The Council of Jerusalem

Reading N°14 in the History of the Catholic Church

by

Fr. Fernand Mourret, S.S.

History does not tell us what effect was produced by the epistle to the Galatians. But we do know that very soon the trouble sprang up again at Antioch. So intense did it become that the brethren at Antioch decided upon an appeal to the Apostles and ancients at Jerusalem.^[1] From them it was that these dissenters said they had received their commission; to them the Antiochene Christians turned to have the pending conflict settled by a competent authority that was recognized by all.

The delegates from Antioch, with Paul and Barnabas at their head, set out, by way of Phenicia and Samaria, for the Holy City. Their solemn reception by the Apostles and ancients^[2] shows that the latter wished to repudiate any solidarity with the coterie that had stirred up so many disputes. But this party, which had its center in Jerusalem and claimed to have connection with the supreme religious authority of the city,^[3] was ready to renew its attacks. It was violently aggressive. No doubt it repeated all the curses of the old rabbis against violation of the Law.

The Apostles and ancients were assembled in council. All were waiting to hear what Peter and James would say. "Men, brethren," said Peter, "you know that in former days God made choice among us, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God, who knoweth the hearts, gave testimony, giving unto them the Holy Ghost, as well as to us. [...] Now therefore, why tempt you God to put a yoke upon the necks of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?"

After Peter finished speaking, "all the multitude held their peace." It was not easy to say anything against words so full of authority and good sense. Paul and Barnabas were brought into the council to tell "what great signs and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them." Then James arose. Although Peter's hierarchical authority was beyond dispute among the faithful, yet James' moral authority was universal at Jerusalem, even in the Jewish world. His regular attendance at the Temple had gained him the particular esteem of the zealots; his being a "brother of the Lord" won him exceptional deference. After citing certain words of the prophets, he concluded by saying: "I judge that they who from among the Gentiles are converted to God are not to be disquieted. But that we write unto them that they refrain themselves from the pollution of idols and from fornication (πορνεία) and from things strangled and from blood."

This was clearly an acceptance in principle of the law of liberty proclainled by Peter and Paul. But it also took into account the need of managing the transition cautiously. The whole assembly agreed to the view expressed by James. The prohibition against eating blood and things strangled went back to the early days of the world. God had given this prohibition to Noe for the purpose of inculcating in his descendants respect for human life. The ban on food offered to idols was intended to inspire a horror of idolatry. The word "fornication" in this passage probably means marriage between relatives within the degrees of consanguinity and affinity forbidden by the Book of Leviticus.^[4]

The Council of Jerusalem then drew up the following decree:

It hath seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us, to lay no further burden upon you than these necessary things: that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication. From which things keeping yourselves, you shall do well.^[5]

In the letter written to the Church at Antioch we find these additional words: 

Some going out from us have troubled you with words, subverting your souls, to whom we gave no commandment.^[6]

This assembly, which took place about the year 51, is commonly spoken of as the Council of Jerusalem.^[7] Besides giving the faithful a rule of conduct, the Apostles and ancients proclaimed a rule of faith by refusing, contrary to the claims of Christians overly imbued with the Pharisaic spirit, to recognize circumcision and the Jewish observances as necessary for salvation. The rule of conduct which was laid down could have only a passing significance. As St. Thomas Aquinas says, "its only purpose was to facilitate the union of Gentiles and Jews living together, and it therefore ceased in course of time; when the cause ceased, the effect would likewise disappear."^[8]

St. Luke relates that the Christians of Antioch received the decree of Jerusalem enthusiastically.^[9] Henceforth the road to the Gentiles was wide open to the Apostles, and Antioch could be proud of having been the starting point of this movement of free expansion.

The Judaizing party did not, however, lay down their arms; they merely changed their tactics. Finding they could no longer hope to shelter themselves under hierarchical authority, they set up a schismatic sect with chiefs of their own. The Epistles of St. Paul, St. Peter, St. Jude and St. James supply a few valuable data about this revolt and schism. St. Paul, writing to the Colossians some time between 58 and 63, warns the faithful against false doctrines that are "according to the tradition of men," "according to the elements of the world,^[10] and not according to Christ."^[11] In his pastoral Epistles, he names some of the leaders of the sect: Hymeneus, Alexander, and Philetus.^[12] He also mentions their disputes over words, their idle questions, and the endless patriarchal genealogies to which they appealed.^[13] St. Peter and St. Jude denounce their contempt for authority and their denial of the coming of the Lord.^[14] St. John declares that, at the time he was writing, certain Antichrists, who had come from the ranks of Christians, denied that Jesus was the Son of God or the Christ, and said that He was only a man and had only the appearance of a body.^[15] In these details, as also in those to be found in the Apocalypse,^[16] we can recognize the germ of Ebionitism and Docetism. In the spread of Christianity, its chief auxiliary had been Judaism; but soon the Judaizing spirit became its principal internal enemy.

It is impossible to deny the existence of the Judaizing sects in Palestine during the Apostolic age, and there is reason to believe that the party condemned by the Council of Jerusalem formed the nucleus of that sect. But it would be a serious mistake to exaggerate, as Baur does, the extent of their influence, by misunderstanding the perfect orthodoxy of those "churches of God which are in Judea," which, as St. Paul testifies in his Epistle to the Thessalonians, suffered from those Jews "prohibiting us to speak to the Gentiles, that they may be saved."^[17] The Acts of the Apostles also mentions Christian communities in Galilee, in Samaria, and on the coast of the Mediterranean. "The term Judaeo-Christianity, strictly speaking, applies only to those Christians, born in Judaism, who looked upon the Law as still binding, and who therefore found themselves engaged in an irreconcilable conflict, not only with St. Paul, but with all Christianity."^[18]

But in the daughter churches, two currents still appear: that of the Ecclesia ex Judaeis, made up of Christians of Jewish birth, who continued to observe the Law, and that of the Ecclesia ex Gentibus, made up of non-Jewish Christians, for whom the Law, though certainly of divine institution, had been provisional, and was now abolished. Beginning with the Council of Jerusalem, this latter current takes on a preponderant role. The triumphant formula is decidedly that of the Epistle to the Galatians:

Neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision availeth anything, but a new creature. And whosoever shall follow this rule, peace on them and mercy, and upon the Israel of God."^[19]

In fact, and justly so, all the old bonds are broken.^[20]

Footnotes

[1] Acts 15:2.

