May 1990 Print

by Mary Buckalew

"Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God." (Psalm 86:3)

St. Luke reports toward the end of his Gospel that the risen Savior, His identity veiled, joined two of His disciples as they hastened from Jerusalem toward the village of Emmaus. As the three journeyed together He "expounded to them in all the scriptures, the things that were concerning him." (Luke 24:44) The prophecies referred to and explained by the Savior would certainly have included those about the Kingdom which He established, the Catholic Church—One, Holy, Roman, and Apostolic.

Inspired by the Spirit of God, the royal prophet David in the 10th century B.C. foretold, in a prophecy quoted both by Christ and by St. Peter, that the Messias would be rejected by the Jews but would be the foundation of the Church. "The stone which the builders rejected; the same is become the head of the corner. This is the Lord's doing: and it is wonderful in our eyes." (Ps 117:22) Speaking in the person of Christ, David in an extraordinarily majestic utterance foretold His reign, prophesying that the Gentiles would be admitted into His universal Kingdom:

... I am appointed king by him over Sion his holy mountain, preaching his commandment.

The Lord hath said to me: Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee.

Ask of me, and I will give thee the Gentiles for thy inheritance, and the utmost parts of the earth for thy possessions. (Ps. 2:6 ff.)

Elsewhere he repeated his prophecy of the universality of Christ's Kingdom:

All the ends of the earth shall remember, and shall be converted to the Lord:

And all the kindreds of the Gentiles shall adore in his sight.

For the kingdom is the Lord's; and he shall have dominion over the nations. (Ps 21:28 ff.)

King David also prophesied the gift of tongues and the missionary journeys of the apostles: "There are no speeches nor languages, where their voices are not heard. Their sound hath gone forth into all the earth: and their words unto the ends of the world." (Ps. 18:4 ff.)

In Psalm 22, which catechumens once memorized preparatory to their admission into the Church, he foretold in a mystic prophecy the Sacraments of the New Law:

The Lord ruleth me: and I shall want nothing. He hath set me in a place of pasture (the Church). He hath brought me up, on the water of refreshment (Baptism): he hath converted my soul. He hath led on the paths of justice, for his own name's sake For though I should walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evils, for thou art with me. Thou has prepared a table before me (the Mass) against them that afflict me. Thou has anointed my head with oil (Confirmation); and my chalice which inebriateth me, how goodly is it (Holy Communion). And thy mercy will follow me all the days of my life. And that I may dwell in the house of the Lord unto length of days.

It was given to King David to describe in a glorious psalm the Church as Queen, exquisitely adorned and presiding over her royal court:

The queen stood on thy right hand, in gilded clothing; surrounded with variety. Hearken, O daughter, and see, and incline thy ear: and forget thy people and thy father's house. And the king shall greatly desire thy beauty; for he is the Lord thy God, and him they shall adore. And the daughters of Tyre with gifts, all the rich among the people, shall entreat thy countenance. All the glory of the king's daughter is within in golden borders, clothed round about with varieties. After her shall virgins be brought to the king: her neighbors shall be brought to thee. They shall be brought with gladness and rejoicing: they shall be brought into the temple of the king. Instead of thy fathers, sons are born to thee: thou shalt make them princes over all the earth. They shall remember thy name throughout all generations. Therefore shall people praise thee forever; yea, forever and ever. (Ps. 44:10 ff.)

And in a beautiful prophetic utterance the royal prophet foretold the love of the Savior for His Catholic Kingdom:

The Lord loveth the gates of Sion above all the tabernacles of Jacob. Glorious things are said of thee, O city of God. I will be mindful of Rahab and of Babylon knowing me. Behold the foreigners, and Tyre, and the people of the Ethiopians, these were there. Shall not Sion say: This man and that man is born in her? and the Highest himself founded her. The dwelling in thee is as it were of all rejoicing. (Ps. 86)

During the 8th century B.C. the holy Amos, father of Isaias, in a prophecy quoted by St. James at the first Council of the Church (Acts 15:15), spoke as had King David of the Church's universality:

In that day I will raise up the tabernacle of David, that is fallen; and I will close up the breaches of the walls thereof, and repair what was fallen: and I will rebuild it as in the days of old.

