"The Sacramental Role"

                                             "Via Dolorosa,"   Magdalene College Chapel,    Cambridge


We continue our review of Abbot Vonier's "A Key to the Doctrine of the Eucharist."   This is taken from Chapter 6, "The Sacramental Role:"

The sacramental graces are specially characterized by their intimate connection with Christ's passion and death.  They are not just any grace, but grace as flowing from the pierced side of Christ.  "Why is it," asks Saint Thomas, "that Baptism washes away, even in the old sinner who approaches it, every stain of sin and all the guilt of sin besides?"  "The suffering of the passion of Christ is communicated to the one who is baptized, inasmuch as he becomes a member of Christ, as if he himself had borne that pain, and therefore all his sins are remitted through the pain of Christ's passion."