[2] Acts 15:4.

[3] The expression τινὰς ἀπὸ Ἰακώβου, which St. Paul uses (Gal. 2:12), may signify persons who claimed to have been sent by James or who were in his entourage. This is the most likely interpretation of the text. "Anyhow, we should not wonder if this old man who, from the testimony of St. Epiphanius (Haereses, LXXVIII, 14), was then from 85 to 88 years old, and had never left his Palestinian surroundings, had not fully realized the situation at Antioch, and judged things not exactly in the same way as did Peter and Paul." (Tixeront, History of Dogmas, I, 151.)

[4] This is the view of Father Prat, La Théologie de saint Paul, I, 76. Le Camus (L'Œuvre des apôtres, I, 161) holds a like opinion. In any case, the decree cannot refer to the sin of fornication as such. It is concerned with determining certain outward and public facts which are capable of serving as the ground for admission into or exclusion from the Christian society. According to the Book of Leviticus, cohabitation within forbidden degrees is a heinous deed (revelare turpitudinem). (Lev. 18:7-18.)

[5] Acts 15:28 f.

[6] Acts 15:24.

[7] Melchoir Cano (De locis theologicis, V, 4) considers it a provincial council; Torrecremata (De ecclesia), a diocesan council; Benedict XIV (De synodol dioecesana, I, i, 5), a sort of council. Some authors look upon it as a tribunal rather than a council. (Le Camus, L'Œuvre des apôtres, II, 153.)

[8] Summa theologica, 1a 2ae, q. 103, a. 4. St. Paul (I Cor. 8:4-10) interprets the decree somewhat broadly. It is possible that the Jerusalem decree, in its practical regulation, was not observed everywhere, but only where there was a question of scandal for certain Jews. Thus are explained the numerous texts gathered by German scholars to cast doubt upon the authenticity of the Council of Jerusalem, because it is supposed that it was not applied in some places. For references of all these texts, see Dufourcq, L'Avenir du christianisme, III, 22. The authenticity of the account of the Council, as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, is attacked on the ground that St. Paul recounts it differently in his Epistle to the Galatians. This difficulty does not exist for those who, like us, agree with Le Camus (op. cit.), Belser (Einleitung in das Neue Testament), Weber (Die Abfassung des Galaterbriefes vor dem Apostelkonzil) , and Round (The Date of St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians), that the Epistle to the Galatians is anterior to the Council of Jerusalem and that it relates a journey made by St. Paul to Jerusalem in the year 47. The provisional character of the practical regulations promulgated by the Council, and their early abandonment, account for the numerous variants of the decree, as found in the manuscripts. The copyists, thinking to correct an error, altered the text to make it conform to the practice of their time. Amidst these divergencies, the critics distinguish two versions: the Eastern and the Western, but they are not agreed on the question which version is the earlier. At all events, the fact of these variants does not affect the authenticity and the substantial integrity of the decree. On this question, see a scholarly article by Coppieters in the Revue biblique, 1907, pp. 35 ff. The so-called "Canons of the Council of Antioch," discovered in 1572 by Father Torres, S.J., have proved to be apocryphal; they were composed at Antioch about the year 360. The critical questions concerning the Council of Jerusalem are summed up by Leclercq in Hefele, Histoire des Conciles (French transl.), vol. I, part 2, pp. 1070 ff.

[9] Acts 15:31.

[10] By these "elements of the world," St. Paul means the elementary religious institutions, Jewish or other, which could serve as a preparation for the Christian faith for one who knew how to pass beyond them, but which could be an obstacle to the faith for those who let themselves be seduced and halted by them.

[11] Coloss. 2:8.

[12] Cf. 1 Tim. 1:20; 2 Tim. 2:17.

[13] Cf. 1 Tim. 1:4; 4:7; 6:3-5. Today, exegetes generally hold that the "endless genealogies" spoken of in the Epistle are fabulous genealogies to be found in certain Jewish apocrypha, not the genealogies of the eons. (Jacquier, Histoire des livres du Nouveau Testament, I, 375.)

[14] Cf. 2 Pet. 2:10 f.; Jude 8.

[15] Cf. 1 John 2:18 f., 22 f.; 4:2, 3, 15.

[16] Apoc. 2:9, 14-16, 20-25.

[17] Cf. 1 Thess. 2:14-16.

[18] Batiffol, Primitive Catholicism, p. 238; Harnack, History of Dogma, I, 289.

[19] Gal. 6:15 f.

[20] For a detailed study of the relations of the Christian Church with Judaism, and for its progressive separation therefrom, see Batiffol, op. cit., pp. 1-36.

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On Winning the Culture Wars, or How To Kill A Dragon

Fafnir
Arthur Rackham (1867-1939)

One fine day, the Hero Sigurd armed himself with his helmet, shield and sword, sattled Grani, his steed, and rode deep into the forest. He halted before Regin's smithy and called to the old man in a loud voice: "Come out, old master! Today we ride to Gnita Heath to slay a dragon!" Regin poked his swarthy head out of the doorway and laughed: "This is the best day of my life! Welcome, Hero Sigurd, to my doorstep!"

