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<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en"> <head> <title>CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: The Church</title><script src="https://dtyry4ejybx0.cloudfront.net/js/cmp/cleanmediacmp.js?ver=0104" async="true"></script><script defer data-domain="newadvent.org" src="https://plausible.io/js/script.js"></script><link rel="canonical" href="https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03744a.htm"> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> <meta name="description" content="The term church is the name employed in the Teutonic languages to render the Greek ekklesia (ecclesia), the term by which the New Testament writers denote the society founded by Jesus Christ"> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS" href="http://feeds.newadvent.org/bestoftheweb?format=xml"><link rel="icon" href="../images/icon1.ico" type="image/x-icon"><link rel="shortcut icon" href="../images/icon1.ico" type="image/x-icon"><meta name="robots" content="noodp"><link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" href="../utility/screen6.css" media="screen"></head> <body class="cathen" id="03744a.htm">  <br/> <div id="capitalcity"><table summary="Logo" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 width="100%"><tr valign="bottom"><td align="left"><a href="../"><img height=36 width=153 border="0" alt="New Advent" src="../images/logo.gif"></a></td><td align="right"> <form id="searchbox_000299817191393086628:ifmbhlr-8x0" action="../utility/search.htm">  <input type="hidden" name="safe" value="active"> <input type="hidden" name="cx" value="000299817191393086628:ifmbhlr-8x0"/> <input type="hidden" name="cof" value="FORID:9"/>  <label for="searchQuery" id="searchQueryLabel">Search:</label> <input id="searchQuery" name="q" type="text" size="25" aria-labelledby="searchQueryLabel"/>  <label for="submitButton" id="submitButtonLabel" class="visually-hidden">Submit Search</label> <input id="submitButton" type="submit" name="sa" value="Search" aria-labelledby="submitButtonLabel"/> </form> <table summary="Spacer" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr><td height="2"></td></tr></table> <table summary="Tabs" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr> <td bgcolor="#ffffff"></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../"> Home </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_white_on_color" href="../cathen/index.html"> Encyclopedia </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../summa/index.html"> Summa </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../fathers/index.html"> Fathers </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../bible/gen001.htm"> Bible </a></td> <td class="tab"><a class="tab_color_on_beige" href="../library/index.html"> Library </a></td> </tr></table> </td> </tr></table><table summary="Alphabetical index" width="100%" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr><td class="bar_white_on_color"> <a href="../cathen/a.htm"> A </a><a href="../cathen/b.htm"> B </a><a href="../cathen/c.htm"> C </a><a href="../cathen/d.htm"> D </a><a href="../cathen/e.htm"> E </a><a href="../cathen/f.htm"> F </a><a href="../cathen/g.htm"> G </a><a href="../cathen/h.htm"> H </a><a href="../cathen/i.htm"> I </a><a href="../cathen/j.htm"> J </a><a href="../cathen/k.htm"> K </a><a href="../cathen/l.htm"> L </a><a href="../cathen/m.htm"> M </a><a href="../cathen/n.htm"> N </a><a href="../cathen/o.htm"> O </a><a href="../cathen/p.htm"> P </a><a href="../cathen/q.htm"> Q </a><a href="../cathen/r.htm"> R </a><a href="../cathen/s.htm"> S </a><a href="../cathen/t.htm"> T </a><a href="../cathen/u.htm"> U </a><a href="../cathen/v.htm"> V </a><a href="../cathen/w.htm"> W </a><a href="../cathen/x.htm"> X </a><a href="../cathen/y.htm"> Y </a><a href="../cathen/z.htm"> Z </a> </td></tr></table></div> <div id="mobilecity" style="text-align: center; "><a href="../"><img height=24 width=102 border="0" alt="New Advent" src="../images/logo.gif"></a></div>  <div id="mi5"><span class="breadcrumbs"><a href="../">Home</a> > <a href="../cathen">Catholic Encyclopedia</a> > <a href="../cathen/c.htm">C</a> > The Church</span></div> <div id="springfield2"> <div class='catholicadnet-728x90' id='cathen-728x90-top' style='display: flex; height: 100px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; '></div> <h1>The Church</h1> <p><em><a href="https://gumroad.com/l/na2"><strong>Please help support the mission of New Advent</strong> and get the full contents of this website as an instant download. Includes the Catholic Encyclopedia, Church Fathers, Summa, Bible and more  all for only $19.99...</a></em></p> <p>The term <em>church</em> (Anglo-Saxon, <em>cirice, circe</em>; Modern German, <em>Kirche;</em> Swedish, <em>Kyrka</em>) is the name employed in the Teutonic languages to render the Greek <em>ekklesia</em> (<em>ecclesia</em>), the term by which the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> writers denote the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> founded by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Our Lord Jesus Christ.</a> The derivation of the word has been much debated. It is now agreed that it is derived from the Greek <em>kyriakon</em> (<em>cyriacon</em>), i.e. the Lord's house, a term which from the third century was used, as well as <em>ekklesia</em>, to signify a <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> place of worship. This, though the less usual expression, had apparently obtained currency among the <a href="../cathen/06517a.htm">Teutonic</a> races. The Northern tribes had been accustomed to pillage the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> churches of the empire, long before their own <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">conversion</a>. Hence, even prior to the arrival of the Saxons in <a href="../cathen/01505a.htm">Britain</a>, their language had acquired words to designate some of the externals of the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian religion</a>.</p> <p>The present article is arranged as follows:</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul> <li>The term <em>Ecclesia</em> </li><li>The Church in prophecy </li><li>Its constitution by Christ; the Church after the Ascension </li><li>Its organization by the Apostles </li><li>The Church, a divine society </li><li>The Church, the necessary means of salvation </li><li>Visibility of the Church </li><li>The principle of authority; infallibility; jurisdiction </li><li>Members of the Church </li><li>Indefectibility of the Church; continuity </li><li>Universality of the Church; the "Branch" Theory </li><li>Notes of the Church </li><li>The Church, a perfect society</li></ul></div> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <h2 id="section1">The term <em>ecclesia</em></h2> <p>In order to understand the precise force of this word, something must first be said as to its employment by the <a href="../cathen/13722a.htm">Septuagint</a> translators of the <a href="../cathen/14526a.htm">Old Testament</a>. Although in one or two places (<a href="../bible/psa025.htm#vrs5">Psalm 25:5</a>; <a href="../bible/jth006.htm#vrs21">Judith 6:21</a>; etc.) the word is used without religious signification, merely in the sense of "an assembly", this is not usually the case. Ordinarily it is employed as the Greek equivalent of the <a href="../cathen/07176a.htm">Hebrew</a> <em>qahal</em>, i.e., the entire community of the <a href="../cathen/08193a.htm">children of Israel</a> viewed in their religious aspect. Two Hebrew words are employed in the <a href="../cathen/14526a.htm">Old Testament</a> to signify the congregation of <a href="../cathen/08193a.htm">Israel</a>, viz. <em>qahal</em> <em>'êdah</em>. In the <a href="../cathen/13722a.htm">Septuagint</a> these are rendered, respectively, <em>ekklesia</em> and <em>synagoge</em>. Thus in <a href="../bible/pro005.htm#vrs14">Proverbs 5:14</a>, where the words occur together, "in the midst of the church and the congregation", the Greek rendering is <em>en meso ekklesias kai synagoges</em>. The distinction is indeed not rigidly observed  thus in Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers, both words are regularly represented by <em>synagoge</em>  but it is adhered to in the great majority of cases, and may be regarded as an established rule. In the writings of the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> the words are sharply distinguished. With them <em>ecclesia</em> denotes the Church of Christ; <em>synagoga</em>, the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jews</a> still adhering to the worship of the Old Covenant. Occasionally, it is <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a>, <em>ecclesia</em> is employed in its general significance of "assembly" (<a href="../bible/act019.htm#vrs32">Acts 19:32</a>; <a href="../bible/1co014.htm#vrs19">1 Corinthians 14:19</a>); and <em>synagoga</em> occurs once in reference to a gathering of <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christians</a>, though apparently of a non-religious character (<a href="../bible/jam002.htm#vrs2">James 2:2</a>) But <em>ecclesia</em> is never used by the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> to denote the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> Church. The word as a technical expression had been transferred to the community of <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> believers.</p> <p>It has been frequently disputed whether there is any difference in the signification of the two words. <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a> (<a href="../fathers/1801077.htm"><em>Enarration on Psalm 77</em></a>) distinguishes them on the ground that <em>ecclesia</em> is indicative of the calling together of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>, <em>synagoga</em> of the forcible herding together of irrational creatures: "congregatio magis pecorum convocatio magis hominum intelligi solet". But it may be <a href="../cathen/05141a.htm">doubted</a> whether there is any foundation for this view. It would appear, however, that the term <em>qahal</em>, was used with the special meaning of "those called by <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> to <a href="../cathen/05551b.htm">eternal</a> life", while <em>'êdah</em>, denoted merely "the actually existing <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> community" (Schürer, Hist. Jewish People, II, 59). Though the evidence for this distinction is drawn from the Mishna, and thus belongs to a somewhat later date, yet the difference in meaning probably existed at the time of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> ministry. But however this may have been, His <a href="../cathen/08069b.htm">intention</a> in employing the term, hitherto used of the Hebrew people viewed as a church, to denote the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> He Himself was establishing cannot be mistaken. It implied the claim that this <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> now constituted the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> people of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, that the Old Covenant was passing away, and that He, the promised <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a>, was inaugurating a New Covenant with a New Israel.</p> <p>As signifying the Church, the word <em>Ecclesia</em> is used by <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> writers, sometimes in a wider, sometimes in a more restricted sense.</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul><li>It is employed to denote all who, from the beginning of the world, have <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believed</a> in the <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">one true God</a>, and have been made His children by grace. In this sense, it is sometimes distinguished, signifying the Church before the Old Covenant, the Church of the Old Covenant, or the Church of the New Covenant. Thus <a href="../cathen/06780a.htm">St. Gregory</a> (<a href="../fathers/360205018.htm"><em>Book V, Epistle 18</em></a>) writes: "Sancti ante legem, sancti sub lege, sancti sub gratiâ, omnes hi . . . in membris Ecclesiæ sunt constituti" (The <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saints</a> before the Law, the <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saints</a> under the Law, and the <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saints</a> under grace  all these are constituted members of the Church).</li><li>It may signify the whole body of the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a>, including not merely the members of the Church who are alive on earth but those, too, whether in <a href="../cathen/07170a.htm">heaven</a> or in <a href="../cathen/12575a.htm">purgatory</a>, who form part of the one <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">communion of saints</a>. Considered thus, the Church is divided into the Church Militant, the Church Suffering, and the Church Triumphant.