SAINT AELRED, SAINT OF SPIRITUAL FRIENDSHIP

Patricia Carroll OCSO draws our attention to Aelred of Rievaulx, a Cistercian saint and spiritual writer who specialised in writing about friendship as an image of the relationship between God and each person.

my source: Wake Up And Live

Soon In "Monks and Mermaids" there will be a post on the Manquehue  Benedictines, a lay community  in Chile belonging to the English Benedictine Congregation.  They run three schools that have a remarkable system of Catholic education.   Like the community itself,   this system is based on Lectio Divina and Spiritual Friendship; and St Aelred is one of their patron saints.   More of that later.   This post serves as an introduction.

Among spiritual writers, I think that Aelred of Rievaulx has been largely overlooked. Aelred was a twelfth century English Cistercian monk, who became abbot of the monastery of Rievaulx in the diocese of York in 1147, and remained spiritual father of that community until his death in 1163.

Steeped in Celtic traditions

He was brought up in Northumbria, which was steeped in the traditions of Celtic monasticism, and stories of holy men and women who kept alive the flame of faith brought by Aidan, the Irishman from Iona, in the seventh century. Aelred came from a family of married priests, his father and grandfather both ministered in Hexham, the last of a dying generation as Rome sought to impose its standard on the far western Celtic Christian tradition. Aelred spent his early years at the court of King David of Scotland and was made the king’s steward at the age of twenty two. He was clearly marked out for great things. However, during the course of a journey while on business for the king, he came across Rievaulx, and was drawn by the beauty of the place and the austere simplicity of the White Monks.

It became clear at an early stage of his monastic life that Aelred had a gift for directing others, a capacity which was marked by compassion and gentleness. Bernard of Clairvaux officially recognised this by asking him to write a spiritual directory for newcomers to Cistercian life, The Mirror of Charity, which reflects Aelred’s spiritual acumen. When he became abbot, the numbers at Rievaulx escalated to hundreds as he rarely turned young aspirants away. This later proved to be problematic for his successors who didn’t possess Aelred’s charismatic gifts. At his death there were three hundred, between choir monks and lay brothers, in the community.

Spiritual writer of depth

Besides being a sensitive pastor, he was also a spiritual writer of remarkable depth. In his later years, with a long period of involvement in the pastoral care of his monks behind him, he wrote what has come to be acknowledged as a spiritual classic, a short treatise entitled On Spiritual Friendship, which seems to have been mostly forgotten or is readily accessible in monastic circles only. It is time that this valuable Christian resource was made available to all the people of God, because in it Aelred provides us with an in-depth spirituality of Christian friendship.

What could an obscure twelfth century monk teach us twentieth century sophisticates about spiritual relationships? Aelred does have something to say to us who set such high value today on relating easily. He also speaks to those who spend hours exploring and probing the human need for intimacy, for deep human relationships based on self-disclosure and mutual acceptance, because he provides us with a Christo-centric view of these relationships. So what was originally written for monastics in the rwelfth century could be utilised today to help us come to a Christian understanding of how to relate to each other.

Aelred speaks about spiritual friendship – a relationship which helps us grow in love: love of each other and love of God. In fact, for him friendship is a sacrament of God’s love. In an earlier book he says that just as there is a continuous dialogue and interchange of love berween the three persons of the Trinity, so human beings – the rational creatures made in the image and likeness of this Trinity of Persons – are called to relationships based on mutual dialogue, exchange, sharing and self-giving. This is the theological foundation for all spiritual relationships. In fact, through the experience of spiritual friendship we come to experience something of God’s love. He refers to this friendship as a very holy sort of charity.

Spirituality of love

Aelred did not write in an historical vacuum. He was very much a person of his age, which was referred to as the Age of Friendship. It was also the period of history when troubadours toured the countryside singing love songs, and the courts were full of the culture of love. Those who entered the monasteries brought the language of courtly love with them, transposing and transforming it into a Christian spirituality of love. However Aelred’s book On Spiritual Friendship is unique because he skilfully synthesised his contemporary understanding of friendship with the ancient tradition of Cicero, the theological depth of Augustine, and his own psychological insight into human nature which was considerable.

