Sketch of a Radical Epistemology

· There Is No Full Grasp of Reality Without the Experience of God

· There is No Experience of God Without the Experience of Jesus Christ

· Only the Experience of Jesus Christ Makes Knowledge of the World Realist


1) Benedict XVI recently asked: “What is real?”

He then developed the question: “Are only material goods, social, economic and political problems ‘reality’? This was precisely the great error of the dominant tendencies of the last century, a most destructive error, as we can see from the results of both Marxist and capitalist systems. They falsify the notion of reality by detaching it from the foundational and decisive reality which is God. Anyone who excludes God from his horizons falsifies the notion of ‘reality’ and, in consequence, can only end up in blind alleys or with recipes for destruction.”[1]


2) Benedict bluntly asks: “Who knows God?” and bluntly answers: “Only God knows God.”

This means that “No one has at any time seen God. The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has revealed him” (Jn. 1, 18). It means that Jesus Christ, who was, indeed, felt and seen[2] was also “looked upon and … handled”[3] by the apostles.

This means that only by knowing Jesus Christ Who is God are we able to know the Father Who is the engendering Source of all. And in the act of knowing Jesus Christ, we come to experience and know the reality of ourselves. And in knowing the reality of ourselves, we know the "meaning" of things.

3) How, then, are we to know Jesus Christ experientially? The answer is that now classical response that Cardinal Ratzinger offered in his “Behold the Pierced One:”

“Thesis 3: Since the center of the person of Jesus is prayer, it is essential to participate in his prayer if we are to know and understand him.

“Let us begin here with a very general matter of epistemology. By nature, knowledge depends on a certain similarity between the knower and the known. The old axiom is that like is known by like. In matters of the mind and where persons are concerned, this means that knowledge calls for a certain degree of empathy, by which we enter, so to speak, into the person or intellectual reality concerned, become one with him or it, and thus become able to understand (intellegere = ab intus legere)….

“In Thesis 1 we saw that prayer was the central act of the person of Jesus and, indeed, that this person is constituted by the act of prayer, of unbroken communication with the one he calls ‘Father.’ If this is the case, it is only possible really to understand this person by entering into this act of prayer, by participating in it. This is suggested by Jesus’ saying that no one can come to him unless the Father draws him (Jn. 6, 44(. Where there is no Father, there is no Son. Where there is no relationship with God, there can be no understanding of him who, in his innermost self, is nothing but relationship with God, the Father – although one can doubtless establish plenty of details about him [historico-critical method]. Therefore a participation in the mind of Jesus, i.e., in hi prayer, which … is an act of love, of self-giving and self-expropriation to men, is not some kind of pious supplement to reading the Gospels, adding nothing to knowledge of him or even being an obstacle to the rigorous purity of critical knowing. On the contrary, it is the basic precondition if real understanding… is to take place.

“The New Testament continually reveals this state of affairs and thus provides the foundation for a theological epistemology. Here is simply one example: when Ananias was sent to Paul to receive him into the Church, he was reluctant and suspicious of Paul; the reason given to him was this: go to him ‘for he is praying’ (Acts 9. 11). In prayer, Paul is moving toward the moment when he will be freed from blindness and will begin to see, not only exteriorly, but interiorly as well. The person who prays begins to see; praying and seeing go together because – as Richard of St. Victor says – ‘Love is the faculty of seeing.’ Real advances in Christology, therefore, can never come merely as the result of the theology of the schools, and that includes the modern theology as we find it in critical exegesis, in the history of doctrine and in an anthropology oriented toward the human sciences, etc. All this is important, as important as schools are. But it is insufficient. It must be complemented by the theology of the saints, which is theology from experience. All real progress in theological understanding has its origin in the eye of love and in its faculty of beholding”[4] (Underline mine).

This theological epistemology explains, for example, Mt 16, 15 and Luke 9, 18 where Jesus formally asks the apostles to give testimony of his identity. Do they really know who He is? After they communicate that those who do not experience Christ by relating with Him to the Father (i.e. they do not experience the self-transcendence involved in being pure relation to the Father, which is replicated in the act of prayer), call Him “John the Baptist, Jeremiah, Elias or one of the prophets,” Christ asks them who they say He is. Simon, son of John – not yet Peter – answers: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Mt. 16, 16). Christ then changes Simon’s name to Peter (matching His own as “Cornerstone” [Acts 4, 11]) and begins to build the reality of the Church on this confession (self-gift) that transforms individuals into other Christs – relational/prayerful - as “living stones” (1 Peter 2, 5).

4) Realism on every level of knowing is made possible only when there is this fundamental experience of the self as radical relation in the act of faith (which is prayer). The reason is the mediation of subjective sense perception and abstractive knowing in the experience of the material world. There is always a subjective filtering medium in the experience of the material, be it sensible perception itself or abstractive thought. Only the experience of the "I" in the free act of self-transcendence is immediate. Ratzinger comments that “while ‘empirical experience’ is the necessary starting point of all human knowledge, it becomes false if it does not let itself be criticized in terms of knowledge already acquired and so open the door to new experiences.”[5] As Aristotle said: “Nothing in the intellect except through sense,” Plato said, “Nothing in the sense except through the intellect.” Ratzinger expatiates and comments: “The senses experience nothing if no question has been raised, if there is no preceding command from the intellect without which sensory experience can take place. Experimentation is possible only if natural science has elaborated an intellectual presupposition in terms of which it controls nature and on the basis of which it can bring about new experiences. In other words, it is only when the intellect sheds light on sensory experience that this sensory experience has any value as knowledge and that experiences thus become possible.

“The progress of modern science is produced by a history of experiences that is made possible by the repeated critical interaction and reciprocal prolongation of these experiences and by the inner bond of the whole. The question that raised the possibility of constructing, let us say, a computer could not even have been asked in the beginning but became possible only in the continuum of an experiential history of experiences newly generated by thought. Up to this point, the structure of the experience of faith is completely analogous to that of the natural sciences; both have their source in the dynamic link between intellect and senses from which there is constructed a path to deeper knowledge [with the huge difference that the empirical sciences must objectify and literally “kill” the object in order to take it apart for analysis, while faith raises raising the believing subject to the level of the Subject-to-be-known to resonate with it internally as like-experience].”[6]

Ratzinger then gives the supreme example of the existential experience of faith in the case of the encounter of Christ and the Samaritan woman. They speak about the object “water” until she becomes subjectively interested and asks for water from Him. He calls for her to tell the truth about self which is equivalent to a radical self-transcendence. “Bring me your husband.” She answers: “I have no husband.” He remarks that she has said well, and because of this sincerity, He discloses His inner Self to her as the Messiah.

“As we have said, the woman must come first to the knowledge of herself, to the acknowledgement of herself. For what she makes now is a kind of confession: a confession in which, at last, she reveals herself unsparingly. Thus a new transition has occurred – to preserve our earlier terminology, a transition from empirical and experimental to ‘experiential’ experience, to ‘existential experience.’ The woman stands face to face with herself. It is no longer a question now of something but of the depths of the I itself and, consequently, of the radical poverty that is man’s I-myself, the place where this I is ultimately revealed behind the superficiality of the something. From this perspective, we might regard the conversation between Jesus and the Samaritan woman as the prototype of catechesis. It must lead from the something to the I. Beyond every something it must ensure the involvement of man himself, of this particular man. It must produce self-knowledge, an self-acknowledgment so that the indigence and need of man’s being will be evident.”[7]

Two Levels of Experience

Philosophically, we can see two (2) levels of knowing corresponding to two (2) levels of experience. The deeper level is the experience of the self that is the deeper reality of Being that we now in consciousness and conscience. Ratzinger call this “anamnesis” because it is a remembering of who we are as created images of the divine Persons.

The more superficial level is the sensible experience that gives rise to abstract thinking which –as we saw in a Platonic vein (as in the phenomenon of quantum physics) raises new questions and creates new possible paradigms of explanation of what is perceived through the senses.

Karol Wojtyla gave a philosophical-phenomenological account of these two levels of experience in the “Introduction” to “The Acting Person:”

“The inspiration to embark upon this study came from the need to objectivize that great cognitive process which at its origin may be defined as the experience of man; this experience, which man has of himself, is the richest and apparently the most complex of all experiences accessible to him. Man’s experience of anything outside of himself is always associated with the experience of himself, and he never experiences anything external without having at the same time the experience of himself.”[8]

Again, this experience of the self is only possible when there is a free, moral act of self-transcendence such as the act of faith and spousal love. Only in this experience of the self is the human intellect enlightened in a fully deployed realism of self, God and “things.”

The large point of Benedict XVI in his “Opening Address for Aparecida Conference” (May 13, 2007)” was “Only those who recognize God know reality and are able to respond to it adequately and in a truly human manner. The truth of this thesis becomes evident in the face of the collapse of al the systems that marginalize God.”

Summarily, perhaps we could quote Hans Urs von Balthasar who makes a profound presentation of the epistemological ramifications of knowing Christ (the Father), the self and sensible reality. Keep in mind that the “meaning” of the finite truths of things can be found when they are “embedded” in the background consciousness of the self which situates them.