</li><li>It is further employed to signify the Church Militant of the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a>. Even in this restricted acceptation, there is some variety in the use of the term. The <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> of a single locality are often referred to in the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> as a Church (<a href="../bible/rev002.htm#vrs18">Revelation 2:18</a>; <a href="../bible/rom016.htm#vrs4">Romans 16:4</a>; <a href="../bible/act009.htm#vrs31">Acts 9:31</a>), and <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> even applies the term to <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> belonging to a single household (<a href="../bible/rom016.htm#vrs5">Romans 16:5</a>; <a href="../bible/1co016.htm#vrs19">1 Corinthians 16:19</a>, <a href="../bible/col004.htm#vrs15">Colossians 4:15</a>; <a href="../bible/phm001.htm#vrs1">Philemon 1-2</a>). Moreover, it may designate specially those who exercise the office of teaching and ruling the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a>, the <em>Ecclesia Docens</em> (<a href="../bible/mat018.htm#vrs17">Matthew 18:17</a>), or again the governed as distinguished from their <a href="../cathen/11537b.htm">pastors</a>, the <em>Ecclesia Discens</em> (<a href="../bible/act020.htm#vrs28">Acts 20:28</a>). In all these cases the name belonging to the whole is applied to a part. The term, in its full meaning, denotes the whole body of the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a>, both rulers and ruled, throughout the world (<a href="../bible/eph001.htm#vrs22">Ephesians 1:22</a>; <a href="../bible/col001.htm#vrs18">Colossians 1:18</a>). It is in this meaning that the Church is treated of in the present article. As thus understood, the definition of the Church given by <a href="../cathen/02411d.htm">Bellarmine</a> is that usually adopted by <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a>: "A body of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> united together by the profession of the same <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">Christian Faith</a>, and by participation in the same <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a>, under the governance of lawful <a href="../cathen/11537b.htm">pastors</a>, more especially of the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">Roman Pontiff</a>, the sole <a href="../cathen/15403b.htm">vicar of Christ</a> on earth" (Coetus hominum ejusdem christianæ fidei professione, et eorumdem sacramentorum communione colligatus, sub regimine legitimorum pastorum et præcipue unius Christi in Terris vicarii Romani Pontificis.  <a href="../cathen/02411d.htm">Bellarmine</a>, De Eccl., III, ii, 9). The accuracy of this definition will appear in the course of the article. </li></ul></div> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <h2 id="section2">The Church in prophecy</h2> <p>Hebrew <a href="../cathen/12473a.htm">prophecy</a> relates in almost equal proportions to the <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">person</a> and to the work of the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a>. This work was conceived as consisting of the establishment of a <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a>, in which he was to reign over a regenerated <a href="../cathen/08193a.htm">Israel</a>. The prophetic writings describe for us with precision many of the characteristics which were to distinguish that <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a>. Christ during His ministry affirmed not only that the <a href="../cathen/12473a.htm">prophecies</a> relating to the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> were fulfilled in His own <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">person</a>, but also that the expected <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Messianic kingdom</a> was none other than His Church. A consideration of the features of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> as depicted by the <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">Prophets</a>, must therefore greatly assist us in understanding <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> <a href="../cathen/08069b.htm">intentions</a> in the institution of the Church. Indeed many of the expressions employed by Him in relation to the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> He was establishing are only intelligible in the Light of these <a href="../cathen/12473a.htm">prophecies</a> and of the consequent expectations of the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> people. It will moreover appear that we have a weighty argument for the <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> character of the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> in the precise fulfillment of the sacred oracles.</p> <p>A characteristic feature of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Messianic kingdom</a>, as predicted, is its universal extent. Not merely the <a href="../cathen/15039a.htm">twelve tribes</a>, but the <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">Gentiles</a> are to yield allegiance to the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Son of David</a>. All kings are to serve and <a href="../cathen/11181c.htm">obey</a> him; his dominion is to extend to the ends of the earth (<a href="../bible/psa021.htm#vrs28">Psalm 21:28 sq.</a>; <a href="../bible/psa002.htm#vrs7">2:7-12</a>; <a href="../bible/psa116.htm#vrs1">116:1</a>; <a href="../bible/zec009.htm#vrs10">Zechariah 9:10</a>). Another series of remarkable passages declares that the subject nations will possess the unity conferred by a common <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> and a common worship  a feature represented under the striking image of the concourse of all peoples and nations to worship at <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a>. "It shall come to pass in the last days (i.e. in the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messianic</a> Era] . . . that many nations shall say: Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> of <a href="../cathen/08261a.htm">Jacob</a>; and he will teach us of his ways and we will walk in his paths; for the <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">law</a> shall go forth out of Sion, and the word of the Lord out of <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a>" (<a href="../bible/mic004.htm#vrs1">Micah 4:1-2</a>; cf. <a href="../bible/isa002.htm#vrs2">Isaiah 2:2</a>; <a href="../bible/zec008.htm#vrs3">Zechariah 8:3</a>). This unity of worship is to be the fruit of a <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">Divine revelation</a> common to all the inhabitants of the earth (<a href="../bible/zec014.htm#vrs8">Zechariah 14:8</a>).</p> <p>Corresponding to the triple office of the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> as <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priest</a>, <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophet</a>, and king, it will be noted that in relation to the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> the <a href="../bible">Sacred Writings</a> lay stress on three points:</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul><li>it is to be endowed with a new and peculiar <a href="../cathen/13309a.htm">sacrificial</a> system </li><li>it is to be the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> of <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> possessed of a <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">Divine revelation</a> </li><li>it is to be governed by an authority emanating from the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a>.</li></ul></div> <p>In regard to the first of these points, the <a href="../cathen/12409a.htm">priesthood</a> of the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> Himself is explicitly stated (<a href="../bible/psa109.htm#vrs4">Psalm 109:4</a>); while it is further taught that the worship which He is to inaugurate shall supersede the <a href="../cathen/13309a.htm">sacrifices</a> of the <a href="../cathen/14526a.htm">Old Dispensation</a>. This is implied, as the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a> tells us, in the very title, "a <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priest</a> after the order of <a href="../cathen/10156b.htm">Melchisedech</a>"; and the same <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> is contained in the prediction that a new <a href="../cathen/12409a.htm">priesthood</a> is to be formed, drawn from other peoples besides the <a href="../cathen/08193a.htm">Israelites</a> (<a href="../bible/isa066.htm#vrs18">Isaiah 66:18</a>), and in the words of the <a href="../cathen/09562b.htm">Prophet Malachias</a> which foretell the institution of a new sacrifice to be offered "from the rising of the sun even to the going down" (<a href="../bible/mal001.htm#vrs11">Malachi 1:11</a>). The <a href="../cathen/13309a.htm">sacrifices</a> <a href="../cathen/11215d.htm">offered</a> by the <a href="../cathen/12409a.htm">priesthood</a> of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Messianic kingdom</a> are to endure as long as day and night shall last (<a href="../bible/jer033.htm#vrs20">Jeremiah 33:20</a>).</p> <p>The <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> of the <a href="../cathen/06655b.htm">Divine truth</a> under the New Dispensation attested by <a href="../cathen/08333c.htm">Jeremias</a>: "Behold the days shall come saith the Lord, and I will make a new covenant with the <a href="../cathen/08193a.htm">house of Israel</a> and with the house of <a href="../cathen/08536a.htm">Juda</a> . . . and they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, saying: Know the Lord: for all shall <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">know</a> me from the least of them even to the greatest" (<a href="../bible/jer031.htm#vrs31">Jeremiah 31:31, 34</a>), while <a href="../cathen/15741b.htm">Zacharias</a> assures us that in those days <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> shall be known as the city of <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>. (<a href="../bible/zec008.htm#vrs3">Zechariah 8:3</a>).</p> <p>The passages which foretell that the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom</a> will possess a peculiar principle of authority in the personal rule of the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> are numerous (e.g. Psalms <a href="../bible/psa002.htm">2</a> and <a href="../bible/psa071.htm">71</a>; <a href="../bible/isa009.htm#vrs6">Isaiah 9:6 sq.</a>); but in relation to <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> own words, it is of interest to observe that in some of these passages the prediction is expressed under the metaphor of a shepherd guiding and governing his flock (<a href="../bible/eze034.htm#vrs23">Ezekiel 34:23</a>; <a href="../bible/eze037.htm#vrs24">37:24-28</a>). It is noteworthy, moreover, that just as the <a href="../cathen/12473a.htm">prophecies</a> in regard to the <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priestly</a> office foretell the appointment of a <a href="../cathen/12409a.htm">priesthood</a> subordinate to the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a>, so those which relate to the office of government indicate that the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> will associate with Himself other "shepherds", and will exercise His authority over the nations through rulers <a href="../cathen/04696b.htm">delegated</a> to govern in His name (<a href="../bible/jer018.htm#vrs6">Jeremiah 18:6</a>; <a href="../bible/psa044.htm#vrs17">Psalm 44:17</a>; cf. <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a>, <a href="../fathers/1801044.htm"><em>Enarration on Psalm 44</em>, no. 32</a>). Another feature of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> is to be the <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">sanctity</a> of its members. The way to it is to be called "the <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holy</a> way: the <a href="../cathen/04010c.htm">unclean</a> shall not pass over it". The <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">uncircumcised</a> and <a href="../cathen/04010c.htm">unclean</a> are not to enter into the renewed <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> (<a href="../bible/isa035.htm#vrs8">Isaiah 35:8</a>; <a href="../bible/isa052.htm#vrs1">52:1</a>).</p> <p>The later uninspired apocalyptic literature of the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jews</a> shows us how profoundly these predictions had influenced their national hopes, and explains for us the intense expectation among the populace described in the Gospel narratives. In these works as in the <a href="../cathen/08045a.htm">inspired</a> <a href="../cathen/12473a.htm">prophecies</a> the traits of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Messianic kingdom</a> present two very different aspects. On the one hand, the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> is a <a href="../cathen/04642b.htm">Davidic</a> king who gathers together the <a href="../cathen/04775c.htm">dispersed of Israel</a>, and establishes on this earth a <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> of purity and sinlessness (<a href="../cathen/14137a.htm">Psalms of Solomon</a>, xvii). The foreign foe is to be subdued (Assumpt. Moses, c. x) and the wicked are to be judged in the valley of the son of Hinnon (<a href="../cathen/01602a.htm">Enoch</a>, xxv, xxvii, xc). On the other hand, the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> is described in <a href="../cathen/05528b.htm">eschatological</a> characters. The <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> is pre-existent and Divine (<a href="../cathen/01602a.htm">Enoch</a>, Simil., xlviii, 3); the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> He establishes is to be a <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">heavenly kingdom</a> inaugurated by a great world-catastrophe, which separates this world (<em>aion outos</em>), from the world to come (<em>mellon</em>). This catastrophe is to be accompanied by a judgment both of <a href="../cathen/01476d.htm">angels</a> and of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> (Jubilees, x, 8; v, 10; Assumpt. Moses, x, 1). The dead will rise (<a href="../cathen/14137a.htm">Psalms of Solomon</a>, 3.11) and all the members of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Messianic kingdom</a> will become like to the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> (Enoch, Simil., xc, 37). This twofold aspect of the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> hopes in regard to the coming <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> must be borne in mind, if <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> use of the expression <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">"Kingdom of God"</a> is to be understood. Not infrequently, it is <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a>, He employs it in an <a href="../cathen/05528b.htm">eschatological</a> sense. But far more commonly He uses it of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> set up on this earth  of His Church. These are indeed, not two kingdoms, but one. The <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a> to be established at the last day is the Church in her final triumph.