I am early into my second reading of the Lord of the Rings. The first time I read the story was when I was in seminary. I remember being blown away, almost daily, by the power of the story, the imagery, and the Catholic theology intricately woven in the narrative.

What I did not realize was that when I would read it again, the Catholic theology would be even more evident that it had been at my initial reading.

Today, I want to briefly draw your attention to an overlooked scene at the end of the Fellowship of the Ring.1

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The fractured fellowship, after suffering the deadly blow of losing Gandalf in the Mines of Moria in his fight against the Balrog, finally finds a brief respite in the angelic woods of Lórien. In their initial encounter with the Elves, and the harsh words from Gimli to Haldir, and the compromise to have the entire company blindfolded as they walk towards the Lord and Lady, we encounter this theologically charged exchange between Legolas and Haldir.

I would like to turn your attention to the response of Haldir:

“Indeed in nothing is the power of the Dark Lord more clearly shown than in the estrangement that divides all those who still oppose him.”

Tolkien is well aware of the theological tradition that the Devil is the divider. He is the one who seeks to disperse and sow disunity. Evil disperses; God unites. This basic Biblical and theological insight is key in the Catholic spiritual and theological tradition.

Following in the tradition of St. Ignatius of Loyola’s Discernment of Spirits, confusion and discord are marks of the bad spirit while unity and peace are marks of the good spirit. It would only be right and true that in Tolkien’s masterpiece, this ontological truth of the spiritual life would shine through his narrative.

In Sacred Scripture, we see Our Lord specifically pray for the unity of his followers and His Church in His High Priestly Prayer in John 17. The source of unity Christ references is His own unity with His Father. Our Lord prays that “they may be one, even as we are one” (Jn 17:11). Unity amongst the followers of Christ, i.e., the Church and the Body of Christ is integrally important. Not only is unity and peace from God, but disunity and divisiveness among believers is a mark of the evil one and a testament against Christianity itself. That is why Our Lord so fervently prays for unity.

This spiritual reality is then beautifully made manifest in this quick scene in Lothlórien. The power of the Dark Lord is growing and has grown to such an extent that even among those who oppose him (the Elves and the Fellowship), there is discord and distrust. We thus see why Haldir states that the growing power of the Dark Lord is evident even in Lórien.

This scene can be a powerful reflection for all of us on the necessity of unity in the Body of Christ. We must constantly fight against the temptation to argue amongst one another, particularly those of the One Body of Christ. Let this scene be a reminder to all of us that the evil one seeks to divide and we must constantly rely on the grace of God to bring about unity and peace amongst Christians in and through the Body of Christ.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, pray for us!

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Recently, I scripted and published a short video on my podcast about the new surge of converts to the Catholic Church in America. The New York Times asked, 60 Minutes asked, and almost everyone else I have seen has asked the obvious question: “Why”. Now, that isn’t a bad question. In fact, it’s a very important question. There is a massive wave of Catholic converts, especially among younger generations, so it is very important that we ask them why they decided to convert. I, however, found it much more interesting to ask a different question.

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Before we get to that question, I wanted to comment briefly on the “Why” question. When asking why these people are converting, there is almost always no consistent answer. Some point to non-Catholic spouses converting, others point to dissatisfaction with secularism, while others point to more personal spiritual reasons. These multi-varied responses reveal not only the working of the Holy Spirit in the individual hearts of these converts, but also the difficulty of ecclesial self-reflection in charting a path forward.

Now, to my mind, the real question for all Catholics is not why they converted, but, whether we are ready to meet them, walk with them, and support them in each of our parishes.

The numbers are quite staggering. Just as an example, the New York Times referenced the Diocese of Des Moines, where the numbers are up 51% from 265 to 400 people in one year.1 Many parishes are seeing their numbers skyrocket. This trend isn’t isolated to one particular area. It’s happening in New York, it’s happening in Washington, it’s happening in Iowa, and it’s happening right here in my own diocese in Alabama. Just this year, the Archdiocese of Mobile had to split up their Rite of Election ceremony at the Cathedral into two separate events because there were too many OCIA candidates to fit into one event.

It is clear people are hungry for meaning. They’re hungry for purpose and they’re hungry for support during their suffering. These are the answers that the Church has. Finally, young people in particular, are starting to see that the Church has been preaching that message for 2000 years.

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The question for all Catholics is whether we are ready for them.

Every one of those new converts that just came into the Church, all of their stories, end the same way: they come into the Church and then what? They meet us.

They meet the parishioner in the pews who hasn’t introduced himself to them. They meet the family who’s been sitting in the same pew for the last three decades and simply looks at them and nods. They meet the cradle Catholic who goes to Mass every Sunday, but hasn’t seen the inside of a confessional in a decade. They meet the on-the-ground Catholic who simply goes through the motions but doesn’t do anything else. It is no wonder that the attrition rate of new converts is so hight. They meet lukewarm people and wonder whether or not they made the right decision.

It is important for us to remember these converts left everything. Many of them left communities, families, and friends to enter the Catholic church. They came to Catholicism because they were hungry for depth, for truth, and for Sainthood. But if these new converts simply meet people who are lukewarm, who are simply going through the motions, that is not okay and that is a recipe for attrition.

As Catholics in the pews, if we aren’t careful, we can become an obstacle between their OCIA formation and acceptance into the parish community. Instead of being a bridge between new converts and entrance into the family of faith, we become an obstacle.

Now, this is not an indictment of your personal faith. This is a call to self-reflection and introspection. Do you take your faith seriously? Do you truly live as if you believe the Catholic Church is the Church established by Christ?

The greatest evangelical moment of the Catholic Church in the United States in the last generation is happening right now. The question is, whether Catholics on the ground in our parishes, not in Rome, not on X, not on YouTube, you, on the ground in the parish, are ready to meet these people.

What does it look like for an ordinary Catholic to be ready to meet these new converts?

In my mind, it starts with something radical and counter-cultural. It starts with personal holiness; not programs, not groups, not better marketing, holiness. The kind of radical holiness that when somebody sits next to you in the pews, they can feel and see your devotion to Jesus Christ. The parishes that are thriving right now are not parishes that have the best marketing or that have the most beautiful events. They are the parishes where every person that comes to Mass is desperately striving for holiness, living out the faith, frequenting the Sacraments, and taking the Liturgy seriously.

Those are the parishes that are thriving and they’re thriving because the people in the pews refuse to be lukewarm. And here’s the part that matters most about all of this: the Church has always had this. The Catholic Church has taught this for 2000 years. The whole Tradition, the lives of the Saints, the Sacraments, the Eucharist, the parish—the church has always had these.

In a world that thrives on reactive and emotional decision-making, in a world that is desperately alone, no political party can substitute for the Church, no social media platform can substitute for it, and no YouTube video can substitute for it. Only the Church, only the parish, only real authentic holiness lived out by authentic Catholics can be the bridge between OCIA, new converts, and entrance into the community where these new converts can receive the support, the strength, and have the support of the community as they strive for holiness as new members of the Church.

Only the Catholic Church can offer the fullness of Jesus Christ. The question is whether or not we believe that as well.

These new converts have searched and they’ve found what the world told them was outdated. They’re not looking for a political identity. They’re not looking for a social club. They are looking for the answers to the biggest questions of their life. They’re looking for meaning in their suffering. They’re looking for Jesus Christ and His Church.

Jesus Christ and his Church are here in the Catholic Church. The Church has always been here. She has always been ready for them. The question is whether we are.

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The Easter Vigil is, without a doubt, the most beautiful Liturgy of the year. Not only does it celebrate the Resurrection of Christ from the dead, but it takes the faithful through the entire history of the world, from Creation, through the fall, through Abraham, through the Exodus, all the way to the Messianic prophecies. In other words, the Easter Vigil is a catechesis of Salvation history.

On top of that catechetical element, it is also rich with symbolism.

• Light and darkness

• Silence and noise

• Death and new life

The whole Liturgy itself speaks of our own movement from death to life, from sin to forgiveness, and from despair to hope. It truly is the all-encompassing Liturgy of the Church.

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As a tool for formation and worship, there is nothing like attending the Easter Vigil. I invite you, if you know someone who is considering becoming Catholic or who is curious about what Catholics believe, to invite them to the Easter Vigil!

Last year, the pastor I work for had the entire Triduum professionally recorded both for catechetical purposes, as well as to have the ability to go back and see the liturgical beauty of the Triduum Liturgy.

That footage, (all 4TB of it!) has been sitting on my desk for almost a year, hanging over me like an anvil. So, after a spark on inspiration, I finally sat down and combed through the hours of footage and what came out was this beautiful story of the Easter Vigil!

Watch the Video

You can find countless videos explaining the Easter Vigil. You can even find countless examples of people talking about the Easter Vigil. What I noticed, however, was that there were very few examples of people showing the Easter Vigil.

That is why I decided to create this video. I wanted to not only help walk people through the story of the Easter Vigil, the symbolism, and the main parts, but more importantly to show the Easter Vigil! While no video or explanation can ever do true justice to the beauty of the Liturgy, I believe this can, at the very least, prompt people to ask the question, “What does the Catholic Church say that I don’t know?” And, “Why is the beauty of the Church’s Liturgy so different from everything else in the world?”

If this short video gets people to ask those questions, then I have done my job as a creator, editor, and storyteller.

As you prepare for the Triduum yourself, I am sharing this video with you which I hope can help you enter more deeply into the mystery of this season and experience the beauty of the worship of God in the Liturgy of the Church!

The Story of the Easter Vigil

If it means something to you, share it with a friend.

God Bless and I hope you have a blessed and holy Triduum!

Donald Paul

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I was recently asked to teach another session of OCIA, just 4 weeks before Easter. In this session, I was asked to teach the Catechumens and Candidates about the 6th Commandment: Thou shall not commit adultery.

This commandment, on first glance, is crystal clear and you might be wondering how a whole OCIA class could be filled up with this “simple” commandment.

Since their response was so positive and the discussion was so fruitful, it became clear to me that this session would be extremely beneficial as a formation guide for you.

So, what follows is the exact session I gave to those 15+ people. My hope is that by engaging with the material yourself, you will also be aided in your formation journey.

The 6th Commandment

Scriptural Evidence:

“You shall not commit adultery” (Ex 20:14; Deut 5:18)

“You have heard that it was said ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that every one who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Mt 5:27-28)

This commandment, found in the decalogue, the Law of Moses, is the classic commandment against adultery. This commandment, on its face, is plain, easy to understand, and quite simple. If you are married, don’t cheat on your spouse and don’t look at another man or woman with lust.

Well, that’s that. What more is there to say about this “simple” commandment?

The beauty of Catholicism is that we are blessed with 2,000 years of reflection, development, and authoritative exegesis. In regard to the 6th Commandment, the Church has given us much to reflect upon. Throughout the history of the Church, this commandment has always been understood as expressing a fundamental human, biological, moral, and sexual morality. In other words, this commandment is fundamentally a command to chastity.

A Primer on Theological Anthropology

In the beginning, in the first book of God’s revelation to man, we read that human beings were and are created in the imago dei, in the image and likeness of God. In the book of Genesis, it says that God created Adam and Eve in his own likeness and He created them male and female. In the context of that revelation, we come to understand some very important characteristics about man.

First, we know that man is made for love. We know this fundamentally because we know that God is love and man is made for communion with God. We know, from the beginning, and in harmony with the whole of Scripture, that God is not solitary; He is a communion of persons. Man, being made in the image and likeness of God means that man is made fundamentally for love because God Himself is love.

Secondly, we learn that every human being, regardless of status, looks, sexuality, etc. has an inherent God-given dignity. Human dignity, rooted in man’s creation in the imago dei, means that, regardless of qualities, circumstances, or birth, all human beings are made in equal dignity. That God-rooted image is the foundation of the fundamental equal dignity of all mankind.

Thirdly, we know that God created human beings male and female. These two genders are from God and they are complementary because God tells them to be fruitful and multiply. Further, we know that Our Lord elevates this complementarity when He states that “a man shall leave his father and his mother and shall cleave to his wife and they shall be one flesh.” In that revelation, Sacramental marriage, a man and woman are joined together in an unbreakable union. That marriage bond is exclusive and unitive.

With all that at the forefront of our minds, just from the initial chapters of Genesis, we have gained a fundamental theological anthropology: who human beings are and what they are for.

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The Connection Between Anthropology and the 6th Commandment

So what does the 6th commandment have to do with that?

Well, the Church has always understood this commandment to be dealing fundamentally with human sexuality, with chastity, and with self-mastery.

Human sexuality concerns the whole person. It is a visible biological sign sure, but it encapsulates the whole person: Body, soul, psychology, emotions, and spirituality.

A person’s sexual identity is not something arbitrary. Rather, it is integral to the very nature of personhood. It is biological yes, but it is far deeper than that. The outward biology is just the physical manifestation of the deeper integral human sexuality of the person.

One primarily expresses sexual identity by the marital embrace. This results in giving oneself over to another completely in that gift of self, which was God’s original plan for human sexuality from the beginning.

Marred by sin, the duality of human sexuality between persons is distorted and is susceptible to domination and sin. Christ comes to restore that harmony within himself.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church describes chastity as “the successful integration of sexuality within the person and thus the inner unity of man in his bodily and spiritual being (CCC 2337).

Chastity is the right-ordering of human sexuality, primarily in the natural union of man and woman, when two become one. A properly integrated person, practicing chastity, is one with himself and can truly give himself away to the other. Both the man and the woman in the marriage, practicing chastity, are perfectly in harmony with themselves and are thus free to give of themselves to the other.

Every person is called to chastity in their particular state, whether single, married, or celibate. Fundamentally, human sexuality is a part of every human being. How that is integrated and expressed ultimately depends on one’s state in life.

The 6th commandment is fundamentally a call to chastity, to rightly ordered human sexuality.

This commandment, the forbidding of adultery, is fundamentally an affront to God’s design for human sexuality. Adultery, the breaking of the union of man and woman, of their exclusivity to one another, is an affront to chastity because adultery is treating another person as an object of desire and not as a human being worthy of dignity and love.

