The Metaphysics of Participation and the Unitive Function of the Sacraments in the Theology of Henri...

“THE METAPHYSICS OF PARTICIPATIONAND THE UNITIVE FUNCTION OF THE SACRAMENTS

IN THE THEOLOGY OF HENRI DE LUBAC”

SCOTT RUSHING

DECEMBER 2006

Introduction

In his book Catholicism: Christ and the Common Destiny of Man,

Henri de Lubac introduces a theological theme that will

become a foundational perspective in many of his later

books. This theme is the fundamental social characteristic

of the Church. De Lubac then connects this theme to the

social characteristic in the doctrine of the sacraments. De

Lubac argues that the unitive function, which is also the

social characteristic, has been ignored since the twelfth

century, and only recently has it begun to be recovered

within Catholic theology.

In this paper I will explore de Lubac’s sacramental

theology as he presents it in his books Catholicism and The

Splendour of the Church. In Catholicism I will focus on de Lubac’s

historical study of the social aspect of the sacraments. I

will then turn to The Splendour of the Church, where de Lubac

demonstrates how the medieval Church came to understand both

the Church and the Eucharist as the “Mystical Body of

Christ”, and why that is important to his sacramental

theology.

De Lubac’s emphasis on the unitive function of the

sacraments is consistent with his attempt to recover the

patristic/medieval understanding of the “suspended middle” –

that creation (and humanity specifically) ontologically

participate with the Divine. This metaphysical perception

contrasted with the analogy of being as outlined by Duns

Scotus in the 13th century, which continued to dominate

catholic theology into the modern period. I will conclude

my paper by arguing that de Lubac’s sacramental theology is

a natural extension of his attempt to recover the “graced

nature” of Aquinas.

Communion Ecclesiology in Catholicism 1

1 I am borrowing the theological phrase “communion ecclesiology” from Dennis Doyle, who uses it to describe a certain understanding of

1

In Catholicism, de Lubac argues that there are two

central aspects toward understanding the sacraments. The

first is that the means of salvation are delivered through

the sacraments. The second aspect is that the sacraments

are “instruments of unity”.2 For de Lubac this second

aspect, which he calls the social aspect, is as important as

the first. In fact, it is not just through the salvific

means of the sacraments that the Christian comes to be

united to the community to Christ. Indeed, it is through

the social aspect that the partaker of the sacraments is

united with both the Church and with Christ.

De Lubac laments the diminished teaching of the Church

on the social dimension of the sacraments. The grace that

is “produced and maintained” by the sacraments is not for

the individual only. Grace, as well as redemption and

revelation, are fundamentally social. Those who take the

sacraments receive grace in accordance with the measure by

the Church in its relationship between human beings “with God through Christ and in the Holy Spirit.” Dennis Doyle, “De Lubac and Communion Ecclesiology”, Theological Studies 60 (1999), 211.

2 Henri de Lubac, Catholicism, trans. Lancelot Sheppard and Sister Elizabeth Englund (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988), 82.

2

which they are joined to the Body of Christ. The sacraments

are not of the individual. The sacraments are of the

Church. Therefore one must receive the sacraments through

participation in the Church. Only through participation in

the Church do the sacraments produce their “full effect.”3

In addition, Christians can only participate in the Spirit

through the Church; as Augustine observes, the Church is the

“society of the Spirit.”4

De Lubac provides a deeper analysis of the unitive and

social functions of the sacraments by citing the examples of

baptism, penance, and Eucharist. Baptism is numerically the

first of the sacraments, because through it one enters into

the Church. “And this is essentially a social event, even

in the primary, extrinsic meaning of the word.”5 Baptism

does not only usher one into the visible Church. Baptism is

also incorporation into the Mystical Body.6 De Lubac traces

3 De Lubac, Catholicism, 82-83.

4 De Lubac, Catholicism, 83. The citation from Augustine is from Sermon 71 (PL 38, 460): “Cum ad Catholican veniunt [haeretici], et societati Spiritus aggregantur, quem foris procul dubio non habebant, non eis repeitur lavacrum carnis.”