That they may possess the remnant of Edom, and all nations, because my name is invoked upon them: saith the Lord that doth these things (Am. 9:11 ff.)

Also during the 8th century B.C. the great Isaias, moved by divine inspiration, foretold that the Church would be visible to all—a mountain upon a mountain, accessible and unmistakable: "And in the last days the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared on the top of mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it." (Is. 2:2) He also testified that the virtue of charity would be exercised to a pre-eminent degree in her:

...They shall turn their swords into plough shares, and their spears into sickles: nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they be exercised any more to war.... They shall not hurt, nor shall they kill in all my holy mountain, for the earth is filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the covering waters of the sea. (Is. 2:4, 11:9)

Isaias also prophesied the kingship of the Messias ruling His Church: "His empire shall be multiplied, and there shall be no end of peace: he shall sit upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom; to establish it and strengthen it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth and forever: the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this." (Is. 9:7 ff.) In an utterance quoted by St. Paul in a sermon recorded by St. Luke in The Acts of the Apostles, Isaias, as had King David, foretold that the Kingdom of the New Covenant, the Church, would welcome the Gentiles: "And he said: It is a small thing that thou shouldst be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to convert the dregs of Israel. Behold, I have given thee to be the light of the Gentiles, that thou mayst be my salvation even to the farthest part of the earth." (Is. 49:6) Elsewhere the holy prophet observed regarding the conversion of the Gentiles that "they to whom it was not told of him, have seen: and they that heard not, have beheld." (Is. 52:15) He also prophesied the universal authority with which the Messias would clothe His Church: "...every tongue that resisteth thee in judgment, thou shalt condemn." (Is. 54:17)

In a prophecy which St. Paul in his epistle to the Romans applied to the apostles, Isaias foretold the travels of the Messias' emissaries: "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, and that preacheth peace: of him that showeth forth good, that preacheth salvation, that saith to Sion: Thy God shall reign!" (Is. 52:7) Again Isaias prophesied concerning the extensive journeys of Christ's missionaries: "...and I will send of them that shall be saved, to the Gentiles into the sea, into Africa, and Lydia... into Italy, and Greece, to the islands afar off, to them that have not heard of me, and have not seen my glory. And they shall declare my glory to the Gentiles." (Is. 66:19 ff.)

In a prophecy which Our Lord himself quoted, Isaias foretold the graces which would emanate from the Sacraments of His Church: "You shall draw waters with joy out of the saviour's fountains." (Is. 12:3; John 7:38) He seems also to have prophetically described Holy Communion as sweetest nourishment for His faithful alone:

All you that thirst, come to the waters: and you that have no money make haste, buy, and eat: come ye, buy wine and milk without money, and without any price.

Why do you spend money for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which doth not satisfy you? Hearken diligently to me, and eat that which is good, and your soul shall be delighted in fatness. (Is. 55:1ff.)

The Lord hath sworn by his right hand, and by the arm of his strength: Surely I will no more give thy corn to be meat for thy enemies: and the sons of the strangers shall not drink thy wine, for which thou hast laboured.

For they that gather it, shall eat it, and shall praise the Lord: and they that bring it together, shall drink it in my holy courts. (Is. 62:8 ff.)

As had Isaias, the holy prophet Micheas, his contemporary, foretold the visibility and universality of the Church:

And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be prepared in the top of mountains, and high above the hills: and people shall flow to it.

And many nations shall come in haste, and say: Come, let us go to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob: and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth out of Sion, and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem. (Mi. 4:1 ff.)

During that same century the holy Osee, in a prophecy quoted by St. Paul in his epistle to the Romans, foretold the admission of the Gentiles into Christ's Church: "And I will say to that which was not my people: Thou art my people: and they shall say: Thou art my God." (Osee 2:24)

Taught by the Spirit of God, Jeremias in the 6th century B.C. foretold that the Kingdom of the Messias would be the result of a New Covenant and not a continuation of the Old:

 Behold the days shall come, saith the Lord, and I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Juda:

Not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt: the covenant which they made void, and I had dominion over them saith the Lord.

