These opening words of the Aihanasium, and countles other pronouncements of the Church to simile effect have been an occasion of much opprobrium and of genuine perplexity. They would indeed be detestable, even blasphemous, were they understood to mean that God arbitrarily trarily insists that the recitation of a right password, e.g. homoousias, Jilioque, transubstantiatio, ensured admission through the heavenly gates, while the utterance of an incorrect formula—homoiousias, subordinate, consubstantiatio, was a meaningless guarantee of the pains of hell. Such monstrous misconceptions are not at all behind the Church's meticulous formulations of dogma or her vigorous anathemas to heresy. She knows full well that, as the Vatican Council says, ‘Divine mysteries by their very nature so transcend the created mind, that even when delivered by revelation and accepted by faith, they remain covered by the veils of faith itself, and are, it were, wrapped in cloud’ (Denzinger, 1796).

As we have seen in the first half of this article the Old Testament ends, apart from the historical interlude of the Machabees, with the Prophets and their vision of all in God's hands. The worst that could happen, destruction, deportation, or death, is understood, as punishment from God. It is a marvellous vision, all the more so, first of all, for being in our World, and very much in our world; for the prophetic career is like any other, with its ups and downs. The book of Jonas, for instance ('Dove'; but also ‘Destroyer’), shows us some of the downs.

We are told that Jonas has a message for Nineveh. Now no one likes to go into a strange town, especially with unpleasant messages; so Jonas runs away in a ship. There is a storm; the sailors cast lots to find the unlucky one; and the lot falls, of course, upon Jonas. He is thrown overboard, at his own request, in fact; as the waters close over his head he must think, ‘At least, it's the end of that message.’

The claim of the sixteenth-century Reformers to return to the teaching of the primitive Church by the aid of the written Scriptures is still heard today, but not so often as formerly, because the spirit of liberal criticism has completely undermined that reverent confidence in the Word of God which was once so strong in the children of the Reformation. As The Times (London) confessed not long ago, ‘to the majority of Englishmen the open Bible is now a closed book…. The popular mind at present takes for granted that the Bible has been fatally discredited and that “nobody now believes that kind of thing”. The Reformers have handed the Church (the writer means the non-Catholic churches, of course) today a problem which they could not have foreseen. Rejecting both the papal usurpation ano the late-medieval abuses and corruptions, they sought to recover a “pure” Christianity.

Two years ago we considered the necessity of the one Church and saw it as alone the way which leads to blessedness. Last year we developed the idea to further conclusions, discussing the missionary task of the Catholic Church and of Catholics among other Christians. And in both sermons I Pointed out more than once that for all the Catholic Church's uniqe position, we should not overlook its earthly configuration and human imperfection, and on that account the proper attitude for Catholics in present-day ecumenical discussions is one of humility, penance and a readiness to learn.

Today we will focus our attention on this, and consider the human side of the Church. We are still indeed dealing with the Church that issues from our Lord and rests in him, but here on earth, as the Church of humankind, it is on a pilgrimage with our Lord as its goal.

I am Raphael, one of the seven angels, who present the prayers of the Saints before the throne and who go in and out of the courts of Heaven…. I cannot eat and drink and walk the earth with you; I am less than a breath. Now therefore, give God thanks; for I go unto Him that sent me.’ This quotation taken from the play Tobias and the Angel, by James Bridie,and itself a paraphrase of the scriptural account of Raphael's farewell to Tobias and his son, sums up the varying angelic activities which are described in the Old and New Testaments. They are shown to us in the courts of heaven, and for this we must depend on the attempted descriptions of visions descriptions necessarily failing in words, for their human authors were 'carried up into Paradise, and heard mysteries which man is not allowed to utter' (II Cor. xii,4), yet, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, conjuring up a picture of power, splendour and light.

When, in the Mass, we pray for the dead we speak of them as ‘sleeping in the sleep of peace'. There seems to be an echo here of our Lord's words, ‘The maid is not dead but sleepeth', and again of his use of the same verb when speaking of Lazarus. Chrysostom suggests that he is telling his followers not to be afraid of death; and perhaps he is contrasting two very different ideas of the after-life: the grey, wraith-like half-existence of Sheol or Hades with the Christian idea of fulfilment, glory, peace. Certainly nowadays we need to be taught not to fear death: in earlier days it was the sex-words which were taboo; now the taboo has been transferred to the death-words, and one must speak not of dying but of passing on or away or even over.