5 De Lubac, Catholicism, 83.


3

this theological perspective on baptism back to the second

century bishop Irenaeus, who stated that “our bodies receive

by baptism that unity which leads to life incorruptible, and

our souls receive the same unity through the Holy Spirit.”7

De Lubac then turns his attention to the sacrament of

penance. Penance is defined by de Lubac as the “social

reintegration of the sinner”.8 Thus in his very definition

of the sacrament de Lubac highlights its social aspect. De

Lubac does not deny that this particular sacrament has the

purpose of inner purification; however, it also works in a

disciplinary manner as well. It is the latter aspect that

de Lubac focuses on, because penance reconciles the sinner

with the Church, which constitutes “an efficacious sign of

reconciliation with God”.9 The sinner cannot receive the

grace of God outside of communion with the Body of Christ.

7 Irenaeus, Adv. Haereses, 3, 17, 2 (PG 7, 930). Quoted in de Lubac,Catholicism, 86.



4

While baptism and penance offer helpful examples in

identifying the social aspect of the sacraments, it is the

Eucharist which is the “sacrament in the highest sense of

the word.”10 De Lubac reveals his true discontent with some

Catholic teaching on the Eucharist in this section of

Catholicism. He is concerned that so many Catholics believe

that the doctrine is already complete, even if the unitive

function is ignored or forgotten. De Lubac traces back

the importance of the unity of the Eucharist through the

Apostle Paul, Ignatius of Antioch, Cyprian, John Chrysostom,

Cyril of Alexandria, Augustine of Hippo, and John Damascene,

showing that this was “in the very forefront of their

thought.”11


11 De Lubac, Catholicism, 90. It is no coincidence that de Lubac returns to the Church Fathers in an attempt to recover this theme of thesacraments as “instruments of unity”. Susan Wood offers a helpful observation: “De Lubac’s fundamental conviction is that in order for Christianity to be adaptable to a modern generation it must first discover its essence through a return to the originating creative thought of its doctrines and institutions.” For de Lubac and Catholic Christianity, the “originating creative thought” would of course be the teachings of the Church Fathers, who are quoted extensively in this section. Susan Wood, Spiritual Exegesis and the Church in the Theology of Henri de Lubac(Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998), 5.

5

Of course the Fathers did not invent this understanding

– it can be traced back to Paul,a nd even to Jewish thought.

Enrico Mazza also concludes that Paul connects the unity of

the sacrament with the unity of the Church. In fact, Mazza

traces this theme of unity amongst the people of God back

through the Old Testament, and forward into Christian

apocryphal literature (i.e. the Didache) also. But as far

as Paul is concerned, Mazza writes that “unity is connected

with the sacramental nature and the efficacy of the

Eucharist…the unity of the Church as a body is a familiar

idea in the letters of Paul.”12

The social and unitive dimension of sacramental

teaching did not decline in the early Scholastic period. De

Lubac notes that “the whole Latin Middle Ages were nourished

on this teaching” so much that they “take it for granted.”13

Influential scholars such as Peter Lombard, Hugh of St.

Victor, Abelard, Innocent III, and Thomas Aquinas all teach

12 Enrico Mazza, The Celebration of the Eucharist: The Origin of the rite and the Development of Its Interpretation, trans. Matthew O’Connell (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1999), 83-84.


6

this aspect of the sacraments.14 De Lubac lists three

stages of depth that came to be located in the Eucharist:

1. sacramentum tantum (sacrament alone—the outward sign—

constituted by the species of bread and wine—the

Mystical Body);

2. sacramentum et res (sacrament and the reality—what is

contained under the sign—constituted by the body and

blood of Christ itself—the historical body);

3. res tantum (reality alone—the definitive fruit of the

sacrament—constituted by the unity of the Church—the

True Body).15

While the first and second stage become the predominant

manner by which the medieval theology of the Eucharist is

remembered, it is the third stage that de Lubac wants to

recover. For the Scholastics as well as the Church Fathers,

Eucharistic theology was not complete without its

symbolization of the unity of the Church (the True Body).



7

De Lubac does not choose to examine in this work the

gradual process by which this dimension came to be

forgotten; he only informs his readers that it does.

