F. M. De Zuleta, SJ.
True. principle of the Catholic Faith. — The chief Truths to be believed. — The Sign of the ross. — The Unity and Trinity of God. — The importance of the Knowledge of God. — The incarnation and Death of our Savior. — Errors of Arius, Nestorius, and Eutyches. — Importance of Meditation on our Lord’s Life and Death. — The Four Last Things: Death— the General and Particular Judgments— Hell — Heaven — Purgatory. — The Church suffering, — Prayer’s for the Dead.
MUST begin my course of Instruction by pointing at the great difference there is between the Catholic religion and any kind of Protestantism. Some Protestants appear to approach very near to the Catholic Church, but, in principle, they are all equally far off.
The Protestant notion is that it is each one’s business to find out his own religion: that is to say, that he must judge for himself what doctrines are most consistent with reason and the Holy Scriptures; or that he must follow the teaching of the clergyman whose views best commend themselves to his judgment.
Catholics, on the contrary, believe that God has established an authority upon earth which all men must obey, and that faith is necessarily an obedience. Our Lord says, “Unless you become as little children you shall not enter into the kingdom of Heaven.” This implies that men are to be ready to give up their own opinions, and follow the teaching of whatever authority He has appointed if they would be saved.
We do not mean by this that poor and uneducated people are to listen without questioning to the teaching of their priests, because they are unlearned, and know no better; but we mean that all classes, rich and poor, learned, and ignorant, priests and laity, must equally submit to the authority of the Church in all that concerns their salvation. There is not one law for the learned, and another for the ignorant. The most Earned man in the world must, in this matter, submit his judgment precisely as a little child would do. He may use all his learning to find out the true church; but, when he has found it, he must put all his books on one side, and ask to be taught, and believe what he is told on the authority of the Church, just as a child would do. If he has not humility enough to do this, he can never be a Catholic. If he were to become he would probably very soon leave the Church, and certainly never be happy in it.
There are two ways in which a man may try to be a Catholic.
He may study all the doctrines of the Church, and make up his mind that they are all reasonable and consistent with the Holy Scriptures, and so he may believe them all, and become a Catholic. This is one way, — and the wrong way.
On the other hand, he may, by God’s grace, become convinced that God has appointed the Holy Church as his guide, and so be willing to accept and believe all she teaches, because it comes to him on the authority of God, and therefore must be true; not because he himself sees how or why it is true.
This is the right way, and the only one by which we can hope to get “joy and peace in believing.” (Rom. 15:13.)
You see, then, that there is a great difference in principle between Catholics and Protestants in the very idea and foundation of their faith.
In short, it comes to this. We have a most difficult road to find. One party of travelers says, ” There is a guide appointed to show us the way; a guide on whom we may implicitly rely. All we have to do is, diligently and patiently to follow his direction.” The other party says: “No, we have no guide, and we want no guide. Let each man find his way as best he can by his own judgment, and by consulting such books and maps as you can get.” Is it wonderful that these last should soon be seen pursuing a thousand different paths? Is it wonderful that they have “gone astray” everyone hath turned aside unto his own way.” (Isaias 103:6.)
Once more, then, you have to understand that people who are out of the Catholic Church may use all their reasoning powers to make sure which is the authority God has given to men, before they submit to it, and indeed they are bound to do so; but, when once they are convinced of the authority of this guide, they must give up all further arguing, and “become as little children,” willing to be taught, and ready to obey.
After laying down this general principle, the next question is, What are the chief things which the Church teaches?
It will be convenient to treat of them in the following order: —
1. The Unity and Trinity of God;
2. The Incarnation and Death of our Savior;
3. The four last things: Death, Judgment, Hell,
Heaven;
4. The testimony and authority of the Catholic Church;
5. The use of prayer and the sacraments.
Under these heads come most of the things which you will require to know. I will first speak shortly of those great truths about which there is no controversy between Catholics and Protestants; and then, more in detail, of those about which you may desire instruction.
To begin with: What is the sign of the Cross? and what is its use? It is that external representation of the Cross of Christ which has been the distinguishing mark of Christians since the time of our Lord. We read in the Holy Scriptures of the “sign of the Son of man.” “And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven.” (S. Matt. 24:30.) The Christian Church has always considered this sign of the Son of man to be the sign of the cross. This sign is the profession of our faith, and in it we ought to glory.