His treatise On Spiritual Friendship is presented in the form of dialogues or imaginary conversations berween himself and three other monks. These are probably based on actual discussions or on the difficulties Aelred had encountered in his ministry as abbot. This literary format makes him easy to read.

The foundation of friendship

Aelred defines friendship as ‘agreement on all things sacred and profane, accompanied by good will and love,’ a definition he borrowed from Cicero. Ideally, friendship becomes a form of charity when it meets with a reciprocal response, so it is based on mutuality. In Christian friendship each one shares, each listens, each gives and receives; it is an adult relationship. In this treatise Aelred rarely refers to spiritual paternity, and usually such references are in relation to his official role as abbot. Instead he emphasises the equality of those involved in the relationship and the responsibility of each for its depth, and so he refers to a friend as ‘a guardian of love’ or ‘a guardian of the spirit itself’. He says that the reciprocal response we encounter in these relationships is a microcosmic image of what we shall discover eternally in God.

For Aelred, God is pure reciprocity, and in heaven we shall know what this is in all its fulness. In Christian friendship there are three persons involved, Aelred says to his young friend Ivo: ‘Here we are, you and I, and I hope a third, Christ, in our midst.’ Authentic Christian friendship must ‘begin in Christ, continue in Christ and be perfected in Christ.’ He says friendship is also everlasting, an image of God’s eternal love, so according to him friendship which can end was never true friendship. Ivo asks Aelred if we could say of friendship what John, the intimate friend of Jesus, says of charity, that God is friendship? Aelred replies ‘this would be unusual, but what is true of charity, should be true of spiritual friendship since those who abide in friendship abide in God and God in them. ‘

The joys of friendship

In the second series of conversations Aelred speaks about the spiritual fruits of friendship and says that ‘those who have no friends are to be compared to beasts for they have no one with whom to rejoice, no one to whom they can unburden their hearts, or with whom to share their inspirations and illuminations.’ He calls a friend ‘another self to whom you can speak on equal terms, to whom you can confess your failings, to whom you can make known your progress [or lack of it!] without blushing, one to whom you can entrust all the secrets of your heart.’

Perhaps there is a similarity here between the usual expectations we would have of a spiritual accompaniment relationship or in the Celtic tradition of the anam chara (literally, ‘soul friend’); or in a mature Christian marriage where the partner has become like another self.

Of course, prayer is an intrinsic part of this relationship. Aelred says that when we pray to Christ for a friend, it is easy, and almost inevitable, that our affection will pass from one to the other, ‘so that we might begin by an awareness of our friend in prayer before the Lord, and gradually understand that when we are with Christ we are also with our friend’. We carry our friend with us in the deepest part of our being where God is found. For Aelred ‘friendship is a stage bordering upon that perfection which consists in the love and knowledge God, so that human beings from the experience of human friendship become friends of God.’

Criteria for discernment

Not all friendship is spiritual. There is such a thing as friendship based on agreement to do evil, e.g., when two thieves get together, or a murder is planned. Aelred acknowledges this reality and provides sound criteria for us to discern whether or not our friendship has a spiritual basis. In the initial stages of friendship he suggests we focus on four criteria:

– Purity of intention. So, we should be asking ourselves questions like: What kind of relationship do we intend to establish? What are our deeper motives?

– The direction of reason. Do we treat the other reasonably or do we just use him or her?

– The restraint of moderation. Are we too intrusive of this person’s otherness, or are we moderate about the demands we make on him or her?

– Valuing the friend’s love in itself. Do we value this relationship as gift, or are we seeking some reward other than the friendship itself?