It's nearly omnipresent these days: Catholics are being called to combat. Not to material combat, mind you - not yet, at least - but to spiritual combat with the forces of darkness, destruction and death which have arrayed themselves against God's Holy Church. Some are hearing the call for the first time, and are eagerly launching themselves headlong into the fray; others have been in the field for so long that they're beginning to show signs of battle fatigue, wondering aloud whether the fight is still worth fighting, whether the generals have a plan, whether it will ever end.

The unlikely pair arrived at Gnita Heath, and the old man paused at the entrance to the clearing in the forest which surrounded the cave where the dragon Fafnir slept. "We have arrived, Hero Sigurd," Regin said in a hushed voice. "Do you see how the trees surrounding the mouth of the cave are all leafless, and that all their bark is singed and covered in soot? The fire which Fafnir blows from his nostrils has eaten them up. And look! Here is the path upon which he drags his massive body when he goes forth to drink from yonder stream. No grass grows upon it." 

The Hero Sigurd traced the course of the well-worn path, his eyes coming to rest upon the point where it disappeared into the blackness of the cave. The opening was littered with crushed helmets and broken shields, and splintered spearshafts sprouted from the ground in odd bouquets. The remains of a charred sattle, apparently flung aside as Fafnir prepared to devour a brave knight's mount, had come to rest upside down in the branches of a nearby tree. The hero turned to Regin, his heavy brow narrowing over his pale blue eyes: "Tell me more about this dragon."

Today's Church Militant is no stranger to such combat. No less than three generations of Catholics have marched into battle against legalized abortion. Despite the victories which have been won - and every child saved is a tremendous victory - the situation on the ground remains shockingly grim: some 50 million babies are murdered in their mothers' wombs every year - 750,000 in the U.S. alone. On any given day, ca. 125,000 babies from around the world die at the hands of certified abortionists. That's slightly more than the maximum capacity of Michigan Stadium.

Over the same time period, pornography has mushroomed into a veritable industry of filth and corruption with earnings topping $100 billion annually, and sex trafficking has grown to see more than 20 million women and children bought and sold on the black market every year; in the U.S. alone, such trafficking generates $9.5 billion yearly. Similarly staggering figures can be produced to document the proliferation and industrialization of the whole gamut of manifest social evils: fornication, pedophilia, contraception, divorce, suicide, euthanasia, corruption, exploitation, usury, etc., etc., ad nauseam. Wave after wave of Catholic resistance fighters have mounted the charge to combat these evils. And though they have fought valiantly, their efforts have done virtually nothing to stem the tide of moral decay currently sweeping the western world.

"Fafnir is an awful and foul beast," began Regin, "with black, dead eyes and thick, leathery scales covering his body from snout to tail. His legs are as massive as tree trunks, and once he has dug his sharp claws into the earth, no amount of force can move him. He belches smoke to blind and confuse his prey and spits fire to maim and torture them before crushing their bones with his powerful jaws and then gorging himself on their flesh."

This scaly panoply of corruption and sin, this "culture of death" as it has been called, is not some random cluster of unfortunate collective human failures, but rather a coherent array of organically related, closely-knit manifest evils. To attack one of these without understanding how it connects to its proximate neighbor, and how each functions in support of the other to form a unified whole, is to engage in a battle with exceedingly little chance of success. What makes the task all the more daunting is that the entire nexus of visible, manifest evil rests squarely upon a mostly invisible foundation composed of the cardinal errors of materialism, positivism, reductionism and relativism. Once these have taken root in the collective mind of a culture, it becomes nearly impervious to all attempts to dissuade it from the path of annihilation.

Sigurd listened carefully to Regin's description, and when the latter had finished, the hero's gaze fell to the ground at his feet. "What is your plan of attack?" asked the old man, who was now worrying that he had put too much flourish into his account of the dragon's ferocity. The Hero Sigurd stood motionless for several moments, then looked again to the mouth of the cave and slowly traced with his eyes the course of the path to the place where the two stood. "We dig." 

"Wha... what?" the old man stammered. A broad smile broke across the hero's face. "We dig a trench in the middle of this path, as wide as a man's shoulders, but several times longer, and deep enough to stand in. I shall hide myself in the trench, and when the beast drags himself down to yonder stream to drink, I shall strike him from below, driving the full length of my sword into his soft, wide belly."

Sigurd kills Fafnir
Hylestad Stave Church (12th century)

The weak point of the culture of death is to be found in the soft underbelly of its terrifically unsound metaphysical assumptions. It is there that its weakness is helplessly exposed, and it is there that we must apply the deadly strike. It was not mere nostalgia or easy familiarity that moved numerous Popes to hold aloft scholastic philosophy in general, and that of St. Thomas Aquinas in particular, as the surest remedy of the ills plaguing our modern world. And it was not by accident that the study of Latin, of scholastic philosophy and particularly of logic and metaphysics, i.e. ontology, natural theology, psychology and cosmology, was quietly and thoroughly removed from our schools' curricula in the late 19th century. Only a generation raised in complete ignorance of the axiomatic principles of scholastic metaphysics could be duped into exchanging true religion for an intellectually corrupt system of pseudo-scientific speculation. Only such a generation could be convinced of the absurdity of a freedom assured, not through submission to God and His Law, but through submission to an increasingly technocratic bureaucracy of individuals welded together by nothing more than common self-interest. Only such a generation could be brought to effectively deny the existence of a divinely ordained human nature - the touchstone of natural law and human morality - and replace it with an infinitely malleable proto-plasmic nothingness.

