Thomistic Thoughts on Christology, Moral Theology, and a “Principled Return” to the Topics of the Secunda Pars
The theological treatment of grace in a systematic, Thomistic account experiences a slight “dislocation” which can even be seen historically. In the Summa theologiae—the super-structure of which, it must always be emphasized, expresses important insights regarding the objective connection between the various truths of faith considered therein—Thomas treats the question of grace amid the general principles of human acts (hence, the older distinction between “general moral theology” or in commune and “special” or “specific moral theology”). However, as is somewhat well-known, thanks to the popularization by Fr. Pinckaers, theology (particularly during the post-Reformation era) separated the question of grace from moral theology into the newly established and separated “dogmatic theology” (implying that moral theology did not have dogmatic roots, nor dogmatic theology moral implications). Thanks to the labors of many theologians over the past century, the organic connection between dogmatic theology and moral theology is increasing, and the “banishment” of a theological treatment of grace from moral theology—something found even in the theologia moralis of St. Alphonsus—seems to be something of the past.
However, I think it is useful to ask why many generations would be led down this road. A rigorous and definitive answer to this would require a study that is dissertation-level in its rigor. But, I have something of a hunch that would at least guide my own research in this direction. In the soundest Thomist accounts that placed some discussions of grace outside of the context of moral theology, the scientific location for such treatments of grace fell into the theological treatises connected to the topics related to creation, structurally placed in the Prima pars of the Summa theologiae, or to the context of the Tertia pars in the context of Christology.
This state of affairs is well summarized by Doronzo, when he explains his own choice—made in “full knowledge of the facts”—to provide a dogmatic treatment of grace in his Theologia dogmatica:
However, modern theologians, beginning from the 18th century…1 placed the treatise on Grace within the ambit of dogmatic theology, generally placing it under the title “On the Grace of Christ” following upon the treatise “On the Incarnate Word.” The reason for this was both: 1˚ the lamentable divorce between the two parts of the single, unified sacred science—namely, moral and dogmatic theology—whereby the former abandoned speculative disputes to the latter; and 2˚ the peculiar importance and controversial nature that the questions concerning the necessity and nature of grace assumed after the Council of Trent in response to both the Protestants and Jansenists, as well as in relation to questions concerning its efficacy raised among the various Catholic schools themselves [i.e., the controversies De auxiliis]. Indeed, this last question is merely an extension of the general question about divine motion and causality, which pertains to the dogmatic treatise “On the One God.”2
I completely concur with the assessment that the dogmatic seclusion of grace is completely baleful to the theological character of morality itself. Even if one does not fall into a kind of purely casuist moral theology,3 a deficient moral appreciation for grace (and thereby, the rich conceptualization of the New Law as an interior law of grace and the Spirit) ineluctably leads to what I refer to, in teaching, as “a Christian-gilded natural law”: a moral theology marked by all of the nobility of our rational vocation, according to the natural law, but decisively lacking the supernatural stamp of grace. Effectively all that one would have is the “merely”4 moral conception of the Christian life ably critiqued by Gardeil in The True Christian Life.5
But, it was the same Gardeil who got me thinking some years ago about the place of Christology (and then, too, Ecclesiology and Mariology) in moral theology itself. Certainly, the reader will be aware of the fact that the Summa theologiae’s detailed treatment of Christ comes after the moral Secunda pars. But there is a passing remark in the introduction to the same work by Gardeil cited above, in which his nephew (Fr. Henri-Dominique Gardeil) remarks about the structure that Fr. Ambroise had originally planned for the work which has come down to us only and very partial form as The True Christian Life:
The first chapter of this work is dedicated to the question of the “receptive subject” of our divine life, and the developed form of Fr. Gardeil’s treatment of this topic came to occupy nearly the entire first volume of La structure de l’âme et l’expérience mystique… The study of the “receptive subject” (i.e., the material cause) of the supernaturalized soul was followed (in the retreat that we mentioned above) by a conference on the final cause of our divine life….
With the third chapter dedicated to the efficient cause [of our soul’s supernaturalized life], we reach one of the interesting (although, in truth, very straightforward) efforts undertaken in the project of “La vraie vie chrétienne,” namely, Fr. Gardeil’s gathering together of the entire spiritual content of the Tertia pars of the Summa Theologiae, placing all of this content under the heading, “The efficient cause of our supernatural life”: Christ, the sacraments, and the Church as well, which normally should be studied, like the sacraments, in the midst of Christology. In short, the work being undertaken is the work of our redemption, a work that proceeded in stages. If we consider it from the perspective of its temporal development, it can be entitled “The history of the human soul,” a history comprised of, as it were, two great acts (in which, moreover, the first act constantly dominates the second): Christ’s activity is the principal cause of our elevation to the divine life and, prolonging this activity, the Church’s activity and that of the sacraments are the instrumental cause of this same elevation. We are living beings, and in our depths, our personal act of living faith, by which we personally adhere to the order of salvation established by and in Christ, will need to correspond to this merciful initiative of the superior life pouring out upon us. [He then goes on to set forth some of Fr. Ambroise’s notes planning this section.]6
This idea impressed itself within my intellect and memory, but it stayed somewhat latent. Only gradually did its implications unfold. Truth be told, it was the weight of revelation itself—especially the Apostle St. Paul and St. John the Theologian—that inclined me toward an awareness of the importance of discussing Christ and Christ’s “capital grace” in the context of moral theology. It was only after completing a work written for a general Catholic readership, Made by God, Made for God, that I explicitly saw the outlines of this insight in my own work, which continually returned to the great themes of incorporation into Christ:
“And from His fulness have we all received, grace upon grace” (Jn. 1:16, RSV).
“Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches…” (Jn. 15:4–5).
“He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God made our wisdom, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption” (1 Cor. 1:30, RSV)
“For in him all the fulness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross” (Col. 1:19–20, RSV).
“My little children, with whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you!” (Gal 4:19, RSV).
And many others…
“From His fullness have we all received, grace upon grace”…: Ever since the summer of 2020, when I was writing that book, I’ve never been able to think about the presentation of the theology of grace the same way. The life of Grace is Triune, and the Trinity is—forever— the keystone of all the revealed mysteries.7 But, every grace, every blessing, all things on heaven and on earth were given being in and through and for Christ (Col. 1:16). Every grace that will ever touch the hearts of man will pass through Christ’s sacred humanity:8
But, although the humanity of Christ does not dwell in us, the just soul is continually under its influence, since by its intermediary every grace is communicated to us, just as in our body the head communicates the vital influx to the members. Since at every waking moment we have some duty to accomplish, Christ’s humanity communicates to us from minute to minute the actual grace of the present moment, as the air we breathe continually enters our lungs. God, the Author of grace, makes use of Christ’s humanity to communicate grace to us, as a great artist uses an instrument to transmit his musical thought to us, or as a great thinker uses his own style, his more or less rich language, to express himself. Thus the seven sacraments are like the strings of a lyre from which God alone can, by His divine touch, draw music. The Savior’s humanity is a conscious, free, and superior instrument, ever united to the divinity in order to communicate to us all the graces that we receive and that Christ merited for us on the cross. Thus every illumination of the intellect, every grace of attraction, of consolation, or of strength, whether felt or not, actually come to us from the sacred humanity.9
But—and here is a wonderful revelation that fills us with joy—this fullness of Divine life which is in Jesus Christ is meant to overflow from Him to us, to the whole of humankind. The Divine Sonship, which is in Christ by nature and makes Him God’s own and only Son, the only-begotten Son, in the heart’s-embrace of the Father—that Sonship is meant to extend all the way to us through grace, in such a way that Christ, in the Divine thought, is but the firstborn of a multitude of brethren who are, through grace as He is by nature, sons of God… The grace of Christ, Son of God, is communicated to us to become in us the wellspring of adoption; it is upon the fullness of the Divine life and grace of Christ Jesus that we all have to draw.10
The living language of the deepest root of all our activity, to the degree that we do not turn aside from grace, is communicated through the instrumentality of Jesus Christ—and not merely so that we might be the passive recipients of that grace, of that communication, but rather, so that the Father might see the Son in us, in the richest and fullest sense that these words can be understood, concerning Him who is rightly called the “Image of the Father”:11
Our sanctification is of the supernatural order, that it is God alone who has created this order and established the means for realizing it in us, and that our sanctification amounts to nothing other than having the features of Christ Himself wholly reproduced within us.12
Through the repeated blows of this government [of infused prudence], the child of God makes the divine likeness restored within him by Christ pass into all of his still-rebellious passions and into his will, infatuated as it is with its own good at the expense of that of God and of his brothers in God. Under its sway, like so many medallions rippling under the striking of a divine pendulum, the supernatural virtues are released, specified, and acquire their contours. And when the labor is sufficiently advanced so that its results can be discerned, the resemblance bursts forth: the face of the Father, perfectly reproduced on the face of Christ Jesus, and already reflected by our superior reason, which asserts itself no longer only upon our brow but now throughout our entire being. Here, you see, we are entirely marked with Christ’s character, no longer only in our reason, but also in the most remote corners of our energies, places that, at first glance, seem the least destined to imitate the divine mores.
Those who have arrived at this point are the true Christian characters. The Christian character is not only the mark of the vir in the homo [the clay of our lower nature], like human character but, moreover, is the imprint of Christ, the splendor of the Father, in the entire man, in the vir first, by grace, then in the homo, through the work of our holy personal self-government corresponding to grace.
In this ultimate result, this creation of Christian characters, the work of our personal and supernatural self-government comes to its fulfillment, having received its definitive seal.13
Indeed, there is a reason that the transfiguration has ever been a source of reflection for great saints, especially in the Byzantine East,14 though not exclusively.15
All that I have said heretofore has meant to function as a kind of rhetorical “elevation” in order to at least situate the question that is often on my mind as a professor whenever I teach these topics in fundamental moral theology. Basically, the question comes down to this: if it is the case that we will certainly misunderstand every single virtue in ST II-II if we fail to understand the dogmatic foundations of moral theology, including the moral theology of grace, and if all grace that has been communicated in the actual order of salvation is in an essential way Christic and Christ-conforming, then will we not also fail to see the profound nature of each virtue (and also of each kind of vice and sin) if we do not ground our moral theology in a theology of beatitude and of grace16 that are themselves appropriately grounded in the principle and source of all the grace and light of glory that we shall receive—namely, Christ?