However, the problem is not that the social aspect came to

be ignored. In fact, the idea of the “relationship between

the physical body of Christ and the Mystical Body came to be

forgotten.”16 Jaroslav Pelikan offers some help in this

regard. Pelikan argues that as the sacrificial

understanding of the Eucharist came to be affirmed in the

twelfth century, it dominated all other aspects of the

Eucharist.17 Pelikan also notes that misunderstandings

about the “body of Christ” led to disuse of certain

theological elements of Eucharistic doctrine. He cites

Augustine for his description of “the unity of the body and

blood of Christ”, but says that the difficulty of

understanding whether this meant the body of Christ in human

form, the body of Christ in the sacrament, or the body of


17 Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: The Growth of Medieval Theology (600-1300) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978), 188.

8

Christ as the Church led to perplexity of meaning and

eventual disuse.18

De Lubac notes that the whole weight of Catholic

doctrine and liturgy supports this social and unitive

aspect. He notes numerous occasions in the liturgy when the

unity of the Church is sought and desired by both the

celebrants and the congregation. Some of these liturgical

exhortations remain from ancient practice, while others are

more contemporary. They work together in concert to remind

the body of “the unity of the Church in space and time, of

pastor and people, which is itself a symbol of that mystic

unity of which the sacrifice of the altar is the bond that

is every renewed.”19

De Lubac points his readers back to Eucharistic prayers

of the early Church. He observes that these ancient

liturgies, preserved in the writings of Theodore of

Mopsuestia, St. Basil, St. Eustace, the Didache, and the

“Apostolic Constitution” all have in common this prayer for

18 Pelikan, 191.


9

the unity of the saints.20 However, these Eucharistic

prayers for unity contain more theological meaning than a

simple desire for peace among the members. In fact, “true

Eucharistic piety…is no devout individualism.”21 It cannot

be, because such piety cannot be conceived without

“fraternal communion.”22 De Lubac does not limit this

communion internally; i.e., Eucharistic piety of the Church

also serves for the purpose of uniting the entire human

race. “And as the Spirit of Christ once came down upon the

Apostles not to unite them together in a closed group but to

light within them the fire of universal charity, so does he

still whenever Christ delivers himself up once more that the

scattered children of God may be gathered together. Our

churches are the ‘upper room’ where not only is the Last

Supper renewed but Pentecost also.”23





10

This aspect of de Lubac’s theological purpose comes as

a natural conclusion to his writing on the sacraments. De

Lubac informs his audience that the Church Fathers

“delighted” to contemplate the creation of humanity “as a

whole”.24 And when the eschatological Christ comes at the

telos of history, the bride will be the “whole human race.”25

Therefore, in this thesis of de Lubac does his sacramental

theology find its full eschatological purpose. The unity of

the Church, as seen in the sacraments, is not for the

benefit of the body of Christ only. Indeed, this unity is a

calling to the Church to be the body of Christ that

represents the whole human race. We as the Church are

called as a social body to unity that we may unite the

entire human race together in unity as the bride of Christ

at the telos of history. Dennis Doyle adds that de Lubac’s

communion ecclesiology requires “those gathered (to be) sent

out with a mission of charity to the larger world.”26



26 Doyle, 224.

11

Communion Ecclesiology in The Splendour of the Church

Another important work of de Lubac in regard to this

subject is The Splendour of the Church.27 In this book, de Lubac

explores several different images of the Church: the Church

as mystery; the Church as mother (ecclesia mater); the

sacrament of Christ; the heart of the Church. The social

aspect of the unity of the Church can be seen as a thread

that runs throughout the entire book. This is not a

background theme; it runs to the heart of de Lubac’s

theological vision of the body of Christ.

The Church is a mystery. De Lubac is aware that such a

statement envelops this theme of unity that he has insisted

upon. The unity of the Church is also a mystery. De Lubac

is not blissfully ignorant of the criticisms of such a

theological position. “Mankind is diverse in the extreme,

divided up by period, climate, culture, environment and

innumerable other things: its problems, anxieties, tastes

27

Hans Urs Von Balthasar describes The Splendour of the Church as a bookthat provides “the spirituality for the theology of Catholicism.” Balthasar, The Theology of Henri de Lubac (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1976), 107.

12

and modes of expression are correspondingly diverse, and the

differences are irreducible.”28 Doyle notes that “one of

the major strengths of de Lubac…is precisely that he is able

to operate on the level of ideal, mystical speech about the

Church while at the same time acknowledging fully the level

of dark abominations.”29 De Lubac appeals to the secular

historian for confirmation that for anyone who examines the

history of humanity, there is little, if any, feeling of

unity amongst the great variations of people who comprise

humankind. The historian has a far easier task of finding

differences than similarities among humans, despite our

common human nature. These differences are furthered even

more by considering humanity across time and space.

