A Leap Forward in Understanding Subsistit in

The Sacramental Dimension of the Church in the Ecumenical Dialogue

This irreversible stand of the Catholic Church on ecumenism is well expressed in the documents of the bilateral dialogues that the Catholic Church has had with various Christian churches and ecclesial communities over the past 40 years. First came the dialogues with Lutheran, Anglican, and Orthodox churches separated from Rome. ⁴ The fundamental ecclesiological idea, expressed in these ecumenical documents, is that the Church is as a sign and instrument of Christ’s presence in the world. The church is sacrament of the Kingdom of God. ⁵ Catholics, Lutherans, and Anglicans recognize that the church embodies the communion that humanity has with God and with every human being. ⁶

The Dogmatic Constitution Lumen gentium no. 1, declares ‘the church is in Christ like a sacrament or as a sign and instrument both of a very closely knit union with God and of the unity of the whole human race.’ The Catholic sacramental vision of the church understands the church of Christ as a concrete and permanent institutional structure in which the episcopal ministry, the collegiality and the Petrine primacy are essential elements. The church is a society of communion, whose innermost reality is the union between God and humanity and is well expressed in its institutional visibility. Each local church ‘re-presents’ the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church. Both the Orthodox churches, separated from Rome, and the churches of the Reformation, ecumenically emphasize the role of the local church. The fundamental problem in ecumenical dialogue is how to understand the relationship between the local church and the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church, between the particular church and the universal church. The distinction between ‘local’ and ‘particular’ depends on the degree of communion with the see of Rome as it is in the case of the Orthodox churches, in which the essential elements of the Catholic Church (apostolic succession, ordained ministry, and Eucharist) are present. Only particular churches can be called ‘sister’ churches, whereas ‘local’ is a more generic term and can be ascribed to all other churches. The church of or in Rome, not to be identified with the (Roman) Catholic Church, must be considered particular, and therefore ‘sister’ of all other particular churches, including the Orthodox churches, whereas the Catholic Church, the universal church, is not the sister church but rather ‘mother’ church of all particular or group of churches. ‘In fact, there is but a single Church, and therefore the plural term Churches can refer only to particular Churches.’ ⁷

For Protestants, the church is fully and effectively present in each local community. Here the word of God is preached and the sacraments are duly administered, as it is affirmed in the Augsburg Confession, art. VII. These two elements are sufficient (satis est) in order to identify the church of Christ. For the Orthodox churches, the local church (diocese) by celebrating the Eucharist fully represents the universal church. ⁸ For Catholics, however, the church of Christ is fully but not completely realized in the local church. By declaring that the church of Christ subsists in the Catholic Church, the Catholic vision is that the local church is concretely, fully, permanently and effectively realized only when it is in communion with the successor of Peter. The unity and communion between the local churches and the church of Rome is not an external but an internal element for the sacramental understanding of the unity and essence of the local church. ‘The evidence of this truth can be seen in the mention of the name of the diocesan bishop and the bishop of Rome in the Eucharistic Prayer in memento Ecclesiae.’ ⁹ According to the CDF, the Petrine primacy is not a mere ecclesiological addition to the local church or an external and legal decoration. The celebration of the Eucharist is a sign of communion and is validly celebrated when such sacramental visibility of union between the local church, the communion of churches, and the church of Rome is expressed. ‘In fact, the unity of the church is also rooted in the unity of the Episcopate. […] The unity of the Episcopate involves the existence of a Bishop who is Head of the Body or College of Bishops, namely the Roman Pontiff (12).’ ¹⁰

The individual bishop is rooted in the apostolic succession only when he is incorporated in the episcopal collegiality; the college of bishops is in apostolic succession, never without the bishop of the prima sedes. No local church can isolate itself from the one and only church; every church is the presence of the catholica ecclesia when it is in communion with the other local churches and the see of Rome. Whether by the ‘one church’ is to be understood immediately the church of Rome or rather the universal church has been the focus of debate between Ratzinger and Walter Kasper. ¹¹ According to Ratzinger there is an ontological and temporal priority of the universal church over the particular churches,whereas, according to Kasper the two aspects of the church of Christ, universal and particular, should be seen in reciprocal and simultaneous relationship. Such debate reveals the truth of what Lumen gentium states at no. 8: that the church ‘forms one complex reality’ made up of a divine and human element. These components correspond to an external visible structure (order) and its hidden spiritual reality (grace). The first is a particular and the second a universal aspect.

The complexity of the church recalls the reality of the hypostatic union of Christ. Lumen gentium no. 8 also declares that there is a strong analogy (non mediocrem analogiam) between the Incarnate Word and the church. At the same time the Dogmatic Constitution recognizes that the Catholic Church, governed by the Pope as its visible head and the bishops as successors of the apostles, is not the continuation of the incarnation as such, a kind of Christus prolungatus, as Johann Adam Möhler affirmed in his ecclesiology. Indeed, the Council strongly distanced itself from the conception of the church as a continuation of the incarnation. ¹² Instead of identification, the Second Vatican Council preferred to speak of analogy between the theandric dimension of the incarnation and the nature of the church. The Word is to human nature (incarnation) what the Spirit of Christ is to the societal dimension of the church.

As the Word of God used the humanity of this Jesus, so the Spirit of Christ uses the particular reality of the Catholic Church. The Council, however, could not but recognize ecclesial elements outside the visible institution of the Catholic Church: ‘many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside of its visible structure. These elements, as gifts belonging to the church of Christ, are forces impelling toward catholic unity’ (Lumen gentium no. 8). According to Salvador Pié-Ninot, the Council Fathers were aware that ‘outside the Catholic Church there are forms of holiness that lead to martyrdom […]: therefore, the question of the salvation of non-Catholics cannot be resolved just by invoking the individual dimension of the votum (the subjective desire) as Mystici corporis suggests. […] The Roman Catholic Church is aware of the active presence of the one church of Christ in the other churches and ecclesial communities, although they are not in full communion with it; hence there’s a need to establish with these churches and ecclesial communities a relationship of dialogue.’ ¹³

