Tag: The Church

The Mystical Body of Christ – How does one become part of the Church?

Published on by M

_88449438_vatican_st_peters_g.jpg

The Mystical Body of Christ – the Church

A lot of questions, contentions and assertions, often contradictory, have arisen lately about the matter of who is, or is not, part of the Church, the Mystical Body of Christ. Some have been correct. However, by far, the larger part of the contentions and assertions have all been either just partially correct or flat-out wrong. Some have been fueled by inadequate knowledge; others have been fueled by partisan denominational agendas. Misunderstandings and misrepresentations abound. Let us look, therefore, at who and what constitutes the Church.

The Church is made up of three parts: the (1) Church Triumphant, which consists of all those persons who are now in Heaven, enjoying the Divine Family in a direct manner. The (2) Church Suffering, which consists of all those souls who are still being purified in Purgatory, but who have now attained the assurance of reaching Heaven once their purification has ended. And (3) the Church Militant, the visible Church that consists of all those people on earth who are part of the Body of Christ.

How does one become part of the Mystical Body of Christ, the Church?

Entrance into the Body of Christ is through baptism of which there are three kinds: (1) the baptism of water, (2) the baptism of blood, and (3) the baptism of desire. Any person who receives any one of the above kinds of baptism is Christian, hence part of the Mystical Body of Christ (Paul VI, 1964. Lumen Gentium, Dogmatic Constitution on the Church). This is the official teaching of the universal Church, the fullness of which resides in the Catholic Church.  Continue reading “The Mystical Body of Christ – How does one become part of the Church?” →

For the people – The desert

Published on by M

“Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman, adorned with the sun, standing on the moon, and with the twelve stars on her head for a crown. She was pregnant and in labour, crying aloud in the pangs of childbirth. Then a second sign appeared in the sky, a huge red dragon which had seven heads and ten horns, and each of the seven heads crowned with a coronet. Its tail dragged a third of the stars from the sky and dropped them to the earth, and the dragon stopped in front of the woman as she was having the child, so that he could eat it as soon as it was born from its mother.  Continue reading “For the people – The desert” →

For the people and the Church – 2

Published on by M

“I have seen all this with my own eyes, heard with my own ears, and understood. Whatever you know, I know too; I am no way inferior to you. But my words are intended for Shaddai; I mean to remonstrate with God. As for you, you are only charlatans, physicians in your own estimation. I wish someone would teach you to be quiet – the only wisdom that becomes you! Kindly listen to my accusation, pay attention to the pleading of my lips.

“Will you plead God’s defence with prevarication, his case in terms that ring false? Will you be partial in his favour, and act as his advocates? For you to meet his scrutiny, would this be well? Can he be duped as men are duped? Harsh rebuke you would receive from him for your covert partiality. Does his majesty not affright you, dread of him not fall on you? Your old maxims are proverbs of ash, your retorts, retorts of clay” (Job 13:1-12).

 

For the people – 2

Published on by M

“Denounce your mother, denounce her, for she is not my wife nor am I her husband. Let her rid her face of her whoring, and her breasts of her adultery, or else I will strip her naked, expose her as on the day she was born; I will make a wilderness of her, turn her into an arid land, and leave her to die of thirst. I will not love her children, since they are the children of whoring.  Continue reading “For the people – 2” →

For the Church – 2 – The rebuilding

Published on by M

“No more, for the House of Israel, shall any of the hostile nations surrounding her be a thorn that wounds or a briar that tears; and so men will learn that I am the Lord Yahweh.

“The Lord Yahweh says this: ‘When I gather the House of Israel from the peoples among whom it is dispersed, this is how I am going to display My holiness in the sight of the nations. They shall live on the soil that I gave to my servant Jacob. They shall live there in confidence, build houses, plant vineyards; they shall live in confidence. When I inflict punishments on all the hostile surrounding nations, then men will learn that I am Yahweh their God'” (Ez 28:24-26).

For the people and the Church

Published on by M

“Publish it among the nations, proclaim it; make no secret of it, say: ‘Babylon is captured, Bel disgraced, Merodach shattered. For a nation is marching on her from the North, to turn her country into a desert: no one will live there any more; man and beast have fled and gone.

“In those days and at that time, the sons of Israel will return: they will come weeping in search of Yahweh their God. They will ask the way to Zion, their faces will turn in that Continue reading “For the people and the Church” →

For the Church

Published on by M

“Take courage, my people, constant reminder of Israel. You were sold to the nations, but not for extermination. You provoked God; and so were delivered to your enemies, since you had angered your creator by offering sacrifices to demons, not to God. You had forgotten the eternal God who reared you. You had also grieved Jerusalem who nursed you, for when Continue reading “For the Church” →

For the people

Published on by M

“When the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughter of Zion and cleansed Jerusalem of the blood shed in her with the blast of judgment and the blast of destruction, Yahweh will come and rest on the whole stretch of Mount Zion and on those who are gathered there, a cloud by day and smoke, and by night the brightness of a flaring fire. For, over all, the glory of Yahweh will be a canopy and a tent to give shade by day from the heat, refuge and shelter from the storm and the rain” (Is 4:4-6).