To prepare for this particular battle, then, it is necessary that we return to the school of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Angelic Doctor, and learn from him the sound principles of a rationally defensible metaphysics. Only then we will be prepared to follow the wise counsel of St. Paul to the Ephesians (6:10-17):

Finally, brethren, be strengthened in the Lord, and in the might of his power. Put you on the armour of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore take unto you the armour of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and to stand in all things perfect. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of justice, and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace: in all things taking the shield of faith, wherewith you may be able to extinguish all the fiery darts of the most wicked one. And take unto you the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

Covetousness

Tenth in a Series on Catholic Morality

by

Fr. John H. Stapleton

Avaricia (Covetousness)
Hieronymous Bosch

"What is a miser?" asked the teacher of her pupils, and the bright boy spoke up and answered: "One who has a greed for gold." But he and all the class were embarrassed as to how this greed for gold should be qualified. The boy at the foot of the class came to the rescue, and shouted out: "Misery!"

Less wise answers are made every day in our schools. Misery is indeed the lot, if not the vice, of the miser. 'Tis true that this is one of the few vices that arrive at permanent advantages, the others offering satisfaction that lasts but for a moment, and leaves nothing but bitterness behind. Yet, the more the miser possesses, the more insatiable his greed becomes, and the less his enjoyment, by reason of the redoubled efforts he makes to have and to hold.

But the miser is not the only one infected with the sin of avarice. His is not an ordinary, but an extreme case. He is the incarnation of the evil. He believes in, hopes in, and loves gold above all things; he prays and sacrifices to it. Gold is his god, and gold will be his reward - a miserable one.

This degree of the vice is rare; or, at least, is rarely suffered to manifest itself to this extent; and although scarcely a man can be found to confess to this failing, because it is universally regarded as most loathsome and repulsive, still few there are who are not more or less slaves to cupidity. Pride is the sin of the angels; lust is the sin of the brute, and avarice is the sin of man. Scripture calls it the universal evil. We are more prone to inveigh against it and accuse others of the vice than to admit it in ourselves.

Sometimes, it is "the pot calling the kettle black;" more often it is a clear case of "sour grapes." Disdain for the dollars "that speak," "the mighty dollars," in abundance and in superabundance, is rarely genuine.

There are, concerning the passion of covetousness, two notions as common as they are false. It is thought that this vice is peculiar to the rich, and is not to be met with among the poor. Now, avarice does not necessarily suppose the possession of wealth, and does not consist in the possession, but in the inordinate desire or greed for, or the lust of, riches. It may be, and is, difficult for one to possess much wealth without setting one's heart on it. But it is also true that this greed may possess one who has little or nothing. It may be found in unrestrained excess under the rags of the pauper and beggar. They who aspire to, or desire, riches with avidity are covetous whether they have much, little, or nothing. Christ promised His kingdom to the poor in spirit, not to the poor in fact. Spiritual poverty can associate with abundant wealth, just as the most depraved cupidity may exist in poverty.

Another prejudice, favorable to ourselves, is that only misers are covetous, because they love money for itself and deprive themselves of the necessaries of life to pile it up. But it is not necessary that the diagnosis reveal these alarming symptoms to be sure of having a real case of cupidity. They are covetous who strive after wealth with passion. Various motives may arouse this passion, and although they may increase the malice, they do not alter the nature of the vice. Some covet wealth for the sake of possessing it; others, to procure pleasures or to satisfy different passions. Avarice it continues to be, whatever the motive. Not even prodigality, the lavish spending of riches, is a token of the absence of cupidity. Rapacity may stand behind extravagance to keep the supply inexhausted.

It is covetousness to place one's greatest happiness in the possession of wealth, or to consider its loss or privation the greatest of misfortunes; in other words, to over-rejoice in having and to over-grieve in not having. It is covetousness to be so disposed as to acquire riches unjustly rather than suffer poverty. It is covetousness to hold, or give begrudgingly, when charity presses her demands. There is, in these cases, a degree of malice that is ordinarily mortal, because the law of God and of nature is not respected.

It is the nature of this vice to cause unhappiness which increases until it becomes positive wretchedness in the miser. Anxiety of mind is followed by hardening of the heart; then injustice in desire and in fact; blinding of the conscience, ending in a general stultification of man before the god Mammon.

All desires of riches and comfort are not, therefore, avarice. One may aspire to, and seek wealth without avidity. This ambition is a laudable one, for it does not exaggerate the value of the world's goods, would not resort to injustice, and has not the characteristic tenacity of covetousness. There is order in this desire for plenty. It is the great mover of activity in life; it is good because it is natural, and honorable because of its motives.

He Dwelt Among Us

Eighth Conference on the Most Sacred Heart

by

Fr. Henry Brinkmeyer

There being in Christ two complete natures, the divine and the human, there must also be in Him two distinct and complete operations: He must have divine thoughts and human thoughts, divine inclinations and human inclinations, divine love and human love. Having studied His divine, uncreated love as manifested in Creation, in the Incarnation and in Heaven, there remains for us to consider His human and created love.

According to a general opinion, from the first moment of His conception in the womb of His Mother, our Lord had the full use of all the faculties of His human soul. His human intellect, as we have already seen, was, from its creation, gifted with infused knowledge, and since love follows knowledge, His human will was also from its creation glowing with human love. This human love manifested itself in many ways, and first of all, in our Lord's private life.

In the created love of the Sacred Heart as manifested in the private life of Christ, the first trait that impresses us is His Poverty. He made Himself poor because He loved the poor and desired their love. Real poverty is indeed hard to bear. The poor man often wants bread to sustain him, clothing to cover him, fire to warm him, a time of relaxation in his fatigues, a physician and remedies in his sickness. He has no choice, he takes what is given to him. His life is a laborious, rough and troubled one. From early dawn till late into the night, he must pursue his painful task. He does not regard weariness and discomfort, if only he can obtain work. He does not rest when he is weak; he does not complain when his hands are toil-worn and the heat is almost overpowering him; he does not seek repose as long as he can earn even a scanty pittance. He is satisfied with a hard bed, coarse clothing, poor food. He does not think of murmuring or seeking sympathy. Nor is he less patient in suffering and sickness. He is content with little; he does not ask for any special attention: and when he is left alone through the weary night, he utters no complaint, when but a word of consolation is spoken to him, his heart wells up, and his eyes fill with glistening tears of gratitude.