For Aelred all the advantages of friendship are secondary by comparison with the value of the relationship itself. We should delight more in the friend’s love than in any benefits we gain as a result. Because friendship is a precious gift, we should be discerning about those whom we choose as friends, and not establish relationships based on either mere whim or animal attraction! This element of choice would seem to be a bit strange. It has been said that you cannot choose your friends, they are given as gift. This is true, but what Aelred is emphasising here is that once the gift of friendship is given, you must make a conscious choice to be committed to the relationship, and this element of choice means that the relationship will be free, that each exercises personal responsibility for the friendship.

According to Aelred in an authentic spiritual friendship the primary foundation of this spiritual love is the love of God, and this should be the main reference point for all that take place within the friendship. In this knowledge we should choose one who is fit to be the companion of your soul, to whom you can entrust yourself as to another self.’ Once this basis of trust is established there is no going back; we should be prepared to work at the relationship through good days and bad, through joys and sorrows.

Qualities of friendship

In his third series of conversations, Aelred describes the qualities which should be found in a spiritual friend, in ourselves or the other. These are loyalty, discretion, right-intention and patience. He says that ‘in friendship there is nothing more praiseworthy than loyalty, which seems to be its nurse and its guardian. It proves itself a true companion in all things, adverse and prosperous, joyful and sad, pleasant and bitter, beholding with the same eye the humble and the lofty, the poor and the rich, the strong and the weak, the healthy and the infirm. .. A truly loyal friend sees nothing in his/her friend but their heart.’ This ability to see beyond the superficial elements of someone’s personality towards deeper levels would be one of the distinguishing features of this spiritual relationship. Another important factor for Aelred is confidentiality. For him there is nothing more wounding to friendship than the betrayal of one’s secret counsels. Without this confidentiality we cannot take the risk of the self-disclosure and revelation which is so much a part of Aelred’s idea of friendship.

Finally Aelred admits that this spiritual friendship is something we will experience with only a few people, perhaps even only one, in this life. This would be reasonable enough as it would seem to make enormous demands on the persons involved, and there are relatively few who will be able or ready to allow us enter the inner sanctuary of their heart. In this sense, it is gift. But what we have experienced, by the grace of God, or can experience with a few people will in heaven be ‘outpoured on all and, by all, be outpoured upon God, and God shall be all in all.’ For since the Incarnation, all those who are living the Christ-life are no longer called servants but friends.

Authentic love makes demands

Aelred’s reflections and guidelines on spiritual friendship are more pertinent today than ever. At a time when human love in all its aspects has been trivialised and de-sacralised, when the pleasure principle is given priority and recreational sex is commonplace, he emphasises the demands that authentic love makes. Christian relationships are demanding and his criteria could be helpful for those responding to the call to Christian marriage, those engaged in relationships of spiritual accompaniment, those endeavouring to revitalise Christian community, as well as the monastics for whom Aelred wrote so beautifully. These are the kinds of relationships exemplified in the lives of saints such as Frances de Sales and Jeanne de Chantal, Clare and Francis of Assisi, John of the Cross and Teresa of Avila. Incidentally, the gentle bishop of Geneva quotes Aelred in his own writings. Aelred’s treatise On Spiritual Friendship is a spiritual classic because it has something to say in every age. If we were looking for a patron saint of all those who endeavour to establish Christ-centred relationships, whether inside or outside of marriage, Aelred would surely be at the top of the list.

This article first appeared in Spirituality (September-October 1996), a publication of the Irish Dominicans

WHAT ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS CAN LEARN FROM POPE FRANCIS by Andrew Estocin (Orthodox Christian Network)

my source: Orthodox Christian Network

The world will be watching from May 24-25, 2014 as Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople and Pope Francis welcome each other in Jerusalem to observe the anniversary of the historic encounter between Pope Paul VI and Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras and the subsequent lifting of mutual anathemas. The main focus of the many scholars and reporters who will cover this event will be the elusive question of “Old Rome and New Rome” that is the question of unity between Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christians. However, hidden amidst all this media coverage will be a unique opportunity for Orthodox Christians to follow the example of Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras of blessed memory and to meet the Pope of Rome again as if for the first time.

