elium_,--that is, the more
public service of prayer, praise and preaching open to all, including
the catechumens or candidates for Church membership, and the private
service for the administration of the eucharist, open only to full
members of the Church in good and regular standing. Meanwhile, as the
general service tended to grow more elaborate, the _missa fidelium_
tended to take on the character of the current Greek mysteries (see
EUCHARIST; Hatch, _Influence of Greek Ideas and Usages upon the
Christian Church_, 1890; Anrich, _Das antike Mysterienwesen in seinem
Einfluss auf das Christentum_, 1894; Wobbermin, _Religionsgeschichtliche
Studien zur Frage der Beeinflussung des Urchristentums durch das antike
Mysterienwesen_, 1896). Many of the terms in common use in them were
employed in connexion with the Christian rites, and many of the
conceptions, particularly that of sharing in immortality by communion
with deity, became an essential part of Christian doctrine. Thus the
early idea of the services, as occasions for mutual edification through
the interchange of spiritual gifts, gave way in course of time to the
theory that they consisted of sacred and mysterious rites by means of
which communion with God is promoted. The emphasis accordingly came to
be laid increasingly upon the formal side of worship, and a value was
given to the ceremonies as such, and their proper and correct
performance by duly qualified persons, i.e. ordained priests, was made
the all-important thing.

4. _The Church and the Sacraments._--According to Paul, man is flesh and
so subject to death. Only as he becomes a spiritual being through
mystical union with Christ can he escape death and enjoy eternal life in
the spiritual realm. In the Epistle to the Ephesians the Christian
Church is spoken of as the body of Christ (iv. 12 ff., v. 30); and
Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, early in the 2nd century, combined the two
ideas of union with Christ, as the necessary condition of salvation, and
of the Church as the body of Christ, teaching that no one could be saved
unless he were a member of the Church (cf. his Epistle to the Ephesians
4, 5, 15; Trall. 7; Phil. 3, 8; Smyr. 8; Magn. 2, 7). Traces of the same
idea are found in Irenaeus (cf. _Adv. Haer._ iii. 24, 1, iv. 26, 2), but
it is first clearly set forth by Cyprian, and receives from him its
classical expression in the famous sentence "Salus extra ecclesiam non
est" (Ep. 73, 21; cf. also Ep. 4, 4; 74,