On Catechizing the Uninstructed 22–27

When, then, five ages of the world had been completed (the first of which is from the beginning of the human race, that is, from Adam, who was made the first man, to Noah, who made the ark at the flood; then the second is to Abraham, who was called the father indeed of all the nations that would imitate his faith, but nonetheless, by the descent of his flesh, of the future people of the Jews, which, before the Christian faith of the nations, was the one people among all the peoples of all lands that worshipped the one true God, the people from whom Christ the Saviour was to come according to the flesh. For these turning points of two ages stand out in the old Books, while those of the other three are declared also in the Gospel, when the fleshly descent of the Lord Jesus Christ is recorded. For the third is from Abraham to King David; the fourth from David to that captivity in which the people of God migrated to Babylonia; the fifth from that migration to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ), from his coming the sixth age is running: so that now the spiritual grace, which was then known to a few patriarchs and prophets, might be made manifest to all nations; so that no one should worship God except freely, desiring from him not visible rewards for his service and the happiness of the present life, but only eternal life, in which he would enjoy God himself; so that in this sixth age the human mind might be renewed to the image of God, as on the sixth day man was made to the image of God. For then the law too is fulfilled, when whatever he commanded is done not from desire for temporal things but from love of him who commanded it. And who would not strive to love in return a most just and most merciful God, who first so loved most unjust and most proud people that for their sake he sent his only Son, through whom he made all things; who, having become man not by any change of himself but by taking on man, could not only live with them but also be killed for them and by them? So, making manifest the new testament of the everlasting inheritance, in which man, renewed by the grace of God, would lead a new life, that is, a spiritual life; so that he might show the old one to be the first, in which a carnal people, acting the old man (except for a few patriarchs and prophets who understood, and some hidden saints), living carnally, desired carnal rewards from the Lord God and received them as a figure of spiritual goods: the Lord Christ, having become man, despised all earthly goods, so as to show that they are to be despised; and endured all earthly evils, which he taught were to be endured; so that happiness should not be sought in the former, nor unhappiness feared in the latter. For, born of a mother who, although she conceived untouched by a man and remained always untouched, a virgin conceiving, a virgin giving birth, a virgin dying, was nonetheless betrothed to a carpenter, he extinguished all the conceit of fleshly nobility. Born, too, in the town of Bethlehem, which among all the towns of Judea was so small that even today it is called a village, he would not have anyone boast of the eminence of any earthly city. He also became poor, to whom all things belong and through whom all things were created, so that no one, when he had believed in him, might dare to be lifted up by earthly riches. He refused to be made king by men, because he was showing the way of humility to the wretched, whom pride had separated from him; although the whole creation bears witness to his everlasting kingdom. He hungered who feeds all; he thirsted through whom all drink is created, and who spiritually is the bread of the hungry and the fountain of the thirsty; he was wearied by an earthly journey who made himself our way to heaven; he became as it were dumb and deaf before his revilers, through whom the dumb spoke and the deaf heard; he was bound who loosed from the bonds of infirmities; he was scourged who drove the scourges of all pains from the bodies of men; he was crucified who ended our torments; he died who raised the dead. But he also rose again, never to die, so that no one might learn from him to despise death as though he would never live again.