Yet it is in these very differences among humanity that

we find the genius of de Lubac’s theological vision. He

discovers amidst this separation a “wonderful phenomenon.”30

“There is a brotherhood of common responses; they answer the

28 De Lubac, The Splendour of the Church, 35.

29 Doyle, 220.


13

same appeal and enjoy the same communion in the same love;

it is as if one and the same blood flowed in their veins.”31

There is one body that defies this separation, and unites

humanity in one faith, and that is the Church: “they are

children of the same Church and have all had from her the

inheritance of the same Christ; fed by the same faith, they

are ‘given to drink by the same Spirit’, who produces in

them one and the same spontaneous reaction, and thus

provides the sign by which they recognize one another.”32

Our responses unite us together with Origen and Augustine.

We have, with them, responded to the love of Christ in

affirmation. “The Christians of every age and country,

every race and culture, do indeed form one single whole,

united by the love of Christ.”33

De Lubac follows the Apostle Paul’s lead in tying

together the doctrines of the Church and the Eucharist,

which he argues is the “very heart of the mystery of the


32 De Lubac, The Splendour of the Church, 35-36.

33 De Lubac, The Splendour of the Church, 36-37.

14

Church.”34 Historically the connection made that the Church

and the Eucharist are both the “Mystical Body of Christ” is

a twelfth century development. According to de Lubac, the

Eucharist had already been described as mystical in the

Patristic period, but it is not until the medieval period

that the Church comes to be described similarly.35

This description is apt, but it comes with a warning.

De Lubac is concerned about those who compare a “mystical”

body to a natural one and assume that the mystical one is

only metaphorical, while the natural body of man is real.

This is not the case for de Lubac. On the contrary, the

“Mystical Body” is a real supernatural organism; just as

real as a human body.

According to de Lubac, there are two dangers associated

with this understanding of the Church as the Mystical Body.


35 De Lubac, The Splendour of the Church, 74. Also, Susan Wood in Spiritual Exegesis and the Church in the Theology of Henri de Lubac, 85, reminds her readers that while the image of Christ as the Head in union with the Church as the body is an interpretation that is read “through the Chalcedonian formula…The Church is then compared with the humanity of Christ, and its union with Christ is represented as structurally the same as humanity’s union with divinity in the personal unity of the Christ.”

15

The first danger is to associate “mystical” in some way with

“moral”. In fact, “mystical” includes the “moral”, but it

means more than just that. The second danger is to

associate “mystical” in some synonymous way with

“mysterious”. This leads to “separating the Mystical Body

from the visible Church” as the Mystical (understood as

Mysterious) Body comes to be synonymous with the invisible

Church.36

The solution for navigating between these two dangers

is by “uniting in one” the Mystical Body as both the

Eucharist and the Church.37 Each one is the cause of the

other.38 In an active sense, the Church produces the

Eucharist. This is an exercise of her sanctifying power.39

In a passive sense, the Eucharist produces the Church. It

is the “Church of the sanctified”.40






16

De Lubac warns his readers that while the physical body

of Christ is in the Eucharist, and the mystical body of

Christ is the Church, the two should not merely be linked

together and therefore thought to be one. De Lubac appeals

to the Apostle Paul for guidance and for theological

clarity. “There is a mystical identification between Christ

and His Church, and the reality of the Eucharistic presence

is a guarantee for us of the ‘mystical’ reality of the

Church.”41 The mystical reality of the Church is a witness

to the mystical reality of the Eucharist. As Susan Wood

explains, “this…interpretation of the Eucharist view(s) the

Eucharist as building up the Church. The Eucharist causes

the Church and looks forward to its completion at the end of

time.”42 Here Wood provides us a hint of the eschatological

dimension that is to come.