At first glance, the idea of Orthodox Christians being able to learn from the Pope of Rome appears out of place if not altogether wrong. However, Orthodox Christians should pause before rushing to judgment about such matters and remember that prior to the Great Schism of 1054, the Pope of Rome was honored with reverence and respect throughout the Orthodox World. Today, Orthodox Christians honor many Popes of Rome as saints including St. Leo the Great, St. Gregory the Dialogist and St. Martin the Confessor. Orthodox Tradition celebrates the lives of many Popes throughout the liturgical year.

Despite these facts, one of the present realities that is most disappointing is how some of our brothers and sisters have portrayed the Pope of Rome. “Dictator” and “anti-christ” are just some of the clichés that have been sadly used. While there have certainly been corrupt Popes throughout history (as there have been corrupt Patriarchs), Orthodox Christians must ask themselves whether or not the last 35 years have greatly challenged such stereotypes, especially when it comes to Popes such as John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and the current Pope of Rome, Francis. Orthodox Christians should especially pause and take notice of the unique witness of Pope Francis. He is in many ways a bishop who reflects the Christianity of the first millennium when the Church was undivided. Pope Francis also models a form of leadership that is greatly needed in Orthodox Christianity today.

Here are a few lessons that Orthodox Christians can learn from Pope Francis:

Authentic Power is Service: One of the great tragedies of modern times is that Orthodox Christians constantly argue over power and status rather than service to the weakest among us. Church leaders debate about who is first and who is last. Clergy argue about the physical boundaries of Churches, who is entitled to govern them as well as about ancient titles that have their place in an ancient world that has long since disappeared. Amidst these arguments, Orthodox Christians need to pause and remember that power in the Church is a paradox. It is also neither a title nor a jurisdiction. Power in the Church is not about who kisses one’s hand but how many feet one can wash in the service of Christ. Pope Francis made this clear when he visited a youth prison in 2013 and chose to wash the feet of the offenders including one who is an Orthodox Christian. 

“Real power is service. As He did, He who came not to be served but to serve, and His service was the service of the Cross. He humbled Himself unto death, even death on a cross for us, to serve us, to save us. And there is no other way in the Church to move forward. For the Christian, getting ahead, progress, means humbling oneself. If we do not learn this Christian rule, we will never, ever be able to understand Jesus’ true message on power.” 

St. John Chrysostom echoes this belief from ancient times: “To love Christ means not to be a hireling, not to look upon a noble life as an enterprise or trade, but to be a true benefactor and to do everything only for the sake of love for God.”

The Church Lives On the Frontiers of Society: The greatest triumphs of Orthodox Christianity have taken place when the Church has lived as a missionary Church and not as an institutional Church. Pope Francis challenges Orthodox Christians with the following words: 

“I prefer a Church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a Church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security. I do not want a Church concerned with being at the center and then ends by being caught up in a web of obsessions and procedures. If something should rightly disturb us and trouble our consciences, it is the fact that so many of our brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life.” 

Sts. Cyril and Methodios, St. Patrick of Ireland, and Metropolitan Philip Saliba are all examples of Orthodox Christians who took incredible risks and in the process grew the Church and spread the Gospel. There is no doubt that each of these men experienced their share of bruises in their work. Pope Francis reminds Orthodox Christians that a risk-taking Church-–a church that is not afraid to fail–is much healthier than a Church that is focused on institutional security and closed in on itself. St. Tikhon of Moscow could not say it better when he writes that 

“The light of the Orthodox Faith has not been lit to shine only for a small circle of people. No, the Orthodox Church is catholic; she remembers the commandment of her Founder, ‘Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature and teach all nations’ (Mark 16.15; Matt. 28.19). We must share our spiritual richness, truth, light, and joy with others who do not have these blessings.”

