The Devil and His Body

2021 ◽  
pp. 147-177
Author(s):  
Gregory D. Wiebe
Keyword(s):  
The Body ◽  
Symbolic Order ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
Religious Institutions ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Devil ◽  
The Church

This chapter begins to consider Augustine’s perception of the history of Rome and its false gods as the history of the demons themselves, as the most profound works of demons are not individual miracles but the religious institutions of the earthly city. The demons’ fall away from God produces a rival symbolic order to Christ’s angelic ministers, one which manifests in a corporate opposition to Christ’s body. The contrary referents of the work of angels and demons correspond to contrary sacraments, which constitute contrary historical bodies: the body of Christ, which is identified with the church in Augustine’s doctrine of totus Christus, and the body of the devil, the exemplar of which, for Augustine, is pagan Rome. Augustine’s understanding of the earthly city is informed by a concept of disordered, demonic sacraments, and the paradigm for this is his discussion of Hermetic ‘god-making’. In this paradigm, human myths and artefacts manifest a demonic sacramental regime when they are elevated to divine status and given cult, a euhemeristic movement that demons both receive as worship and confirm with wonders.

The Two Bodies of Christ: Communion Frequency and Ecclesiastical Discourse in Pre–Vatican II Australian Catholicism

2010 ◽  
Vol 79 (2) ◽  
pp. 359-409
Author(s):  
Gavin Brown
Keyword(s):  
Vatican Ii ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
Second Vatican Council ◽  
Vatican Council ◽  
History Of ◽  
To Receive ◽  
The Church ◽  
Two Bodies

Today, most Catholics attending Mass come forward to receive communion as a matter of course. But this fact actually belies a very long history of low communion frequency and an institution's often losing struggle to have Catholics regularly receive the body of Christ. Already by the end of the fourth century, communion frequency in the Church, both East and West, had declined rapidly. Thereafter, outside small circles of especially devout communicants, communion at Mass remained for most Catholics an infrequent act. Yet during the mid-twentieth century, in the space of just a few decades, this situation showed signs of quite dramatic reversal. In the nineteenth century in Australia, average communion frequency among most practising Catholics was relatively nominal—perhaps three or four times a year was typical. On the eve of the Second Vatican Council, however, most Catholics in Australia were partaking of communion fortnightly and even weekly. Why this shift? What happened in the course of a generation which turned around a situation spanning many centuries in the Church's tradition of eucharistic worship?

scholarly journals RELIGIOUS PLURALISM AND DISABILITY IN ZAMBIA: APPROACHES AND HEALING IN SELECTED PENTECOSTAL CHURCHES

2016 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 54-72
Author(s):  
Nelly Mwale ◽  
Joseph Chono Chita
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Religious Pluralism ◽  
People With Disabilities ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
Video Recordings ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Pentecostal Churches ◽  
The Devil ◽  
The Church

Zambia has recently witnessed the growth of Pentecostal churches that publicly claim to be healing disabilities. This paper explored how some Pentecostal churches in Zambia’s pluralist society claimed to be healing disability. Interviews, documents and video recordings from three different Pentecostal ministries depicting healing and disability were analysed. The paper observes that some Pentecostal ministries exemplified disability as that which could be healed through the work of the Holy Spirit, and disability was attributed to the work of the devil. The paper argues that the disability healing messages and miracles indirectly victimised people with disabilities, despite its potential to offer social capital. This created a need for deconstructing views on disability. Disability issues in the church also had to go beyond healing and miracles to appreciating the contributions of people with disabilities to the body of Christ. 

scholarly journals Die verband tussen doop en lidmaatskap van die kerk

1999 ◽  
Vol 55 (2/3) ◽  
Author(s):  
W. A. Dreyer
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
Main Thesis ◽  
Initiation Rite ◽  
Church Polity ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church

The relationship between baptism and membership of the church. This aricle examines the relaionship between bapism and membership of the church. The author's main thesis is that baptism signifies the unity with Christ, and as such unity with the body of Christ (the church). Research has shown that baptism exists in different religions, cults and sects as an initiation rite. This forms the background to the New Testament,s presentation of baptism as (inter alia) an initiation rite. This article examines not only these baptism rites, but also the different metaphors in the New Testament concerned with baptism as initiation. The history of baptism in the church and the way bapism functions in the Reformed tradition, in terms of church polity and membership of the church, are also examined.

