Day 114: The Church Is One

"This is the sole Church of Christ, which in the Creed we profess to be one, holy, catholic and apostolic." These four characteristics, inseparably linked with each other, indicate essential features of the Church and her mission. the Church does not possess them of herself; it is Christ who, through the Holy Spirit, makes his Church one, holy, catholic, and apostolic, and it is he who calls her to realize each of these qualities. CCC 811

In today's reading, the Catechism speaks of the first of the four attributes of the Church as outlined in the Nicene Creed: that it is One as the Triune God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are One. A diversity of every race, language, and culture joined together in Christ, especially via the Mass and the sacraments. The same Eucharist a Catholic can partake anywhere in the world, exactly as the Lord intended.  The Catechism Compendium notes:

The one Church of Christ, as a society constituted and organized in the world, subsists in (subsistit in) the Catholic Church, governed by the Successor of Peter and the bishops in communion with him. Only through this Church can one obtain the fullness of the means of salvation since the Lord has entrusted all the blessings of the New Covenant to the apostolic college alone whose head is Peter. (#816)

It is that unity of the Church, despite our own sins and arguments, that I personally find compelling as a Catholic. From very humble and sinful men, the Church blessed by Christ has spread throughout the world in spite of our best efforts to thwart it. I like how the Catechism Companion, Vol I puts it:

The Church has been spread to the entire world, and we have inherited it from fishermen and tax collectors. There are broken people in the Church, but there is an unknown multitude of saints. We can easily overlook the fact that a remarkable stream of saints has been raised up by Jesus Christ in his Church over the past two thousand years. (p. 232)