The Catholic Church rightly affirms that natural law and human reason play a positive and preparatory role in man’s search for God. Human reason is not antithetical to divine revelation, indeed is a part of it; yet these faculties are insufficient of themselves to bring individuals to the kind of intimate relationship God ultimately wishes to have with the creatures made in His own image:
“By natural reason man can know God with certainty on the basis of His works.
But there is another order of knowledge, which man cannot possibly arrive at by his own powers: the order of divine revelation. Through an utterly free decision, God has revealed Himself and given Himself to man. This He does by revealing the mystery, his plan of loving goodness, formed from all eternity in Christ, for the benefit of all men”655
And God having chosen to work from within, used a people (Israel succeeded by the Church) to enlighten and reconcile the people (the world) to Himself. That process was initiated when God revealed Himself to Abram and made him Abraham – the father of many nations, by whom all peoples of the earth should ultimately be blessed. From his seed would spring the nation of Israel, intended to become the priestly people of God. For them, divine revelation would no longer be restricted to what could be determined innately or by observing creation. God would reveal Himself and His requirements more precisely by 651 Ps104:15
652 Acts14:16-17
653 1Tim2:4
654 Augustine “Of the morals of the Catholic Church” chap. 20
655 Catechism of the Catholic Church chap 2 #50 - https://www.catechismonline.com/the-
98
means of the Law and Prophets. He would even reveal His name: JHWE – “I AM who I am”, and something of His awesome power and purity through His presence in the Holy of Holies.
Later and more overtly, God’s personality and loving purposes for humanity were witnessed, albeit briefly and to a privileged few, through the incarnate Word Himself:
“The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth…And of His fullness we have all received and grace for grace”656
Now, through the New Covenant initiated by Christ’s blood, God’s saving truth is known more fully through the Church and her Scriptures. For this holy, universal and apostolic Church is the mystical Body of Christ on earth; His flesh and bones657, the instrument of His saving and redemptive mission. The Spirit guides her and progressively leads her into all truth658. A further progression of understanding continues in the Church through the centuries, but there can be no entirely new revelation which surpasses or in any way seeks to correct the initial revelation itself, merely its interpretation. For the foundation has once and for all been laid by Christ and His apostles and forms the scriptural and oral deposit of faith which the Church must guard and teach; the faith having once-for-all been entrusted to God’s holy people659:
“Yet even if revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely
explicit; it remains for the Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries”660
The revelation that has been completed will have incorporated clear instruction essential for the functioning and mission of the Church, much of it provided in verbal form, but also a less vital package of mysteries for the Church to unpack during her long journey of discovery. No contributor to the canon of Scripture utilizes the word “musterion” more than the apostle Paul. A mystery from the human perspective is necessarily a secret or veiling from God’s perspective, the Greek word encompassing both aspects. There is the mystery of godliness661, the mystery of the Kingdom662, the mystery of the Church663, the mystery of the gospel664, the mystery of the faith665 together with the four especially relevant to this disclosure: Luther and the mystery of lawlessness 666, the fellowship/administration of the mystery, being the unforetold nature of Gentile inheritance and its implications to wider providence667, the mystery of Babylon668 and the final Mystery of God, being His providential intentions towards the whole creation669, an apprehension of which would 656 Jn1:14,16
657 Eph5:30
658 Jn16:13
659 Jude3
660 Catechism of the Catholic Church #66 http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/para/66.htm
661 1Tim3:16
662 Mk4:11
663 Eph5:32
664 Eph6:19
665 1Tim3:9
666 Greek: “anomias” 2Thes2:7
667 Rom11:25; Eph3:9; Col1:27
668 Rev17:5
669 Cf. Enoch93 verse 10: https://www.worldstudyBible.com/Enoch/Enoch-Chapter-93.htm
99
bring sweetness to the mouth but bitterness to the gut regarding what had earlier been assimilated670. For the Spirit’s progressive enlightenment both within the Catholic and Protestant churches has invariably resulted in a keener awareness of God’s gracious magnanimity towards humanity, challenging the harsh and narrow perspectives of the fearsome Augustine as well as that of the Reformers who regarded that colossus as “Paul’s most trustworthy interpreter”671. In the context of ecclesiological re-integration, any new perspectives must be underpinned from Scripture, and that has involved deconstructing the biblical theology that was foundational to the earlier understanding.