De Lubac presents an indictment against anyone who

would claim that the Eucharist is merely a symbol. If the

Eucharist is not the Real Presence of Christ, then in no way


42 Wood, 61.

17

could the sacrament witness to the unity and the mystical

presence of Christ in the Church. And thus de Lubac

concludes his thoughts on this subject by reminding

schismatics that because they have cut themselves off from

the one true Church, they cannot reproduce the unity that is

produced through the reality of the presence of Christ in

the Eucharistic elements. “The Church, like the Eucharist,

is a mystery of unity—the same mystery, and one with

inexhaustible riches. Both are the Body of Christ—the same

body.”43

The Sacrament of Christ in The Splendour of the Church

According to de Lubac, the Church itself is a

sacrament. All of the other sacraments are contained in the

Church. The Church is a sacrament, like Christ in His

humanity is a sacrament of God.44


44 De Lubac, The Splendour of the Church, 120. According to Dennis Doyle, de Lubac is likely the first person to consider this theme of theChurch as sacrament. Catholicism is the earliest book that he can find which proposes this theme. Dennis Doyle, 221.

18

Sacraments have dual characteristics. The first

characteristic of a sacrament is that it is a sign of

something else. In de Lubac language, the sign must be

“passed through”, not “stopped at”.45 Sacraments are a

mediation between two terms. The second characteristic of a

sacrament is that it is a sign which we never cease to pass

through. In this way, the two characteristics can never be

discarded. They are both necessary. Thus, the first

characteristic is that the sign is mediatory, while the

second characteristic is that the sign is necessary for us

to pass through it to reach what it signifies.46

Christ is a sacrament of God precisely because He

envelops these two characteristics.47 Christ is “the Way”

to God. Christ is the “image of the invisible God”.

Christians, and of course the Church, will always have to go

through Christ to know the Father. There will never come a

time in history when Christ is not necessary. Thus Christ




19

is both the mediator, and forever necessary to encounter the

Father. Balthasar explains it thusly: “The Church remains

the ‘sacrament of Christ’: leading to him and at the same

time effectively containing him.”48

Likewise, the Church is a sacrament of Christ. It is

through the Church that we come to Christ, and the Church is

and will be necessary for us to encounter Christ. However,

we are also simultaneously one body, with Christ as the head

and the Church as the members. Christ is the Bridegroom and

the Church is the Bride. The Church is the tabernacle in

which Christ dwells, and the temple in which Christ

teaches.49 “If she is not the sacrament, the effective

sign, of Christ, then she is nothing.”50 Paul McPartlan

provides a helpful statement of the supernatural unity

characterized through the image of the Church as Christ’s

Bride: “We see, therefore, that the Church is

supernaturally united, as Christ’s Bride, by each of her

48 Balthasar, 109.


50 De Lubac, The Splendour of Christ, 131.

20

members having within them the identical indwelling Christ,

who restores in each the identical imprinted image which is

the basis of humanity’s natural unity, since each human

being possesses it whole and entire and undivided.”51

As we have already seen from Catholicism, de Lubac argues

that Christ works through the Church in order to reach the

entire human race. Therefore his audience should not be

surprised to find the Church’s eschatological mission which

results from this theology of the sacrament of Christ. The

Church’s mission is to make Christ present to humanity.52

“Christ should continue to be proclaimed through us, and to

appear through us.”53 The good news for the Church is that

we know she will not fail in this mission; after all, she

will become the Bride of Christ! McPartlan observes that in

de Lubac “the future, the Holy Spirit and the Church are

profoundly linked. The same Spirit who gives hope also

gathers the Church…and the hope of the Church on earth is 51 Paul McPartlan, The Eucharist Makes the Church: Henri de Luback and John

Zizioulas in Dialogue (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1993), 19.



21

precisely that of being gathered finally, with all the

angels and saints, into the heavenly Church in the holy

city, the new Jerusalem.”54

But as we have seen previously from de Lubac, a warning

is placed here for the Church. The concern of de Lubac is

that too many apologizers of the Church stop at the Church

herself, rather than pointing towards He who the Church

serves as a sacrament. Of course, it is good to preach the

Church. It is good to defend the Church. Especially in

this modern culture when the Church often comes under

attack, she should defend herself. However, the defense

should not end with a proper defense of the Church. “If we

thus speak of the Church and the Church alone, we are not in

fact showing her in her reality—her sacramental reality.”55

This warning goes further than just an apologetic tone

in defense of the Church. De Lubac also warns of a deeper

attack—an interior attack. Here de Lubac is concerned with

nineteenth century philosophies of history, such as those 54 Paul McPartlan, “The Eucharist, the Church and evangelization:

The Influence of Henri de Lubac,” Communio 23 (Wint 1996), 777.