Then, having strengthened his disciples, he spent forty days with them and ascended into heaven as they watched; and when fifty days from the resurrection were completed, he sent them the Holy Spirit (for he had promised him), through whom, love being poured out in their hearts, they could fulfil the law not only without burden but even with delight. That law was given to the Jews in ten commandments, which they call the Decalogue. These in turn are reduced to two: that we love God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind; and that we love our neighbour as ourselves. For that on these two commandments hang the whole Law and the Prophets the Lord himself both said in the Gospel and showed by his example. For the people of Israel too, from the day on which they first celebrated the Passover in an image, killing and eating a sheep, with whose blood their doorposts were marked for the protection of their safety, from that very day the fiftieth day was completed, and they received the law written by the finger of God, by which name, as we have already said, the Holy Spirit is signified: just as, after the Lord's passion and resurrection, which is the true Passover, on the fiftieth day the Holy Spirit himself was sent to the disciples; no longer signifying hard hearts by tablets of stone; but, when they were gathered together in one place in Jerusalem itself, suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and there appeared to them tongues divided like fire, and they began to speak in tongues, so that all who had come to them each recognized his own language (for Jews used to gather to that city from every land, wherever they had been scattered, and had learned the various languages of various nations); then, preaching Christ with all boldness, they did many signs in his name, so much so that as Peter passed by, his shadow touched a certain dead man and he rose again. But when the Jews saw such great signs done in the name of him whom they had crucified, partly through envy and partly through error, some were provoked to persecute his preachers, the apostles; but others, wondering all the more at this very thing, that such great miracles were done in the name of him whom they had mocked as crushed and conquered by them, turned in repentance, and thousands of Jews believed in him. These no longer desired temporal benefits and an earthly kingdom from God, nor did they expect the promised king Christ in a carnal way; but understanding immortally, they loved him who for them had borne such great things mortally at their hands, and had forgiven them their sins, even the crime of his own blood, and had shown by the example of his resurrection that immortality is to be hoped for and desired from him. And so, now putting to death the earthly desires of the old man, and burning with the newness of the spiritual life, as the Lord had commanded in the Gospel, they sold all that they had and laid the prices of their goods at the feet of the apostles, so that they might distribute to each as each had need; and living in harmony in Christian love, they did not call anything their own, but they had all things in common, and one soul and one heart toward God. Then they too suffered persecution from the carnal Jews, their fellow citizens according to the flesh, and were scattered, so that Christ might be preached more widely by their dispersion, and that they too might imitate the patience of their Lord; for he who had meekly suffered them commanded them, made meek, to suffer for him. Among these very persecutors of the saints was also the apostle Paul, and he raged most fiercely against the Christians; but afterward, believing and made an apostle, he was sent to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles, suffering worse things for the name of Christ than he had done against the name of Christ. And founding churches throughout all the nations where he sowed the Gospel, he earnestly instructed them that, since they, coming from the worship of idols and unpractised in worshipping the one God, could not easily serve God by selling and distributing their goods, they should make offerings for the poor among the saints who were in the churches of Judea that had believed in Christ: so apostolic teaching established the one as soldiers, and the others as tribute-paying provincials; setting in among them Christ as the cornerstone, as he had been foretold through the prophet, in whom both, like walls coming from different directions, namely from the Jews and from the Gentiles, might be joined by a kindred love. But afterward heavier and more frequent persecutions arose against the Church of Christ from the unbelieving nations, and day by day the word of the Lord was fulfilled, who foretold: Behold, I send you as sheep in the midst of wolves.

But that vine which, as had been prophesied of it and foretold by the Lord himself, was spreading its fruitful branches throughout the world, sprouted the more abundantly the more richly it was watered with the blood of martyrs. As they died beyond number in every land for the truth of the faith, even the persecuting kingdoms themselves gave way and, with the neck of their pride broken, were converted to know and revere Christ. And it was necessary that the same vine, as had been repeatedly foretold by the Lord, should be pruned, and that the unfruitful shoots should be cut off from it, by which heresies and schisms have arisen in various places under the name of Christ, of people seeking not his glory but their own, through whose opposition the Church would be more and more exercised, and its teaching and patience tested and made illustrious. All these things, then, just as we read that they were foretold so long before, so we know that they have been done; and as the first Christians, because they did not yet see these things come to pass, were moved to believe by miracles, so we, because all these things have been fulfilled just as we read them in the Books that were written long before they were fulfilled, in which all were spoken of as future and are now seen as present, are built up to faith, so that, enduring and persevering in the Lord, we may believe without doubt that the things that remain will also come. For the tribulations still to come are read in the same Scriptures, and the last day of judgment itself, when all the citizens of both those cities will rise again, having received their bodies, and will give account of their life before the judgment seat of Christ the judge. For he who first deigned to come in the lowliness of humanity will come in the brightness of power; and he will separate all the godly from the ungodly: not only from those who were altogether unwilling to believe in him, but also from those who believed in him in vain and without fruit; to the one he will give the eternal kingdom with himself, to the other eternal punishment with the devil. But just as no joy in temporal things can be found in any way like the joy of eternal life which the saints will receive, so no torment of temporal punishments can be compared with the everlasting torments of the wicked.