“Christ, God-made-man, is the manifest truth both of God and of the world, because he upholds the world by is word of power (Heb. 1, 3). Of necessity, then, he is also the place where all the empirically established partial truths, in their barren, alien, disappointing and tedious finitude, are reconciled in the One Truth which, because it is a divine Person, cannot be superseded.”[9]

"The difficulty of accepting that Jesus Christ is the rector truth of all truth is the concreteness of the individual Jesus of Nazareth with, von Balthasar says, “a particular number of utterances, events and anecdotes in salvation history, a particular number of statements, defined by council and popes and to be accepted by faith as true. The Christian is surrounded by an apparently finite world of truths; but, turn as he may, although he can certainly always find new and interesting combinations, he cannot escape this world of truths in which he is a prisoner. A feeling of restriction can undermine his contemplation. Surely a Buddhist, a Taoist, is infinitely freer in his contemplation?> Surely such a person is more at peace, able to turn from wearying multiplicity and enter into the immensity and openness of the One, whereas the Christian can never get beyond the stage of being ‘occupied with many things’? He seems bound to the One Scripture (whereas mankind can show so many other holy words), to the One Church (among so many other communities which are earnestly seeking salvation), and ultimately to the One Redeemer. How ever magnificent figure the latter may be, he is still one among others; eventually his immense historical influence will be exhausted, according to the laws of historical existence and he wil give way to fresh new perspectives. Surely there is something unnatural, both in the way Christians cling rigidly to these historical events and make them absolute, and in the arbitrary spiritualizing which they then apply to them? They seem to find it necessary to subject all other historical events to a symbolic and prophetic style of interpretation too, in order to establish the absolute primacy of the Christian events over all others, including present-day ones.”

“Unless a person’s living and thinking hinges on faith, he is bound to think in this way. It is a temptation which may always afflict the contemplative anew; he will have to fight his way back to faith’s center. He will have to reflect calmly on what is actually gained as a result of the apparent sacrifice of liberalism in Christian spirituality: now, all the isolated truths of nature and supernature, of the cosmos, of history, of the Church, are drawn together in the wealth, the freedom and the mystery of a Beloved Person, who, thought human like ourselves, is not a finite Person, but divine Love itself. This Someone to whom all the individual truths point as to their origin and home is not a mere ‘other’ of whom we could get tired: he is the eternal Thou, and as such (‘non-aliud’) abolishes the dismal chasm of otherness, for he is the rocklike foundation of each individual self. So it is in him, and only in him, that the contemplative movement of all non-Christian religions, i.e., leaving the many behind and losing oneself in the One, the movement from beings to Being, comes to full expression. Now, the One is accessible without our having to leave behind the many, the world (which would otherwise be imperative). All becomes the fragrance of the Unique One, who manifests himself, now appearing, now vanishing, in the many: currimus in odorem unguentorum tuorum. But truth – and the eternal Son describes himself as Truth – is itself a truth of self-surrender, of transparency, leading us forward as it recedes from view: the Son is the way to the Father. He is the Father’s fragrance in the world. He is both ultimate and not ultimate. As God, he is absolute; and yet, as absolute, relative: as the Son who is a relationship proceeding from the Father and returning to him.”[10]

Benedict says this more simply taking the example from Scripture. He offers the scene of the encounter of Nathanael to whom “Philip had said that he had 'found the one about whom Moses wrote in the law, and also the prophets, Jesus, son of Joseph, from Nazareth'" (John 1:45).

As we know, Nathanael posed a weighty prejudice to him: "Can anything good come from Nazareth?" (John 1:46a). This expression is important for us. It allows us to see that, according to the Jewish expectations, the Messiah could not come from such an obscure village, as was the case of Nazareth (cf. also John 7:42). At the same time, however, it shows the freedom of God, who surprises our expectations, manifesting himself precisely there, where we least expect him. Moreover, we know that, in reality, Jesus was not exclusively "from Nazareth," but that he was born in Bethlehem (cf. Matthew 2:1; Luke 2:4). Nathanael's objection, therefore, had no value, as it was founded, as often happens, on incomplete information. Nathanael's case suggests to us another reflection: In our relationship with Jesus, we must not only be content with words. Philip, in his reply, presents a significant invitation to Nathanael: "Come and see" (John 1:46b). Our knowledge of Jesus is in need above all of a living experience: Another person's testimony is certainly important, as in general the whole of our Christian life begins with the proclamation that comes to us from one or several witnesses. But we ourselves must be personally involved in an intimate and profound relationship with Jesus. In a similar way, the Samaritans, after having heard the testimony of the compatriot whom Jesus had met at Jacob's well, wished to speak directly with him and, after that conversation, they said to the woman: "We no longer believe because of your word; for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the savior of the world" (John 4:42). Returning to the scene of the vocation, the evangelist tells us that, when Jesus sees Nathanael approaching, he exclaims: "Here is a true Israelite. There is no duplicity in him" (John 1:47). It was praise that recalls the text of a psalm: "Happy those to whom the Lord imputes no guilt, in whose spirit is no deceit" (Psalm 32:2), but which arouses Nathanael's curiosity, who, surprised, replies: " How do you know me?" (John 1:48a). Jesus' answer at first is not understood. He said to him: "Before Philip called you, I saw you under the fig tree" (John 1:48b). Today it is difficult to realize with precision the meaning of these last words. According to what the specialists say, it is possible that, given that at times the fig tree is mentioned as the tree under which the doctors of the law sat to read and teach the Bible, he is alluding to that type of occupation carried out by Nathanael at the moment of his calling. Anyway, what counts most in John's narration is the confession of faith that Nathanael professes at the end in a limpid way: "Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel!" (John 1:49). Although it does not reach the intensity of Thomas' confession with which John's Gospel ends: "My Lord and my God!" (John 20:28), Nathanael's confession has the function to open the terrain to the fourth Gospel. In the latter a first and important step is taken on the path of adherence to Christ. Nathanael's words present a double and complementary aspect of Jesus' identity: He is recognized both by his special relationship with God the Father, of whom he is the only-begotten Son, as well as by his relationship with the people of Israel, of whom he is called King, an attribution proper of the awaited Messiah. We must never lose sight of either of these two elements, since if we only proclaim the heavenly dimension of Jesus we run the risk of making him an ethereal and evanescent being, while if we only recognize his concrete role in history, we run the risk of neglecting his divine dimension, which is his proper description.”[11]




[1] Benedict XVI’s Opening Address for Aparecida Conference “Not Only the Continent of Hope, but Also the Continent of Love!” May 13, 2007, #3.
[2] Lk. 24, 38-43.
[3] I Jn. 1, 1.
[4] J. Ratzinger, “Behold the Pierced One, Ignaitus (1984) 25-27.
[5] J. Ratzinger, “The Anthropological Element in Theology,” in Principles of Catholic Theology, Ignatius (1987) 348
[6] Ibid
[7] Ibid 354.
[8] Karol Wojtyla, “The Acting Person,” D. Reidel Publishing Company Dordrecht (1979) 3.
[9] Hans Urs von Balthasar, “Prayer,” Ignatius (1986 [1955 Verlag]) 63.
[10] Ibid 66-67.
[11] VATICAN CITY, OCT. 4, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Address by Benedict XVI at the General Audience, dedicated to present the figure of the Apostle Bartholomew.

The Days Before the Ascension

Sermon by Saint Leo the Great

“Beloved, the days which passed between the Lord’s resurrection and his ascension were by no means uneventful; during them great sacramental mysteries were eventful; during them great sacramental mysteries were confirmed, great truths revealed. In those days the fear of death with all its horrors was taken away, and the immortality of both body and soul affirmed. It was then that the Lord breathed on all his apostles and filled them with the Holy Spirit; and after giving the keys of the kingdom to blessed Peter, whom he had chosen and set above all the others, he entrusted him with the care of his flock.

“During these days the Lord joined two of his disciples as their companion on the road, and by chiding them for their timidity and hesitant fears he swept away all the clouds of our uncertainty. Their lukewarm hearts were fired by the light of faith and began to burn within them as the Lord opened up the Scriptures. And as they shared their meal with him, their eyes were opened in the breaking of bread, opened far more happily to the sight of their own glorified humanity than were the eyes of our first parents to the shame of their sin.

“Throughout the whole period between the resurrection and ascension, God’s providence was at work to inset this one truth before their eyes, that our Lord Jesus Christ, who was truly born, truly suffered and truly died, blessed apostles together with all the others had been intimidated by the catastrophe of the cross, and their faith in the resurrection had been uncertain; but now they were so strengthened by the evident truth that when their Lord ascended into heaven, far from feeling any sadness, they were filled with great joy.

“Indeed that blessed company had a great and inexpressible cause for joy when it saw man’s nature rising above the dignity of the whole heavenly creation, above the ranks of angels, above the exalted status of archangels. Nor would there be any limit to its upward course until humanity was admitted to a seat at the right hand of the eternal Father, to be enthroned at last in the glory of him to whose nature it was wedded in the person of the Son.

Guardini on “the mysterious lingering on earth after the Resurrection” and the Ascension.

“It might be asked: Why this mysterious lingering on earth after the Resurrection? Why didn’t the Lord return home directly? What was happening during those forty days?

“Let us for a moment suppose that the Resurrection and the period afterwards had been only offshoots of morbid religious experience, legend or myth – what would those days have looked like? Doubtless, they would have been filled with demonstrations of the liberated one’s power; the hunted one, now omnipotent, would have shattered his enemies; he would have blazed from temple altars, would have covered his followers with honors, and in these and other ways, have fulfilled the longings of the oppressed. He would also have initiated the disciples into the wonderful mysteries of heaven, would have revealed the future, the beginning and end of all things. But nothing of all this occurs. No mysteries are revealed; no one is initiated into the secrets of the unknown. Not one miracle, save that of Christ’s own transfigured existence and the wonderful fish-catch which is only a repetition of an earlier event. What does happen? Something completely unspectacular, exquisitely still: the past is confirmed. The reality of the life that has been crosses over into eternity. These days are the period of that transition.

“And we need them for our faith; particularly when we evoke the great images of the eternal Christ throning at his Father’s right, coming upon the clouds to judge the living and the dead, ruling the Church and the souls of the faithful growing from the depths of God-summoned humanity ‘…to the mature measure of the fullness of Christ’ (Eph. 4, 13). Such images place us in danger of losing the earthly figure of the Lord. This must not happen. Everything depends on the eternal Christ’s remaining also Jesus of Nazareth, who walks among us until the day when all things will be enfolded in eternity; on the blending of borderless spirit with the here and now of the process of salvation. In the Christ of the Apocalypse one vision holds this fast: the Lamb standing ‘as if slain’ but alive (Apoc. 5, 6; 1, 18). Earthly destiny entered into eternity. Once and forever, death has become lasting life. But there is a danger that this truth dangle in space, enigmatic as a rune on an ancient stone. This period of transition deciphers the rune, gives us the key to the parable: All that has been remains in eternal form. Every word Jesus ever spoke, every event during his lifetime is fixed in unchangeing reality, then and now and forever. He who is seated on the throne contains the past transfigured to eternal present.”[1]

[1] Romano Guardini, “The Lord,” Henry Regnery Co. (1954) 420-422.

