Immediately one notes here that Bonaventure, in commenting on the sacrament of Order, utilizes the singular, namely, Order. He begins by referring to 1 Corinthians 12:12 that the “Church is likened to an organic body,” and an “organic body necessarily requires for its perfection an ordering.” His first response to this question departs from this understanding of the nature of the Church as a body. Then, again he draws from the order in the Church triumphant as a model for the Church yet on pilgrimage.
Further reflection on the Church leads Bonaventure to see the beauty and rightness of its order, lest “confusion would clearly appear.” The wisdom of God appears in the order of all creation, and this same wisdom is also present “in the constitution of the Church.” Order flows from the wisdom of God’s eternal plan, and the Church is no exception. In no place, in either of these two distinctions on the sacrament of Order, does Bonaventure maintain that it is instituted by Christ, although he does mention this in passing when he treats the institution of Eucharist. Here, however, order is about the wisdom of God and the beauty of the Church.
He continues to emphasize that this sacrament is “for the sake of rule and beauty in the Church.” It is the sacrament that gives the Church a living form. It provides “for the orderly dispensing of the sacraments,” and so the ministers of the sacraments “ought to have been ordered for this through the reception of some sacrament.” Furthermore, they must also be “ordered among themselves.” And so he concludes, this sacrament “is rightly called Order.”
Bonaventure begins to address the priesthood when he asks the question whether the sacrament of Order is one sacrament or several. “A priest is distinct and different from a deacon.” Are these then two different sacraments? His response to this question is, of course, “the sacrament of Order is one, but it has many parts.” The sacrament that orders the Church is also ordered within itself. Ultimately, although ordered to all the sacraments, it is principally ordered to the “ministry of the Sacrament of the altar.” Thus, the sacrament contains distinct and many parts, but because all these parts “are still ordered to one completion, they constitute one sacrament.” Thus, the priest, the deacon, the lector, the porter, etc. all constitute one and the same sacrament, although ordered differently to the ministry of the altar. Furthermore, because all of these parts “distinguish according to a certain status …and each one is placed in a particular ministry, therefore character is imprinted in every Order.”
To identify the sacrament of Order more carefully, Bonaventure examines the three sacraments in which character is impressed. He writes the following: “Baptism configures one to the dying and redeeming Christ by which a person is buried with him in death.” Confirmation configures to the suffering and fighting Christ; hence a sign of the cross is imprinted on the forehead. Order configures one to the ministering and laboring Christ. Thus, because all of these are configured to Christ more or less, character is imprinted in all of them. The character imprinted in Order cannot be separated unto itself.
All those who share in the one sacrament of Order and are configured to the same ministering and laboring Christ differ in their ministry to the extent and degree “of their approach to the last office, namely the priesthood.” He explains this in the following way: “Hence a person is introduced into the Church through the porter; second, he is led through the reading of the prophets; he is third helped through the exorcist, that he be freed from evil; he is fourth aroused by the acolyte, that he advances in good; and last come the other two Orders which minister with the priest in the offering of sacrifice.” One thing is clear in Bonaventure’s approach: the priest is not alone in the sacrament of Order. The one in this office must share with and be ordered toward and with those who share in other parts of the same sacrament. Otherwise the beauty the sacrament of Order brings to the Church is lost.
The beauty is lost even if the sacred orders minister “with respect to the true body of Christ,” because without the lesser orders to “serve by preparing the Mystical Body of Christ to the end that it be conducted to the worthy reception of his true body” the deeper meaning and purpose of ministering the “true body of Christ” is lost.
In regard to the integrity of the sacrament of Order and its parts, the two basic elements, visible and audible, must externally be present, as proper to the specific part of the sacrament. In the minor orders it was “the handing over of instruments,” and “in sacred Orders, since a noble and surpassing power is there given, it is done with the imposition of hands.” Although no set words are required (as only two of the sacraments have words set down by the Lord), whatever form the Church has approved is to be used.
Two final questions follow. Is the office of bishop a part of the sacrament of Order? Is the male sex necessary in order to be ordained? To the first question, Bonaventure responds in the negative. “Beyond the priesthood there is no grade of Order.” However, within this grade of Order, which is fulfilled in the ministry of the body and blood of the Lord, there are distinctions of grades and offices. “These are archpriest, bishop, archbishop, patriarch and Supreme Pontiff, which neither add an Order nor a new grade beyond the priesthood, but only dignity and office.” These offices “do not constitute a new grade or Order.”
To the second question, Bonaventure responds whether women “are able to be [ordained], is in doubt.” He further reflects that in the sacrament of Order the person ordained signifies Christ the mediator. “The mediator was of the male sex and can only be signified by the male sex.” However, even with this, he draws no strong conclusion. He simply writes: “this position is more probable.”
In following question three, of the second article of distinction 25, in the respondeo, Bonaventure draws from the sacrament of Matrimony that the man is “the sign of Christ, just as the woman is the sign of the Church.” One in the sacrament of Orders is like the married man, signifying Christ as spouse of the Church.
This, one might see, demonstrates Bonaventure’s emphasis on the foundation and importance of the “natural sign” in his sacramental theology. Sexuality is a natural visible characteristic of the human person, and so in his thinking, it is also a sign filled with natural signification that goes to the heart of human identity. He argues “the sacrament of Order is more abundant in the reason of its signification than the other sacraments.” The ordained priest “signifies Christ himself,” just as in Matrimony the groom “is the sign of Christ” and the bride “is the sign of the Church.”