"Tradition"

Jubilee Year 2025 Indulgences pic.twitter.com/JOxkahbH12

— A Catholic Life (@acatholiclife) December 29, 2024

Reparation and Expiation

That sort of Latin spiritual theology is still around in certain circles.

Colloquio Telefonico con mons. Schneider. “Preghiera, Riparazione ed Espiazione”. https://t.co/ShSDhaNtgy

— Marco Tosatti (@MarcoTosatti) June 6, 2021

There Is a Place for Hope in the Christian Life

And considering the Last Things frequently. But is the eschaton our primary motivation or God in the present? Focusing too much on our subjective beatitude instead of objective beatitude (God) can lead to that sort of piety which focuses on the accumulation of good works and merit, rather than God. Purification of one's self so that one can focus on God is what is important; everything else will be taken care of accordingly.

I think we need more homilies on heaven. Fixing the mind and heart on the good things to come helps to bear well and patiently the sufferings and sorrows of the present. To live for heaven is neither escapist nor cowardly: it's Christian. https://t.co/isHX4A26QQ

— Fr. Patrick Mary Briscoe, OP (@PatrickMaryOP) December 5, 2020

Aquinas 101: Grace

A primer on grace, justification, and merit from the @ThomisticInst https://t.co/0uqUJtZJQm

— Patrick Madrid ✌🏼 (@patrickmadrid) May 22, 2020

A Latin Perspective

First Things: Go to the Altar by Jane Stannus

The cassocked one answered seriously, “A priest is one who primarily offers sacrifice.”

I'll have to see if there are any dogmatic statements by Latin churches before Trent. From the Concil of Trent, Session XXIII:

CHAPTER I.
On the institution of the Priesthood of the New Law.
Sacrifice and priesthood are, by the ordinance of God, in such wise conjoined, as that both have existed in every law. Whereas, therefore, in the New Testament, the Catholic Church has received, from the institution of Christ, the holy visible sacrifice of the Eucharist; it must needs also be confessed, that there is, in that Church, a new, visible, and external priesthood, into which the old has been translated. And the sacred Scriptures show, and the tradition of the Catholic Church has always taught, that this priesthood was instituted by the same Lord our Saviour, and that to the apostles, and their successors in the priesthood, was the power delivered of consecrating, offering, and administering His Body and Blood, as also of forgiving and of retaining sins. 

 Only now do I understand the implications of what my friend said many years ago, regarding the confusion that arises from having the same word translate  ἱερεύς and  πρεσβύτερος.


1 Peter 2:9 in Greek and Latin (Nova Vulgata).
Priest: sacerdos. Priesthood: sacerdotium.



It is standard for the same word to be used for both Greek terms in English and in Latin.
I don't know when the Latin sacerdos first began to be used to translate for the Greek hiereus and prebyteros. Is this true of all of the languages (especially European) in use in the patriarchate of Rome? It is the case that the English word priest is derived from the Latin presbyter, a borrowing by Jerome from presbyteros. Somewhere along the line, ecclesiastical Latin came to prefer sacerdos over Jerome's presbyter? Even though this goes against its normative translation of Holy Scripture?

wiktionary

wikipedia

From Google:

Origin

And a related blog post by "Hadley Rectory": The Etymology of English "Priest" 

So for these languages (and French, but not necessarily the other Romance languages?) that the word used to translated presybter/presbyteros (and referring to that Holy Order) was also used to translate hiereus, rather than the word for hiereus being used to translate presbyteros as in Latin.

Denzinger (in Latin)

Let us continue with the First Things essay:

“Yes, He offered Himself for us on Calvary nearly two thousand years ago. However, in order for us to come into contact with the merits of His sacrifice, the priest renews it in an unbloody way each day.”

Merit. What Christ merited in His sacrifice are the benefits which are given to us by God. A Tridentine view, derived from Aquinas? (How dominant was this opinion about Christ's merits among the schoolmen?) Does merit imply some sort of exchange or return? Not necessarily but it does entail God giving something on condition of some requirement being satisfied. Can Latin "merit" be harmonized with the soteriology of the early Church? In a somewhat roundabout way, a way that needlessly complicates our understanding of the Divine Agape.

Writing for Rorate Caeli on March 24, Father Richard Cipolla suggested that Catholics’ greatest anxiety at this time of locked churches isn’t missing Mass per se, but rather missing an opportunity to receive Communion, overlooking, he fears, the true nature and importance of the Mass itself. This time of waiting and deprivation offers an excellent opportunity to consider the enormous significance of each Mass—with or without communion of the faithful.

