Builders And Bearers

Super quem erat quasi aedificium civitatis vergentis ad Austrum.  Notandum est quod non dicitur, Super quem erat aedificium, sed quasi aedificium, ut videlicet ostenderetur quod non de corporalis, sed de spiritalis civitatis aedificio cuncta dicerentur. Qui enim non se aedificium, sed quasi aedificium vidisse perhibet, cor audientium ad spiritalem fabricam mittit, sicut per Psalmistam dicitur: Jerusalem quae aedificatur ut civitas. Quia etenim illa internae pacis visio ex sanctorum civium congregatione construitur, Jerusalem coelestis ut civitas aedificatur. Quae tamen in hac peregrinationis terra dum flagellis percutitur, tribulationibus tunditur, ejus lapides quotidie quadrantur. Et ipsa est civitas, scilicet sancta Ecclesia, quae regnatura in coelo adhuc laborat in terra. Cujus civibus Petrus dicit: Et vos tanquam lapides vivi superaedificamini. Et Paulus ait: Dei agricultura, Dei aedificatio estis. Quae videlicet civitas habet hic in sanctorum moribus magnum jam aedificium suum. In aedificio quippe lapis lapidem portat, quia lapis super lapidem ponitur; et qui portat alterum, portatur ab altero. Sic itaque, sic in sancta Ecclesia unusquisque et portat alterum, et portatur ab altero. Nam vicissim se proximi tolerant, ut per eos aedificium charitatis surgat. Hinc enim Paulus admonet, dicens: Invicem onera vestra portate, et sic adimplebitis legem Christi. Cujus legis virtutem denuntians, ait: Plenitudo legis charitas. Si enim ego vos portare negligo in moribus vestris, et vos me tolerare contemnitis in moribus meis, charitatis aedificium inter nos unde surgit, quos vicaria dilectio per patientiam non conjungit? In aedificio autem, ut praediximus, lapis qui portat portatur, quia sicut ego jam mores eorum tolero qui adhuc in conversatione boni operis rudes sunt, ita ego quoque ab illis toleratus sum, qui me in timore Domini praecesserunt et portaverunt, ut portatus portare discerem. Sed ipsi quoque a majoribus suis portati sunt. Lapides vero qui in summitate atque extremitate fabricae ponuntur, ipsi quidem portantur ab aliis, sed alios nequaquam portant, quia et hi qui in fine Ecclesiae, id est in extremitate mundi nascituri sunt, tolerantur quidem a majoribus, ut eorum mores ad bona opera componantur; sed cum non eos sequuntur qui per illos proficiant, nullos super se fidelis fabricae jam  lapides portant. Nunc itaque alii portantur a nobis, nos vero portati sumus ab aliis. Omne autem pondus fabricae fundamentum portat, quia mores simul omnium solus Redemptor noster tolerat. De quo Paulus ait: Fundamentum enim aliud nemo potest ponere praeter id quod positum est, quod est Christus Jesus. Portat fundamentum lapides, et a lapidibus non portatur, quia Redemptor noster omnia nostra tolerat, sed in ipso malum non fuit quod tolerari debuisset. Unde bene nunc dicitur: Dimisit me super montem excelsum nimis, super quem erat quasi aedificium civitatis, quia mores et culpas nostras solus ille sustinet, qui totam sanctae Ecclesiae fabricam portat. Qui per prophetae vocem de perverse adhuc viventibus dicit: Laboravi sustinens. Non autem sustinendo Dominus laborat, cujus divinitatis potentiam nulla fatigatio contingit; sed, verbis humanis loquens, ipsam suam circa nos patientiam laborem vocat. Sanctus Gregorius Magnus, In Ezechielem Prophetam, Liber Secundus, Homilia I Migne PL 76 938-939

'On which there was as a city built situated to the south.' 1  It should be noted that it does not say, 'On which there was a city built,' but 'as a city built', that it evidently be shown that it speaks not of a material but of a spiritual building of a city. For not as a thing built, but as if built it is presented, that the heart of the hearers be turned to spiritual building, as it said by the Psalmist: 'Jerusalem which is built up like a city'. 2 Since because that vision of eternal peace is made from the gathering of the holy, the heavenly Jerusalem is 'like' a city built up. Which though on its journey on this earth it is struck with whips, and buffeted by tribulations, its stones are lain down everyday. And this city is the Church which shall reign in heaven while it labours on earth. Concerning which city Peter says, 'And you are as living stones built up,' 3 And Paul says, 'Cultivated by God, you are the building of God.' 4 And certainly the city has already had here by the ways of the saints a great building up. For in a building a stone bears a stone, for stone is placed on stone, and that which bears another, is borne by another. And as it is, so it is in the holy Church that everyone bears another, and he is borne by another. For each must bear his neighbours that through them rises up the building of love. Whence Paul admonishes, saying, 'Bear one another's faults, and so you fulfill the law of Christ.' 5 And announcing the virtue of the law, he says, 'The Fullness of the law is love.' 6 For if I bear you in overlooking your ways, and you bear me in contempt of my ways, how does the building of love between us rise, which by mutual diligence though patience is bound together? In the building, however, as we have said, he who bears a stone is borne, because as I bear their ways who are yet reluctant to turn to good works, so I was borne by them who preceded me in the fear of the Lord and bore me, that borne we learn to bear. But they also were by their elders borne. Yet the stones which are placed at the heights and at the extremities are borne by another but do not bear anyone else, because these are they who are on the borders of the Church, that is, those who are born far out in the world should be borne by the greater, that the ways of them might be composed to good works, but when they do not follow those by whom they would be improved, they do not bear stones for the building of faith. So now others are borne by us, and we are borne by others, but the whole weight of the building the foundation bears, because the Redeemer alone bears the ways of all. Concerning which Paul says, 'No other foundation is anyone able to place apart from the one that has been placed, which is Jesus Christ.' 7 The foundation bears the stones, and by the stones it is not borne, because our Redeemer bears all, but in Him there was no evil that he would bear. Whence it is well said above: 'He placed me on an excessively high mountain, on which there was as a city built up,' because our ways and faults He alone bears, He who bears the whole fabric of the Holy Church. He who through the voice of the Prophet concerning the error of the living says, 'I have laboured bearing.' 8 However the Lord does not labour in His bearing, for no weariness touches the power of His Divinity, but since this is spoken of in human words, he speaks of it in the manner of the weariness of our labour. Saint Gregory the Great, On the Prophet Ezekiel, Book 2, from Homily 1 1 Ezek 40.2 2 Ps 121.3 3 1 Pet 2.5 4 1 Cor 3.9 5 Galat 6.2 6 Rom 13.10 7 1 Cor 3.11 8 Jerem 6.11