In marriage, one vows exclusivity. Adultery is the breaking of that vow and reveals a disharmony in ones human sexuality.

“Thou shall not commit adultery” is therefore the tip of the iceberg as to what actually is encapsulated in the 6th commandment. This commandment is forbidding sins against chastity (masturbation, fornication, adultery, lust, pornography, prostitution, homosexuality, etc.). Everything that is against the virtue of chastity is contained within the 6th commandment.

Fundamentally, the 6th commandment is a call to rightly ordered human sexuality, to see the other as a gift, as an image of God, one that is called to love, to give oneself as a gift, and to respect as an integral human person.

I hope this formation guide has been of benefit to your formation. If you want to learn more, don’t forget to subscribe as we continue walking together!

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If you want the full formation experience, become a paid subscriber today!

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Hey friends,

I am so grateful that you are here. The Catholic faith is a gigantic beautiful umbrella. One that encompasses many people, many ideas, and 2,000 years of Tradition.

While that is what makes it so special (besides the obvious Salvation/Freedom from Sin/Life with Christ element), it can also be incredibly difficult to understand, live, and teach others about it.

My mission is to make Catholicism accessible to you; to be a guide, a formation guide, to help you grow in your faith, understand it, and teach others about it. Everything I write and create is for that purpose.

With that in mind, I wanted to provide you with some resources for your formation journey.

Saints in the Parish Podcast

For over 2 years, I have hosted, produced, created, and edited a growing Catholic podcast on Youtube and audio platforms. It is called Saints in the Parish. The purpose is to form Catholics who are in the pews to live their faith more intentionally and know it more thoroughly. Lately, and going forward, I have begun to interview a wide range of Catholics with the purpose of showing our audience that holiness is attainable, it is attractive, and it is real.

Conversations such as:

• Priesthood vocation stories

• The difficulty of practicing NFP (with my wife!)

• Leaving the corporate ladder and becoming a priest

• and more!

If you have followed me for a while and enjoy what I write, I guarantee you will love this podcast.

There is a new video episode every Sunday night and the audio posts every Monday morning.

Saints in the Parish

Subscribe to the Youtube channel and follow along!

Formation Guides

Second, I have created two formation guides for you. One is on the 21 Ecumenical Councils, the other is on John Henry Newman’s Theory of Doctrinal Development.

Not only will you benefit from their guided formation, you will also help support me and my mission to help form Catholics and guide them through their formation.

Formation Guides

Paid Version of In Defense of Theology

Lastly, on top of all the free content and formation help I provide on In Defense of Theology, you can also upgrade to the paid version, which unlocks all of the premium formation essays!

These essays, written over the last year, and growing monthly, are the most formation-rich content I write. These essays range from highly-researched formation essays, to academically rich articles on theology, philosophy, faith, and Church history.

If you want to grow in your faith and become a fully formed Catholic, consider becoming a paid subscriber today!

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As always, thank you for being here and for following along. I am extremely grateful for you, for your support, and your encouraging words over the last year.

God Bless!

Donald Paul

According to the document, Sacrosanctum Concilium of the Second Vatican Council

Mother Church earnestly desires that all the faithful should be led to that fully conscious and active participation in liturgical celebrations which is demanded by the very nature of the liturgy.1

To fully understand this demand of “fully conscious and active participation,” it is crucial to discuss what the fundamental nature of the liturgy is, why that nature itself demands active participation by every Catholic, and subsequently, the ways the faithful can fully, consciously, and actively participate in the Sacred Liturgy of the Church.

To understand fundamentally what the Church means be “participatio actuosa” in the Liturgy, it is of fundamental importance to understand what exactly the Liturgy is, and equally important, what it is not.

What is Worship?

In the mind of the Church, the Liturgy is fundamentally the worship of God. Alcuin Reid speaks of this nature in his essay “Thoroughly imbued with the spirit and power of the Liturgy—Sacrosanctum Concilium and Liturgical Formation”. He writes, “the Sacred Liturgy makes present Almighty God’s indulgence towards man: it is a feast of His incarnate and saving love realised sacramentally in our midst by means of created things.”2 The Liturgy, thus understood, is an objective reality. Through the use of created things—bread and wine—the Liturgy makes present the actual sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the Cross which is the penultimate and final event of God’s “incarnate and saving love.” This is contrasted explicitly with the false understanding of the Liturgy as “an idea, the product of a meditation, or a personal feeling, or conviction arising from some devotion or spiritual enthusiasm howsoever worth such things may be.”3 The Liturgy of the Church is not something subjective—something merely “created” or modified by the passing whims of a people or society. Rather, it is an objective reality to which we submit ourselves humbly and totally. Since the Liturgy is the worship of God, it places a moral demand on us. In the Decalogue, which God gave to Moses, we are commanded to worship God alone. Quoting St. Thomas Aquinas, Alcuin Reid states that, “rendering true worship is the primary response of man demanded by God’s justice.”4 Therefore, by the very nature of the Liturgy, it places a demand on us to not just “attend” but to fully participate in this perfect worship.

Active Participation in Sacrosanctum Concilium

In understanding the Liturgy, and the Council Father’s wishes expressed in Sacrosanctum Concilium, of “fully conscious and active participation,” it is important to discuss what the Council Fathers meant in using this phrase, as well as how they themselves wanted the Liturgical renewal to be carried out.

In paragraph 14 of Sacrosanctum Concilium, the Council Fathers qualify how the Church is to interpret and carryout their call for “participatio actuosa.” In the third and final paragraph of paragraph 14 the document states, “it would be futile to entertain any hopes of realizing this [the restoration of the Liturgy by the full and active participation of the faithful] unless the pastors themselves, in the first place, become thoroughly imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy, and undertake to give instruction about it.”5 It is only by becoming “thoroughly imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy” that we can come to fully understand and actualize the active participation that the document calls for. This now begs an important question as we begin, what does it mean to be “imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy”?

“imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy”

First and foremost, this requires a disposition of silence and receptivity. If the Liturgy is the place where we offer right worship and praise to Almighty God, as well as it being the “the feast of his incarnate and saving love,” then we must first recognize that this is not something we “do,” but something we have received as an unmerited gift from God. It is then necessary to receive proper instruction from the pastors of the Church, who themselves must be seeped with this “spirit.” Alcuin Reid says this spirit is, “more easily ‘caught’ than ‘taught,’” namely, “by hands joined in…prayer, by knees bent in adoration, by voices raised in the discipline of the Church’s chant, through the body bowed profoundly, by signs of the cross made, in ashes accepted on our foreheads, [and] through water sprinkled on us.”6 In other words, this “spirit” is “caught” by a complete submission to the sacramental, personal, and full-bodied entrance into the life of the Church’s Liturgy and devotions. In doing this, the “spirit” of the Liturgy will become a natural part of our conscience. Then with the help of pastors, who themselves are imbued with this same spirit, we will come to the beginning of that “active participation” that the document urges for a proper Liturgical renewal.

Sacrosanctum Concilium, after giving the prerequisite of the Liturgical renewal, namely becoming “thoroughly imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy,” urges that “the faithful should be led to that fully conscious and active participation in liturgical celebrations.” What do the Council Fathers mean by “active participation”?

In the years and decades following the Second Vatican Council, this statement has been interpreted, in general, as a call to activity. This activity takes shape in the common call for more lay lectors, more lay members of the choir, more lay Extraordinary Ministers of the Eucharist, etc. While these ministries are not excluded from this call to “active participation,” is that fundamentally what the Council Fathers envisioned when formulating this statement for liturgical renewal? Alcuin Reid, in the beginning of his essay quoted extensively above, writes that, “some—perhaps a good deal—of liturgical activity has had very little to do with actual participation, very little to do with being thoroughly connected to the action of Christ through the ritual worship of His Church, and more to do with the misconception that as many people as possible must be ‘doing things’ at the liturgy.”7 According to Alcuin Reid, among many, it is clear that in the wake of the Council “active” has been misunderstood to simply mean “activity” and not “actual.” Further, Pope St. John Paul II, in an Ad Limina Address given to Bishops of the United States, says that “active participation certainly means that, in gesture, word, song and serve, all the members of the community take part in an act of worship…”8 However, “active participation does not preclude the active passivity of silence, stillness and listening: indeed, it demands it.” In promoting the liturgical renewal called for by the Second Vatican Council, St. John Paul II is striking a healthy balance in interpreting “active.” As he states, the Council certainly called for the baptized faithful to take an active role in the Liturgy through singing and serving, but he is careful to tamper the “activity” interpretation with the “active passivity” of silence and contemplation. It is therefore clear that “active participation,” in the mind of the Council Fathers, fundamentally refers to the idea that every baptized member of the Church, by virtual of their baptism, has the duty to fully participate in the worship of God by first being instructed in the tradition of the Church’s rich history, as well as being “formed” through the sacramentals of the Church’s spiritual heritage. In doing so, they are not merely “passive observers” of the Liturgy, but are truly participating in the unending sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the Cross in their singing, serving, reading, and also in their contemplation of the mysteries of the Liturgy.

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3 Practical Means of Achieving Active Participation

In the rich Tradition of the Church, there are numerous tools, devotions, and practices to facilitate, not only our becoming imbued with the spirit of the liturgy, but most importantly our active participation in the Liturgy.

-1. The Divine Office

The Divine Office, or more commonly known as the Liturgy of the Hours, is a powerful facilitator to help imbue us with this “spirit of the liturgy,” as well as to engage in “active participation” in the Liturgy. In Chapter IV of Sacrosanctum Concilium, the Council Fathers undertook a discussion of the Divine Office. They wrote that, “the divine office is devised so that the whole course of the day and night is made holy by the praises of God.”9 The order and nature of the Divine Office, which is composed of the various hours, lends itself to the continual praise of God “night and day” by those who participate. Furthermore, the lay faithful are encouraged to join in this public prayer of the Church along with the pastors whose moral duty it is to pray this Office. The Divine Office’s efficaciousness for personal prayer cannot be overstated. That is why the Council Fathers insist that the Liturgy of the Hours “is a source of piety, and nourishment for personal prayer.”10 In union with the prayer of Mother Church, the faithful who humbly and routinely pray the Liturgy of the Hours will be spiritually nourished by this source of spiritual instruction. Furthermore, the Council Fathers continue by urging the priests and the faithful who pray these prayers to actively turn their minds to their “voices” when praying the Office. They write that, “to better achieve this [the active attuning of their minds to the words being spoken], let them take steps to improve their understanding of the liturgy and of the bible, especially of the psalms.”11 This public prayer of the Church, when prayed reverently and with due attention, combines study and absorption of the Liturgy itself as well as the Scriptures.

The Divine Office is thus a highly efficacious tool to facilitate the active participation in the Liturgy. The Council’s call for “fully conscious and active participation” in the Liturgy can be aided and indeed lived out by the faithful’s adoption of the Liturgy of the Hours into their daily habit of prayer. When the Divine Office becomes a part of the life of the faithful, the Council’s urgency of “active participation” can come to be actualized and lived out by every baptized Catholic in every Catholic Parish.

-2. The Liturgical Calendar

A second way to bring about the participation the Council urged is through the study of and participation in the Liturgical Calendar of the Church and the celebration of the Solemnities and feast days celebrated therein.

The Liturgical Calendar is a treasure chest of spiritual enhancement as well as a teacher of the faithful. Beginning with the Feast of Christ the King, the Liturgical Calendar takes the Church and the faithful through the complexities of the Tradition of the Church, the events in the life of Christ, and the feasts of the saints of the Church. Most importantly, according to Sacrosanctum Concilium, is the fact that “within the cycle of a year,… she unfolds the whole mystery of Christ, from the incarnation and birth until the ascension, the day of Pentecost, and the expectation of blessed hope and of the coming of the Lord.”12 This is certainly the most valuable purpose of the Liturgical Year. By its order and nature, it draws the faithful into the mysteries of Christ and instructs them throughout the year.

The Liturgical Year also commemorates the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Saints, and Martyrs. The Fathers desired that the Liturgical Year would “proclaim the paschal mystery achieved in the saints who have suffered and been glorified with Christ,” as well as offering them “as examples drawing all to the Father through Christ.”13 Through the celebration of the Liturgical Year in which we celebrate the Resurrection on Sundays, the feasts of the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the Saints, the faithful are led deeper into the life of the Church. The Liturgical Year is a practical and efficacious way to actively participate in the Liturgy, to grow in personal holiness, as well as actively participate in the Liturgy itself through the prayers, hymns, and processions that are celebrated throughout the year. In this way, the baptized faithful will certainly “become thoroughly imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy” and led towards that “fully conscious and active participation in liturgical celebrations.”

-3. Singing of Sacred Music

Finally, the baptized faithful can be aided in “active participation” during the Liturgy by participating in the singing of Sacred Music during the Liturgical celebrations. Sacred Music is especially important in the liturgical setting as Sacrosanctum Concilium states that, “sacred music is to be considered the more holy in proportion as it is more closely connected with the liturgical action, whether it adds delight to prayer, fosters unity of minds, or confers greater solemnity upon the sacred rites.”14 It is the power of the Liturgy, in conjunction with sacred music, that can foster an increase in active participation. This participation gives a “more noble form” to the liturgical worship when “the divine offices are celebrated solemnly in song.”15 It thus follows that Sacred Music is a sure instrument in fostering active participation of the faithful because of its pedagogical power as well as its transforming and heightening of the prayers of the faithful gathered at the Liturgy.

In Pope Benedict XVI’s Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Sacramentum Caritatis, he speaks of the power of Sacred Music when he writes that “everything—texts, music, execution—ought to correspond to the meaning of the mystery being celebrated, the structure of the rite, and the liturgical seasons.”16 This is noteworthy because Sacred Music, as an aid in Liturgical worship, should be at the service of the Liturgy. It should inspire, teach, and transform the faithful during the Liturgy. When the faithful listen, sing, and interiorize the mysteries contained in the Sacred Music, they will be able to more fully, in accord with the insistence of the Council Fathers, “imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy,” and thus increase their “active participation” in the Liturgy.