Why is the Mass so important? Well, quite simply, the Mass is the sum and substance of our religion. It is the jewel that blazes at the very heart of Christianity, the unbloody renewal of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, carried out continuously in every time and place until the end of the world. It is the heart of our Christian lives, for to be a Christian, as one of the greatest missionaries of the 20^th century said, is to be one “who offers himself as a victim on the altar with Our Lord.”

To assist at Mass is not merely to attend a commemoration or a memorial of an event that happened long ago. The holy sacrifice is an action that happens now, in the present. The priest, acting in persona Christi, approaches the altar—not a table, for this event is not reducible to a meal—to perform the sacrifice, accomplished in consecrating the bread and wine. When the priest pronounces the words of consecration, Saint Gregory Nazianzus tells us, he “sunders with unbloody cut the Body and the Blood of the Lord, using his voice as a sword.” The faithful assisting at Mass unite their hearts to the priest and unite their lives and sufferings to the Victim, that all may be offered to God together.

Renewal? Is that the same as "repeated"? I think Latins in general prefer a word like "re-presented." It is clear that she does not mean repeated from the second and third paragraph. As for "offering it up," how far does this go back in popular Latin piety?

Can the Mass be properly and efficaciously accomplished in the absence of the faithful? A group of progressives recently argued on blog Pray Tell that it cannot. Questioning the theological basis for Mass without a congregation, they claim that the Second Vatican Council changed the liturgy into a communal and public action of the baptized, which the priest can’t accomplish without them.

But they’re wrong. Vatican II said nothing about private Masses. Rather, we ought to look to Session 22 of the Council of Trent. As we consider the locked doors of our churches in this time of crisis, we can take comfort from one fact: Christ is both priest and sacrifice, and therefore a valid Mass is always efficacious, meaning that it always accomplishes the ends for which it is offered. Its efficacy is not determined by the presence of the faithful; the sacrifice of the Mass, Ott tells us, is the sacrifice of the Church, and in that sense is never “private.” Nor are the faithful needed to offer the sacrifice since it is Christ Himself who offers it through His priest. 

The efficacy of the Mass was so beautifully explained to me by the priest who kindly permitted me to publish the story about the construction worker that it’s worth reproducing his words here:
“The holy Mass,” he said, “is the supreme act of religion that renders to God what is due to Him: adoration, thanksgiving, and propitiation for sin, after which we can then present to Him our petitions.

“Our Lord Jesus Christ perpetuates this supreme act Himself throughout the ages, through the ministry of His priests upon our holy altars. He abases Himself in perfect adoration before the Godhead, acknowledging our utter dependence upon Him. The most perfect praise of the excellence of God above all wells up from His Sacred Heart.

“He offers nothing less than His own Sacred Body and Precious Blood, united to His Soul and Divinity, as the perfect gift of thanksgiving in the Eucharist… by which we render to God fitting and perfect gratitude for all of His goodness and mercy towards us.

“He likewise perpetuates the offering of His Sacred Body and Precious Blood in propitiation for sin. In and through the same sacrifice, Jesus presents our petitions (for we utterly depend on Him for all things)…

Has the act of sacrifice been separated from the Sacrament and its reception by the faithful, so that without the latter, it doesn't matter as it is the former that is more important?

The question is, in sacrifice do we "give" anything to God in thanksgiving, other than the thanksgiving?

"Compassion" and "Mercy"

Pope Francis' mentions the Sacred Heart devotion but in connection with his own language of "compassion" and "mercy," which may be compatible with sentimentalism but may not be compatible with law or the good. Charity separated from truth.







CNA: ‘The heart of the Church’s mission is prayer,’ Pope Francis says

Catholic Herald: The time is ripe for a revival in devotion to the Sacred Heart by Fr Alexander Lucie-Smith

Can the devotion to the Sacred Heart be separated from Latin soteriology and its concepts of merit, atonement, expiation, and reparation that are logical consequences of it? (It has also been linked to the modern Latin devotion to Christ the King, cf. the reference by Pius XI to Quas Primas in Miserentissimus Redemptor.)

Consecration to the Sacred Heart. Pope Leo XIII - 1899 - Vatican.VA
Miserentissimus Redemptor (May 8, 1928) | PIUS XI
CARITATE CHRISTI COMPULSI Pope Pius XI 3 May 1932 Sacred Heart - EWTN - Vatican.VA
Haurietis Aquas (May 15, 1956) | PIUS XII

A Forgotten Devotion in the West?

The Most Sacred Heart of Jesus (EWTN)

Fr. Tim Finigan: The healthy notion of reparation

That we can seek to make up for our sins is only possible because of our participation in Christ and the satisfaction of God's righteousness that He is able to make -- and the latter part is meant not in a Latin/legalistic way but an Eastern one.