I have no complete project to lay out here. Rather, I can only rhetorically sketch some basic implications of the insight that I have had.17 First and foremost, I think it can be retained within the overall sapiential-scientific structure of the conception of theological “science” formulated in the very architecture of the Summa theologiae itself. The Trinity is forever the center of the “Divine Science”—for in God, the Trinity is the “Divine Science,” and all of our wayfaring. Theology is nothing other than a kind of impression of this divine science, whether operating in a purely apophatic mode (“mystical theology,” in the classical sense of that term18) or in the form of discursive reflection attempting to reach some small “understanding of the faith,” intellectus fidei. Therefore, theological “science” must always have the Trinity as its architectonic truth, for—to use language which is manifestly deficient, but which gestures in the correct direction—the Trinity “explains” all the other mysteries, the Triune Deity is the great “illuminative principle” for the entire intellectus fidei.19 And what is more, the progression from one treatise to the next in the Summa seems, to my eyes, scientifically quite correct—at least in the mode of presenting a science in facto esse, fully formed, following upon the discursion of discovery in fieri.20 Perhaps a partial treatment of the causal aspect of grace should be placed in the treatise God Creante et Elevante—for there are questions regarding creation, causality, and providence which all seem better to fit there (though all of these topics have repercussions in moral theology). And, indeed, insofar as grace is the root principle of moral actions, it must be discussed under its moral aspect, in a clear manner, prior to any discussion of the virtues, so that they might themselves be understood in view of their own principle in grace. And all of this moral discussion is necessary as a kind of preliminary for Christology, for one cannot speak of the grace and virtue of Christ if one has not spoken first about grace and virtue. But, I also think that there is wisdom in returning to the topic of grace from the perspective of Christology—whatever might have been the history of the treatise De gratia Christi (which, to slightly qualify the claims of Doronzo from above, was not always envisioned explicitly as an addendum to the De verbo incarnato). The tradition of speaking of a treatise De gratia Christi seems to indicate an important insight wholly harmonious with sound Thomism: all grace comes through Christ as an instrument.21 Therefore, in light of the treatment of Christ—with special, though not exclusive, importance being given to the discussion of Christ’s capital graces and the “mysteries of Christ’s life”22—and likewise, following up upon the treatment of ecclesiology and sacramental theology, one can return to moral matters with an even more specific principle and light to illuminate:
Beatitude and the role of Christ in Beatitude;
Human acts and “participated theonomy” in light of Christ’s primacy in all things;
The passions in light of Christology’s discussion of the concupiscence-free state of the passions in Christ’s sacred humanity (for though the fomes peccati will never be extinguished, nonetheless, our purification tangentially tends toward Christ’s own perfection);
All Law as centered on Christ;23
Grace and all the virtues as being “Christic,” Christ-conformed, and Christ-conforming.24
This would only be a continued reflection, with the principles and conclusions of Christology returning to moral theology (just as they can also return to the other treatises too) in order to deepen one’s wisdom and science, seeing the marvelous interconnection of the mysteries.
In the immediate question of grace, a perfect “toothing-stone” for beginning such integration is found in a hidden way in an objection and response in ST I-II, q. 112, a. 1 (Whether God alone causes grace?). In objection 2, St. Thomas remarks that the sacraments are also causes of grace: “Further, there is this difference between the sacraments of the New Law and those of the Old, that the sacraments of the New Law cause grace, whereas the sacraments of the Old Law merely signify it. Now the sacraments of the New Law are certain visible elements. Therefore, God is not the only cause of grace.”25 His response is deceptively simple, especially if one is a regular reader of Thomas, for the answer is almost per se nota for the Thomist: the sacraments are instruments, and instruments act in virtue of a higher agent. As Thomas himself responds:
As in the person of Christ the humanity causes our salvation by grace, the Divine power being the principal agent, so likewise in the sacraments of the New Law, which are derived from Christ, grace is instrumentally caused by the sacraments, and principally by the power of the Holy Ghost working in the sacraments, according to John 3:5: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”
But we must not be put off step by such philosophical and theological clarity. Every grace passes through Christ’s sacred humanity, and therefore every grace could be said to be “colored” by that instrument. An instrument is not utter plasticity in the hands of a higher agent. The particular character of the effect produced by an instrument is marked, in some way, by the nature of the instrument itself. And, therefore, all grace will be marked, in some way, by Christ and the primacy that He plays in the actual order of salvation, in the “universe of redemption.”26
If these words are shocking to the reader—for it would seem to place a created intermediary between the Trinity and us—we must always remember that Christian revelation is a revelation of mediation, of sacramentalization, of transfiguration, and especially in Christ, of rendering theandric the acts of the truly Incarnate Word who is the head of a humanity whose nature He shares. But, some might say: should we not merely focus on the substantial supernaturality of grace and merely insist that it “passes through” the instrumentality of Christ’s sacred humanity? Should we not merely focus on the Divine causality and not the instrument?
But the sacraments themselves already indicate to us why we cannot do so, at least if we take seriously the way that each sacrament uniquely provides a radiance of supernatural grace, fit to the particular meaning of that sacrament.27 And, similarly, if we can truly say that each of the acts of Christ life is infinite and value and the source of a unique grace for us,28 then we must believe that the one grace of God is susceptible to “coloration”—all analogies limp—as it transfigures our lives.29 And, so too, the same must hold if we think of grace as conforming, above all, to the “law” of friendship,30 ever molding itself to the particular needs of our particular vocations.
