Chapter 32.—37. What shall we say of what he himself advanced in his epistle, that "Quodvultdeus, having been convicted of two adulteries, and cast out from among you, was received by those of our party?"2391
| 2391 The Council of Carthage, held on the 13th of September, 401, passed a decree (canon 2) in favor of receiving the clergy of the Donatists with full recognition of their orders.
|
What then (I would speak without prejudice to this man, who
proved his case to be a good one, or at least
persuaded men that it was so), when such men among you, being as yet undetected,
administer baptism, what is received at their
hands,—
faith, or guilt? Surely not
faith, because they have not the conscience of one who gives in
holiness to cleanse the conscience of the recipient. But yet not guilt either, in
virtue of that added word: "For he that has received his
faith wittingly from one that is faithless, receives not
faith but guilt." But when men were
baptized by those of whom I speak, they were surely ignorant what sort of men they were. Furthermore, not receiving
faith from their baptizers, who had not the conscience of one that gives in
holiness, and not receiving guilt, because they were
baptized not knowing but in ignorance of their faults, they therefore remained without
faith and without guilt. They are not, therefore, in the number of men
of such abandoned character. But neither can they be in the number of the
faithful, because, as they could not receive guilt, so neither could they receive
faith from their baptizers. But we see that they are reputed by you in the number of the
faithful, and that no one of you declares his opinion that they ought to be
baptized, but all of you hold valid the baptism which they have already received. They have therefore received faith; and yet they have not received it from those who had not
the conscience of one that gives in holiness, to cleanse the conscience of the recipient. Whence then did they receive it? This is the point from which I make my effort; this is the question that I press most earnestly; to this I do most urgently demand an answer.
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