1P5: The Wedding of the Lamb by Peter Kwasniewski

Prof. Kwasniewski cites Fr. Bouyer at the beginning of his essay but what would Fr. Bouyer think of the essay and the appropriation of what he wrote regarding the Christian Mystery?

Setting aside the question of merit and Christ's meritorious causality, does the following not stike one as being problematic?

"He speaks these words because He wills to give us nothing less than His very self. In the gift of His holy and life-giving Eucharist, His resurrected flesh and blood, we receive the Lord, our God, King, Father, Spouse, Brother, Friend, for our pilgrimage on earth and for eternal glory in heaven."

Christ is not God the Father and we are not adopted sons of the Son but adopted sons of the Father. Sounds like a problem with Trinitarian theology.

As for spouse... Christ is the bridegroom and the Church is His bride, but I still think it problematic to take that metaphor to understand it literally in describing our relationship to him.

The Holiness of the Theotokos

The latest in a series dealing with the Immaculate Conception and such -- Eclectic Orthodoxy: Immaculate Virgin: Predestined Before the Ages

"But does assertion of predestinating grace imply that Mary does not need the salvation of Christ? Duns Scotus famously addressed this question in the 13th century and argued that by his atoning sacrifice on the Cross, Christ “merited to take away this most heavy penalty [of original sin] from his Most Blessed Mother.” Ahead of time, as it were, Mary is redeemed from sin by her son, the incarnate Son."

Scotus and and the tricky language of merit, as it is tied to a particular Latin view of atonement?

Germ cell theory and the Theotokos being purified through the contact with Christ, we have a problem -- the germ cells are not identical with the body of Christ, though one of them does develop, mature and become the egg used in the Holy Conception of Christ.

How is the Virgin Mary sanctified apart from Christ, without participating in Christ, if she is a woman of the New Covenant? A correspondence with the righteous of the Old Covenant?

A New Understanding of Anselm

Silverio Rebelo, Le Sacrifice du Christ chez Saint Anselm de Cantorbery, Le noveau visage du Cur Deus Homo, Irenikon, LXXXVII, 2014, 5-46

Summary of Silverio Rebelo:
"The Sacrifice of Christ according to Saint Anselm of Canterbury - A New Look at the Cur Deus Homo." According to the current interpretation of the Cur Deus Homo, Anselm explained the redemptive function of the sacrifice of the Cross in accordance with the basic perspective of the theory of vicarious satisfaction, the classic design of a legal-term replacement of the work of Christ. However, a closer examination reveals a theology of redemption of a very different type, deeply rooted in the patristic tradition, whose basic idea is that the sacrifice of Christ is a life-giving event. According to this interpretation of the mediation of Christ, faith allows believers to share in the perfection of his obedience unto death, which becomes the basis of their life of obedience to God. This leads to a veritable revolution in the understanding of the relationship between God and humanity: the sacrifice of Christ is not a condition of the grace of God for humankind, but a work that renews their way of living, and is an expression [of] God's unconditional will to save."

The article contains a discussion of merit in CDH 2.19 - is this the source of Aquinas's teaching on merit re: Christ's redemptive work in ST III? Or is it mediated by other sources? From a completely unrelated work? Wholly "original"?

The dominant understanding of Anselm's teaching among Latins, transmitted in academic settings, is probably familiar to those who have studied Latin theories of atonement. It is a representation put forth even by Joseph Ratzinger and Louis Bouyer. I assume that both read Anselm's CDH, either in Latin or in translation, so that their representation is confirmed by their reading of the primary source and not based solely on secondary sources. So why did the theological giants of yesteryear fail to get Anselm right (assuming this revised understanding of Cur Deus Homo is the correct one)? Did they lack access to the requisite scholarship for properly understanding how the terms satisfaction and honor were being used by Anselm, definitions that could not be uncovered until they were situated within the historical and theological culture in which they were used? Was it a problem of translation (and the interpretation that precedes translation)?

Notes on Divine Righteousness, Satisfaction and Atonement

St. Thomas, ST III 46, 2 obj. 3

Further, God's justice required that Christ should satisfy by the Passion in order that man might be delivered from sin. But Christ cannot let His justice pass; for it is written (2 Timothy 2:13): "If we believe not, He continueth faithful, He cannot deny Himself." But He would deny Himself were He to deny His justice, since He is justice itself. It seems impossible, then, for man to be delivered otherwise than by Christ's Passion.

ST III 46, 2 ad 3:

Even this justice depends on the Divine will, requiring satisfaction for sin from the human race. But if He had willed to free man from sin without any satisfaction, He would not have acted against justice. For a judge, while preserving justice, cannot pardon fault without penalty, if he must visit fault committed against another--for instance, against another man, or against the State, or any Prince in higher authority. But God has no one higher than Himself, for He is the sovereign and common good of the whole universe. Consequently, if He forgive sin, which has the formality of fault in that it is committed against Himself, He wrongs no one: just as anyone else, overlooking a personal trespass, without satisfaction, acts mercifully and not unjustly. And so David exclaimed when he sought mercy: "To Thee only have I sinned" (Psalm 50:6), as if to say: "Thou canst pardon me without injustice."