Ascension 2007

The Gnostic Scandal

Guardini confronts the Initial Scandal of the Gnostic Mind: Is there matter in God? Does God have a body?

“To the question: What have we to do with the spiritualism of Gnostics” – the answer is: A great deal!”[1] Gnosticism is a rationalism that splits reality into hermetically sealed dualisms such as compartmentalized spirit and matter. In the light of that, Guardini asks:

“Who is God? The supreme Spirit, and so pure, that the angels by contrast are `flesh’! He is the Endless, Omnipotent, Eternal, All-inclusive One in the simplicity of his pure reality. The Unchanging One, living in himself, sufficient unto himself.”[2]

And in view of the revelation of Jesus Christ asks:

“What possible use could he have for a human body in heaven? … Why must we also believe that this piece of creation is assimilated into the eternity of God’s existence? What for? A bit of earthliness lost and caught up into the tremendousness of eternity? Why doesn’t the Logos shake the dust from him and return to the pure clarity of his free divinity?”[3]

Guardini then asks:

“But then what manner of God is this, with whom Resurrection, Ascension and throning on his right hand are possible?”

And he answers:

“Precisely the kind of God who makes such things possible! He is the God of the Resurrection, and we must learn that it is not the Resurrection that is irreconcilable to him, but part of our thinking that is irreconcilable to the Resurrection, for it is false.”

He concludes:

“If we take Christ’s figure as our point of departure, trying to understand from there, we find ourselves faced with the choice between a completely new conception of God and our relation to him.”

Besides,

“We must also completely reform our idea of humanity, if it is to fit the mould Christ has indicated. We can no longer say: man is as the world supposes him to be; therefore it is impossible that he throne at God’s right, but: since Revelation has revealed that the Son of Man does throne at God’s right, man must be other than the world supposes him. We must learn that God is not only `supreme Being,’ but supremely divine and human Being; we must realize that man is not only human, but that the tip of his essence reaches into the unknown, and receives its fulfillment in his Resurrection.”[4]

Josef Ratzinger on the Ascension:

“What, then, is the meaning of Christ’s ‘ascension into heaven’? It expresses our belief that in Christ human nature, the humanity in which we all share, has entered into the inner life of God in a new and hitherto unheard of way. It means that man has found an everlasting place in God. Heaven is not a place beyond the stars, but something much greater, something that requires far more audacity to assert: Heaven means that man now has a place in God.”

“The basis for this assertion is the interpenetration of humanity and divinity in the crucified and exalted man Jesus. Christ, the man who is in God and eternally one with God, is at the same time God’s abiding openness to all human beings. Thus Jesus himself is what we call ‘heaven; heaven is not a place but a person, the person of him in whom God and man are forever and inseparably one. And we go to heaven and enter into heaven to the extent that we go to Jesus Christ and enter into him. In this sense, ‘ascension into heaven’ can be something that takes place in our everyday lives.”[5]

The word “interpenetration” is of major importance. It is contrasted with the word “parallel” that is the assumed to be the way the divine and human natures are related in Christ. This latter understanding has had the most profound impact on the way we understand the relation of the divine and the human, be it supernatural/natural, grace/nature, faith/reason, church/state and priest/layman. The clarification of this word “interpenetration” is of maximal importance in the most practical affairs in these seemingly irresolvable dualisms. Consider that if Christ is God, and the revelation of the meaning of man, then the alignment and relation of the divine and human in Christ will determine the meaning “human” in life, thought, the political and economic order and priesthood.

To get it right, Ratzinger (following Von Balthasar) insists on the need to cap off Christology not with Chalcedon in 451, but with Constantinople III in a.d. 680-681. He says:


“It is common enough for the theological textbooks to pay scant attention to the theological development which followed Chalcedon. In many ways one is left with the impression that dogmatic Christology comes to a stop with a certain parallelism of the two natures in Christ. It was this same impression that led to the divisions in the wake of Chalcedon. In fact, however, the affirmation of the true humanity and the true divinity in Christ can only retain its meaning if the mode of the unity of both is clarified. The Council defined this unity by speaking of the `one Person’ in Christ, but it was a formula which remained to be explored in its implications. For the unity of divinity and humanity in Christ which brings `salvation’ to man is not a juxtaposition but a mutual indwelling. Only in this way can there be that genuine `becoming like God,’ without which there is no liberation and no freedom.

“It was to this question, after two centuries of dramatic struggles which also, in many ways, bore the mark of imperial politics, that the Third Council of Constantinople (680-681) addressed itself. On the one hand, it teaches that the unity of God and man in Christ involves no amputation or reduction in any way of human nature. In conjoining himself to man, his creature, God does not violate or diminish him; in doing so, he brings him for the first time to his real fullness. On the other hand (and this is no less important), it abolishes all dualism or parallelism of the two natures, such as had always seemed necessary in order to safeguard Jesus’ human freedom In such attempts it had been forgotten that when the human will is taken up into the will of God, freedom is not destroyed; indeed, only then does genuine freedom come into its own. The Council of Constantinople analyzed the question of the two-ness and the one-ness in Christ by reference to the concrete issue of the will of Jesus. It resolutely maintains that, as man, Jesus has a human will which is not absorbed by the divine will. But this human will follows the divine will and thus becomes one will with it, not in a natural manner but along the path of freedom. The metaphysical two-ness of a human and a divine will is not abrogated, but in the realm of the person, in the realm of freedom, the fusion of both takes place, with the result that they become one will not naturally, but personally. This free unity – a form of unity created by love – is higher and more interior than a merely natural unity. It corresponds to the highest unity there is, namely, Trinitarian unity. The Council illustrates this unity by citing a dominical word handed down to us in the Gospel of John: `I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me’ (Jn. 6, 38). Here it is the divine Logos who is speaking, and he speaks of the human will of the man Jesus as his will, the will of the Logos. With this exegesis of John 6, 38 the Council indicates the unity of the subject in Christ. There are not two `I’s in him, but only one. The Logos speaks in the I-form of the human will and mind of Jesus; it has become his I, has become adopted into his I, because the human will is completely one with the will of the Logos. United with the latter, it has become a pure Yes to the Father’s will.".[6]

The impass in the 200 years after Chalcedon in resolving the relation of the divine and human nature in Christ was due to borrowing a static understanding of “nature” from Greek metaphysics whereby the notion of freedom would be confined to the notion of “choice.” The key to understanding this consists in the critical turn that defines the entire theology/philosophy of then-Joseph Ratzinger, to wit: the experience and consciousness of the human person along the same lines as the divine Persons, i.e. relationality. To be = to be in relation. This lifts us out of the epistemology of sensation --> abstraction into the epistemology of the experience of the “I” in the moment of self-transcendence-self-gift. We are here talking about two levels of experience: one on the level of the external senses; the other, on the level of the “I” in the moment of self-determination. This latter is a “deeper” (because unmediated by sense or concept) experience of Being than experience of sensible being. In this non-mediated contact of the “I” with itself in the moment of existential action, freedom is not primarily choice but as self-mastery and self-determination. One experiences deciding about oneself rather than simply being necessitated between the poles of stimulus and response. If one makes the gift of self in obedience as in faith, or self-gift as in spousal love, then one experiences being-in-relation. This is a distinct experience from sensation with a distinct metaphysics that is not equal to, but transcending the notion of in-itself-substance (that has dominated thought since the Ionian philosophy of the 6th century B.C. that was in contact with Jewish faith at the time of the Exile).

Ratzinger studied Constantinople III and found there that the human and divine “wills” in Christ are irreducible as metaphysically distinct (divine and human) but since they are both wills of the same Person of the Logos, they are one personal will since it is the not the will that wills, but the Person. Voila the key metaphysical error that has plagued us for centuries and left us with the conundra of the dualisms that most practically beset us. To wit: It is the same Person who wills with the human and the divine will. Hence, they are one in the Subject although they are ontologically irreducible. Hence again, instead of the word “parallel” that would explain the previous explanations in terms of “natures,” we have the term “compenetration” that points to the mystery of the Incarnation in the one Person.

Consider Ratzinger again on this:


“In the manuals, the theological development after Chalcedon has ordinarily come to be little considered. The impression thus frequently remains that dogmatic Christology finishes up with a certain parallelism between the two natures of Christ. This impression has also been the cause leading to the divisions since Chalcedon. But in effect the declaration of the true humanity and the true divinity of Christ can retain its significance only when there is a clarification also of the mode of unity of the two natures, which the Council of Chalcedon has defined by the formula of the `one person’ of Christ, at that time hot yet fully examined. In fact only that unity of divinity and humanity which in Christ is not parallelism, where one stands alongside the other, but real compenetration, - compenetration between God and man – means salvation for humankind. Only thus in fact does that true `being with God’ take place, without which liberation and freedom do not exist.

