Chapter 10.—43. But this, they say, is the very thing which disquiets us,—If we are unrighteous, wherefore do you seek our company? To which question we answer, We seek the company of you who are unrighteous, that you may not remain unrighteous; we seek for you who are lost, that we may rejoice over you as soon as you are found, saying, This our brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.
2550
Why, then, he says, do you not
baptize me, that you might
wash me from my
sins? I reply: Because I do not do despite to the stamp of the monarch, when I correct the
ill-doing of a deserter. Why, he says, do I not even do penance in your body? Nay truly, except you have done penance, you cannot be
saved; for how shall you
rejoice that you have been reformed, unless you first
grieve that you had been
astray? What, then, he says, do we receive with you, when we come over
to your side? I answer, You do not indeed receive
baptism, which was able to exist in you outside the framework of the body of
Christ, although it could not
profit you; but you receive the
unity of the Spirit in the
bond of
peace2551
without which no one can see
God; and you receive
charity, which, as it is written, "shall cover the multitude of
sins."
2552
And in regard to this great
blessing, without which we have the
apostle’s
testimony that neither the
tongues of men or of
angels, nor the understanding of all
mysteries, nor the
gift of
prophecy, nor
faith so great as to be able to remove
mountains, nor the bestowal of all one’s goods to
feed the
poor, nor giving one’s body to be
burned, can
profit anything;
2553
if, I say, you think this mighty
blessing to be worthless or of trifling value, you are deservedly but miserably
astray; and deservedly you must necessarily
perish, unless you come over to Catholic
unity.
44. If, then, they say, it is necessary that we should repent of having been outside, and hostile to the Church, if we would gain salvation, how comes it that after the repentance which you exact from us we still continue to be clergy, or it may be even bishops in your body? This would not be the case, as indeed, in simple truth, we must confess it should not be the case, were it not that the evil is cured by the compensating power of peace itself. But let them give
themselves this lesson, and most especially let those feel sorrow in their hearts, who are lying in this deep death of severance from the Church, that they may recover their life even by this sort of wound inflicted on our Catholic mother Church. For when the bough that has been cut off is grafted in, a new wound is made in the tree, to admit of its reception, that life may be given to the branch which was perishing for lack of the life that is furnished by the root. But when the
newly-received branch has become identified with the stock in which it is received, the result is both vigor and fruit; but if they do not become identified, the engrafted bough withers, but the life of the tree continues unimpaired. For there is further a mode of grafting of such a kind, that without cutting away any branch that is within, the branch that is foreign to the tree is inserted, not indeed without a wound, but with the slightest possible wound inflicted on the
tree. In like manner, then, when they come to the root which exists in the Catholic Church, without being deprived of any position which belongs to them as clergy or bishops after ever so deep repentance of their error, there is a kind of wound inflicted as it were upon the bark of the mother tree, breaking in upon the strictness of her discipline; but since neither he that planteth is anything, neither he that watereth,2554
so soon as by prayers poured forth to the
mercy of
God peace is
secured through the union of the
engrafted boughs with the
parent stock,
charity then covers the multitude of
sins.
45. For although it was made an ordinance in the Church, that no one who had been called upon to do penance for any offense should be admired into holy orders, or return to or continue in the body of the clergy,2555
| 2555
Pope Innocent I., in his 6th Epistle to Agapitus, Macedonius, and Maurianus, bishops of Apulia, writes to the effect that "canons had been passed at Nicæa, excluding penitents from even the lowest orders of the ministry" (can. 10).
|
this was done not to cause
despair of any indulgence being granted, but merely to maintain a rigorous
discipline; otherwise an argument will be
raised against the keys that were given to the
Church, of which we have the
testimony of Scripture: "Whatsoever thou shall loose on
earth shall be loosed in
heaven."
