CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Mater ecclesia has been one of the more prevalent and unique expressions for conveying the nature and function of the church in Christian thought. Unlike other ecclesial metaphors, such as the Body of Christ or People of God, mater ecclesia lacks a direct scriptural antecedent. Although various maternal images exist in Scripture, none are explicitly associated with the Christian community itself.1 Moreover, the metaphor of mater ecclesia appeared suddenly in late second-century patristic literature and without explanation. Yet, once the image was introduced, patristic writers continuously employed mater ecclesia as an image characterizing the corporate identity of the church. Epitomized in Cyprian‘s oft-repeated dictum, ―One cannot have God for a Father who does not have the church for a mother,‖ patristic writers understood the church‘s maternity as a natural extension of God‘s paternity, and an individual‘s association with her as an absolute requirement for salvation.2 The popularity of this image grew to such an extent, especially in the ancient western church, that the figure of mater ecclesia became the subject of not only ecclesiologically-focused treatises but Christian poetry, mosaics, and architecture as well. 1 Paul S. Minear in his thorough study, Images of the Church in the New Testament, lists and discusses over ninety New Testament images for the Christian community; the church as mother is not among them. Paul S. Minear, Images of the Church in the New Testament (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1975). 2 unit. 6 (CCSL 3:253.149-50): ―Habere iam non potest Deum patrem qui ecclesiam non habet matrem‖ (Trans. author). 1 Christian writers continued to employ and develop the image of mater ecclesia in the medieval and modern periods. During the Middle Ages, various theologians, such as Berengaudus and Serlo of Savigny,3 associated mater ecclesia with Mary to create a Maria-ecclesia in which the attributes of both figures are understood to be interchangeable in a quasi-perichoretic relationship.4 Some Catholic thinkers in the modern era, such as Matthias Joseph Scheeben and Hans Urs von Balthasar, further developed this notion and reversed the patristic understanding of the relationship between Mary and the church by making Mary the mother of the church.5 Others associated mater ecclesia with the teaching function of the Magisterium itself.6 The image of Mother Church has been so historically pervasive in Christian thought that one modern commentator even avers, ―The Church is our mother. We would not be Christians if we did not acknowledge in her this essential characteristic.‖7 3 Berengaudus, Exposition on the Seven Visions of the Book of the Apocalypse, PL 17: 876 D, and Serlo of Savigny, in nativitate B. M. (pg. 117 in Tissier‘s edition). See also Aelred, Sermon 2 on the Nativity (PL 195: 323 AC). The identity and, subsequently, the date of the former is still debated among scholars; for the most recent analysis see, Derk Visser, Apocalypse as Utopian Expectation (800- Iconography (Leiden: Brill, 1996). 4 Perichoresis (also termed Circuminsession) is a patristic term first articulated by Gregory of Nazianzus and developed by John of Damascus, which was used to explicate the relationship of Trinitarian persons. Based on John 17:21, a perichoretic relationship involves an interpenetration of persons. This notion will be later applied in Mariology, notably by Scheeben, concerning the motherhood of Mary and the church. 5 Scheeben, who influenced Balthasar, applied the notion of perichoresis to the relationship of Mary and the church, because he felt a relationship of analogy did not fully capture the closeness between the two figures; see Handbuch der Katholischen Dogmatik, Vol. 3 (Freiburg: Herder, 1882), 604ff. In Mariology, Scheeben goes so far as to say, ―Mary is the spiritual mother of mankind in a manner still more sublime than is the Church;‖ see M. J. Scheeben, Mariology, Vol. 2, trans. T. L. M. J. Geukers (St. Louis: Herder, 1947), 250. 6 This especially can be seen in the ―Profession of Faith‖ of Vatican I. 7 Henri de Lubac, The Motherhood of the Church, trans. Sergia Englund (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1982), 75. 