</p> <h2 id="section3">Constitution by Christ</h2> <p>The <a href="../cathen/08486b.htm">Baptist</a> proclaimed the near approach of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a>, and of the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messianic</a> Era. He bade all who would share its <a href="../cathen/02599b.htm">blessings</a> prepare themselves by penance. His own mission, he said, was to prepare the way of the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a>. To his <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> he indicated <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus of Nazareth</a> as the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> whose advent he had declared (<a href="../bible/joh001.htm#vrs29">John 1:29-31</a>). From the very commencement of His ministry Christ laid claim in an explicit way to the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messianic</a> dignity. In the <a href="../cathen/14379b.htm">synagogue</a> at <a href="../cathen/10725a.htm">Nazareth</a> (<a href="../bible/luk004.htm#vrs21">Luke 4:21</a>) He asserts that the <a href="../cathen/12473a.htm">prophecies</a> are fulfilled in His <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">person</a>; He declares that He is greater than <a href="../cathen/14135b.htm">Solomon</a> (<a href="../bible/luk011.htm#vrs31">Luke 11:31</a>), more venerable than the <a href="../cathen/14499a.htm">Temple</a> (<a href="../bible/mat012.htm#vrs6">Matthew 12:6</a>), Lord of the <a href="../cathen/13287b.htm">Sabbath</a> (<a href="../bible/luk006.htm#vrs5">Luke 6:5</a>). John, He says, is <a href="../cathen/05381b.htm">Elias</a>, the promised forerunner (<a href="../bible/mat017.htm#vrs12">Matthew 17:12</a>); and to John's messengers He vouchsafes the <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proofs</a> of His <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messianic</a> dignity which they request (<a href="../bible/luk007.htm#vrs22">Luke 7:22</a>). He demands implicit <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> on the ground of His Divine legation (<a href="../bible/joh006.htm#vrs29">John 6:29</a>). His public entry into <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> was the acceptance by the whole people of a claim again and again reiterated before them. The theme of His preaching throughout is the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a> which He has come to establish. <a href="../cathen/09674a.htm">St. Mark</a>, describing the beginning of His ministry, says that He came into <a href="../cathen/06341c.htm">Galilee</a> saying, "The <a href="../cathen/14726a.htm">time</a> is accomplished, and the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a> is at hand". For the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> which He was even then establishing in their midst, the Law and the <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">Prophets</a> had been, He said, but a preparation (<a href="../bible/luk016.htm#vrs16">Luke 16:16</a>; cf. <a href="../bible/mat004.htm#vrs23">Matthew 4:23</a>; <a href="../bible/mat009.htm#vrs35">9:35</a>; <a href="../bible/mat013.htm#vrs17">13:17</a>; <a href="../bible/mat021.htm#vrs43">21:43</a>; <a href="../bible/mat024.htm#vrs14">24:14</a>; <a href="../bible/mar001.htm#vrs14">Mark 1:14</a>; <a href="../bible/luk004.htm#vrs43">Luke 4:43</a>; <a href="../bible/luk008.htm#vrs1">8:1</a>; <a href="../bible/luk009.htm#vrs2">9:2, 60</a>; <a href="../bible/luk018.htm#vrs17">18:17</a>).</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p>When it is asked what is this <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> of which Christ spoke, there can be but one answer. It is His Church, the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of those who accept His Divine legation, and admit His <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to the obedience of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> which He claimed. His whole activity is directed to the establishment of such a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>: He organizes it and appoints rulers over it, establishes <a href="../cathen/13064b.htm">rites</a> and <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremonies</a> in it, transfers to it the name which had hitherto designated the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> Church, and solemnly warns the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jews</a> that the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> was no longer theirs, but had been taken from them and given to another people. The several steps taken by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> in organizing the Church are traced by the <a href="../cathen/05645a.htm">Evangelists</a>. He is represented as gathering numerous <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a>, but as selecting twelve from their number to be His companions in an especial manner. These share His life. To them He <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">reveals</a> the more hidden parts of His <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> (<a href="../bible/mat013.htm#vrs11">Matthew 13:11</a>). He sends them as His deputies to preach the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a>, and bestows on them the <a href="../cathen/10350a.htm">power to work miracles</a>. All are bound to accept their message; and those who refuse to listen to them shall meet a <a href="../cathen/05793a.htm">fate</a> more terrible than that of <a href="../cathen/14130a.htm">Sodom and Gomorrha</a> (<a href="../bible/mat010.htm#vrs1">Matthew 10:1-15</a>). The Sacred Writers speak of these twelve chosen <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> in a manner indicating that they are regarded as forming a corporate body. In several passages they are still termed "the twelve" even when the number, understood literally, would be inexact. The name is applied to them when they have been reduced to eleven by the defection of <a href="../cathen/08539a.htm">Judas</a>, on an occasion when only ten of them were present, and again after the appointment of <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> has increased their number to thirteen (<a href="../bible/luk024.htm#vrs33">Luke 24:33</a>; <a href="../bible/joh020.htm#vrs24">John 20:24</a>; <a href="../bible/1co015.htm#vrs5">1 Corinthians 15:5</a>; <a href="../bible/rev021.htm#vrs14">Revelation 21:14</a>).</p> <p>In this constitution of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolate</a> Christ lays the foundation of His Church. But it is not till the action of official <a href="../cathen/08537a.htm">Judaism</a> had rendered it manifestly impossible to hope the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> Church would admit His claim, that He prescribes for the Church as a body independent of the <a href="../cathen/14379b.htm">synagogue</a> and possessed of an administration of her own. After the breach had become definite, He calls the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> together and speaks to them of the judicial action of the Church, distinguishing, in an unmistakable manner, between the private <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individual</a> who undertakes the work of <a href="../cathen/04394a.htm">fraternal correction</a>, and the ecclesiastical authority empowered to pronounce a judicial <a href="../cathen/13720b.htm">sentence</a> (<a href="../bible/mat018.htm#vrs15">Matthew 18:15-17</a>). To the <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> thus conferred He attached a Divine sanction. A sentence thus pronounced, He assured the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>, should be ratified in <a href="../cathen/07170a.htm">heaven</a>. A further step was the appointment of St. Peter to be the chief of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Twelve</a>. For this position he had already been designated (<a href="../bible/mat016.htm#vrs15">Matthew 16:15 sqq.</a>) on an occasion previous to that just mentioned: at <a href="../cathen/03135a.htm">Cæsarea Philippi</a>, Christ had declared him to be the rock on which He would build His Church, thus affirming that the continuance and increase of the Church would rest on the office created in the person of Peter. To him, moreover, were to be given the <a href="../cathen/08631b.htm">keys</a> of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of Heaven</a>  an expression signifying the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of plenary authority (<a href="../bible/isa022.htm#vrs22">Isaiah 22:22</a>). The promise thus made was fulfilled after the <a href="../cathen/12789a.htm">Resurrection</a>, on the occasion narrated in <a href="../bible/joh021.htm">John 21</a>. Here Christ employs a simile used on more than one occasion by Himself to denote His own relation to the members of His Church  that of the shepherd and his flock. His solemn charge, "Feed my sheep", constituted Peter the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">common shepherd</a> of the whole collective flock. (For a further consideration of the Petrine texts see article <a href="../cathen/12423a.htm">PRIMACY</a>.) To the twelve Christ committed the charge of spreading the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> among all nations, appointing the <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">rite of baptism</a> as the one means of admission to a participation in its <a href="../cathen/12436b.htm">privileges</a> (<a href="../bible/mat028.htm#vrs19">Matthew 28:19</a>).</p> <p>In the course of this article detailed consideration will be given to the principal characteristics of the Church. <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> teaching on this point may be briefly summarized here. It is to be a <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> ruled in His absence by <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> (<a href="../bible/mat018.htm#vrs18">Matthew 18:18</a>; <a href="../bible/joh021.htm#vrs17">John 21:17</a>). It is therefore a visible <a href="../cathen/14568a.htm">theocracy</a>; and it will be substituted for the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> <a href="../cathen/14568a.htm">theocracy</a> that has rejected Him (<a href="../bible/mat021.htm#vrs43">Matthew 21:43</a>). In it, until the <a href="../cathen/08552a.htm">day of judgment</a>, the <a href="../cathen/05649a.htm">bad</a> will be mingled with the good (<a href="../bible/mat013.htm#vrs41">Matthew 13:41</a>). Its extent will be universal (<a href="../bible/mat028.htm#vrs19">Matthew 28:19</a>), and its duration to the end of <a href="../cathen/14726a.htm">time</a> (<a href="../bible/mat013.htm#vrs49">Matthew 13:49</a>); all powers that oppose it shall be crushed (<a href="../bible/mat021.htm#vrs44">Matthew 21:44</a>). Moreover, it will be a <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> of <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>, in the world, though not of it (<a href="../bible/joh018.htm#vrs36">John 18:36</a>). It will be one and undivided, and this unity shall be a witness to all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> that its founder came from <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> (<a href="../bible/joh017.htm#vrs21">John 17:21</a>).</p> <p>It is to be noticed that certain recent critics contest the positions maintained in the preceding paragraphs. They deny alike that Christ claimed to be the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a>, and that the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> of which He spoke was His Church. Thus, as regards <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> claim to <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messianic</a> dignity, they say that Christ does not declare Himself to be the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias</a> in His preaching: that He bids the possessed who proclaimed Him the <a href="../cathen/14142b.htm">Son of God</a> be silent: that the people did not suspect His <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messiahship</a>, but formed various extravagant hypotheses as to his <a href="../cathen/11727b.htm">personality</a>. It is manifestly impossible within the limits of this article to enter on a detailed discussion of these points. But, in the light of the testimony of the passages above cited, it will be seen that the position is entirely untenable. In reference to the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a>, many of the critics hold that the current <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> conception was wholly <a href="../cathen/05528b.htm">eschatological</a>, and that <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> references to it must one and all be thus interpreted. This view renders inexplicable the numerous passages in which Christ speaks of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> as present, and further involves a misconception as to the nature of <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> expectations, which, as has been seen, together with <a href="../cathen/05528b.htm">eschatological</a> traits, contained others of a different character. Harnack (What is Christianity? p. 62) holds that in its inner meaning the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> as conceived by Christ is "a purely religious blessing, the inner link of the <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">soul</a> with the living <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>". Such an interpretation can in no possible way be reconciled with <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> utterances on the subject. The whole tenor of his expressions is to lay stress on the concept of a <a href="../cathen/14568a.htm">theocratic</a> <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>.