Third, the apostles wanted to teach us that those who are
most devoted to the most holy virgin have a most powerful advocate with her Son,
our Lord and Master. (Robert Bellarmine, An Explanation of the Apostles’
Creed [trans. Christian D. Washburn; Praxedes Press, 2025], 66)
The Right Hand of the Father
Finally, I will explain the last words of this article: “the
right hand of the Father”. To be at the right hand of the Father is proper to
Christ alone and is not proper to any other saint, angel, or even His Most Holy
Mother. Why? To be “at the right hand of God” in heaven means to be equal to
God. As St. Paul states, “And to which of the angels has He ever said, ‘Sit at
my right hand?”’” (Heb 1:13). We must not imagine, however, that God the Father
is at the left of Christ, nor that He is between the Son and the Holy Spirit. The
three Persons of the Trinity are of one and the same nature, which is infinite
and everywhere. Hence in Psalm 110 it is said that the Son is at the right hand
of the Father: “Sit at my right hand” (Ps 110:1) and “The Lord is at your right
hand” (Ps 110:5). Therefore, to be at the right hand of the Father is nothing
less than to be above every creature and to be equal to the Father. Christ’s
human nature is exceedingly inferior to His divine nature, but because Christ
is only one Person with both divine and human natures, therefore Christ as God
cannot be at the right hand of the Father without Christ the man also being
there. Analogously a royal robe is as high as a king while the king is wearing
it. (Robert Bellarmine, An Explanation of the Apostles’ Creed [trans.
Christian D. Washburn; Praxedes Press, 2025], 88-89)
On the grave danger of being
excommunicated:
The Communion of Saints
The communion of saints means that the Church is like a
human body, in which all the members are united in such a way that the good of
one member redounds to the good of all its members.
The principal goods of the Church are the seven
sacraments, and these are available to all who are worthy to receive them. There
are also sacrifices, indulgences, prayers, and the Divine Office. These are
useful to all who are in the Church. Sermons, miracles, and ecclesiastical
power are means instituted by Christ in the Church for the common good of all
the faithful.
Nor is it just the members of the Church on earth who
help us, but also the souls in purgatory and the saints in heaven pray for us
as well. Finally, through charity we know that everyone should rejoice in the
good of the other as if it were his own.
From this we can gather how great an evil excommunication
is, because it drives a man out of the Church and deprives him of all the
above-mentioned goods, even of ecclesiastical burial. Indeed, St. Bernard
pointedly observes that the Church on Good Friday prays for pagans, Jews,
heretics, and schismatics, but she does not pray for the excommunicated. The Church
does not excommunicate her disobedient children so that they will go to hell.
Instead, she excommunicates them so that, being ashamed of being expelled from
the company of the faithful, they may repent and return to the bosom of the
Catholic Church. (Robert Bellarmine, An Explanation of the Apostles’ Creed [trans.
Christian D. Washburn; Praxedes Press, 2025], 114-15)
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