On similar grounds, I see no reason to balk at the idea that—globally—we can speak of the “Christic coloration”, the Christ-conformity, of all grace. Because of the present decrees of salvation—that is, the freely chosen providential deeds of God in this universe, the universe of redemption—all of creation is gathered around Christ as its nucleus. To be convinced of this, one merely need read the words of St. Paul over and again.31 And the works of Bl. Columba Marmion, cited already on several occasions already, present a spiritual theology that one could rightly say was penned by a saintly man deserving to be called the “Doctor of Divine Filiation.”32 But, also, as another kind of extrinsic confirmation, I cannot help but think of the works of Journet, who has also figured importantly in this essay, and whose second volume of the Church of the Incarnate Word has convinced me that these series of nebulous pedagogical and authorial insights do perhaps have a real foundation upon a sound theological “science” itself:
It is by acting as an instrumental cause, under an elevating motion coming from the divinity, that Christ’s humanity produces grace within us. It is not by acting as a principal cause, for Christ’s grace, being of the same species as our own, cannot by itself have the power to physically cause grace in others. And although it is true that the general metaphysical law of effects is that they resemble, not their instrumental cause, but their principal cause; nonetheless, Christ’s humanity is an instrumental cause in its own right, conjoined to the divinity, excellentissima, which possesses within itself, in an eminent way, all the gifts of grace that it communicates to men, thus placing the imprint of its likeness on everything it touches.33
What does such “coloration” look like? For a full account, I would have the reader consider the lengthy reflections that can be found in Journet.34 Allow here only the briefest of sketches, based upon Journet, though without all necessary technical precisions. My goal is to present the general outlines that capture why I think moral theology is missing infinite riches for the moral and spiritual life if one does not return to ST II after completing the cursus of a full ST III.35
Because of the infinity of Christ’s created grace, it can truly be at once His personal grace and also the grace of all the members of His mystical body.36 Each member, precisely as a member and part of the whole that is His mystical body, will partake in the unified character of this grace which pours forth from His fullness. In Christ, grace finds its native soil, the ground in which it can experience its fullest blossoming. Every grace is from Christ—either by anticipation (prior to His coming) or as the already-realized ultimate end (in the case of graces received by those who are “on the outside” after His coming, or even by partially sacramentalized Christians from dissident Protestant communities). But fully perfect grace will be grace which is sacramental and oriented, that is, conferred through the “touch” of the sacraments and oriented by the full authority of the Church and her pastors under Peter. That is, perfect grace is ecclesial grace or, to put it another way, the grace of those who are members of the Mystical body.37
Therefore, in the Church, through her liturgy and her shared life of charity, the grace of Christians should become increasingly marked by configuration to Christ, meaning that our grace is not merely marked by a kind of distant creaturely imitation or participation but, with continued perfection, is marked—to the degree that this remains possible for a mere creature—by the connaturality, fullness, and filialness that was proper to Christ. One can see here, also, the importance of seeing the Christ-conforming role also played by the gifts of the Holy Spirit—which played an important role in the “connaturality” of the sacred humanity’s instrumentality.38 Each of these aspects of the created grace of Christ the head will be reflected in “Christ the body,” that is, in His members.
However, because the Incarnation is at once “Doxological”39 or “Latreutic” and “Contrite” or “Penitent”, it is also marked by three “temporary” modalities. In short, because the Incarnation is not just a generic Incarnation but, rather, a Redemptive Incarnation, therefore the capital grace of Christ (which proceeds like a radiant light from the “grace of union”) is stamped with this redemptive character as well.
First, it is a grace that brings about the Sanctification, not the Elimination, of Suffering:
To say that Christ in glory touches the Church through the wounds of His passion is to say, in other words, that the grace He infuses into Her is intended first and foremost to sanctify her, not to glorify her. Although the Church, in virtue of her inner strength, is capable of one day transfiguring the world, she will never be able to do so in time or to usher in an era of millenarian bliss. Nevertheless, she is certain to survive all the catastrophes of history, since she is already the incorruptible kingdom of God, albeit pilgrim and crucified.40
Or, as Journet says elsewhere, in a text that I have often quoted to my students:
It seemed certain that at the moment when the Kingdom of heaven would come to touch the earth, it would immediately burst the fragile envelop of time, dissipate sorrow, cast out death, renew all things, and transfigure the universe. Indeed, should it descend for anything other than this? But, behold, on the contrary, that its power is covered with signs of weakness and its grandeur with signs of humility. Behold that its eternity slips silently under the unchanged bark of time. Behold that its felicity is immersed in the very ocean of our trials. It was made so as to disperse suffering, temptations, and death, and behold that it chooses to live in the midst of them so as to tame them, seeking not—alas!—to eliminate them but only to illuminate them. The law of its radiation ought to be a law of the glorious transfiguration and behold that it wishes to be first of all and for long centuries only a law of sorrowful sanctification. We expected it in its radiance of the heavenly kingdom, and behold that it has come to us with the traits of a pilgrim and crucified kingdom.41
Second, we are drawn in the wake of Christ’s life. We experience His “interior states”42 and, above all, the continued activity and presence of the mysteries of His incarnation.43 In this way, our life becomes a life directed toward the Cross and Resurrection, primarily cruciform during our time, but already breaking in with the light of victory too, for grace is, in a real way, a beginning of glory in us.