2 Despite the centrality of mater ecclesia throughout the history of Christian ecclesiology, there are surprisingly few systematic studies analyzing the metaphor. The purpose of this dissertation is to help fill this lacuna in scholarship by examining the use and development of mater ecclesia among North African writers during the patristic era. The rationale for focusing on its expression in patristic North Africa is threefold. First, modern, especially magisterial, references to Mother Church almost always cite patristic antecedents, Cyprian and Augustine being the most commonly quoted. Second, not only did the explicit title of mater ecclesia originate in North Africa, but its writers also employed and developed the metaphor of mater ecclesia the most during the early church period. Third, because western ecclesiology has been largely based on the thought of Cyprian and Augustine, understanding their use of mater ecclesia can provide a helpful foundation for analyzing more recent expressions of the metaphor. Concerning the expression of mater ecclesia in North African ecclesiology, this dissertation will demonstrate that the metaphor was an expressive reflection of the ecclesiology to which it refers. In the case of North Africa, as the understanding of the church became more abstract, the concept of mater ecclesia concomitantly became less reflective of the local Christian community and was personified independently from it. What remained constant, however, was how the metaphor functioned, namely as an image used to delineate who constituted the true church vis-à-vis those who were not included. As will be demonstrated, this is evinced by the fact that the metaphor first arose and was primarily utilized in polemical and persecutory contexts. The image of mater ecclesia often had a divisive element to it, as with most rhetoric derived in these contexts. Thus, the meaning and function of the appellation mater ecclesia, as developed in North 3 African ecclesiology, was not conciliatory and inclusive, but rather polemical and exclusive. Mater Ecclesia in Modern Scholarship Only since the mid-twentieth century have scholars begun to study the patristic use and development of mater ecclesia. Even still, few studies have analyzed the metaphor in a systematic fashion. This is somewhat surprising given not only the popularity of mater ecclesia in early Christian thought but also the increased scholarly interest in gendered expressions and images used during the patristic era.8 The following historiographical survey functions to highlight past contributions in this area and indicate in what way this study diverges from them. The famous Dutch theologian Sebastian Tromp produced the first significant study highlighting the importance of mater ecclesia in patristic thought. In his article, 8 Most studies looking at gender during the patristic period focus either on the theological anthropology in patristic theory and practice or on the development of Mariology. Concerning the former see especially, Kari Elisabeth Børresen, ―In Defense of Augustine: How Femina is Homo?‖ in Collectanea Augustiniana: Mélanges T.J. van Bavel, ed. Bernard Bruning; ―Male-female, a Critique of Traditional Christian Theology,‖ Temenos 13 (1977): 31-42; ―Patristic Feminism: The Case of Augustine,‖ AugStud 25 (1994): 139-152, and ―Gender and Exegesis in the Latin Fathers,‖ Augustinianum 40, no. 1 (2000): 65-76; Elizabeth Clark, Women in the Early Church (Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1983); ―‗Adam‘s Only Companion‘: Augustine and the Early Christian Debate on Marriage,‖ Recherches augustiniennes 21 (1986): 139-162; ―Theory and Practice in Late Ancient Asceticism: Jerome, Chrysostom, and Augustine,‖ Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 5 (1989): 25-46; Kim Power, Veiled Desire: Augustine on Women (New York: Continuum, 1996); Margaret Miles, Carnal Knowing: Female Nakedness and Religious Meaning in the Christian West (Boston: Beacon Press, 1989) and Desire and Delight: A New Reading of ‟ “ ” (New York: Crossroad, 1992); Rosemary Radford Ruether, Women and Redemption: A Theological History (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998); Catherine Mowry LaCugna‘s ―God in Communion with Us: The Trinity,‖ in Freeing Theology: The Essentials of Theology in Feminist Perspective, ed. Catherine Mowry LaCugna (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1993); G. Bonner, ―Augustine‘s Attitude to Women and <Amicitia>,‖ in Homo Spiritualis: Festgabe fur Luc Verheijen OSA zu seinem 70. Geburtstag, ed. C Mayer (Wurzburg: Augustinus-Verlag, 1987): 259-75; E. Ann Matter, ―Christ, God and Woman in the Thought of St. Augustine,‖ in Augustine and His Critics: Essays in Honour of Gerald Bonner, eds. Robert Dodaro and George Lawless (New York: Routledge, 2000): 164-175. Concerning the latter, see G. Bonner, ―The Figure of Eve in Augustine‘s Theology,‖ SP 33 (1997): 22-34; Robert B. Eno, ―Mary and Her Role in Patristic Theology,‖ in The One Mediator, the Saints, and Mary, ed. H. George Anderson, J. Francis Stafford, and Joseph A. Burgess (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992), 159- 76; Maureen A. Tilley, ―Mary in Roman Africa: Evidence for her Cultus,‖ SP 39 (2006):121-126. 4 ―Ecclesia Sponsa Virgo Mater‖ (1937), Tromp examines the image of mater ecclesia among other feminine portrayals of the church and delineates four principal images associated