So, brother, strengthen yourself in the name and help of him in whom you believe, against the tongues of those who mock our faith, through whom the devil speaks seductive words, wishing above all to mock faith in the resurrection. But believe from your own case that you will be, after you have been, since you see that you are now, when before you were not. For where was this mass of your body and this form and framework of limbs a few years ago, before you were born, or even before you were conceived in your mother's womb? Where was this mass and this stature of your body? Did it not come forth into the light from the hidden secrets of this creation, the Lord God forming it invisibly, and rise by sure stages of growth to this size and form? Is it then difficult for God, who even gathers banks of clouds out of hiding in a moment and covers the sky in an instant, to restore this bulk of your body as it was, who was able to make it when it was not? Believe, then, firmly and unshakably, that all things which seem to be withdrawn from human eyes as if perishing are safe and whole for the almighty power of God; who, when he wills, will restore them without any delay or difficulty, at least those which his justice judges are to be restored: so that people may give account of their deeds in those bodies in which they did them; and in them may merit either the change to heavenly incorruption for the merits of piety, or a corruptible condition of the body for the merits of iniquity, not one that is dissolved by death but one that provides matter for everlasting pains. Flee, then, by unshaken faith and good conduct, flee, brother, those torments where neither the torturers fail nor the tortured die; for whom it is death without end not to be able to die in their torments. And burn with love and longing for the everlasting life of the saints, where activity will not be toilsome nor rest idle; there will be the praise of God without weariness and without failing; no weariness in the mind, no labour in the body; no need, neither your own, for which you might wish to be helped, nor your neighbour's, which you might hasten to help. God will be all the delight and the fullness of the holy city that lives wisely and blessedly in him and from him. For we shall be made, as we hope and expect from his promise, equal to the angels of God, and together with them we shall enjoy that Trinity, now by sight, in which we now walk by faith. For we believe what we do not see, so that by the very merits of faith we may be found worthy also to see what we believe and to cleave to it; so that the equality of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and the unity of the Trinity itself, how these three are one God, we may no longer sound out in words of faith and noisy syllables, but drink in by most pure and most ardent contemplation in that silence. Hold these things fixed in your heart, and call upon God in whom you believe to protect you against the temptations of the devil; and be on your guard lest that enemy creep up on you from another quarter, who, for the most malicious consolation of his own damnation, seeks others with whom to be damned. For he dares to tempt Christians not only through those who hate the Christian name, and grieve that the world has been taken over by that name, and still desire to serve idols and the curious arts of demons; but he also attempts it through those whom we mentioned a little earlier, cut off from the unity of the Church like a pruned vine, who are called heretics or schismatics; and sometimes he also attempts to tempt and seduce through the Jews. But above all one must beware lest anyone be tempted and deceived through people who are in the Catholic Church itself, whom it bears like chaff until the time of its winnowing. For God is patient toward them for this reason: both to strengthen the faith and prudence of his elect by exercising it through their perversity; and because many from their number make progress and, taking pity on their own souls so as to please God, are converted with great vigour. For not all, through the patience of God, store up for themselves wrath on the day of the wrath of his just judgment; but the same patience of the Almighty leads many to the most wholesome sorrow of repentance. Until that happens, not only the forbearance but also the mercy of those who already keep the right way is exercised through them. So you will see many drunkards, greedy people, cheats, gamblers, adulterers, the sexually immoral, people who bind sacrilegious remedies on themselves, people given over to enchanters and astrologers or diviners of any ungodly arts. You will notice too that the same crowds fill the churches on the festival days of the Christians that fill the theatres on the holidays of the pagans; and seeing this you will be tempted to imitate them. And why should I say you will see what you certainly know already? For you are not unaware that many who are called Christians do all these evils that I have briefly mentioned. And you are not unaware that people whom you know to be called Christians sometimes perhaps do still worse things. But if you have come with this intention, as if to do such things without fear, you are greatly mistaken: nor will the name of Christ profit you when he begins to judge most severely who first deigned to help most mercifully. For he foretold these things and says in the Gospel: Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father. Many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, in your name we ate and drank. For all who persist in such works, then, damnation is the end. So when you see many not only doing these things but also defending and urging them, hold yourself to the law of God and do not follow its transgressors. For you will be judged not according to their opinion but according to his truth. Join yourself to the good, whom you see loving your King with you. For you will find many, if you too begin to be such. For if at the shows you wanted to be with them and cling to those who loved, together with you, a charioteer or a beast fighter or some actor, how much more ought you to delight in union with those who love God with you, of whom his lover will never be ashamed, because not only can he himself not be conquered, but he will also make those who love him unconquerable? And yet you ought not to place your hope even in the good themselves, who go before you or accompany you to God, since you ought not to place it even in yourself, however much you have advanced, but in him who, by justifying them and you, makes you such. For you are secure about God, because he does not change; but about man no one is wisely secure. But if we ought to love those who are not yet righteous so that they may become so, how much more ardently are those to be loved who already are? But it is one thing to love a man, another to place one's hope in a man; and the difference is so great that God commands the one and forbids the other. And if, having suffered some insults or tribulations for the name of Christ, you do not fall away from the faith or turn aside from the good way, you will receive a greater reward; while those who give way to the devil in these things lose even the lesser one. But be humble before God, so that he may not allow you to be tempted beyond your strength.

