51. en. Ps. 26, exp. 2.2; Boulding, Expositions (III/15), 275; CCL 38.155.
206 Ecclesial Reception of the Divine Life tion. The Son of Man's perfect and integrated humanity can "become" all men and women's because all of humanity has been assumed by the divine Word. This is how in the church Christ has made us his own, "uniting us into one body with himself (concorporans nos sibi) and making us his members, so that in him we too are Christ" (ut in illo et nos Christus essemus).51 Augustine's daring in positing such a theology of the totus Christus leaves us with three important implications: Augustine's understanding of Christian holiness, prayer, and community.
First, the totus Christus has to do with the nature of Christian holiness in particular and the attribution of all gifts in general. Holiness has become collective in the humanity of God: a charge to find—and become—Christ in the world in which the pilgrim church labors. As such, the pilgrim church is the place where the sanctified humanity and divine love coalesce in order to provide us with both the object of proper love and the means with which to fulfill the dominical command. Christians are to hear Christ's new command to love one another (cf. John 13:34) not as mere mortals care for one another, and "not as men love one another because they are men, but as they love one another because they are gods and all [of them] sons of the Most High, so that they may be brothers to his only Son, loving each other with the love with which he himself loved them. . . ."52 Only in Christ and as Christ can human dignity be fully recognized and loved because only in Christ is love not mortal and solipsistic. That is, in the "whole Christ" fallen men and women need no longer rely only on their own selves but are rather brought into the perfect love of Christ for others.
The Holy Spirit unifies all Christian characteristics into Christ. This vital component of Augustine's ecclesiology safe-
51. en. Ps. 26, exp. 2.2; Boulding, Expositions (III/15), 275; CCL 38.155. 52. Jo. eu. tr. 65.1; Rettig, Tractates, 4.51; cf. Jo. eu. tr. 111.6.