SACRAMENTS OF THE INCARNATE WORD - ETD - University of ...

Similar to the prologue and first article of the Summa, Thomas here emphasizes
the urgent need by the faithful of knowledge of God’s saving revelation, borne by
teachers in the Church. Where ST I 1, 6, however, only gestures at “experience of divine
things”—also in a Corinthian key, with reference to the “spiritual person” (2.15)—
Thomas here specifies the primacy of the sacraments for human salvation, following
Paul’s understanding of Baptism and the Eucharist as means of sanctifying grace. “To the
church of God that is in Corinth,” begins the Apostle, “to those who are sanctified in
Christ Jesus” (I Cor 1.2), and Thomas adds: “in the faith, passion, and sacraments” of
Christ, citing the similar but more specific I Corinthians 6.11: “You were washed, you
have been sanctified,” as well as Hebrews 13.12: “Jesus suffered outside the gate, in
order to sanctify the people through his own blood.” 103 To be washed in Christ’s blood is
to receive a “call to be saints,” as Paul says, a call to join with all those “who in every
desperationem labi possent, sicut de quibusdam dicitur Sap 2.22 quod nescierunt sacramenta Dei, nec
speraverunt mercedem iustitiae, quia per sacramenta homines purificantur, ut sint praeparati ad
recipiendum mercedem iustitiae. Tertio quia hoc pertinet ad debitum officium praelati vel doctoris,
secundum illud Eph 3.8: mihi omnium sanctorum minimo data est gratia haec, illuminare omnes quae sit
dispensatio sacramenti absconditi a saeculis in Deo.”
102 Ibid., n. 2: “Sic ergo praedicta verba [viz. Wis 6.22] demonstrant nobis materiam huius
epistolae, in qua apostolus agit de sacramentis Ecclesiae. Cum enim in epistola ad Romanos gratiam Dei
commendasset, quae in sacramentis Ecclesiae operatur: hic, scilicet in prima epistola ad Corinthios, de ipsis
Ecclesiae sacramentis agit; in secunda vero de ministris sacramentorum.” Cf. likewise the general prologue
to the Pauline commentary, preceding the lectura on Romans: “ipsa gratia Christi... potest considerari...
secundum quod est in sacramentis gratiae et sic commendatur in duabus epistolis ad Corinthios, in quarum
prima agitur de ipsis sacramentis” (n. 11).
103 Ibid. 1.2, n. 7: “Secundo ex munere gratiae, cum dicit sanctificatis in Christo Iesu, id est, in
fide, passione et sacramento Christi Iesu. Infra 6.11: sed abluti estis, sed sanctificati estis. Heb ult.: Iesus ut
sanctificaret per suum sanguinem populum, extra portam passus est.” Cf. the elaborations at ibid. 3.17, n.
175: “in Christ’s faithful is the holiness of grace, which they acquired at baptism” (quoting I Cor 6.11) and
ibid. 6.11, n. 287: “by the power of Christ’s blood in baptism, as it says in Revelation 1.5: ‘He freed us
from our sins in his blood.’”
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