Bad Advertisement? Are you a Christian? Online Store: | PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP Chapter VII.St. Ambrose, addressing Christ, complains of the Novatians, and shows that they have no part with Christ, Who wishes all men to be saved. 30. So, then, Lord Jesus, come wholly to Thy Church, since Novatian makes excuse. Novatian says, “I have bought a yoke of oxen,” and he puts not on the light yoke of Christ, but lays upon his shoulders a heavy burden which he is not able to bear. Novatian held back Thy servants by whom he was invited, treated them contemptuously and slew them, polluting them with the stain of a reiterated baptism. Send forth, therefore, into the highways, and gather together good and bad,2949
31. Thy Church does not excuse herself from Thy supper, Novatian makes excuse. Thy family says not, “I am whole, I need not the physician,” but it says: “Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved.”2950
32. And Thou indeed, O Lord, desirest that all should be healed, but all do not wish to be healed. Novatian wishes not, who thinks that he is whole. Thou, O Lord, sayest that Thou art sick, and feelest our infirmity in the least of us, saying: “I was sick and ye visited Me.”2952
33. And this confession is indeed rightly made by them, for they have not the succession of Peter, who hold not the chair of Peter, which they rend by wicked schism; and this, too, they do, wickedly denying that sins can be forgiven even in the Church, whereas it was said to Peter: “I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound also in heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed also in heaven.”2954
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