S. Paul says: ” God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Gal. 6:14.) S. Cyril of Jerusalem, in the fourth century, uses these words: “Let us not, therefore, be ashamed of the cross of Christ; but even though another hide it, do thou openly seal it on thy brow, that the devils, beholding that royal sign, may flee far away trembling. But make thou this sign when thou eats and drinks, sits or lying down, rises up, speaks, walks: in a word, on every occasion; for He who was here crucified is above in the heavens.” (Catech. iv.)
This holy sign is still in constant use in the Catholic Church. It is commonly made in the following manner. You put the middle finger of your right hand to your forehead, and say: “In the name of the Father;” then you move it to just below your breast, and say: “and of the Son;” then to your left shoulder, with the words: “and of the Holy;” and after that to your right shoulder, saying: “Spirit. Amen.”
The use of this sign is to remind us of the two first and most important mysteries of the faith. It reminds us, but gives us a ready way of professing our belief in them.
The words we say, “In the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit/’ put us in mind of the Blessed Trinity.
The shape which we mark on ourselves reminds us of the Incarnation and Death of our Savior.
1. The “Unity and Trinity of God” means that there is only one, true, supreme, living God, the Maker and Lord of all things, and in this One God there are Three Persons.
These Three Persons— the Father, the First Person; the Son, the Second Person; the Holy Spirit, the Third Person — are all really distinct, and yet there is only One God.
These Three Persons are equal in all perfections. “And in this Trinity, there is nothing before or after, greater or less, but all three Persons are co-eternal and equal to each other,” to use the words of the Athanasian Creed.
But how can this be? We do not know. It is one of the secrets of God’s own nature which he tells us, and which we are bound to believe because He tells it us, though we are utterly unable to understand it.
Now it is well for me here to remark that the know ledge of God — the thought about God — is the beginning and foundation of all religion. ” The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” “This is life eternal, to know Thee, the only True God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent.” (S. John 17:3.) Let me explain this.
A man has got his mind very full of the notion of God. He thinks of the boundless greatness of God, compared to which he himself is as a grain of sand to the Universe. He thinks of the infinite wisdom of God, seeing at once all things — things past, present, and to come; things hidden as easily as things manifest — and compares it with his own stumbling reason. He thinks of God’s presence everywhere, from which there is no escape. “If I ascend into heaven, Thou art there: if I descend into hell, Thou art present.” And lastly, he has in his mind a great reverence for God and for all things belonging to Him, and a sense of his responsibility to God for all his actions. Such a man as this finds no difficulty in religion. The mysteries of his faith seem quite reasonable and natural to him; they are consistent with the idea of God which is familiar to him. The things required of him in the service of God are just what he is prepared to give. If hp is not a Catholic, should the Catholic religion ever be put in his way, so as to give him a chance of knowing it, he will be in a good disposition to embrace it.
On the other hand, if a man has not in his heart much real thought of God or reverence for Him, you may be sure that his religion rests on a very slight foundation. It is like the house built on the sand; whatever external appearance of solidity it may have, it is in danger of falling in the first trial, “And the rains fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that house, and it fell.” (S. Matt. 7:27.)
You must take care, therefore, to train yourself to a deep sense of the presence of God, and of your responsibility to Him. Think a great deal of His infinite perfections and unlimited empire over all His creatures, and of the boundless reverence and homage due to Him from the whole of His creation, and carefully abstain from the slightest willful irreverence in thought or word. It is too common a thing to hear Christians speak of God in a slighting, careless, irreverent manner, as if He were one like themselves, whose laws and providence they were fully at liberty to discuss. This tone of mind is a great danger, which you must do your best to avoid.
We now come to the second thing to be remembered. This, too, is brought into our minds every time we make the sign of the cross. It is ” The Incarnation and Death of our Savior.”
It means that God the Son— the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, who was always God, equal to the Father and the Holy Spirit — took to Himself our human nature, and became man as well as God. The Catechism says of the Incarnation — ” It means that God the Son took flesh and was made man by the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary, without having any man for His father.” He was true God, and at the same time true man, that is to say, He had a body and a soul, and a will like ours, and was like us in all things except sin.