22

offered by Hegel and Comte, which explain that humanity is

on the cusp of a new stage “that will lead to the complete

elimination of the fictitious being”.56 Afterwards, there

will no longer be any need for the kind of dogmatic

development that the Catholic Church offers.

De Lubac’s response is somewhat surprising. He argues

that the Church should not be too quick to protest. His

argument is not out of any sympathy for this philosophy of

history, which he certainly denies. His argument is

practical. The Church should not pretend that any kind of

internal danger does not exist. If there is a lack of

clarity on doctrine, or if there is any internal

inconsistency, then these external attacks can help lead to

internal improvement in guarding the Truth. The danger must

not be exaggerated, but the Church must be on guard against

it.57

Conclusion56 Auguste Comte, Systeme de Politique Positive, vol. ii, p. 108; vol.

iii, p. 455. As quoted in de Lubac, The Splendour of the Church, 136.


23

Antonio Sicari writes that anyone who examines the

writings of de Lubac will observe two dynamics that

intersect throughout all of his works: “the vertical

movement by which the gifts from on high break upon humanity

(‘gifts’ which are, above all, the divine Persons themselves

who welcome us into their Trinitarian intimacy), and a

horizontal movement, spread out in every direction to

recreate bonds between people by overcoming every barrier of

time and space, all possible diversities, and even the very

confines of death.”58

In this concise summary, Sicari has expressed the major

themes in the works of de Lubac. In a vertical movement

humanity knows God as Trinity. The Trinity is not a

movement of diversity, but of unity. In a horizontal

movement humanity comes together in unity as the Church.

The sacramental reality combines both the vertical and

horizontal movements described here. In Catholicism we learn

that the sacraments are not of the individual; instead, they

58 Antonio Sicari, “’Communio’ in Henri de Lubac,” Communio 19 (Fall 1992), 451.

24

are of the Church. Only through participation in the unity

of the Church does one receive the fullness of grace that is

available through the sacraments. This teaching is based

both on biblical teaching, as can be demonstrated from Paul,

and based in church tradition, as we learned from the

Fathers, especially Augustine.

In The Splendour of the Church de Lubac explains that both

the Church and the Eucharist are both the “Mystical Body of

Christ”. The Church produces the Eucharist and the

Eucharist produces the Church. The Mystical Body of Christ

is not some ethereal analogical imagery, but is instead a

real supernatural organism. The Church is a unified body

who becomes visibly signified during the Eucharist

celebration.

The Church herself is in fact a sacrament. The Church

is both a sign of Christ, and a mediator through which we

must pass to be united with that which is signified.

Paradoxically, the Church is both the Body of Christ, with

Christ as the Head, and also the Bride of Christ, who serves

as the Bridegroom. As we have seen previously, Christ is at

25

work in the Church, holding her together in unity, in order

that the Church may unite the entire human race. Therefore

it is the eschatological purpose of the Church to make

Christ present to humanity. And the Church will not fail in

this mission, because it has already been revealed that the

Church will be the Bride come time for the eschatos. Thus de

Lubac has demonstrated the social and eschatological purpose

in his sacramental theology.

In recent years, theologians associated with the

Radical Orthodoxy conversation have identified Henri de

Lubac as one of the forerunners of the post-secular project.

The nouvelle theologie of de Lubac, Yves Conger, and others

worked to retrieve the metaphysics of participation that was

defined by patristic and medieval theologians such as

Augustine and Aquinas. According to John Milbank, de Lubac

“was a greater theological revolutionary than Karl Barth,

because in questioning a hierarchical duality of grace and

nature as discrete stages, he transcended, unlike Barth, the

shared background assumption of all modern theology.”59

59 John Milbank, “The programme of Radical Orthodoxy,” in Radical Orthodoxy? A Catholic Enquiry, ed. Laurence Paul Hemming (Burlington, VT:

26

RO theologians acclaim de Lubac for challenging the

neoscholastic interpretation of Aquinas, and thus

challenging the possibility of a purely natural order. It

certainly follows that RO theologians would congratulate de

Lubac for coming to this conclusion, since they criticize

the univocity of being, as defined by Duns Scotus, for

creating a “new” secular realm separate from the religious.