Make Some Noise: The idea of Orthodox Christians making noise would seem contrary to our inheritance. Yet, a look at history shows that the Orthodox Church has been making a noisy mess of things since Apostolic times when the first disciples were labeled “Those people who have been turning the world upside down”(Acts 17:6). Such noise means rowing upstream against the world and challenging the world inside and outside of the Church to be faithful to the Gospel. Holiness always has a component that upsets the status quo. Pope Francis provided this bold exhortation to young people in Rio de Janeiro: 

“Let me tell you what I hope will be the outcome of World Youth Day: I hope there will be noise. … I want you to make yourselves heard in your dioceses, I want the noise to go out, I want the Church to go out onto the streets, I want us to resist everything worldly, everything static, everything comfortable, everything to do with clericalism, everything that might make us closed in on ourselves.” 

In order for the Orthodox Church to be faithful to Her Tradition, she must step outside of Her comfort zone and proclaim the Gospel in its fullness with compassion and without apology. Evangelism is by its very nature a “noisy” business.

There is no doubt that countless words will be written in the following weeks about Roman Catholic and Orthodox unity. In truth, it is highly doubtful that such unity will take place any time soon. Common sense reveals that there are serious doctrinal and cultural issues that make unity extremely difficult if not impossible. Any serious Catholic and Orthodox Christian would confess as much. Orthodoxy matters and should never be compromised for the purpose of ecumenical convenience or social acceptance. That being said, the Church has always looked to the horizon outside of itself and has at times found truth in the most surprising of places. Fr. Thomas Hopko is correct: “God is not a prisoner of His own Church!” In this light, Orthodox Christians would do well to follow the present-day example of our father Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and give Pope Francis our kindness, consideration, and our prayers. After all, if the Pope of Rome can humble himself and wash the feet of an Orthodox Christian, then the Holy Spirit can indeed work in ways that we never before thought possible.

Posted by the Orthodox Christian Network.  You can find the Orthodox Christian Network on Google+.

Andrew Estocin, the author of this article, is a lifelong Orthodox Christian and alumni of OCF. He received his theological degree from Fordham University and is a parishioner at St. George Greek Orthodox Church in Albuquerque, NM.

THE HOLY TRINITY AND BEING AND REFLECTED IN THE CHURCH by Carl Olsen on the Theology of Jean Danielou, and John Behr on JOhn Zizioulas

Jean Daniélou and the "Master-Key to Christian Theology" | Carl E. Olson | August 21, 2007 

This article originally appeared in a slightly different form on the Catholic Exchange website.

"Without a doubt the master-key to Christian theology, which distinguishes it utterly from all rational theodicy," the French Jesuit Jean Daniélou (1905-74) wrote in God and the Ways of Knowing, "is contained in the statement that the Trinity of Persons constitutes the structure of Being, and that love is therefore as primary as existence." This "master-key" was the object of study and love for Daniélou, whose scholarly and popular writings contemplated the depths of Trinitarian love and its salvific work in human history.

 Although not as well-known today as his fellow Jesuit Henri de Lubac and theological contemporary Hans Urs von Balthasar, Jean Daniélou occupies a key place (no pun intended) in twentieth-century Catholic theology, recognized for his dialogue with other world religions, his writings on the Church Fathers and Scripture, and his insights into the nature of divine revelation and Tradition. Trained in philology––the study of classical languages––and theology, Daniélou was a professor at the Institut Catholique in Paris and a vital member of the controversial "New Theology", or ressourcement, movement. His first works were scholarly studies of the theologies of St. Gregory of Nyssa, Origen, and the Jewish thinker Philo. His History of Early Christian Doctrine before the Council of Nicaea is considered a classic in patristic scholarship. 

Daniélou's work with de Lubac included collaboration on Sources Chrétiennes, a collection of patristic texts translated into French, which were first published in the 1940s and have since reached four hundred in number. The series sought to recover the riches of the patristic tradition, especially in the areas of Biblical interpretation and spirituality. The first volume published was Daniélou's translation of St. Gregory of Nyssa's spiritual classic, The Life of Moses. 

