Zubiri sacrament and Church in the Pauline mystery

Abstract

It is noted that already in “Hellenism and Christianity” (1934-1935), Zubiri en-dorses the prolongation of the Mystery of Christ –his redeeming sacrifice– in the Sacrament and the Church. He reacts –with manifest “fervor”– to the darkening of the mystery and the relegation of the Sacrament and Church in the speculative theology of the nineteenth century, which – according to him – forgets that religion is re-ligio and projects on St. Paul things of the nineteenth century: religious experience, Hegelianism and mystery religion. His choice of the Pauline letter to the Ephesians makes sense. In it – following St. Irenaeus and the Greek Fathers – he highlights: the Pauline perspective of the Mysterium Christi; the soteriological value of the recapitulation (άνακεφαλαίωσις); and sacramental (baptismal) regeneration that makes us children in the Son and, in Him, partakers of the divine nature. This is the perspec-tive of Casel’s Mysterientheologie. We already find the caselian thesis of the reproduction of the redemptive work (not only its effect) in sacramental grace. His theology of the sacramental and ecclesial mystery is made explicit in “The Supernatural Being...”. Thus, any contrary interpretation is questioned.