- In a private audience with Marmion at the Vatican, Pope Benedict referred to Christ, the Life of the Soul, commenting, "It is a great help to me in my spiritual life." At another time he recommended Marmion's work to a visiting archbishop: "Read this–it is the pure doctrine of the Church." Thibaut, p. 353.


- Pope Pius XII stated that the works of Marmion were "outstanding in the accuracy of their doctrine, the clarity of their style, and the depth and richness of their thought." Toups, p. 160, note 4.

Yes, I also don't think the Abbot Marmion was necessarily wrong, but suggesting "the Catholic Church" (by which the juridical society is meant) and "the Holy Catholic Church" (by which the invisible communion is spoken of) are two distinct realities which Bowler did rather than one and the same reality is quite clearly declared false in the same Encyclical.

Why not just submit gladly and docilely to the teaching of the Church receiving it as the very teaching of Christ?

64. From what We have thus far written, and explained, Venerable Brethren, it is clear, We think, how grievously they err who arbitrarily claim that the Church is something hidden and invisible, as they also do who look upon her as a mere human institution possession a certain disciplinary code and external ritual, but lacking power to communicate supernatural life.[120] On the contrary, as Christ, Head and Exemplar of the Church "is not complete, if only His visible human nature is considered..., or if only His divine, invisible nature..., but He is one through the union of both and one in both ... so is it with His Mystical Body"[121] since the Word of God took unto Himself a human nature liable to sufferings, so that He might consecrate in His blood the visible Society founded by Him and "lead man back to things invisible under a visible rule."[122]

65. For this reason We deplore and condemn the pernicious error of those who dream of an imaginary Church, a kind of society that finds its origin and growth in charity, to which, somewhat contemptuously, they oppose another, which they call juridical. But this distinction which they introduce is false

What Marmion wrote is clear. If you didn't understand it, I explained it further, if you still don't understand it by now, then I have to believe that you choose to not understand it.

The simple answer is that Holy Catholic Church to me meant the sinless Church that Marmion describes, and to all of you it does not, and moreover, none of you ever heard that there is a sinless Church. It's as simple as that.

The problem with your definitions is that the Catholic Church is Holy. There's no distinction between sinful and sinless Church, unless you mean the human element and the Divine element. Likewise, when Dom Marmion says concerning the invisible Church and visible, he's referring to two bonds, the formal membership of the Catholic Church (by Baptism) and the bonds of charity, which as he note he says is more important than the visible Church.

END

Bowler- Get under the direction of a priest.

If you are already so, find a new one (preferably holy this time)

Do you know any priests better than Abbot Marmion?

If you don't understand what he is saying, then just have the humility to realize that he is saying something that you were never taught, and take the time to learn more about it.

There are 1 billion baptized Catholics in the world today, if the world exploded, and everyone was vaporized, only "the holy and invisible society of the souls that share by grace in Christ's Divine Sonship, and form the Kingdom", will be saved (the sinless, those Catholics without mortal sin). That is what Abbot Marmion is talking about, when he says "It is true that the invisible Church, or the soul of the Church, is more important than the visible Church".

Christ the Life of the Soul, by Abbot D Columba Marmion 1925

Chapter 5- THE CHURCH, THE MYSTICAL BODY OF CHRIST (pg 93)

to procure this glory is the Church. Christ comes on earth to create and constitute the Church; it is the work to which all His existence converges, and He confirms it by His Passion and Death. His love for His Father led Jesus Christ to the mountain of Calvary but it was there to form the Church, and make of her, by purifying her in His Divine Blood, a spotless and immaculate Bride: Dilexit Ecclesiam et seipsum tradidit pro ea ut illam sanctificaret (Ephes 5:25-26).

This is what St. Paul tells us. Let us then see what this Church is, of which the name occurs so often under the great Apostle's pen as to be inseparable from that of Christ.

We may consider the Church in two ways: first as a visible, hierarchical society, founded by Christ to continue His sanctifying mission here below; she appears thus, as a living organism. But this point of view is not the only one; to have a complete idea of the Church, we must regard her, as the holy and invisible society of the souls that share by grace in Christ's Divine Sonship, and form the Kingdom He won by His Blood. That is what St. Paul calls the body of Christ, not of course, His physical body, but His mystical body. It is on this second point of view we shall principally dwell: we must not, however, pass over the first in silence.

It is true that the invisible Church, or the soul of the Church, is more important than the visible Church, but, in the normal economy of Christianity, it is only by union with the visible society that souls have participation in the possessions and privileges of the invisible kingdom of Christ.