The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1870-04-10

~, may, at this stage in our reasoning, b,
defined, the successive reorganization of man.
h'na' osOsaea by SIN and reunited by grace,
through the restoration O. ideal unity.
Nhe word Church, taken in its widest
significance, embraces the religious society
winch was intrusted' with the deposit OF
revelation from the beginning of the world
until the end of time. In the days of Noah
and his early descendants, the Church COM
prised the whole human race, Bnt soon
the revolutions of nature, the migrations
ana conquests of peoples, and the moral
corruption growing in some measure ont
OF the fierce mutual hostilities Of men. but
chiefly due to the ever widening distance
between them and their original centre
all concurred in obscuring the truth, in
adulterating and falsifying religion, and in
producing, in the long run, that unsightly
medley of errors and superstitions known
by the name Of paganism. Then God. that
the truth might not disappear altogether
from earth, resolved to form new and
elect race, a race that would preserve ideal
truth In Its primitive purity, and hold nm
lug Light in the midst of the universal dark
ness. For this purpose He called a man.
eas -ffeaa-ehe- very heart Of Cha1dea, the
place, very probably, where primitive truth
vas lost-that the cure might come from
where the disease originated. A sunar.
aeorai vocation singled Abraham out Of
IL his contemporaries, to be the second.
nd In the order of election, the first father
our species. This extraordinary man.
nose memory is even to this day held in
'neration, and whose name, with a slirht
is perpetuated by the people
the East, was the Adam of the prede.-
'ed race; for the spiritual branches had.
less than the corporeal, to cerminata
=" one ana the same trunk, and the old
lnciple of heredity, to be ennobled bv
'red rite, that, as has been said already.
might gradually give way to elective in
Iutlons. From him sprang the Patri-
nal Church, confined to the limits of the
My and the tribe, and from the tribe.
itlplled proceeded the national Church
alped by Moses, until at length, through
qst' the ecclesiastical society became
federacy of nations, and took the nama
Cashoilc' expressive alike of its present
'iitude and its future universally. The
SION OF the Catholic Church, of the
rch, since from what has been said
can be but one Church, is to restore
IN the order of time to their primitive
mic unity the scattered Fragments If
human race for the Gospel, besides
using the resurrection of the ;pd;-
al, has also promised that of the Who'll.
es: And as the future universal re-
etion OF individuals was preigured by
'surrectlon of our Lord, who is IL.
anu e"clent cause; 80 the resurrec
u the natural race is symbolized nv
or restoration of the elect
the Church, of which our Lord 10
under and abiding life.
again, as the death of the species
'used by the division and pervers;on 49,
al truth, accompanied and aa,n,-
oS the division and perversion of
yes, SO the initial resurrection of
Nv an Tue church was effected by the
'''on OF ideal truth in language, in
per room and on that blessed dav
the HOLY Ghost descended ON the
20 "hen the universal society and
hood, SO rndely destroyed at BABE,
constructed when the represents,
II every tribe, and nation. and
listened to and understood ono
~ that man, too, the mouth-piece
lal organ, of this elect society. nro,
his mother language the won
Vol ks of God. Therefore it is mani;
the name of Church (Ecclesia,
adapted to the elect society of everv
ongs' nevertheless, with more pro.
% the Catholic society, which, hav.
mated the confederation of nations
pieteiy substituted for the heredi.
elective principle, is not merely
The Patriarchal and Mosaic disnen,
the Preparation-it is the init;o1
ton of the future unity of man
ITO he Coorinued)