And, therefore, thirdly, we co-merit, we co-redeem, we co-mediate with Christ by entering into the liturgy of His own life, now present in the sacraments (and around them, the liturgy, which is the golden garland that is the gem-setting around the gems of his priestly-sacramental activity). In the words of Marmion: “in His mysteries, Christ makes but one with us.”44
What riches indeed, can be drawn from these dogmatic, liturgical, and spiritual teachings, whether in doctrines, practices, spiritual authors, or theological writers! Think of how tightly we can bind together the dogma of the economy of salvation and the ultimate theological end of the Trinity, in whose light all of these mysteries are welded together. I do not speak of a “Christocentrism” for fear of losing the great focus of all our life: the Triune God, who is the only center of theology. But, a Trinitarian-focused moral theology of beatitude, communicated through the most beautiful of all created realities, the resurrected humanity of Christ:45 that seems like a noble project for Thomistic moral theology today. Allow the union of Trinity and Christ in grace expressed, in closing, again by the “Doctor” of Divine Filiation, Bl. Columba Marmion:
Holiness… is a mystery of divine life communicated and received—communicated in God, from the Father to the Son, by an indescribable ‘generation’; communicated, outside God, by the Son to the humanity to which He unites Himself personally in the Incarnation and then, through that humanity, restored to souls and received by each of them in the measure of their particular predestination, ‘according to the measure of Christ’s bestowal,’ in such a way that Christ is truly the life of the soul, because He is its source and its dispenser.46
These ellipses are added because Doronzo cites Billuart. However, upon consultation with Billuart’s Summa sancti thomae, this is not the case. Therefore, though I have immense respect for Doronzo, I would just have the reader be careful considering the point he is observing, which likely stands in need of further qualifications.↩︎
See Doronzo, Emmanuel Doronzo, Theologia Dogmatica, vol. 1 (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1966), no. 700 (p. 698). One should, however, say “On God, considered in what pertains to Him essentially” or “On God, as One,” considered as an integral part of a single Tractatus De Deo. I owe this insight to Fr. Jean-Hervé Nicolas. It has been confirmed by Thomist theologians whom I deeply respect. Doronzo goes on, however, to express certain positions—wholly open to debate among theologians, of course—that differ from the outlook that will be expressed below, drawn from Journet. To my eyes, Journet’s understanding of the Redemptive Incarnation more fully and coherently expresses the implications of the intrinsically redemptive character of the entirety of the Incarnation, including the created grace of Christ, in connection with the “grace of union”, which is a union effected not merely for any Incarnation whatsoever but for a Redemptive Incarnation.↩︎
The existence or nonexistence of a “purely” casuist moral theology need not detain us here. The history is not simple. The various moral texts that we see in the wake of Busenbaum and St. Alphonsus cannot be categorized as “purely” casuist, due to the fact that they function in a somewhat scientific-analytic mode, although within a framework that deeply differs from that of the Thomist idea of theological thought.↩︎
“Merely”: for an understanding of theosis / divinization formally-eminently includes the notion of the highest possible moral ideal, but transcribed to a higher level of Trinitarian union.↩︎
See Ambroise Gardeil, The True Christian Life, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2022), 53–55.↩︎
Gardeil, The True Christian Life, 9 (see 9–14).↩︎
See the very first essay I posted, by Fr. Philipon, on To Be a Thomist, here.↩︎
This holds true even in the beatific vision, where the subjective capacitation that is the lumen gloriae will be educed in our soul by an agency passing through Christ’s sacred humanity. And here, as Jean-Hervé Nicolas rightly observes, we find the best explanation for what Lossky desires to attribute to Christ in eternity (however, as objective mediating principle of the Vision) in the latter’s admirable, although sometimes critiquable, The Vision of God. See Nicolas, Catholic Dogmatic Theology: A Synthesis, vol. 1 On the Trinitarian Mystery of God, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2022), 304; vol. 2 On the Incarnation and the Redemption, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2023), 416.↩︎
Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life: Prelude of Eternal Life, trans. M. Timothea Doyle (St. Louis, MO: B. Herder, 1947), 111.↩︎
Bl. Columba Marmion, Christ the Life of the Soul, trans. Alan Bancroft (Bethesda: Zaccheus Press, 2005), 27.↩︎
See ST I, q. 35.↩︎
Bl. Columba Marmion, Christ the Ideal of the Monk, trans. A Nun of Tyburn Convent (London: Sands and Company, / B. Herder, 1926), 355 (translation lightly altered).↩︎
Gardeil, The True Christian Life, 144–145.↩︎
See Light on the Mountain: Greek Patristic and Byzantine Homilies on the Transfiguration of the Lord, trans. Brian E. Daley, S.J. (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2014).↩︎
For example, see both the presentation and sources in Jean-Pierre Torrell, Le Christ en ses mystères: la vie et loeuvre de Jésus selon saint Thomas d’Aquin, vol. 1 (Paris: Deslée, 1999), 280–301. Interestingly, also, the theme of “transfiguration” (above all in graces terminal state in glory) readily comes to the pen of someone like Journet in Égilse du verbe incarné, vol. 2 (Fribourg, Switzerland: Éditions St. Paul, 1997):
Catholic spiritualism, which the Orthodox and even the Anglo-Catholics profess as well, could be called a spiritualism of transfiguration, for it believes that, according to the current plan of Providence, the spirit (that is, above all, the Holy Spirit and the spiritual gifts of grace) has as its primary end not to supplant, eliminate, vaporize, and annihilate created beings, human realities, bodily things, and even the material universe but, on the contrary, aims to penetrate them in order to begin, even here-below, to transform them, to dwell therein, to deify them, to transfigure them (p. 88)
The Word came into the world to renew it, to gather it around Himself, to hand it over to the Father, thus leading all things back to their principle, that is, recapitulating them. This recasting and restoration of the universe around the Word made flesh: this is His body; it is the Church; it is the kingdom. She will come to her perfection and consummation through transfiguration and in glory, and she was created precisely so that she might reach this supreme moment of efflorescence: “There shall no more be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and his servants shall worship him; they shall see his face, and his name shall be on their foreheads. And night shall be no more; they need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they shall reign for ever and ever” (Rev. 22:3–5, RSV) (p. 339).
