Chapter I: Christ’s Mediatorship as a Condition of Our Redemption

Section I: The Possibility of the Redemption

1. Definition of the Term “Mediator”

A mediator (mediator) is one who holds a neutral position between parties at variance, and is therefore apt to interpose between them as the equal friend of each.

a) Thus, in the political domain, a neutral government sometimes intervenes between quarrelling powers by proffering its friendly offices as arbitrator.

The notion of a mediator, therefore, comprises two distinct elements, viz.: (1) the existence of two extremes in contrary opposition, and (2) a quality or characteristic proper to him who interposes, which enables him to reconcile the parties at variance.

This is the true Catholic notion of mediatorship. There is also an heretical one, which appears in the religious systems of the Gnostics and the Arians. To exalt the Creator of the universe as far as possible above mere matter, which they regarded as intrinsically evil, the Gnostics invented a series of “intermediate beings,” which they called aeons, and which were supposed to bridge the gap between the Godhead and the material world. The last of these in a descending line was the so-called Demiurge, who as creator of the material universe was believed to be the proper mediator between the absolute Being and the physical cosmos.¹ The Arians regarded the Logos as the most exalted of creatures and as creator of all the rest, and ascribed to him the office of mediator between God the Father and the universe created by the Logos. We have already disproved this error by showing, in our treatises on the Divine Trinity² and the Incarnation,³ that, so far from being a creature, the Logos is true God, consubstantial with the Father.

b) A duly qualified mediator may exercise his functions either in the moral or in the ontological order.⁴ In some manner or other moral always presupposes ontological mediation, and hence the one cannot be conceived apart from the other.

To perform the part of a moral mediator one must be able, either by one’s natural powers, or through the instrumentality of grace, to reconcile opposing extremes in the order of being. Hence the distinction between mediator naturalis and mediator per gratiam. Moses,⁵ the Levites, the Prophets, and the Apostles were mediators by grace. So is every Catholic priest in virtue of his ordination. As regards natural mediatorship, Christ is our only Mediator in the moral order, because He is the sole natural Mediator between God and man. “The fact of Christ’s existence is in itself a mediation, a bond between the Creator and His creatures. By uniting our humanity to His Divinity, He united us to God and God to us. He is of God and in God, but He is also of us and in us.”⁶ Being consubstantial with man as well as with God,⁷ Christ is the born mediator between God and man (mediator naturalis).

This unique natural mediatorship constitutes the foundation of an equally unique moral mediatorship. The offended Deity exacted adequate atonement for the sins of mankind, and therefore redemption or moral mediation was impossible except on the basis of a natural mediatorship.⁸

c) It follows, by way of a corollary, (1) that mankind has but one mediator, because there is no natural mediator between God and man other than the Godman Jesus Christ; (2) that all other so-called “mediators” are such merely by grace. They owe their mediatorial power solely and entirely to Christ, and can consequently be called mediators only in a subordinate and secondary sense.

No further argument is required to disprove the Protestant objection that Catholics obscure and degrade the unique mediatorship of Christ by admitting a host of priests and saints as co-mediators between God and man. “It is an essential function of the office of a mediator,” says Aquinas, “to join together and unite those between whom he is to interpose; for it is in the middle that extremes meet. Now, to unite men with God perfectively belongs to Christ, through whom men are reconciled to God… . And therefore Christ alone is a perfect mediator between God and men, inasmuch as, by His death, He reconciled the human race to God… . There is, however, nothing to forbid others from being called mediators between God and men under a certain respect (secundum quid), in so far, namely, as they cooperate in uniting men with God, either by disposing them for such a union (dispositive), or by assisting them in the process of unification (ministerialiter).“⁹