Such is veritable poverty: and such was the portion our Lord took for Himself on earth. The whole world was obliged to acknowledge Him as its true proprietor, its Creator, its God: all joy, all delight, all honor and beauty could have been His: but He renounced all to win the poor man's love. His parents were poor, and He was born poor, not even in an ordinary dwelling house, but in a deserted stable, His cradle was a manger; the breath of animals, the fire to warm Him; He was satisfied with the stall of the ox and the ass. Like a hunted beast of prey, He fled into Egypt, and there in exile He was poor. He remained poor in Nazareth. He grew up a poor carpenter's son. On His youthful shoulders He carried the timber to build for His own creatures; till the age of thirty He labored in the sweat of His brow with the square, the hammer and the saw. Later on, He continued to live among the poor and was indeed the lowliest among them. He who fed the birds suffered from hunger. He who created the sun endured the cold. He who found a hole for every fox of the field had not whereon to rest His head. He who clad kings with purple wore all His life the woolen garment woven by His Mother's hands. He who possessed all things had not a coin wherewith to pay the tribute. Deprived of all, naked and bleeding away His last blood on the cross, He was forced to cry out: "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" It was in this way our Lord strove to win the hearts of men ! and why? Because He loved them: love seeks to be loved.

But there was another way by which He sought to draw all to Himself. In every sin there is pride, for in every sin there is rebellion of the proud self against the will of God. Christ became man to destroy the reign of sin by being obedient to His Father even unto the death of the cross. Obedience is a death-blow to pride. Christ came, then, to teach men obedience. But how did He impart the lesson? Not only by fulfilling the commands of His heavenly Father and drinking the chalice of the Passion to its bitterest dregs! His Heart was too full of love for men to be satisfied with that. He went further: He took no thought of the profound humiliation it was to cost Him; He was determined in His love to give them an example which would break down every pretext of pride and consequent insubordination. What course did He pursue? Of the thirty-three years He spent on earth, He lived thirty in complete subjection to the will of His creatures. Try to fathom those mysterious depths of humiliation, for they were dug by love.

"He was subject to them!" (Luke 2:51) He was their God and Creator and Lord, yet He was subject to them. In Him were all the depth and riches of the knowledge and wisdom of God, yet, when they commanded, He was subject to them. It was He who framed the laws of the universe and who marked the courses the stars are traveling, yet He listened to the orders of His creatures, and was subject to them. His hand it was that held them up and preserved them, His bounty it was that gave to them the light of understanding, and the power of speech; yet their directions were for Him a law. "He was subject to them."

Mary and Joseph knew that He was God, and that all wisdom was in Him. A trial indeed, then, it was to be obliged to command. Still such was their Child's will. They must command, for He would obey. His Mother called Him hither and He came; she directed Him to go thither and He went. His foster-father bade Him carry this plank and He carried it, to saw or fasten those joists of timber, and He obeyed. "He was subject to them!"

And not only was He subject to Mary and Joseph, but to all men. He, with St. Joseph, hired Himself out to His creatures. He built them houses and made them furniture; He asked for their directions and followed them; He received their advice, even their reproofs; no work was too menial for Him! He was but the carpenter's son, men engaged Him as such, and He was subject to them! Whose heart is not touched when meditating on this mystery of our Lord s obedience? Remember it was all prompted by love; His Heart was consumed with love for man, and nothing is too difficult or humiliating for love.

By His voluntary poverty Jesus wins our compassion; by His obedience He gains our admiration. But love is excited by beauty, beauty of body, of soul, of character; for beauty is a certain aspect of goodness. In its root, only the good is beautiful; for beauty arises from order, harmony, due arrangement and subjection, and that is goodness. Now, our Lord came to win the hearts of men, and therefore He made Himself beautiful. He took to Himself, not only the infirmities of human nature, but also its goodness; He was physically and spiritually the most beautiful of the children of men. His humanity was a lattice through which His divinity appeared.

I know some authors have doubted the physical beauty of our Lord, and have fancied that there was nothing extraordinary in His appearance, that He looked like any ordinary mortal. This, however, cannot be. A perfect soul requires a fitting instrument to actuate it, that is, a perfect body; the more tender and fine the fibre, muscle and nerve, the more sensitive also is the human being to shame, the more deeply does he feel degradation or dishonor. Our Lord's body must consequently have been perfect in form and symmetry, and a mirror of the soul within. But our Lord's beauty was especially and principally spiritual. Beauty of body becomes repulsive when it cloaks a wicked soul. Christ's outward beauty all came from within. His beauty was too pure and holy to be equally appreciated by all. What Jesus was in the sight of His Mother, He was not in the sight of any other; what He was for His Apostles and intimate friends, He was not for strangers; what He was for the just, the pure, the humble, the faithful, He was not for the unjust, the immodest, the proud and the unbelieving.

Still, His character was so grand, and yet so beautifully human, that in every age it attracts and subdues the hearts of men. Holy Scripture indicates this when it tells us that He grew in grace and loveliness before God and man. Children pressed around Him on the streets and gathered on His knees, for He was innocent and mild like them. Multitudes paused to look upon Him as He passed; when He spoke, though His words were often severe, men felt strangely stirred and hung entranced upon His lips, and the thought entered the hearts of the women in Israel, "How happy to be the mother of such a Son!" Yes, He took to Himself our nature with all its littleness and lowliness so far as they are innocent; He was one like ourselves, a man of sorrows and acquainted with infirmity; yet His sacred character, even at this distant day, appears so beautiful and excellent that it captivates all hearts and causes even professed infidels in unguarded moments, to confess that He was Divine.