Recognized for his balanced and insightful examinations of world religions--especially Judaism, Buddhism, and Hinduism--and for his penetrating analysis of modern culture, Danielou was called to be a theological expert at the Second Vatican Council. There he was consulted on Gaudium et Spes, the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, a work that Karol Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul II, also worked on. In 1969 Daniélou was made a cardinal by Pope Paul VI.

For all of his scholarly brilliance, Daniélou was equally impressive in his ability to convey complex and subtle theological truths to a wide readership through a number of popular works. These included books on liturgy, patristics, prayer, creation, revelation, Scripture and tradition, and the theology of history. In God And The Ways of Knowing he examines the relationship between pagan beliefs, philosophy, and Christian theology. The Advent of Salvation is a comparative study of non-Christian religions and Christianity, similar to his Holy Pagans of the Old Testament. The Scriptural roots of the liturgy and sacraments, especially as developed by the Church Fathers, are masterfully explored in The Bible and The Liturgy, while the inner life of prayer and its cosmic consequences are taken up in Prayer: The Mission of the Church.

Cardinal Avery Dulles has written that "Daniélou was a Jesuit of broad culture, keenly sensitive to the contemporary cultural and philosophical trends. . . . Fundamental to Daniélou's theology is the idea that God is essentially personal; he is sovereign subjectivity." Always focused on the master-key of Trinitarian love, Daniélou often wrote about two essential facets of that divine life: the progressive revelation, or self-giving, of God within salvation history, and the continuity of that redemptive history. In The Advent of Salvation he writes, "The mystery of history is summed up in God's design of giving His spiritual creatures a share in the life of the Trinity." God, who is love, continually reaches out to man, an activity that culminates in the mystery of the Incarnation, a mystery continued on in the Mystical Body of Christ, the Church. The Christian faith is not a system, a philosophy, or one religion among many, but a unique and supernatural encounter with the living God-man. Daniélou wrote, in The Lord of History:

"The mystery of the Holy Trinity, known to us through the Word made flesh, and the mystery of the deification of man in him––that is the whole of our religion, summed up in one person, the person of Jesus Christ, God made man, in whom is everything we need to know."

Because of his study of the Church Fathers, Daniélou largely avoided the neo-Thomistic terminology and approach and instead embraced a more relational and dynamic vocabulary. He emphasized that faith is more than an assent to intellectual propositions, being a covenantal act in which man gives himself to the God who first gives Himself to man. "[Man] is thrown, as a creature of flesh and blood, into the abyss of Trinitarian life, to which all life and all eternity will have no other object than to accustom him. . . . Thus man goes on from glory to glory, and the whole history of salvation may be considered as a gradual unveiling of the ineffable Trinity" (God and the Ways of Knowing). This emphasis on the personal, relational nature of Christianity was also championed by de Lubac, von Balthasar, Karl Adam, Romano Guardini, and Yves Congar and had an obvious influence on the documents of the Second Vatican Council. 

Keenly aware of the damage done by gnosticism in the early Church, Daniélou stressed the continuity of salvation history over against dualistic, fragmented concepts of human history, including Marxism, pantheism, and pseudo-Christian philosophies. "What characterizes Christianity is a certain wholeness; in it there is the fullness of truth," he wrote, "In the order of continuity it marks a more advanced stage of evolution, the highest point of that evolution. I believe this idea to be absolutely essential if we are to understand how Christianity completes other religions and other civilizations, and to see as a result that everlasting newness, which Saint Augustine and so many others have proclaimed. Christianity is and always will be 'the newest thing out'." (The Advent of Salvation). Scripture is not simply a book filled with truth-claims, but is a continuous story of Truth: the Old Testament is filled with the work of divine education preparing for the "fullness of time", the Incarnation, and the Gospels, which, in turn, resulted in the mission of the Holy Spirit, as recorded in the New Testament and carried on in the Church.