Final Thoughts

The liturgical renewal to which Sacrosanctum Concilium advocated for was one of refocusing on the indispensable elements of the Liturgy. It called for the rediscovering of the nature of the Liturgy, and clear terms, called for pastors and all the baptized faithful to become “imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy.” In doing so, with the assistance of various helpers such as the Liturgy of the Hours, the Liturgical Calendar, and Sacred Music, all the baptized faithful could engage in “active participation” during the Liturgy. This active participation, as called for by the Council and expounded and taught by the Magisteriums of Pope St. John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, not only advocated for participation of the baptized faithful in assisting in the Liturgy itself, but also, and this is the element that has unfortunately been often left out, for the actual participation of the baptized faithful in active listening, active singing, and intentional and conscious worship. Only by a rediscovering of the Council’s intentions, as well as the authentic renewal of the Liturgy, can all the baptized faithful come to true “active participation” in the Sacred Liturgy that is their duty by virtue of their baptismal priesthood.

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One of the most humbling opportunities I have been given in my ministry teaching and forming Catholics is the opportunity to walk with OCIA candidates in their formation process. Every year, I typically get assigned 3-4 sessions to teach. While it varies every year, ranging from Church History, Christian Prayer, Revelation, Christ as Mediator Between God And Man, etc., the one class I have taught every year is the Sacrament of Marriage.

In this session, which is my favorite, I take the candidates through Salvation History, showing them God’s original design for marriage in Genesis, through the Fall, through natural marriage, and finally ending in Christ’s elevation of Marriage to the level of a Sacrament of the New Covenant. I end with a discussion on the specific aspects of marriage in Canon Law, and finally, with a brief but solid defense of the Church’s rejection of artificial means of contraception.

Since my goal in this publication is to help form you into strong, faithful, and evangelically oriented Catholics, I think it would be beneficial to present you with the material I give to my OCIA candidates, in the hopes that it will also give you food for thought in your own formation, as well as provide you with material to use yourself in your own ministry.

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The Sacrament of Marriage, OCIA Formation Course

CCC 1601-1654

The Institution of Marriage (In the Beginning)

In the beginning, God created man and woman in the Garden of Eden, as recorded in the first chapters of the book of Genesis.

Scripture affirms that man and woman were created for one another. It says “It is not good that the man should be alone.” The woman, who Scripture says is man’s “Helpmate” is the one who Adam recognizes as “Bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh.”

Scripture then says “Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh.” (Gen 2:24) This reveals God’s original design for marriage. Marriage, according to God’s original design, is an unbreakable bond wherein the two become one “flesh.”

We know that in the original state, that perfect state of harmony between God and man and between Adam and Eve, lasted but a short while. When sin enters the picture through the fall of Adam and Eve, marriage, in the order of creation, ruptures its’ internal harmony and thus becomes dominated by lust, greed, and as a consequence, is burdened by pain of childbirth and the “toil of work.”

From that moment onward, marriage, still willed by God in the order of creation, is marred by sin and concupiscence. However, marriage is still built into the very nature of humanity, even in its fallen state.

With the brokenness of man, mankind needed God’s grace in order to restore humanity back to the original state that he was created for. In addition to the restoration of human nature, the reordering of marriage was also to take place when, in the fulfillment of his plan, God restored humanity back to Himself through His Son in the Incarnation.

Marriage in the Old Testament

The Catechism states that “After the fall, marriage helps to overcome self-absorption, egoism, pursuit of one’s own pleasure, and to open oneself to the other, to mutual aid and to self-giving.” (CCC 1609) This refers to the natural state of marriage, without the assistance of grace, because this is before the Incarnation.

In this state, marriage helps to overcome these temptations because it requires, on the basic level of relation between persons, mutual sacrifice and assistance to the other in the relationship. Throughout the narrative of the Old Testament, there is a gradual deepening of the understanding of marriage.

The Catechism states that “Moral conscience concerning the unity and indissolubility of marriage developed under the pedagogy of the old law.” (CCC 1610). This means that through the Old Testament, the people’s understanding of the unity and indissolubility of marriage continually deepened as they grew in understanding of the Law of Moses and further understood God’s revelation in its totality.

For example, we have the widespread practice of polygamy. In the lives of the Kings and Patriarchs, it is not explicitly rejected, although it is clear that there are consequences for this practice (see the splintering of the Kingdom under King Solomon and his many wives and children). Again, the Catechism states that “Nevertheless, the law given to Moses aims at protecting the wife from arbitrary domination by the husband, even though according to the Lord's words it still carries traces of man's ‘hardness of heart’ which was the reason Moses permitted men to divorce their wives.” (CCC 1610)

Then, throughout the ministry of the Prophets, their revelation of God’s love for the people of Israel helps to deepen the understanding of marriage as a sign of exclusive married love. This gradual unfolding helped develop an understanding of the unity and indissolubility of marriage. Lastly, as the Catechism notes, the books of Ruth and Tobit reveal “an elevated sense of marriage and to the fidelity and tenderness of spouses.” (CCC 1611)

This final development, before the Incarnation, sets the stage in Salvation History for Christ to complete the formation of marriage and thus elevate it to a Sacrament of the New Covenant.

Most Catholics were never given a structured theological formation, especially on the Sacrament of marriage.

What you’re about to read is an expanded version of the same formation notes I use for adults in OCIA preparing to enter the Catholic Church.

The remainder of this post includes:

• ✅ An introductory sacramental theology of marriage for adult formation

• ✅ The canonical requirements of a valid sacramental marriage

• ✅ Annulments clarified

• ✅ The goods and ends of marriage

• ✅ Types of Marriages: Mixed Marriages and Disparity of Cult

• ✅ The Church’s teaching on contraception explained within the context of adult formation

• ✅ A comprehensive list of suggested reading resources for continued formation

If you feel your formation is lacking, where unfortunately many Catholics are today, this is exactly where you need to be. That is why In Defense of Theology exists.

Unlock the full formation class below.

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I encounter Catholics every day, both online and in the parish, that have the same problem:

“I am a faithful Catholic. I go to Mass every Sunday. I pray, but I feel like I really don’t know my faith like I should. What do I do?

This theme of true faithfulness to Christ and the Church but lacking in basic formation is prevalent, not only among young people, but in every age, demographic, and location.

In recent years with the advent of social media and the internet, there has been a growing availability of resources to address this problem. Think: Word on Fire, Ascension, Catholic Answers, etc. These resources are plentiful, orthodox, and extremely helpful. Before I went to seminary and got my Bachelor and Masters Degree in Theology, they were the source of my formation.

However, as good as these resources are for the masses, there is still a hunger for personal guidance and accompanying formation. When I teach in-person classes at the parish, such as a series on celibacy, the Liturgy, and Philosophy, my goal is not only to give the information, but it is also to be a formator for them. Someone who can not only give the information but who can also walk with them in their walk with Christ, specifically as they go through the same formation I had the privilege of receiving in higher education.

As my own ministry at the parish and online has grown, I have realized that most Catholics do not have access to higher education in Catholic studies (both cost and time), but that does not mean they do not desire it. That gap, as I see it, between the “big guys” (Word on Fire, etc.) and most Catholics, is where I feel my ministry fits.

My goal, the goal of In Defense of Theology, my podcast, my guides, etc., is to be a guide and a formator for you; someone who can walk with you, lead you, and show you the wealth of treasures that the Church has to offer. In short, to give you what I had the privilege to receive from my formation.

That is what I hope this publication can do for you.

Now, if I were just beginning to walk with someone, what would be the first things I would advise for them? (Not including prayer and the Sacraments because, obviously, that is a given).

1. Grab a Bible

2. Grab the Catechism

3. Subscribe to Bishop Barron’s content

4. Subscribe to Ascension Press’s content

5. Subscribe to In Defense of Theology

Grab a Bible

The first thing to do in your formation journey is to read Sacred Scripture. Now, I don’t mean just open up chapter 1 (Genesis 1), and start reading cover-to-cover. The Bible is not meant to be read like that, and I can almost promise you that you won’t make it.

However, what you can do, and what you should do, is intentionally immerse yourself in the world of Sacred Scripture.

For instance, take a Gospel, John for instance, and start, chapter by chapter, making your way through. If you have a Bible that has extensive footnotes, make sure you pay attention to them. Once you are done, pick another Gospel and do the same.

I would also recommend you look at the daily readings. Using the Church’s Lectionary as a reading guide is extremely helpful because it takes the guesswork out for you, and because it is specifically compiled by the Church, there is a structure and an order to what is chosen. Don’t reinvent the wheel; use what the Church has done for you.

So, number 1, get you a Bible and start to read it.

Grab a Catechism

The Catechism of the Catholic Church is a highly useful and often underutilized resource for formation. Compiled in 1992 under the authority of Pope St. John Paul II, the Catechism is a massive resource and a wonderful reference guide to what the Church believes about many of the main problems or question you might have.

Now, as I mentioned in the last section, just like Sacred Scripture, the Catechism is not meant to be read cover to cover. Once again, you won’t make it. However, it is incredibly useful as a resource and guide to give you practical answers to questions as well as to use it as a resource for further study using the footnote resources. If you have a question about what the Church teaches about x, go look in the Catechism for a beautiful answer. However, while you are doing that, look at the footnotes and use those as a perfectly curated list for further study.

The Catechism should be one of your main sources of information in your formation journey.

Subscribe to Bishop Barron, Ascension, etc.

As I mentioned above, these resources are invaluable in your formation journey. As of now, many years later, there are most likely many videos, guides, etc. from each source that you can look into to answer your specific question. In the beginning, I used these sources daily to get a basic grasp of the Church, as well as to further my own study as I was beginning my academic formation.

In Defense of Theology

As a part of your formation journey, I would point you to this publication as a great source of personalized formation guidance. I write every essay and article on this publication with the intention to help you as a Catholic better understand the faith. I have many articles that dive into niche theological topics, that will interest some, and bore otherd=s. I also have many articles that are step-by-step explainers of important Catholic theology, which all Catholics should read.

I would point you specifically to my essay in which I break down the Catechism into its parts which can give you a richer understanding of why it is organized the way it is and how to better understand it.

I would also point you towards my personal favorite topic, Vatican II. Of all the DMs I get and of all the comments I receive, there always one common theme: how the heck do I understand Vatican II. Seeing that need, I wrote a whole introduction series to Vatican II which you can find here.

• Introduction to the Second Vatican Council

Another helpful tool, if you want to learn more about the Ecumenical Councils, which I also get asked about frequently, I put together a 32 page formation guide to the Ecumenical Councils which goes into detail about each Council, when it was, who started it, what happened, and what did it say. You can find that here.

Ecumenical Council Formation Guide

Lastly, one of the most misunderstood theological teachings, but one which quite literally is the backbone for understanding all the doctrines of the Church, is doctrinal development. Once again, in an effort to guide you in your formation, I have put together a formation guide to Doctrinal development, which you can find here.

Doctrinal Development Formation Guide

I hope this gets you started on your formation journey! Remember, I am here to walk with you to help you understand theology and understand the reasons why you believe what you believe!

If you want to support me and this mission, consider becoming a paid subscriber!

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A few months ago, I had the opportunity to engage hundreds of Protestant interlocutors in the comment section of my an Instagram Reel for my podcast.

The theme of the video was simple: the Catholic Church accepts all baptisms as valid, so long as water is used and the Trinitarian formula is said. Within a few days, the Reel had exploded to thousands of views and hundreds of comments. In reading and responding to many comments, there emerged a common theme leveled at me and the Catholic faith that continues to motivate me in this mission: Catholics fundamentally misunderstand the purpose of baptism.

To many faithful Catholics, that might come as a shock. However, outside of the Catholic world, the Catholic theology of Sacramental Baptism stands isolated among a sea of Protestant beliefs.

We, as faithful Catholics, must dive deeply into the Scriptures, the Fathers of the Church, and the rich Tradition of the Church. We must deepen our understanding of the Sacrament of Baptism so that we can properly articulate the clear and necessary command of Jesus Christ in Matthew 28:19: to baptize all nations in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

In browsing the minefield that is a social media comment section, the most common objection raised was that baptism isn’t necessary for salvation—it is an outward sign of what has already occurred inwardly in the believer.

So, let’s address that objection.

Objection: “Baptism Isn’t Necessary For Salvation”

“They[Catholics] still assume that baptism is necessary for salvation, which is foreign to scripture.” - a real comment from the video

Among the many comments “refuting” the claim that baptism is not necessary for Salvation, the common theme was that the Catholic teaching of the necessity of baptism for salvation is “foreign to scripture”.

In typical Protestant theology, Salvation consists of accepting Jesus Christ as Lord as well as interiorly accepting the Salvation that He won on the Cross. This is, fundamentally, an interior action that occurs in the believer’s heart or soul. Once that act of Salvation has occurred, one is “saved” and then, in most Protestant denominations, baptism follows as an outward sign of that interior event because, in the 3rd Chapter of John’s Gospel, Christ commanded that we be baptized.

To put it simply, what is necessary for salvation is the interior act of acceptance of salvation—“accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior.” Baptism, then, merely follows as a physical manifestation of that already-happened interior event. The outward act is merely following Christ’s command in the Gospel, but that act itself is not what incorporates the believer into the Body of Christ.

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However, is this what we see in Scripture?

In the most explicit passage, John chapter 3, we read the story of Nicodemus visiting and conversing with Jesus. In this passage, Nicodemus comes to Jesus and acknowledges that He has performed miracles, and that only if God is with someone, can they perform those miracles. Jesus then turns the conversation deeper and states that “‘unless one is born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God.’” (v. 3). Nicodemus takes this literally, as physical rebirth. Jesus corrects him and says, “‘Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.’” (v. 5).

This exchange has consistently been interpreted to be referring to Sacramental baptism with water and the Holy Spirit. However, most Protestants have interpreted this in a similar fashion to what Nicodemus himself thought: that one must first have been physically born (of the flesh) and then reborn a second time (in the Spirit).