The Decree on Ecumenism, Unitatis redintegratio no. 3, declares that ‘the separated churches and communities as such, though we believe them to be deficient in some respects, have been by no means deprived of significance and importance in the mystery of salvation. For the Spirit of Christ has not refrained from using them as means of salvation which derive their efficacy from the very fullness of grace and truth entrusted to the church.’ In the churches and ecclesial communities separated from Rome, the church of Christ is present and active, and Christ uses these ecclesial realities as means of salvation. It is good to remember that the distinction between ‘churches’ and ‘ecclesial communities’ was introduced during the Council with the primary intent of respecting the self-consciousness of those Christian bodies, which did not wish to be called ‘churches.’ ¹⁴ During the 70th session of the Council, Cardinal Franz König explicitly proposed to define these Christian bodies not merely as ‘communities’ but ‘ecclesial communities’ because they are not simply sociological entities, but essentially defined by their being ‘church.’ ¹⁵ Only later was the term ‘churches’ used to mean those bodies that have more of the essential elements of the Catholic Church (apostolic succession, ordained ministry, and Eucharist) and the term ‘ecclesial communities’ those bodies with fewer elements. ¹⁶ The Catholic Church formally recognizes as ‘churches’ of a nature similar to its own particular churches the Orthodox churches separated from full communion with Rome, and some Western churches not in communion with Rome. The Old Catholic Churches and the Anglican Communion fall into this category. ¹⁷ Paul VI described the latter as ‘our beloved sister church,’ during the visit of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Michael Ramsey, to Rome in 1966.

During the work of the Council many bishops realized that the Spirit of Christ is present and active beyond the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church. In other churches and ecclesial communities the written word of God is preached. There is a life of grace and the sign of martyrdom. Faith, hope, and charity, and other interior gifts of the Holy Spirit are alive and effective. Even visible elements, like baptism, Eucharist, and ordained ministry, and synodal and episcopal collegiality can be found.

Therefore, it became clear to the fathers of the Council that they needed to acknowledge clearly the ecclesial elements beyond the Catholic Church. In one of the sessions of the second period of the Council (25–26 November 1963), the Plenary Commission de fide et moribus examined the revised text of the first chapter of the Constitution de ecclesia. ¹⁸ During these sessions the previous terminological change from est to invenire, and adesse was completed to subsistere. The intent of the Commission was motivated by the ‘awareness of the importance to avoid a description of the relationship between the universal church of Christ and the Catholic Church in terms of exclusivity.’ ¹⁹ The report of the Commission explains that in the communities outside the Catholic Church ‘the only church of Christ is present, albeit imperfectly, in a way that is somewhat similar to his presence in the particular churches, and in them the church of Christ is somehow working through the means of their ecclesial elements.’ ²⁰ With this statement, the Second Vatican Council wanted ‘to harmonize two doctrinal statements: on the one hand, that the church of Christ, despite the divisions which exist among Christians, continues to exist fully only in the Catholic Church, and on the other hand, that “outside of her structure, many elements can be found of sanctification and truth,” that is, in those churches and ecclesial communities which are not yet in full communion with the Catholic Church.’ ²¹

The Dogmatic Constitution Lumen gentium no. 8 and the Decree on Ecumenism no. 4 thereby accomplished a major change in Catholic ecclesiological understanding, if we compare it with Mystici corporis. Kasper underlines such a substantial move, from est to subsistit, as follows: ‘No more is it said: the Catholic Church is the church of Christ, but in a more cautious way it is stated that the church of Jesus Christ subsists in the Catholic Church. The church of Christ actually is there, present and realized. So you can say that outside the visible borders of the Catholic Church there are not only individual Christians but also elements of the church of Christ. These are not only weak elements: they are fragments that dynamically lead to the fullness and unity.’ ²² It represents not only a change in terminology. It is a shift in the way the relationship between the church of Christ and the Catholic Church is understood; this change acknowledges the ecclesiological relevance of the churches and ecclesial communities existing outside the Catholic Church. According to Cardinal Karl Lehmann the change from est to subsistit in ‘is intimately linked to, and should be read in the light of the statements on the elements of the church.’ ²³ The presence of elementa ecclesiae outside the visible structure of the Catholic Church qualifies these realities as churches and ecclesial communities. Where more elementa ecclesiae are present, the greater is the realization of the church of Christ.

In order to interpret theologically and consistently the meaning of ‘subsistit,’ it is important to conflate in this Latin expression two terms: historical continuity and full presence. Both denotations identify the word subsistit. In the Orthodox churches the church of Christ ‘continues to exist,’ but since in them it is not fully present, one cannot say that the church of Christ subsists in the Orthodox churches. The only place where such consistency seems to fail can be found in the Decree on Ecumenism no. 13 where it is said that in the Anglican Communion Catholic traditions and institutions continue in part to subsist (ex parte subsistere). ²⁴ However the subject of the subsisting—in this case—is not the church of Christ but Catholic elements.

In the Responses to Some Questions Regarding Certain Aspects of the Doctrine on the Church, the CDF pointed out that ‘the word “subsists” can only be attributed to the Catholic Church alone precisely because it refers to the mark of unity that we profess in the symbols of the faith (I believe … in the “one” church); and this “one” church subsists in the Catholic Church.’ ²⁵ In the Catholic Church the unity of the church of Christ (one, holy, catholic and apostolic church) is fulfilled by the presence of the element of the Petrine ministry. In the other churches and ecclesial communities such a unity is imperfectly and partially present. In them is realized the presence of the church of Christ only by degrees. We find here the ecclesiological model of concentric circles used by Lumen gentium nos 14–16.

The churches and ecclesial communities, in which the church of Christ is effectively present with various elements of sanctification and of truth, can be recognized as means of salvation, because in them—as Ratzinger said—the church ‘occurs.’ ²⁶ In his essay on ecclesiology, The New People of God, Ratzinger invites Catholic theologians to recognize the actual presence of the Word of God outside the visible confines of the Catholic Church, because ‘in these churches and ecclesial communities there is “the church” in some form, and the borders of the action of the Holy Spirit are not identical with those of the visible church.’ ²⁷ We find the same pattern of understanding in the encyclical on ecumenism of Pope John Paul II, Ut unum sint. In no. 11 it is stated: ‘The elements of sanctification and truth present in the other Christian Communities, in a degree which varies from one to the other, constitute the objective basis of the communion, albeit imperfect, which exists between them and the Catholic Church. To the extent that these elements are found in other Christian communities, the one church of Christ is effectively present in them. For this reason the Second Vatican Council speaks of a certain, though imperfect communion.’

