I find these three readings converging on a single pastoral lesson. The Apostolic Tradition (the church-order manual) presses the necessity of inward integrity before outward admission: candidates are probed about marriages, trades, and habits precisely because the soul’s state must ground sacramental life; the community protects its liturgy by admitting only those whose lives show habitual ordering toward God. Augustine’s reflection on the angels and the heavens turns our gaze upward: angels “read” God without letters because they eternally behold and choose the immutable counsel, reminding us that true knowledge of God issues from a loving, continual turning toward the divine face — and that our present sight is only a foreshadowing of a future, complete vision (cf. Ps 36:5; 1 John 3:2). Thomas, in Summa Q23, locates moral species in the end: right intention determines whether an action is truly good. Together they teach a single regimen — formation of desire (Apostolic Tradition), the habit of continual love (Augustine), and the primacy of ordered ends (Aquinas) — so that the baptized not only perform rites rightly but live with hearts trained to pursue God above all. (Ps 36:5; 1 Cor 10:31; 1 John 3:2)
Readings:
Hippolytus (trad.), Apostolic Tradition, Chapters 16–23
Augustine, The Confessions, Book 8, Chapter 15; Book 8, Chapter 18
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Part 1–2, Question 23 (combined)
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