2. The Dogma

Theologically speaking, Mediation is synonymous with Redemption. That Christ was our natural Mediator is an article of faith, defined by the Council of Trent. “Si quis hoc Adae peccatum [originale] … per aliud remedium asserit tolli quam per meritum unius mediatoris Domini nostri Iesu Christi, qui nos Deo reconciliavit in sanguine suo … anathema sit.”—“If any one asserts that this sin of Adam [original sin], … is taken away … by any other remedy than the merit of the one Mediator, our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath reconciled us to God in His own blood, … let him be anathema.”¹⁰

a) Moral mediation, or the Redemption proper, according to Holy Scripture, consists in the shedding of the blood of Him who was the sole, because the natural, Mediator between God and man. Consequently, Christ’s moral mediatorship is based upon His natural mediatorship. Cfr. Col. I, 19 sq.: “Quia in ipso [scil. Christo] complacuit omnem plenitudinem inhabitare [= mediatio ontologica naturalis] et per eum reconciliare omnia in ipsum, pacificans per sanguinem crucis eius [= mediatio moralis]—Because in him it hath well pleased the Father, that all fulness should dwell; and through him to reconcile all things unto himself, making peace through the blood of his cross.”¹¹ Both the ontological and the moral mediatorship of Christ are pregnantly summed up by St. Paul in I Tim. II, 5 sq.: “Unus enim Deus, unus et mediator Dei et hominum, homo Christus Iesus, qui dedit redemptionem semetipsum pro omnibus—For there is one God, and one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a redemption for all.”

The Redemption of the human race began with the conception of Jesus Christ and was consummated in the shedding of His precious Blood on the Cross.¹² Hence the functions of His moral mediatorship comprise all His human-divine (theandric) acts from the manger to Calvary. His mediatorial act par excellence was the institution of the New Covenant. “Et ideo Novi Testamenti mediator est, ut morte intercedente in redemptionem earum praevaricationum, quae erant sub Priori Testamento, repromissionem accipiant—And therefore he is the mediator of the New Testament: that by means of his death, for the redemption of those transgressions which were under the former testament, they that are called may receive the promise of eternal inheritance.”¹³ In fact, everything that Christ did and does for us must be regarded as the result of His mediatorship, e.g., the institution of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the establishment of His Church, the mission of the Holy Ghost, the sanctification of souls,¹⁴ etc.

b) We meet with a profound conception of Christ’s mediatorship in the writings of St. Augustine. This Father may be said to have anticipated the objections of such later heretics as Calvin, who held that Christ is our mediator only according to His Divinity, and the older Lutheran theologians, who attributed His mediatorial action exclusively to His human nature.¹⁵

The truth lies between these extremes. It is the Godman as such who is our Mediator, but only in His human nature. “He is the mediator between God and man,” says St. Augustine, “because He is God with the Father, and a man with men. A mere man could not be a mediator between God and man; nor could a mere God. Behold the mediator: Divinity without humanity cannot act as mediator; nor can humanity without Divinity; but the human Divinity and the Divine humanity of Christ is the sole mediator between Divinity and humanity.”¹⁶ And again: “Christ is the mediator [between God and man] not because He is the Word; for the Word, being immortal and happy in the highest degree, is far removed from the miseries of mortal men; but He is the mediator as man.”¹⁷

c) The Schoolmen, following St. Augustine, teach that Christ is our Mediator according to His human nature, though the mediatorial dignity redounds to the whole theandric Person. St. Thomas puts it thus: “As it belongs to the office of a mediator to unite the parties between whom he mediates, … Christ, as man, is properly called mediator, forasmuch as, as man, He united men to God, by conveying to men both precepts and gifts, and by offering satisfaction and prayers to God for men.”¹⁸ Yet, since the actions of the human nature derive their infinite value from the divine Person of the Logos, the mediatorship of Christ, though exercised in and through His humanity, presupposes and rests upon His Divinity. Hence there is no contradiction between St. Paul, who calls Christ mediator as “man” (I Tim. II, 5), and the Fathers, who insist that only a Godman could be an adequate mediator between the offended majesty of God and sinful humanity.