One day we shall see Him. We shall contemplate His holy feet, His gentle hands, His sacred lips, His noble brow. We shall look into His blessed countenance, His loving eyes, His opened side. We shall rest our heads upon His bosom and listen to the beatings of His tender Heart. "Dearly beloved, we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like to Him: because we shall see Him as He is!" (1 John 3:2) God grant it!

Fr. Nicholas Gruner, RIP

Fr. Nicholas Gruner
1942-2015

Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine,

et lux perpetua luceat ei.

Requiescat in pace. Amen.

The Judaizers and the Galatians

Reading N°13 in the History of the Catholic Church

by

Fr. Fernand Mourret, S.S.

The very success of Paul and Barnabas among the pagans involved their newly founded churches in a momentous dispute. It was impossible not to see that Antioch was the center of all the new Christian communities, and Paul seemed to be their leader. What, then, of the influence of the mother Church? In these new communities the Jewish observances were not all kept. What was happening to the ancient traditions? The Church at Jerusalem was being recruited by a considerable number of priests and Levites,^[1] some of whom did not altogether forsake the narrowness of their rabbinical training and showed themselves extremely sensitive.

No doubt God had spoken to Peter at Joppa with regard to the centurion Cornelius. But the situation was now much changed. The present issue was not whether to admit a pagan and his family into the Church, regardless of the Jewish legal observances, but whether a sort of federation of churches might be formed, with a center and a head, seeming to draw the disciples of Christ into a movement quite different from that over which Jerusalem had theretofore had the direction. Some half-converted Jewish priests were grieved to see the Holy City deprived of its primacy, the Temple abandoned, the work of Moses rejected. Their complaint was apparently sanctioned by the example of their chief, James the Less, who was seen to be so assiduous at prayer in the Temple, and so exact in fulfilling the prescriptions of the Law.^[2]

Some years later, the Council of Jerusalem would make allowance for whatever was reasonable in these claims. Unfortunately, certain ill-disposed persons embittered the dispute. Paul and Barnabas, at the time of their previous journey to Jerusalem, saw through the designs of "false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privately to spy our liberty, which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into servitude."^[3] Some of these were simply narrow, obstinate men who would not for any reason give up a view once taken or a prejudice once formed. Others were jealous and malicious; in their bitter attacks on the Apostle and his labors, it seemed they aimed at the very work of Christ Himself in His most ardent missioner.^[4]

The storm broke loose shortly after the return of Paul and Barnabas to Antioch. The two missioners declared to their listeners that the hour was now at hand to open wide the door of faith to the Gentiles.^[5] At this, some men, who had arrived from Jerusalem and claimed to speak in the name of the Apostles, rose up before them. St. Luke does not give us their names. St. Paul applies to them a word difficult to translate, which may refer to the haughtiness of their claims and the insufficiency of their authority (ὑπερλίαν ἀπόστολοι), "superapostles" or "apostles above measure."^[6] They declared: "Except you be circumcised after the manner of Moses, you cannot be saved."^[7] They succeeded in winning over part of the Antiochene Jews and made loud proclamation of their commission from the Church at Jerusalem. Their daring went farther. When Peter came to Antioch for the purpose of observing at close quarters the progress of the Gospel in one of its most important phases, they appealed to him against Paul's methods. At the same time, they tried to stir up the principal churches founded by Paul against him and his teaching.

Peter followed the line of conduct revealed to him at Joppa, freely mingling with the converted pagans. He was seen to sit at their tables, without concerning himself about the food that was served. The men from Jerusalem endeavored to persuade him that such conduct scandalized the Jews and troubled their consciences. Already, they said, a large part of the Antiochene Jews had risen up against Paul and the converted pagans. They advised Peter to live as a Jew, observing the Mosaic prescriptions, to restore confidence and peace. The Apostle of the circumcised,^[8] moved by this reasoning, yielded. Little by little, to quiet the Jews, he discontinued his close relations with the converted pagans, ate with his fellovv-Jews, and followed the same rules as they. Barnabas, too, weakened and was won over. Following them, a number of Christians began a strict observance of the Jewish regulations at their meals.

Petrus et Paulus
4th century etching

Paul saw the danger and judged that he was qualified to denounce it to Peter. At Jerusalem he had been officially recognized by the Apostles as the providential Apostle of the ucircumcised. It was evident that, by Peter's present conduct, the work which God had entrusted to him was threatened with failure. "To maintain circumcision, with the implied full observance of the Law, was to forego the hope of conquering the world. Never would the world become Jewish. The question of principle was graver still. To make a Mosaic practice an essential condition of salvation was virtually to deny the transient nature of the old economy, the sufficiency of the Redemption, the value of the blood and merits of Jesus Christ, the efficacity of grace; this would be to overturn the fundamental dogma of Christianity."^[9] The Apostle of the Gentiles, therefore, was in duty bound to point out to the head of the Church the effects of his excessive condescension. In one of his Epistles, he writes:

When I saw that they walked not uprightly unto the truth of the Gospel, I said to Cephas before them all: "If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of the Gentiles, and not as the Jews do, how dost thou compel the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?"^[10]

Roman province of Galatia

Peter yielded to Paul's reasoning,^[11] and the danger dreaded by Paul seemed to be warded off.^[12] But the sect was not satisfied with acting merely at Antioch. Its emissaries had already visited the Christian communities of Galatia, disturbing the neophytes by the confidence with which they everywhere repeated their famous motto: "Without circumcision there is no salvation." Nothing could be more painful to Paul's heart. These earnest people of Galatia had received the faith of Christ with most enthusiastic eagerness and had welcomed the Apostles with marks of filial affection. With his own hand, in spite of the painful infirmity of his eyes, Paul wrote as best he could, in big letters,^[13] an epistle vibrating with feeling that he made no attempt to restrain.