However, a close examination of the text does not indicate that, and actually indicates the opposite. Jesus clearly states that to see the Kingdom of God, one must be born anew. The Greek word used is “Anothen” (Gk. ἄνωθεν) which has two meanings: “again” and “from above”. Which does Jesus mean here? Nicodemus clearly takes this to mean “again” as is evidenced by his outrageous question of re-entering into his mother’s womb to be born again. But Jesus clarifies by combining both meanings—the physical experience of water and the spiritual experience of the Spirit. Therefore, Jesus is giving the teaching of water baptism as a necessary prerequisite of entrance into the Kingdom of God. You must be born of water and the Spirit. It is not merely an interior experience, but it is the physical action of being baptized with the Holy Spirit in the waters of Sacramental Baptism.

In paragraph 1257 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, it states that “The Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation”, and cites John 3:5 as I quoted above. The paragraph continues in this way: “He also commands his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to all nations and to baptize them.” Finally the Catechism, speaking for the Church, states that “the Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude.” It is through baptism that we can be assured entry into Heaven. The certainty here is not a type of Predestination, but a profound trust in the authenticity of Jesus’s words that “unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”

Furthermore, if we look at 1 Peter, we see St. Peter explicitly affirm the Catholic Church’s interpretation of Jesus’s words, and even goes further and gives us a typological reading of the Noah event in Genesis. St. Peter states that “when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you…” (1 Pet 3:20-21). This illuminating passages helps settle whatever vagueness may exist in John 3. Drawing from the image of the cleansing power of the great flood in which the earth was cleansed of sin by means of water, St. Peter affirms that just as the earth was cleansed and Noah and his family were saved via water, so Baptism, which fulfills that event, now saves us.

I do not see any other way John 3 and 1 Peter can be harmonized if not understood as affirming water baptism as the means of salvation and necessary for entrance into the Heavenly kingdom.

It is imperative that we study, pray, and reflect on this profound Sacrament of water and spirit that Our Lord instituted as the ordinary means of Salvation. It is up to us, the Catholic faithful, to explain and defend this Sacrament from those—whether they be in the comment section on social media, in our families, or in our local coffee shop—who would claim that baptism is unnecessary for Salvation. It is quite literally a fight in which the stakes are life and death.

Through loving dialogue that is respectful, resolute, and well-reasoned, we can continue to bring our separated brothers and sisters into the fullness of truth that Christ has revealed to His Church.

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As Catholics, we know the doctrine of Purgatory is bound up in the Church’s prayers, beliefs, and faith. In the absence of this doctrine, votive Masses for the dead, intercession for the dead, indulgences for oneself as well as for those who have deceased, are rendered meaningless. Therefore, this doctrine is one of the foundational eschatological doctrines of the Catholic Church. However, for those that are skeptical or downright reject this doctrine, they typically do so by appealing to Purgatory’s “absence” in Scripture.

Therefore, in this essay, I will briefly lay out the Church’s teaching on Purgatory as expressed in the Catechism. Lastly, I will examine a few Scriptural passages, both Old and New, which give textual evidence to the doctrine in order to put to bed the false argument that Purgatory is extra-biblical.

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The Catholic Doctrine of Purgatory

The Catholic Church doctrinally teaches the post-mortem temporal state of Purgatory as the place of final purification for those souls that die in charity—in relationship with God—but are not yet perfectly purified for the Beatific Vision.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church has a brief section on this state of final purification. The Catechism states that “all who die in God's grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven.”1 The doctrine states that those who need further purification after death, are assured of their salvation, but they cannot yet enter heaven. One of the underlying principles of the doctrine is that nothing unclean can enter Heaven. That means that nothing unclean—no spot or blemish on the soul—can be present for the soul to enter Heaven.

Purgatory is fundamentally a great mercy of Almighty God who intimately knows our human condition. If a soul seeks God, tries to strive for holiness, but is still habitually committing minor sins or has any temporal punishment remaining in the soul from sins committed, they are still living in charity (i.e., they have not broken relationship through mortal sin). However, since nothing unclean can enter Heaven, this soul would be incapable of final beatitude. Therefore, the doctrine of Purgatory is a great mercy which allows souls to receive final purification after death for anything that would still keep them out of Heaven. This state of final purification, however, is distinct from the punishment of hell.2 This interim state of purification is what the Church calls Purgatory.

Three Objects of Purification in Purgatory

As a further, albeit incomplete treatment of Purgatory, it would be informative to state what, according to the Tradition, is atoned for, or what is satisfied in Purgatory. Throughout the history of the Church, there have been various theories regarding the objects of purification. However, we can, in general, state three “things” which the soul is cleansed of in Purgatory:

1. Guilt of venial sins not yet forgiven;

2. Evil dispositions remaining in the soul; and

3. The reatus poenae (Punishment due to sins committed which have not yet been satisfied for.)

For a complete treatment of this doctrine, see this previous essay:

The Textual Witness of Sacred Scripture for the Doctrine of Purgatory

It is true, the word “Purgatory” is not mentioned in Scripture. However, there are multiple references to elements and conditions that can only truly be explained, in their fullest sense, with the doctrine of Purgatory. As we will see, any exegesis of these passages that do not include the doctrine of Purgatory, do not do full justice to the witness of the texts.

1 Corinthians 3:14-15

St. Paul, in his mighty letter to the Corinthian Church, makes an interesting observation and statement regarding the afterlife and the punishment due to sin. In 1 Corinthians 3:15, St. Paul states that “If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.”3 So, in the beginning of this verse, St. Paul is telling the Corinthians that some Christians will endure suffering and loss because of their bad works or efforts. The Greek word used is “zemioo”, or to “suffer loss.” This means that the Christian whose effort is bad, will suffer a penalty. However, St. Paul does not say this man will suffer eternal punishment. Rather, St. Paul says that that man will be “saved, but only as through fire.” Interestingly, St. Paul is revealing that salvation will be given, but it will only be given through this “fire”. This qualification of punishment can only truly be explained when read through the lens of the saving fires of Purgatory.

Matthew 12:31-32

In this passage, the connection to the doctrine of Purgatory might not be obvious, but, with the help of one of the Church Fathers, namely, St. Gregory the Great, it will become apparent.

Our Lord, speaking to the Pharisees, gives us the famous “Unforgivable Sin” against the Spirit. Our Lord states plainly that “every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven.” Our Lord then states that “whoever says a word against the Son of man will be forgiven; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.” A simple exegesis of this passage reveals that Our Lord plainly lays out the impossibility of forgiveness of the man who “says a word” against the Spirit in this age or in the age to come. In other words, whoever commits this “sin against the Spirit” will not be forgiven here or after death.

If you find yourself searching for the connection to Purgatory in this passage, let me explain using the exegetical prowess of one of the early Doctors of the Church. In order to explicate the theological conclusion drawn from this passage, we turn to St. Gregory the Great. In his exegesis of this passage, St. Gregory the Great draws out the logical conclusion of this verse which, for him, make clear the ontological reality of a post-mortem state of purification, i.e. Purgatory.

St. Gregory the Great writes:

From this statement we learn that some sins can be forgiven in this world and some in the world to come. For, if forgiveness is refused for a particular sin, we conclude logically that it is granted for others.4

The great saints meaning is clear: since Christ makes the positive affirmation that since forgiveness is refused for the particular sin against the Holy Spirit, in this age and in world to come, it logically follows that “some” sins can in fact be forgiven both in this world and in the world post-mortem. If forgiveness of sins post-mortem was impossible, Our Lord would not have specified that that particular sin was unforgivable here or in the age to come. The great Pope’s insight reveals that it logically follows that since this sin was unable to be forgiven, that does not imply that none can be forgiven. Thus we can logically conclude from Christ’s own words that some sins can be forgiven both here and in the age to come—after death.

Through the witness of St. Gregory’s Dialogues, which was written sometime around 593 A.D., we realize that the idea of a purgatorial state, a place where purification occurs after death, was not a novel Medieval invention.

2 Maccabees 12:43-45

If you are not Catholic and therefore doubt the validity of the Book of Maccabees, I would direct you to my recent podcast episode on the Canon of Sacred Scripture.

Watch the Episode

Lastly, we have the evidence of Purgatory and prayers for the dead in the Second Book of Maccabees. In this famous passage, we see Judas and his army, gathering their fallen comrades. After seeing the dead men with idols in their possession, Judas and his men pray for the forgiveness of their sins. In the last sentence, it states that “he[Judas] made atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin.”5 This is the often quoted passage when using biblical authority for the doctrine of Purgatory. In this passage, we see that Judas and his men made atonement for the sin of idolatry that the fallen soldiers had committed. Furthermore, we see that the passage states that Judas sent money for a sin offering to atone for their idolatry and the text states that Judas “acted very well and honorably.” From this wonderful passage, we can gather that prayers for the dead are good, they are in view of the future resurrection, and it is efficacious to do so. In this one passage, we see evidence for Purgatory, prayers for the dead, intercessory prayer, and the hope of the future Resurrection in Christ, which had not yet been accomplished.

Conclusion

The Catholic doctrine of Purgatory is not a novel invention, inserted into the minds of the faithful during the Middle Ages, rather, this eschatological doctrine is firmly rooted in Scriptural texts. The doctrine of Purgatory is a doctrine where, with correct guidance and assistance, one can clearly see the action of the Church developing a doctrinal Tradition, in harmony with Sacred Scripture, and faithful to the deposit of faith.

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Do you have any other Scriptural texts you refer to when discussing Purgatory? Let me know in the comments below!

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This essay is an exclusive benefit for paid subscribers. If you are not a paid subscriber, you can still read a good amount of it. However, if you would like access to the full essay, I invite you to become a paid subscriber today.

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The most irritating and theologically ignorant arguments I hear often, from Catholics and non-Catholics, are the “celibacy is bad for priests,” “celibacy is an unreasonable law,” and “we would have so many more priests if we got rid of celibacy” arguments.

I could go on for hours about the theological importance of celibacy for the Church and for the world, and I could also present you with serious consequences if the Church were to “get rid of” her law on clerical celibacy.

However, instead of giving you the theological arguments and the appeal to common sense, I would like to present you with a lecture I gave recently in which I go through the historical record and early Church testimony regarding the case for clerical celibacy. What you will discover is that this law is ancient—very ancient. In fact, most of the Church Fathers were adamant that perpetual continence (following ordination) for clergy was a tradition that came directly from the Apostles themselves.

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The Relational State Of Clergy in the Early Church

To begin, it is important to state that in the early Church, it is quite clear that there was no “obligation” for deacons, priests, or bishops to be unmarried. In this sense, by “obligation,” I mean something similar to the obligation in the Church now, as governed by Canon Law. In the early Church, there was no such law.

In regards to the beginning of that obligation or prohibition of married clergy, most people will point to the Second Lateran Ecumenical Council in 1139 as the starting point for the prohibition against married clergy. However, simply because there was no direct prohibition against married clergy does not mean that it didn’t exist.

According to Stefan Heid, in his book Celibacy in the Early Church, “during the first centuries the celibate clergyman was not exactly the exception, but neither was he the rule.”1 In other words, the celibate clergy was not a random exception; many clergy lived in this state. However, the celibate clergy was also not necessarily the rule.

However, as most scholars will attest, in the early Church, it is undeniable that there were clergymen, married and unmarried, who renounced sexual intercourse after holy orders. Going forward in our study, this “renunciation of sexual intercourse” will be the key to understanding celibacy in the early Church, as well as understanding how clerical celibacy and the practice of unmarried clergy developed through the history of the Church.

A Brief Note on the Necessity for Unmarried Clergy in Canon Law

Before exploring the early Church, it will be beneficial to your study to understand that it was not until the Council of Trent (1521-1545) that unmarried men were required by Canon Law to be eligible for Holy Orders. Before that, it was merely that no marriage could be entered into after Holy Orders. To clarify, before the Council of Trent, it was the standard practice that both married and unmarried men could qualify for Holy Orders. There was no set law against married men entering into the clerical state. However, even before the addition of a law requiring unmarried clergy, all candidates for Holy Orders were required to practice perpetual continence after Holy Orders, even those that were married. The norm then was perpetual continence for clergy. Only after Trent did the Church officially include in Canon Law the explicit requirement that all candidates for Holy Orders be unmarried men.

Clergy in the Early Church:

The Life-Style of Married Clergy in the Early Church

It seems that, in principle, married clergy in the early Church were required to renounce sexual activity after Holy Orders. In the early Church, it seems that the discipline was not celibacy in the sense of unmarried men, but rather sexual continence, which could be practiced by both married and unmarried clergy.

In the two big historical theological studies The Apostolic Origins of Priestly Celibacy, by Christian Cochini, S.J., and Clerical Celibacy in East and West by Ukrainian Catholic Priest, Roman Cholij, both conclude that “there has always been an obligation for higher clerics to abstain from sexual relations”2 after ordination. This obligation was based upon the idea of a total dedication to God and to the service of the Church for clerics. By abstaining from sexual relations with their wives, the clerics demonstrated their total dedication.

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The Apostles and Their State of Life

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The late 1st and early 2nd century Church Father, St. Ignatius of Antioch is best remembered for his 7 letters written to the various Churches (and St. Polycarp), on his way to Rome to be martyred.

This early Church Father was the 3rd bishop of Antioch in Turkey and was martyred in Rome in the early 2nd century. He is a vitally important early witness for the structure and organization of the Church, early belief in the Eucharist, and as a powerful orthodox witness against the heresy of Docetism in the 1st century.

One of his shorter letters, the Letter to the Trallians, contains a few critically important revelations for us today. In this brief essay, I will unpack these two important points, namely Church unity under the bishop, and an early orthodox Catholic position on the Incarnation of Christ against the Docetists.

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The Letter to the Trallians

In this short letter, St. Ignatius of Antioch writes primarily to encourage the Trallians to remain steadfast and faithful to their bishop, Polybius.1 In this letter, Ignatius gives us a clear image of the ecclesial structure of the early Church.

