The new people of God 

When our Lord does come to use the word qahal—the word used for God’s people—he calls it “my qahal”: I will found my Church, my people. The bond that Christ establishes with this new qahal is not a bond oflaw, it is a bond of love. T he very best moment for establishing this bond was a banquet where his Twelve sat about him in love. Just as Moses often sprinkled blood upon the people as a sign of covenant, so he said that he would make a new covenant, a new pact, a new testament. And there was the sprinkling of the blood of goats and bullocks and sheep; he gave his own Blood and said, “This is the Blood of the new covenant” — the new testament, the new pact. This is the bond that will unite all of my people together. Now do you see that the Church is not an institution?