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| To Stephen, Concerning a Council.
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Epistle LXXI.2838
| 2838
Oxford ed.: Ep. lxxii. [Concerning the council
(seventh of Carthage), see the Acts, infra. Elucidation
XVI.] |
To Stephen, Concerning a
Council.
Argument.—Cyprian with His Colleagues in a Certain Council Tells
Stephen, the Roman Bishop, that It Had Been Decreed by Them, Both that
Those Who Returned from Heresy into the Church Should Be Baptized, and
that Bishops or Priests Coming from the Heretics Should Be Received on
No Other Condition, Than that They Should Communicate as Lay
People. a.d. 255.
1. Cyprian and others, to Stephen their
brother, greeting. We have thought it necessary for the arranging
of certain matters, dearest brother, and for their investigation by the
examination of a common council, to gather together and to hold a
council, at which many priests were assembled at once; at which,
moreover, many things were brought forward and transacted. But
the subject in regard to which we had chiefly to write to you, and to
confer with your gravity and wisdom, is one that more especially
pertains both to the priestly authority and to the unity, as well as
the dignity, of the Catholic Church, arising as these do from the
ordination of the divine appointment; to wit, that those who have been
dipped abroad outside the Church, and have been stained among heretics
and schismatics with the taint of profane water, when they come to us
and to the Church which is one, ought to be baptized, for the reason
that it is a small matter2839
to “lay hands on them that
they may receive the Holy Ghost,” unless they receive also the
baptism of the Church. For then finally can they be fully
sanctified, and be the sons of God, if they be born of each
sacrament;2840
| 2840
The sense of this passage has been doubted but seems to be
this: “The rite of confirmation, or the giving of the Holy
Ghost, is of no avail unless baptism have first been conferred.
For only by being born of each sacrament, scil.
confirmation and baptism, can they be fully sanctified and be born
again; since it is written, ‘Except a man be born of water
and of the Spirit,’ etc.; which quotation is plainly meant
to convey, that the birth of water is by baptism, that of the
Spirit by confirmation.” | since it is
written, “Except a man be born again of water, and of the Spirit,
he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”2841
For we find also, in the Acts of
the Apostles, that this is maintained by the apostles, and kept in the
truth of the saving faith, so that when, in the house of Cornelius the
centurion, the Holy Ghost had descended upon the Gentiles who were
there, fervent in the warmth of their faith, and believing in the Lord
with their whole heart; and when, filled with the Spirit, they blessed
God in divers tongues, still none the less the blessed Apostle Peter,
mindful of the divine precept and the Gospel, commanded that those same
men should be baptized who had already been filled with the Holy
Spirit, that nothing might seem to be neglected to the observance by
the apostolic instruction in all things of the law of the divine
precept and Gospel.2842
But that that is not baptism
which the heretics use; and that none of those who oppose Christ can
profit by the grace of Christ; has lately been set forth with care in
the letter which was written on that subject to Quintus, our colleague,
established in Mauritania; as also in a letter which our colleagues
previously wrote to our fellow-bishops presiding in Numidia, of both
which letters I have subjoined copies.
2. We
add, however, and connect with what we have said, dearest brother, with
common consent and authority, that if, again, any presbyters or
deacons, who either have been before ordained in the Catholic Church,
and have subsequently stood forth as traitors and rebels against the
Church, or who have been promoted among the heretics by a profane
ordination by the hands of false bishops and antichrists contrary to
the appointment of Christ, and have attempted to offer, in opposition
to the one and divine altar, false and sacrilegious sacrifices without,
that these also be received when they return, on this condition, that
they communicate as laymen, and hold it to be enough that they should
be received to peace, after having stood forth as enemies of peace; and
that they ought not, on returning, to retain those arms of ordination
and honour with which they rebelled against us. For it behoves
priests and ministers, who wait upon the altar and sacrifices, to be
sound and stainless; since the Lord God speaks in Leviticus, and says,
“No man that hath a stain or a blemish shall come nigh to offer
gifts to the Lord.”2843
Moreover, in Exodus, He
prescribes this same thing, and says, “And let the priests which
come near to the Lord God sanctify themselves, lest the Lord forsake
them.”2844
And
again: “And when they come near to minister at the altar of
the holy place, they shall not bear iniquity upon them, lest they
die.”2845
But
what can be greater iniquity, or what stain can be more odious, than to
have stood in opposition to Christ; than to have scattered His Church,
which He purchased and founded with His blood; than, unmindful of
evangelical peace and love, to have fought with the madness of hostile
discord against the unanimous and accordant people of God? Such
as these, although they themselves return to the Church, still cannot
restore and recall with them those who, seduced by them, and
forestalled by death without, have perished outside the Church without
communion and peace; whose souls in the day of judgment shall be
required at the hands of those who have stood forth as the authors and
leaders of their ruin. And therefore to such, when they return,
it is sufficient that pardon should be granted; since perfidy ought
certainly not to receive promotion in the household of faith. For
what do we reserve for the good and innocent, and those who do not
depart from the Church, if we honour those who have departed from us,
and stood in opposition to the Church?
3. We have brought these things, dearest
brother, to your knowledge, for the sake of our mutual honour and
sincere affection; believing that, according to the truth of your
religion and faith, those things which are no less religious than true
will be approved by you. But we know that some will not lay aside
what they have once imbibed, and do not easily change their purpose;
but, keeping fast the bond of peace and concord among their colleagues,
retain certain things peculiar to themselves, which have once been
adopted among them. In which behalf we neither do violence to,
nor impose a law upon, any one, since each prelate has in the
administration of the Church the exercise of his will free, as he shall
give an account of his conduct to the Lord.2846
| 2846
[Obviously, the law of liberty here laid down might introduce the
greatest confusion if not limited by common consent. Yet the
tolerant spirit of our author merits praise. P. 378, notes 1,
2.] | We bid you, dearest brother, ever
heartily farewell.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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