According to Francis Sullivan, the church of Christ is not exhausted in the visible and institutional boundaries of the Catholic Church, but it is ‘realized by different degrees of density and fullness, in bodies that all have a true ecclesial character, although some more fully than others.’ ²⁸ These bodies are true ‘churches’ and not merely sociological groups with accidental ecclesial features. Therefore, they re-present the church of Christ, though not fully.

Churches and Ecclesial Communities

The ecclesiological shift which occurred in Vatican II, dealing with the ecclesial realities outside the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church, has brought a different understanding of the presence of the church of Christ: from the fullness in the Catholic Church to the different degrees of its presence (gradual presence) in the other churches and ecclesial communities.

The Catholic Church differs from the Orthodox churches because though the latter possess both apostolic succession and collegiality, they lack communion with the Bishop of Rome and Successor of Peter. Even greater is the difference between the Catholic Church and the ecclesial communities born with the Reformation because they lack not only the Petrine ministry but also the apostolic succession and collegiality. Therefore they have no valid Eucharist. Both documents of the CDF, Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on Some Aspects of the Church Understood as Communion and Responses to Some Questions Regarding Certain Aspects of the Doctrine on the Church, restate that not only episcopal succession and collegiality are essential and constitutive factors for a church to fully be considered a church but also the requirement of the communion with the Bishop of Rome. ‘The communion with the universal church, represented by Peter’s Successor, is not an external complement to the particular church, but one of its internal constituents, the situation of those venerable Christian communities also means that their existence as particular churches is wounded. The wound is even deeper in those ecclesial communities which have not retained the apostolic succession and a valid Eucharist.’ ²⁹

If all these three elements (Petrine ministry, apostolic succession, and episcopal collegiality) are intrinsically and essentially related one to the other, and necessary in order to have what we properly call ‘church,’ the lack of one or more of these makes it impossible for an ecclesial reality to be recognized as ‘church.’ If the mutual interiority between universal church and a particular church defines the nature of an ecclesial reality, and this mutual interiority is not some external complement to a particular church but rather one of its internal constitutive principles, then how can we still consider and recognize the Orthodox churches as ‘churches,’ when they are separated from the Roman See? How can the declaration of the CDF Dominus Iesus declare that these Orthodox churches ‘are explicitly true particular churches’? How can the fourth answer given by the CDF to Some Aspects Regarding the Doctrine on the Church call them ‘particular churches’ and ‘sister churches of the particular Catholic Churches’ if they lack one of the essential attributes of the ‘esse ecclesiae’? ³⁰

One might say that such inconsistency could be overcome if we keep in mind that the episcopacy is ‘one and indivisible.’ The lack of an explicit recognition of the head of the collegium does not deny an ‘implicit’ link with the Successor of Peter as its head. However, if they lack full communion with the Roman Pontiff, these churches are more than diminished in their visible and sacramental expression, since the Petrine ministry ensures the unity of the episcopate, which is essential for a valid Eucharist. ‘The Episcopate is one, just as the Eucharist is one: the one Sacrifice of the one Christ, dead and risen. The liturgy expresses this reality in various ways, showing, for example, that every celebration of the Eucharist is performed in union not only with the proper Bishop, but also with the Pope, with the episcopal order, with all the clergy, and with the entire people. Every valid celebration of the Eucharist expresses this universal communion with Peter and with the whole church, or objectively calls for it, as in the case of the Christian churches separated from Rome.’ ³¹ Invoking the unity and indivisibility of the episcopate, therefore, does not solve the question of ecclesiology for Orthodox churches. Stating that these churches do not want to deny explicitly the head of the episcopate, that is the bishop of Rome, but only reject those prerogatives that the Catholic Church has defined during the second millennium, it remains true that the episcopate of these Orthodox churches, separated from Rome, is deficient and these churches cannot be recognized as particular churches.

Such inconsistency is even more evident when we look at the Assyrian church of the East, with which John Paul II signed a Common Christological Declaration in 1994 in which the Catholic and the Assyrian churches can recognize each other as sister Churches. ³² We should keep in mind that the Assyrian church of the East does not have the same canon of Scripture nor the same seven sacraments. Most importantly, until 2001 their Eucharist was considered dubious because of a defectus formae in the Anaphora Addai and Mari. According to the analysis of Hervé Legrand ‘this church must be considered in a situation similar to the churches born with the Reformation.’ ³³ Yet these deficiencies do not deprive the Assyrian church of true sacraments, since they enjoy a valid apostolic succession, although lacking the Petrine ministry. However, if the Petrine ministry is constitutive and essential in order that a particular church may be inserted into the universal church, can we consider such deficiency (defectus) only as a ‘wound,’ or is it more an ‘absence’ (privatio)? The ecclesiological structure of the college of bishops and the Petrine ministry are not purely external, historically or socially useful, but express the mutual interiority between the universal church (the church of Christ) and the particular church.

The lack of just one of the necessary and essential elements for the ‘esse ecclesiae’ does alter, and not simply wound the ecclesial status of a church. The document of the CDF, Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on Some Aspects of the Church Understood as Communion n. 13, states that the church is ‘fully’ church, when there is the ‘presence of the universal Church with all its essential elements.’ The same position is found in Dominus Iesus no. 17 and in Ut unum sint no.14. Both documents declare that ‘the elements of this already-given church exist, found in their fullness in the Catholic Church and, without this fullness, in the other Communities.’ In the Orthodox churches separated from Rome there is no such fullness of the means of salvation. Certainly they possess a greater presence of them (apostolic succession and episcopal collegiality) than the churches of the Reformation, since these latter have none of these elements. For this very reason the Orthodox churches can be called ‘churches,’ whereas the communities of the Reformation cannot be called ‘church’ in proper sense. ³⁴ If they lack the Petrine ministry, however, which is ‘an internal and constitutive principle,’ an element belonging from within (and not from without) to the essence of each particular church, how can the Orthodox churches still be called ‘churches’? How can such inconsistency be overcome? We may have a solution, by saying that the Petrine ministry is essential to the fullness (plene esse) and not to the essence (esse) of the church. Only then can the Orthodox churches separated from Rome be recognized as churches, even if not fully, since they are in an imperfect union with the Catholic Church.

