would be no hope. If the forgiveness of sins were not to be had in the Church,
SERMON 213 145 region, as many as there are in this province, as many as there are also across the sea,22 as many as there are in the whole wide world, since from the rising of the sun to its setting the name of the Lord is praised (Ps 113:3). Such is the Catholic Church, our true mother, the true consort of that bridegroom.
Let us honor her, because she is the bride of so great a Lord. And what am I to say? Great and unheard of is the bridegroom's gracious generosity; he found her a whore, he made her a virgin. She mustn't deny that she was once a whore, or she may forget the kindness and mercy of her liberator. How can she not have been a whore, when she used to go fornicating after idols and demons?23 Fornication of the heart was there in all her members, fornication of the flesh in some of them; of the heart in all. And he came, and made her a virgin; he made the Church a virgin. In faith she is a virgin; in the flesh she has a few virgins, the nuns; in faith she should have all of us virgins, both women and men. In that sphere, you see, there should be universal chastity and purity and sanctity.
Well, do you want to know how the Church is a virgin? Listen to the apostle Paul, listen to the friend of the bridegroom, jealous for the bridegroom, not for himself: I have joined you, he says, to one husband. He was speaking to the Church; and to which Church? Wherever his letter could reach. I have joined you to one husband, to present you to Christ as a chaste virgin. But I am afraid, he said, that just as the serpent seduced Eve by his cunning, so your minds may be corruptedfrom the chastity which is in Christ (2 Cor 11:2-3). If you are afraid of being corrupted, it means you are a virgin. I am afraid, he said, that just as the serpent seduced Eve by his cunning. Did that serpent lie with Eve physically? And yet he extinguished the virginity of her heart. This is what I am afraid of, he said, that your minds may be corrupted from the chastity which is in Christ.
So the Church is virgin; let her be virgin; let her beware of being seduced, or she will find herself corrupted. The Church is a virgin. You're going to say to me, perhaps, "If she is a virgin, how does she give birth to children? Or if she doesn't bear children, how is it we gave in our names24 to be bom of her womb?" I answer: she is both virgin, and she gives birth. She imitates Mary, who gave birth to the Lord. Didn't the virgin, Saint Mary, both give birth and remain a virgin? So too the Church both gives birth and is a virgin. And if you really think about it, she gives birth to Christ, because those who are baptized are his members, parts of his body. You, says the apostle, are the body of Christ, and members of it (1 Cor 12:27).
The forgiveness of sins by baptism and the Lord's prayer
9. In the forgiveness of sins. If this were not to be had in the Church, there would be no hope. If the forgiveness of sins were not to be had in the Church, there would be no hope of a future life and eternal liberation. We thank God, who gave his Church such a gift. Here you are; you are going to come to the holy font, you will be washed in saving baptism, you will be renewed in the bath of rebirth (Ti 3:5), you will be without any sin at all as you come up from that bath. All the things that were plaguing you in the past will there be blotted out.