Catholic Radio Dramas

The unity of the faithful

From a commentary on the psalms by Saint Hilary of Poitiers, bishop (d. c. 368) (Lib. 8, 13-16: PL 10, 246-249)

The unity of the faithful in God through the incarnation of the Word and the sacrament of the Eucharist

We believe that the Word became flesh and that we receive his flesh in the Lord’s Supper. How then can we fail to believe that he really dwells within us? When he became man, he actually clothed himself in our flesh, uniting it to himself for ever. In the sacrament of his body he actually gives us his own flesh, which he has united to his divinity. This is why we are all one, because the Father is in Christ, and Christ is in us. He is in us through his flesh and we are in him. With him we form a unity which is in God.

The manner of our indwelling in him through the sacrament of his body and blood is evident from the Lord’s own words: This world will see me no longer but you shall see me. Because I live you shall live also, for I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you. If it had been a question of mere unity of will, why should he have given us this explanation of the steps by which it is achieved? He is in the Father by reason of his divine nature, we are in him by reason of his human birth, and he is in us through the mystery of the sacraments. This, surely, is what he wished us to believe; this is how he wanted us to understand the perfect unity that is achieved through our Mediator, who lives in the Father while we live in him, and who, while living in the Father, lives also in us. This is how we attain to unity with the Father. Christ is in very truth in the Father by his eternal generation; we are in very truth in Christ, and he likewise is in us.

Christ himself bore witness to the reality of this unity when he said: He who eats my flesh and drinks by blood lives in me and I in him. No one will be in Christ unless Christ himself has been in him; Christ will take to himself only the flesh of those who have received his flesh.

He had already explained the mystery of this perfect unity when he said: As the living Father sent men and I draw life from the Father, so he who eats my flesh will draw life from me. We draw life from his flesh just as he draws life from the Father. Such comparisons aid our understanding, since we can grasp a point more easily when we have an analogy. And the point is that Christ is the wellspring of our life. Since we who are in the flesh have Christ dwelling in us through his flesh, we shall draw life from him in the same way as he draws life from the Father. Source: The Liturgy of the Hours – Office of Readings

Source: The Liturgy of the Hours – Office of Readings

Saint Hilary was born at Poitiers, Gaul, of a noble family. He was a convert from paganism to Christianity by his study of the Bible and was baptized when well on in years. He was elected bishop of Poitiers about 350. He actively opposed the Arian heresy and refused to attend a synod at Milan called by Emperor Constantius in 355 in which required the bishops present to sign a condemnation of St. Athanasius for his refutations against Arianism. Hilary refused and was condemned for his orthodoxy by the synod of Arian bishops at Beziers in 356. He was exiled by the Arian Emperor to Phrygia later that year. Hilary was so successful in exposing Arianism as a heresy at a council of Eastern bishops at Seleucia in 359 and in encouraging the clergy to resist the heresy that the Arians requested the Emperor to send him back to Gaul.

Hilary was instrumental in the excommunication of Arian Bishop Saturninus. In 361, the death of Constantius ended the Arian persecution of the Catholics. Hilary died at Poitiers in 368 leaving numerous treatises, notable among which were his De Trinitate written while he was in exile, De synodis, and Opus historicum. He was declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Pius IX in 1851.