The memory of the Holy Angels, today expressly cited in the Roman Martyrology of the Catholic Church, as Guardian Angels, It has been celebrated since 1670 on October 2, the date set by Pope Clement X (1670-1676); the Orthodox Church celebrates them on January 11th.
But who are the Angels and what relationship do they have in the history of mankind? First of all the existence of Angels is a dogma of faith, defined several times by the Church (Nicene Symbol, Constantinople Symbol, Fourth Lateran Council (1215), First Vatican Council (1869-70)).
Everything that concerns the Angels has constituted its own science called “angelology”; and all the Fathers of the Church and theologians have in their arguments expressed and elaborated various interpretations and concepts regarding their existence, creation, spirituality, intelligence, will, tasks, elevation and fall.
What does the Bible say about angels?
Specific episodes of the Old and New Testament indicate the presence of Angels: the fight with Jacob’s angel (Genesis 32, 25-29); the ladder traveled by angels, dreamed by Jacob (Genesis, 28, 12); the three angels guests of Abraham (Genesis, 18); the intervention of the angel who stops the hand of Abraham who is about to sacrifice Isaac; the angel who brings food to the prophet Elijah in the desert.
The announcement to the shepherds of the birth of Christ; the angel who appears to Joseph in a dream, suggesting that he flee with Mary and the Child; the angels who adore and serve Jesus after the temptations in the desert; the angel who announced the resurrection of Christ to Magdalene and the other women; the liberation of Saint Peter from prison and chains in Rome; without forgetting the cosmic and celestial angelic symbolism of the Apocalypse of St. John the Evangelist.
What is the evangelical foundation of the figure of the guardian angel?
The Guardian Angel indicates the existence of an angel for every man, who guides him, protects him, from birth to death, is mentioned in the Book of Job, but also by Jesus himself, in the Gospel of Matthew, when referring to children he says: “Be careful not to despise even one of these little ones, because I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father who is in heaven”.
Sacred Scripture speaks of other tasks performed by angels, such as that of offering our prayers and sacrifices to God, as well as that of accompanying man on the path of goodness.
What is the heavenly army and how is it composed?
The figure of the Angel as a symbol of the celestial hierarchies generally appears since the early times of Christianity, placing itself in continuation of the Jewish tradition and as a transformation of the pre-Christian types of the Victories and the winged Geniuses, who also had the mediating function, among the supreme divinity and the terrestrial world.
Through the teaching of De celestial hierarchy of the pseudo Dionysius the Areopagite, they are distributed into three hierarchies, each of which is divided into three choirs. The first hierarchy includes the seraphim, cherubim and thrones; the second the dominations, the virtues, the powers; the third the principalities, the archangels and the angels. The choirs are distinguished from each other by tasks, colours, wings and other identifying signs, again according to the pseudo Areopagite, the closest to God are the seraphim, red in colour, a sign of ardent love, with three pairs of wings; then come the cherubim with six wings dotted with eyes like those of the peacock; the powers have two rainbow-colored wings; principalities are armed angels facing God and so on.
Most distinguished by their specific mention in the Bible, are the Archangels, the celestial messengers, present in the most important moments of the History of Salvation; Michael, present since the beginning at the head of the army of heaven against the rebel angels, also appeared to Pope St. Gregory the Great on the Castel S. Angelo in Rome, left the sign of his presence in the Sanctuary of Monte S. Angelo in the Gargano; Gabriel the messenger of God, appeared to the prophet Daniel; to Zechariah announcing the birth of s. John the Baptist, but above all he brought the announcement of the birth of Christ to the Virgin Mary; Raphael is mentioned in the Book of Tobit, he was guide and savior from the dangers of the young Tobit, then not mentioned in the Bible, there is Uriel, mentioned twice in the fourth apocryphal book of Ezra, his name occurs frequently in oriental liturgies, s . Ambrose placed him among the archangels, accompanied the little saint. John the Baptist in the desert brought alchemy to earth.
Was Lucifer an angel?
Yes. The Fourth Lateran Council defined as a truth of faith that many Angels, abusing their freedom, fell into sin and became evil.
St. Thomas stated that the Angel could only commit a sin of pride, the celestial spirit deviated from the order established by God and by not accepting it, it did not recognize divine supremacy above its perfection, therefore a sin of pride which immediately followed a sin of disobedience and envy of the excellence of others. He could not commit other sins, because they presuppose the passions of the flesh, for example hatred, desperation.
St. Thomas Aquinas also specifies that the Angel’s sin consisted in wanting to make himself similar to God. Christian tradition has given it the name Lucifer to the most beautiful and shining of the angels and their leader, rebelled against God and fell from heaven into hell; Lucifer’s pride in his own beauty and power led him to the great act of pride with which he opposed God, drawing a certain number of angels to his side. Other angels of the celestial army led by Michael lined up against him, engaging in a great and primordial struggle in which Lucifer and all his followers succumbed and was thrown down from heaven; he became the leader of the demons or devils in hell and a symbol of the most unbridled pride.
The name Lucifer and his identification with the rebellious leader of the angels came from a text by the prophet Isaiah (14, 12-15) in which a satire on the fall of a Babylonian tyrant was interpreted by many ecclesiastical writers and by Dante himself (Hell XXIV), as the poetic description of the celestial rebellion and the fall of the chief of the angels. “How you have fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn! How you were thrown to the ground, you who attacked all nations! Yet you thought in your heart: I will ascend into heaven, above the stars of God I will raise my throne… I will ascend the highest clouds, I will be similar to the Most High. And instead you were thrown into the abyss, to the bottom of the abyss!”.
What do angels do?
Holy Scripture suggests several times that the Angels they enjoy the vision of the face of God, because the happiness to which the celestial spirits were destined surpasses the needs of nature and is supernatural.
And in the New Testament a comparison is frequently established between men, saints and angels, as if the goal to which the former are destined is nothing other than a participation in the goal already achieved by the good angels, who are indicated as “saints, sons of God, angels of light” and who are “before God, in the presence of God or his throne”; all expressions that indicate their state of bliss; they were sanctified at the very moment of their creation.
What are the attributes of angels?
Intelligence and will.
The Angel as a spiritual being cannot be without these two faculties; indeed in him they must be much more powerful, as he is pure of spirit; on the promptness and infallibility of the angelic intelligence, as well as on the energy, the tenacious will, the superior freedom, the great Angelic Doctor, Saint Thomas Aquinas, wrote extensively in his Summa Theologicato which please refer for further information.