</p> <h3>The Church after the Ascension</h3> <p>The <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the Church as set forth by the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> after the <a href="../cathen/01767a.htm">Ascension</a> is in all respects identical with the teaching of Christ just described. St. Peter, in his first <a href="../cathen/07448a.htm">sermon</a>, delivered on the day of Pentecost, declares that <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus of Nazareth</a> is the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messianic</a> king (<a href="../bible/act002.htm#vrs36">Acts 2:36</a>). The means of <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> which he indicates is <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a>; and by <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a> his <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">converts</a> are aggregated to the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> (<a href="../bible/act002.htm#vrs41">Acts 2:41</a>). Though in these days the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christians</a> still availed themselves of the <a href="../cathen/14499a.htm">Temple</a> services, yet from the first the brotherhood of Christ formed a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> essentially distinct from the <a href="../cathen/14379b.htm">synagogue</a>. The reason why St. Peter bids his hearers accept <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a> is none other than that they may "save themselves from this unbelieving generation". Within the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of believers not only were the members united by common <a href="../cathen/13064b.htm">rites</a>, but the tie of unity was so close as to bring about in the Church of <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> that <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a> of things in which the <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> had all things common (<a href="../bible/act002.htm#vrs44">2:44</a>).</p> <p><a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> had declared that His <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> should be spread among all nations, and had committed the execution of the work to the twelve (<a href="../bible/mat028.htm#vrs19">Matthew 28:19</a>). Yet the universal mission of the Church revealed itself but gradually. St. Peter indeed makes mention of it from the first (<a href="../bible/act002.htm#vrs39">Acts 2:39</a>). But in the earliest years the <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> activity is confined to Jerusalem alone. Indeed an old <a href="../cathen/15006b.htm">tradition</a> (<a href="../cathen/01617d.htm">Apollonius</a>, cited by <a href="../cathen/05617b.htm">Eusebius</a> <a href="../fathers/250105.htm"><em>Church History</em> V.17</a>, and <a href="../cathen/04045a.htm">Clement of Alexandria</a>, <a href="../fathers/02106.htm"><em>Stromata</em> VI.5</a>) asserts that <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> had bidden the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> wait twelve years in <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> before dispersing to carry their message elsewhere. The first notable advance occurs consequent on the <a href="../cathen/11703a.htm">persecution</a> which arose after the death of Stephen, A.D. 37. This was the occasion of the preaching of the Gospel to the <a href="../cathen/13416a.htm">Samaritans</a>, a people excluded from the <a href="../cathen/12436b.htm">privileges</a> of <a href="../cathen/08193a.htm">Israel</a>, though acknowledging the <a href="../cathen/10582c.htm">Mosaic Law</a> (<a href="../bible/act008.htm#vrs5">Acts 8:5</a>). A still further expansion resulted from the <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> directing St. Peter to admit to <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a> <a href="../cathen/04375b.htm">Cornelius</a>, a devout <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">Gentile</a>, i.e. one associated to the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish religion</a> but not <a href="../cathen/03777a.htm">circumcised</a>. From this time forward <a href="../cathen/03777a.htm">circumcision</a> and the observance of the Law were not a <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a> requisite for incorporation into the Church. But the final step of admitting those <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">Gentiles</a> who had <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">known</a> no previous connection with the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">religion of Israel</a>, and whose life had been spent in <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">paganism</a>, was not taken till more than fifteen years after <a href="../cathen/01767a.htm">Christ's Ascension</a>; it did not occur, it would seem, before the day described in <a href="../bible/act013.htm#vrs46">Acts 13:46</a>, when, at <a href="../cathen/01570a.htm#II">Antioch in Pisidia</a>, Paul and Barnabas announced that since the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jews</a> accounted themselves unworthy of <a href="../cathen/05551b.htm">eternal</a> life they would "turn to the <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">Gentiles</a>".</p> <p>In the <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> teaching the term <em>Church</em>, from the very first, takes the place of the expression <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm"><em>Kingdom of God</em></a> (<a href="../bible/act005.htm#vrs11">Acts 5:11</a>). Where others than the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jews</a> were concerned, the greater suitability of the former name is evident; for <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm"><em>Kingdom of God</em></a> had special reference to <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">beliefs</a>. But the change of title only emphasizes the social unity of the members. They are the new congregation of <a href="../cathen/08193a.htm">Israel</a>  the <a href="../cathen/14568a.htm">theocratic</a> polity: they are the people (<em>laos</em>) of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> (<a href="../bible/act015.htm#vrs14">Acts 15:14</a>; <a href="../bible/rom009.htm#vrs25">Romans 9:25</a>; <a href="../bible/2co006.htm#vrs16">2 Corinthians 6:16</a>; <a href="../bible/1pe002.htm#vrs9">1 Peter 2:9 sq.</a>; <a href="../bible/heb008.htm#vrs10">Hebrews 8:10</a>; <a href="../bible/rev018.htm#vrs4">Revelation 18:4</a>; <a href="../bible/rev021.htm#vrs3">21:3</a>). By their admission to the Church, the <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">Gentiles</a> have been grafted in and form part of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> fruitful olive-tree, while <a href="../cathen/01624b.htm">apostate</a> <a href="../cathen/08193a.htm">Israel</a> has been broken off (<a href="../bible/rom011.htm#vrs24">Romans 11:24</a>). <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a>, writing to his <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">Gentile</a> <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">converts</a> at <a href="../cathen/04363b.htm">Corinth</a>, terms the ancient Hebrew Church "our fathers" (<a href="../bible/1co010.htm#vrs1">1 Corinthians 10:1</a>). Indeed from time to time the previous phraseology is employed, and the Gospel message is termed the preaching of the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a> (<a href="../bible/act020.htm#vrs25">Acts 20:25</a>; <a href="../bible/act028.htm#vrs31">28:31</a>).</p> <p>Within the Church the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> exercised that regulative power with which <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> had endowed them. It was no chaotic mob, but a <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> possessed of a corporate life, and organized in various orders. The evidence shows the twelve to have possessed (a) a <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">power of jurisdiction</a>, in virtue of which they wielded a legislative and judicial authority, and (b) a <a href="../cathen/15006b.htm">magisterial</a> office to teach the <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">Divine revelation</a> entrusted to them. Thus (a) we find <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> authoritatively prescribing for the order and <a href="../cathen/05030a.htm">discipline</a> of the churches. He does not advise; he directs (<a href="../bible/1co011.htm#vrs34">1 Corinthians 11:34</a>; <a href="../bible/1co016.htm#vrs1">16:1</a>; <a href="../bible/tit001.htm#vrs5">Titus 1:5</a>). He pronounces judicial <a href="../cathen/13720b.htm">sentence</a> (<a href="../bible/1co005.htm#vrs5">1 Corinthians 5:5</a>; <a href="../bible/2co002.htm#vrs10">2 Corinthians 2:10</a>), and his <a href="../cathen/13720b.htm">sentences</a>, like those of other <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>, receive at times the <a href="../cathen/14133a.htm">solemn</a> sanction of <a href="../cathen/10338a.htm">miraculous</a> punishment (<a href="../bible/1ti001.htm#vrs20">1 Timothy 1:20</a>; <a href="../bible/act005.htm#vrs1">Acts 5:1-10</a>). In like manner he bids his delegate <a href="../cathen/14727b.htm">Timothy</a> hear the causes even of <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priests</a>, and rebuke, in the sight of all, those who <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sin</a> (<a href="../bible/1ti005.htm#vrs19">1 Timothy 5:19 sq.</a>). (b) With no less definiteness does he assert that the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolate</a> carries with it a <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrinal</a> authority, which all are bound to recognize. <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> has sent them, he <a href="../cathen/01179a.htm">affirms</a>, to claim "the obedience of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>" (<a href="../bible/rom001.htm#vrs5">Romans 1:5</a>; <a href="../bible/rom015.htm#vrs18">15:18</a>). Further, his <a href="../cathen/14133a.htm">solemnly</a> expressed desire, that even if an <a href="../cathen/01476d.htm">angel</a> from <a href="../cathen/07170a.htm">heaven</a> were to preach another <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> to the <a href="../cathen/06336a.htm">Galatians</a> than that which he had delivered to them, he should be <a href="../cathen/01455e.htm">anathema</a> (<a href="../bible/gal001.htm#vrs8">Galatians 1:8</a>), involves a claim to <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallibility</a> in the teaching of <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revealed</a> <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>.</p> <p>While the whole <a href="../cathen/04112a.htm">Apostolic College</a> enjoyed this power in the Church, St. Peter always appears in that position of <a href="../cathen/12423a.htm">primacy</a> which Christ assigned to him. It is Peter who receives into the Church the first <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">converts</a>, alike from <a href="../cathen/08537a.htm">Judaism</a> and from <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">heathenism</a> (<a href="../bible/act002.htm#vrs41">Acts 2:41</a>; <a href="../bible/act010.htm#vrs5">10:5 sq.</a>), who works the first <a href="../cathen/10338a.htm">miracle</a> (<a href="../bible/act003.htm#vrs1">Acts 3:1 sqq.</a>), who inflicts the first ecclesiastical penalty (<a href="../bible/act005.htm#vrs1">Acts 5:1 sqq.</a>). It is Peter who casts out of the Church the first <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretic</a>, <a href="../cathen/13797b.htm">Simon Magus</a> (<a href="../bible/act008.htm#vrs21">Acts 8:21</a>), who makes the first <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic visitation</a> of the churches (<a href="../bible/act009.htm#vrs32">Acts 9:32</a>), and who pronounces the first <a href="../cathen/05089a.htm">dogmatic</a> decision (<a href="../bible/act015.htm#vrs7">Acts 15:7</a>). (See Schanz, III, p. 460.) So indisputable was his position that when <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> was about to undertake the work of preaching to the <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">heathen</a> the Gospel which <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> had revealed to him, he regarded it as <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> to obtain recognition from Peter (<a href="../bible/gal001.htm#vrs18">Galatians 1:18</a>). More than this was not needful: for the <a href="../cathen/01656b.htm">approbation</a> of Peter was definitive.</p> <h2 id="section4">Organization by the apostles</h2> <p>Few subjects have been so much debated during the past half-century as the organization of the primitive Church. The present article cannot deal with the whole of this wide subject. Its scope is limited to a single point. An endeavour will be made to estimate the existing information regarding the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolic</a> Age itself. Further light is thrown on the matter by a consideration of the organization that is found to have existed in the period immediately subsequent to the death of the last <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a>. (See <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">BISHOP</a>.) The independent evidence derived from the consideration of each of these periods will, in the opinion of the present writer, be found, when fairly weighed, to yield similar results. Thus the conclusions here advanced, over and above their intrinsic value, derive support from the independent <a href="../cathen/15677a.htm">witness</a> of another series of authorities tending in all <a href="../cathen/06319a.htm">essentials</a> to confirm their accuracy. The question at issue is, whether the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> did, or did not, establish in the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> communities a <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchical</a> organization. All <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> scholars, together with some few <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestants</a>, hold that they did so. The opposite view is maintained by the <a href="../cathen/12652a.htm">rationalist</a> critics, together with the greater number of <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestants</a>.