James Smith notes that the result of Scotus’ theological

supposition is the “unhooking of creation from the Creator

and reason from revelation, carving out an autonomous or

secular realm of both being and thought. In this sense, the

production of ‘the secular’ finds it impetus in late

medieval ontology.”60 So while patristic/medieval

theologians recognized a metaphysics of participation that

linked the immanent to the transcendent, Scotus introduced

an ontology of univocity of being that separated creation

from the Divine, ultimately creating this separate sphere

that resulted in the creation of a secular realm.

Ashgate, 2000), 35.60 James K.A. Smith, Introducing Radical Orthodoxy: Mapping a Post-Secular

Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic Group, 2004), 99.

27

In this paper we have seen two separate ideas put

forward, and I am arguing that these two moves are linked.

First, de Lubac demonstrates in Catholicism and The Splendour of

the Church that ancient theologians recognized a unitive

function in the sacraments. This unity links the

participants with the Divine who is himself represented in

the sacraments. The unity in the sacraments also serves the

purpose of representing the unity that is present within

humanity, who stands together in the imago dei. Secondly, de

Lubac and Radical Orthodoxy theologians posit the

metaphysics of participation, which intrinsically links the

immanent and transcendent, the Divine and humanity. These

two theological premises are in fact themselves unified, in

that one requires the other. They both represent the

assumptions of ancient theologians, before Duns Scotus

introduced the world to the univocity of being. It should

not surprise us then that when Scotus’ theory became en vogue

in catholic theology, that the unitive function within the

sacraments also became “forgotten.” And it is certainly no

accident that with the recovery of Aquinas’ graced nature

28

theology, that this unitive function is also being

“remembered.”

29

WORKS CITED

Augustine. Sermon 71. In Patrologiae cursus completes, series Latina. J.P. Migne. 217 vols. Paris, 1844-1865

De Lubac, Henri. Catholicism: Christ and the Common Destiny of Man. Trans. Lancelot C. Sheppard and Sister Elizabeth Englund. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988.

_____. The Christian Faith. Trans. Brother Richard Arnandez. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1969.

_____. The Motherhood of the Church. Trans. Sr. Sergia Englund. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1971.

_____. The Splendour of the Church. Trans. Michael Mason. Glen Rock, NJ: Deus Books, Paulist Press, 1963.

Doyle, Dennis. “Henri de Lubac and the Roots of Communion Ecclesiology.” Theological Studies 60 (1999). 209-227.

Irenaeus. Adversus Haeresis. Patrologiae cursus completes, series Graeca. J.P. Migne. 162 vols. Paris, 1857-1886.

Macy, Gary. The Theologies of the Salvific Function of the Sacrament according to the Theologians c.1080-c.1220. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984.

Mazza, Enrico. The Celebration of the Eucharist: The Origin of the Rite and the Development of Its Interpretation. Trans. Matthew O’Connell. Collegeville, Minn: Liturgical Press, 1999.

McPartlan, Paul. The Eucharist Makes the Church: Henri de Lubac and John Zizioulas in Dialogue. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1993.

McPartlan, Paul. “The Eucharist, the Church and Evangelization: The Influence of Henri de Lubac.” Communio 23 (Wint 1996): 776-785.

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Milbank, John. “The programme of Radical Orthodoxy.” In Radical Orthodoxy? A Catholic Enquiry, ed. Laurence Paul Hemming, 33-45. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2000.

Pelikan, Jaroslav. The Christian Tradition: The Growth of Medieval Theology (600-1300). Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978.

Sicari, Antonio M. “’Communio’ in Henri de Lubac”. Communio 19 (Fall 1992): 450-464.

Smith, James K.A. Introducing Radical Orthodoxy: Mapping a Post-Secular Theology. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic Group, 2004.

Voderholzer, Rudolf. “Dogma and History: Henri de Lubac andthe Retrieval of Historicity as a Key to Theological Renewal.” Communio 28, no.4 (Wint 2001): 648-668.

Von Balthasar, Hans Urs. The Theology of Henri de Lubac: An Overview. Trans. Joseph Fessio and Michael Waldstein. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1976.

Wood, Susan. Spiritual Exegesis and the Church in the Theology of Henri de Lubac. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998.

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