“For we have not a high priest who cannot have com passion on our infirmities; but one tempted in all things, like as we are, without sin”’ (Heb. 4:15.) He was born in the stable at Bethlehem, and was called Jesus; and after He had lived thirty-three years on earth, He died upon the Cross on Mount Calvary for our salvation.
St. Paul says of Him — “Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God; but debased Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of man, and in habit found as a man.” (Phil. 2:6.)
Our Savior then has two natures — the nature of God and the nature of man; but these natures are joined together in one Person, by what is called the “Hypostatic Union.” By this we mean, that as in ourselves, a body and a soul are riot two persons, but one per son; so the Divine nature and the human nature of our Lord are also only One Person. “For as a rational soul and flesh are one man, so God and man are one Christ.” (Athanasian Creed.)
When our blessed Savior was living on earth, He constantly showed these two natures in the different things that he did and suffered.
When He raised the dead to life, and cured the sick, and worked other miracles, He showed His Divine power over the laws of nature. So that “Men wondered, saying: What manner of man is this, for the winds and the sea obey Him?”
At the very same time, he showed that He had a real human nature. He was born, He was hungry and thirsty, and tired, and at last He suffered and died upon the Cross.
The reality of these two natures, and their union in the One Person of our Lord is the groundwork of the whole mystery of redemption. It has, therefore, been the special office of the Church to guard these truths from the attacks of error. Very early the Arian heresy arose. Arius denied the divinity of our Lord, by saying that, though He was called God, He was not really God, of the same nature with God the Father. When this heresy had been condemned at the first general council, held at Nicea, another error was taught, which came to the same result in another way. Nestorius declared that there were two persons in Christ, a Divine person and -a human person, and that it was only the human person that suffered for us, and hence that the Blessed Virgin Mary ought not to be called the Mother of God, because she was the mother of the human person only. When this error had been condemned, a heresy sprung up which appeared to be exactly the contrary. The Eutychians taught that in Christ not only was there only one person, but onlv one nature; that is, that our Lord was really God, but not really man, and therefore that His passion and death were not real, but only apparent. This came to exactly the same result as the other errors; it did away with the great truth that God came down into this world and was truly born, and truly suffered for the redemption of men. These same errors have been continued, in one shape or other, outside the Catholic Church to the present day.
You have to bear in mind, therefore, that from the time of the Incarnation, Christ has been truly God and truly man, and that he will be so for all eternity. Whilst He was on earth bearing reproach and suffering for us, He was that very God by whom “all things were made,” (S. John i. 3)—” Upholding all things by the word of His power” (Heb. 1:3); and now, when He is glorified, and sits at the right hand of the Father, He is just as truly the Son of Man, as when He was born in the stable at Bethlehem. ” Every spirit that dissolves Jesus is not of God; and this is Antichrist of whom you have heard, that he cometh, and he is now already in the world.” (1 St. John 4:3.)
I must here speak of the importance of knowing the history of our Savior, His life and death, His miracles and His testimony.
“Christian” means follower of Christ. If you know nothing about Christ, and will not take the trouble to learn, you do not deserve to be called a Christian. The Catechism tells us about His Life and Passion, in the explanation of the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th articles of the Creed.
In the devotions of the Rosary and the Stations, the events of our Lord’s life and death are constantly put before us; and if you would be a good Christian, you must make them the subject of frequent meditation.
I will now go on to the consideration of the “Four last things:” Death, Judgment, Hell, and Heaven.
It is quite necessary to understand the Catholic faith about these things, and in practice to keep them constantly in mind, if you would save your soul.
S. Paul says, “he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and is a rewarder to them that seek Him.” (Heb. 11:6.) And in the Book of Ecclesiasticus, it is said: ” In all thy works remember thy last end, and thou shalt never sin.” (Ecclus. 7:40.)
The first of these ” last things” is death. “It is appointed unto men once to die, and after this the judgment.” (Heb. 9:27.) We know very well that we all have to die, and that the time of our death is quite uncertain. Our Lord says: ” Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watches.” (Apoc. 16:15.)