None of this, of course, was new with Daniélou and the "New Theology" movement. He and his colleagues simply sought to rediscover and appreciate these truth, and to appropriate them for a modern generation hungry to draw spiritual nourishment from the sources of the Faith. In doing so, Daniélou articulated Catholic doctrine and theology with a striking clarity and beauty, always drawing upon the language of Scripture and the Church Fathers. In all that he did, this great French theologian and cardinal sought to use the master-key in exploring the dynamic, intimate love of the Triune God for man.

THE TRINITARIAN BEING OF THE CHURCH

AN INTRODUCTION BY JOHN BEHR

The actions of God are differentiated but not divided: it is the one God, the Father, who calls the Church into being as the body of Christ indwelt by the Holy Spirit; and, in return, the Church is conceived in terms of communion, but communion with God, as the body of his Son, anointed with his Spirit, and so calling upon God as Abba, Father.
The relationship between Trinitarian theology and ecclesiology has been much discussed in recent decades. It is an intriguing subject, and perhaps an odd juxtaposition. It has often been noted that although a confession of faith in “one Church” is included in most ancient creeds along with “one baptism,” the Church herself is seldom directly reflected upon; the person of Jesus Christ, his relation to the Father and the Spirit, was endlessly discussed, and the subject of a great many conciliar statements, but not the Church or ecclesiology more generally.

The question of ecclesiology, it is often said, is our modern problem, one (at least for the Orthodox) provoked by the ecumenical encounter of the twentieth century. One fruit of this encounter is the realization of the Trinitarian dimensions of the Church herself, so providing continuity with the theological reflection of earlier ages and grounding the Church in the Trinity.

Following in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, ecumenical dialogue in recent decades has emphasized the connection between the Trinity and the Church largely through the exploration of what is commonly referred to as “communion ecclesiology.”Koinonia, “communion,” was the theme of the Canberra Assembly of the WCC in 1991, and also at the Fifth World Conference on Faith and Order in Santiago de Compostela in 1993. In this approach, the koinonia of the three Persons of the Holy Trinity, the very being of God, is taken as the paradigm of the koinonia that constitutes the being of the ecclesial body, the Church.

As Metropolitan John (Zizioulas) put it in his address to the meeting at Santiago de Compostela: “The Church as a communion reflects God’s being as communion in the way this communion will be revealed fully in the Kingdom.” [Metropolitan John (Zizioulas) of Pergamon, "The Church as Communion," SVTQ 38.1 (1994): 3-16, at p.8] Such communion ecclesiology readily dovetails with the “Eucharistic” ecclesiology espoused by many Orthodox during the twentieth century: it is in the sacrament of the Eucharist, the event of communion par excellence, that the Church realizes her true being, manifesting already, here and now, the Kingdom which is yet to come. Although, as Metropolitan John continues, “Koinonia is an eschatological gift,” the fullness of this eschatological gift is nevertheless already given, received, or tasted, in the celebration of the Eucharist.

Painted in these admittedly rather broad strokes, the oddity of juxtaposing the Trinity and the Church can be seen. What is said of the Church is certainly based upon what is said of the Trinity, but the effect of speaking in this manner, paradoxically, is that the Church is separated from God, as a distinct entity reflecting the divine being. Another way of putting this, using terms which are themselves problematic, would be to say that communion ecclesiology sees the Church as parallel to the “immanent Trinity”: it is the three Persons in communion, the one God as a relational being, that the Church is said to “reflect.” This results in a horizontal notion of communion, or perhaps better parallel “communions,” without being clear about how the two intersect.