2556
But lest it should so happen that, after the detection of offenses, a
heart swelling with the
hope of ecclesiastical preferment might do penance in a spirit of
pride, it was determined, with great severity, that after doing penance for any
mortal sin, no one should be admitted to the number of the clergy, in order that, when all
hope of temporal preferment was done away, the medicine of
humility might be endowed with greater
strength and
truth. For even the holy
David did
penance for
deadly sin, and yet was not degraded from his
office. And we know that the
blessed Peter, after shedding the bitterest of
tears,
repented that he had denied his
Lord, and yet remained an
apostle. But we must not therefore be induced to think that the care of those in later times was in any way superfluous, who, when there was no risk of endangering
salvation, added something to
humiliation, in order that the
salvation might be more thoroughly protected,—having, I suppose,
experienced a feigned repentance on the part of some who were influenced by the desire of the
power attaching to
office. For experience in many
diseases necessarily brings in the invention of many remedies. But in cases of this
kind, when, owing to the serious ruptures of
dissensions in the
Church, it is no longer a
question of
danger to this or that particular individual, but whole
nations are
lying in
ruin, it is right to yield a little from our severity, that true
charity may give her aid
in healing the more serious evils.
46. Let them therefore feel bitter grief for their detestable error of the past, as Peter did for his fear that led him into falsehood, and let them come to the true Church of Christ, that is, to the Catholic Church our mother; let them be in it clergy, let them be bishops unto its profit, as they have been hitherto in enmity against it. We feel no jealousy towards them, nay, we embrace them; we wish, we advise, we even compel those to come in whom we find in
the highways and hedges, although we fail as yet in persuading some of them that we are seeking not their property, but themselves. The Apostle Peter, when he denied his Savior, and wept, and did not cease to be an apostle, had not as yet received the Holy Spirit that was promised; but much more have these men not received Him, when, being severed from the framework of the body, which is alone enlivened by the Holy Spirit, they have usurped the sacraments of the Church outside the Church and
in hostility to the Church, and have fought against us in a kind of civil war, with our own arms and our own standards raised in opposition to us. Let them come; let peace be concluded in the virtue of Jerusalem, which virtue is Christian charity,—to which holy city it is said, "Peace be in thy virtue, and plenteousness within thy palaces."2557
Let them not exalt themselves against the solicitude of their mother, which she both has
entertained and does
entertain with the object of gathering within her
bosom themselves, and all the mighty
nations whom they are, or recently were, deceiving; at them not be puffed up with
pride, that she receives them in such
wise; let them not attribute to the
evil of their own exaltation the good which she on her part does in order to make
peace.
47. So it has been her wont to come to the aid of multitudes who were perishing through schisms and heresies. This displeased Lucifer,2558
| 2558
Bishop of Calaris. Cp. De Agone Christiano, c. xxx. 32.
|
when it was carried out in receiving and healing those who had
perished beneath the
poison of the Arian
heresy; and, being displeased at it, he fell into the
darkness of
schism, losing the
light of
Christian charity. In accordance with this principle the
Church of Africa has recognized the Donatists from the very beginning, obeying herein the
decree of the
bishops who gave sentence in the
Church at
Rome between Cæcilianus and the party of Donatus;
and having
condemned one
bishop named Donatus,
2559
| 2559
The Bishop of Casæ Nigræ.
|
who was
proved to have been the
author of the
schism, they determined that the others should be received, after correction, with full recognition of their orders even if they had been
ordained outside the
Church,—not that they could have the
Holy Spirit even outside the
unity of the body of
Christ, but, in the first place, for the sake of those whom it was possible they might
deceive while they remained outside, and prevent from obtaining that
gift; and, secondly, that their
own
weakness also being mercifully received within, might thus be rendered capable of
cure, no obstinacy any longer standing in the way to close their
eyes against the evidence of
truth. For what other intention could have given rise to their own
conduct, when they received with full recognition of their orders the followers of Maximianus, whom they had
condemned as
guilty of sacrilegious
schism, as their
council2560
shows, and to fill whose places they had already
ordained other men, when they saw that the people did not depart from their
company, that all might not be involved in
ruin? And on what other ground did they neither speak against nor
question the validity of the
baptism which had been
administered outside by men whom they had
condemned? Why, then, do they wonder, why do they complain, and make it the subject of their calumnies, that we receive them in such
wise to promote
the true
peace of Christ, while yet they do not remember what they themselves have done to promote the false peace of Donatus, which is opposed to Christ? For if this act of theirs be borne in mind, and intelligently used in argument against them, they will have no answer whatsoever that they can make.
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