</p> <p>In considering the evidence of the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> on the subject, it appears at once that there is a marked difference between the state of things revealed in the later <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> writings, and that which appears in those of an earlier date. In the earlier writings we find but little mention of an official organization. Such official positions as may have existed would seem to have been of minor importance in the presence of the <a href="../cathen/10338a.htm">miraculous</a> <a href="../cathen/03588e.htm">charismata</a> of the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Spirit</a> conferred upon <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individuals</a>, and fitting them to <a href="../cathen/01115a.htm">act</a> as organs of the community in various grades. <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> in his earlier <a href="../cathen/05509a.htm">Epistles</a> has no messages for the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> or <a href="../cathen/04647c.htm">deacons</a>, although the circumstances dealt with in the <a href="../cathen/04364a.htm">Epistles to the Corinthians</a> and in that to the <a href="../cathen/06336a.htm">Galatians</a> would seem to suggest a reference to the local rulers of the Church. When he enumerates the various functions to which <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> has called various members of the Church, he does not give us a list of Church offices. "<a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>", he says, "hath set some in the church, first <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">apostles</a>, secondly <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a>, thirdly <a href="../cathen/05072b.htm">doctors</a> [<em>didaskaloi</em>]; after that <a href="../cathen/10350a.htm">miracles</a>; then the <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a> of healings, helps, governments, kinds of <a href="../cathen/14776c.htm">tongues</a>" (<a href="../bible/1co012.htm#vrs28">1 Corinthians 12:28</a>). This is not a list of official designations. It is a list of "charismata" bestowed by the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Spirit</a>, enabling the recipient to fulfill some special function. The only term which forms an exception to this is that of <em>apostle</em>. Here the word is doubtless used in the sense in which it signifies the twelve and <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> only. As thus applied the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolate</a> was a distinct office, involving a personal mission received from the Risen Lord Himself (<a href="../bible/1co001.htm#vrs1">1 Corinthians 1:1</a>; <a href="../bible/gal001.htm#vrs1">Galatians 1:1</a>). Such a position was of altogether too special a <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a> for its recipients to be placed in any other category. The term could indeed be used in a wider reference. It is used of Barnabas (<a href="../bible/act014.htm#vrs13">Acts 14:13</a>) and of Andronicus and Junias, <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul's</a> kinsmen (<a href="../bible/rom016.htm#vrs7">Romans 16:7</a>). In this extended signification it is apparently equivalent to <em>evangelist</em> (<a href="../bible/eph004.htm#vrs11">Ephesians 4:11</a>; <a href="../bible/2ti004.htm#vrs5">2 Timothy 4:5</a>) and denotes those "apostolic men", who, like the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>, went from place to place labouring in new fields, but who had received their commission from them, and not from Christ in person. (See <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">APOSTLES</a>.)</p> <p>The "prophets", the second class mentioned, were men to whom it was given to speak from time to time under the direct influence of the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Spirit</a> as the recipients of <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> <a href="../cathen/08045a.htm">inspiration</a> (<a href="../bible/act013.htm#vrs2">Acts 13:2</a>; <a href="../bible/act015.htm#vrs23">15:23</a>; <a href="../bible/act021.htm#vrs11">21:11</a>; etc.). By the nature of the case the exercise of such a function could be occasional only. The "charisma" of the "doctors" (or teachers) differed from that of the <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a>, in that it could be used continuously. They had received the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of intelligent insight into <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revealed</a> <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>, and the power to impart it to others. It is manifest that those who possessed such a power must have exercised a function of vital moment to the Church in those first days, when the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> communities consisted to so large an extent of new <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">converts</a>. The other "charismata" mentioned do not call for special notice. But the <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a> and teachers would appear to have possessed an importance as organs of the community, eclipsing that of the local ministry. Thus in <a href="../bible/act013.htm#vrs1">Acts 13:1</a>, it is simply related that there were in the Church which was at Antioch <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a> and <a href="../cathen/05072b.htm">doctors</a>. There is no mention of <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> or <a href="../cathen/04647c.htm">deacons</a>. And in the <a href="../fathers/0714.htm"><em>Didache</em></a>  a work as it would seem of the first century, written before the last <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a> had passed away  the author enjoins respect for the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> and <a href="../cathen/04647c.htm">deacons</a>, on the ground that they have a claim similar to that of the <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a> and <a href="../cathen/05072b.htm">doctors</a>. "Appoint for yourselves", he writes, "<a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> and <a href="../cathen/04647c.htm">deacons</a>, worthy of the Lord, <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> who are meek, and not lovers of money, and <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> and approved; for unto you they also perform the service [<em>leitourgousi ten leitourgian</em>] of the <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a> and <a href="../cathen/05072b.htm">doctors</a>. Therefore despise them not: for they are your honourable men along with the <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a> and teachers" (<a href="../bible/act015.htm">Acts 15</a>).</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p>It would appear, then, indisputable that in the earliest years of the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> Church ecclesiastical functions were in a large measure fulfilled by men who had been specially endowed for this purpose with "charismata" of the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Spirit</a>, and that as long as these <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gifts</a> endured, the local <a href="../cathen/10326a.htm">ministry</a> occupied a position of less importance and influence. Yet, though this be the case, there would seem to be ample ground for holding that the local <a href="../cathen/10326a.htm">ministry</a> was of <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> institution: and, further, that towards the later part of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolic</a> Age the abundant "charismata" were ceasing, and that the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> themselves took measures to determine the position of the official <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchy</a> as the directive authority of the Church. The evidence for the existence of such a local <a href="../cathen/10326a.htm">ministry</a> is plentiful in the later <a href="../cathen/05509a.htm">Epistles</a> of <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> (<a href="../bible/phi000.htm">Philippians</a>, <a href="../bible/1ti000.htm">1</a> and <a href="../bible/2ti000.htm">2 Timothy</a>, and <a href="../bible/tit000.htm">Titus</a>). The <a href="../cathen/12008a.htm">Epistle to the Philippians</a> opens with a special greeting to the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> and <a href="../cathen/04647c.htm">deacons</a>. Those who hold these official positions are recognized as the representatives in some sort of the Church. Throughout the letter there is no mention of the "charismata", which figure so largely in the earlier <a href="../cathen/05509a.htm">Epistles</a>. It is indeed urged by Hort (Christian Ecclesia, p. 211) that even here these terms are not official titles. But in view of their employment as titles in documents so nearly contemporary, as the <a href="../fathers/1010.htm"><em>Epistle of Clement</em> 4</a> and the <a href="../cathen/04779a.htm">Didache</a>, such a contention seems devoid of all probability.</p> <p>In the <a href="../cathen/14727b.htm">Pastoral Epistles</a> the new situation appears even more clearly. The purpose of these writings was to instruct Timothy and Titus regarding the manner in which they were to organize the local Churches. The total absence of all reference to the spiritual gifts can scarcely be otherwise explained than by supposing that they no longer existed in the communities, or that they were at most exceptional phenomena. Instead, we find the Churches governed by a <a href="../cathen/07326a.htm">hierarchical</a> organization of <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a>, sometimes also termed <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a>, and <a href="../cathen/04647c.htm">deacons</a>. That the terms <em><a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a></em> and <em>presbyter</em> are synonymous is evident from <a href="../bible/tit001.htm#vrs5">Titus 1:5-7</a>: "I left thee in Crete, that thou shouldest . . . <a href="../cathen/11279a.htm">ordain</a> <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priests</a> in every city . . . For a <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> must be without crime." These <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a> form a corporate body (<a href="../bible/1ti004.htm#vrs14">1 Timothy 4:14</a>), and they are entrusted with the twofold charge of governing the Church (<a href="../bible/1ti003.htm#vrs5">1 Timothy 3:5</a>) and of teaching (<a href="../bible/1ti003.htm#vrs2">1 Timothy 3:2</a>; <a href="../bible/tit001.htm#vrs9">Titus 1:9</a>). The selection of those who are to fill this post does not depend on the possession of <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">supernatural gifts</a>. It is required that they should not be unproved <a href="../cathen/10742a.htm">neophytes</a>, that they should be under no charge, should have displayed <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">moral</a> fitness for the work, and should be capable of teaching. (<a href="../bible/1ti003.htm#vrs2">1 Timothy 3:2-7</a>; <a href="../bible/tit001.htm#vrs5">Titus 1:5-9</a>) The appointment to this office was by a <a href="../cathen/14133a.htm">solemn</a> <a href="../cathen/07698a.htm">laying on of hands</a> (<a href="../bible/1ti005.htm#vrs22">1 Timothy 5:22</a>). Some words addressed by <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> to <a href="../cathen/14727b.htm">Timothy</a>, in reference to the <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremony</a> as it had taken place in Timothy's case, throw light upon its nature. "I admonish thee", he writes, "that thou stir up the grace (<em>charisma</em>) of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, which is in thee by the <a href="../cathen/07698a.htm">laying on of my hands</a>" (<a href="../bible/2ti001.htm#vrs6">2 Timothy 1:6</a>). The <a href="../cathen/13064b.htm">rite</a> is here declared to be the means by which a charismatic gift is conferred; and, further, the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> in question, like the <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptismal</a> <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a>, is permanent in its effects. The recipient needs but to "waken into life" [<em>anazopyrein</em>] the grace he thus possesses in order to avail himself of it. It is an abiding endowment. There can be no reason for asserting that the <a href="../cathen/07698a.htm">imposition of hands</a>, by which Timothy was instructed to appoint the <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a> to their office, was a <a href="../cathen/13064b.htm">rite</a> of a different <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a>, a mere formality without practical import.