This is the fourth article in the series Man and Woman – Image of the Triune God. The first article is What Is “The Real Thing” For Women? The second article is Image of One – Image of Three. The third article is Gift and Response. This article will be followed by Man – Minister of Confirmation and Woman – Minister of Communion.

The first reaction of most people reading the title of this article will be to think that there is a typo in it, that the word “oeconomic” should be spelled “economic.” The second reaction of these people will be to think that this article is about money.

When I explain that there is no typo in the title, that the spelling “oeconomic” is quite deliberate, and that this article has nothing to do with money or finance or the price of eggs, then most people will stop reading and look for some more interesting subject.

I had originally planned to call this article “The Kingdom of the Sons of God,” as I wrote at the end of the previous article, but that is a clumsy phrase, and I do try to write simple and hopefully somewhat elegant English. “The Oeconomic Kingdom” is short, simple, and definitely eye-catching, and it is perfectly exact. “Oeconomic” is an old form of the present word “economic” and it refers to the management of a household. I use it here to jar my readers into realizing that I am writing about something other than the stock market. I am writing about what the Fathers of the Church called “the economy of salvation.” As the Catechism of the Catholic Church says, “The Fathers of the Church distinguish between theology (theologia) and economy (oikonomia). ‘Theology’ refers to the mystery of God’s inmost life within the Blessed Trinity and ‘economy’ to all the works by which God reveals himself and communicates his life.”[i]

In my previous article Gift and Response, I discussed “theology,” the “mystery of God’s inmost life within the Blessed Trinity.” In this article, I will discuss “economy,” that is, some of the works “by which God reveals himself and communicates his life.”

A major adjustment to the way theology was taught in recent centuries was made in the documents of the Second Vatican Council and it consisted in the return to the traditional teaching of revelation as “God’s speaking and his manifestation of himself.” (We discussed this in an earlier article.)[ii] As we have seen, God’s own life, the internal life of the Trinity, is mutual gift and response. This is the love that is God. This is what God is, and it is all that He has to give. Therefore, His “economy,” that is, “all the works by which God reveals himself and communicates his life,” is nothing else than God’s gift of Himself and His longing for our response.

We need to keep this in mind because we risk narrowing our understanding of God’s self-giving. God only has Himself to give, He can only give His own infinite life and love. So every action of the Trinity is one facet of that infinite self-giving. Creation, redemption, sanctification, each of which is attributed to one Person of the Trinity, but which is in fact, an action of all Three, are all simply God’s offer to share His inner life of love, an offer made to all His creatures, though made possible in different ways.

The Bible is the written record of God’s economy. It begins, “In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth.”[iii] God’s act of creation was the beginning of His self-giving revelation. St. John the Evangelist begins his Gospel with a similar phrase: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”[iv] The beginning of creation was the beginning of God’s self-giving outside of Himself, but the real beginning occurred in eternity with God’s mutual self-giving within Himself. John goes on to make it clear that both actions are in harmony: “He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.”[v] There is no contradiction between theology and economy. Both are the same action. Both are the same gift. The only difference is the recipients.

John makes it clear in his Gospel that the Word was in the beginning, but he then shows that the Word is also the end, the goal of revelation. “Jesus answered, ’I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all things to myself.’[vi]” Paul confirms this: “When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to the one who put all things in subjection under him, so that God may be all in all.”[vii]

This is important because creation involves creatures quite different from one another. It includes such beings as different as angels and rocks, human beings and quarks. It is made up of purely spiritual beings, the angels, purely material beings, rocks and similar items, and human beings who are both spiritual and material. Yet, Scripture says that, in Christ, all of these creatures will share in the glory of God. “For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God.”[viii]

This has already begun in the Church. We find it first and most noticeably in the sacraments. The sacraments take inanimate, material realities, and cause them to do divine actions. In Baptism, water makes us children of God. In confirmation and the sacrament of healing, oil infuses divine power. The most notable example, of course, is the Eucharist, when bread and wine become the body and blood of the Son of God. Matter becomes an instrument of spiritual power and brings about divine effects.

It doesn’t stop there. The Bible recounts the healing of the woman with the flow of blood who touched Jesus’s cloak. [ix] The Church teaches the veneration of relics, the remains of those recognized as saints, objects that they have touched and even objects touched to a relic. Again, matter carries a power beyond its nature. This shouldn’t surprise us: we give gifts to people to express our friendship and love, and, like the relics, the object carries with it a power that it does not possess in itself: the power of communion.

“God will be all in all.” All creation exists to communicate God’s life in His creatures. Matter becomes life-giving beyond its own nature. Human beings give life to one another, their own life, and, to the degree that they are united to God, God’s life. (See my article, “God By Participation”)

What about angels? We have discussed material realities, and we have discussed human beings. Creation also includes angels, purely spiritual beings. As I wrote in my previous article, “We have seen that each angel images God’s oneness and Scripture explains how this takes place, for it says of the angels, ‘Are not all angels spirits in the divine service, sent to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation?’ The angels act to further God’s plan for humanity. Their actions are not aimed at aiding in the salvation of other angels, for each angel has already made that decision. Their actions are aimed at affecting our salvation. Their actions are aimed outside of themselves.”

Angels are helpers. They help us and they help one another. In the book of Daniel, the angle Gabriel tells how Michael, “one of the chief princes,” helped him in his battle with the angel of Persia.[x] Angels help others and in doing so they foster God’s work in creation. They especially help human beings, acting as guardians to guide us along the paths of grace. Even the medieval cosmology that presented angels as directing the movement of the planets can be understood in the framework of their service to believers. They may not push the planets and stars around, but I have no doubt that they can enlighten and guide us in our consideration and use of material things. They can surely help us to see and use them for the glory of God and our sharing in His life of love.

This short glimpse of the “economy of salvation” can set the framework for understanding more deeply our own role in that economy. All creation, from the simplest and most material to the most sublime, is willed by God to bring us to share in His life. That life is a life of communion, and man and woman are the protagonists of communion. We will see in our next two articles what this entails.

Notes:

[i] Catechism of the Catholic Church #236

[ii] Joseph Ratzinger, cf. Jared Wicks, “Six Texts by Prof. Joseph Ratzinger as peritus before and during Vatican Council II” Gregorianum, Vol. 89, No. 2 (2008), pp. 233-311 (79 pages), p. 271. https://www.jstor.org/stable/23582851

[iii] Gen. 1, 1

[iv] Jn 1, 1

[v] Jn 1, 2-3

[vi] Jn 12, 32

[vii] 1 Cor. 15, 28

[viii] Rom. 8, 19

[ix] Matt. 9, 20-22

[x] Dan. 10, 13 & 21, and 12, 1

---

Image: A Menagerie of Galaxies. By ESA/Hubble, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=106391081