CHRISTOLOGICAL THESES FROM THE

SCS COMPREHENSIVE EXAM QUESTIONNAIRE

12. What are the similarities and the differences between the Christology of the Synoptic
Gospels?

13. Discuss the division, author and date of the Fourth Gospel; its relationship with the
other Gospels; and its Christological tract.

30. What were the first four Ecumenical Councils of the early Church? How did those first
four Ecumenical Councils contribute to the development of the Christological doctrine?

46. Jesus Christ, the only Son of the Father, the eternal Word, was sent out of love for us
and became incarnate so that we might have life through him. He is true God and true
man, in the unity of his divine Person; for this reason, he is the one and only mediator
between God and men (Cf. CCC, 480).

47. “Christ’s whole life is a mystery of redemption. Redemption comes to us above all
through the blood of the cross, but this mystery is at work throughout Christ’s entire
life”: his Incarnation, his hidden life, his word, his healings and exorcisms, and in his
Resurrection and Ascension into heaven (Cf. CCC, 517).

48. The Kingdom of God was inaugurated on earth by Christ. “This Kingdom shone out
before men in the world, in the works and in the presence of Christ” (Lumen gentium,
5). The Kingdom of God is before all else a person with the face and name of Jesus of
Nazareth, the image of the invisible God (Cf. Redemptoris missio, 18). The Church
receives the mission of proclaiming and establishing among all peoples the Kingdom
of Christ and of God, and she is, on earth, the seed and the beginning of that kingdom
(Lumen gentium, 5).

49. By his loving obedience to the Father, “unto death, even death on a cross” (Phil 2:8),
Jesus fulfills the atoning mission of the Suffering Servant of God (Is 53:10). It is truly
the Son of God made man who suffered, died and was buried. In his human soul united
to his divine person, the dead Christ went down to the realm of the dead and opened
heaven’s gates for the just who had gone before him.

50. Faith in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ has as its object an event which is historically
attested to by the disciples, who really encountered the Risen One. At the same time,
this event is mysteriously transcendent insofar as it is the entry of Christ’s humanity
into the glory of God (CCC, 656).