What we affirm of the Petrine ministry can also be applied to the other essential and constitutive elements of the church: apostolic succession and episcopal collegiality. The lack of these elements in the ecclesial communities of the Reformation does not alter their being-church (esse ecclesiae). The documents already mentioned from the CDF are right to say that the lack of these elements deeply wounds these ecclesial communities in their communion with the Catholic Church, but it cannot be said that they are not ‘churches.’ Kasper pointed out that these ecclesial communities, because in them the church of Christ is active and present, must be defined as ‘true and real churches.’ ³⁵ They are ‘churches’ in an analogical sense. ³⁶ But if we keep on saying, as Kasper also does, that these are ‘churches of another type, which lack from the Catholic standpoint of view essential elements of the Church,’ the same can be said also of the Orthodox churches which lack the Petrine ministry which is essential for any particular church.

An ecclesiology of the elements of the church, then, must pay attention to the gradual realization of the church of Christ. The first stage of realization is the communication of the faith: the event of the communicatio evangelii. ³⁷ The kerygma is the nexus between God’s self-communication and the historical and communal experience of the Risen Lord (ecclesiogenesis). If the church-event depends on the communication of faith, there may be different forms by which this event is realized. The church of Christ is actively present in the preaching of the Good News, although in an implicit and embryonic form. Whenever and wherever the Gospel is preached, the church of Christ is present: ‘the communicative act of faith is theologically first, since it is the event by which the church is built up and by which is realized the relation of the church with others.’ ³⁸

The beginnings of the Catholic Church in Korea are a clear example of this gradual realization of the church of Christ. A layperson, Yi Seung-hun, baptized by a Jesuit missionary, built up a Catholic community there in the mid-1780s. For more than 50 years this community lived as a church, even though no ordained ministry and hierarchical bonds were established. Only after the killing of more than 300 people of this community (among them Yi Seung-hun) was the Catholic hierarchy established with the ordination to the priesthood of Kim Tae-gon Andrew, from a family of Catholics that had suffered in the persecutions. ³⁹

If the communication of faith constitutes the church and its hallmark is the sacrament of baptism, we may say that the beginning of the institutional dimension of the church of Christ is baptism. ‘Baptism makes possible a communion (although imperfect), that unites churches among themselves in a fundamental reality (the baptized members as Body of Christ). There is already a communion grounded in baptism, which does not represent a full ecclesial communion, but signifies a real participation in the Body of Christ.’ ⁴⁰ The Decree on Ecumenism n. 3 declares that the ecclesial communities are a means of salvation. That is, they are ‘sign and instrument of the intimate union with God for all humanity’ (cf Lumen gentium, n. 1).

The communication of the faith, however, is only causa fiendi of the church, not its causa essendi. ‘It is the church that celebrates the baptism and when she does that, the faith of the whole church is expressed, and not the faith of just that person who is baptized. The church is not generated by the fact that people gather to form a church. We do not enter into the church through baptism; rather we are welcomed into the church as a pre-existing reality of salvation.’ ⁴¹ Baptism does not generate the church of Christ, but incorporates us into it. Through the other sacraments, especially the Eucharist, a greater participation in the church of Christ is realized. The fullness of the elementa ecclesiae (baptism, Eucharist, ordained ministry, apostolic succession, collegiality, and Petrine ministry) is to be found in the Catholic Church. Furthermore, in such a hierarchical understanding of the means of salvation, the fullness can be realized only once. Therefore, if the Catholic Church has been endowed with all means of grace, it follows that the church of Christ subsists in the Catholic Church, because in it the church of Christ is fully present, although the church of Christ is present by degrees in other churches. ‘The Catholic Church is convinced that in it the fullness of all means of salvation is present. Only in it the church of Jesus Christ subsists in a lasting way.’ ⁴²

An essential distinction must be made, therefore, between the ontological and the phenomenological dimensions of the church. From the ontological perspective, there is no gradual or differentiation of the church of Christ. Wherever the church of Christ is present and active, the Spirit of Christ is effective at work and uses Christian communities as a means of salvation. Nevertheless from the phenomenological perspective, there are degrees of realization of the church of Christ: from a full presence (subsistence) to a greater or lesser realization of the active presence of the church of Christ. Only when we consider the church of Christ from the phenomenological perspective, can we appreciate the different stages of its realization. ‘The church of Christ, without ceasing to be incarnate and historical in its social existence, transcends the Catholic Church so that we may not only speak of non-Catholic Christians as in some way belonging to it, but we are also justified in regarding non-Catholic Christian communities as being imperfect or defective realizations of it. The teaching of the constitution on the church, therefore, leaves theological space for other churches. The church of Christ that constitutes one single complex reality with the Catholic Church is present in other Christian churches, even though according to Catholic faith these are institutionally imperfect or inadequate realizations of Christ’s church.’ ⁴³

In order to clarify further the distinction between the ontological and phenomenological dimension of the church, a Christological reference may help. In God’s self-communication (grace), what is really communicated is God’s own being. In a particular and unique man, Jesus of Nazareth, the Word of God fully abides (Col 1:19). In Jesus lives ‘bodily all the fullness of God’(Col 2:9). Since in Jesus the Word of God fully abides, we identify in him the subsistence of the Word of God. Jesus is totus deus; however, Jesus’ divine nature exceeds the visible boundaries of Jesus’ humanity. Jesus is totus deus but not totum dei. We also participate in the divine nature through and by means of the humanity of Jesus. In confessing that Jesus is the Christ, we claim that his humanity has fully realized God’s self-communication, and that is why in Jesus alone the Word of God subsists. Karl Rahner repeatedly stresses that the hypostatic union is ‘an intrinsic moment within the whole process by which grace is bestowed upon all spiritual creatures.’ ⁴⁴ The fulfillment and unique event of the hypostatic union does not differ in its nature from the other spiritual subjects. In Jesus the human reception of the Word of God reached its full climax. ‘The Incarnation of God is the unique and highest instance of the actualization of the essence of human reality.’ ⁴⁵ On our side, such reception is by degrees and partial (Col 2:10). However, we too are filled with the fullness of God (cf. Eph 3:19), because God will be all in all (1 Cor 15:28).

