Hello again.
I will tell you what I see in the summary offered on this post. You can tell me what I misunderstand about this summary. I think that will show what I am saying well enough (but you need to read LW7’s summary of the conversation).
Thank you for that thorough summary. Now it is my turn.
Arians, Mormons and Catholics agree that the Father and the Son are different persons, but they differ in their respective beliefs about how many beings they are and about their nature. Let us see:
- Arians: The Father and the Son are different beings and have different natures.
- Mormons: The Father and the Son are different beings and have the same nature.
- Catholics: The Father and the Son are the same being and have the same nature.
We know by Apostolic Tradition that there exists only one God (for example 1 Tim 2,5):
- Arians pass this test, because for them the Father was the unique God, and the Son, as different being, has a different and lesser nature, he was for them a kind of a creature, a minor god if you want, but infinitely inferior; and therefore, not the unique God (uncreated).
- Catholics pass this test as well, because for us the Father is the unique God, and the Son, although a different person, is also this unique God. They are not two gods, but the same one.
- But Mormons do not pass it, because for you, The Father and the Son have the same nature and at the same time they are different beings. Then, they are two gods. Even more, counting the Holy Spirit, the wife/s of the Father (goddesses) and multiple other gods, the father of the Father, and other relatives, the next generation of gods, and so on; there are many more. So Mormons do not pass it.
Although Arians were monotheistic, they did not believe in the full divinity of the Son, precisely the dividing issue they had with Catholics.
Apostolic Tradition has another proposition, that the Son is the same thing (essence, substance, nature) as the Father. For example, in John 5,18 it is stated that the Son is equal to God, contrary to the Arian position. So this is a second test that Arians do not pass.
In Nicaea, it was officially introduced a new term, consubstantial, so that using one word, it meant that the Father and the Son are the same in nature, and at the same time, due to the divine nature, they are not two gods, but the true and only one God.
The only way you can reconcile the two statements (or tests), i.e. “there is only one God”, and “the Son (different from the Father) is the same things as God”, is applying the truth of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. It is that way simple.
And about John 17,20ff, was also used by Arians to say that the union of the Father and the Son does not imply same nature. You use it nowadays to say it does not imply same being (contradicting the unicity of God), but only on purpose. Saint Augustine, among other saint fathers, who debated against Arians, explained the true sense of that passage. I have read some of them in the “Catena Aurea” (compiled by saint Thomas Aquinas) and in debates between Augustine and some Arians, but in Spanish (and it is too long).
Before I can address the passage I have to stablish some terms:
- Ontological unity: to describe a union of nature and being.
- Operative unity: to describe a union of purpose, will, doctrine.
Mormons consider the Triune Godhead as having an operative unity, composed by the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, “and these three constitute three distinct personages and three Gods” (as it was taught by Joseph Smith,
lds.org/manual/teachings-joseph-smith/chapter-2?lang=eng). On the other hand, we have the ontological unity, believed by Catholics, in which God is in Three Persons. The ontological unity implies the operative one, but not vice-versa.
I think you interpret the passage as if it says that the unity wished by Jesus for his disciples were of the same type as the one among the Father and the Son. And that this one must be an operative unity, since human beings cannot fuse together to be one being.
If that were the case, it would not have been a problem for Jesus to ask: “That they and us may be one”, and “they in you, you in them”. On the contrary, he said “that they may be one as we are one” (verse 22) and “I in them, and you in me, so that they can be perfectly one” (verse 23). He does not say “you in them” or “they in you” but “I in them” and “you in me”. These distinctions made by our Lord are for a reason. This is the key: Jesus has two natures, so that he can be one with human beings, according to his human nature; and one with God, according to his divine one. Jesus is the nexus among the disciples and the Father. This is the only way “that they may be one in us” (verse 21). Again he does not say “they may be one with us” (as a whole), but “in us”, as the creatures are in the Creator, or God in their temple (of the body).
And we have here a third kind of unity, communion, which is a union by grace in which God lives in the soul, and the soul in God, and the soul with all the souls who are in God, and God in them. This includes the operative union (Acts 2,44; 4,32) and it reflects the ontological one, by the grace of God, since it is a participation in his Divine Nature (2 Peter 1,3-4). This is also related with being in the image of Christ (2 Corinthians 3,18) and being part of his Mystical Body.
Stephen168 has explained about the meaning of consubstantial when applied to two different natures!
Consubstantial has the same meaning whether you apply it to humanity (generic to use your term) or to the Trinity (numeric to use your term). God has one nature and humanity has one nature.
Thank you brother!