Many other texts could be cited.↩︎
And thereby, too, law, given the spiritual nature of the “law of grace” that is the New Law (see ST I-II, q. 106, a. 1).↩︎
Also, see the other works cite in note 34 below.↩︎
As Gardeil well summarizes this point (without at all dismissing the later conception, assigned to its legitimate and necessary duties) in La structure de l’âme et l’expérience mystique, 3rd ed (Paris: Lecoffre / Gabalda, 1927), vol. 1, x: “… understood not as the theology of mysticism (as found, for example, in the Mystica theologia by Valgornera or the Theologia mystico-scholastica by Joseph of the Holy Spirit, which are purely theological works) but, rather, as the ensemble of acts of mystical contemplation organically linked together”. Also, see the introduction to the draft of my forthcoming translation (to be published in the English edition of Nova et Vetera) of an article by Labourdette concerning the nature of spiritual theology.↩︎
The theologian cannot cease repeating this to oneself: the Trinity is the keystone of the mysteries. Again, see this article on To Be a Thomist here.↩︎
The structure of presentation of theological science in fieri interests me—indeed haunts me—for in that regard, I have often thought that St. Thomas does not provide the immediate model for us in texts (even if he does, indeed, in principles). Well trained, amply able to reflect, and having experienced the need for scientific exposition—and armed with utterly essential insights gleaned from the Posterior Analytics—he provided all of history with the structure of theological science, as living in his mind, with a clear articulation of the interconnection of the mysteries and their implications. But as for the eduction of this objective science, for the poetics, rhetoric, and dialectic (in the classical sense) that must precede such scientific form—and which, perhaps, never leave its form, due to the limits of human cognition (which from generation to generation must win its way toward wisdom), and the elevation of its object—this eduction, this theologia in fieri, is something that perhaps we still await a great saint to provide for us in model. Who knows? Perhaps the providence of God, permitting the forgetfulness of much Catholic truth, will raise up some day that saint who will help to provide a solid model concerning the sure entrance into theological wisdom, that “methodological” reflection which both Cano and Gardeil lauded (though it still seems to be waiting for us to achieve):
↩︎Often I have wondered, my most excellent reader, who it is who brought greater good to mankind: he who introduced a wealth of knowledge in various disciplines or he who devised an account and way by which disciplines themselves might be taught more easily and conveniently…. The poverty in teaching found in more recent authors is compensated by the ease with which they are understood: they more skillfully penetrate the minds of the untrained and sluggish, and what was once debated extensively and freely, they now express succinctly and precisely, bringing considerable light to the more obscure discoveries of the ancients. As far as I can conjecture, in this one respect, more recent authors may be found to be equals or even superiors to the ancients, even if far inferior in all other respects (Cano, De locis theologicis, proemium).
See, for example, the study by Theophil Tschipke, Die Menschheit Christi als Heilsorgan der Gottheit, the French of which is available as L’humanité du Christ comme instrument de salut de la divinité, trans. Philibert Secrétan (Fribourg, Switzerland: Academic Press Fribourg, 2003).↩︎
I have in mind Marmion’s Christ in His Mysteries, but one should also consult the work and citations found in Torrell’s work cited above. Moreover, from the perspective of a sound attempt to take what is best from earlier ages, this kind of appreciation for the mysteries of Christ enables one to rescue what is best and most noble from the “French School” of spirituality. Marmion and Journet offer quite admirable Thomist attempts to do so.↩︎
And I believe that even modally supernatural effects are possible in the case of the “natural law,” which can only be “adequately considered” by someone in a state of grace. This is a topic I have been musing on since the writing of my Ph.L. thesis, and happily also it is a topic being researched by one of my thesis students at the Byzantine Catholic Seminary.↩︎
The expressions are all taken from Journet.↩︎
I have merely drawn this translation from the well-known translation, here at https://www.newadvent.org/summa/2112.htm.↩︎
This is an expression used by Journet in various works.↩︎
For a beginning, see Robert Reginald Masterson, “Sacramental Graces: Modes of Sanctifying Grace,” The Thomist 18, no. 3 (July 1955): 311–371; Jean-Hervé Nicolas, “La Grâce sacramentelle,” Revue tomiste 61 (1961): 165–192, 522–540.↩︎
For a good reflection on this, see Marmion’s Christ in His Mysteries. Also see the work of Torrell cited above.↩︎
And thus, too, one would have a sense for the unique graces that are attached to the particular mysteries of Christ’s life, above all lived through the liturgical year, though also in devotions like the Rosary. In this way, as regards the liturgy in particular, one has a manner for persevering what is best in the insights of someone like Odo Casel in The Mystery of Christian Worship. For a detailed discussion, appreciation, and critique of aspects of Casel, however, see Jean-Hervé Nicolas, “Réactualisation des mystères rédempteurs dans et par les sacrements,” Revue thomiste 58 (1958): 20–54; Jean Gaillard, “Chronique de Liturgie: La théologie des mystères,” Revue Thomiste 57 (1957): 510–511.