In God’s self-communication (grace), God’s own being is always and everywhere fully given and fully efficacious, but not always and everywhere fully accepted by human freedom. The Word of God as such (verbum dei qua deus) cannot be present partially or by degrees. God gives His own being always and everywhere, fully and totally. But the Word of God as incarnate (verbum dei qua homo) is particularly, temporally and gradually actualized. Here, not there; now, not tomorrow; more or less; fully or partial. The human (individual and institutional) reception of God’s self-communication is realized by degrees.

An analogous understanding may apply to the church of Christ and its fulfilled actualization in the Catholic Church. Between the Catholic Church and the church of Christ there is a formal identity (ecclesia catholica est tota ecclesia), but if there are elementa ecclesiae beyond and outside the Catholic Church, we must acknowledge that ecclesia catholica non est totum ecclesiae. That is why the conciliar fathers introduced the subsistit and avoided est. They wanted to avoid an exclusive identification of the Catholic Church with the church of Christ. Only if we give up such an exclusive claim may we acknowledge that there are ecclesial elements outside the Catholic Church. Therefore, the term ‘church’ can be applied not only to the Orthodox churches but also to the ecclesial communities. ⁴⁶ The Council realized that outside the fullness of the Catholic Church (tota ecclesia) there is a much more fundamental reality: the church of Christ (totum ecclesiae). ‘This fundamental opening showed the way for the postconciliar reception process, which communicated the insight that the Catholic Church, while she is “of course the institutionally perfect realization” of the church of Jesus Christ, does not completely exhaust the latter, so that “many elements of sanctification and of truth […] can be found outside the Catholic Church as gifts belonging to the church of Christ” that impel believers toward Catholic unity.’ ⁴⁷

We identify in the Catholic Church the subsistence of the church of Christ, because here the fullness of the church of Christ visibly abides. Therefore, the CDF states ‘the full identity of the church of Christ with the Catholic Church.’ ⁴⁸ The adjective ‘full’ does not point to an exclusive identity (tota ecclesia = totum ecclesiae) but rather to the fullness of ecclesial elements. ⁴⁹ There is full identity of the church of Christ with the Catholic Church (tota ecclesia) from the phenomenological perspective. However, the church of Christ exceeds and is present beyond the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church does not exhaust the totum ecclesiae. Thus, from the ontological perspective, the church of Christ always is present and active everywhere, without measure and degrees; but from the phenomenological perspective, the church of Christ has many degrees of realization, from less to more, until its fullness is realized and can be found in the Catholic Church. Kasper states, ‘the Council thus advocates a graded concept of church according to which the non-Catholic Churches and ecclesial communities participate in a graded way in the unity and catholicity of the Catholic Church.’ ⁵⁰

By replacing ‘est’ with ‘subsistit’ two different dimensions of the church are taken into account: an ontological dimension where the presence of the church of Christ, without degrees and differentiation, is acknowledged, but also a phenomenological dimension where subsistence expresses the full presence or actualization of the church of Christ. The ontological dimension has a priority over the phenomenological dimension, but it cannot be revealed without the phenomenological. Therefore, the universal aspect of the church is prior to all its local realizations, but the particular realization has a temporal priority over the universal aspect of the church. The CDF says as much: ‘From the Church, which in its origins and its first manifestation is universal, have arisen the different local Churches, as particular expressions of the one unique church of Jesus Christ. Arising within and out of the universal church, they have their ecclesiality in it and from it. Hence the formula of the Second Vatican Council: The church in and formed out of the churches (ecclesia in et ex ecclesiis), is inseparable from this other formula: The churches in and formed out of the church (ecclesiae in et ex ecclesia).’ ⁵¹

The distinction between the presence (totum ecclesiae) and subsistence (tota ecclesia) prevents us from saying that there are degrees of subsistence, or that the church of Christ subsists equally in many other churches. The subsistence is attributed only to that church to which the fullness of the means of salvation has been entrusted and received. The church of Christ is not divided into many parts, as if each one were a totality. It would be contradictory to affirm many totalities. Rather a fulfilled totality can only be ‘one.’ For this reason the declaration Dominus Iesus, n. 16 explicitly added ‘only’ while speaking of the church of Christ subsisting fully in the Catholic Church. The declaration wanted to underline that only one church can be considered the full realization of the church of Christ, whereas many can represent the degrees of such fulfillment.

The Catholic Church consistently affirms that there are no partial or many subsistences of the church of Christ, but only one subsistence, just as from the Christological perspective there is just one single subsistence of the Word of God in Jesus Christ. ⁵² The Catholic Church understands herself as formally identical (ecclesia catholica est ‘tota’ ecclesia) with the church of Christ, since in her there is the fullness of the means of salvation. ‘To say that the church of Christ continues to exist fully only in the Catholic Church means that the Catholic Church alone has preserved everything that belongs to the church’s integrity, such as the unity that is preserved through the communion of all its bishops with the pope, along with the fullness of the means of grace.’ ⁵³ Nonetheless, the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church are not materially identical with the church of Christ: ecclesia catholica non est ‘totum’ ecclesiae. ‘Outside her visible confines there are not only individual Christians but ecclesial elements or, as in the case of the churches of the East, even genuine particular churches.’ ⁵⁴ The ecclesial elements, therefore, are rooted in the totum ecclesiae which constitutes the objective basis of the sacramentality of these churches. Thus the church of Christ is present by degrees in these churches and ecclesial communities and endows them with the same grace and truth that has been fully entrusted to the Catholic Church. We need to ask now whether the lack of full communion with the Catholic Church compromises the sacramental life and efficacy in these churches and ecclesial communities.