“This same query returned at the third Council of Constantinople (680-681) after two centuries of dramatic struggle marked most often also by Byzantine politics. According to this Council, on the one hand: the unity between the divinity and the humanity in Christ does not in any sense imply an amputation or reduction of the humanity. If God joins himself to his creature –man/woman – he does not wound or diminish it: he brings it to its plenitude. But on the other hand (and this is no less important) there remains no trace of that dualism or parallelism of the two natures, which in the course of history was frequently judged necessary to defend the human liberty of Jesus. Such studies forgot that the assumption of the human will into the divine will does not destroy freedom, but on the contrary generates true liberty. The Council of Constantinople has analyzed concretely the problem of the two natures and one person in Christ in view of the problem of the will of Jesus. We are reminded firmly that there exists a specific will of the man Jesus that is not absorbed into the divine will. But this human will follows the divine will and thus becomes a single will with it, not, however, in a forced way but by way of freedom. The metaphysical duplicity of a human will and a divine will is not eliminated, but in the personal sphere, the area of freedom there is accomplished a fusion of the two, so that this becomes not one single natural will but one personal will. This free union – a mode of union created by love – is a union higher and more intimate than a purely natural union. It corresponds to the highest union which can exist, the union of the Trinity… The Council explains this union by a saying of the Lord given in the Gospel of John: `I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of the Father who sent me’ (Jn. 6, 38). Here the divine Logos is speaking, and speaking of the human will of Jesus in the mode by which he calls his will the will of the Logos. With this exegesis of John 6, 38, the Council proves the unity of the subject: In Jesus there are not two `I,’ but only one. The Logos speaks of the will and human thought of Jesus using the `I;’ this has become his `I,’ has been assumed into his `I,’ because the human will has become fully one with the will of the Logos, and with it has become pure assent to the will of the Father.

“Maximus the Confessor, the great theologian-exegete of this second phase of the development of Christological dogma, has illustrated those references to the prayer of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, which we have already seen in the previous meditation, as the most clear expressions of the singular relationship of Jesus with God. In effect, in such prayer we can, so to speak, look into the inner life of the Word become man. We can see it in that phrase which remains the measure and model of all effective prayer: “Not what I will, but who thou wilt’ (Mk. 14, 36). The human will of Jesus enters into the will of the Son. By doing so, it receives the identity of the Son, which consists in entire subordination of the I to the Thou, in the giving and transferring of the I to the Thou: this is the mode of being of the one who is pure relations and pure act. When the `I’ gives itself to the `Thou,’ freedom originates, because the `form of God’ has been assumed.

"But we can also describe this process, and describe it better, from the other side: the Logos so humbles himself that he adopts a man’s will as his own and addresses the Father with te I of this human being; he transfers his own I to this man and thus transforms human speech into the eternal Word, into his blessed `Yes,’ Father.’ By imparting his own I, his own identity, to this human being, he liberates him, redeems him, makes him God. Now we can take the real meaning of `God has become man’ in both hands, as it were: the Son transforms the anguish of a man into his own filial obedience, the speech of the servant into the Word which is the Son.

“In the unity of wills of which we have spoken is attained the greatest conceivable transformation of any person, which is at the same time the one thing ultimately desirable: divinization. Thus the prayer which enters into the prayer of Jesus, and which in the body of Christ becomes the prayer of Jesus Christ, can be defined as the `laboratory’ of freedom. Here, and in no other place occurs that profound change in a person which we need for the world to become better. Only on this road in fact does conscience attain its full rectitude and an irresistible strength. And only from this conscience can be born again that order in human affairs which corresponds to human dignity and which can defend it: an order which in every generation must be sought afresh by a vigilant human conscience, so that the Kingdom of God may come, a kingdom which God alone can build.”[7]

Ascension: Presence, not Absence

Ratzinger:

“(T)he disciples returned to Jerusalem ‘with great joy’ (Lk 24, 52). They knew that what had occurred was not a departure; if it were, they would hardly have experienced ‘great joy.’ No, in their eyes the Ascension and the Resurrection were one and the same event. This event gave them the certainty that the crucified Jesus was alive; that he had overcome death, which cuts man off from God, the Living One; and that the door to eternal life was henceforth forever open.

“For the disciples, then, the ‘ascension’ was not what we usually misinterpret it as being: the temporary absence of Christ from the world. It meant rather his new, definitive, and irrevocable presence by participation in God’s royal power. This is why Johannine theology for practical purposes identifies the Resurrection and the return of Christ (e.g., 14, 18 ff.); with the resurrection of Jesus, by reason of which he is now with his disciples forevermore, his return has already begun.”[8]

Presence as “Word”

“That Luke did not have an essentially different understanding of the situation is again clear from today’s reading. In it Christ rebuffs the disciples’ question about the restoration of the kingdom and instead tells them that they will receive the Holy Spirit and be his, Jesus,’ witnesses to the ends of the earth. Therefore they are not to remain staring into the future or to wait broodingly for the time of his return. No, they are to realize that he is ceaselessly present and even that he desires to become ever more present through their activity inasmuch as the gif of the Spirit and the commission to bear witness, preach, and be missionaries are the way in which he is now already present. The proclamation of the Good News everywhere in the world is – we may say ion the basis of this passage – the way in which, during the period between the Resurrection and the second coming, the Lord gives expression to his royal rule over all the world, as he exercises his lordship in the humble form of the world.

“Christ exercises his power through the powerlessness of the word by which he calls human beings to faith.[9]

“If I Go, I Will Send Him To You”

The way that Christ continues to be present in the most real way consists in each of us becoming Christ. This is the reason for the sending of the Spirit. The profound truth is that Christ is the meaning of man as prototype. Gaudium et Spes #22 reads: “In reality it is only in the mystery of the Word made flesh that the mystery of man truly becomes clear. For Adam, the first man, was a type of him who was to come, Christ the Lord, Christ the new Adam, in the very revelation of the mystery of the Father and of his love, fully reveals man to himself and brings to light his most high calling.” The footnote to point on Tertullian reads: “For in all the form which was moulded in the clay, Christ was in his thoughts as the man who to be.” Since the Being of Christ as Logos is total relationality to the Father, and the Council has formulated that relationality in Gaudium et Spes #24 as “man, the only earthly being that God has willed for itself, finds himself by the sincere gift of himself,” when the human person makes that sincere gift of self, he begins to be transformed in ipse Christus. The Christological Gestalt of the transformation of man into Christ is the radical relationality of self-gift.

Since man without Christ can do nothing – nihil posse - , the Ascension to the Father involves the sending of the Spirit Who, in Himself, is Person-gift. It is the Spirit Who gives us the power and the act of self-giving and transforms us into Christ Himself, Who then, in turn, continues to be present “disguised as us” in the midst of secular society. Concerning the physiognomy of the Spirit, John Paul II wrote: “It can be said that in the Holy Spirit the intimate life of the Triune God becomes totally gift, an exchange of mutual love between the divine Persons, and that through the Holy Spirit, God exists in the mode of gift. It is the Holy Spirit who is the personal expression of this self-giving, of this being-love. He is Person-Love. He is Person-Gift. Here we have an inexhaustible treasure or the reality and an inexpressible deepening of the concept of person in God, which only divine Revelation makes known to us.”[10]

And consider this: If the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, and if the Son, ascended to throne at the right hand of the Father is the Incarnate Logos Jesus Christ, then the Holy Spirit proceeds as “spirated” from the very Body of Jesus Christ. The total immateriality of the Person of the Spirit proceeds from the matter of the Son. This boggles the Gnostic imagination and demands that we rethink our understanding of the Incarnation and the meaning of the material world.

Secularity

Secularity refers to the freedom of autonomy of the human will of the Christ. That human will is perfected in its human freedom by becoming the will of the divine Person-Subject of the Logos Who exercises it. Hence, "The Crucified Christ reveals the authentic meaning of freedom; he lives it fully in the total gift of himself and calls his disciples to share in his freedom."[11] Secularity is that freedom of autonomy that we exercise as baptized into Christ’s Person, and therefore into His freedom. We are also called to personally master-ourselves as the supreme exercise of freedom, in order to get possession of ourselves to conform to the truth of the human person in Christ, and thus to make the gift. Such exercise of freedom is the meaning of “secularity.” See Gaudium et Spes #36 and “Christifideles laici” #15.

This presence of Christ after the Ascension will be overwhelmingly “secular” (that is not secularism which is equal to atheism: there is not God). Most recently in his “Opening Address for Aparecida Conference,” Benedict XVI remarked:

“This political task [creating political and economic structures] is not the immediate competence of the Chruch. Respect for a healthy secularity – including the pluralism of political opinions – is essential in the authentic Christian tradition. If the Church were to start transforming herself into a directly political subject, she would do less, not more, for the poor and for justice, because she would lose her independence and her moral authority, identifying herself with a single political path and with debatable partisan positions. The Chruch is the advocate of justice and of the poor, precisely because she does not identity with politicians nor with partisan interests. Only by remaining independent can she teach the great criteria and inalienable values, guide consciences and offer a life choice that goes beyond the political sphere. To form consciences, to be the advocate of justice and truth, to educate in individual and political virtues: that s the fundamental vocation of the Church in this area. And lay Catholics must be aware of their responsibilities in public life: they must be present in the formation of the necessary consensus and in opposition to injustice."[12]

The Gift of Self: Exaltation on the Cross

“For John… the mystery of Good Friday, of Easter, and of Christ’s Ascension form but a single mystery. The cross has a second, mysterious dimension: it is the royal throne from which Christ exercises his kingship and draws the human race to himself and into his wide-open arms (cf. Jn. 3, 14; 8, 28; 12, 32-33). Christ’s royal throne is the cross; his exaltation takes the form of what seems to the outsider the extreme of disgrace and humiliation."






