Question One: On the Existence of Character

59. Character (from the Greek word χαρακτήρ,¹ i.e., figure, seal, mark; merkteeken) is a spiritual seal, distinctive from others, indelibly impressed upon the soul, by which man is deputed and consigned to certain offices of Christian worship.

¹ The Greek Fathers, however, do not use this word but the term σφραγίς, a seal, from the verb σφραγίζειν, to seal, to sign, which is also used in the Scriptures.

It is said:

a seal, because although of itself it is not sensible, nevertheless for us it is a sign by reason of the external rite by which it is conferred;

spiritual, both by reason of the power which is handed over for divine things, and by reason of the subject in which it is received;

indelible: it is a property which belongs to character, because it is a certain spiritual consecration which remains as long as its subject remains;

impressed upon the soul: not the very Word of God, as Rosmini erroneously said,² but something created in the soul; which nevertheless is not to be understood of the very essence of the soul but of its faculty;

² Condemned proposition 28.

by which man is deputed to the offices of Christian worship: character contains an aptitude or power of receiving or performing divine things;

distinctive from others: since it is a seal, it has the office of distinguishing before God indeed and the angels, and also before men, by reason of the visible sacrament by which it is impressed.

60. Thesis. Certain sacraments impress upon the soul a character, or a spiritual seal distinct from grace. - This is of faith from the Council of Trent, sess. 7, can. 9, confirming the Council of Florence, and sess. 23, c. 4 and can. 4, against Wicleff, who said that character was unknown to Scripture and the Fathers, and against the Protestants, who say that Innocent III devised it.

The doctrine is not clearly drawn out from the Scriptures, although they affirm that Christians are sealed, which seems to be understood of the sacraments (II Cor. I, 21-22; Eph. I, 13; IV, 30); nor from primitive tradition, because all the texts could strictly be understood of sacramental grace.

From the beginning the Fathers acknowledge an impressed seal which marks and distinguishes men before God and the angels, which they compare to the character by which soldiers are marked on the body, or sheep on the back, with the stamping of coin, and of a ring in wax, or with the mark of circumcision: by this seal the faithful are signed as belonging to the family and flock of God.³ Yet the Fathers do not always sufficiently distinguish the seal from the grace of the sacrament, nor do all hold it as incapable of being lost.

³ Hermas, Similitudes VI, 3; IX, 16; II Clement VIII, 6; Tertullian, On the Spectacles, 24; On the Resurrection of the Flesh, 8; Clement of Alexandria, Who Is the Rich Man That Shall Be Saved?, 42; Stromata II, 3; Hippolytus, On Christ and Antichrist, 6; Cyprian, ep. 73; Cyril of Jerusalem, Catecheses I, 2-3; XVIII, 33; XXI, 7; XXII, 7; Chrysostom, on II Corinthians, book III, n. 7; hom. 2 on Ephesians, n. 1; Ambrose, On the Mysteries, 42; On the Holy Spirit, book I. Thus for Baptism: Hermas, II Clement, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Cyprian, Basil, Cyril of Jerusalem; for Confirmation: Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Cyprian, Cyril of Jerusalem, Ambrose; for Order: Gregory of Nyssa, on the Baptism of Christ.

From the fourth century they explain it more explicitly, and call it indelible, unbreakable, and indissoluble, such that it can be broken by no effort.⁴

⁴ Basil, on Holy Baptism, 4-5; Gregory Nazianzen, oration on Baptism; Gregory of Nyssa, oration on Baptism, n. 11; Cyril of Jerusalem, Pro-catechesis, 16, 17; Apostolic Constitutions, III, 16.

Finally, they say that it is separable from grace, and that in itself it is not changed when grace is lost.⁵ Thus the doctrine which at the beginning lay hidden implicitly and was brought forth obscurely, afterward was proposed explicitly and clearly; but from the beginning it was certainly contained in the very practice of the Church.

⁵ Ambrose, On the Holy Spirit, book I; Basil and Gregory Nazianzen, cited place, and especially Augustine.

It is proved:

From the practice of the Church: Certain sacraments once validly conferred have always from the beginning of the Church been held as unrepeatable; but there can be no reason for this matter unless because they imprint an indelible character, as Augustine argues, on Psalm 39.

With the whole Church, namely, approving, he defended against the Donatists: a) that the validity of the sacraments does not depend on the goodness of the minister, but that true sacraments are dispensed by heretics and schismatics; b) that certain sacraments cannot be repeated without sacrilege, even in those who received them from heretics; c) that the reason for unrepeatability is that the sacraments have an unfailing effect, an indelible character. In this controversy Augustine could appeal to the sense of the whole Church and to universal custom.

By reason of fittingness: The sacraments depute men to some spiritual and sacred functions. But he who is deputed to something is customarily consigned for it, just as soldiers were accustomed to be marked with bodily marks, because they were deputed to bodily warfare. Therefore it is fitting that in the sacraments the faithful be marked with a spiritual character.

This is confirmed: Just as the New Law not only externally, but by participation in the divine nature, renders us internally holy and adopted sons of God, so it belongs to its perfection that we be deputed to divine things and be made participants of divine power, not only by an extrinsic ordination of reason, but also by an intrinsic and inhering consecration and sealing.⁶

⁶ St. Thomas, on IV Sentences, d. 4, q. 1, a. 2, qc. 2, ad 3.