</p> <p>With the evidence before us, certain other notices in the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> writings, pointing to the existence of this local ministry, may be considered. There is mention of <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a> at <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> at a date apparently immediately subsequent to the <a href="../cathen/05046a.htm">dispersion of the Apostles</a> (<a href="../bible/act011.htm#vrs30">Acts 11:30</a>; cf. <a href="../bible/act015.htm#vrs2">15:2</a>; <a href="../bible/act016.htm#vrs4">16:4</a>; <a href="../bible/act021.htm#vrs18">21:18</a>). Again, we are told that Paul and Barnabas, as they retraced their steps on their first missionary journey, appointed <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a> in every Church (<a href="../bible/act014.htm#vrs22">Acts 14:22</a>). So too the injunction to the <a href="../cathen/14629d.htm">Thessalonians</a> (<a href="../bible/1th005.htm#vrs12">1 Thessalonians 5:12</a>) to have regard to those who are over them in the Lord (<em>proistamenoi</em>; cf. <a href="../bible/rom012.htm#vrs6">Romans 12:6</a>) would seem to imply that there also <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> had invested certain members of the community with a <a href="../cathen/14611a.htm">pastoral</a> charge. Still more explicit is the evidence contained in the account of <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul's</a> interview with the Ephesian elders (<a href="../bible/act020.htm#vrs17">Acts 20:17-23</a>). It is told that, sending from <a href="../cathen/10303c.htm">Miletus</a> to Ephesus, he summoned "the <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a> of the Church", and in the course of his charge addressed them as follows: "Take heed to yourselves and to the whole flock, wherein the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Ghost</a> has placed you <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> to tend [<em>poimainein</em>] the Church of God" (<a href="../bible/act020.htm#vrs28">20:28</a>). St. Peter employs similar language: "The <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a> that are among you, I beseech, who am myself also a <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyter</a> . . . tend [<em>poimainein</em>] the flock of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> which is among you." These expressions leave no <a href="../cathen/05141a.htm">doubt</a> as to the office designated by <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a>, when in <a href="../bible/eph004.htm#vrs11">Ephesians 4:11</a>, he enumerates the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gifts</a> of the <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Ascended Lord</a> as follows: "He gave some <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">apostles</a>, and some <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a>, and other some evangelists, and other some <em><a href="../cathen/11537b.htm">pastors</a> and <a href="../cathen/05072b.htm">doctors</a></em> [<em>tous de poimenas kai didaskalous</em>]. The <a href="../cathen/08275b.htm">Epistle of St. James</a> provides us with yet another reference to this office, where the sick man is bidden send for the <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a> of the Church, that he may receive at their hands the <a href="../cathen/13064b.htm">rite of unction</a> (<a href="../bible/jam005.htm#vrs14">James 5:14</a>).</p> <p>The term <em>presbyter</em> was of common use in the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> Church, as denoting the "rulers" of the <a href="../cathen/14379b.htm">synagogue</a> (cf. <a href="../bible/luk013.htm#vrs14">Luke 13:14</a>). Hence it has been argued by some non-Catholic writers that in the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> and <a href="../cathen/04647c.htm">deacons</a> of the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> there is simply the <a href="../cathen/14379b.htm">synagogal</a> organization familiar to the first <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">converts</a>, and introduced by them into the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> communities. <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul's</a> concept of the Church, it is urged, is essentially opposed to any rigid governmental system; yet this familiar form of organization was gradually established even in the Churches he had founded. In regard to this view it appears enough to say that the resemblance between the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> "rulers of the <a href="../cathen/14379b.htm">synagogue</a>" and the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <em>presbyter-episcopus</em> goes no farther than the name. The <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> official was purely civil and held office for a time only. The <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> presbyterate was for life, and its functions were spiritual. There is perhaps more ground for the view advocated by some (cf. de Smedt, Revue des quest. hist., vols. XLIV, L), that <em>presbyter</em> and <em>episcopus</em> may not in all cases be perfectly synonymous. The term <em>presbyter</em> is undoubtedly an honorific title, while that of <em>episcopus</em> primarily indicates the function performed. It is possible that the former title may have had a wider significance than the latter. The designation <em><a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyter</a></em>, it is suggested, may have been given to all those who were recognized as having a claim to some voice in directing the affairs of the community, whether this were based on official status, or social rank, or benefactions to the local Church, or on some other ground; while those <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a> who had received the <a href="../cathen/07698a.htm">laying on of hands</a> would be known, not simply as "presbyters", but as "presiding [<em>proistamenoi</em>  <a href="../bible/1th005.htm#vrs12">1 Thessalonians 5:12</a>) <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a>", "presbyter-bishops", "presbyter-rulers" (<em>hegoumenoi</em>  <a href="../bible/heb013.htm#vrs17">Hebrews 13:17</a>).</p> <p>It remains to consider whether the so-called "monarchical" <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a> was instituted by the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>. Besides establishing a college of presbyter-bishops, did they further place one man in a position of supremacy, entrusting the government of the Church to him, and endowing him with <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> authority over the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> community? Even if we take into account the <a href="../cathen/13635b.htm">Scriptural</a> evidence alone, there are sufficient grounds for answering this question in the affirmative. From the <a href="../cathen/14726a.htm">time</a> of the <a href="../cathen/05046a.htm">dispersion of the Apostles</a>, <a href="../cathen/08275b.htm">St. James</a> appears in an episcopal relation to the Church of <a href="../cathen/08344a.htm">Jerusalem</a> (<a href="../bible/act012.htm#vrs17">Acts 12:17</a>; <a href="../bible/act015.htm#vrs13">15:13</a>; <a href="../bible/gal002.htm#vrs12">Galatians 2:12</a>). In the other <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> communities the institution of "monarchical" <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> was a somewhat later development. At first the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> themselves fulfilled, it would seem, all the <a href="../cathen/05215a.htm">duties</a> of supreme oversight. They established the office when the growing needs of the Church demanded it. The <a href="../cathen/14727b.htm">Pastoral Epistles</a> leave no room to <a href="../cathen/05141a.htm">doubt</a> that Timothy and Titus were sent as <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> to Ephesus and to Crete respectively. To Timothy full <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> powers are conceded. Notwithstanding his youth he holds authority over both <a href="../cathen/04049b.htm">clergy</a> and <a href="../cathen/08748a.htm">laity</a>. To him is confided the <a href="../cathen/05215a.htm">duty</a> of guarding the purity of the Church's <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>, of ordaining <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priests</a>, of exercising <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a>. Moreover, <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul's</a> exhortation to him, "to keep the <a href="../cathen/04153a.htm">commandment</a> without spot, blameless, unto the coming of our <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Lord Jesus Christ</a>" shows that this was no transitory mission. A charge so worded includes in its sweep, not Timothy alone, but his <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">successors</a> in an office which is to last until the <a href="../cathen/08552a.htm">Second Advent</a>. Local <a href="../cathen/15006b.htm">tradition</a> unhesitatingly reckoned him among the occupants of the <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">episcopal see</a>. At the <a href="../cathen/03555a.htm">Council of Chalcedon</a>, the Church of Ephesus counted a <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">succession</a> of twenty-seven <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> commencing with Timothy (<a href="../cathen/09609c.htm">Mansi</a>, VII, 293; cf. <a href="../cathen/05617b.htm">Eusebius</a>, <a href="../fathers/250103.htm"><em>Church History</em> III.4-5</a>).</p> <p>These are not the sole evidences which the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> affords of the monarchical <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a>. In the <a href="../cathen/01594b.htm">Apocalypse</a> the <a href="../cathen/01486a.htm">"angels"</a> to whom the letters to the seven Churches are addressed are almost certainly the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> of the respective communities. Some <a href="../cathen/04157a.htm">commentators</a>, indeed, have held them to be personifications of the communities themselves. But this explanation can hardly stand. St. John, throughout, addresses the <a href="../cathen/01486a.htm">angel</a> as being responsible for the community precisely as he would address its ruler. Moreover, in the symbolism of <a href="../bible/rev001.htm">chapter 1</a>, the two are represented under different figures: the <a href="../cathen/01476d.htm">angels</a> are the stars in the right hand of the <a href="../cathen/14144a.htm">Son of Man</a>; the seven <a href="../cathen/03248a.htm">candlesticks</a> are the image which figures the communities. The very term <em>angel</em>, it should be noticed, is practically synonymous with <em>apostle</em>, and thus is aptly chosen to designate the episcopal office. Again the messages to Archippus (<a href="../bible/col004.htm#vrs17">Colossians 4:17</a>; <a href="../bible/phm001.htm#vrs2">Philemon 2</a>) imply that he held a position of special dignity, superior to that of the other <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a>. The mention of him in a letter entirely concerned with a private matter, as is that to <a href="../cathen/11797b.htm">Philemon</a>, is hardly explicable unless he were the official head of the Colossian Church. We have therefore four important indications of the existence of an office in the local Churches, held by a single <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">person</a>, and carrying with it <a href="../cathen/01629a.htm">Apostolical</a> authority. Nor can any difficulty be occasioned by the fact that as yet no special title distinguishes these <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">successors</a> of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> from the ordinary <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a>. It is in the <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a> of things that the office should <a href="../cathen/06608b.htm">exist</a> before a title is assigned to it. The name of <em>apostle</em>, we have seen, was not confined to the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Twelve</a>. St. Peter (<a href="../bible/1pe005.htm#vrs1">1 Peter 5:1</a>) and St. John (<a href="../bible/2jo001.htm">2</a> and <a href="../bible/3jo001.htm#vrs1">3 John 1:1</a>) both speak of themselves as <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">presbyters</a>". <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> speaks of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolate</a> as a <em>diakonia</em>. A parallel case in later <a href="../cathen/07365a.htm">ecclesiastical history</a> is afforded by the word <em><a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a></em>. This title was not appropriated to the exclusive use of the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Holy See</a> till the eleventh century. Yet no one maintains that the supreme pontificate of the Roman <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> was not recognized till then. It should cause no surprise that a precise terminology, distinguishing <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a>, in the full sense, from the presbyter-bishops, is not found in the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a>.