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The Glory of Mother ChurchAuthor(s): Michael ConnollySource: The Irish Monthly, Vol. 72, No. 857 (Nov., 1944), pp. 458-465Published by: Irish Jesuit ProvinceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20515314 .

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458

The Glory of Mother Church

By MICHAEL CONNOLLY, S.J.

HE ideal love of husband and wife is a form of the love of friendship, of disinterested love. It ranks with mother love amongst the most sacred and ennobling human

affections. It has inspired some of the finest literature and art in the world; it has spurred men and women to heights of achieve

ment which merely selfish endeavour could never scale. Sacred literature has many striki-ng examples of this married love: the love of Jacob for Rachel, the love of the Spouses in the Canticle of Canticles (classic image of the mystical union of God and the soul), the love of Our Lady and St. Joseph. Now when the

Holy Spirit, Inspirer of Sacred Scripture, wishes to bring home to us hbo much Chrlst loves His Church, He clwoses this nost tender, most loyal, most self-sacrificing human devotedness as

His term of comparison. Our Lord and His forerunner, St. John the Baptist, speak of the union of Christ and His Church as a marriage. Indeed, to the mind of St. Paul, marriedr love at its best is but an image of Christ's love for His Church. "Husbands love your wives as Christ also loved the Church" (Eph. v., 25). And he adds immediately how Christ has proved

His love: " He delivered Himself up for His Church." Than which there can be no greater love, Our Lord Himself tells uis

(St. John, xv, 13). When, therefore, we try to grow in knowledge and esteem of the Church, we are merely endeavour ing to fulfil St. Paul's injunction: " Let that mind be in you,

which also was in Christ Jesus " (Philip, ii, 5). To further this endeavour is the purpose of these articles. They are nothing

more than a simple introduction to' the Encyclical Mystici



THE GLORY O MOTHER CHURCH 459

Corporis Christi of Pope Pius XII, who at the beginning of his

letter thus indicates his aim: "It is therefore as in duty bound, Venerable Brethren, as well ass in response to a general desire, that we feel called to display and extol in the eyes of all the beauty, the endowments and the Glory of Mother Church "(8).*

?1

When the present writer, as a very small boy, was learning the penny Catechism; and had as yet but a very vague understanding of the abstract concepts and polysyllabic words which abound in

that little book, he was accustomed to associate the word "Church " (it occurred very frequently in chapters 10 and 11) with an imagination-image of the local parish church. Indeed

at one period he seems to have fancied that the word meant nothing else, and he used woffder to himself wvhich part of the floor hid beneath it the foundation-rock mentioned by Our Lord to St. Peter. He was puzzled that no bump in the smooth pavement betrayed its presence. And this vague image con tinued to haunt his imagination even when he had begun to un derstand that the Church spoken-of in the Catechism was not

just the chief building in the parish, but something much vaster and therefore harder to visualise, indeed " a living temple far

more exalted than any made with hands, a habitation of God in the Spirit " (7). When Catholics outlive their childhood fancies regarding

matters of religion, they do not always take the trouble to sub stituite for them true and adequate notions befitting adult years.

* These numbers refer to the paragraphs of the English translation of Mystici Corporis Christi published by the London C.T.S. Our pages are copiously besprinkled with such references in the hope of inducing the reader to make first-hand acquaintance

with the Encyclical.



460 THE IRISH MONTHLY

Pius XII fears that their adult concept of the Church is some

times not merely inadequate but distorted (8). Even Irish Catholics, though as a rule well-instructed and rarely hostile to the Church, have sometimes never " precised " their ideas bf the