One can say that Christ's human acts are meritorious and that His life, that in which we participate through the holy mysteries/the sacraments, provides the template for our deification. This much can be harmonized with Christus Victor theories .

Beyond this, the problem arises when Aquinas writes (ST III 48, 2): "He properly satisfies for an offense who offers something which the offended one loves equally, or even more than he detested the offense."

Usually it is understood as a form of quantitative equalizing, the "accounting ledger." It might be possible to make Aquinas here verbally agree with a Christus Victor theory of atonement, Christ satisfies Divine Righteousness for the sin of Adam (and our sins) by doing what Adam failed to do and thus countering his sin and fall, taking upon the condition of fallen man and healing him, etc..

But St. Thomas continues in III 48, 2: "But by suffering out of love and obedience, Christ gave more to God than was required to compensate for the offense of the whole human race."

The language still remains that of measuring or "accounting, as given in the language of the third objection, "Further, atonement implies equality with the trespass, since it is an act of justice," which Aquinas does not deny in his response.

Similarly, forcing an interpretation of justice as Divine Righteousness (in its wholly holy sense) could be done for ST III 46, 1 ad 3 but it would notbe a good fit :

That man should be delivered by Christ's Passion was in keeping with both His mercy and His justice. With His justice, because by His Passion Christ made satisfaction for the sin of the human race; and so man was set free by Christ's justice: and with His mercy, for since man of himself could not satisfy for the sin of all human nature, as was said above (Question 1, Article 2), God gave him His Son to satisfy for him, according to Romans 3:24-25: "Being justified freely by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God hath proposed to be a propitiation, through faith in His blood." And this came of more copious mercy than if He had forgiven sins without satisfaction. Hence it is said (Ephesians 2:4): "God, who is rich in mercy, for His exceeding charity wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together in Christ."

The article from the new Catholic Encyclopedia may be an attempt at a corrective to "A rigorously juridical concept of satisfaction [that] can suggest an exchange governed by commutative justice. Excessive humanization of the Creator-creature relationship can effect the theological discussion of whether or not Christ's payment of satisfaction in mankind's name was in the strictest sense a work of justice."

It goes a way to try to return to Christus Victor theories of atonement and return to a fuller sense of Divine Righteosness, but it also takes steps back as soon as it advances. For example:

The Prophets and the Psalmist appeal to the justice of god when yearning for deliverance. Goodness, mercy, fidelity, constancy—all these are aspects of the Biblical notion of God's justice. When Saint Thomas speaks of "the severity of God" that was "unwilling to forgive sin without punishment," he rightly couples this immediately with "His goodness" in giving mankind one who could adequately satisfy in behalf of all those who deserved punishment (Summa theologiae 3a, 47.3 ad 1).

[Hampered by too much attachment to Aquinas.]

And: "The word propitiation reminds one that Christ's suffering and death were an expiation for an offense or an appeasement of an offended God."

And yet what follows does not support this as the explanation of propitiation, but rather propitiation as understood in Christus Victor theories : "Though God's loving justice was not punishing His innocent Son, He did so plan the redemptive Passion as to enable Jesus to express His filial love through experiences that came to mankind historically as punishments for sin, namely, suffering and death "

(FB)

The Winner of the Ratzinger Prize,

Post by Vatican Radio - English Section.

Te Deum

Te Deum laudamus, Gregoriano, T. Simplex; SCHOLA GREGORIANA MEDIOLANENSIS, Giovanni Vianini, Milano.It.

"The Te Deum. PLENARY INDULGENCE when recited publicly on the last day of the year. Otherwise partial. (Enchiridion indulgentiarum, 60)"

Do some Catholics mistakenly hold to a Pelagian mindset? (I'm not addressing Pope Francis on this question.) A mentality of
"works righteousness"? Does an extreme focus on indulgences in some forms of popular spirituality help us grow in charity? Or does it lead us to wrongly focus on subjective rewards instead? A truncated Christian spirituality... Orthodox/Eastern Catholics are puzzled by talk about indulgences; some even think the doctrine erroneous. How do we properly motivate people to prayer and acts of charity?

Collecting some thoughts on indulgences and whether popular strains of Latin spirituality have become too focused on them, replacing communion with God with a form of works righteousness that may be orthodox with respect to God's initiative and our complete dependence upon His grace, and yet nonetheless promotes a tit-for-tat or transactional relationship with God.