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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 April 2024
The theology and practice of the Eucharist is undoubtedly at the heart of the ecumenical task. The discussions on intercommunion and eucharistic hospitality have become the focus of nearly every ecumenical dialogue and of many ecumenical gatherings. Nevertheless I do not want to discuss this issue again here. For I am convinced that there will be no serious answer to the problem as long as we do not agree on some basic ecclesiological principles.
I want to deal with one of these basic principles. It is very strange indeed that so few theologians or churchmen have written on the link between Eucharist, Baptism and Church taken all together. Usually one studies the relation of Baptism with Church, of Eucharist with Church, of Baptism with Eucharist, but without putting together the result of these three analyses. I shall try to do it here. It will lead us to the very basic question of the distinction between the oneness (unicitas) and the Unity (Unitas) of the visible Church.
1 See Summa Theologiae, 111a , 68, 1, ad. 3. To the question “why baptise those who have already been sanctified without baptism? Thomas Aquinas replies: “Those who have been sanctified in the womb of their mother have without doubt received the grace which heals one of original sin, but they have not received the character which conforms one to Christ. That is why even today, if some were sanctified from the time when they were in their mother’s womb, it would still be necessary to baptize them, so that thanks to the character, they should be conformed to the other members of Christ (ut ... aliis membris Christi conformaretur)”. Baptism is an act at one and the same time of Christ and of the Church. All the treatise on baptism is marked by this theme of incorporation in Christ, by conformation to his death and resurrection (see 111a, 66, 2;66, 9, ad.5;68, 4;68.5; 69,2; 69, 6;etc..
2 See Summa Theologiae, 111a, 30, 4: “There is a double reality (res) in this sacrament. One is signified and contained, the Christ; the other is signified and not contained, the mystical Body of Christ which is the society of saints (societas sanctorum) ... quiconque prend ce sacrament signifie du fait même qu’il est uni au Christ et incorporé à ses membres.” See also 111a, 60, 3;73, 6.
3 See Boyer, C. H., “Vestiges de la véritable Eglise”, in Unitas 9, 1956, pp. 87-89Google Scholar; G. Lafont, “L’appartenance a l’Eglise”, in L’Eglise en marche, Cahiers de la Pierre-qui-vire, 1964, pp. 25-89; E. Lamirande, “La signification écclésiologique des communautés dissidentes et la doctrine des ‘vestigia Ecclesiae’; panorama théologique des vingt-cinq dernières années, in Istina 10, 1964, pp. 25-58; Y. Congar, “Le development de L’évaluation écclésiologique des eases non-catholiques,” in Rev. de Droit Canon 25, 1975, pp. 169-198. See also Dietzfelbinger, W., “Vestigia Ecclesiae” in The Ecumenical Review, 15, 1963 pp. 268-376CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
4 It is interesting to read in this light I Clement 46: 5-7. The division is within the one Body of Christ, bearer of the one Spirit, called to one and the same vocation. And it sets up one against the other those who are members of each other.
5 See Schema Constitutionis “De Ecclesia” 1964: “quaedam verba mutantur: loco est dicitur subsistit in, ut expressio melius concordet cum affmatione de elementis ecclesialibus quae alibi adsunt.”
6 Mgr. Philips, L’Eglise et son mystère au 11a Concile du Vatican, texte et commentaire de la Constitution Lumen Gentium. Desclee, T1, 119. The pages that the author dedicates to the subsistit in are particularly enlightening.
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