Chapter 2.—2. But now that we have begun a disputation with a man of peace like Cyprian, let us go on. For when he had brought an objection against himself, which he knew was urged by his brethren, "What then will become of those who in times past, coming to the Church from heresy, were admitted without baptism? The Lord," he answers, "is able of His mercy to grant indulgence, and not to separate from the gifts of His Church those
who, being admitted in all honesty to His Church, have fallen asleep within the Church."1471
| 1471 Cypr. Ep. lxxiii. 23.
|
Well indeed has he assumed that
charity can cover the multitude of
sins. But if they really had
baptism, and this were not rightly perceived by those who thought that they should be
baptized again, that error was covered by the
charity of
unity so long as it contained, not the discord and spirit of the
devil, but merely human
infirmity, until, as the
apostle says, "if they were otherwise
minded, the
Lord should
reveal it to them."
1472
But woe unto those who, being torn asunder from
unity by a sacrilegious rupture, either rebaptize, if
baptism exists with both us and them, or do not
baptize at all, if
baptism exist in the Catholic
Church only. Whether, therefore, they rebaptize, or
fail to
baptize, they are not in the
bond of
peace; wherefore let them apply a remedy to which they please of these two
wounds. But if we admit to the
Church without
baptism, we are of the number of those who, as Cyprian
has assumed, may receive pardon because they
preserved unity. But if (as is, I think, already clear from what has been said in the earlier books)
Christian baptism can
preserve its
integrity even amid the perversity of
heretics, then even though any in those times did rebaptize, yet without departing from the
bond of
unity, they might still attain to pardon in
virtue of that same
love of
peace, through which Cyprian bears witness that those admitted even without
baptism might obtain that they
should not be separated from the
gifts of the
Church. Further, if it is true that with
heretics and schismatics the
baptism of
Christ does not exist, how much less could the
sins of others hurt those who were
fixed in
unity, if even men’s own
sins were
forgiven when they came to it even without
baptism! For if, according to Cyprian, the
bond of
unity is of such efficacy, how could they be hurt by other men’s
sins, who were
unwilling to separate themselves from
unity, if even the unbaptized,
who wished to come to it from heresy, thereby escaped the destruction due to their own sins?
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