The Epistle opens with a prayer for the increase of their charity:

Grace be to you and peace from God the Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins.

Then, without any oratorical caution, the Apostle goes straight to the point:

There are some that trouble you and would pervert the Gospel of Christ. But though we or an angel from heaven preach a Gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema. [...] The gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. For neither did I receive it of man, nor did I learn it; but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. For you have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews' religion: how that beyond measure I persecuted the Church of God.

With a few masterful strokes, Paul then describes his past life, his conversion, the divine lights granted him, and his relations with the other Apostles. In these lines, which we can feel were written hurriedly, Paul clearly sets forth the two unanswerable arguments on which he builds his whole contention: his doctrine comes to him directly from Christ and has been expressly and repeatedly confirmed by the chief Apostles, notably by Simon Peter. His solid guaranty is Christ's word, declared authentic by the hierarchy. Why, then, should he retreat? For, he says, "if I build up again the things which I have destroyed, I make myself a prevaricator." Why return to the letter of the Law, when we have the grace of Christ? This thought of the grace of Christ transports him. He says:

With Christ I am nailed to the cross. And I live, now not I, but Christ liveth in me. And that I live now in the flesh, I live in the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and delivered Himself for me. [...] O senseless Galatians, who hath bewitched you that you should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been set forth, crucified among you?

The Law has, indeed, been appealed to, and Moses. Is there any question of setting up the faith in opposition to the Law, Christ in opposition to Moses? Not at all. The Apostle asks only that the Law of Moses should not make anyone forget the promises made to Abraham and realized by the grace of Christ. Between Abraham and Christ, Moses gave the Law to restrain passions, to maintain faithfulness to the promises, and to prepare for the advent of grace.

The Law was our pedagogue in Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after the faith is come, we are no longer under a pedagogue.

But all this is argument. The Apostle is eager to speak more directly to the heart of his dear Galatians. He writes:

You know how, through infirmity of the flesh, I preached the Gospel to you heretofore; and your temptation in my flesh, you despised not nor rejected.[...] I bear you witness that, if it could be done, you would have plucked out your own eyes and would have given them to me. [...] They would exclude you, that you might be zealous for them. [...] My little children, of whom I am in labor again, until Christ be formed in you. And I would willingly be present with you now, and change my voice.

Then the Apostle returns to his argument. Taking his stand on his enemies' ground, he makes use of a thoroughly rabbinical logic, an allegorical interpretation of the story of Agar and Sara. The Christian is not the child of a slave; he is a free man. The Epistle continues:

We are not the children of the bondwoman, but of the free: by the freedom wherewith Christ has made us free. [...] Walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh. [...] The fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity. [...] Against such there is no law. And they that are Christ's have crucified their flesh, with the vices and concupiscences.

Such are the main lines of the famous Epistle to the Galatians, in which Paul opens his soul to his disciples. Its style is simple, picturesque, and sincere, at times hesitant, as though beneath the weight of a crushing thought, like the feeble body of the Apostle; again it is proud, brilliant, reaching the sublime, under the impulse of a superhuman inspiration.

Footnotes

[1] Acts 6:7. Cf. Acts 15:5.

[2] Hegesippus, in Eusebius, II, xxiii; Josephus, Antiquities, XX, ix.

[3] Gal. 2:4.

[4] The Tübingen school makes no mistake in affirming the existence of a party ruthlessly hostile to St. Paul. But they are wrong when, without proof and even in face of most convincing evidence to the contrary, they attribute the inspiration and guidance of that party to St. Peter and St. James. We know what St. Peter's attitude was regarding the conversion of the Gentiles, and we see St. James joining in the conciliary declaration which disavowed the sect in question. Those whom St. Paul calls "false brethren unawares brought in" could not be Apostles. St. Epiphanius supposes that the future heretic Cerinthus belonged to this Judaizing sect. (Haereses, 26.)

[5] Acts 14:26.

[6] Cf. 2 Cor. 11:5; 12:11.

[7] Acts 15:1.

[8] Gal. 2:8.

[9] Prat, La Théologie de saint Paul, I, 71.

[10] Gal. 2:14.

[11] "Peter certainly yielded to Paul's reasons. If he had been obstinate, this whole affair, instead of being an argument in favor of St. Paul's gospel, would be a serious objection which St. Paul could not have remembered without utterly ruining the thesis which was so dear to him." (Prat, op. cit., I, 74.)

[12] Such is this famous Antioch incident, reduced to its just historical proportions. Enemies of the Holy See have made a great fuss about it; and some apologists of the papacy have been so disturbed by it that they have gone to great lengths in an effort to prove that the Peter of this incident is not the Peter who was the head of the Church. We need scarcely say that neither the pope's infallibility nor his supreme authority in the Church is in any way involved in this passing disagreement. Peter's whole fault was in letting himself be momentarily circumvented by Judaizers, who misled him as to the effects of his conduct. As Tertullian says, "The fault was one of conduct, not of preaching, conversationis fuit vitium, non praedicationis." (De praescriptione, chap. 23.) Was St. Peter, then, living at Antioch? Tradition gives him the title of bishop of that city; and Antioch itself has always honored him as its first founder. (See Eusebius, H. E., III, xxxvi, and Chron., bk. 2.) In matter of fact, the Apostles were the bishops of all the churches that they founded; their authority over those churches may rightly be called an episcopate, but we should not imagine it organized like that of their successors. The latter, attached to a single church and residing there, were alone true bishops in the sense we give the word. But when Peter, the supreme head of the Apostolic College and of the whole Church, arrived at the "metropolis of the East," that city acclaimed him as its pastor. "There the name 'Christian' was born. Church history bears witness to the fact that this church, though founded by St. Barnabas and St. Paul, recognized Peter, because of his lofty office, as its first pastor. Peter had to come there when it was so prominent for its brilliant profession of Christianity, and his chair at Antioch became a solemnity in the churches." (Bossuet, Sermon sur l'unité de l'Eglise, 1St point.)