Church. Many an unreflecting. Catholic manages with an ill

defined notion which frequently enough fails to represent some essential and important constituents of the Church's being. For him, the word " Church " evokes the idea of something distiPct from himself, but nevertheless to which he belongs, not in the sense in which the arm belongs to the man, but somewhat as a

group of children pertain to a very proper but somewhat severe governess. He esteems this vigilant guardian of his- good behaviour; he knows she is taking care of him for his own good; he trusts her and, if it came to the point, would, perhaps, die'-for her. But her zeal for the proprieties, her old-fashioned wayv, and what he deems her severity, oppress him and he sometimes permits himself a grumble and a word of criticism of her human shortcomings. He may be imperceptibly confirmed in this view by such expressions as " Church-property ", or by the usage which refers to certain young men as "going on for the Church". So that in his (unreflective) mind the Church becomes. identified with her ruling Order merely, to the exclusion of layfolW like himself who are the objects of that rule. He is prone to confuse the Church with the Clergy, to think that the Church Teaching and Ruling is the Church sans phrase. Oh, no doubt, he knows that the Church is divine, set up by Christ and a very valuable institution; through her ministrations he hopes to save his.soul.

But still like so many useful and necessary things, like medicine and hard work and the police force, she can be on the whole somewhat of a nuisance.



THE GLORY OF MOTHER CHURCH 461

?2

Even the reflective Catholic, who has tried to bring his chief religious concepts into clear focus, has often an incomplete idea of' the nature of the Church. This is not always his own fault. The Church, like her Divine Founder, is both divine and human; like the men who are her members she comprises in her being an invisible and spiritual, as well as a visible element. To lose sight of either element is to fall short of adequate comprehension of the Church (61, 63). Yet we must not wonder if many (even thoughtful) Catholics, are content with this inadequate notion.

Most men find it laborious to penetrate beyond externals. And there is an historical reason why the visible aspect of the Church's teing has, in the past few centuries, been very much emphasised in religious instruction, viz., the need to combat the doctrine of the Protestant Reformers and their successors, that Christ's Church is a merely spiritual, invisible, scarcely-identifiable set of people who are predestined, or in grace (62, 63).

Lesson 10 of the Catechism opens with a definition of the True Church, to which our reflective Catholic refers when he tries to clarify his notions. " The True Church is the Congregation of 411 the faithful, who being baptised, profess the same faith, par take of the same sacraments and are governed by their lawful pastors under one visible head on earth." See how this descrip tion brings out the visible, social structure of the Church. It is the " congregation "-society or human association; the societyp composed of " the Faithful ", i.e., those men, women and

children who are enrolled by the visible rite of being baptised; who not merely inwardly believe but outwardly profess the same Faith; who kneel at the Altar-rails and receive the same Eucharist, bow their penitent heads to the same Absolution, are anointed with the same Chrism and Holy Oil (all outward signs);



4&2 THE IRISH MONTHLY

governed by the same Bishops and by the same Bishop of Rome. .What is in the forefront here but the humaft society, the unio

moralis plurium hominum? It is the same idea which is upper

most in our thoughts when we speak of such and such a convert as being received into the Church, or of such and such an apostate as falling awa,y from the Church. Or, when we say that a certain

government is persecuting the Church, or that the foreign mis sionaries are spreading the Church. It is true that this idea does not represent the Church as a merely human organisation. -For one thing, it does not omit the important detail that this religious

society had Christ, Our Lord, for its Founder, when He began i-t all by gathering disciples around Him (25 s), and preaching the

Kingdom of God, and when He formally constituted it after His Resurrection, making His Apostles its rulers and sending them to teach, govern and sanctify (thereby indicating the special business and aim of this association). But in all this what wve are chiefly concerned with is the fact that the Church is a visible, identifiable organisation of human beings, with a purpose of its

oWn, a Founder of its own, conditions and mode of entry, rulers and rules of its own. And this is all true and important and there is (as we have said) an historical reason why it has been so

muach emphasised. Pius XII is far from underrating this external, visible, organi

sational framework of the-Church of Christ. He deals with it briefly but adequately in that part of the Encyclical where he shows that the Church is a body (14-23). Being arr association ofwmen united for a common purpose which is to be obtained by co-operation, she may truly be called, by a metaphor which is very old and very common, a " moral " body, a " moral " unity. Tbij moral body is visible in its members, rulers, rite of initiation. It has different parts (its members) and different organs (menu bers. with different functirns, systematically co-ordinated). It




hais its means of growth and repair (the Sacraments). Being a

terrestrial body, it has its weak, sickly and even dead menbers. All of which amply justifies the Scriptural comparison of the Church to a body.

