The following is a “teaser” in advance of my talk at the upcoming Saint Benedict Center Conference: “The Absolute Primacy of Jesus Christ and Its Implications for Our Crusade.”
WHAT are the implications of the Absolute Primacy of Christ for our Crusade? To answer this, we must keep in mind that ours is a two-fold Crusade: first, to propagate fidelity to the Catholic Church’s teaching on her own necessity for salvation; second, to work for the conversion of America to the Catholic Church. As Brother Francis used to insist, this Crusade brings us up against the four heresies condemned by Popes Gregory XVI (Indifferentism), Pius IX (Liberalism), Leo XIII (Americanism), and Saint Pius X (Modernism).
The first implication I will call a deeper, more intensely supernatural and Christian outlook on creation and on history: The Incarnation is not only the central event that splits history in two between B.C. and A.D., and, as such, is the center or axis upon which all history hangs; it is that, but it is also much more, for it is the very purpose of creation itself. All creation is for Jesus Christ, predestined to be the Supreme Glorifier of the Blessed Trinity, and the Recipient, in turn, of the glory we give Him. “And you are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s,” says Saint Paul in I Cor. 3:23. He is the archetype of all creation. The Scotistic “proof texts” — especially Col. 1:15-20 — bring this out admirably.
The Mystery of the Annunciation is not only the central point of history, but also the very raison d’être of creation, without which there would be no history — only eternity. The weight of this Mystery is in history, but also beyond history; it is cosmological and metaphysical, not merely historical; and, while this statement can somehow be made of all of Christ’s mysteries, it is more absolutely true of this one because this Mystery is entirely antecedent to history, and history itself depends upon it. Such an outlook thoroughly vanquishes the historicism that is one of the constitutive elements of Catholic Modernism. Historicism holds that social and cultural phenomena are determined by history, and the Modernists subjected Catholic doctrine to this false principle so that doctrine was shaped and determined by evolutionist historical processes. No, reality is quite the other way round: History was shaped and determined by this central Christian Mystery.
The second implication I will draw flows from the first, and it pertains to extra ecclesiam nulla salus, a doctrine of the Church that I believe makes more sense, or, if you will, “fits better” into the economy of Christ’s Absolute Primacy. Let me say here that the so-called Thomist position is certainly compatible with Catholic doctrine, and I would not want to say or even imply otherwise, for that would usurp the role of the ecclesiastical Magisterium. What I am saying is that, as a theological synthesis of revealed truth, the Scotist position of Christ’s Absolute Primacy provides us with a superior edifice into which this dogma fits.
In order to make sense of this sweeping declaration, let me cite a passage from the works of Saint Paul:
To me, the least of all the saints, is given this grace, to preach among the Gentiles, the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to enlighten all men, that they may see what is the dispensation of the mystery which hath been hidden from eternity in God, who created all things. (Eph. 3:8-9)
The Scotist authors interpret this “mystery which has been hidden from eternity in God” as the eternal plan for the Incarnation to happen and Jesus Christ to exist as the supreme Glorifier of the Triune God. According to the Jesuit Biblical scholar, Père Ferdinand Prat and his theologian confrere, Father Emile Mersch, this Mystery is the plan to save all men without distinction of race by identifying them all with His well-beloved Son in the unity of the Mystical Body. But this is not an either-or matter. I believe that “the Mystery” is both of those things, and that they are of a piece: It is the predestination of Jesus Christ as our Head and of us as His members in the Mystical Body, the Catholic Church, which Saint Augustine aptly referred to as “the Whole Christ.” Again, we “are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s.” If we look at the Biblical texts cited by Blessed John Duns Scotus and his disciples, we see in several of them the predestination not only of Jesus Christ as antecedent to the fall and sin, but also of us, His mystical members. We also see in these passages explicit or implicit affirmations of the doctrine we defend.
Let’s begin with a look at Romans 8:29, giving it a slightly broader context with the two verses that enclose it:
And we know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to his purpose, are called to be saints. For whom he foreknew, he also predestinated to be made conformable to the image of his Son; that he might be the firstborn amongst many brethren. And whom he predestinated, them he also called. And whom he called, them he also justified. And whom he justified, them he also glorified. (Romans 8:28-30)
The Scotists provide a long list of Fathers of the Church who said that it is Christ as Man who is the firstborn. Firstborn not only in eternity, but in creation — firstborn not chronologically, but by way of intention, because, as they properly reason, using a famous passage from Aristotle’s Metaphysics, that which is first in intention is last in execution; or, as Blessed John reformulated it for his purposes, “everyone who wills in an orderly manner, wills first the end, then more immediately those things which are closer to the end.” But note that this passage from Romans 8 — which does not mention sin at all — speaks not only of Christ as the firstborn, but of us as His brethren, who are foreknown and predestined to be “made conformable to his image.” As Father Maximilian Dean, a Franciscan author, notes in his book, A Primer on the Absolute Primacy of Christ (p. 57),
Based on this passage of St. Paul, what is the divine intention? “For those whom He has foreknown He has also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son.” (Rom. 8:29). Before God creates, calls, justifies, and glorifies His saints, He predestines them to be “conformed to the image of His Son.” This necessarily means that God predestined and foresaw Jesus Christ, the Word Incarnate, first in His plan. The sacred humanity of Christ is predestined to grace and glory and the saints are predestined in Him.