And “after this the judgment.” You have heard of the day of judgment — the ” great and terrible day of the Lord,” as it is called; “and then you shall see the sign of the Son of Man coming in a cloud, with great power and majesty.” And S. John says : “I saw the dead, great and small, standing in the presence of the throne, and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged by those things which were written in the books, according to their works.” (Apoc. 20:12.) ” In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall rise again incorruptible; and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption; and thy
mortal must put on immortality.” (1 Cor. 15:52.)
All generations of men, from Adam down to the last of the human race, will have to appear at this great Judgment. All their thoughts, words, and deeds, evil and good, will be made manifest, and an irrevocable sentence will be pronounced according to them. At this general Judgment, our Lord Jesus Christ will be glorified. At His first coming, He bore persecution and reproach from men; at His second, He will be exalted before all creation, as the Judge of the living and the dead, and as the Savior of the world. All those who are saved, will have to thank Him alone for their redemption, and will say: ” Thou art worthy, O Lord, to take the book, and to open the seals thereof; because thou was slain; and has redeemed us to God in thy blood out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation.” (Apoc. 5:9.)
Moreover, the dealings of God with men will be made manifest, — according to the words of the Psalm: “That thou mayest be justified in thy words, and mayest over come when thou art judged.” (Psalm 1. 6.) There are many things now which we are quite unable to under stand. We ” see in a glass in a dark manner.” (1 Cor. 13:12.) When we consider the different degrees of knowledge, the different opportunities and graces given to men; and again, the temptations and difficulties which many have to surmount, we are bewildered if we attempt to account for God’s dealings with creatures. All those, to whom He has given understanding and free will, must in some way have their day of trial, just as Adam and Eve had theirs in Paradise; and we know that God will deal with each one of them with Infinite mercy and Infinite justice. How this will be, we cannot understand. We must therefore not “judge before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of dark ness; and will make manifest the counsels of hearts.” (1 Cor. 4:5.)
But when will this day of Judgment be? We do not know. It may be hundreds of years to come. When the apostles asked our Lord about the future, He said to them: ” It is not for you to know the times or moments which the Father hath put in His own power.” This is a lesson we ought all to take to ourselves. We cannot therefore say when the general judgment will come; but there is another judgment which more immediately concerns us, and this is called the “Particular Judgment.” For this, you will not have to wait very long. As soon as ever you are dead — before your friends have clone mourning over you — your soul will go into the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Judge of the living and the dead. You will have to answer to Him for all your sins; for every thought, word, and deed of your life; and on the sentence, which He then pronounces, depends the whole of eternity.
In whatever state your soul is found at the hour of your death, you will remain forever. This life is the time of change; but when eternity begins, there can be no further changing. ” If the tree fall to the south, or to the north, in what place soever it shall fall, there shall it be.” (Eccles. 11: 3.)
Supposing that, when you die, you are in the friend ship of God; then, you will remain in His love for ever. But if you are unhappy enough to die in a state of rebellion against God, that is, in unforgiven mortal sin, then there is no hope of ever being reconciled to Him.
The five foolish virgins, in the parable, came to the door, and said, ” Lord, Lord, open to us -” but it was shut, and never to be opened. And the Lord said, ” Amen, I say to you, I know you not.” If we are not ready when God calls us, our fault cannot afterwards be remedied.
And what will then follow? Hell. He will say to the wicked, ” Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire, which was prepared for the devil and his angels ” (S. Matt. 25:41), and the Holy Scriptures concludes with these words, ” and these shall go into everlasting punishment, and the just into life everlasting.”
The punishment of sin will bear some sort of proportion to the Infinite Majesty of God, which is out raged by it, and will last forever. “Out of hell there is no redemption.” “And the smoke of their torments shall ascend up for ever and ever; neither have they rest day nor night who have adored the beast, and his image.” (Apoc. 14:11.)
This is a fearful truth, but when once we know that God has revealed it, all we have to do is to believe it, and to remember that ” His ways are not as our ways,” and that it is ” a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the Living God.”
But in proportion to the severity of God’s justice is the greatness of His mercy.