When this has been said, he is to be asked whether he believes these things and desires to observe them. When he has answered, he is of course to be signed solemnly and treated according to the custom of the Church. As for the sacrament which he receives, when it has been well commended to him, he should be told that the signs of divine things are indeed visible, but that the invisible things themselves are honoured in them; and that that substance, sanctified by the blessing, is not to be regarded as it is regarded in any ordinary use; he should also be told what is signified by the discourse he has heard, and what it seasons in him, of which that thing bears the likeness. Then he is to be advised on this occasion that if he hears anything in the Scriptures that sounds carnal, even if he does not understand it, he should still believe that something spiritual is signified which pertains to holy conduct and the future life. And he learns this briefly in this way: whatever he hears from the canonical Books that he cannot refer to the love of eternity and truth and holiness, and to the love of neighbour, he should believe to have been said or done figuratively; and he should try to understand it so as to refer it to that twofold love. In such a way, of course, that he understands his neighbour not carnally, but as everyone who can be with him in that holy city, whether this is already apparent or not yet; and that he should not despair of the correction of any person whom the patience of God sees living, for no other reason, as the Apostle says, than that he may be led to repentance. If this discourse, in which I have instructed an uninstructed man as though he were present, seems long to you, you may say these things more briefly; but I do not think it ought to be longer; although it makes a great difference what the matter itself suggests when it is being dealt with, and what the presence of the hearers shows that they not only bear but even desire. But when speed is needed, see how easily the whole matter can be set out. Suppose again that someone is present who wishes to be a Christian; then, when questioned, that he has answered as the former one did; for even if he does not answer this, it must be said that he ought to have answered it. Then the rest is to be woven together in this way. “Truly, brother, that is the great and true blessedness which is promised to the saints in the world to come. But all visible things pass away, and all the pomp and delights and curiosity of this world will perish, and they drag their lovers with them to destruction. From this destruction, that is, from everlasting punishments, God in his mercy, wishing to set people free, if they are not enemies to themselves and do not resist the mercy of their Creator, sent his only-begotten Son, that is, his Word, equal to himself, through whom he founded all things. And while remaining in his divinity, and not departing from the Father, nor changed in any way, yet by taking on man and appearing to men in mortal flesh, he came to men: so that, as through one man, who was made first, that is Adam, death entered the human race, because he consented to his wife, who had been seduced by the devil, so that they transgressed God's commandment; so through one man, who is also God, the Son of God, Jesus Christ, all past sins being blotted out, all who believe in him might enter into eternal life.

