Quotes from Joseph Pohle

the whole substance of the bread has been converted into the Body and the whole sub stance of the wine into the Blood of Christ. What, then, remains ? The Council tells us that it is " the species of

Origen says: " The Church hath received it as a tradition from the Apostles that infants, too, ought to be baptized." 21

The faithful of to-day should try by a more ardent contrition to make up for the enforced mildness of the Church in the administration of Penance. 43

St. Augustine observes in one of his Sermons: " There were those who said that certain sins must not be forgiven. They were excluded from the Church and became heretics. Our kind Mother the Church never

ceases to be merciful, no matter what sins have been conv mitted.

course, the dis tinction between the divine potestas auctoritatis and the theandric potestas excellentiae must always be kept in mind. The former is incommunicable, while the latter may, to a certain limited extent, be bestowed upon crea tures. 31

The matter of a Sacrament remains within the sphere of its determined species as long as it retains, in the popular estimation, its peculiar properties, while the form remains specifically unchanged as long as the logical and theological sense of the formula is preserved intact. Alterations, ad ditions or omissions which do not run counter to this prin ciple are to be regarded as merely accidental changes.

Perfect contrition effects the immediate justification of the sinner without the Sacrament of Penance, as we shall show presently. 12 How can this extra-sacramental

The sacramental system of the Reformers flowed quite logically from their false idea of justification. If justification really consisted in a merely extrinsic appli cation of the merits of Jesus Christ, which cover the sin ner and hide his wickedness from the sight of God, and if faith were the only thing whereby man is justified, 2

it would be perfectly proper to regard the Sacraments in the sense of Luther as a kind of acted sermons calculated to sustain the faith (signa paraenetica or con-cionatoria). Quite consistently, therefore, did the Augs burg Confession " condemn those who hold that the Sac raments work justification ex opere operate.

They infallibly confer grace, not only on the predestined, but on " all who receive them rightly." 9 Their efficacy is ex opere operate, i. e. derived from the ob jective value of the rite itself, not from the merits of minister or subject. 10

Faith, as such, is merely a dispositive cause of justification,— part of its causa materialis, — whereas a Sacrament is a true efficient cause, though, of course, dependent for its efficacy on the disposition of the recipient, as upon a condition, because " wet wood can not catch fire." 23

St. Augustine says: " Baptism does not consist in the merits of those by whom it is ad ministered, nor in the merits of those to whom it is ad ministered, but in its own sanctity and truth, on account of Him by whom it has been instituted, [it is] for the perdition of those who use it badly and for the salvation of those who use it well." 30

A man who is sorry for his sins, is sorry either be cause sin is an evil done to God (malum Deo), or because it is an evil done to himself (malum homini). If his sorrow is inspired by the first-mentioned motive, i. e. perfect charity, which not only loves God as the highest good above all else, but likewise abhors whatever is op posed to Him, he has perfect contrition. 4 All other kinds are necessarily imperfect.

Two elements, the one objective, the other subjective, enter into the composition of every Sac rament : the external rite and the interior intention.

With the sole exception of Penance, which demands certain supernatural acts (faith, contrition, etc.) either as quasi-matter, or at least as a necessary condition, the possession of the true faith is not an indispensable requisite for the valid reception of the Sacraments on the part of the subject.

Sacraments derive their origin from, and owe their institution to, Christ, not only as God, but also as man. He is the natural mediator between God and man both in His divine and in His human nature. The graces which He merited for us, and which He distributes through the Sacraments, were merited in His human nature.

Hence, if one places an obstacle to sacramental grace, 4 he receives the Sacra ment unworthily, but the Sacrament itself is not invalid; it is valid but lacking its proper form (validum et in-forme).

If his contrition is not perfect, the unworthily received Sacrament of Baptism can re cover its effects only in connection with Penance, which blots out mortal sin ex opere operato, and removes the obstacle that prevented the infusion of grace.

A Sacrament (sacramentum tantum) and the sacra mental grace which it confers (res tantum, effectus) are two separate and distinct things. A Sacrament does not fulfil the whole purpose for which it was instituted unless it actually confers grace.

When corruption (corruptio specierum) sets in, e. g. when the host becomes mouldy or the contents of the Chalice sour, Christ is no longer pres ent. The cessation of the Real Presence must not, how ever, be conceived as a " retransubstantiation," 27 for while Christ may be the terminus ad quern of a substan tial conversion, He can never become its terminus a quo.

St. Au gustine draws a distinction between habere and utiliter habere 6 and asks: " What does it avail a man to be baptized if he is not justified?

the Blood and the Blood from the Body. In what other way, in fact, would it be possible to represent the bloody Sacrifice through the Consecration? Hence our oppo nents defeat themselves with their own weapons when they deny that the separation of the Blood from the Body is a result of the words of Consecration.

Perfect contrition (contritio), which is a true supernatural sorrow from a motive of perfect charity, justifies a man independently of the Sacraments.