[1] R. Guardini, The Lord, Regnery (1954) 412.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid. 413.
[4] Ibid 413.
[5] J. Ratzinger, “Dogma and Preaching,” Franciscan Herald Press (1985) 63.
[6] Ratzinger comments: “The central distinction which is fundamental to the Council (and which has received scant attention up to now) was worked out by Maximus the Confessor: he distinguishes the Thelema Physikon which belongs to the naturae and thus exists separately in Christ’s godhead and manhood, from the `gnomic’ thelema `which is identical with the liberum arbitrium and pertain to the person; in Christ it can only be a single thelema, since he subsists in the divine Person’ (Beck 41). Thus `much that had earlier been regarded as Monophysite… could be taken into spiritually’ (Beck 43). Once this basic idea of Constantinople III, which is central to Neo-Chalcedonian Christology, based on Pannenberg, are futile, resting on a misunderstanding. In Theo. Berichte 2, 29, Wiederkehr speaks of the `symmetrical path of the two-natures doctrine’ under the influence of the `two wills’ decision and thinks that it resulted from the idea `of an internal Christological dialogue… between a divine and a human nature.’ Thus he can rightly object that `there is nothing of this in the Jesus of the synoptics.’ `As far as the man Jesus is concerned, his dialogue partner is the Father, not his own self in his divine nature and person.’ This assertion, which he opposes to Neo-Chalcedonism, is in fact precisely the view of Constantinople III, except that the latter works out its ontological and existential structure very much more thoroughly than Widerkehr. Pannenberg (Jesus, God and Man, 1968) formulates it thus: “`Person’ is a relational concept, and, because the relation of Jesus to the Father in his dedication to him is identical with the eternal Person of the Son of God’ (339). It seems to me, if I read him correctly, that Pannenberg too fails to see that he is thinking along the same lines as Constantinople III (and Maximus the Confessor). In fact he is concentrating rather on the dispute with Leontius of Byzantium. From this point of view… etc., etc.
[7] Josef Ratzinger, “Journey Towards Easter,” Crossroad (1987) 88-91.
[8] J. Ratzinger, “Dogma and Preaching,” op. cit. 64.
[9] Idem.
[10] John Paul II, “Dominum et Vivificantem” #10.
[11] John Paul II, “Veritatis Splendor” #85.
[12] Benedict XVI, “Not Only the Continent of Hope, but Also the Continent of Love!” Aparecida, Brazil, May 13, 2007, 4.

Michael Waldstein's "Introduction" to John Paul II's Archives on "The Theology of the Body" (TOB)

The "Spousal" as Gaudium et Spes # 24: “Man… Finds Himself by the Sincere Gift of Himself”

Connection between Benedict’s “Deus Charitas Est” and TOB:

Waldstein says: “TOB is at its core an attempt to read precisely this language (“God is Love”) in the spousal mystery (Eph 5).

`This mystery is great; I say this with reference to Christ and the Church’ (Eph 5, 32). In the overall context of Ephesians and further in the wider context of the words of Sacred Scripture, which reveal God’s salvific plan “from the beginning,” one can see that here the term “Mysterion” signifies the mystery first hidden in God’s mind and later revealed din man’s history. Given its importance, the mystery is “great” indeed: as God’s salvific plan for humanity, that mystery is in some sense the central theme of the whole of revelation, its central reality. It is what God as Creator and Father wishes above all to transmit to mankind in his Word. (TOB 93:2)

“Of all the works of John Paul II, TOB is the most direct, profound, and extensive analysis of ‘what God… wishes above all to transmit to human beings in his Word..’ Just as TOB is the catechesis among John Paul II’s catecheses, so it is the reading of the divine meaning of Scripture among all his readings. The encyclical Dominum et Vivificantem on the Holy Spirit comes perhaps closest to TOB since it contains an extensive meditation on the Gospel of John, particularly on the mystery that ‘God is love.’

“In his intimate life, God ‘is love,’ the essential love shared by the three divine Persons: personal love is the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of the Father and the Son. Therefore he ‘searches even the depths of God,’ as uncreated Love-Gift. It can be said that in the Holy Spirit the intimate life of the Triune God becomes totally gift, an exchange of mutual love between the divine Persons and that through the Holy Spirit, God exists in the mode of gift. It is the Holy Sprit who is the personal expression of this self-giving, of this being-love. He is Person-Love. He is Person-Gift. Here we have an inexhaustible treasure of the reality and an inexpressible deepening of the concept of person in God, which only divine revelation makes known to us. (Dominum et Vivificantem, 10)

“This Trinitarian core of John Paul II’s vision can be traced back to Karol Wojtyla’s encounter as a young man with the poetry and theology of St. John of the Cross."




2. Wojtyla’s Carmelite Personalism

a. Gaudium et Spes, 24:3, and the Sanjuanist Triangle

Pascal Ide has traced Gaudium et Spes, 24:3, through John Paul II’s vast literary output and shown that it plays a key role in the comprehensive theology of gift developed by John Paul II, particularly Man and Woman He Created Them. This passage from Gaudium et Spes reads: ‘Indeed, the Lord Jesus, when he prays to the Father, that all may be one… as we are one’ (Jn. 17:21-22) and thus offers vistas closed to human reason, indicates a certain likeness between the union of the divine Persons and the union of God’s sons in truth and love. This likeness shows that man, who is the only creature on earth which God willed for itself, cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of self; cf. Lk 17:33” (24:3). Two fundamental principles are contained in the last sentence of this text. First, God wills human beings for their own sake, for their good. Persons should thus not be used as mere means. [Me: This is the most profound formulation of human freedom. Freedom does not primarily nor predominantly mean “choice.” It means, as in this formulation, self-mastery. We cannot master ourselves if we have not first been loved [which means “Grace” {that is divine Love}]. Wojtyla calls this principle ‘the personalistic norm.’ Second, persons can only find themselves in a sincere gift of self.

The Triangle (Sic)

(1) To love is to give oneself (lower left of triangle); (2) The spousal love of man and woman is the paradigmatic case of a total gift of self in our experience (Lower right of triangle); (3) The Trinity is the exemplar of love and gift (apex of the Triangle). (The blog would not take the triangle diagram )

“The first point on this triangle is a general account of love as a gift of self. From this point, one line extends horizontally to the thesis that the gift of self is present with particular completeness in the spousal love between man and woman. Another line extends upward diagonally, to the analogous application of the same account of love to the Trinity. Love and Gift take place in complete fullness in the begetting of the Son and the procession of the Sprit (See Dominum et Vivificantem, 10, just qute above). The descending line from point three to point two represents the thesis that communion between created persons, particularly the communion of spousal love between man and woman, flows as an image from God’s own Trinitarian communion.

Gaudium et Spes, 24:3, expanded in this way by a characteristic triangle, constitutes the very core of Wojtyla/John Paul II’s philosophical and theological personalism. Wojtyla first encountered this personalism in the works of St. John of the Cross. The later encounter with the personalism of Kant and the very different personalism of Scheler enriched this Carmelite point of departure, but left its fundamental structure intact. The fundamental structure of Kant’s personalism, and of Scheler’s as well, is different. Wojtyla adopted neither the one nor the other.

b. Wojtyla’s Encounter with St. John of the Cross:

“In 1941, one year a before he entered the underground seminary of Krakow, Karol Wojtyla, twenty-one years old, and a student of Polish literature, had a profound encounter with St. John of the Cross. The Gestapo played an instrumental and, in retrospect, historic role in bringing about this encounter. Hitler stripped Polish parishes of most of their priests in order to break the backbone of Polish religious and intellectual resistance. Consequently, Wojtyla came under the spiritual guidance of a layman, Jan Tyranowski, who introduced him to St. John of the Cross.”[1]

Wojtyla’s Personal Account of Jan Tyranowski

“But was it really necessary to accept Jan himself before accepting what he brought to us? Jan simply proclaimed the truth about the full supernatural life of man, which is but the fulfillment of the riches of our Faith. These truths were well known from catechism, from books, from sermons. Did Jan really proclaim anything new? This is the very thing that Jan did not proclaim, did not teach, officially. Jan merely harvested souls, in the full meaning of that term. He wanted these souls to accept the truths of religion anew, but not as prohibitions and limitations. He wanted to elicits from the supernatural resources which he knew existed within all souls, the real form of the supernatural life of man; a life that, through the grace of God, becomes participation in the life of God.

“That was the difficulty of his endeavor. Imagine, if you will, these young people who judged Jan quite skeptically, who carried within them an inflated concept of their own self-sufficiency and arrogance typical of their age. And each one of them asked: what does this man want of me? What is it that he finds lacking in me? For it became apparent very quickly that Jan was demanding something of them, of their lives, their convictions, their emotions, their attitudes. At first it was not easy to determine what it was that he demanded. The truth about the new, fuller interior life, a truth which Jan already possessed, was totally unknown to them. This was not a question of a lecture, of learning some new facts, but of reforming one’s life and attitudes – a life which, until now, seemed quite good, virtually perfect, inviolable, impervious to all external influences, especially the influence of some overly pious old man. Each of us tenaciously challenged the truth of Jan’s words and was reluctant to overcome his reservations, whether they sprang from reason, emotions or other sources. It was a long-lasting effort in which the processes of Grace were activated in young souls and fulfilled through contact with the interior life of this good, simple man. His inner life was like an anchor beyond his words; it explained his actions, it drew us to him despite all of our reservations and resistance. His words often offended us, not because they were inappropriate, but because they were so unoriginal, because our self-esteem was hurt by the realization of the gulf separating his inner life from ours. He showed us God much more immediately than any sermons or books; he proved to us that God could not only be studied, but also lived. But, above all, he surprised us with facts. Undoubtedly, there is a great difference between what is proclaimed by an apostle and what is proclaimed by anyone else. First of all, there is a difference in the attitude and capabilities of the listener. The apostle must be – and is – concerned with at least an incipient change in the listener. And this change is not a consequence of reasoned arguments, but the result of a Grace that transcends mere words. And how much harder is it to convince where the desired result is not only the acceptance of truth, but also the change of one’s ego, the transcendence of the self.

“That is what was special about Jan, something that made you feel that this man transcended the processes of grace. I repeat: he surprised us with the accomplished fact. Despite all the resistance, reservations and prejudice against his words, the way he expressed himself, or the thoughts that he wrote down about the interior life (which in reality consisted in copying passages from books on spirituality), there arose a certain necessity t to give in to his internal truth and to imitate the life which he himself lived and to which he was the apostle….