</p> <p>The conclusion reached is put beyond all reasonable <a href="../cathen/05141a.htm">doubt</a> by the testimony of the sub-Apostolic Age. This is so important in regard to the question of the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a> that it is impossible entirely to pass it over. It will be enough, however, to refer to the evidence contained in the <a href="../cathen/05509a.htm">epistles</a> of St. Ignatius, <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">Bishop</a> of <a href="../cathen/01570a.htm">Antioch</a>, himself a <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciple</a> of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>. In these epistles (about A.D. 107) he again and again asserts that the supremacy of the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> is of Divine institution and belongs to the <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> constitution of the Church. He goes so far as to affirm that the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> stands in the place of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> Himself. "When ye are <a href="../cathen/11181c.htm">obedient</a> to the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> as to <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a>," he writes to the Trallians, "it is evident to me that ye are living not after <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>, but after <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a>. . . be ye <a href="../cathen/11181c.htm">obedient</a> also to the <a href="../cathen/12395a.htm">presbytery</a> as to the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a>" (<a href="../fathers/0106.htm"><em>Letter to the Trallians</em> 2</a>). He also incidentally tells us that <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> are found in the Church, even in "the farthest parts of the earth" (<a href="../fathers/0104.htm"><em>Letter to the Ephesians</em> 3</a>) It is out of the question that one who lived at a period so little removed from the actual <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolic</a> Age could have proclaimed this <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> in terms such as he employs, had not the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a> been universally recognized as of Divine appointment. It has been seen that Christ not only established the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a> in the <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">persons</a> of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Twelve</a> but, further, <a href="../cathen/04470a.htm">created</a> in St. Peter the office of supreme <a href="../cathen/11537b.htm">pastor</a> of the Church. Early <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian history</a> tells us that before his death, he fixed his residence at <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>, and ruled the Church there as its <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a>. It is from <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> that he dates his <a href="../bible/2pe000.htm">first Epistle</a>, speaking of the city under the name of Babylon, a designation which St. John also gives it in the <a href="../cathen/01594b.htm">Apocalypse</a> (c. xviii). At <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>, too, he suffered <a href="../cathen/09736b.htm">martyrdom</a> in company with <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a>, A.D. 67. The list of his <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">successors</a> in the <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">see</a> is <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">known</a>, from <a href="../cathen/09272b.htm">Linus</a>, <a href="../cathen/01446a.htm">Anacletus</a>, and Clement, who were the first to follow him, down to the reigning pontiff. The Church has ever seen in the occupant of the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">See of Rome</a> the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">successor of Peter</a> in the supreme pastorate. (See <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">POPE</a>.)</p> <p>The evidence thus far considered seems to demonstrate beyond all question that the <a href="../cathen/07326a.htm">hierarchical</a> organization of the Church was, in its <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> elements, the work of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> themselves; and that to this <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchy</a> they handed on the charge entrusted to them by Christ of governing the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a>, and of teaching the revealed <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>. These conclusions are far from being admitted by <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> and other critics. They are unanimous in holding that the <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">idea</a> of a Church  an organized <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>  is entirely foreign to the teaching of Christ. It is therefore, in their eyes, impossible that <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholicism</a>, if by that term we signify a worldwide institution, bound together by unity of constitution, of <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>, and of worship, can have been established by the direct action of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>. In the course of the nineteenth century many theories were propounded to account for the transformation of the so-called "Apostolic Christianity" into the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christianity</a> of the commencement of the third century, when beyond all dispute the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> system was firmly established from one end of the Roman Empire to the other. At the present day (1908) the theories advocated by the critics are of a less extravagant nature than those of F.C. Baur (1853) and the <a href="../cathen/15083a.htm">Tübingen</a> School, which had so great a vogue in the middle of the nineteenth century. Greater regard is shown for the claims of historical possibility and for the value of early <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> evidences. At the same time it is to be observed that the reconstructions suggested involve the rejection of the <a href="../cathen/14727b.htm">Pastoral Epistles</a> as being documents of the second century. It will be sufficient here to notice one or two salient points in the views which now find favour with the best known among non-Catholic writers.</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul><li>It is held that such official organization as existed in the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> communities was not regarded as involving special spiritual gifts, and had but little religious significance. Some writers, as has been seen, <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believe</a> with Holtzmann that in the <em>episcopi</em> and <em>presbyteri</em>, there is simply the <a href="../cathen/14379b.htm">synagogal</a> system of <em>archontes</em> and <em>hyperetai</em>. Others, with Hatch, derive the origin of the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a> from the fact that certain civic functionaries in the <a href="../cathen/14399a.htm">Syrian</a> cities appear to have borne the title of "episcopi". Professor Harnack, while agreeing with Hatch as to the origin of the office, differs from him in so far as he admits that from the first the superintendence of worship belonged to the functions of the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a>. The offices of <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophet</a> and teacher, it is urged, were those in which the primitive Church acknowledged a spiritual significance. These depended entirely on special charismatic gifts of the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Ghost</a>. The government of the Church in matters of religion was thus regarded as a direct Divine rule by the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Spirit</a>, acting through His inspired agents. And only gradually, it is supposed, did the local <a href="../cathen/10326a.htm">ministry</a> take the place of the <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a> and teachers, and inherit from them the authority once attributed to the possessors of spiritual gifts alone (cf. Sabatier, Religions of Authority, p. 24). Even if we prescind altogether from the evidence considered above, this theory appears devoid of intrinsic probability. A direct Divine rule by "charismata" could only result in confusion, if uncontrolled by any directive power possessed of superior authority. Such a directive and regulative authority, to which the exercise of spiritual gifts was itself subject, existed in the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolate</a>, as the <a href="../cathen/14530a.htm">New Testament</a> amply shows (<a href="../bible/1co014.htm">1 Corinthians 14</a>). In the succeeding age a precisely similar authority is found in the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a>. Every principle of <a href="../cathen/04503a.htm">historical criticism</a> demands that the source of episcopal power should be sought, not in the "charismata", but, where <a href="../cathen/15006b.htm">tradition</a> places it, in the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostolate</a> itself.</li><li>It is to the crisis occasioned by <a href="../cathen/06592a.htm">Gnosticism</a> and <a href="../cathen/10521a.htm">Montanism</a> in the second century that these writers attribute the rise of the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> system. They say that, in order to combat these <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresies</a>, the Church found it <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> to federate itself, and that for this end it established a statutory, so-called "apostolic" <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>, and further secured the episcopal supremacy by the fiction of <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">"apostolic succession"</a>, (Harnack, Hist. of Dogma, II, ii; Sabatier, op. cit., pp. 35-59). This view appears to be irreconcilable with the facts of the case. The evidence of the Ignatian epistles alone shows that, long before the <a href="../cathen/06592a.htm">Gnostic</a> crisis arose, the particular local Churches were conscious of an <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> principle of solidarity binding all together into a single system. Moreover, the very fact that these <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresies</a> gained no foothold within the Church in any part of the world, but were everywhere recognized as <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretical</a> and promptly excluded, suffices to <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">prove</a> that the <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> was already clearly <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">known</a> and firmly held, and that the Churches were already organized under an active <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a>. Again, to say that the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">Apostolic succession</a> was invented to cope with these <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresies</a> is to overlook the fact that it is asserted in plain terms in the <a href="../fathers/1010.htm"><em>Epistle of Clement</em> 42</em></a>.</li></ul></div> <p>M. Loisy's theory as to the organization of the Church has attracted so much attention in recent years as to call for a brief notice. In his work, "L'Evangile et l'Église", he accepts many of the views held by critics hostile to <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholicism</a>, and endeavours by a <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of development to reconcile them with some form of adhesion to the Church. He urges that the Church is of the <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a> of an organism, whose animating principle is the message of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a>. This organism may experience many changes of external <a href="../cathen/06137b.htm">form</a>, as it develops itself in accordance with its inner needs, and with the requirements of its environment. Yet so long as these changes are such as are demanded in order that the vital principle may be preserved, they are unessential in <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a>. So far indeed are they from being organic alterations, that we ought to reckon them as implicitly involved in the very being of the Church. The formation of the <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchy</a> he regards as a change of this kind. In fact, since he holds that <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a> mistakenly anticipated the end of the world to be close at hand, and that His first <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> lived in expectation of His immediate return in <a href="../cathen/06585a.htm">glory</a>, it follows that the <a href="../cathen/07326a.htm">hierarchy</a> must have had some such origin as this. It is out of the question to attribute it to the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>. <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">Men</a> who <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believed</a> the end of the world to be impending would not have seen the <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessity</a> of endowing a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> with a <a href="../cathen/06137b.htm">form</a> of government intended to endure.</p> <p>These revolutionary views constitute part of the theory known as <a href="../cathen/10415a.htm">Modernism</a>, whose <a href="../cathen/12025c.htm">philosophical</a> presuppositions involve the complete denial of the <a href="../cathen/10338a.htm">miraculous</a>. The Church, according to this theory, is not a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> established by <a href="../cathen/05551b.htm">eternal</a> Divine interposition. It is a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> expressing the religious experience of the collectivity of <a href="../cathen/04268a.htm">consciences</a>, and owing its origin to two natural tendencies in <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>, viz. the tendency of the <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individual</a> believer to communicate his <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">beliefs</a> to others, and the tendency of those who hold the same <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">beliefs</a> to unite in a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. The <a href="../cathen/10415a.htm">Modernist</a> theories were <a href="../cathen/01450a.htm">analyzed</a> and condemned as "the synthesis of all the <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresies</a>" in the <a href="../cathen/05413a.htm">Encyclical</a> "Pascendi Dominici gregis" (18 September, 1907). The principal features of M. Loisy's theory of the Church had been already included among the condemned propositions contained in the <a href="../cathen/04670a.htm">Decree</a> "Lamentabili" (3 July, 1907). The fifty-third of the propositions there singled out for reprobation is the following: "The original constitution of the Church is not immutable; but the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> like <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> is subject to perpetual change."