Validity and Efficacy of Other Churches’ Sacraments

The documents of the CDF—The Church as Communion, n. 17, Dominus Iesus, n. 17, and Some Aspects of the Doctrine on the Church—affirm that the ecclesial communities of the Reformation have an imperfect communion with the Catholic Church, because they have not preserved the valid episcopate. Therefore they do not possess the genuine and integral substance of the Eucharistic mystery and cannot be recognized as churches ‘in the proper sense.’ The documents refer to the Council’s Decree on Ecumenism no. 22 which declares that the ecclesial communities ‘especially for the lack of the sacrament of order (propter sacramentis ordinis defectum), have not preserved the genuine and integral substance of the Eucharistic mystery.’ The main reason why the Eucharist celebrated by Lutherans and Anglicans is invalid is to be found—according to the Decree on Ecumenism—in the absence of the sacrament of order.

According to Catholic doctrine, to have a valid Eucharist the presence of the matter and form of the sacrament are not enough: bread and wine, and the consecratory words. Additionally, a validly ordained minister must perform the sacramental action as persona Christi gerens.

The intimate connection that exists between Order and Eucharist remains a debated issue in ecumenical dialogue. The Decree on Ecumenism no. 22 has clearly stated that the lack of the sacrament of order invalidates the Eucharist. Consequently, the ecumenical recognition of the validity of the sacrament of baptism, celebrated in other churches, does not motivate the recognition of the validity of the other sacraments of incorporation into the church of Christ. In order to realize such incorporation a valid apostolic succession is required and, while it is still present in the Orthodox churches, it is lacking in the Lutheran and Anglican churches. For the Catholic understanding of the church, the bishop is necessary not only for the ‘bene ecclesiae’ but also for the ‘esse ecclesiae.’ As stated in Lumen gentium n. 8, there is an intimate relationship (res-sacramentum) between the outer structure of the visible church (Order—sacramentum tantum), and the hidden and spiritual reality (Grace—res tantum). The outward visibility of the sacrament is expressed not only in the matter and form of the sacrament, but also in the apostolic succession. The defectus ordinis, mentioned in the Decree on Ecumenism no. 22, seems to confirm that no apostolic succession has been kept in the churches of the Reformation. However, the defectus ordinis does not univocally mean that there is no order, or there is an absence or a void of ministry. Referring to the ecumenical dialogues of these past 40 years Kasper interprets ‘defectus’ in the sense of deficiency and not of total absence. ‘Just as we speak of elements of the church, so we can also speak analogously of the recognition of essential elements of the ministry in the ecclesial communities of the Reformation.’ ⁵⁵ The presence of these essential elements causes the ministry of these ecclesial communities not to be null or void: ‘the ministry in the respective other churches is not ‘nothing’, but rather that, in a non-quantifiable way, ‘something’ is recognized as being there—namely, something of the ministry that Christ established for his church.’ ⁵⁶ This does not immediately lead to the mutual recognition of ministries. As long as this recognition is still missing from both sides, the Catholic Church cannot attribute validity to the sacraments celebrated in the ecclesial communities of the Reformation. The distinction made between Baptism, which has already received mutual recognition, and the other sacraments—Ordained Ministry and Eucharist—which have not yet received such mutual recognition, points to a much more dynamic complexity between sacramentum tantum and res sacramenti. If the grace of Christ (res sacramenti) by itself has a sacramental dynamic and leads to the fullness of sacramental incorporation into the Body of Christ, it means that the liturgical actions (sacramentum tantum), performed by other churches and ecclesial communities, can truly produce a life of grace and communicate salvation. ‘The separated churches and communities as such, though we believe them to be deficient in some respects, have been by no means deprived of significance and importance in the mystery of salvation. For the Spirit of Christ has not refrained from using them as means of salvation which derive their efficacy from the very fullness of grace and truth entrusted to the church’ (Unitatis redintegratio no. 3).

While reaffirming the invalidity of Anglican and Lutheran orders, and consequently the invalidity of their Eucharistic celebrations, the conciliar Decree on Ecumenism cannot but recognize that in these ecclesial communities grace is communicated, even if not by means of a valid sacrament. This distinction suggests that between order and grace there is an asymmetry: saving grace is mediated through the sacramental and institutional visibility of the church, but it is not totally conditioned or constrained by it. Grace exceeds order and overflows it, as the church of Christ (totum ecclesiae) transcends the boundaries of the Catholic Church (tota ecclesia).

In this connection Peter Lombard stated that God can give grace to humanity without sacraments, since God’s power is not bound to these signs: ‘cum igitur absque sacramentis (quibus non alligavit potentiam Suam) homini Deus gratiam donare posset.’ ⁵⁷ Likewise The Catechism of the Catholic Church n. 1257, while speaking of baptism, refers to the understanding that Saint Bonaventure has of the relationship between grace and sacrament more generally. Bonaventure speaks of the sacrament as a reality that predisposes to grace, but it is only God who gives grace, sometimes beyond sacraments, since grace is effective not because of some magic intrinsic virtue of the sacraments, but because God disposes to link His grace with these signs.

Even Thomas Aquinas agrees with Lombard’s axiom and states that God does not bind His power to the sacraments. ⁵⁸ Aquinas does not agree completely with this understanding of the sacramental sign, because it fails to acknowledge the efficacy of the sacrament as causa secunda, and ascribing only to God’s will such efficacy. Aquinas prefers to speak of instrumental cause: sacraments are instruments or means of salvation in the hands of God, through which God works effectively. From this perspective, the author of grace is always God (causa prima), but sacraments become an indispensable means through which God makes His grace to flow. This different understanding, however, does not prevent Thomas from recognizing that God can communicate His grace outside the sacraments.

We see, then, that Catholic theology has never ruled out the presence of the ‘extra-sacramental grace’ which is obtained, for instance, at the baptism of desire, spiritual communion, and the act of perfect contrition. The recent document of the International Theological Commission, ‘The Hope of Salvation for Infants who Die without Being Baptized,’ no. 29, reaffirms an extra-sacramental configuration to Christ. Clearly, the Catholic Church believes in the existence of an extra-sacramental grace offered to all, even going beyond the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church.