For all the things that you now see done in the Church of God and under the name of Christ throughout the whole world were foretold ages ago; and as we read them, so we also see them; and from this we are built up in faith. There was once a flood over the whole earth, so that sinners might be destroyed; and yet those who escaped in the ark showed forth the sacrament of the future Church, which now floats on the waves of the world and is delivered from drowning by the wood of the cross of Christ. It was foretold to Abraham, the faithful servant of God, a single man, that from him would be born a people that would worship the one God among the other nations that worshipped idols; and all things that were foretold as coming to that people came to pass as they were foretold. In that people Christ was also prophesied, the King of all the saints and God, to come from the seed of Abraham himself according to the flesh, which he took on, so that all who imitated Abraham's faith might also be children of Abraham; and so it was done: Christ was born of the Virgin Mary, who was of that race. It was foretold through the prophets that he would suffer on the cross at the hands of the same people of the Jews, from whose race he came according to the flesh; and so it was done. It was foretold that he would rise again; he rose again; and according to the very predictions of the prophets he ascended into heaven and sent the Holy Spirit to his disciples. It was foretold not only by the prophets but also by the Lord Jesus Christ himself that his Church would spread throughout the whole world, scattered by the martyrdoms and sufferings of the saints; and it was foretold at a time when his name was still unknown to the nations and was mocked where it was known; and yet, by the mighty works of his miracles, whether those he did himself or those he did through his servants, as these are proclaimed and believed, we now see that what was foretold has been fulfilled, and the very kings of the earth, who before persecuted Christians, are now subjected to the name of Christ. It was also foretold that schisms and heresies would go out from his Church, and under his name, in whatever places they could, would seek their own glory, not Christ's; and these things have been fulfilled. Will the things that remain, then, not come? It is plain that, as these foretold things have come, so those too will come: whatever tribulations of the righteous still remain; and the day of judgment, which will separate all the ungodly from the righteous in the resurrection of the dead; and he will set apart for the fire they deserve not only those who are outside the Church, but also the chaff of the Church itself, which it must bear with great patience until the final winnowing. Those who mock the resurrection, thinking that this flesh cannot rise because it rots, will rise in it to punishment; and God will show them that he who could make these bodies before they existed can restore them in a moment as they were. But all the faithful who are to reign with Christ will rise in the same body in such a way that they will also be found worthy to be changed to angelic incorruption; so that they become equal to the angels of God, as the Lord himself promised; and praise him without any failing and without any weariness, living for ever in him and from him, with such joy and blessedness as can neither be spoken nor conceived by man. You, then, believing these things, beware of temptations (because the devil seeks others to perish with him): so that that enemy may not lead you astray, not only through those who are outside the Church, whether pagans, or Jews, or heretics; but also, those whom you see in the Catholic Church itself living evil lives, either immoderate in the pleasures of the belly and the throat, or unchaste, or given to empty curiosities or unlawful ones, whether of the shows, or of remedies, or of devilish divinations, or living in the pomp and conceit of greed and pride, or in any life that the law condemns and punishes, do not imitate them; but rather join yourself to the good, whom you will find easily if you too are such; so that together you may worship and love God freely: for he himself will be our whole reward, so that in that life we may enjoy his goodness and beauty. But he is to be loved not as something seen by the eyes, but as wisdom is loved, and truth, and holiness, and justice, and love, and whatever else is so called: not as these things are in men, but as they are in the very fountain of incorruptible and unchangeable wisdom. Whomever, then, you see loving these things, join yourself to them, so that through Christ, who became man that he might be the Mediator between God and men, you may be reconciled to God. But as for perverse people, even if they enter the walls of the church, do not think that they will enter the kingdom of heaven; for in their own time they will be separated, if they do not change for the better. So imitate good people, bear with the bad, love all; since you do not know what he who is bad today will be tomorrow. And do not love their unrighteousness; but love them for this purpose, that they may lay hold of righteousness: for not only the love of God has been commanded us, but also the love of neighbour, on which two commandments hang the whole Law and the Prophets. And no one fulfils it except one who has received the gift of the Holy Spirit, who is certainly equal to the Father and the Son; for the Trinity itself is God: and in this God all hope is to be placed. It is not to be placed in man, of whatever kind he may be. For he by whom we are justified is one thing, those with whom we are justified are another. And the devil tempts not only through desires, but also through the terrors of insults and pains and death itself. But whatever a man suffers for the name of Christ and for the hope of eternal life, and endures persevering, a greater reward will be given him; but if he yields to the devil, he will be condemned with him. But works of mercy, with devout humility, obtain from the Lord that he does not allow his servants to be tempted more than they can bear.”