THE CHURCH

SEVEN MODELS

‚The Political Society

‚The Body of Christ

‚The Sacrament

‚The Pilgrim People of God

‚The Human Community

‚The Servant

‚Communion

THE POLITICAL SOCIETY

Weakness:

$ enumerates only visible and structural

characteristics of the Church;

$ political and exclusivist intent;

$ overstresses authority of hierarchy;

$ lacks lay involvement.

Strength:

T gives definite guidelines;

T establishes bonds of professed faith;

T provides government;

T promotes the Sacraments.

THE BODY OF CHRIST

Strength:

T stresses the abiding presence of Jesus Christ;

T represents the gifts of the Holy Spirit;

T shows interdependence of the members;

T presents a mystery of faith;

T stresses the mystical, supernatural community of grace.

Weakness:

$ doesn’t encompass the visible society of human beings;

$ or else, it divinizes the visible community of the faithful;

$ can be anti-institutional;

$ can be exclusivist;

$ doesn’t resolve tension between spiritual communion and visible institution.

THE SACRAMENT

Strength:

T addresses the relationship between the visible and the invisible;

T contrasts less the Church and non-Church;

T gives room for constructive criticism;

T avoids the impression of perfection or completeness.

Weakness:

$ a theological rather than a popular model;

$ has had less impact than the two previous models.

THE PEOPLE OF GOD

Strength:

T presents a historical community on pilgrimage, not static, moving;

T democratic, stresses basic unity of members;

T transcends hierarchical, clerical, juridical, triumphalist limitations;

T stresses need for repentance and renewal;

T provides the spirit of liturgical renewal.

Weakness:

$ understresses relation between the People and Jesus Christ;

$ can give impression that the Church is still living under the Old Law;

$ has not impacted outside the documents of Vatican II.

THE HUMAN COMMUNITY

Strength:

T fosters friendship and trust;

T freer if institutional structures;

T can unite community and institution.

Weakness:

$ can engender anti-institutionalism;

$ can become closed in on themselves (narcissism);

$ can develop into splinter groups and sects.

THE SERVANT

Strength:

T carries on Jesus Christ’s mission of service to the world;

T shares in the problems of human life, serving people;

T scrutinizes the signs of the times;

T introduces an attitude of listening to the world and learning;

T inspires a theology of liberation.

Weakness:

$ the Church’s contribution in the socio-political sphere is not clear;

$ it gives a social meaning to biblical terms;

$ shifts of meaning and simplifications need to be looked into.

COMMUNION

Strength:

T aims at unity and brotherhood of all people;

T traces its source and model to the Blessed Trinity;

T promotes the giving of self in love through communication.

Weakness:

$ develops the Body of Christ model;

$ tension remains between spiritual communion and visible institutional society.