Would it surprise you that many approved authors, including Fathers and Doctors of the Church, have connected this verse to the sacrament of Baptism? Here is Saint Gregory of Nyssa, who cites the circumstances of Our Lord’s Baptism in the Jordan:
Again, He becomes “the first-born among many brethren,” Who is born before us by the new birth of regeneration in water, for the travail whereof the hovering of the Dove was the midwife, whereby He makes those who share with Him in the like birth to be His own brethren, and becomes the first-born of those who after Him are born of water and of the Spirit…. (Gregory of Nyssa, “Gregory of Nyssa against Eunomius,” in Gregory of Nyssa: Dogmatic Treatises, Etc., ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, trans. William Moore et al., vol. 5, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, Second Series [New York: Christian Literature Company, 1893], 158.)
And here is Saint John Chrysostom:
Ver. 29. “For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the Image of His Son.” See what superb honor! for what the Only-begotten was by Nature, this they also have become by grace. And still he was not satisfied with this calling of them conformed thereto, but even adds another point, “that He might be the first-born.” And even here he does not come to a pause, but again after this he proceeds to mention another point, “Among many brethren.” So wishing to use all means of setting the relationship in a clear light. Now all these things you are to take as said of the Incarnation. For according to the Godhead He is Only-begotten. See, what great things He hath given unto us! Doubt not then about the future. … Ver. 30. “Moreover whom He did predestinate, them He also called; and whom He called, them He also justified.” Now He justified them by the regeneration of the laver. “And whom He justified, them He also glorified” by the gift, by the adoption. (John Chrysostom, “Homilies of St. John Chrysostom, Archbishop of Constantinople, on the Epistle of St. Paul to the Romans,” in Saint Chrysostom: Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistle to the Romans, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. J. B. Morris, W. H. Simcox, and George B. Stevens, vol. 11, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series [New York: Christian Literature Company, 1889], 453.)
“The regeneration of the laver,” is a reference to Titus 3:5, and clearly refers to the sacrament of Baptism, as Catholic authors, ancient and modern, recognize.
Saint John Damascene also applies this text to Baptism:
And He is called First-born among many brethren, for although being Only-begotten, He was also born of a mother. Since, indeed, He participated just as we ourselves do in blood and flesh and became man, while we too through Him became sons of God, being adopted through the baptism, He Who is by nature Son of God became first-born amongst us who were made by adoption and grace sons of God, and stand to Him in the relation of brothers. Wherefore He said, I ascend unto My Father and your Father. He did not say “our Father,” but “My Father,” clearly in the sense of Father by nature, and “your Father,” in the sense of Father by grace. (John Damascene, “An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith,” in St. Hilary of Poitiers, John of Damascus, ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, trans. S. D. F. Salmond, vol. 9b, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, Second Series [New York: Christian Literature Company, 1899], 77.)
The U.S. Bishops’ own online Bible commentary has this to say:
Image: while man and woman were originally created in God’s image (Gn 1:26–27), it is through baptism into Christ, the image of God (2 Cor 4:4; Col 1:15), that we are renewed according to the image of the Creator (Col 3:10).
This list of Fathers who applied Romans 8:29-30 to Baptism could be augmented.
Not to put too fine a point on it, and certainly not to sound more erudite than I am, let me point out that the Greek word for “called” in this passage — ἐκάλεσεν (ekálesen) — is the basis for the word ἐκκλησία (ekklésia), which is the Greek New Testament word for “Church” — i.e., the society of those who are “called out” (the literal meaning of ἐκκλησία) of the world by the baptismal vocation to holiness.
Father Prat says this of the word used in Romans 8:30:
We know that for the Apostle vocation (κλῆσις) is always the efficient call to faith. The called (κλητοί) are those who have really responded to the call of God. It is, therefore, almost a synonym for Christians, but with an allusion to divine favor. (The Theology of Saint Paul, Vol. 1, p. 241)
In other words, those whom God foreknew and predestined in Christ are efficaciously called to conformity to His image, and incorporated into His Body, the Church.
It is my intention in my talk at the conference to look at other scriptural passages that Blessed John Duns Scotus used to prove the Absolute Primacy, i.e., that Our Lord Jesus Christ was predestined from all eternity antecedent to God’s foreseeing the fall of man, in such wise that the Incarnation, God’s greatest work in creation, was in no way occasioned by or conditioned upon sin. These passages include Ephesians 1:3-10 (the famous Christological hymn) and Colossians 1:15-20, both of which have ecclesiastical ramifications flowing from their Christology.
For now, though, I would like to conclude with a thought from the above-cited Father Maximilian Dean’s A Primer on the Absolute Primacy of Christ(p. 94), who distills his own thoughts on these Pauline passages — as enlightened by the sublime doctrine of Blessed John Duns Scotus — in the following terse synthesis:
The absolute primacy of Jesus Christ underscores the centrality of Christ in the whole created universe. Creation is fundamentally christocentric. This means that all rational, free creatures find their reason for existence in Him alone; either they live for Him or die without Him, and this forever — Heaven or Hell. In a word, all the elect, angels and saints, are predestined in Him before the foundations of the world as members of His Mystical Body, the Church. Christ is the Head; we are His members.
Is this not a lofty and profound demolition of the heresy of indifferentism? Is it any wonder that Father Feeney should have considered himself a “Franciscan” on this issue of the Absolute Primacy of Christ — given its powerful implications for our Crusade?
