Folio 144

St. Agatho, 678–681

printed p. 112 · pdf p. 144

[another version: with true faith] the true resurrection of the body of all the dead. Neither do we believe that we shall rise in an ethereal or any other body (as some madly say) but in that in which we live and exist and move. When this example of His holy resurrection was finished, our same Lord and Savior returned by ascending to His paternal home, which in His divinity He had never left. There sitting at the right hand of the Father, He awaits the end of time to be the judge of all the living and the dead. Thence with the holy angels and men He will come to judge, and to render to everyone the due of his own reward, according as each one living in the body has done good or evil [II Cor. 5:10]. We believe that the holy Catholic Church, purchased by the price of His blood, will reign with Him for eternity. Established in her bosom we believe in and confess one baptism for the remission of all sins. In this faith we both truly believe in the resurrection of the dead and we await the joys of the future life. We must pray and beg for this only, that when, the judgment finished and over, the Son will hand over the kingdom to God the Father [I Cor. 15:24], that He may render us participators of His kingdom, so that through this faith in which we cling to Him, we may reign with Him without end.—This exposition is the pledge of our confession through which the teaching of all heretics is destroyed, through which the hearts of the faithful are cleansed, through which also we ascend gloriously to God for all eternity. Amen.

DONUS 676–678

ST. AGATHO 678–681

ROMAN COUNCIL 680

The Hypostatic Union 1

[From the dogmatic epistle of Agatho and the Roman Synod "Omnium bonorum spes" to the Emperors 2]

288. We acknowledge (indeed) that one and the same our Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, from two and in two substances subsists, unconfusedly without change, indivisibly, inseparably [see n. 148], never the difference of natures destroyed on account of the union,

  1. Msi XI 290 E f., Jf 2110; Hrd III 1119 D f.; ML 87, 1221 B; cf. Hfl III 252 f. ↩

  2. The Fathers of Synod VI (Constplt. III) accepted this letter, asserting that Peter spoke through Agatho. "The highest chief of the Apostles struggled with us; for we had his imitator and the successor to the See as a supporter and illustrator of the divine sacrament through a letter. That ancient city of Rome offered you [Constantinus] a confession written by God" [Hrd III 1422 E f.]. ↩