“The main element of his interior life, however, was contemplation. For him, this did not mean a reasoned analysis of God’s truths, a pure thought exercise. His aim was to become enamored of the subject under contemplation, he sought not a dry exercise of the mind, but a full exercising of the spirit…

“He was an apostle of God’s greatness, God’s beauty, and God’s transcendence. This he learned from his spiritual guide, St. John of the Cross. God exists within us not so we can stifle Him in the narrow confines of our human spirit; God is within us to tear us away from ourselves toward His supernatural transcendence. That was also the main goal of Jan’s strivings. In this he was the strongest, the clearest, the most convincing, the most apostolic. God is within us. Jan knew this. One could often meet him along the banks of the Wisla (Vistula River), or in his own home, explaining to some young listeners the essence of God’s virtues, the methods of mediation or the mysteries of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Theoretically these lectures were less than perfect…

“Our last experience of Jan for us was his illness and death. But first a few more details about his person.

“This man was not a fiction or a symbol, but a real living person…He lived in Krakow, in Debniki, at 15 Rozana Street. He was born in 1900 and died in March of 1947… His family was of a typical suburban middle class. His father and brother Edward died before Jan did – and his mother died even as he lay on his own deathbed. It is worth noting that Jan’s demeanor, for example the way he wore his watch, his expressions, all of the many details that reflect the social environment, were totally consistent with that environment. The entire difference was hidden within, and it was from within that all his external habits obtained their particular character. Jan guided his inner life according to the book Mistyka by Fr. Semenenko. Later, however, St. John of the Cross and ST. Theresa of the Child Jesus became his chief spiritual masters. They were not only his masters, they let him to discover himself, they explained and justified his own life.
“Jan’s death was indeed a form of self-sacrifice. Jan approached it consciously; he wished it and prayed for it…[2]

The Revealed Difference Between Love (Ερος) and Self-Gift (Αγάπη): Jn 21: 4

The encounter takes place on the shore of the Lake of Tiberias. John the Evangelist recounts the conversation between Jesus and Peter in that circumstance. There is a very significant play on words.

In Greek, the word "fileo" means the love of friendship, tender but not all-encompassing; instead, the word "agapao" means love without reserve, total and unconditional. Jesus asks Peter the first time: "Simon... do you love me (agapas-me)" with this total and unconditional love (Jn 21: 15)?

Prior to the experience of betrayal, the Apostle certainly would have said: "I love you (agapo-se) unconditionally". Now that he has known the bitter sadness of infidelity, the drama of his own weakness, he says with humility: "Lord; you know that I love you (filo-se)", that is, "I love you with my poor human love". Christ insists: "Simon, do you love me with this total love that I want?". And Peter repeats the response of his humble human love: "Kyrie, filo-se", "Lord, I love you as I am able to love you". The third time Jesus only says to Simon: "Fileis-me?", "Do you love me?".

Simon understands that his poor love is enough for Jesus, it is the only one of which he is capable, nonetheless he is grieved that the Lord spoke to him in this way. He thus replies: "Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you (filo-se)".

Affirmation

This is to say that Jesus has put himself on the level of Peter, rather than Peter on Jesus' level! It is exactly this divine conformity that gives hope to the Disciple, who experienced the pain of infidelity.

From here is born the trust that makes him able to follow [Christ] to the end: "This he said to show by what death he was to glorify God. And after this he said to him, "Follow me'" (Jn 21: 19).

From that day, Peter "followed" the Master with the precise awareness of his own fragility; but this understanding did not discourage him. Indeed, he knew that he could count on the presence of the Risen One beside him.

From the naïve enthusiasm of initial acceptance, passing though the sorrowful experience of denial and the weeping of conversion, Peter succeeded in entrusting himself to that Jesus who adapted himself to his poor capacity of love. And in this way he shows us the way, notwithstanding all of our weakness. We know that Jesus adapts himself to this weakness of ours.

We follow him with our poor capacity to love and we know that Jesus is good and he accepts us.
It was a long journey for Peter that made him a trustworthy witness, "rock" of the Church, because he was constantly open to the action of the Spirit of Jesus. Peter qualifies himself as a "witness of the sufferings of Christ as well as a partaker in the glory that is to be revealed" (I Pt 5: 1). When he was to write these words he would already be elderly, heading towards the end of his life that will be sealed with martyrdom. He will then be ready to describe true joy and to indicate where it can be drawn from: the source is believing in and loving Christ with our weak but sincere faith, notwithstanding our fragility.

He would therefore write to the Christians of his community, and says also to us: "Without having seen him you love him; though you do not now see him you believe in him and rejoice with unutterable and exalted joy. As the outcome of your faith you obtain the salvation of your souls" (I Pt 1: 8-9).[3]


[1] John Paul II, “Man and Woman He Created Them, A Theology of the Body” Translation, Introduction, and Index by Michael Waldstein, Pauline Books and Media (2006) 22-24.
[2] Adam Boniecki, MIC, “The Making of the Pope of the Millennium, Kalendarium of the Life of Karol Wojtyla,” Marian Press, Stockbridge, Mass (2000) 66-70.
[3] Benedict XVI General Audience, Wednesday, 24, May 2006.

The "Invention" (Finding) of the Holy Cross

Today’s feast is double. It is the feast of the finding of the Holy Cross, and the feast of the apostles Philip and James. The two feasts merge in that Philip and James, as well as the other apostles except John (thanks to Our Lady) fled from the crucifixion for fear. They loved with the imperfect love of Filein, not with the perfect love of self-gift to death that is Agapao. However, both were loved by Jesus Christ who asked no more from them at the present moment than the weak and traitorous love of mere friendship. In the lives of these Apostles, the divine vocation was compatible with the limitations common to all men. Sometimes they were pig-headed and obstinate, with their fair share of human outlook, like the other Apostles. The Lord had to form them bit by bit, with infinite patience. St. John tells us in his Gospel that when Christ was ready to do the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, he asked Philip, Whence are we to buy bread for these people to eat? In saying this, he was putting him to the test; he himself knew well enough what he meant to do. Philip answered according to purely human reasoning: Two hundred silver pieces would not buy enough bread for them, even to give each a little.”

Sacred Scripture often shows us other weaknesses that the Apostles had: petty earthly ambitions, discouragement at difficulties, lack of faith… Nonetheless, because they were simple, their defects were slowly filed down. Thus they prepared themselves to cooperate with our Lord in his mission of redemption. Philip ended by preaching the Gospel in Phrygia where he was crucified and martyred. In his old age, James was thrown from the pinnacle of the Temple in Jerusalem. The memory of these Apostles must fill us with confidence. We too have weaknesses and defects, but we can count on the powerful help of grace and we shall conquer them.

The Cross

On the occasion of this feast of the finding of the Holy Cross, St. Josemaria said:

“The Lord has given us the system to follow in Opus Dei so that the cross that he himself imposes on us, or which he allows circumstances things or persons around us to impose on us, that the cross that he has made for us, does not weigh upon us. And that system is to love without allowing it to fall and without dragging it. It means embracing adversities whether they be internal or external, and realizing that they all have their purpose and that they are all a wonderful treasure.

“When one walks where Christ walks when there is no longer mere resignation but the soul conforms itself to the cross, when the soul takes on the form of the cross, then one loves God’s will, when one wants the cross, then the cross no longer weighs, then the cross is no longer mine but his, and he carries it with me.
“To find the cross is to find Christ. And with him there is always joy even when on e is faced with injustice, misunderstanding or physical suffering. This is why, even though I understand that it is an ordinary way of speaking, I become upset when I hear adversity, which often springs from one’s own pride, called a cross. That is not the cross. That is not the true cross because it is to Christ’s cross. I have never felt sorry for myself, though the Lord has sent me plenty of sorrows. Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord, because you have given me an asceticism that is yours, because you have made me understand that to have the cross is to have joy. It means possessing you.”

It is only by finding the Holy Cross that we pass from that immature love that masks an ever present egoism that is capable of a love of friendship that is always potentially traitor and fraud – to the mature love of Christ that is persevering to the point of death for the other. Today we celebrate the physical discovery of that cross.

Golgotha Covered by Two Pagan Temples

The Emperor Hadrian (117-138) had the dip in the ground that separated Golgotha from the Sepulcher filled in, and on this new platform had two temples built, one dedicated to Juno over the Sepulcher, and the other to Venus, on the summit of Golgotha. Hadrian is known to have felt great animosity towards Christianity at the end of his life, and it is almost certain that these temples were built especially to destroy for ever the earthly traces of the Redemption.Early Church historians commented ironically on the paradoxical results of the pagans’ efforts with the passage of time. “Poor men!” exclaimed Eusebius of Caesarea. “They thought it was possible to hide from the human race the splendor of the sun that had risen over the world! They did not yet understand that it is impossible to keep hidden under earth Him who has won the victory over death!” 1 Indeed, by the fourth century, when the Church finally enjoyed freedom, these two pagan temples enabled the Holy Places to be located unfailingly. All that had to be done was demolish the temples and excavate underneath, and the Holy Sepulcher and the summit of Calvary were revealed.

