SACRAMENTS
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SACRAMENTS
authoritativo, innate power. As man He had another
power which St. Thomas calls "the power of the prin-
cipal ministry" or "the power of excellence" (III,
Q. Ixiv, a. 3). "Christ produced the interior effects
of the sacraments by meriting them and by effecting
them. . . . The passion of Christ is the cause of our
justification meritoriously and effectively, not as the
principal agent and authoritatively, but as an instru-
ment, inasmuch as His Humanity was the instru-
ment of His Divinity" (ibid.; of. Ill, Q. xiii, aa. 1, 3).
There is theological truth as well as piety in the old
maxim: "From the side of Christ dying on the cross
flowed the sacraments by which the Church was
eaved" (Gloss. Ord. in Rom. 5; St. Thomas, III, Q.
Ixii, a. 5). The principal efficient cause of grace is
God, to Whom the Humanity of Christ is as a con-
joined instrument, the sacraments being instruments
not joined to the Divinity (by hypostatic union):
therefore the saving power of the sacraments passes
from the Divinity of Christ, through His Humanity
into the sacraments (St. Thomas, loc. cit.). One who
weighs well all these words will understand why Catho-
lics have great reverence for the sacraments. Christ's
power of excellence consists in four things: (1) Sacra-
ments have their efficacy from His merits and suffer-
ings; (2) they are sanctified and they sanctify in His
name; (3) He could and He did institute the sacra-
ments; (4) He could produce the effects of the sacra-
ments without the external ceremony (St. Thomas,
Q. Ixiv, a. 3). Christ could have communicated this
power of excellence to men: this was not absolutely
impos.sible (ibid., a. 4). But, (1) had He done so
men could not have possessed it with the same per-
fection as Christ: "He would have remained the head
of the Church principally, others secondarily" (ibid.,
ad 3). (2) Christ did not communicate this power,
and this for the good of the faithful: (a) that they
might place their hope in God and not in men; (b)
that there might not be different sacraments, giving
ri.se to divisions in the Church (ibid., ad 1). This
second reason is mentioned by St. Paul (I Cor., i,
12, 13): "every one of you saith: I indeed am of
Paul; and I am of Apollo; and I of Cephas; and
I of Christ. Is Christ divided? Was Paul then
crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of
Paul? "
(3) Immediate or Mediate Institution. — The Coun- cil of Trent did not define explicitly and formally that all the sacraments were instituted immediately by Christ. Before the council great theologians, e. g. Peter Lombard (IV Sent., d. xxiii), Hugh of St. Victor (De sac, II, ii), Alexander of Hales (Summa, IV, Q. xxiv, 1) held that some sacraments were instituted by the Apostles, using power that had been given to them by Jesus Chri.st. Doubts were raised especially about confirmation and extreme unction. St. Thomas re- jects the opinion that confirmation was instituted by the Apostles. It was instituted by Christ, he holds, when he promised to send the Paraclete, although it was never administered whilst He was on earth, be- cause the fullness of the Holy Ghost was not to be given until after the Ascension: "Christus instituit hoc sacramentum, non exhibendo, sed promittendo" (III, Q. Ixii, a. 1, ad lum). The Council of Trent defined that the sacrament of Ex-treme Unction was instituted by Christ and promulgated by St. James (Sess. XIV, can. i). Some theologians, e. g. Becanus, Bellarmine, Vasquez, Gonet, etc. thought the words of the council (Sess. VII, can. i) were ex-plicit enough to make the immediate institution of all the sacra- ments by Christ a matter of defined faith. They are opposed by Soto (a theologian of the council), Estius, Gotti, Toumely, Berti, and a host of others, so that now nearly all theologians unite in saying: it is theo- logically certain, but not defined {de fide) that Christ immediately instituted all the sacraments of the New Law. In the Decree "Lamentabili", 3 July, 1907,
Pius X condemned twelve propositions of the Mod-
ernists, who would attribute the origin of the sacra-
ments to some species of evolution or development.
The first sweeping proposition is this: "The sacra-
ments had their origin in this that the Apostles, per-
suaded and moved by circumstances and events,
interpreted some idea and intention of Christ" (Den-
zinger-Bannwart, 2040). Then follow eleven proposi-
tions relating to each of the sacraments in order (ibid.,
2041-51). These propositions deny that Christ im-
mediately instituted the sacraments, and some seem
to deny even their mediate institution by the Saviour.
(4) What does Immediate Institution Imply f Poiver of the Church. — Granting that Christ immedi- ately instituted all the sacraments, it does not neces- sarily follow that personally He determined all the details of the sacred ceremony, prescribing minutely every iota relating to the matter and the form to be used. It is sufficient (even for immediate institution) to say: Christ determined what special graces were to be conferred by means of external rites: for some sacraments (e. g. baptism, the Eucharist) He deter- mined minutely (in specie) the matter and form: for others He determined only in a general way (in ge- nere) that there should be an external ceremony, by which special graces were to be conferred, leaving to the Apostles or to the Church the power to determine whatever He had not determined, e. g. to prescribe the matter and form of the Sacraments of Confirma- tion and Holy Orders. The Council of Trent (Sess. XXI, cap. ii) declared that the Church had not the power to change the "sub.stance" of the sacraments. She would not be claiming power to alter the substance of the sacraments if she used her Divinely given au- thority to determine more precisely the matter and form in so far as they had not been determined by Christ. This theory (which is not modern) had been adopted by theologians: by it we can solve historical difficulties relating, principally, to confirmation and Holy orders.
(5) May we then say that Christ in.stituted some sacraments in an implicit state? That Christ was satisfied to lay down the essential principles from which, after a more or less protracted development, would come forth the fully developed sacraments? This is an application of Newman's theory of develop- ment, according to Pourrat (op. cit., p. 300), who pro- poses two other formuhe; Christ instituted all the sac- raments immediately, but did not himself give them all to the Church fully constituted; or Jesus instituted immediately and explicitly baptism and Holy Euchar- ist: He instituted immediately but implicitly the five other sacraments (loc. cit., p. 301). Pourrat himself thinks the latter formula too absolute. Theologians probably will consider it rather dangerous, and at least ' ' male sonans " . If it be taken to mean more than the old expression, Christ determined in genere only the matter and the form of some sacraments, it grants too much to development. If it means nothing more than the expression hitherto in use, what is gained by admitting a formula which easily might be mis- understood?
IV. Number of the Sacraments. (I) Catho- lic Doctrine: Eastern and Western Churches. — The Council of Trent solemnly defined that there are seven sacraments of the New Law, truly and properly so called, viz., baptism, confirmation. Holy Eucharist, penance, extreme unction, orders, and matrimony. The same enumeration had been made in the Decree for the Armenians by the Council of Florence (1439), in the Profession of Faith of Michael Palieologus, of- fered to Gregory X in the Council of Lyons (1274) and in the council held at London, in 1237, under Otto, legate of the Holy See. According to some writers Otto of Bamberg (1139), the Apostle of Pome- ran ia, was the first who clearly adopted the number seven (see Tanquerey, "De sacr."). Most probably