?3

Butthe Church is no ordinary moral body. It is the Body of Chirist. That is, as the Holy Father very fully shows (24-57), the association which has Christ for its Founder, Head, Sup porter and Saviour. However, the relation of the Churel to Christ, in virtue of which she is called the Body of Christ, is something more than the mere, extrinsic, juridical relation by which, for instance, the King is called head of the body politic. r'o call attention to this '' something more ", as well as to dis tinguish Christ's Church from His physical Body, hypostatically united to the Word of God (59, 60), Christian usage has added the adjective " mystical ", calling the Church the " Mystical Body of Christ The Pope's Encyclical is chiefly concerned with bringing out the implications of this term " Mystical Body of Christ ". He wishes to underline the inner, spiritual, super natural life of the Church-its greatest glory and title to our esteem. "Just as the framework of our mortal body is indeed a marvellous work of the Creator, yet falls far short of the sublime dignity of our soul, so the structure of the Christian society, proof though it is of the wisdom of its divine Architect, is never theless something of a completely lower order in comparison with the spiritual gifts which enrich it and give it life. . . ." (61).

For the sympathetic non-Catholic, the term "Catholic Church" denotes a venerable, prudently-devised religious organisation which has been, and is still capable of being, a great



464 THE IRISH MONTHLY

power for good in the world, but is no more divine than number less other man--made societies, founded to further moral, cultural or religious aims. A well-known and eloquent formulation of this viewpoint is Macaulay's eulogy of the Church in his essay on

Ranke's History of the Popes. The prestige which the Church to-day enjoys amongst many who are not her children and to

which Pius XII refers once or twice (8, 5, 62), often implies nothing more tlhan this. For Catholics, even when they are not infected by this error of "' naturalism " (9), the word " Church" has come to express directly the visible organisation, and only obliquely the invisible supernatural life which is therein com

municated.* With a view to stressing duly this inner life, mbdern theologians, for instance, Cardinal Franzelin, have gone back to St. Paul's terminology for a definition and have described the Church as "' the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ

? 4

The purpose of the Incarnation was that men might have life and have it more abundantly. 'This was the task of the Son oif Go-d made-man. The work -of the Church is the continuation of that task (12). Christ to-day performs His task through the instrumentality of His Church; she is so intimately united with

Him in this work that St. Paul calls her quite simply " Christ" (5i). This "; conunication of supernatural life " (62) is the

Church's main business, indeed it is her sole, business. It sums up briefly all that mysterious, inner, hidden aspect of the-Church's being which we have 'just spoken of. Despite modern pro pagandists, it is not the Church's primary function to admonish dictators, or to arrange peace terms between warring nations, or

*Cf. Lercher: Institutiones Theol. Dogmdt. (1927)1 vol. 1, n. 383.




even to solve social questions4 The proper and essential task of the Church is to make men sons of God For this she was founded; for this she was equipped. Her success or faildre in any given period or country must be judged in terms of her

accomplishment of this task. Other achievements-often very notable-are accidental to her main activity; they are means or

by-products of that activity. This process of transforming man into the supernatural image of God is the inward life with whieh the Church throbs and to emphasise which Pius XII gives us the "Mystical Body of Christ " as the best description of the

Church (13). For the Church is called " Body of Christ " not merely because she is an association (a moral body) having Christ for its Founder and Ruler, but also because her living members are quickened by the divine life imparted to them by Christ. " From Him flows into the Body of the Church all the. light which divinely illumines those who believe, and all the grace which makes them holy as He himself is holy" (47).

(,To be continued.)



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