If we are found faithful and ready, like the wise virgins, with our lamps burning in our hands, then God is ” our reward exceeding great.” He will say to the just, ” Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the kingdom which is prepared for you.” (St. Matt. 25:34.) “The just shall go into life everlasting,” and “God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and death shall be no more, nor mourning, nor crying, nor sorrow shall be any more.” (Apoc. 21:4.)
This reward which God promises to us, is beyond all we can imagine. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive what God hath prepared for them that love Him.” (1 Cor. 2:9.) This great reward is everlasting. We shall never cease to enjoy it, and never grow tired of it
But now I come to speak of a part of the Catholic faith which Protestants do not at all understand. It is this. The just indeed receive their judgment of happiness at once, and for ever, when they- are judged immediately after their death. It does not follow, however, that they immediately enter into possession of this happiness.
Very often, perhaps generally, the justice of God requires that they should suffer for a time. This state of suffering, in which the good are detained, is called Purgatory. The Catechism describes it as “a middle state of souls suffering for a time on account of their sins.”
Without knowing this doctrine, it would be difficult to understand the strict justice of God, by which He ” renders to every man according to his works.”
It often happens that men lead wicked lives for years, and then, at the last, are converted. How can they be punished for all the evil they have committed? Some, no doubt, make atonement for their sins in this world, but many do not. If there were no place of punishment in the next world, even for those who have repented, how could it be true that God holds us accountable for every action of our lives, and rewards us according to them?
The souls of the dead go to Purgatory for two reasons.
First, when they have committed great sins. They have repented of them, and so been saved from hell fire for the sake of the Passion of Christ, but they have done nothing to satisfy God’s justice.
Secondly, they are punished for venial sins which never been forgiven in this life. They might only have obtained God’s pardon, but, through laziness or want of good disposition, they never did so.
Protestants have a notion that the doctrine of Purgatory interferes with our belief in the all-sufficiency of the atonement offered by our Lord. This is not so. We believe that the merits of Christ’s precious Blood are more than enough to purchase the pardon of all sins, and the salvation of all sinners. We may have to suffer in Purgatory, however, not from any deficiency in our Lord’s merits, but because we have not availed ourselves of them. S. Paul says, ” Other foundation no man can lay but that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus. Now if any man builds upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every man’s work shall be manifest, for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire, and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he hath built there upon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work burn, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved yet so as by fire.” (1 Cor. 3:11.)
Here we have the complete and perfect foundation, and the imperfect work built upon it, and God trying, purifying, and perfecting the work by fire. This seems to correspond very accurately with what the Church teaches us about Purgatory.
Protestants also fancy that the doctrine of Purgatory makes the judgment of God less final and conclusive. As I said before, however, the Church teaches us that the sentence pronounced at the particular judgment is absolutely final, although it may not at once be fully carried into effect.
One consequence of the doctrine of Purgatory is the practice of praying for the dead.
The souls of the faithful departed, although suffering for a time, are still the friends of God, for ever established in His love, and are our brethren. As such, they form one division of the Church — the Church suffering — and by the ” Communion of Saints ” are united to the Church triumphant in Heaven, and the Church militant upon earth. These parts of the Church, although externally separated, are united by an inter communion of prayer. Just aa it is the will of God that those on earth should pray for one another, and that the prayers of some should be the means by which graces are bestowed on others, so it is His will that those on earth should pray for their brethren departed, and endeavor by their devotion, and the offering of the Holy Sacrifice, to pay some part of that debt which remains due to the justice of God.
What the Church teaches about Purgatory may be well illustrated by the account given in the book of Maccabees. We read how, when some of his men had been slain, the valiant Judas, “making a gathering, sent twelve thousand drachms of silver to Jerusalem for sacrifice to be offered for the sins of the dead, thinking well and religiously concerning the resurrection, (for if he had not hoped that they that were slain would rise again, it would have seemed superfluous and vain to pray for the dead), and because he considered that they who had fallen asleep with godliness, had great reward laid up for them. It is therefore a holy and whole some thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins.” (2 Mach. 12:43.)
The souls of the faithful departed are often spoken of as the “Holy Souls,” and the Catholic Church urges her children to be earnest in prayer for them at all times, and especially in the month of November, when they are particularly commemorated. I shall have occasion to say a little more on this subject whom I have to speak of Indulgences.
P. J. KENEDY & SONS. 1910..