In an impassioned appeal for apostolic activity on the part of layfolk, described in the foreword as ‘a disturbing and courageous book', the author strongly decries the defeatist attitude that some adopt in face of the present calamitous state of society. The spread of gross materialism, the threat of unparalleled destruction by new and horrible means of warfare, and the success of what is well-named ‘apostolic Communism', may easily tempt us to think that now is the time to close up the ranks, concentrate on the faithful remnant, and leave the unbelieving multitude to its fate. This attitude is not new in the history of the Church. It recalls the example of those early Christians who were so persuaded of the imminence of the second coming of our Lord that they thought it not worth while concerning themselves with the ordinary affairs of life, or of anything else but their private preparation for that great event.

Why do we say, rightly, that sex is something that generally speaking, should not be talked about in public, in mixed groups, especially between boys and girls? Is it because sex is mean and shameful, perhaps even sinful?; Is it because sex is the private concern of men only, something therefore, that women need not bother about and are not entitled to know about? Is it because sex is something holy and sacred, something to be protected; a mystery whose secrets we penetrate only gradually; something, therefore, to be kept secret, in various measures, from the eyes of the uninitiated; and all this in order that this holy thing might not be abused by ignorant, careless, or wicked people?

Certainly not for the first reason. Sex is not dirty and shameful still less sinful. ‘God created man to his own image; male and female he created them.

In considering this sacrament we have again to see how something natural has been transformed by the power of god acting through his Church. As in penance, where the matter of the sacrament is sorrow for sin, what is transformed is not something non-human, such as oil or water, but the mutual consent of a man and a woman to give themselves to one another for the purpose of continuing the human race; something, that is to say, effectively significant even before it is given a new dignity by the action of Christ. For marriage is as old as the human race, and following the lead given by St Paul (Ephesians v, 31) we can learn its significance from the original institution in Paradise.

The account given in the book of Genesis (ii, 18-24) begins with God's action in creating a partner for Adam, because ‘It is not good for man to be alone’.

There is always a danger that emphasis on the primary effect or purpose of any one of the seven Sacraments may obscure our vision of secondary effects and purposes. It is only natural that we should think of a Sacrament in relation to its principal effect, but we must never lose sight of the complete picture. It is as though we thought only of the head in a human body and forgot the unobtrusive little finger or toe. Yet should we lose a little toe we suddenly become aware of being thrown out of balance. If a more important limb—none the less secondary —suffers grave damage we notice it still more. In spite of the fact that we adjust ourselves strangely quickly, we do remain crippled and unable to take our full share of life.

In English universities there has been a growing awareness during the last dozen years or so of the need to integrate science with other sources of knowledge, even with religious knowledge: this independently of any specific Catholic investiga tion. Faculties of the history and philosophy of science have been started, in which undergraduates reading science can spend a year either before or after taking their degree. It is important for schools to be aware of this, not only because they will be sending pupils on to the university, but because young science teachers will increasingly have their eyes turned towards the implication of their subject beyond the narrow limits of an examination syllabus, and in Catholic schools in particular towards religious instruction. In this moreover they will have greater help from books than has been available in the past.

The centenary year of Lourdes has drawn the attention of the world as it was drawn in that wonderful year 1858. Some approach with an attitude of reverence, others with a faint but somewhat sceptical admiration, and there will no doubt be others who greet the celebrations with a scoffing smile of contempt. So far, however, there has been little sig of scoffing or contempt. Indeed the most striking thing that has appeared since the opening of the centenary year was, not the enthusiastic crowds of pilgrims who assisted at the ceremonies of February 11, but the dignified and respectful way in which the great journals of the secular press reported the event. They showed no fumbling or hesitation in the use of Catholic terminology nology; they spoke of ‘the Blessed Virgin’ and ‘Saint Bernadette’ without the use of inverted commas, nor was there any hint of scepticism about the visions or the miracles of Lourdes.

God is too good to be used or fitted into our human schemes, and loving him above all means a complete outgoing from the frets of our creaturely condition. Nevertheless it does not follow that the workings of grace in us have to material or texture, or, if these are present, then that they hold no theological interest. Hence the title is chosen deliberately.

I suppose one of the hydras haunting the spiritual life comes from misunderstanding the all-or-nothing principle. God is recogized as the infinite good, which indeed he is, but this infinity in made both so big and individualized that it elbows out all other goods. This emphatically God does not do, otherwise when we called him creator it would be only of a shadow world. Again, it is feared that if you love things, and especially if you enjoy doing so, you dissipate what should be reserved for him alone.