But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel, after those days, saith the Lord: I will give my law in their bowels, and I will write it in their heart: and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. (Jer. 31:31 ff.)

The holy prophet also foretold that objects and practices considered sacred under the Old Covenant would be forgotten under the New: "And when you shall be multiplied, and increase in the land in those days, saith the Lord, they shall say no more: The ark of the covenant of the Lord: neither shall it be visited, neither shall that be done any more." (Jer. 3:16.)

As had others before him, Jeremias prophesied the admission of the Gentiles into the Church:

O Lord, my might, and my strength, and refuge in the day of tribulation: to thee the Gentiles shall come from the ends of the earth, and shall say: Surely our fathers have possessed lies, a vanity which hath not profited them. Shall a man make gods unto himself, and they are no gods? Therefore, behold, I will this once cause them to know, and I will show them my hand and my power: and they shall know that my name is the Lord. (Jer. 16:19 ff.)

He stressed the catholicity of the Savior's Kingdom: "At that time Jerusalem shall be called the throne of the Lord: and all the nations shall be gathered together to it, in the name of the Lord to Jerusalem, and they shall not walk after the perversity of their most wicked heart." (Jer. 3:17.)

The holy Jeremias prophesied the reign of Christ and, under the figure of sacrifices of the Old Law, the priesthood:

For thus saith the Lord: There shall not be cut off from David a man to sit upon the throne of the house of Israel. Neither shall there be cut off from the priests and Levites a man before my face to offer holocausts, and to burn sacrifices, and to kill victims continually. (Jer. 33:17 ff.)

Again he prophesied concerning the priests of Christ's holy Kingdom, "I will give you pastors according to my own heart, and they shall feed you with knowledge and doctrine." (Jer. 3:15) He also prophesied the Sacred Humanity of Christ the King: "...their leader shall be of themselves: and their prince shall come forth from the midst of them: and I will bring him near, and he shall come to me: for who is this that setteth his heart to approach me, saith the Lord?" (Jer. 30:21.)

The prophet Ezechiel during the 6th century B.C. foretold the Sacrament of Baptism: "I will pour upon you clean water, and you shall be cleansed from all your filthiness, and I will cleanse you from all your idols." (Ez. 36:25.) Perhaps he also prophesied the Church's perpetual consolation, the Blessed Sacrament present in her tabernacles, when he declared that the name of the holy city was to be "The Lord is there." (Ez. 48:35.)

Prompted by God, the prophet Joel, whose century is unknown, foretold that the Kingdom of Christ would be a source of divine graces: "...it shall come to pass in that day, that the mountains shall drop down sweetness, and the hills shall flow with milk: and waters shall flow through all the rivers of Juda: and a fountain shall come forth of the house of the Lord, and shall water the torrent of thorns." (Jo. 3:18)

The prophet Malachi as during the 5th century B.C. was by divine dispensation granted the singular privilege of prophesying the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Church's ineffable and most precious treasure: "For from the rising of the sun even to the going down, my name is great among the Gentiles, and in every place there is sacrifice, and there is offered to my name a clean oblation: for my name is great among the Gentiles, saith the Lord of hosts." (Mal. 1:11)

Consumed with holy yearning to probe the secrets of God, the prophet Daniel in the 6th century B.C. was vouchsafed a mystic vision in which he was shown that this heavenly Kingdom, the Holy Roman Catholic Church, would in the power of Christ extend to the ends of the earth and endure until the end of time:

I beheld therefore in the vision of the night, and lo, one like the son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and he came even to the Ancient of Days: and they presented him before him.

And he gave him power, and glory, and a kingdom: and all peoples, tribes and tongues shall serve him: his power is an everlasting power that shall not be taken away: and his kingdom shall not be destroyed. (Dan. 7:13 ff.)