The Development of the Canon Law Since 1500 A. D.

1940 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 235-252 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vivan A. Peterson
Keyword(s):  
Canon Law ◽  
The Body ◽  
Moral Sense ◽  
Original Meaning ◽  
Ecclesiastical Authority ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Church ◽  
Straight Rod

The body of law dealing with discipline, polity, and sacramental administration which has grown up in the history of the church is ordinarily styled Canon Law (jus canonicum), because it is a collection of canons. Canon (derived from the Greek kanon) means a rule, in a material and moral sense. Its original meaning was a straight rod. In apostolic times it signified the truth of Christianity as an authoritative standard of life and a statement of doctrine in general. It is, therefore, easy to understand how the word kanon later came to mean the ecclesiastical legislation which governed the conduct of the faithful. The excellent definition given by Archbishop Cicognani. states that “The Canon Law may be denned as ‘the body of laws made by the lawful ecclesiastical authority for the government of the Church’.”

La metáfora de la 'ecclesia mater' en la literatura antidonatista

Augustinus ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 66 (1) ◽  
pp. 213-225
Author(s):  
Paola Marone ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Fourth Century ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
Careful Study ◽  
African Theology ◽  
The Church

The modern scholars have studied the maternity of the Church independently from the anti-Donatist literature. But a careful study of the anti-Donatist documents reveals many interesting elements. According to Optatus and Augustine the notion of mother was abscribed to all believers, because the body of Christ was formed of all those the Church bore as children through the baptism. According to both African bishops also the donatists gave a valid baptism, but only Augustine demonstrated how the salvation could be found outside of the viscera Ecclesiae. Then this article deals with the image of the Ecclesia mater as illustrated in the Adversus Donatistas of Optatus published in answer to the donatist bishop Parmenianus and in all that Augustine penned against the schismatics (Tractatus, Sermones, Epistulae). By doing so, it presents a picture of the African theology of the fourth century.

What is Distinctive about Methodist Ecclesiology? A Response to Papers by Miriam Haar, Justus Hunter and Robert Martin

Ecclesiology ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 66-74
Author(s):  
Kenneth Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
The Body ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
Per Se ◽  
The Church

Does Methodism want a distinctive ecclesiology? British Methodism assumes its ecclesiology from the Church of England which explains its lack of ecclesiological thinking, its genuine desire for reunification, and indeed its focus on ecclesia in actu. But there can be no ecclesia in actu apart from ecclesia per se. Being and doing are one in God. The Church, grounded in the dynamic being of God in Trinity, celebrates in the action of the Eucharist the wholeness of God’s presence with his world. Proleptically the Church includes the whole of creation and all people. Hence, when as the Body of Christ we pray the Our Father with our Lord, we pray on behalf of all, not just for ourselves. But what then do we mean by apostolicity? Perhaps in Methodism we would be well occupied exploring more keenly with the Roman Catholic Church what we each mean by being a society within the church. Outler may have been right when he opined that Methodism needed a Catholic Church within which to be church.

scholarly journals PERSPEKTIF RASUL PAULUS TENTANG BERBAHASA ROH BERDSARKAN 1 KORINTUS 14

2015 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-21
Author(s):  
Sarwono Sarwono
Keyword(s):  
The Body ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
1 Corinthians ◽  
Speaking In Tongues ◽  
The Gift ◽  
The Church

The gift of speaking in tongues is a message to the body of Christ which is given in tongues and is not understood by the user. Therefore, it must be followed by an interpretation by the language understood by the congregation. The gift of tongues is usually news of a prophecy for the Lord's church and must be followed by an interpretation. If the gift of tongues is not followed by an interpretation, it cannot build up the church. Therefore, the author will discuss the apostle Paul's perspective on tongues based on 1 Corinthians 14.

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