St. Helena

The driving force behind the rediscovery of the places of our Lord’s Passion was the Empress St Helena, who traveled to the Holy Land in 326. She was the mother of the Emperor Constantine and was already advanced in years – she must have been around 80 by that time. But she did not want to die without having prayed in the land where the Lord had lived, died and risen. We have little information about St Helena’s early life. She was probably a native of Bithynia, and of humble origin. St Ambrose says that she was a stabularia – possibly meaning a servant at an inn – before her marriage to Constantius Chlorus in the year 273. Their son Constantine was born the following year. Constantius was an ambitious officer in the Roman army, who achieved the rank of joint Emperor in 293. That same year he repudiated his wife, who was not of noble blood, and Helena remained under a cloud until her son Constantine bestowed the title of Empress on her in 306. By that time Helena was already a Christian, and she used her privileged position to do good, practicing charity towards the poor, and enriching divine worship by all the means in her power. So outstanding were her faith and piety that St Ambrose did not hesitate to sing her praises, calling her a “Great woman, who gave to the Emperor much more than you received from him.” 2On her journey to the Holy Land she was responsible for the building of the first basilicas, that of the Nativity in Bethlehem and of the Ascension on Mount Olivet. As for Golgotha, when St Helena arrived in Jerusalem the pagan temples had just been demolished, so that the Empress was able to fulfill her dream of kneeling on the ground where our Savior had been raised on the Cross, and praying at the rock of the Holy Sepulcher. However, she realized at once that the most important relics of all had not yet been found.St Ambrose gives us a vivid description of her walking among the ruins of the Roman temples accompanied by soldiers and workmen, and asking herself, “Here is the battleground, but where is the victor’s trophy? Do I sit on a throne, while the Cross of the Lord is buried in the dust? Am I surrounded by gold, and the triumph of Christ by rubble? (…) I see that you have done everything possible, O devil, to bury the sword by which you were brought to naught.” 3

The new excavations ordered by the Empress bore fruit when three crosses were found in the ground near Golgotha, as well as the tablet on which was written in Hebrew, Greek and Latin “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews” (usually represented by the initials of the Latin words, INRI). This was the “invention” or finding (from the Latin invenire, to find) of the Holy Cross of our Lord, which had been hidden for three centuries. The holy Empress left most of the relics in Jerusalem, but she took back with her to Rome three fragments of the True Cross, the tablet with the inscriptions, one of the nails, and some thorns from the crown that the executioners had placed on Jesus’ head. She also had a large amount of earth from Golgotha brought to Rome, and the stone steps from the stairway that our Lord had trodden four times on the day of his Passion, when he was tried before Pilate in the Praetorium.The Sessorian Basilica, or “Sancta Hierusalem”There are many documents dating from the third and fourth centuries that describe how, after St Helena’s visit, the Christians venerated the relics that had been left in Jerusalem. This is attested by Eusebius, Rufinus, Theodoret, and St Cyril of Jerusalem. Egeria (or Aetheria), a woman who went on pilgrimage to the Holy Places in the fourth century, spoke of great crowds of the faithful who, even then, gathered from all the Christian East to take part in the solemn celebrations in honor of the Cross.This Nail, the three fragments of the Cross and the INRI tablet were kept devoutly by St Helena in her imperial palace, the Palatium Sessorianum. Some years later, possibly after his mother’s death, Constantine had a basilica built there which took its name from the palace and was known as the Sessorian Basilica, and also Sancta Hierusalem – Holy Jerusalem. The earth from Golgotha that the Empress Helena had brought from Golgotha was laid down as the symbolic foundation of the building, and the precious fragments of the Holy Cross were displayed for the veneration of the faithful in a reliquary of gold adorned with jewels.Of this first basilica built by Constantine only a few pieces of the outer walls now remain. Another was built in the twelfth century, and this was replaced in its turn by a late Baroque building, completed in 1744, which still stands today. Despite these architectural changes, and other events such as the Barbarian invasions of Rome, a large number of documents testify that the relics now venerated in the basilica are the very same as those brought by St Helena from the Holy Land.

The basilica naturally became the object of devotional visits by the Christian people, and very soon the Good Friday liturgy began to be celebrated there. Until the fourteenth century the Pope in person walked barefoot at the head of the procession from the Lateran Basilica to the Basilica of Santa Croce, to adore the vexilla Regis, the banner of the King and flag of our salvation.

St. Josemaria Escriva

August 4, 1946

St Josemaría went to pray in the Basilica of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme on August 4, 1946. He had been in Rome less than two months, since June 23. Since arriving in the Holy City he had worked intensely, amid the fierce summer heat and in spite of the problems caused by his diabetes, to prepare the documents that had to be presented to the Holy See to obtain the Decretum Laudis, or “Decree of Praise”, for Opus Dei. This would mean the approval of the Work as an institution of pontifical rite, endowed with universal regulations. St Josemaría urgently wished for this approval as it would facilitate Opus Dei’s apostolic expansion, and he put every effort into completing the work in the shortest possible time.On August 4, at a quarter to five in the afternoon, the Cardinal Prefect of the competent dicastery had a meeting with Don Alvaro del Portillo to discuss the dates when the documents could be presented. This was when the Founder of Opus Dei decided to spend that Sunday afternoon praying in the Basilica of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, while Don Alvaro was with the Cardinal.It is easy to guess what St Josemaría’s prayer that afternoon must have been like: a prayer of confident, faith-filled petition, together with the utmost acceptance of God’s Will. There, before the relics of the Passion, he must have thought once again how “finding the Cross of Jesus Christ on our path assures us that we are following in his footsteps.” 4 The Decretum Laudis was finally granted by the Holy See more than six months later, on February 24, 1947. Although this delay made St Josemaría suffer, he accepted it without losing his peace of mind, as an opportunity to embrace the Cross. And he passed on that attitude to his children. “We must always be peaceful and positive about setbacks if they occur, about what people call failures. Success or failure is in the interior life. Success consists of receiving Jesus Christ’s Cross serenely, opening our arms wide to it, because for Jesus and for us, the Cross is a throne, it is the exaltation of love. It is the summit of redeeming effectiveness to bring souls to God, in our own mode as lay-people: with our conversation, our friendship, our work, our words, our doctrine, our prayer and mortification.”5

The Holy Cross Dynamizes Us from “Love of Friendship” (Filein) to “Gift of Self” (Agapao)

Benedict XVI said that the call [to follow Jesus] near the Sea of Galilee, and then the confession of faith: "`You are Christ, the Messiah’" is a confession that is still lacking, initial and yet open. St Peter puts himself on a path of "sequela", following. And so, this initial confession carries within it, like a seed, the future faith of the Church.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

“The school of faith is not a triumphal march but a journey marked daily by suffering and love, trials and faithfulness. Peter, who promised absolute fidelity, knew the bitterness and humiliation of denial: the arrogant man learns the costly lesson of humility. Peter, too, must learn that he is weak and in need of forgiveness. Once his attitude changes and he understands the truth of his weak heart of a believing sinner, he weeps in a fit of liberating repentance. After this weeping he is finally ready for his mission.
On a spring morning, this mission will be entrusted to him by the Risen Christ. The encounter takes place on the shore of the Lake of Tiberias. John the Evangelist recounts the conversation between Jesus and Peter in that circumstance. There is a very significant play on words.
In Greek, the word "fileo" means the love of friendship, tender but not all-encompassing; instead, the word "agapao" means love without reserve, total and unconditional. Jesus asks Peter the first time: "Simon... do you love me (agapas-me)" with this total and unconditional love (Jn 21: 15)?
Prior to the experience of betrayal, the Apostle certainly would have said: "I love you (agapo-se) unconditionally". Now that he has known the bitter sadness of infidelity, the drama of his own weakness, he says with humility: "Lord; you know that I love you (filo-se)", that is, "I love you with my poor human love". Christ insists: "Simon, do you love me with this total love that I want?". And Peter repeats the response of his humble human love: "Kyrie, filo-se", "Lord, I love you as I am able to love you". The third time Jesus only says to Simon: "Fileis-me?", "Do you love me?".
Simon understands that his poor love is enough for Jesus, it is the only one of which he is capable, nonetheless he is grieved that the Lord spoke to him in this way. He thus replies: "Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you (filo-se)".
Affirmation
This is to say that Jesus has put himself on the level of Peter, rather than Peter on Jesus' level! It is exactly this divine conformity that gives hope to the Disciple, who experienced the pain of infidelity.
From here is born the trust that makes him able to follow [Christ] to the end: "This he said to show by what death he was to glorify God. And after this he said to him, "Follow me'" (Jn 21: 19).
From that day, Peter "followed" the Master with the precise awareness of his own fragility; but this understanding did not discourage him. Indeed, he knew that he could count on the presence of the Risen One beside him.
From the naïve enthusiasm of initial acceptance, passing though the sorrowful experience of denial and the weeping of conversion, Peter succeeded in entrusting himself to that Jesus who adapted himself to his poor capacity of love. And in this way he shows us the way, notwithstanding all of our weakness. We know that Jesus adapts himself to this weakness of ours.
We follow him with our poor capacity to love and we know that Jesus is good and he accepts us.”[1]
It was a long journey for Peter that made him a trustworthy witness, "rock" of the Church, because he was constantly open to the action of the Spirit of Jesus. Peter qualifies himself as a "witness of the sufferings of Christ as well as a partaker in the glory that is to be revealed" (I Pt 5: 1). When he was to write these words he would already be elderly, heading towards the end of his life that will be sealed with martyrdom. He will then be ready to describe true joy and to indicate where it can be drawn from: the source is believing in and loving Christ with our weak but sincere faith, notwithstanding our fragility.
He would therefore write to the Christians of his community, and says also to us: "Without having seen him you love him; though you do not now see him you believe in him and rejoice with unutterable and exalted joy. As the outcome of your faith you obtain the salvation of your souls" (I Pt 1: 8-9).





--Notes1. Eusebius of Caesarea, De Vita Constantini, 3, 16.2. St Ambrose, De Obitu Theodosii, 41.3. St Ambrose, De Obitu Theodosii, 43-444. St Josemaría Escrivá, Letter 14 February 1944, 19.5. St Josemaría Escrivá, Letter 31 May 1954, 30.

[1] Benedict XVI, General Audience, Wednesday, 24 May 2006.

Anniversay of the Dedication of the Prelatic Church of Opus Dei: May 2, 1986

Opus Dei is analogical to a diocese (the difference being that Opus Dei is not geographical but "personal"). As a diocese instantiates the Universal Church in a geographical territory with a cathedral church, the See of the bishop, so also Opus Dei has a "personal" church - Santa Maria de la Paz - encompassing the tomb of the person of the founding Prelate, St. Josemaria Escriva, endued in his successors with episcopal powers.

* * * * * *

The significance of the solemn dedication of the Prelatic Church, Our Lady of Peace, at the headquarters of Opus Dei in Rome rests on the fact that Opus Dei as a personal prelature is analogous to a diocese (particular Church) and therefore has a prelatic Church with a prelatic See. It is not a diocese and therefore does not locate the universal Church in a geographical location, but because it is analogous to a diocese it does have its church and see. The Prelature being "personal" and not geographical, the oratory Santa Maria de la Paz was chosen because it contains the personal remains of the Founder, St. Josemaria Escriva.