1. Union With The Bishop

Ignatius is clear that the bishop, as head of the local Church, is there as a visible reminder of Our Lord. Ignatius states that when the Trallians “are subject to the bishop as to Jesus Christ, it is evident that [they] are living… in accordance with Jesus Christ…”2 Furthermore, their union with the bishop also entails being under the authority of the “council of presbyters as to the Apostles of Jesus Christ” and the “deacons” are “ministers of God’s Church.”3 We now have, in the first century, the 3-fold rank of holy orders in the Church: bishop, priest, and deacon. St. Ignatius, therefore, gives witness to the ancient nature of the ecclesial structure of the Church.

Lest anyone think the 3-fold rank of the hierarchy is meaningless to the nuture of the Church, St. Ignatius of Antioch makes clear that without these ranks in the Church, “no group can be called a church.”4 This important statement puts to bed any modern criticism of the structure of the Catholic Church. The Church of the last 2,000 years did not invent the hierarchical rank, nor can it dispense from that order without sacrificing what she herself is, the Church. The importance of this witness in the first century is invaluable for our understanding of the ecclesial nature of the Church and our connection to that Church. The hierarchy is not in place as an arbitrary law-giver or as an authority against Christ Himself. As Ignatius witnesses to, the hierarchical rank is there because it is essential for the Church to be what it is.

Adding to this ecclesial structure, Ignatius also makes an important point regarding the unity of the Church, which is one of his special concerns in all of his letters. Ignatius states that it is necessary to be united to the bishop of the local Church. After warning of false teachings and heresies, Ignatius adds that the Church must be on special guard against false teachers. Ignatius continues that they must “cling inseparably to Jesus Christ and to the bishops and to the commandments of the Apostles.”5 To guard against heresy, it is necessary to be united to Christ and the bishops, as well as to the teaching of the Apostles. One must be in the Church in order to have a clear conscience. One can be assured that he is outside the Church if he “does anything without the bishop and council of presbyters and deacons…”6 One cannot simply “be a Christian” apart from a physical connection to the hierarchy of the Church which connects the individual to the community, to the Apostles, and to Christ Himself.

It is therefore absolutely essential that we, Catholics of the 21st century, be united to our local bishop, who is our local leader and the one who represents Christ Himself to us. It is necessary that we obey the bishop because he has been put in charge of us. The hierarchy of the Church is not dispensable, it is necessary for our union with the Church and with one another.

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2. Christ Actually Became Man And Suffered

One of the heresies the early Church had to combat was Docetism, the heresy that denied the physical reality of the Incarnation and the physical suffering of Christ.

St. Ignatius of Antioch situates Christ within the actual history of the world. He lays out that Jesus “was of the family of David, who was the son of Mary; who really was born, who both ate and drank; who really was persecuted under Pontius Pilate, who really was crucified and died while those in heaven and on earth and under the earth looked on; who, moreover, really was raised from the dead when his Father raised him up.”7 After giving the physical evidence for the Incarnation, Ignatius turns to rebuke the Docetists who say that Christ “suffered in appearance only”.8 If Christ did not actually suffer, Ignatius questions why he himself is suffering in chains.

Lastly, Ignatius once again appeals to Church unity as evidence for the error of Docetism. He writes that “these people are not the Father’s planting. For if they were, they would appear as branches of the cross, and their fruit would be imperishable—the same cross by which he, through his suffering, calls you who are his members. The head, therefore, cannot be born without members, since God promises unity, which he himself is.”9 Unity with the Church and in the Church is a mark of orthodoxy.

Finally

St. Ignatius of Antioch, being at the end of the first century and having intimate knowledge of the Apostolic teaching, is an integral witness to the life of the Church, the teachings of the Church, and the problems that the Church faced in the time following the death of the Apostles. His witness of the ecclesial structure of the hierarchy and the necessity of unity under the local bishop is important for us today because we can become jaded by scandal, history, and poor hierarchical examples and we tend to distrust those who have been put in charge over us.

St. Ignatius of Antioch gives us a powerful witness to the necessity of the hierarchy and their connection to Christ Himself. Lastly, Ignatius gives us one of the earliest records of the early Church defending her teachings against errors and heresies centuries before the great Ecumenical Councils. Today, in an age rife with disunity in the Church, Ignatius is a great model to us of fidelity to the Church, fidelity to those whom Christ has appointed over us, and fidelity to the teachings of the Church.

May we remain faithful to Christ and to His Church with the help of God’s grace.

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Have you read any of the early Church Fathers? If so, let me know below which one has been the most impactful to your faith and theological journey!

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The origin of the world and the creation of man in the book of Genesis has long been a point of contention in biblical exegesis and in attacks against the innerrancy of Sacred Scripture.

Many people, some Catholics included, see the book of Genesis and the creation of the world as simply a “pre-historical” fairytale by an unscientific culture trying to make sense of a wild world. In that regard, to our “scientific” minds, the origin of the world in the book of Genesis is simply a “nice” story but one that cannot be relied on for any objective truth about the origin of the world or the origin of humanity.

Throughout the history of the Church, the correct interpretation of the origin of creation in the book of Genesis has long occupied the minds of Church Fathers, the Magisterium, and theologians alike.

Works dealing with the Hexaemeron (“the six days”) of creation, were composed by some of the most important figures in the Church. The literal, spiritual, moral, and ecclesial implications of the texts cannot be overstated.

Over the centuries, there have been various streams of interpretation regarding creation, ranging from the literalness or figurativeness of the “six days” to the arguments of polygenism vs. monogenism in the face of modern genetics. Many questions remain open and, within reason, open to various interpretations as to the literalness or figurativeness of certain passages.

There are, however, 6 de fide (necessary to believe) truths contained in the creation account of Genesis. I will lay them out below and include many references to sources regarding each, both from the Catechism and from the Church Fathers.

**There are other truths which are de fide that follow from these basic truths which I have not mentioned but since they do not directly involve the account in Genesis, I have left them out.

For the purposes of this essay, I will list and explain the 6 de fide truths that are mentioned in Dr. John Bergsma and Dr. Brant Pitre’s A Catholic Introduction To The Old Testament.1

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1. “initial creation from nothing (ex nihilo)”2

In the Catechism…

The profession of faith of the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) affirms that God “from the beginning of time made at once (simul) out of nothing both orders of creatures, the spiritual and the corporeal, that is, the angelic and the earthly, and then (deinde) the human creature, who as it were shares in both orders, being composed of spirit and body." (CCC 327)

This de fide truth goes against any opposing theory which would contradict the Scriptural text that clearly states God created the world out of nothing. He took what was void and formless and created all that exists. One is free to debate about the age of the world, or scientifically how various theories sit with the evidence, but a Catholic is not free to hold that the world has always existed, which directly contradicts Scripture.

The Church Fathers…

While men, indeed, cannot make anything out of nothing, but only out of matter already existing, yet God is in this point pre-eminently superior to men, that He Himself called into being the substance of His creation, when previously it had no existence.3 — St. Irenaeus of Lyons

2. “the infusion of a spiritual soul into the first man, thus differentiating him from the animals”4

In the Catechism…

The human person, created in the image of God, is a being at once corporeal and spiritual. the biblical account expresses this reality in symbolic language when it affirms that "then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being." Man, whole and entire, is therefore willed by God. (CCC 362)

The Church teaches that every spiritual soul is created immediately by God - it is not "produced" by the parents - and also that it is immortal: it does not perish when it separates from the body at death, and it will be reunited with the body at the final Resurrection. (CCC 366)

This truth is foundational for human anthropology. The differentiation of human beings from all of God’s creation rests in the fact that we have a created rational and spiritual soul. That spiritual soul is joined to the body in one union which together constitutes a human being. Human beings are thus made in the image and likeness of God. That fact cannot be denied and, as regards the interpretation of Genesis, is necessary to maintain as a literal truth of the creation of man and woman.

The Church Fathers…

I ask whence Cain and Abel, who were the first-born of our first parents, had their souls? And the whole human race downwards, what are we to think was the origin of their souls? Did they come by propagation, like brute beasts? So that, as body springs from body, so soul from soul? Or is God daily making souls—He, with whom to will is to do, and who never ceases to be a Creator?5 — St. Jerome

Since, then, I am now speaking to a catholic, whence I pray you tell me, do you suppose that the soul, I will not say your soul or my own soul, but the soul of the first man, was given to him? If you admit that it came from nothing, made, however, and inbreathed into him by God, then your belief tallies with my own.6 — St. Augustine

3. “a historical first human couple, from which all people are descended (i.e., not polygenism)”7

In the Catechism…

Because of its common origin the human race forms a unity, for “from one ancestor (God) made all nations to inhabit the whole earth”:

“O wondrous vision, which makes us contemplate the human race in the unity of its origin in God. . . in the unity of its nature, composed equally in all men of a material body and a spiritual soul; in the unity of its immediate end and its mission in the world; in the unity of its dwelling, the earth, whose benefits all men, by right of nature, may use to sustain and develop life; in the unity of its supernatural end: God himself, to whom all ought to tend; in the unity of the means for attaining this end;. . . in the unity of the redemption wrought by Christ for all.” (CCC 360)

This, of all six statements, is the most difficult to understand with what we “know” about science and genetics. This de fide truth (which some argue as to whether this must be held), states that the origin of humanity comes from a single, original pair (Adam and Eve). This rejects so-called polygenism, the theory that humanity is descended from multiple pairs. The importance of this truth is massive. If we understand original sin (which we will get to below), as being passed down from progeny to progeny—innate in human nature post-fall—then it seems only logical that all of humanity must be descended from a single pair (monogenism). If one were to hold a view similar to polygenism, one would have to contend with how original sin is passed down to all human beings. The unity of mankind and the objectivity of original sin seem to necessitate monogenism.

Additional Quotes…

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger states in his book The Divine Project, that in the creation of man, there is an “idea of the unity of mankind” because we have a “common origin”.8

When, however, there is question of another conjectural opinion, namely polygenism, the children of the Church by no means enjoy such liberty. For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents. Now it is in no way apparent how such an opinion can be reconciled with that which the sources of revealed truth and the documents of the Teaching Authority of the Church propose with regard to original sin, which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam and which, through generation, is passed on to all and is in everyone as his own.9 (Pope Pius XII, HG, 37)

Thou madest Adam and gavest him Eve his wife
as a helper and support.
From them the race of mankind has sprung. (Tob. 8:6)

4. “the state of original holiness, constituted by ‘harmony between the first couple and all creation’ as well as a condition in which ‘man would not have to suffer or die’”10

In the Catechism…

By the radiance of this grace all dimensions of man's life were confirmed. As long as he remained in the divine intimacy, man would not have to suffer or die. The inner harmony of the human person, the harmony between man and woman, and finally the harmony between the first couple and all creation, comprised the state called "original justice" (CCC 376)

This truth is necessary because it is a fundamental recognition that the human condition now, marred by sin and concupiscence, was not the original plan of God. Original holiness was the state of man in the garden, where he was at once in perfect harmony with God and also with all of creation. Original holiness was lost by the fall which also had as a consequence: death. This truth is also a recognition that death is a consequence of original sin and something that was not originally apart of God’s plan. Death was introduced when sin was committed. That consequence of sin is thus passed on to all the descendants of Adam and Eve.

The Church Fathers…

For God has not only made us out of nothing; but He gave us freely, by the Grace of the Word, a life in correspondence with God. But men, having rejected things eternal, and, by counsel of the devil, turned to the things of corruption, became the cause of their own corruption in death, being, as I said before, by nature corruptible, but destined, by the grace following from partaking of the Word, to have escaped their natural state, had they remained good. For because of the Word dwelling with them, even their natural corruption did not come near them.11 — St. Athanasius of Alexandria

And therefore it is agreed among all Christians who truthfully hold the Catholic faith, that we are subject to the death of the body, not by the law of nature, by which God ordained no death for man, but by His righteous infliction on account of sin.12 — St. Augustine

5. “a historical fall of the first human couple—a decision of our first parents to reject God”13

In the Catechism…

The doctrine of original sin is, so to speak, the “reverse side” of the Good News that Jesus is the Saviour of all men, that all need salvation and that salvation is offered to all through Christ. the Church, which has the mind of Christ, knows very well that we cannot tamper with the revelation of original sin without undermining the mystery of Christ.

The account of the fall in Genesis 3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man. Revelation gives us the certainty of faith that the whole of human history is marked by the original fault freely committed by our first parents. (CCC 389-390)

This truth is fundamental to the Catholic faith. It recognizes that the fall in Genesis, while perhaps using figurative language and elements of ancient storytelling, nevertheless tells of an actual event. Catholic doctrine recognizes that there was actually a fall of man from God. That it was not the original intention of God that sin would mark His creation. Our first parents actually made a free choice to reject God, the consequence which we now share.

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6. “the transmission of original sin ‘by propagation to all mankind’ from the first man and woman”14

In the Catechism…

How did the sin of Adam become the sin of all his descendants? the whole human race is in Adam "as one body of one man". By this "unity of the human race" all men are implicated in Adam's sin, as all are implicated in Christ's justice. Still, the transmission of original sin is a mystery that we cannot fully understand. But we do know by Revelation that Adam had received original holiness and justice not for himself alone, but for all human nature. By yielding to the tempter, Adam and Eve committed a personal sin, but this sin affected the human nature that they would then transmit in a fallen state. It is a sin which will be transmitted by propagation to all mankind, that is, by the transmission of a human nature deprived of original holiness and justice. and that is why original sin is called "sin" only in an analogical sense: it is a sin "contracted" and not "committed" - a state and not an act. (CCC 404)

This final necessary truth of Genesis affirms to us that original sin is inherited by all human beings following the original personal sin of Adam and Eve. This doctrinal truth is necessary because from it flows the necessity of Sacramental Baptism, the necessity of the Cross, and the Passion of Christ. The doctrine of original sin is a foundational truth for the whole of Salvation History. Adam and Eve’s sin has been passed on since the beginning. This sin is the reason why Christ came and became Incarnate and suffered and died for humanity.

As Catholics, I hope this clarification of the literalness or figurativeness of Genesis is helpful! Now you can debate whether or not God created the world in 6, 24 hour days…

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Are you surprised these 6 de fide truths are the only things you must believe about the creation account in Genesis? Let me know below!