The purpose of this paper is to show how the Synagogue as an institution, as it was organized by the Jews on their return from the Exile in Babylon, not only provided the early Christian Church with a whole set of services, customs and ritual laws, but also supplied a certain kind of atmosphere which played an important part in the development of early Christianity.

This appears at the very beginning, when we find our Lord Jesus Christ himself using the institution and attending the Synagogue. It was in the Synagogue at Nazareth that Jesus first proclaimed himself the Messias, when he read from ‘the book of baias the prophet: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me … “ and added, ‘This day is fulfilled this Scripture in your ears'.

Nothing could be plainer than the fact that the problems of Christian disunity do not press very heavily on the great majority of English Christians. For some the whole idea that separated Christians might ever come together again in the unity of the faith seems so impossible and visionary as to be discounted altogether. For others the present situation has come to be thought of as normal, and even perhaps intended by God, and is no longer seen as a cause of sorrow or scandal; either they regards the questions which separate Christians as of no real importance, or else they think of Christians separated from themselves as so far gone in error, as to be no longer in any real sense brethrem in Christ.

In last month's article ‘Sacrament and Symbol’ we say something of the nature of the sacramental sign and its relationship to the human creature for whom it was instituted. But the sign exists for the sake of the thing signified and its most important function (though not its only function) is to lead us to a knowledge of this thing signified. In this article, therefore, I propose to give a short account of what St Thomas understood by res sacra, the sacred reality lying behind the sign.

For this sacred reality is the thing signified. ‘A sacrament, says St Augustine, ‘is the sign of a sacred reality’; and St Thomas adds, ‘in so far as it is making men holy’. The Augustinian definition is too wide; as wide, in fact, as it possibly can be for it includes the whole of creation.

The primary object of the meetings in the Synagogue was the reading of the Scriptures, yet this was quite a recent innovation, seemingly introduced along with the new institution. In order to realize this better, we must go back to the time of the Temple.

In the old days, when Israel had been gathered together in her own land, leading a national life that centred round the Temple in Jerusalem and the big annual festivals held there, the whole People used to go up to the Temple to offer sacrifice. The indissoluble bond between the Temple and the sacrifices made there was indeed one of the basic requirements of the Testament religion.

Our Lord and Redeemer, my dear brethren, wishing to find us prepared, intimates what evils will attend the low world in its old age, in order to keep us from loving it now. He makes known the number of upheavals which will herald the approaching end, so that, if in times of tranquillity we do not want to fear God, we may at least fear his approaching judgment, when we are reduced to extremity by such catastrophes. Now, a little before the passage of the Holy Gospel which, brethren,you have just heard read, our Lord uttered these words: Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and there shall be great earthquakes, and in places plagues and famines.

Hail, then from us, O holy mystical Trinity, who has gathered us all together in this church of Mary, the Mother of God. Hail, from us Mary, Mother of God, majestic treasure of the whole world, the lamp unquenchable, the crown of virginity, the sceptre of orthodoxy, the indestructible temple, the dwelling of the Illimitable, Mother and Virgin, throught whom he is called in the holy Gospels “Blessed who cometh in the name of the Lord”. Hail, thou who didst contain him in the holy virginal womb, who cannot be contained, thou through whom the Holy Trinity is glorified and adored throughout the world; through whom heaven rejoices, through whom the angels and archangels are glad; through whom devils are put to flight through whom the tempter-devil fell from heaven; through whom the fallen creature is taken up into heaven; through whom all creation, held fast by the madness of idolatry has come to the knowledge of truth; through whom holy baptism has come to believers, and the oil of gladness; through whom churches are erected throughout the world; through whom the nations are brought to repentance.

The Christian sacrament is at once cause and sign. Each sacrament is a cause which signifies the kind of grace it produces and a sign which causes what it signifies. In the sacrament we have a perfect coincidence of sign and instrument, for in performing the signifying action we are also constructing an instrument used by God to confer grace. Now it is obvious that the causing of grace is something much more mysterious and much more important than its signification, and in the face of a Protestant criticism which denied all efficiency to the sacraments and saw them simply as symbols or memorials of Christ's life, it is not suprising that Catholic apologetics should have emphasized this causal character of the sacraments. The Christian sacrament is a genuine cause of grace, operating not only dispositively or ‘morally’, but directly causing what it signifies.