I’ve been reading some teachings about “temple identity.” The idea is that St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians to make them, and us, aware of our “temple identity.”
According to these teachers, Paul was saying that every Christian is a “house of God” filled with the Holy Spirit, who is able to work the same kind of miracles Jesus performed. He wrote, “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? (1 Cor 3:16)” Based on this, Christians are encouraged to make an “identity declaration” in these words: “I am a Temple of the Holy Spirit and God’s Spirit dwells in me!” This is supposed to help them “live in the power of the Holy Spirit” and use the authority they have received to “expand the kingdom of God.”
Another institution tells its staff to make a “declaration for identity and mission” in these words: “I am anointed. I am temple of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, today, I will proclaim the Gospel to all I encounter. I will proclaim freedom. I will proclaim physical and emotional healing. I set the oppressed free.”
Is this really what Paul was saying to the Corinthians? No.
You probably know that Paul wrote his letters in Greek. In Greek, there are two words for “you.” One is singular, and one is plural – think of the American word “y-all” or the old English word “ye.”
In this passage, Paul uses the plural pronoun. He is not encouraging his flock to make a “declaration” beginning with the word “I” — that’s the last thing he wants! He wants to correct Corinthian Christians who are saying things like, “I belong to Paul” and “I belong to Apollos” (see 1 Cor 3:4) and introduce divisions into the local church. To counter this, he employs the metaphor of a building (see 1 Cor 3:10) as a way to name the whole Church. In effect, he is saying, “You — all of you together — are one building, which is God’s temple, God’s field. Apollos and I are working together on the same project.”
In 1 Cor 6:19-20, he again speaks of a temple using the plural form of “you.” “Do you (plural) not know that your (plural) body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you (plural), which you (plural) have from God? You (plural) are not your own; you (plural) were bought with a price. So glorify God in your (plural) body.” There is only one temple, because all Christians form one body in Christ. St. Paul would not want anyone in his flock to say “God’s Spirit dwells in me;” he would prefer them to say, “God’s Spirit dwells in the Church.”
Having said that, there is an appropriate way that we can call an individual Christian a temple. The ritual of baptism says that the body of a baptized Christian is a temple of God’s glory where the Holy Spirit dwells. For this reason, a Christian’s body can be called a “temple of the Holy Spirit.” This is why, in our funeral customs, Catholic Christians respect the bodies of the dead and their places of rest. Nevertheless, in the New Testament, Christians are never called “temples,” in the plural, of the Holy Spirit. The Church is called the temple of the Holy Spirit, the house of God, God’s field.
One group attempts to reinforce their teaching about “temple identity” with a partial quotation from St. Ambrose of Milan (d. 397): “ … He who dwells in the temple has divine power … for it is a temple of Power.” However, if you look at the whole sentence Ambrose wrote, it does not affirm the concept of “temple identity.” Here is the complete quotation: “Therefore, He Who dwells in the temple has divine power, for as of the Father and of the Son, so are we also the temple of the Holy Spirit; not many temples, but one temple, for it is the temple of one Power” (On the Holy Spirit, 3.12.91).
What was Ambrose really saying and why? In his day, some people denied that the Holy Spirit was fully divine. He wants to prove that the Holy Spirit is fully divine, that he is worshiped as God just as the Father and Son are worshiped, and that he has unity of nature with the Father and the Son. So, he cites 1 Cor 3:16, which portrays the community of believers as a temple of the Holy Spirit. Ambrose stresses the unity of the temple: “not many temples, but one temple.” This means that, instead of declaring, “I am the temple of the Holy Spirit,” Ambrose declares “We are the temple of the Holy Spirit.” Thus, the full quotation actually contradicts the teaching on “temple identity.”
Pope Leo XIV recently cited Ambrose’s great disciple St. Augustine in making a similar point about how all Christians form a single temple:
“The desire to work together for a common purpose reflects an essential reality: no one is Christian alone! We are part of a people, a body established by the Lord. When speaking of Jesus’ first disciples, Saint Augustine once said, ‘They became God’s temple, not only as individuals; together they were built into the temple of God.’”
Drawing on Augustine and Ambrose, we could amplify the Pope’s statement: No one is Christian alone; no one is God’s temple alone.