Catholic Pocket Dictionary

Catholic Pocket Dictionary/New Dispensation

THE NEW DISPENSATION

THE COMING OF CHRIST

Preparation-The ancient world had to pass through all the various stages of external progress and internal degeneracy in order to learn by sad experience the insufficiency of its natural resources and the need of a divine Redeemer.

The belief was widely spread among the Gentiles that a deliverer was to come; the political condition of the world, the influence of the Roman Empire itself prepared the way for the speedy propagation of the Kingdom of Christ. The best pagan philosophers, as Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and others, though without authority and the intention of teaching the common people and reforming the world, had, nevertheless, spread ideas among the educated classes which facilitated a transition to the Christian revelation.

The perfect development and universal use of the two languages of the civilized world, Latin and Greek, afforded an efficient means for the propagation, explanation and defense of Christ's teaching. At the time of the Savior's coming universal peace reigned in the world.

THE BIRTH OF CHRIST

Jesus Christ, the God man, was born at Bethlehem, of the Virgin Mary, during the reign of Augustus. Through His mother He belonged to the family of David, to the tribe of Juda, to the nationality of the Hebrews. Owing to the time and place of His birth, He was a subject of the Roman Empire which officially testified to His human nature at His birth by the census rolls (to which Tertullian, born 160 A. D., refers as existing in his time); at His death by the inscription: "Jesus Nazarenus," affixed to the cross by the order of the Roman Governor Pontius Pilate. The shepherds of Bethlehem and the Magi from the East doing homage to the new-born Savior, represented the two great divisions of mankind, the Jews and the Gentiles.

Pursued by Herod as a possible rival of his dynasty, Jesus spent a portion of His boyhood in Egypt, and after His return led a life of humble and laborious retirement at Nazareth up to His thirtieth year.

CHRIST’S PUBLIC LIFE

In the fifteenth year of the reign of the Emperor Tiberius, John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Redeemer, began to preach and baptize on the banks of the Jordan. When Jesus was about thirty years of age, He was baptized by John, and announced as the "Lamb of God 'who taketh away the sins of the world."

After a forty days' fast in the desert, Jesus entered upon His public life--the life of a teacher, benefactor and worker of miracles,--and the foundation of His Church. At the age of thirty-three He instituted the Holy Eucharist, was betrayed by Judas, condemned to death by the Jews, and crucified under the authority of Pontius Pilate. Thus the Jews and Gentiles again co-operated in carrying out the divine decrees. During the forty days between His resurrection and ascension, He completed the work of the organization of His Church.

On the fortieth day after His resurrection, in the presence of many witnesses He ascended into Heaven, taking with him the human body which he had assumed for the redemption of mankind. But before returning to the bosom of His Eternal Father He laid deep the foundation of His future Church, by bestowing upon the Apostles the full power of the Priesthood, by sending them even as the Father sent Him to all nations of the earth, and by establishing St. Peter the visible and abiding Head of the Church.