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This essay is the fruit of my personal affection for this Old Testament story and the profound impact it has had on my faith. It unpacks the Christological significance of the story and unlocks many elements of the story which I had not understood until reading Origen of Alexandria’s Homily XIII on the Sacrifice of Isaac.

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When my wife and I were in marriage preparation, we discerned multiple weeks about which readings we would have for our wedding Mass.

After both being moved by the image of marriage as sacrifice, we chose the Crucifixion in John’s Gospel as our gospel reading and the Sacrifice of Issac in Genesis 22 as our first reading.

Everyone obviously thought we were crazy for choosing such dark and sacrificial imagery for our wedding; but, for us, there was no more perfect image of what marriage is than sacrifice, and what better images of sacrifice than Our Lord’s sacrifice and the sacrifice of Issac?

Since that time, I have been fascinated by the story of Abraham’s ultimate test of faith by God in Genesis. This dramatic account solidifies Abraham’s faith in God and his status as the Patriarch of all Patriarchs.

When reading the Old Testament, it is important that we read it as Catholics. This means that there are layers to the Scriptural texts. There is obviously the actual text itself, which we would call the literal meaning, which is enhanced and discovered by use of the historical critical method of biblical interpretation. This involves discovering the world behind the text, the intentions of the author, etc. As a Catholic, however, the interpretation cannot stop there. There is also the recognition that Sacred Scripture has God as its primary author, which means that the Scriptures must be read in their totality—both Old and New. The Scriptures are not read in isolation; rather, they are read in continuity with each other. On top of that, we also read the Scriptures in their ecclesial context, discovering how the Church has read and interpreted them and how they fit into the Tradition of the Church. With that in mind, the world of Sacred Scripture is opened to us, and the Old Testament texts come alive and, in a real sense, burst with meaning in God’s providence and in the overarching narrative of Salvation History. What was once simply a story is now a foreshadowing, a type, of what God will accomplish in His providence. A providence that the human author could not have known on his own, but one which God in His omnipotence and omniscience has worked into the narratives conveyed by human hands.

Let us now turn to this dramatic Christological story of the Sacrifice of Isaac and discover why I have called it an Epiphany.

The word epiphany comes from the Greek word epiphaneia, meaning a manifestation, appearance, or revelation. It is most often used to describe the event of the Epiphany where the Magi visit the child Jesus. However, throughout the Gospels, there are various “epiphanies”, or revelations, of God, such as the Baptism of the Lord and the Transfiguration. These events reveal who Jesus is and offer a revelation of God.

In the Old Testament, there are also epiphanies, or revelations of God, such as the burning bush in Exodus 3. Developing that theological and biblical imagery, I would contend that throughout the Old Testament, there are countless places where Christ is foreshadowed directly, such as the “Suffering Servant” in Isaiah, as well as typologically in the image of Melchizedek, Adam, etc. These are what I would call “little epiphanies”, or providential manifestations of the plan of Salvation, the unfolding of Salvation History foreshadowing the salvation God would offer to mankind in His Son, Jesus Christ.

With that in mind, the story of the Sacrifice of Isaac, read typologically, is a powerful revelation of the future Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus. John Bergsma and Brant Pitre, in their massive introduction to the Old Testament, write that “this typological reading provides a powerful explanation for the otherwise inexplicable and unique occurrence of the God of Israel appearing to command human sacrifice.”1

Origen of Alexandria, the greatest biblical exegete in the early Church, helps us understand this typology in his Genesis Homily XIII on the Sacrifice of Issac.

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Typology in the Sacrifice of Isaac

“Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love…”(Gen. 22:2)

In the story, God comes to Abraham and tells him, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Mori′ah, and offer him there as a burnt offering upon one of the mountains of which I shall tell you”(Gen 22:2). This striking statement is meant to remind Abraham that the promises made to him concerning the covenant go through Isaac, the son of the promise, and the son whom Abraham loves. God is seeking to test Abraham’s faith because on one hand, God promised Abraham that he would be blessed for generations through Isaac, but now, the son of the promise is the victim to be slain by his father. Origen magnificently explains, through the words of St. Paul, what Abraham thought in his heart at this moment: “By faith Abraham did not hesitate, when he offered his only son, in whom he had received the promises, thinking that God is able to raise him up even from the dead”(Heb 11:17, 19).2 The reason, according to Origen and St. Paul, that Abraham does not hesitate to follow God’s command is that Abraham had faith that even if Isaac was to be slain, God could raise him from the dead. Thus, Origen beautifully states that “the Apostle [St. Paul], therefore, has reported to us the thoughts of the faithful man, that the faith in the resurrection began to be held already in that time in Isaac” and Abraham “hoped for the resurrection of Isaac and believed in a future which had not yet happened.”3

Thus we see here, in the very beginning of the narrative, that the future resurrection of Christ was nascent in Abraham’s faith. Thus, Origen states that Abraham “knew the Christ was to be born from his seed, who also was to be offered as a truer victim for the whole world and was to be raised from the dead.”4

“On the third day…”(Gen. 22:4)

Next, we see that God did not say immediately sacrifice your son. Rather, God told Abraham to journey to the “land of Mori′ah”(Gen 22:2), which Abraham, Isaac, and the two men arrived at “on the third day”(Gen 22:4). There was therefore a three-days-journey to Mount Moriah. The significance of the three days cannot be underscored. Not only does the journey solidify the physical and spiritual suffering Abraham needed to endure, where he no doubt wrestled with, agonized over, and reminisced over the love he had for his son and his impending sacrifice, but the numerical importance of “three” is noteworthy. Origen notes that the third day “is always applied to mysteries,”5 such as worshipping in the desert on the third day after the flight from Egypt and their purification on the third day. But most importantly, “the third day is the day of the Lord’s resurrection6” so there is a clear Messianic connection being made.

He took the wood “and laid it on Isaac his son…”(Gen. 22:6)

After they get to Mount Moriah, Abraham lays the wood for the sacrifice on the shoulders of his son Isaac to be carried up the mountain. What more striking image of the Cross of Calvary exists than this? Origen recounts that Isaac carrying the wood on his back “is a figure, because Christ also ‘himself carried his own cross,’(Jn. 19:17) and yet to carry ‘the word for the holocaust’ is the duty of a priest.” Thus, Isaac “becomes both victim and priest.”7 The image of Abraham laying the wood on Isaac’s back is an unmistakable parallel to Christ carrying His cross up the Mount of Calvary. This Christological image we see in the person of Isaac is perfected and opened in the person of Jesus, who is Himself both priest, the one who offers the Sacrifice, and also victim, the one who is offered. This dual aspect is clearly found in Isaac. Thus, we have a foreshadowing of the Passion of Christ.

“Abraham went and took the ram, and offered it up as a burnt offering…”(Gen. 22:13)

Finally, after the angel tells Abraham to stay his knife, to spare his son, Abraham turns and sees a ram which is caught in a thicket. He then takes the ram, kills it, and offers it as the sacrifice instead of Isaac. This final element to the story gives us the final clue as to the revelation of God’s future events.

Origen unlocks the meaning for us in his homily by comparing the unslain Isaac, the image of the spirit of Christ, which is incorruptible, and the slain ram, the image of the mortal body of Christ which was slain on the wood of the Cross. Origen states that “it is worthwhile to know how both [Isaac and the ram] are appropriate to Christ, both Isaac who is not slain and the ram which is slain.”8 Origen continues his analysis by appealing to the Incarnation. He states that “one aspect of Christ, therefore, is from above; the other is received from human nature and the womb of the virgin." Christ suffered, therefore, but in the flesh; and he endured death, but it was the flesh, of which the ram is a type… But the Word continued ‘in incorruption,’ which is Christ according to the spirit, of which Isaac is the image.”9 This is why Christ is both priest and victim—the slain and the one who offers.

In speaking about the typology of this story, St. John Chrysostom, in his Homilies on Genesis, states:

All these things were types of the cross. That is why Christ said: Abraham rejoiced that he might see My day: he saw it, and was glad. How did he see it, considering that he was born so many years before? In type (typos) and in shadow (skia)…. The reality had to be depicted beforehand in type.10

Thus, in the end, the whole story is a type of the passion, death, and resurrection of Christ which was enacted some 2,000 years before. In the context of the whole Scriptures, God desires “for Abraham and Isaac to enact within salvation history the kind of self-sacrificial donation that God himself, as a Trinity of persons, will carry out in order to bring about the salvation of mankind.”11

The Old Testament dramatic story of the Sacrifice of Isaac is a type of Calvary. The story is an epiphany of Christ, a revelation of God’s future plan of his rescue mission to save fallen humanity from the corruption of sin by willingly giving us his “only son”, his “beloved son”, and offering Him on the wood of the Cross for our salvation. Christ is both priest and victim; He is both Isaac and the ram of sacrifice. Do not let the Old Testament sit in isolation. Let the plan of salvation history unfold before you in the dramatic story of God’s providence and the depths of His love for us.

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St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologiae begins with a question that might strike religious readers as a little backwards: Do we need revelation beyond philosophy (which, in his time would have included all empirical sciences), or is philosophy sufficient on its own?

Far to the contrary of Aquinas’ original concern, many Catholics today think that philosophy is unnecessary since we have theology. After all, if God revealed things to us to allow us to know him, why would we try to understand anything else? Revelation should be sufficient.

This echoes the concern of Ancient Christian writer Tertullian, who asked “What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” He was concerned that philosophy could actually dilute the Catholic faith, and that it would distract people from trying to understand God’s word itself.

But as Christianity has developed, so has our understanding and appreciation for philosophy and its role as a preambulum fidei - a preamble to the faith. This role has become so valued that philosophy is sometimes called the handmaid of theology, because philosophy assists and supports theology.

This means that philosophy can dispose us to accepting the gift of faith from God. It prepares us mentally and spiritually to accept the truths God has revealed to us so that, when faith is offered, we can accept it.

So, since I am being graciously hosted by In Defense of Theology (it’s beautiful over here, by the way. And the food is delicious!), I decided to offer three ways that good philosophy can assist us in doing good theology.

1. It can give us good reasons to believe that God exists.

Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga famously argued that it was possible for people to believe in God because it was so obvious to them that it formed the rest of their worldview. This kind of belief is called a “properly basic belief.”

But while some people are blessed to think that way, that is not where everybody is, including many people who honestly want to know, love and serve God.

It should be obvious that you cannot receive messages from somebody who does not exist. But it is also quite difficult to receive messages from someone you strongly believe not to exist. And since theology assumes that God exists, it is pretty important that a theologian actually believe that, you know, God exists.

That is where philosophy can come in. There are many arguments in philosophy that provide very good evidence for the existence of God, including cosmological arguments, fine-tuning arguments and arguments from miracles.

Philosophy also provides answers to challenges from atheists, showing that objections to the existence of God can be met and neutralized.

And since you cannot do theology if God does not exist, these features are important aspects of philosophy’s help to theology. But here is another one.

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2. Philosophy can help us know things about God’s nature

The practice of learning about God’s nature is called “natural theology,” and it precedes Christianity itself. But as Christians developed their theology, they saw that many of the things that are revealed to us by the Bible were also discovered by pagan philosophers like Aristotle. God’s omnipotence (God is all-powerful), omnipresence (God is everywhere), omniscience (God knows all things), and all-goodness are revealed in Scripture, but it is also perfectly possible to come to knowledge of these things through only our own human intellects. These proofs lead credence to non-Christians for the truth of the Bible, and provide additional material for Catholics to reflect upon.

There are also things that, while not mentioned explicitly in Scripture, nonetheless line up with the God of the Bible and are implied by his other attributes. Two examples are God’s simplicity (God has no parts) and his impassibility (God cannot be caused in any way). While these are not explicitly mentioned in Scripture, we can know them based on what else we know about God, and thus philosophy actually provides material for theology itself through its own work.

3. Philosophy can help us think in a disciplined way

One of the greatest benefits that philosophy has to offer is the way that it teaches ordered, precise and analytical thinking through logic and its techniques for understanding abstract concepts. Many sciences can benefit from this, but theology is especially well-suited to help itself to the riches of a philosophical education. Because theology is itself dealing with abstract concepts that must be derived from prior principles rather than experimentation or mathematical formulas, philosophy can help theologians to reason well, even though the subject material itself is revealed by God.

In fact, this revelatory nature is not minimized or obscured by philosophy. Instead, by using philosophy we can plumb the depths of God’s revelation, and discover everything that he meant to teach us by implication. And historically, this is exactly what has happened: many of our greatest theologians were expertly trained philosophers, including Augustine, Aquinas, Bonaventure and many others. Their profound insights, though of course informed and sustained by mystical experience and revealed truth, were honed, sharpened and clarified by airtight logical reasoning.

People sometimes fear the influence of philosophy on theology, worrying that it will somehow corrupt or ruin our emphasis and understanding of God’s revelation. But, ironically, quite the opposite is true: since God is Truth, and cannot contradict himself, philosophy provides us with tools to really understand and explore theology in its fullness.

Alex Spieldenner is the middle school theology teacher behind Aquinas and Beyond, the Substack devoted to helping people understand the Catholic philosophical tradition.

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How has your experience with philosophy informed the way you understand Catholic theology? Let me know in the comments below!

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How would you answer these questions:

“Who is God?”

“What is He like?”

“What kind of father is He?”

Our answer to these questions will dictate much of the way we pray, live, and experience the presence of God.

If you think God is a good father, one who loves you, desires your good, and intimately cares for you, then you will love Him because He is worthy of love, you will trust Him—even when it doesn’t make sense, and you will avoid sin out of a desire to please God.

If you think God is a task-master, one who seeks to punish offenses, inflict suffering on the innocent, and relishes in His power, then you will obey Him out of fear, tend towards distrust, and find it difficult to love Him.

In our world today, even amongst many Christians, you will find that many people see God as a dictatorial taskmaster, not as a loving Father. For instance, you might frequently see on social media accounts a reoccurring image of God as a military commander, one who wants His children to fall into line, or perhaps a God who relishes in punishing sinners.