Metropolitan John is very careful to specify that the koinonia in question “derives not from sociological experience, nor from ethics, but from faith.[ "The Church as Communion," p.5] We do not, that is, start from our notions of what “communion” might mean in our human experience of relating to others, and then project this upon the Trinity. Rather, we must begin from faith, for “we believe in a God who is in his very being koinonia … God is Trinitarian; he is a relational being by definition; a non-Trinitarian God is not koinonia in his very being. Ecclesiology must be based on Trinitarian theology if it is to be an ecclesiology of communion.” .["The Church as Communion," p.6]

However, only after stating the principles of Trinitarian koinonia does Metropolitan John affirm, as a second point, that “koinonia is decisive also in our understanding of the person of Christ. Here the right synthesis between Christology and Pneumatology becomes extremely important.”  He rightly emphasizes (correcting V. Lossky) that the `economy of the Son” cannot be separated from “the economy of the Spirit,” that is, both that the work of (or the “relation to”) the Spirit is constitutive for the person of Christ and that there is no work of the Spirit distinct from that of Christ. [Cf. J. Zizioulas, Ijeingas Communion (Cresrwood, NY: SVS Press, 1985), 124-25. A point already noted by Lossky, who observes that "In speaking of three hypostases we are already making an improper abstraction: if we wanted to generalize and make a concept of the ‘divine hypostasis,' we would have to say that the only common definition possible would be the impossibility of any common definition of the three hypostases." (In the Image and Likeness of God [Crestwood, NY: SVS Press, 1975], 113);]

Nevertheless, besides the very serious question concerning the appropriateness of characterizing the Trinity as a communion of three Persons, this approach does not adequately take into account the “economic” reality in which all Trinitarian theology is grounded and in terms of which the Scriptures describe the Church. Christology and Pneumatology may have been synthesized, but Trinitarian theology is still considered as a realm apart. Although Metropolitan John emphasizes that “the Church is not a sort of Platonic `image’ of the Trinity; she is communion in the sense of being the people of God, Israel, and the `Body of Christ,” this is followed, in the next sentence but one, with the affirmation that “the Church as communion reflects God’s being as communion.” [Metropolitan John, "Church as Communion," p8, my emphasis]

Despite the tantalizing mention of the Church as the “Body of Christ,” we are left with a communion of three divine Persons and the image of this in the communion that is the Church, whose structure, authority, mission, tradition and sacraments (especially, of course, the Eucharist, [Cf. Metropolitan John, "Church as Communion. p15: "Baptism, Chrismation or Confirmation, and the rest of the sacramental life, are all given in view of the Eucharist. Communion in these sacraments may be described as 'partial' or anticipatory communion, calling for its fulfillment in the Eucharist."] a point to which I will return) are correspondingly “relational.”

We have the Trinity and the Church, the three primary scriptural images for the Church — that is, the Church as the people of God, the body of Christ and the temple of the Holy Spirit – offer us, as suggested by Bruce Marshall, a way of looking at the Trinitarian being of the Church in a way that integrates the Church directly and intimately to the relationship between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. [Bruce D. Marshall, "The Holy Trinity and the Mystery of the Church: Toward a Lutheran/Orthodox Common Statement," paper presented to the North American Lutheran-Orthodox Dialogue, May 2002.]

Moreover, each of these images links the Church in a particular way to one member of the Holy Trinity without undermining the basic Cappadocian point, that the actions of God are differentiated but not divided: it is the one God, the Father, who calls the Church into being as the body of Christ indwelt by the Holy Spirit; and, in return, the Church is conceived in terms of communion, but communion with God, as the body of his Son, anointed with his Spirit, and so calling upon God as Abba, Father.

I would like to begin with the basic content of these images, and then continue by suggesting how Trinitarian theology, as expounded in the fourth century and beyond, directs us to combine these various images, as different aspects of the single mystery that is the Church.

Following this I will offer some further considerations regarding the calling of the Church and her eschatological perfection, and concerning baptism (with which the Church is invariably connected in creedal formulations) as the foundational sacrament of the Church, and the implications this has for the question of the boundaries of the Church, and lastly how, as the place where the human being is born again through baptism, the Church can also be considered as our mother, in which each Christian puts on the identity of Christ.