The thing is simply inexplicable except on one hypothesis – that that unique thirst of Jesus upon the cross is communicated to his members, that his ambition to suffer is perpetuated continually in that Mystical Body in which he reenacts the history of his Passion – that these are the cells of that Body, which, like his hands and feet, are more especially pierced by nails, and who rejoice to know that they are called to this august vocation, by which the redemption wrought on Calvary is perpetually reenacted on earth; who “fill up what is lacking of the sufferings of Christ,” who are lambs of God whose blood mingles with the Blood on Calvary, victims whose sacrifice is accepted as united with his. This conception of the Church as the Body of Christ is surely the one hypothesis which makes the sufferings of individuals tolerable to contemplate.
Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson (+ 1914) was a British convert to Catholicism who is best known for his novels about the faith.
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