18.

 Finally, Venerable Brothers, all who are your subjects, both clergy and people, may learn this from Blessed Ephrem: the love of the fatherland, whose claims indeed rest on the profession of Christian wisdom itself, must not be separated from the love of the heavenly fatherland, nor be preferred to it. We speak of that fatherland which is nothing other than the innermost rule of God in the souls of the just, begun here, then perfected in heaven. Indeed the Catholic Church exhibits a mystical image of this, since, transcending all differences of nationality and language, she embraces all sons of the Lord as a single family under a common father and pastor. Ephrem also teaches that the sources of spiritual life are in the sacraments, in the observance of the Evangelical precepts, and in the manifold exercises of piety which the liturgy supplies and the authority of the Church proposes. On this subject, note what our saint has to say about the sacrifice of the Altar: "With his hands the priest places Christ on the altar to become food. He addresses the Father as a member of the family saying, "Give me your Spirit, that in his coming he may descend upon the altar and sanctify the bread placed there to become the Body of your only begotten Son. He tells him of Christ's passion and death and exposes His blows; nor is His divinity ashamed of those blows. He says to the invisible Father: behold, your Son is nailed to the cross, his garments are sprinkled with blood, his side pierced with a lance. He recalls for him the passion and death of his Beloved, as though he had forgotten them, and the Father, hearing, favors his request."[³⁷] He also remarks on the state of the just after death. In a singular manner, these remarks augment the constant doctrine of the Church, later defined in the council of Florence. "The deceased has been taken away by the Lord and has already been introduced to the kingdom of heaven. The soul of the deceased is received in heaven and inserted as a pearl in the crown of Christ. The deceased even now resides with God and his saints."[³⁸]