[13] Gal. 6:11.

***

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Pride

Ninth in a Series on Catholic Morals

by

Fr. John H. Stapleton

Superbia (Pride)
Hieronymus Bosch

Excellence is a quality that raises a man above the common level and distinguishes him among his fellow-beings. The term is relative. The quality may exist in any degree or measure. 'Tis only the few that excel eminently; but anyone may be said to excel who is, be it ever so little, superior to others. Three kinds of advantages go to make up one's excellence. Nature's gifts are talent, knowledge, health, strength, and beauty; fortune endows us with honor, wealth, authority; and virtue, piety, honesty are the blessings of grace. To the possession of one or several of these advantages excellence is attached.

All good is made to be loved. All gifts directly or indirectly from God are good, and if excellence is the fruit of these gifts, it is lawful, reasonable, and human to love it and them. But moderation is to be observed in all things. Virtue is righteously equidistant, while vice goes to extremes. It is not, therefore, attachment and affection for this excellence, but inordinate, unreasonable love that is damnable, and constitutes the vice of pride.

God alone is excellent and all greatness is from Him alone. And those who are born great, who acquire greatness, or who have greatness thrust upon them, equally owe their superiority to Him. Nor are these advantages and this preeminence due to our merits and deserts. Everything that comes to us from God is purely gratuitous on His part, and undeserved on ours. Since our very existence is the effect of a free act of His will, why should not, for a greater reason, all that is accidental to that existence be dependent on His free choice? Finally, nothing of all this is ours or ever can become ours. Our qualities are a pure loan confided to our care for a good and useful purpose, and will be reclaimed with interest.

Since the malice of our pride consists in the measure of affection we bestow upon our excellence, if we love it to the extent of judging it not a gift of God, but the fruit of our own better selves; or if we look upon it as the result of our worth, that is, due to our merits, we are guilty of nothing short of downright heresy, because we hold two doctrines contrary to faith. "What hast thou, that thou hast not received?" If a gift is due to us, it is no longer a gift. This extreme of pride is happily rare. It is directly opposed to God. It is the sin of Lucifer.

A lesser degree of pride is, while admitting ourselves beholden to God for whatever we possess and confessing His bounties to be undeserved, to consider the latter as becoming ours by right of possession, with liberty to make the most of them for our own personal ends. This is a false and sinful appreciation of God's gifts, but it respects His and all subordinate authority. If it never, in practice, fails in this submission, there is sin, because the plan of God, by which all things must be referred to Him, is thwarted; but its malice is not considered grievous. Pride, however, only too often fails in this, its tendency being to satisfy itself, which it cannot do within the bounds of authority. Therefore it is that, from being venial, this species of pride becomes a mortal offense, because it leads almost infallibly to disobedience and rebellion. There is a pride, improperly so called, which is in accordance with all the rules of order, reason and honor. It is a sense of responsibility and dignity which every man owes to himself, and which is compatible with the most sincere humility. It is a regard, an esteem for oneself, too great to allow one to stoop to anything base or mean. It is submissive to authority, acknowledges shortcomings, respects others and expects to be respected in return. It can preside with dignity, and obey with docility. Far from being a vice, it is a virtue and is only too rare in this world. It is nobility of soul which betrays itself in self-respect.

Here, then, is the origin, progress and development of the vice. We first consider the good that is in us, and there is good in all of us, more or less. This consideration becomes first exaggerated; then one-sided by reason of our overlooking and ignoring imperfections and shortcomings. Out of these reflections arises an apprehension of excellence or superiority greater than we really possess. From the mind this estimate passes to the heart, which embraces it fondly, rejoices and exults. The conjoint acceptation of this false appreciation by the mind and heart is the first complete stage of pride - an overwrought esteem of self. The next move is to become self-sufficient, presumptuous. A spirit of enterprise asserts itself, wholly out of keeping with the means at hand. It is sometimes foolish, sometimes insane, reason being blinded by error.

The vice then seeks to satisfy itself, craves for the esteem of others, admiration, flattery, applause, and glory. This is vanity, different from conceit only in this, that the former is based on something that is, or has been done, while the latter is based on nothing.

Vanity manifested in word is called boasting; in deed that is true, vain-glory; in deed without foundation of truth, hypocrisy.

But this is not substantial enough for ambition, another form of pride. It covets exterior marks of appreciation, rank, honor, dignity, authority. It seeks to rise, by hook or crook, for the sole reason of showing off and displaying self. Still growing apace, pride becomes indignant, irritated, angry if this due appreciation is not shown to its excellence; it despises others either for antipathy or inferiority. It believes its own judgment infallible and, if in the wrong, will never acknowledge a mistake or yield. Finally the proud man becomes so full of self that obedience is beneath him, and he no longer respects authority of man or of God. Here we have the sin of pride in all the plenitude of its malice.

Pride is often called an honorable vice, because its aspirations are lofty, because it supposes strength, and tends directly to elevate man, rather than to debase and degrade him, like the other vices. Yet pride is compatible with every meanness. It lodges in the heart of the pauper as well as in that of the prince. There is nothing contemptible that it will not do to satisfy itself; and, although its prime malice is to oppose God, it has every quality to make it as hideous as Satan himself. It goeth before a fall, but it does not cease to exist after the fall; and no matter how deep down in the mire of iniquity you search, you will find pride nethermost. Other vices excite one's pity; pride makes us shudder.