The Byzantine practice of the full iconostasis, with the 12 mysteries of the life of Christ and the Mother of God, can be said to liturgically express this, with the iconostasis not functioning solely as a division between the sanctuary and the nave of the Church but, quite importantly, as the point of mediation, as the point of radiance, from the Eucharistic mystery, through the various refractions of the one life of Christ through His mysteries (and his Apostles and other saints), to all who are present. I cannot remember, now, where I first heard one speak in this way of the iconostasis, but I think that it well represents—not merely in a fanciful picture, but as a real liturgical and graced mediation—the instrumentality of the Word, which instrumentality passes through the whole of His sacred humanity, through all of His acts, through all of His body, through is saints themselves to us. This final observation, itself merely nascent in expression, is nonetheless pregnant with many further points of importance concerning the ecclesiological, Mariological, and soteriological implications of much of what I have been discussing in this article, for as members of His body, we not only receive personal holiness but, likewise, receive some—though quite real—participation in Christ’s meriting, mediation, and redeeming power, as co-meritors, co-mediators, and co-redeemers. How great are the implications of all of this if we are to understand aright moral theology itself! For all of this, I turn the reader to Journet’s second volume, which is rich in implications for all of these topics.↩︎
Which is, after all, for good reasons, Thomas’s chosen analogy for charity itself. See ST II-II, q. 23, a. 1.↩︎
Excellent purely scriptural summaries of this can be found a work like Ceslas Spicq, Vie Morale et Trinité Sainte selon Saint Paul (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1962). But, also, see Lucien Cerfaux, Christ in the Theology fo St. Paul, trans. Geoffrey Webb and Adrian Walker (New York: Herder and Herder, 1959), 195–368; The Church in the Theology of St. Paul, trans. Geoffrey Webb and Adrian Walker (New York: Herder and Herder, 1963), 262–287, 300–356; The Christian in the Theology of St. Paul, trans. Lilian Soiron (New York: Herder and Herder, 1966), 312–372. And the life-long work of the Protestant scripture scholar (though long-time professor at St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore) Michael J. Gorman bears witness to this same theme. See, for example, Participating in Christ: Explorations in Paul's Theology and Spirituality (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2019); Inhabiting the Cruciform God: Kenosis, Justification, and Theosis in Paul's Narrative Soteriology (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmanns, 2009).↩︎
See M.-M. Philipon, “Le docteur de l’adoption divine,” Vie spirituelle 78 (1948): 81–99. Also, for an overview presentation of Marmion’s life and works, see M.-M. Philipon, The Spiritual Doctrine of Dom Marmion, trans. Matthew Dillon (Westminster, MD: The Newman Press, 1956); Raymund Thibaut, Abbot Columba Marmion: A Master of the Spiritual Life (1858–1923), trnas Mother Mary St. Thomas of Tyburn Convent (London / St. Louis: Sands & Co. / B. Herder, 1932).↩︎
Journet, Église, vol. 2, 450.↩︎
See, for example, ibid., 209–651; L’église du verbe incarné, vol. 4 (Fribourg, Switzerland: Éditions Saint Paul, 2004), 32–163. Also, though expressing his own synthesis, see the important section dedicated to Christ and grace in Jean-Hervé Nicolas, Les Profondeurs de la grâce (Paris: Beauchesne, 1968) 231–330. There is a sense in which the current project that I propose is anticipated in the little work by Louis-Bertrand Gillon, Christ and Moral Theology, trans. Cornelius Williams (Staten Island: Alba House, 1967). Gillon focuses more so on exemplarity (a topic not without relevance in the contemporary academic moral literature, I add), though with some dogmatic foundations. Some related notes can be gathered from Joseph Wawyrkow’s “Jesus in the Moral Theology of Thomas Aquinas,” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 42, no. 1 (Winter 2012): 13–33. Somewhat disappointing regarding the fulfillment of its ultimate aims is Livio Melina, Sharing in Christ’s Virtues, trans. William E. May (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America, 2001). There is much that is insightful, faithful, and of use in Melina’s work, but (to my eyes at least), it does not manage to “land” the noble aims that it sets for itself. The general theme of following Christ and life in Christ inspired, of course, many works of moral theology in the mid-20th century. This theme comes up regularly in Fr. Kennan’s accounts of the history of moral theology (though, I note that I do not rank myself among those who follow Keenan on a number of points). In addition to Bernard Häring, another author who figures centrally in such accounts for Keenan is Fritz Tillman.↩︎
The latter itself is a work not completed by Thomas himself, of course. Yet, here too, one could continue the line of the reflections in the present essay and consider also the eschatological implications of the Christian life here-below, for the realities of damnation and of glorification have significant implications for our understanding of the full meaning of the virtues and of sin. For example, will it not, perhaps, be the case that the infused moral virtues will be the means for the radiance of the “accidental beatitude” of the resurrected state through the whole of our resurrected flesh? And yet, these virtues are specified by the same object here below and here after; they only differ in state.↩︎
See ST III, q. 8, a. 5.↩︎
