cor. 12:4)?

d. The gift of counsel enables us to know under difficult circumstances what the will of God is.

We might recall the answer made by Christ to the question whether tribute should be paid to Cæsar (Matt. 12:21), and the judgment of Solomon (1 Kings 3). Our Lord, when warning the apostles of the persecutions awaiting them, had said, “Be not solicitous how you shall answer or what you shall say; for the Holy Spirit shall teach you in the same hour what you must say” (Luke 12:11–12).

e. The gift of fortitude enables us to bear courageously whatever is necessary in carrying out God’s will.

St. John Nepomucene (1393) chose rather to be imprisoned, tortured with hot irons, and finally cast into the Moldau, rather than betray the secret of the confessional. Job was patient in spite of the loss of his property, his children, and his health, and in spite of the mockery of his wife and friends. Abraham was ready to sacrifice his only son. The gift of fortitude is especially prominent in the holy martyrs, and most of all in Our Lady, the Queen of martyrs. “She herself,” says St. Alphonsus, “would have nailed her Son to the cross had such been God’s will; for she possessed the gift of fortitude in a higher degree than Abraham.”

f. The gift of piety enables us to make continual efforts to honor God more and more in our hearts, and to carry out His will more perfectly.

St. Teresa took a vow always to choose what was most perfect, and St. Alphonsus never to waste time. St. Aloysius would spend hours in presence of the Blessed Sacrament, till his confessor had to command him to shorten his devotions. Many of the saints used to melt into tears during their prayer or in meditating on heavenly subjects.

g. The gift of the fear of God enables us to fear giving offence to God more than all the evils in the world.

Such was the gift, for instance, of the three children in the furnace, and of all the martyrs. It enables us to overcome the fear of man and human respect.

2. The Holy Spirit gives to many graces of a rarer kind; for instance, the gift of tongues, of miracles, of prophecy, of discernment of spirits, of visions, of ecstasies, etc.²⁶⁵

The apostles received on the feast of Pentecost the gift of tongues, and we find it recorded also in the life of St. Francis Xavier, as having been possessed by him. The prophets of the Old Law foretold future events. St. Peter knew the thoughts of Ananias. St. Catharine of Sienna after communion used to be raised in the air and rapt out of her senses. St. Francis of Assisi received the stigmata, or impression on his body of the sacred wounds of Our Lord. Instances of all these gifts occur again and again in the lives of the saints, and are, after all, only the fulfilment of the promise of Our Lord in Mark 16:17–18. These graces are conferred by the Holy Spirit on whom He will (1 Cor. 12:11). Louis of Granada beautifully expresses it: “As the sun shines on the flowers, and brings out their various perfumes, so does the light of the Holy Spirit fall on pious souls, according to their peculiarities, and develops in them His graces and gifts.”

These extraordinary graces are conferred by the Holy Spirit generally for the benefit of others and in aid of His Church.²⁶⁶

The time of the apostles was conspicuous for extraordinary gifts (1 Cor. 12–14). “God is like a gardener,” says St. Gregory the Great, “who waters the flowers only while they are young.” Extraordinary graces ought to be used with due discretion for the benefit of others (1 Cor. 12:12). In the words of St. Irenæus, “A merchant does not leave his money idle in his chests, but he makes the best use he can of it in business; so God’s will is that His graces should not be left unemployed, but that men should make good use of them.” These extraordinary gifts of themselves do not make men better. They are indeed great graces, available for great good, and are the free gift of God, like riches, health, etc. Hence the words of St. Teresa: “Not for all the goods and joys of this world would I give up a single one of the graces given me; I esteemed them always as a singular gift of God and a very great treasure.” It is the right use of these gifts, and not the gifts themselves, which make them of service to man. St. Fulgentius writes: “One may have the gift of miracles, and yet lose his soul. Miracles give no certainty of one’s salvation.” Nor are these extraordinary graces a sign of holiness in the possessor of them; Our Lord’s own words convey this in Matthew 7:22. Yet there is no saint of the Church who has not had these gifts. Benedict XIV says: “They are, as a rule, given not to sinners but to the just. When they are found in union with heroic virtue in a man, they are a strong proof of his sanctity.” These gifts are usually accompanied by great sufferings, such as desolation of spirit, struggles with the devil, sickness, persecutions, etc.

3. The gifts of the Holy Spirit were conspicuous in a special degree in Jesus Christ (Acts 10:38), His holy Mother, the apostles, the patriarchs and prophets of the Old Law, and all the saints of the Catholic Church.²⁶⁷

The Holy Spirit as Guide of the Church

1. The Holy Spirit maintains and guides the Catholic Church.²⁶⁸

As the soul is to the body, so is the Holy Spirit to the Catholic Church, and, like the soul, His action is invisible. He is the Architect of the Church; His action produced the Incarnation (Luke 1:35); He exercised His powers through the humanity of Christ (Luke 4:18; Acts 10:38); He perfects the Church founded by the Redeemer (Eph. 2:20–22).

a. The Holy Spirit secures the Catholic Church from destruction (Matt. 16:18), and preserves it from error (John 14:16).²⁶⁹

b. The Holy Spirit supports the rulers of the Church in the duties of their office (Acts 20:28), and especially the Vicar of Christ, the Pope.²⁷⁰

The Holy Spirit gives to them what they shall say (Matt. 10:19). He speaks through them as on Pentecost He spoke through the apostles (Matt. 10:20). In the words of St. Basil: “As the pen writes what the writer wishes, so the preacher of the Gospel speaks nothing of his own but what the Holy Spirit gives to him.”

c. The Holy Spirit raises up in times of danger for the Church able champions of her cause.

For example St. Athanasius (A.D. 373) in the time of the Arians; the holy Pope Gregory VII. (A.D. 1085) when the Church was in general disorder; St. Dominic (A.D. 1221) at the time of the Albigenses; St. Catharine of Sienna (A.D. 1380), at the time of the great Papal schism; St. Ignatius of Loyola (A.D. 1556) at the time of Luther.

d. The Holy Spirit is the cause that there are so many saints in the Church in all ages.²⁷¹

Almost every year new saints are canonized in Rome.

3. APPARITIONS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

The Holy Spirit has appeared under the form of a dove, of fire, and of tongues, to signify His office in the Church.²⁷²

“The Holy Spirit,” says St. Gregory the Great, “appeared in the form of a dove and of fire, because His work is done gently and zealously, and whoever is wanting in gentleness and zeal is not under His influence. He appeared in the form of tongues, because He gives to man the gift of speech, by which he may inflame others to the love of God.” The Holy Spirit appeared under the form of fire, because He consumes the dross of our sins, drives the darkness of ignorance out of our souls, melts the icy coldness of our hearts, and inflames us with love of God and of our neighbor, and because He hardens and strengthens the heart of man whom He has made from the clay of the earth. “Our God is a consuming fire” (Heb. 12:29).