How you view God as Father changes everything.

Genesis Reveals God’s Nature

Without the help of the Sacred Scriptures, we would be left to simply guess regarding who God is. Luckily, because of the inspired Scriptures, God has revealed who He is.

In the creation account in the first chapter of Genesis, the author poetically sets the creation of the world in a revealing pattern. The seven days of creation, culminating in the creation of man and woman, reveal much about who God is. In the beginning, “the earth was without form and void”(Gen 1:2). So, on the first day, God brings form to what was formless in the separation of the light from the darkness. On the second day, he created the “firmament”(Gen 1:6) in the midst of the waters and brought form to the Heavens. Then on the third day, God created the earth and separated it from the seas. The last 3 days God fills the new form He created with creatures in the skies, in the seas, and on the land. Thus God brought form and filled the void that once prevailed. At the final culmination of creation, after exclaiming the goodness of all He had made, God created man and woman in “our image, after our likeness” (Gen 1:26). These creatures, after the image and likeness of God, were “very good” (Gen 1:31).

In order to fully understand the full weight of the poetic nature of the story, it is integral that we understand the numerical significance of the number seven. Tim Gray and Jeff Cavins, in their book Walking with God, explain that the number seven, which we will see later in Genesis, signifies a covenant with God. “God’s creation of the world in seven days signifies that he is making a covenant with his creation.”1 The seventh day then, the day of rest, is holy.2 The authors further clarify that in this culture, the creation of a covenant was, in essence, “a family bond.”3 With this in mind then, Gray and Cavins state that

the many uses of “seven” throughout Israel’s liturgy all relate to the celebration and worship of the covenant God made with his people. Thus, God’s creation of the heavens and the earth in seven days, as recounted in Genesis 1, communicates the resplendent theological truth of how, at the foundation and beginning of the story, God seeks to enter into a covenant with his creation, making man and woman not simply his creatures but his sons and daughters.4

Thus man and woman are not simply “creatures”, but sons and daughters. This we see fleshed out explicitly in the New Testament, such as in 1 Peter: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people” (1 Pet 2:9); Furthermore, Jesus says “No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends” (Jn 15:15). God’s relationship with His people is one of intimate familial connection.

The Fall And The Distorted Image Of God

The dramatic turn of the story however, happens in Genesis 3, with the fall of Adam and Eve. During their temptation, Satan’s method is one of sowing distrust and distorting God’s nature. Satan says “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat of the any tree of the garden?’”(Gen 3:1). Eve’s response reveals the discord Satan has already sown in her heart. Not only does she repeat what God’s command was, namely that they may eat of all the trees except one, but she adds a command that God did not say—that they may not even touch the tree. This interaction reveals that Satan’s method of temptation is to paint God as an arbitrary law-giver, one who sets up meaningless laws, not as a good Father, but as a dictator king. This is further evidenced by Satan’s second temptation, “You will not die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you be like God, knowing good and evil” (Gen 3:4-5). Satan thus juxtaposes God’s command with the pervasive lie that God is not out for Adam and Eve’s good, rather for their subjugation.

In their fall, Adam and Eve grasp, out of pride, for something that they already possess; Satan says that God is afraid if they eat from the tree they will become like Him, in a sense, equal to God. The irony is that Adam and Eve are already like God; They are made in His image and likeness. They grasp for something they already have because they have been tempted into thinking that God is enslaving their freedom, not providing the means for their flourishing.

Now that they have fallen, they are continuously tempted, as we are, into thinking that God is not on their side, that He is not a good Father, but it an arbitrary law giver. As Fr. Mike Schmitz says in the Bible in a Year podcast when commenting on this scene, your image of God will determine how you hear God’s response to Adam after He realizes they know they are naked. God says “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?”(Gen 3:11). Your image of God and how you view His Fatherhood will dictate whether or not you hear that question as one of anger or one of heartbreak. If God is a good Father, as He has revealed Himself to be, then that question posed to Adam is one of a good Father’s heart breaking because His son and daughter have broken their relationship with Him and have chosen against Him, they have distorted the perfect plan He had for them. It is not a question posed in anger and wrath, it is asked in a heart wrenching moment of sadness.

God’s Plan Of Salvation

The rest of Salvation History is God’s mission of redemption, His mission to save those creatures that He created in His image and likeness—us. Through baptism, we have been reborn, washed clean of Original Sin, given Sanctifying Grace, and once again made sons and daughters of God, members of the Body of Christ.

In our relationship with Him, when we read the Sacred Scriptures, when we attend the Sacred Liturgy, we are communing with a God who loves us abundantly, who desires our good, and who emptied Himself completely by sending His Son to save us from our sins. He is a good and loving Father who wants a relationship with us, not out of necessity, but out of a pure and abiding love. The Catechism beautifully sums this up when it says

Scripture and Tradition never cease to teach and celebrate this fundamental truth: "The world was made for the glory of God." St. Bonaventure explains that God created all things "not to increase his glory, but to show it forth and to communicate it", for God has no other reason for creating than his love and goodness…5

He’s a good and loving Father; let’s start seeing Him that way.

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Reading Catholic theology is challenging. You have to, on the one hand, have a pretty vast wealth of knowledge stored up so you aren’t constantly looking up ever 15th word and you have to have a measurable grasp of theology and Church history so you can correctly situate the text in light of tradition.

While the task of “doing” theology, or simply understanding what you are reading is a gradual process, there are some key and necessary terms and phrases that you just have to know at the outset.

So, I will lay out 8 (and trust me, there are hundreds more) phrases or words that I believe are critical to grasp before you can begin to read theology in light of the Church’s tradition, and in faithfulness to the Magisterium.

This is by no means an exhaustive list. However, I hope this will give you a launching off point in your own study of theology.

This list will be broken into two parts: essential theological terms and essential theological phrases. Under each will be an explanation of the term or phrase, a few quotes that reveal the depth of each idea, and some recommended reading.

Essential Theological Terms

1. Hypostatic Union

The hypostatic union is the theological phrase for the Incarnation of Our Lord. It is how the Church Fathers, primarily beginning in and around the 4th and 5th centuries explained the union of divinity and humanity in Christ.

St. Irenaeus of Lyons

• “Therefore, He caused man [human nature] to cleave to and to become one with God. For unless man had overcome the enemy of man, the enemy would not have been legitimately vanquished.”1

St. Athanasius of Alexandria

• “Therefore from His works He revealed both Himself as Son of God, and His own Father, and from the affections of the flesh He showed that He bore a true body, and that it was His own.”2

St. Gregory Nazianzen

• “What [Christ] was He laid aside; what He was not He assumed; not that He became two, but He deigned to be One made out of the two. For both are God, that which assumed, and that which was assumed; two Natures meeting in One, not two Sons (let us not give a false account of the blending).”3

📚Further Reading

• God Sent His Son: A Contemporary Christology by Christoph Cardinal Schönborn

2. Ecclesiology

Ecclesiology is the theological study of the Church. It answers questions like: What is the Church? and what constitutes the body of Christ on earth? It is a critical pillar of Catholic theology. The Church is Christ’s visible body on earth, the continuation of His saving mission through time. It is the Church that dispenses the Sacraments, guides the souls of believers, and guards the Deposit of faith.

Henri de Lubac

• “In everything he does on the supernatural level the Christian acts ut membrum Ecclesiae, ut pars Ecclesie—Christ loves us individually but not separately, saying to each of us, as he did to Moses, ‘I know thee by name’; he loves us in his Church, for which he shed his blood.”4

📚Further Reading

• The Splendor of the Church by Henri de Lubac

3. Eschatology

Eschatology is the theological study of the “Last Things”: Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, and Judgement. It answers the theological questions surrounding the particular and final judgements, the nature of heaven and hell, the reality and necessity of purgatory, and much more.

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger

• “In Christ, God himself entered that realm of death, transforming the space of noncommunication into the place of his own presence.”5

📚Further Reading

• Eschatology: Death and Eternal Life by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger

4. Christology

Christology is the theological study of Jesus Christ Our Lord. It deals with who He is, what He did, and it is the theological discipline that explains the hypostatic union.

Council of Chalcedon

• “[We confess that] one and the same Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son, must be acknowledged in two natures, without confusion or change, without division or separation.”6

Council of Ephesus (Second Letter of Cyril of Alexandria to Nestorius)

• “We do not say, in fact, that the nature of the Word underwent a transformation and became flesh or that it was changed into a complete man composed of soul and body. Rather, we say that the Word, hypostatically uniting to himself the flesh animated by a rational soul, became man in an ineffable and incomprehensible manner and was called Son of man, not merely by will or good pleasure or because he only assumed a person. Furthermore, [we say] that the natures brought together in real union [are] different and from these two only one Christ and Son results, not as though the difference of the natures was suppressed by the union, but, rather, because the divinity and the humanity have formed for us only one Lord and Christ and Son by their ineffable and mysterious coming together in unity….”7

📚Further Reading

• God Sent His Son: A Contemporary Christology by Christoph Cardinal Schönborn

5. Original Sin

Original sin is the sin of Adam and Eve which is inherited through human nature in all human beings. While the sin of Adam and Eve was an individual sin, Original Sin is an inherited sin, meaning it is not actually committed by human beings, but is merely the inherited result of the punishment inflicted upon human nature. Original Sin separates man from God. It is remedied through sacramental baptism where sanctifying grace is infused in the soul and makes one capable of salvation through the Cross of Christ.

St. Augustine

• “Whence they, who are not liberated through grace, either because they are not yet able to hear, or because they are unwilling to obey; or again because they did not receive, at the time when they were unable on account of youth to hear, that bath of regeneration, which they might have received and through which they might have been saved, are indeed justly condemned; because they are not without sin, either that which they have derived from their birth, or that which they have added from their own misconduct. “For all have sinned”—whether in Adam or in themselves—’and come short of the glory of God.’”8

Pope St. Leo the Great

• “And because through the transgression of the first man the whole stock of the human race was tainted, no one can be set free from the state of the old Adam save through Christ’s sacrament of baptism.”9

📚Further Reading

• On the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin by St. Augustine

Essential Theological Phrases

1. “Whatever is not assumed is not saved”

This important “axiom” of the Church Fathers is necessary to understand because it is the driving force for all of the Christological statements. This phrase deals with Soteriology, or the theological discipline which deals with Salvation. In Latin, which you sometimes might see, this phrase reads “Quod non est assumptum non est sanatum.”

This phrase or principle, which we can see in many of the Church Fathers as well as in St. Thomas, and the Councils, is clearly articulated in St. Gregory Nazianzen. St. Gregory writes in his Letter to Cledonius the Priest Against Apollinarius that “For that which He has not assumed He has not healed; but that which is united to His Godhead is also saved.”10 This basic formula is a recognition by the Fathers that for Christ to assume full humanity and redeem humanity, He had to actually assume real humanity. Anything less than the full weight of humanity would imply or even leave open the possibly that parts of humanity were not redeemed.

Origen of Alexandria

• “man would not have been saved entirely if Christ hadn’t clothed himself in man entirely.”11

St. Thomas Aquinas

• “I respond that Christ came for the restoration of human nature, which he restored by assuming it. Therefore it was necessary that he assume whatever essentially follows on human nature—namely, all the properties and parts of the human nature, among which is also sex.”12

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2. Lex orandi, lex credendi

This ancient Latin phrase translates to ““the law of prayer is the law of belief.” In short, this axiom gives clarity to the fact that belief in the Church, whether that be theological, doctrinal, or otherwise, originates in the prayer of the Church. All doctrinal expression comes out of the experience of prayer. This Latin phrase is used often in Liturgical theology. It was originally attributed to Prosper of Aquitaine, a contemporary of St. Augustine. Put another way, Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, Archbishop of Colombo in Sri Lanka writes that “doctrine often evolves in the faith experience of prayer.”13 This phrase creates, if you will, a litmus test of liturgical theology to be first rooted in the genuine encounter of the believing people in their prayer with God.

Prosper of Aquitaine

• “ut legem credendi lex statuat supplicandi” (the law of praying establishes the law of believing)14

  ---

3. “Consensus of the Fathers”

This general phrase, is both clear and very unclear. We see this phrase in the Council of Trent. It says “…no one, relying on his own skill, shall,–in matters of faith, and of morals…presume to interpret the said sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church,–whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures…or even contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers.”15 This decree from the Council of Trent states clearly that no one can interpret Scripture on his own in a way that is, in faith and morals, contrary to the Church and to the “unanimous consent of the Fathers.” This decree is not an infallible decree. It is rather a juridical decree, meaning that it is a law of the Church. Interestingly, it is not currently in canon law, but it has been expressed in numerous magisterial documents, most especially in Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical, Providentissimus Deus. He writes that:

the Holy Fathers, We say, are of supreme authority, whenever they all interpret in one and the same manner any text of the Bible, as pertaining to the doctrine of faith or morals; for their unanimity clearly evinces that such interpretation has come down from the Apostles as a matter of Catholic faith. The opinion of the Fathers is also of very great weight when they treat of these matters in their capacity of doctors, unofficially; not only because they excel in their knowledge of revealed doctrine and in their acquaintance with many things which are useful in understanding the apostolic Books, but because they are men of eminent sanctity and of ardent zeal for the truth, on whom God has bestowed a more ample measure of His light. Wherefore the expositor should make it his duty to follow their footsteps with all reverence, and to use their labours with intelligent appreciation.16

Put simply, the consensus of the fathers is what I would call a litmus test for doctrinal, moral, and traditional continuity. In other words, did the Fathers, in regard to some particular doctrine, in general, teach the same thing? For instance, did the Fathers, in general, teach the primacy of the bishop of Rome?—In general, yes. Did the Fathers teach the necessity of baptismal regeneration with water?—Yes.

Does this mean that all of them must teach it, or that a certain number must teach it? Not necessarily. It is a general hermeneutic principle for ascertaining the truth of a Catholic doctrine. It does not mean that a certain number of Fathers must have taught something for it to get the “stamp of approval.” Rather, it is simply a test for the authenticity and “originality” of an essential Catholic doctrine.