Returning to the specific case of the ecclesial communities not in full communion with the Catholic Church, we should notice that the extra-sacramental grace of the Spirit of Christ is offered to all and works through these communities. The grace of Christ is made effective not only because the faithful of these communities assent to it (ex opere operantis), but also because grace is communicated through their ecclesial and liturgical acts. Even if the sacraments of Order and Eucharist are considered invalid for the Catholic Church, because the ecclesial communities are not fully incorporated into the Catholic Church, they still have efficacy, deriving from the church of Christ, whose fullness of grace has been entrusted to the Catholic Church.

Any time we face the question of the salvific meaning of the sacraments dispensed by other churches and ecclesial communities, it is necessary to differentiate the question of efficacy from the question of the validity of the sacrament. In order to deal with the former question, it is helpful to recall what Rahner says on the distinction between the universal history of salvation and particular revelation. The universal or transcendental dimension of God’s revelation represents what we have previously defined as the ontological dimension; the particular, special or categorical revelation represents what we have previously defined as the phenomenological dimension. ‘The categorical history of revelation, in an unthematic way and through everything which takes place in human history, can indeed be the historical mediation of the transcendental, supernatural experience of God as supernatural revelation. But the history of the transcendental revelation of God will necessarily show itself again and again to be a history which is taking place in an irreversible direction towards a highest and comprehensive self-interpretation of man.’ ⁵⁹ God’s transcendental self-communication is the condition of possibility of the categorical self-interpretation of human transcendental experience of God. Such self-interpretation is historically conditioned by human freedom, which may accept or reject God’s unconditional self-communication. Rahner defines such history as the ‘special’ or ‘particular’ history of salvation. It can also be named as the ‘official’ or ‘public’ history of revelation. It corresponds to the biblical revelation of the Old and New Testament. ‘This categorical history of revelation in the Old and New Testament can and must be understood as the valid self-interpretation of God’s transcendental self-communication to man, and as the thematization of the universal categorical history of this self-communication, which of course does not necessarily have to be made thematic always and everywhere in a sacral way.’ ⁶⁰ The ‘official’ or ‘public’ dimension of this history of salvation reaches its climax and fulfillment in Jesus Christ and continues in the particular history of the church, through its historical and irreversible tangibility. The ‘official’ and ‘public’ acts of this particular collective subjectivity (ecclesia sicut societas) are the sacraments in which the church expresses herself as fundamental sacrament. ⁶¹ In these official acts the church manifests the social and institutional nature (even canonical) of God’s grace (opus operatum). The sacraments are ‘public’ actions of the church, in which grace is signified. In their ‘being signified’ is expressed the ‘ecclesial’ reception of God’s grace in its phenomenological aspect.

In an essay on the theology of worship Rahner discusses two models of interpreting God’s grace acting in the world and history. ‘The first way of seeing the operation of divine grace in the world considers that operation first of all and primarily as an intervention of God in the world at a definitive point in space and time.’ ⁶² This first model interprets God’s action in a miraculous and mythological way. God’s grace is mainly actual grace, ‘as events at certain points in space and time […] where grace comes to be in a world otherwise deprived of it.’ ⁶³ According to this model, sacraments are seen as punctual and singular incursions of God from outside and from above. ‘The second way of considering the operation of grace starts out from the assumption that the secular world from the outset is always encompassed and permeated with the grace of the divine self-communication. His grace is always and everywhere present in the world.’ ⁶⁴ This second model interprets God’s action in the world and history as the ‘outburst’ or the emergence of the innermost, ‘ever present gracious endowment of the world with God himself into history.’ ⁶⁵ This divine grace, which is always and everywhere, indivisibly and unconditionally, bestowed and offered to every human being, represents God’s self-communication in its ontological dimension. ‘Grace, then, occurs, not only and not even primarily in the sacraments, but wherever a person accepts and realizes in freedom his existence as it is, as radically and immediately dependent on God.’ ⁶⁶ The more radical a person’s or a community’s acceptance of grace is, the greater is the augmentation of grace and presence of God in them.

From God’s point of view, grace is by itself always effective; but from the human point of view, grace becomes effective when it is received in the public celebration of the sacrament. Rahner uses the example of love between two human beings, which comes first and leads to its declaration. A love declaration may remain null and utterly void, if there is no actual and real love between two people. A love declaration, therefore, does not originate love, yet makes it effective. On the other side, any public disclosure of love enhances the love that has caused it: ‘sacramental sign and sacramental cause do not occur next to each other, but in each other.’ ⁶⁷

Any sign can be correctly performed and unambiguously understood, only if it is expressed within the same or similar linguistic community. God’s grace is the cause of the efficacy of the sacrament; however, its condition relies upon the ecclesial signifying performance. ‘Human religious subjectivity, human faith, human readiness to accept pardon and salvation from God are not the cause of the sacrament’s effective power; they are the condition, brought about by the Spirit of God, for the effective application of the grace of God that is offered in the sacrament.’ ⁶⁸ Whereas God’s self-communication, as cause of the sacrament’s effective power, is always and everywhere bestowed, the individual and institutional reception is local and temporal, and takes place according to the condition each particular church has established through the centuries and according to certain customs and observances, as we have observed referring to the sacramental ordinance in the Assyrian church.

How does a gradual understanding of the presence of the church of Christ value the celebration of sacraments outside the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church? In Lumen gentium no. 15 the Council recognizes that outside the Catholic Church, other Christians receive sacraments in their own churches and ecclesial communities; that means that in these ecclesial realities ‘sacraments’ are present and can be received.

