"Did not Christ redeem us by his merits?": Laud and Calvin on invoking the Saints
And for invocation of saints, though some of the ancient Fathers have some rhetorical flourishes about it, for the stirring up of devotion, (as they thought,) yet the church then admitted not of the innovation of them, but only of the commemoration of the martyrs, as appears clearly in St. Augustine. And when the church prayed to God for any thing, she desired to be heard for the mercies and the merits of Christ, not for the merits of any saints whatsoever. For I much doubt this were to make the saints more than mediators of intercession, which is all that you acknowledge you allow the saints. For I pray, is not by the merits more than by the intercession. Did not Christ redeem us by his merits? and if God must hear our prayers for the merits of the saints, how much fall they short of sharers in the mediation of redemption? You may think of this. For such prayers as these the church of Rome makes at this day, and they stand (not without great scandal to Christ and Christianity) used, and authorized to be used in the Missal. For instance: upon the feast of St. Nicholas you pray, “that God, by the merits and prayers of St. Nicholas, would deliver you from the fire of hell.” And upon the octaves of St. Peter and St. Paul, you desire God “that you may obtain the glory of eternity by their merits.” And on the “feast of St. Bonaventure, you pray, “that God would absolve you from all your sins by the interceding merits of Bonaventure.”
What is particularly interesting here is how Laud echoes Calvin's critique of the practice:
Wherefore, since the Scripture calls us away from all others to Christ alone, since our heavenly Father is pleased to gather together all things in him, it were the extreme of stupidity, not to say madness, to attempt to obtain access by means of others, so as to be drawn away from him without whom access cannot be obtained. But who can deny that this was the practice for several ages, and is still the practice, wherever Popery prevails? To procure the favour of God, human merits are ever and anon obtruded, and very frequently while Christ is passed by, God is supplicated in their name. I ask if this is not to transfer to them that office of sole intercession which we have above claimed for Christ? Then what angel or devil ever announced one syllable to any human being concerning that fancied intercession of theirs? There is not a word on the subject in Scripture. What ground then was there for the fiction? Certainly, while the human mind thus seeks help for itself in which it is not sanctioned by the word of God, it plainly manifests its distrust. But if we appeal to the consciences of all who take pleasure in the intercession of saints, we shall find that their only reason for it is, that they are filled with anxiety, as if they supposed that Christ were insufficient or too rigorous. By this anxiety they dishonour Christ, and rob him of his title of sole Mediator, a title which being given him by the Father as his special privilege, ought not to be transferred to any other. By so doing they obscure the glory of his nativity and make void his cross; in short, divest and defraud of due praise everything which he did or suffered, since all which he did and suffered goes to show that he is and ought to be deemed sole Mediator. At the same time, they reject the kindness of God in manifesting himself to them as a Father, for he is not their Father if they do not recognize Christ as their brother. This they plainly refuse to do if they think not that he feels for them a brother's affection; affection than which none can be more gentle or tender. Wherefore Scripture offers him alone, sends us to him, and establishes us in him. “He,” says Ambrose, “is our mouth by which we speak to the Father; our eye by which we see the Father; our right hand by which we offer ourselves to the Father. Save by his intercession neither we nor any saints have any intercourse with God,” (Ambros. Lib. de Isaac et Anima). If they object that the public prayers which are offered up in churches conclude with the words, through Jesus Christ our Lord, it is a frivolous evasion; because no less insult is offered to the intercession of Christ by confounding it with the prayers and merits of the dead, than by omitting it altogether, and making mention only of the dead - Institutes III.20.21.
Laud particularly shares Calvin's emphasis on how invocation of the Saints obscures the Church's reliance on the merits of Christ alone, a crucial Reformed motif. Note too how Laud, like Calvin, rejects Roman liturgical norms regarding the cult of the Saints. Mindful that the invocation of Saints was a key devotional practice dividing Reformed and Roman piety, Laud's classically Reformed emphasis in his critique of the practice is an example of how Laudian thought was fundamentally a defence of the Elizabethan Settlement.
Yes, while the Roman Missal goes too far about the merits of the saints, nonetheless they do have merits, and those are graces that increase the holiness of all who come within that influence. Why remember them if there is nothing beautiful, good, and transformative about the commemoration? The merits of Bonaventure may not be sufficient to absolve us from sins...but the merits bestowed by Priesting are sufficient? And all our merits have their source in Christ, the fountain of all merits. The Bible does not tell us to invoke the saints, but whenever a glimpse is given of the heavenly places, there are prayers ascending from those who dwell therein. Indeed, because Christ is our only Mediator and Advocate, no mediation and advocacy happens apart from him, even the prayers and supplications made here below. How more true is it of those who are alive in Christ though they are seen by the foolish to be dead? Again, I do recognize that the Roman practice went off the rails. But we cannot dismiss the necessity of the saints and their merits, which endure past death, without eventually questioning the need for humans at all in the work of God to save the world, and that includes the efficacy of the Sacraments. Christ sent the seventy and the twelve, and was not diminished in the sending, but rather increased by it. I get that perhaps one doesn't need the Litany of the Saints, because the Kalendar is, in effect, a litany of the saints. But understanding how God still blesses us with each saint's unique story that gives rise to merits whose source, of course, is Christ alone, this is the right thing to do, in that it honors the work Christ has accomplished in the world because he sent the saints to do it, and they did. The saints did pass away, but the merits they transmitted through their lives did not, and cannot, for their source is in Christ. How we access those merits, those blessings I believe that are gifts to the Church and still intended for our edification, is for me the question here.
ReplyDeletePart of my problem with this language is how alien it is to the Prayer Book tradition. I cannot help but think of the Post-Communion Prayer of Thanksgiving: "not weighing our merits, but pardoning our offences". This flows from the teaching of Article XIV and its use of the Lord's words, "When ye have done all that are commanded to you, say, We are unprofitable servants". Language of the 'merits of the Saints' was not included in the Prayer Book tradition precisely because it too easily could be used to distract the Church from a radical focus on the grace of God.
DeleteThis does not, however, prevent us from rejoicing in the work of grace in the lives of the Saints, commemorating them as 'living stones', and imitating their examples. But here the Prayer Book very deliberately avoids use of the language of 'merit', as it can allow us to settle our gaze on the Saint rather than the One to whom the Saint points.
Are the Saints gifts to the Church, given for our edification? Absolutely! Does this affirmation require the language of 'merit'? The Prayer tradition answers this in the negative.