Abstract

Andrzej Napiórkowski:
The Double Mystery of the Human Church of the Triune God
(FKTh 2025-3, p. 177–192)

The double mystery of the human Church of the Triune God - The author advocates the restoration of the concept of mystery/sacramentum to ecclesiology, which provides a solid basis for expressing in an integral way the reality of the Church as a double mystery resulting from the organic connection between the Holy Trinity and man. At the same time, he is critical of certain ecclesiological categories, such as “people of God,” “communio,” and “synodality,” which were attributed a kind of interpretive exclusivity in post-conciliar debates. Napiorkowski notes that the Church is too rich a reality to be confined to just one category. Therefore, he postulates a return to the use of other biblical and patristic categories (the mystical Body of Christ, the temple of the Holy Spirit, the House of God, or the Bride of the Lamb), as they are congruent in nature, i.e., they complement each other rather than exclude each other.