My ‘Would St. Thomas Aquinas baptize an Extraterrestrial?’ argued that intelligent extraterrestrial life with sufficiently different matter from human beings would not share a human nature and would therefore not be integrated into the Mystical Body of Christ in the same way as human beings, through Christ's sacrifice and the sacraments. Marie George, in ‘Would St. Thomas Aquinas Baptize an Extraterrestrial? Revisited’, demonstrated that the angels are fully incorporated into the Mystical Body of Christ in the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas, and therefore posited that St. Thomas would not object to intelligent extraterrestrials of a different nature being baptized. This article revises my contentions about the Mystical Body and then shows that St. Thomas's theology excludes angels from the sacraments on the grounds of lacking a shared nature and argues that, while both extraterrestrials and angels can be saved by Christ, the sacraments have been given only to those who share a human nature with Christ.

Fifty years ago, Yves Congar voiced concern over what he considered a serious point of confusion in the post-conciliar Church, namely, the meaning of “the sacred” in Christian faith and mission. This essay details Congar's diagnosis of the problem and explores the continued relevance of his constructive response, or, what he calls “sacred pedagogy.” For Congar, the world is not sacred in itself, because the body of Christ is the only sacred reality. Yet the world can become sacred, if we approach it “pedagogically,” as filled with signs that can lead us to grace. In the end, however, all present experience of the sacred will be transcended in the eschatological kingdom of God.

The sacrament of order raises important ecumenical questions, but discussion is hindered by binding historical magisterial judgments of invalidity. This article examines a mostly overlooked ecumenical proposal made by Karl Rahner in 1974 for approaching the sacrament and examines its implications by applying the insights of contemporary cognitive linguistic thinkers. Rahner suggested that Protestant order could be ruled valid by the Catholic Church through a determination analogous to the radical sanation of a marriage. Such a proposal both accepts the prior judgment that the sacrament was invalid and declares it to now be valid retroactively to its beginning. Rahner's proposal has several important implications: first, it can allow for mutual recognition of ministries without requiring either a reordination of the other's presbyters or a revocation of the historical judgments of invalidity. Potentially more broadly, it can serve as the basis for a rethinking of sacramental causality in general.

Many authors are hesitant to speak of the Eucharist in the pre-Nicene period and some modern scholarship has attempted to cast doubt on the traditional view that Christ instituted the Eucharist at the Last Supper. This article examines contemporary liturgical studies on the early history of the Eucharist. In light of this it proposes that the traditional view is still the only possibility for an authentic Catholic theology and that liturgical history is, in fact, part of the discipline of Church history that cannot be confused with secular methods of the historical sciences. In this sense, the history of the Eucharist and its later developments must be studied in a manner that acknowledges Providence and the work of the Holy Spirit in the history of the Church. In particular the crystallization of the early “shape” of the liturgy must be understood to be a fundamental element of the divine institution of the Church and not merely a chance selection of one tradition of Eucharistic worship from many equally valid options.

This paper shows the theological vision of Aquinas’ moral theology by exploring the intimate connectedness of his moral thought in the prima secundae of the Summa theologiae with his sacramental theology and Christology in the tertia pars. While some have disputed the theological and Christological character of Aquinas’ moral thought, both the structural presentation of the Summa and the key role grace plays in his treatment of the moral life point to the importance of the sacraments, which, empowered by the Holy Spirit, communicate the grace of Christ's Passion to men, who by themselves cannot act to attain their end in God because of God's infinity and man's sinfulness. The paper proceeds by exploring Aquinas’ moral writings on man's end, habits and human action, and law and grace to a discussion of why man needs a savior. The paper then discusses the Passion of Christ the savior and its function in forgiving sin and opening the way to the infinite God in heaven for finite men, and concludes with a discussion of the importance of the Sacraments in the moral life as the instruments through which the effects of Christ's Passion are transmitted to men.