Christ's presence in community

Abstract

I propose through this dissertation to discuss the theme of "Christ's presence in community" based on Christ's words "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the middle of them". Matthew 18,20. Besides being an academic exercise, this dissertation is a personal experience. In undertaking this theology course, I rediscovered God in a unique way both academically and personally. Through one of my colleagues during this course, I was introduced to the "small group", a living Christian community. Concurrently, I found evidence in the academic studies I was undertaking of that presence of Christ that I was experiencing so consciously for the first time, in a living community. I overcame that "I", my self-centredness through an encounter with a living "you", a "you" truly present among men. But this "you" is not a Jesus who lived at one time in the past: it is the crucified and risen Jesus who lives here and now in his Church. Thus through this experience I was led back to the Church and my eyes were opened to a better understanding of dogme, the sacraments, and the authority of the Church, about which I was studying.