Now, jump into your theological reading! If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out and ask!—or comment below!

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Perhaps the biggest tagline in Protestantism, one that determines the fierceness of one’s Christian commitment is “Do you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ?” The answer to that is, for all intents and purposes, is the measure of one’s Christian faith. However, in Catholic language, and in the cultural experience of Catholicism, a personal relationship with Jesus is not emphasized. This language is foreign to most Catholic ears. This begs the question of whether or not this is missing in Catholicism, or if Catholicism simply understands the nature of Christianity and the Church in an otherly unique way, as compared to the Protestant understanding. Put more bluntly, has Protestantism fundamentally misunderstood the nature of the Church and the individual believers relationship to Jesus?

The answer is quite a simple one: it boils down to a fundamental misunderstanding of the primary nature of the Church, the place of the individual within the collective “we” of the body of Christ. Joseph Ratzinger in particular refers to this Ecclesiological understanding of the nature of the Church as the “we structure” of the Church, as opposed to the “I” structure.

The Answer Lies In The “We” Structure Of The Church: communio

Henri de Lubac, the great 20th century master of ecclesiology, states this ecclesiological point succinctly: “the mystery of the Trinity has opened to us a totally new perspective: the ground of being is communio.”1 The Christian’s primary focus is towards the object of faith, which is the oneness of God; but that oneness is actually a communio: the Trinity. Ratzinger follows up by stating that “to believe in the Trinity means to become communio.”2 This community is exemplified in the central tenet of Christian belief, the credo. As we profess this ancient creed on Sundays, we begin with Credo in unum Deum (I believe in One God). At first glance, this would seem to indicate that the foundation of faith is found in the individual to the One God. However, As Ratzinger notes, since the object of faith is the communio of God, which incorporates the individual into the collective communio, the “I” of the creed is a “collective ‘I’.”3 This collective “I” is an “ecclesial ‘I’.”4 The faith is lived and mediated within this ecclesial sphere.

The Church, as dispenser of the grace of Christ, as the giver of the Lord’s sacraments, is the means by which Jesus established his salvation to be offered to the world through history. Membership in this communio is necessary for the reception of the sacraments, for the gratuitous gift of Sacramental grace to be dispensed to the individual believer. Incorporation into this community is achieved through sacramental baptism. That first sacrament of Christian initiation is the door by which the individual, in his state of Original Sin—isolated and alone—enters into the land of the “collective ‘I’” of the ecclesial community. The incorporation of the individual into the unity of the Body of Christ is essential in the transformation of the subject in orientation to the object of faith: the Trinity. It is within the community of the Church, the collection of individual believers, that we fully realize the plan of salvation that Christ gave to his Apostles.

Should There Be An Emphasis On A “Personal Relationship” In Catholicism?

Now that we have a better grasp of the “we” structure of the Church, we can further explain our main question, of whether or not Catholicism needs to emphasize the individual’s personal relationship with Jesus?

Fundamentally, the personal relationship question is primarily a Protestant question. Quite simply, I believe this is rooted in a fundamental misunderstanding of the Church. For most Protestants, the first point of contact with the God is through one’s personal encounter with the Bible and in the personal silence of prayer. This encounter could be mediated by the collective worship in a Sunday service, but, if you asked most mainline Protestants, their concern is more with their own relationship with Jesus, not the flow of grace from God through the community. The community is therefore just one aspect of their faith, but one that, if you were to push, could probably be discarded if necessary. This is why, for most Protestants, there is not obligation to attend Sunday services. On vacations, or if other obligations come up that are out of the ordinary, there is typically no moral guilt in missing their Sunday service. This flows fundamentally from this “I” versus “We” structure. It is an “I” first, “We” second mentality

In the Catholic Church, it is quite clear that the community is essential for the faith. The individual certainly has a personal encounter with God. This encounter is found in personal prayer, spiritual reading, etc. This encounter, however, is typically conditioned by the community. What I mean by that is that when a Catholic encounters the Living God, it is almost always most tangibly achieved through the celebration of the sacraments and the reception of the Eucharist during Mass. This encounter with God, which is personal, is ultimately a part of the communio of the Church. Even the personal reception of the Eucharist is mediated by the public worship of the Mass. The Eucharist is celebrated in community. It is a product of the believing Church, of the words of the Church, through the priest, who shares in the power of his bishop, who is a part of the unbroken Apostolic Succession stretching back to the Apostles. The individual experience of God is always mediated by the “we” of the Church. Through Baptism, the individual becomes a member of the community. The parish, as the local, physical embodiment of the community of the Body of Christ, is the place where faith is nourished, God is worshiped, and the individual partakes in the communal worship of God.

Fundamentally, there is nothing necessarily wrong with a “personal” relationship with Jesus. In a real sense, every Catholic should have a unique encounter with God in prayer. The problem arrises when this individual experience is isolated from the community of believers. As a member of the Body of Christ, the individual is never truly individual. The believer is a member of the One Body. That body, the Church, is the place where the community gathers as one and worships the Triune God. The individual’s relationship with God is always mediated and conditioned by the living breathing body of believers.

A Sacramental Example Of The “We”

To give a sacramental example, the “individual”reception of the sacrament of Penance is, at first glance, a solo experience. The sacrament is dispensed individually, in the personal encounter between priest and penitent. However, in the sacramental theology of Reconciliation, there is a dual reconciliation that occurs during the sacrament, which is exemplified by the physical presence of the priest. In the sacrament of Reconciliation, the believer is at once reconciled to God through absolution, but he is also reconciled back to the community. The priest is this physical presence of Jesus—yes, but also of the Church. Mortal sin breaks communion with God and breaks communion with the Church. The sacrament of Reconciliation is a communal sacrament because it restores the communio of the Church. It re-incorporates the individual into the collective communio of the Church.

You Cannot Have An Individual Relationship Apart From The Community

As a Catholic, you cannot have a completely individual and personal relationship with God that is not also intimately connected to the community of the Church. That fundamental spiritual reality is what is missing in Protestantism. That is what must be recovered in Catholic language, and what must be continuously given to our Protestant brothers and sisters. We must emphasize the collective “we” of the Church as opposed to the isolation of the “I”.

Christ unites, Satan isolates.

Be united to the communio of the Church as we worship the Triune God, One In Nature, three in Persons.

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After a year in college, I knew God was calling me to leave and enter seminary. At that time, after 12 years of Catholic education, I couldn’t tell you hardly anything about theology besides the most basic textbook-level stuff.

The first book I read after reverting back to the faith, right before I left for seminary, was Jason Evert’s wonderful little book, Saint John Paul the Great: His Five Loves. This wonderful book changed my life in regards to me taking the faith seriously, but it ignited my love of reading.

Since then, I have been consuming philosophy, theology, and literature. I have read and studied many of the classic and important works of philosophy and theology in both my degrees as well as in my ministry. Since I know many of you love to read and study theology, below you will find 4 theology book recommendations that I would give to anyone who wants to deeply study Catholic theology. As an additional resource, I have also given you 5 books that I love which have greatly influenced me, but are not strictly theological (although all of them are deeply rooted in the Catholic ethos).

1. The Spirit of the Liturgy by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger

I simply cannot recommend this book enough. I have read it multiple times—as a part of my theology studies, for pleasure, as well as having led a parish book study using it. I have not found a book on the foundations of Catholic liturgy and worship that is more accessible, spiritually moving, and theologically rich than this book.

From this book, I have deepened my understanding of what divine worship is, the correct facing orientation during the liturgy, and the importance of bodily posture during the liturgy.

If you are interested in the liturgy, without wading into the “theology wars”, I highly recommend this book from the future Pope Benedict XVI.

2. Dei Verbum from the Second Vatican Council

Of all the documents of the Second Vatican Council, none have impacted my theological insight more than Dei Verbum, the Constitution on Divine Revelation. This Constitution is monumentally important as a Magisterial development of Vatican I’s document, Dei Filius. Dei Verbum has helped me more deeply understand what Revelation is, in the Catholic sense, and what constitutes the mechanisms for its transmission through time.

Dei Verbum beautifully says that “For both of them [Tradition and Scripture], flowing from the same divine wellspring, in a certain way merge into a unity and tend towards the same end.”1 I simply cannot recommend you read this Constitution enough. If you want to deeply study what the Church believes about Divine Revelation, you must read Dei Verbum.

3. An Essay On The Development Of Christian Doctrine by St. John Henry Newman

If you have followed my work for any amount of time, you will know of my affinity and admiration for St. John Henry Newman. His theological insight and his level of brilliance are unparalleled in the last few centuries. Among his greatest contributions to the thought of the Church is his masterpiece, An Essay On The Development Of Christian Doctrine. This book has taught me not only that doctrine develops, but how it develops. The development of doctrine is a topic that has captivated theological minds throughout the centuries, but even more so, in the last few decades. At the Second Vatican Council, Newman’s theory of development was clearly in the minds of the Council Fathers. I cannot recommend this book enough if you are serious about studying theology. I would not be exaggerating if I were to say that it is necessary for your formation.

4. God Sent His Son: A Contemporary Christology by Christoph Cardinal Schönborn

When I was in seminary, one of the textbooks we used in my Christology course was this lengthy and dense, but accessible Christological study by Cardinal Schönborn, the former Archbishop of Vienna. This wonderful book gives the reader a thorough introduction to the Christological debates of the early Church, the resolutions, and the intricacies of the theological discipline of Christology. I would recommend this book to any serious student of theology because it gives, in my opinion, one of the best introductions to a high-level Christology, without delving too deeply into the weeds of specific academic Christological discussions. If you want to kickstart your Christological study, you need to read this book.

5 More Non-Theology Books You Need To Read

1. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

2. Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis

3. Leisure: The Basis of Culture: Including the Philosophical Act by Josef Pieper

4. Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh

5. The Diary of a Country Priest by Georges Bernanos

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One of the big adjustments for men as they leave seminary formation is the loss of regimented prayer. By that, I mean in seminary, your entire day, from morning until night, is ordered by the rhythm of prayer. The breviary is like the quarter chimes on the clock, structuring the day to the tune of the Liturgy of the Hours—to daily prayer. On top of that, the seminary culture is one that encourages daily encounter with the Lord in the Mass and in the personal Holy Hour.

When I left seminary, that rigid structure evaporated. In the daily life of the 9-5 job, prayer becomes more difficult. The usual struggle of ex-seminarians is adjusting their prayer life from the cloister of seminary to the expectations of the secular world.

I was no different. It took me a while to adjust to life outside of seminary and to find easier ways to maintain my prayer life post-seminary.

Now, as a married father of two small children, that prayer life is even more challenged and frankly quite difficult to maintain. I am not stating that I feel obligated to pray as I did while I was a celibate seminarian, however, the Lord still calls me to a deep prayer life.

Theology As An Encounter With God, Not Primarily As An Intellectual Endeavor

In looking at the history of the Church, particularly the early Church, it is clear that theology as a discipline was a way of life. Theology was about uncovering and explaining the truths of Revelation, of explaining the One whom one intimately knew. Put another way, theology was primarily an intellectual response to love. In the early Church, the theologians were the Saints. They were those who knew Jesus, who served Him, and those who loved Him. Theology was, for them, a response, in faith, to Christ. Their theological expertise flowed as a secondary effect from their sanctity. They could speak knowingly about Jesus because they fundamentally knew Him.

This experience, this way of doing theology is what the Nouvelle théologie movement, the ressourcement theologians, sought to recover in the 20th Century. These theologians, such as Balthasar, De Lubac, Ratzinger, and Wojtyla, sought a recovery of the ancient method of theology. These men, raised in the Neo-Scholastic tradition, found the manualistic theology in which they were trained to be stuffy, academic, and anti-Patristic (anti-Patristic meaning contrary to how the Fathers did theology, not in the sense of hating the Fathers). This movement sought a return to the kneeling theology of the Fathers. This theology is one that is deeply biblical, deeply relationship oriented, and one that flows downstream of the personal encounter with Christ in the sepulcher of one’s heart.

This is not meant as a slight to St. Thomas Aquinas and the Scholastics. These men were deeply indebted to Aquinas. This is rather a reaction against the manual tradition and the hyper Neo-Scholastic tradition of Catholic theology in the early 20th Century.

Now, how does this have anything to do with my story, and more importantly, with the task of doing theology and reading theology today?

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My Shortfalls

I was taught theology in the ressourcement tradition, in the tradition of deep personal encounter with Jesus leading to theological enquiry.

The problem at hand becomes, for me, when my personal prayer declines, so does my theological enquiry.

Let me put it another way. When I am reading, writing, and thinking about theological subjects, I tend to neglect my personal relationship with Jesus. For me, that is the first thing to go, not my theology. That is a major problem for me—and maybe for you too.

I have let my personal relationship with Jesus become stale at the expense of my “theology and study”. That cannot happen.

I am currently re-reading Balthasar’s Love Alone Is Credible (which I highly recommend). I was struck yesterday by a passing quote in the Preface which pierced me like a knife:

Yikes.

This is the wisdom of the Church Fathers and the Saints. Knowledge of God begins with intimate personal encounter with Him. “Lovers are the ones who know most about God; the theologian must listen to them.”1 The true theologian is the saint, not the professor. The true theologian is St. Therese of Lisieux, not the guy with 2 degrees from Rome.

I have been focused on reading and writing (which are obviously important), but I have let my daily encounter with Jesus become secondary, which is unacceptable.

Relationship first. Theology second.

I must, we must, focus on encountering the Lord daily; Meeting the Lord in the silence of prayer. Let the writing, the theology, come second. My theological inquiry will be better and more true in the measure that I encounter Jesus daily.

That is what is meant by a kneeling theology. That is what I haven’t been doing.

We can only speak well of the one who we encounter daily.

I will make a renewed effort to encounter the Lord anew each day so that, in that experience of prayer, I may silently listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit.

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📌If you are struggling in this same vain, let me know how you have recovered your daily prayer routine by commenting below. I would love to see how you have overcome the business of daily life and the distractions that often come up when trying to develop a prayer life.

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