When all is said and done, “Opus Dei, as a Christian community, is not a particular Church, but rather a transdiocesan, universal convocation of the faithful that transcends particular Churches because the authority of the Prelate is not sacramental conferred by a juridical act of the Pope. If the authority were sacramental, it would be limited to a specific geographical region. As it hangs off the sacramental reality of the papacy, it is universal and transdiocesan in scope. However, it is episcopal in function in that it convokes, engenders [as a "Father"] and directs the ontological reality of the communio that is Opus Dei comprised of both laity and ministerial priests that are unum in vocation, free and autonomous in secular, professional life, and directed to a common apostolic mission in all the dioceses. Because of this, it has been fitting that the Prelate be consecrated a bishop and pertain to the college of bishops. Concluding then, as dioceses have cathedral churches for the bishop, by analogy to dioceses (particular churches), Opus Dei has its own Prelatic Church.

Opus Dei’s internal structure replicates “the aboriginal relationship obtaining in the Church between christifideles- called to live out the requirements and implications of their baptism – and sacred ministers, who bring in… the ‘ministerial’ consequences of the sacrament of Order.”[1] In the words of St. Josemaria Escriva, “Opus Dei is a little bit of the Church.”[2]

Opus Dei: “Analogous” to a Particular Church (Diocese)

This “aboriginal relationship” of baptized laity and ordained ministerial priests has historically taken the form of “particular churches,” principally dioceses. Rodriguez says “the particular Church, precisely since it is an element of the ‘Church’s essential structure’… historically takes a variety of forms de iure ecclesiastico) those described by canon 368: diocese, territorial prelatures, and so forth). These forms pertain to the Church’s definite et mutabilis form, and the communion of all of them in the universal Church makes up the Corpus Ecclesiarum of Vatican II.”

Rodriguez goes on: “The ‘eminent’ character of the particular Church makes of it a natural analogue for understanding theologically those other institutions that, without being particular Churches, do respond to the structural element ‘christifideles/sacred ministry.’ These other forms of Christian community are structurally canonical creations (de iure ecclesiastico) that thus represent an historical development of the oft-cited structural dimension of the Church (‘christifideles/sacred ministry’). As we have seen, this dimension is certainly primary, basic, aboriginal (de iure divino)”[3] (emphasis mine).

In the case of Opus Dei, the Church “has discerned the foundational charism and the social arrangement immanent in the Christian community born of that charism”[4] (emphasis mine).

Opus Dei: Not a Particular Church, But Personal Prelature

Rodriguez says: “Opus Dei is not a particular Church, but is has in common with the particular Church a certain level of ‘theological substance.’”[5] That “theological substance” is the sacramental, and therefore ontological, reality of laity and priests that form a communio of the two as constitutively interdependent and forming the secular reality of the Body of Christ. I say “secular” because of the “theonomous” freedom that derives from the human will of Christ as the true will of the divine Logos. The human will of Jesus of Nazareth never ceased to be human and free when assumed by the divine Person of the Logos. On the contrary, it became fully itself ("compenetrated") as human free will in the Son’s obedience with it to the Father in His death on the Cross. That freedom of autonomy or “theonomy” is our freedom as baptized and ordained into His priesthood of Self-gift -- freedom, of course, meaning the freedom of the divine Person as Self-gift to the Father. That freedom is revealed in its fullness in Christ crucified (Self-gift) to which we as laymen and priests are called.[6]

It is critical to understand that the Prelate of Opus Dei, although he has episcopal powers by juridical act of the Pope, does not situate the universal Church in a geographical place. “Rather, his role is to gather faithful and priest in Opus Dei in order to carry out its own particular apostolic mission, which is one of a universal scope...”[7] However, because the primary mission of the Prelate is to generate sons and daughters as laity and priests into the self-gift of the communio that is the Work, his most important task as Prelate is to be “Father.” Hence, “what is decisive is neither his ‘jurisdiction’ nor their obedience. Rather, what truly defines Opus Dei’s prelate is his ‘fatherhood,’ his role as a pastor who is a father to all the Prelature’s faithful… The prelate’s role in the life of Opus Dei deeply configures the prelature.”[8]

The core understanding of the particular Church demands that we back up to the reality of the Church Herself. What is she? Benedict at one point said that the Church is not a “what” but a “who:” “The Church is not an apparatus, nor a social institution, nor one social institution among many others. It is a person. It is a woman. It is a Mother. It is alive.”[9] The Church is a “who” as the “space” in which the “I” of Christ is engendered.

Hence, there is no salvation outside of the Church because there is no salvation outside of Christ. The Church, the true Church, is Jesus Christ Himself who is both God and man. There is only salvation through Him Who is God/man. He as God/man reveals Himself to be the Bridegroom and the Church is His Bride. The one flesh union of the Bridegroom and the Bride is the Eucharist whereby the Bridegroom becomes the Head and the Bride becomes the Body. The Oneness made up of Head and Body form the one single Whole Christ. The Body that is the Church of Jesus Christ, comprised sacramentally by Baptism and Orders into lay faithful and ministerial priests, “subsists” in the Catholic Church. This needs explanation. Then-Cardinal Ratzinger expatiated:

“Council: 'Subsistit In' Explains Church as Concrete Subject"

"At this point it becomes necessary to investigate the word subsistit somewhat more carefully. With this expression, the Council differs from the formula of Pius XII, who said in his Encyclical Mystici Corporis Christi: 'The Catholic Church "is" (est) the one mystical body of Christ'. The difference between subsistit and est conceals within itself the whole ecumenical problem. The word subsistit derives from the ancient philosophy as later developed in Scholastic philosophy. The Greek word hypostasis that has a central role in Christology to describe the union of the divine and the human nature in the Person of Christ comes from that vision. Subsistere is a special case of esse. It is being in the form of a subject who has an autonomous existence. Here it is a question precisely of this. The Council wants to tell us that the Church of Jesus Christ as a concrete subject in this world can be found in the Catholic Church. This can take place only once, and the idea that the subsistit could be multiplied fails to grasp precisely the notion that is being intended. With the word subsistit, the Council wished to explain the unicity of the Catholic Church and the fact of her inability to be multiplied: the Church exists as a subject in historical reality.”[10]

The development of this “Who” – the “I” of Christ - is the achievement of salvation, or eternal life. This takes place only by the giving of self dynamized by the love of Christ for each one that is called “grace,” that occurs in the communio of the Church. This communio - the "I" of the Church - has as its aboriginal form the relation of lay faithful to priest and priest to layman, or the need of the Church of Mary for the Church of Peter, and the Church of Peter for the Church of Mary.[11] This aboriginal relationship in Opus Dei where both layman and priest have the same vocation (equally sharing in the one priesthood of Christ) to sanctity but are irreducibly different (as male and female) is the “Gestalt” of the Church that is “prior” to the canonically established “religious” life that was a later development.

Chronological Priority of Secularity to the “Religious” Canonical State

Rodriguez: “The ‘personal prelature’ formula, appropriating as it does an institution that expresses the internal dimension of the Church’s basic structure, locates Opus Dei within the order of ecclesial realities prior (emphasis mine) to the historically verified tensions between canonically secular and religious persons or institutions within the Church, with their legal and social consequences. A personal prelature simply indicates that in Opus Dei there is no consecration other than that of character-imprinting sacraments (emphasis mine), which alone, as we have said repeatedly, structure this kind of institution. Opus Dei, as an institution, enjoys the secularity proper to the Church’s hierarchical [meaning: “sacred origin”] institutions. Consequently, all the members of Opus Dei are secular; the lay faithful are ordinary faithful who live their Christian life from the lay or secular status characteristic of all lay people; and the priests incardinated in the Work are simply secular priests, who find their place in the prelature – and therefore in the Church- through the ‘ministeriality’ that structurally defines sacred ministers.”[12]


[1] Pedro Rodriguez, “The Place of Opus Dei in the Church,” Opus Dei in the Church, Scepter (1994) 38.
[2] Ibid 1.
[3] Ibid 45.
[4] Ibid
[5] Ibid 47.
[6] Cf. Veritatis Splendor #85.
[7] Pedro Rodriguez… 55.
[8] Ibid 56.
[9] J. Ratzinger, “The Ecclesiology of Vatican II,” L’Osservatore Romano N. 4 – 23 January 2002, 7.
[10] J. Ratzinger, “Ecclesiology of the Constitution on the Church, Vatican II, ‘Lumen Gentium,’” L’Osservatore Romano, 19, September 2001 pp. 5-8.
[11] See John Paul II, “Mulieris Dignitatem” ftn. #55.
[12] Pedro Rodriguez, op. cit, 42.

How to Handle Rejection: Perseverance!

The following is an historical interchange between an applicant for Harvard Business School – after his rejection - and the Dean:


Dean W. Curie
Chairman, MBA Admissions Board
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, Massachusetts 02163

Dear Dean Currie:

Your rejection letter has been received and given careful consideration. Unfortunately, the number of qualified schools trying to reject me far exceeds the number I am willing not to attend. Therefore, I am sorry that I cannot accept your letter and will be attending Harvard in the fall.

Thank you for you interest in rejecting me. You have my best wishes for success in finding another student to reject for the position which I intend to take. I look forward to seeing you in September.

Sincerely,



* * * * * * * * * * * * * *


Dear…,

Your rejection letter of January 17 has been received and given careful consideration. Unfortunately the number of not quite qualified applicants not accepting our rejection still exceeds the number of places in the class. Therefore, I am sorry that I cannot accept your letter indicating your intention to enroll in the fall.

Thank you for you interest in rejecting our letter. You have my best wishes for finding another school to accept your rejection of their rejection.

Sincerely,



Dean W. Currie


The man was eventually accepted – late.