By stating that the church of Christ ‘subsists in’ the Catholic Church, the Catholic understanding supposes that this church has a kind of monopoly on the grace of Christ. ⁶⁹ She is endowed with the authority to pronounce a declaration of validity on the way sacraments have been performed. We may wonder, however, whether such a declaration causes the efficacy of the sacraments as such or whether it simply states that these sacraments are valid for the Catholic understanding of the church. The Catholic Church (tota ecclesia) has been entrusted with the fullness of the means of salvation, and her declaration of validity on the sacraments of other churches and ecclesial communities expresses such self-understanding of her sacramentality. The Council, however, clearly states that these means of salvation ‘belong by right to the one church of Christ’ (Unitatis redintegratio no. 3). The Catholic Church must therefore acknowledge that outside its visible ‘monopoly’ there is saving grace, which can be shared and otherwise embodied. The cause of the sacramental efficacy is the church of Christ (totum ecclesiae), but it remains conditioned by the mediation of churches and ecclesial communities. The encyclical Ut unum sint no. 13 clearly states that beyond the boundaries of the Catholic Church there is not an ecclesial vacuum, but there is an objective basis, which is made of eximia elementa. Outside the Catholic Church there are not just ‘elements’ as a restrictive interpretation would argue. ‘Vatican II nowhere said that outside the Catholic Church there are only elements of the church. On the contrary, it recognized the presence and salvific role of churches and ecclesial communities that are not in full communion with the Catholic Church.’ ⁷⁰ In no. 11 the encyclical defines the ‘objective basis’ for these ecclesial elements as the ‘church of Christ.’ ‘To the extent that these elements (of sanctification and truth) are found in other Christian communities, the one church of Christ is effectively present in them.’ As ‘ecclesial’ these elements refer to their ontological aspect; as ‘elements’ they refer to their phenomenological aspect. They are elements that are in a process of fulfillment.

In order to deal with the question of the validity of the sacraments, it is necessary to remember that sacraments are effective as a means of grace because they signify grace. Sacramenta significando efficient gratiam. ⁷¹ As Herbert Vorgrimler argues: ‘Sacraments cause grace, since they are signs of grace, grace is made present precisely in being signs of grace. They do not produce more grace than the grace given by God’s presence with humanity. The increase is not on God’s side, but on the personal receptivity due to the communication of grace by means of the sign which produces greater tangibility.’ ⁷² In order that a sign may operate, it needs to be understood. Thus Rahner says: ‘The sacramental sign is cause of grace in as much as it is conferred by being signified.’ ⁷³ The causality ascribed to the sacrament occurs in the form of ‘notification.’ Sacraments are visible, embodied words that produce grace not because they have or transmit some special quidditas. They ‘cause’ grace by simply showing and making known what is already at work there—God’s self-communication. Ultimately the sacrament works as a linguistic sign: the performers and the receivers must comprehend its meaning. This meaning then becomes effective when the purpose, by which a sign is performed, is understood. This purpose is called ‘intentio ecclesiae’ and expresses the semantic rule by which a linguistic sign is recognized and not misinterpreted. Such intention is essential for the issue of the validity of a sacrament.

According to Giuseppe Rambaldi, the fundamental argument behind the decision of Pope Leo XIII of declaring null and utterly void the ordinations carried out according to the Anglican rite is based on the native character or spirit (nativa indoles ac spiritus) by which these ordinations have been performed. The defective nature of the intention, by which these ordinations were performed, cannot but make them invalid, thus breaking the apostolic succession. ⁷⁴ Such a declaration of invalidity simply states that the sacrament has been performed outside the public semantic horizon of the Catholic Church. Since this is an essential condition in order that the sacrament can be understood and be effective within a particular community, then this liturgical action—performed without proper intention—is meaningless, and therefore ineffective for the Catholic Church. However, does such a declaration of invalidity stop Christ’s grace from being present and active through the Church of England?

In the declaration of the Catholic bishops of England and Wales (18 November 1993) we find the answer to this question. The bishops suggest that those seeking full communion with the Catholic Church should not ‘deny the value of their previous ministry. According to the teaching of the Second Vatican Council, the liturgical actions of their ministry can most certainly engender a life of grace, for they come from Christ and lead back to him and belong by right to the one church of Christ.’ ⁷⁵ The bishops of England and Wales recognize, therefore, the ministry exercised by those priests of the Church of England who decided to pass over to the Catholic Church. The bishops did not say that their orders are valid, or that Christ’s grace was not present or active in their ministry. They simply acknowledged that their ministry was not yet fully realized. By full embodiment in the Catholic Church, the grace of Christ already acting efficaciously in their ministerial priesthood reached a visible fulfilled expression of grace, truth, and unity. The declaration of the Catholic bishops of England and Wales is an example of how the distinction between the ontological and phenomenological dimensions of the church of Christ may lead to a deeper understanding of the dialectic between the efficacy and validity of the sacraments celebrated in other churches and ecclesial communities, and promote future ecumenical dialogues.

In an essay, Unity of the Churches. An Actual Possibility, Rahner and Heinrich Fries suggested accepting the validity of Protestant ordinations because their sacramental efficacy originated in the one church of Christ. Both authors make an analogy with marriage. ‘Can one seriously rate a marriage “invalid” before God, where there was a “procedural error,” for which no one was seriously to blame and which was entirely unavoidable under the actual circumstances? Or can one say that such a marriage is valid even with that kind of procedural error, because it is nevertheless a reality in the church and is lived in this church as a Christian marriage?’ ⁷⁶ Similarly, despite the differences still dividing Catholics from Lutherans, Kasper, in one of his early essays, wonders whether the two churches might share not only a common baptism, but also the Eucharist towards which the baptism is oriented, and finally the sacrament of order to which the Eucharist is bound. In this connection, perhaps, the early church’s decision that acknowledged the validity of the baptism of heretics, as well as the ordinations celebrated outside the visible boundaries of the Catholic Church, could lead us to recognize the sacraments of other churches and ecclesial communities. ⁷⁷

At the end of our reflection on the leap forward in the understanding of the ‘subsistit in’ after 50 years of the Decree on Ecumenism of the Second Vatican Council, Unitatis redintegratio, a greater awareness of the sacrum commercium between the Catholic Church and the other churches has been achieved. Ratzinger acknowledged that there is a shortfall between the Catholic Church and other churches. ‘The council gave up the “est” of absolute identification […] with a broader “subsists” […], without missing the specific claim of the Roman Catholic Church and has showed the existence of a deficit, a debt on both sides.’ ⁷⁸ It remains, therefore, for both the Catholic Church and the other churches to grasp the urgency of this renewed commitment to the ecumenical journey.