No doubt, one can continue these reflections in an ecclesiological direction, along the lines of what one finds in Mura, especially his second volume of Le Corps mystique du Christ: Sa Nature et Sa Vie Divine (Paris: André Blot, 1937). Mersch’s The Whole Christ and Morality and the Mystical Body provide indications as well, although to my eyes (at least at this time) the latter work disappointingly does not express the depths that one would hope for based upon the indications in The Whole Christ.↩︎
For a clear presentation of this important point, see Dominic Legge, The Trinitarian Christology of St. Thomas Aquinas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017), 187–210. Although Legge’s primary concern is directly Christological, I have for years thought about this Christ-conforming aspect to the gifts, as giving us—mutatis mutandis, with an infinite difference—a participation in the instrumentality of the sacred humanity of Christ. A full and rich theology of (always derivative) co-merit, co-redemption, and co-mediation surely can build out this insight concerning the connection between the gifts and life as members of Christ’s body.↩︎
Though not wholly isomorph with his positions, my thought has been impregnated here by the important reflections on “doxological contrition” by Khaled Anatolios, whose insights seem to have important implications concerning the operational aspects of a sound Christological primacy along the lines accepted by the Salmanticenses. See Khaled Anatolios, Deification through the Cross: An Eastern Christian Theology of Salvation (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2020); Dylan Schraeder, A Thomistic Christocentrism: Recovering the Carmelites of Salamanca on the Logic of the Incarnation (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2021). Note, however, that the position of the Salmanticenses and others in the tradition figures prominently in Journet and is also present in Garrigou-Lagrange, as well as others writing prior to the Council.↩︎
Journet, Église, vol. 2, 532.↩︎
Although Jean-Hervé Nicolas cites this text as coming from one of the volumes of L’église du verbe incarnée (on which I am currently working, along with Dominic Spiekermann, who will be completing volumes 4 and 5 of the work), at the present moment—even after using digital means—I am only able to track this quote to Charles Journet, “La mission visible de l'Esprit-Saint,” Revue thomiste 65 (1965): 357–397 (here, 376–7).↩︎
And here, though corrections are needed, the French School and its followers offer many riches.↩︎
And here, one can redeem the great insights of the followers of Casel and others like them.↩︎
See Marmion, Christ in His Mysteries.↩︎
Though I am aware of the problems surrounding Marie-Dominique Philippe, I think that the following captures so well something deserving of meditation. I am taking this quote from a paper I gave several years ago at the meeting of the annual American Maritain Association. Pressed for time now, I cannot do a final editorial workover of the translation, but it is sufficiently stable for the purposes of To Be a Thomist. See Marie-Dominique Philippe, L’Activité artistique: philosophie de faire, vol. 2 (Paris: Beauchesne, 1970), 296–7 (cf. 54–7):
We could discover no more eminent synthesis of these formal aspects of beauty than we could by elevating our gaze above the possibilities of human art, so that we might penetrate the domain properly belonging to the divine art, about which only the theologian may speak to us: that of the resurrection of the glorious bodies of Christ and of the Virgin Mary…
The resurrection of the body of Christ is indeed a re-creation in beauty, whereas the first forming of his body in the womb of Mary took place in a hidden manner, in view of the communication of love. We can say that the principal and first goal of creation is to communicate the goodness of God. God creates through love and, as the text of Genesis tells us, God judges that all that He has made is good: valde bonum. If creatures possess a given beauty, this is not the principal goal sought by God the Creator. Now, what is already true in the natural order becomes even more manifest when we are raised to the supernatural order. This is why we can say that the entire universe was created for man, who himself was created to become “a son of God” by receiving grace and charity, which unite him to Christ. Thus, to the eyes of God’s wisdom, all the world’s beauty is ordered to divine filiation. Original sin, which shattered the harmony between the natural and supernatural orders, by that same fact accentuates the distinction between the requirements of the divine love and those of human beauty—and, on the concrete level of experience, this enables us to explain many struggles and antagonisms. Let us recall certain forms of devotion, certain statues said to be “works of religious art” whose hideousness was denounced so vehemently by Léon Bloy!
If, properly speaking, beauty is not the goal of creation, it is, by contrast, indeed the bodily resurrection’s raison d’être: to manifest and radiate the divine love. God resurrected the body of His Son not to communicate to it a new fullness of love—for from this perspective, His communication to the Son was perfect and could have nothing added to it—but, instead, did so in order that the fullness of love in His soul might grasp hold of all the fibers of His glorified body and could thereby manifest itself in dazzling brilliance. When God’s omnipotence resurrected Christ’s body, laying as it did in the darkness of the tomb and the depths of the earth, He thereby took up his work anew, in view of the glory of the Father and of Christ. The glorified body of Christ is truly the splendor of the form of God, Christian beauty par excellence.
And, nobody can cite such words without tipping one’s hat to the Balthasarian synthesis in which Beauty and Glory play such an important role.↩︎
Marmion, Christ the Life of the Soul, 8–9.↩︎