</p> <h2 id="section5">The Church, a divine society</h2> <p>The church, as has been seen, is a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> formed of <a href="../cathen/02473c.htm">living</a> <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>, not a mere <a href="../cathen/10663b.htm">mystical</a> union of <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">souls</a>. As such it resembles other <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a>. Like them, it has its code of rules, its executive officers, its <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremonial</a> observances. Yet it differs from them more than it resembles them: for it is a <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. The <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a> is <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> alike in its origin, in the purpose at which it aims, and in the means at its disposal. Other kingdoms are natural in their origin; and their scope is limited to the temporal welfare of their citizens. The <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a> of the Church is seen, when its relation to the <a href="../cathen/12677d.htm">redemptive</a> work of Christ is considered. It is the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of those whom He has <a href="../cathen/12677d.htm">redeemed</a> from the world. The world, by which term are signified <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> in so far as they have fallen from <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, is ever set forth in <a href="../cathen/13635b.htm">Scripture</a> as the kingdom of the <a href="../cathen/04764a.htm">Evil One</a>. It is the "world of darkness" (<a href="../bible/eph006.htm#vrs12">Ephesians 6:12</a>), it is "seated in the wicked one" (<a href="../bible/1jo005.htm#vrs19">1 John 5:19</a>), it <a href="../cathen/07149b.htm">hates</a> Christ (<a href="../bible/joh015.htm#vrs18">John 15:18</a>). To <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">save</a> the world, <a href="../cathen/14142b.htm">God the Son</a> became <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a>. He <a href="../cathen/11215d.htm">offered</a> Himself as a propitiation for the <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sins</a> of the whole world (<a href="../bible/1jo002.htm#vrs2">1 John 2:2</a>). <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, Who desires that all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> should be <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">saved</a>, has offered <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> to all; but the greater part of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a> rejects the proffered <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a>. The Church is the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of those who accept <a href="../cathen/12677d.htm">redemption</a>, of those whom Christ "has chosen out of the world" (<a href="../bible/joh015.htm#vrs19">John 15:19</a>). Thus it is the Church alone which He "hath purchased with his own blood" (<a href="../bible/act020.htm#vrs28">Acts 20:28</a>). Of the members of the Church, the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a> can say that "<a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a>" (<a href="../bible/col001.htm#vrs13">Colossians 1:13</a>). <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a> terms the Church "mundus salvatus"  the <a href="../cathen/12677d.htm">redeemed</a> world  and speaking of the enmity borne towards the Church by those who reject her, says: "The world of perdition <a href="../cathen/07149b.htm">hates</a> the world of <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a>" (<a href="../fathers/1701080.htm"><em>Tractate 80 on the Gospel of John</em>, no. 2</a>). To the Church Christ has given the means of grace He merited by His life and death. She communicates them to her members; and those who are outside her fold she bids to enter that they too may participate in them. By these means of grace  the light of <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revealed</a> <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>, the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a>, the <a href="../cathen/10006a.htm">perpetual renewal of the Sacrifice of Calvary</a>  the Church carries on the work of sanctifying the <a href="../cathen/05374a.htm">elect</a>. Through their instrumentality each <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individual</a> <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">soul</a> is perfected, and conformed to the likeness of the <a href="../cathen/14142b.htm">Son of God</a>.</p> <p>It is thus manifest that, when we regard the Church simply as the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a>, we are considering its external <a href="../cathen/06137b.htm">form</a> only. Its inward life is found in the indwelling of the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Ghost</a>, the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gifts</a> of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>, <a href="../cathen/07465b.htm">hope</a>, and charity, the grace communicated by the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a>, and the other prerogatives by which the children of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> differ from the children of the world. This aspect of the Church is described by the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> in figurative language. They represent it as the Body of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>, the Spouse of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>, the <a href="../cathen/14499a.htm">Temple</a> of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. In order to understand its <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> nature some consideration of these comparisons is requisite. In the conception of the Church as a body governed and directed by Christ as the head, far more is contained than the familiar <a href="../cathen/01449a.htm">analogy</a> between a ruler and his subjects on the one hand, and the head guiding and coordinating the activities of the several members on the other. That <a href="../cathen/01449a.htm">analogy</a> expresses indeed the variety of function, the unity of directive principle, and the cooperation of the parts to a common end, which are found in a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>; but it is insufficient to explain the terms in which <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> speaks of the union between Christ and His <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a>. Each of them is a member of Christ (<a href="../bible/1co006.htm#vrs15">1 Corinthians 6:15</a>); together they form the <a href="../cathen/10663a.htm">body of Christ</a> (<a href="../bible/eph004.htm#vrs16">Ephesians 4:16</a>); as a corporate unity they are simply termed <em>Christ</em> (<a href="../bible/1co012.htm#vrs12">1 Corinthians 12:12</a>).</p> <p>The intimacy of union here suggested is, however, justified, if we recall that the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gifts</a> and <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a> bestowed upon each <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciple</a> are <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a> merited by the <a href="../cathen/11530a.htm">Passion of Christ</a>, and are destined to produce in him the likeness of Christ. The connection between Christ and himself is thus very different from the purely juridical relation binding the ruler of a natural <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> to the <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individuals</a> belonging to it. The <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a> develops the relation between Christ and His members from various points of view. As a <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> body is organized, each joint and muscle having its own function, yet each contributing to the union of the complex whole, so too the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> is a body "compacted and firmly joined together by that which every part supplieth" (<a href="../bible/eph004.htm#vrs16">Ephesians 4:16</a>), while all the parts depend on Christ their head. It is He Who has organized the body, assigning to each member his place in the Church, endowing each with the special <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a> <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a>, and, above all, conferring on some of the members the <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a> in virtue of which they rule and guide the Church in His name (<a href="../bible/eph004.htm#vrs11">4:11</a>). Strengthened by these <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a>, the <a href="../cathen/10663a.htm">mystical body</a>, like a physical body, grows and increases. This growth is twofold. It takes place in the <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individual</a>, inasmuch as each <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> gradually grows into the <a href="../cathen/11665b.htm">"perfect man"</a>, into the image of Christ (<a href="../bible/eph004.htm#vrs13">Ephesians 4:13, 15</a>; <a href="../bible/rom008.htm#vrs29">Romans 8:29</a>). But there is also a growth in the whole body. As <a href="../cathen/14726a.htm">time</a> goes on, the Church is to increase and multiply till it fills the earth. So intimate is the union between Christ and His members, that the <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">Apostle</a> speaks of the Church as the "fullness" (<em>pleroma</em>) of Christ (<a href="../bible/eph001.htm#vrs23">Ephesians 1:23</a>; <a href="../bible/eph004.htm#vrs13">4:13</a>), as though apart from His members something were lacking to the head. He even speaks of it as Christ: "As all the members of the body whereas they are many, yet are one body, so also is Christ" (<a href="../bible/1co012.htm#vrs12">1 Corinthians 12:12</a>). And to establish the reality of this union he refers it to the efficacious instrumentality of the <a href="../cathen/05572c.htm">Holy Eucharist</a>: "We being many, are one bread, one body: for we all partake of that one bread" (<a href="../bible/1co010.htm#vrs17">1 Corinthians 10:17</a>  Greek text).</p> <p>The description of the Church as <a href="../cathen/14499a.htm">God's temple</a>, in which the <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> are "living stones" (<a href="../bible/1pe002.htm#vrs5">1 Peter 2:5</a>), is scarcely less frequent in the <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> writings than is the metaphor of the body. "You are the temple of the <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">living God</a>" (<a href="../bible/2co006.htm#vrs16">2 Corinthians 6:16</a>), writes <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> to the Corinthians, and he reminds the Ephesians that they are "built upon the foundation of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">apostles</a> and <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a>, <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a> himself being the chief <a href="../cathen/14303a.htm">corner stone</a>; in whom all the building being framed together, groweth up into a <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holy</a> temple in the Lord" (<a href="../bible/eph002.htm#vrs20">Ephesians 2:20 sq.</a>). With a slight change in the metaphor, the same <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a> in another passage (<a href="../bible/1co003.htm#vrs11">1 Corinthians 3:11</a>) compares Christ to the foundation, and himself and other <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> labourers to the builders who raise the temple upon it. It is noticeable that the word translated "temple" is <em>naos</em>, a term which signifies properly the inner sanctuary. The <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a>, when he employs this word, is clearly comparing the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> Church to that Holy of Holies where <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> manifested His visible presence in the Shekinah. The metaphor of the temple is well adapted to enforce two lessons. On several occasions the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a> employs it to impress on his readers the <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">sanctity</a> of the Church in which they have been incorporated. "If any shall violate the temple of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>", he says, speaking of those who corrupt the Church by <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">false doctrine</a>, "him shall <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> destroy" (<a href="../bible/1co003.htm#vrs17">1 Corinthians 3:17</a>). And he employs the same motive to dissuade <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> from forming <a href="../cathen/09693a.htm">matrimonial alliance</a> with Unbelievers: "What agreement hath the temple of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> with <a href="../cathen/07636a.htm">idols</a>? For you are the temple of the <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">living God</a>" (<a href="../bible/2co006.htm#vrs16">2 Corinthians 6:16</a>). It further illustrates in the clearest way the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> that to each member of the Church <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> has assigned his own place, enabling him by his work there to cooperate towards the great common end, the <a href="../cathen/06585a.htm">glory</a> of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>.</p> <p>The third parallel represents the Church as the bride of Christ. Here there is much more than a metaphor. The <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">Apostle</a> says that the union between Christ and His Church is the archetype of which <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> marriage is an earthly representation. Thus he bids wives be subject to their husbands, as the Church is subject to Christ (<a href="../bible/eph005.htm#vrs22">Ephesians 5:22 sq.</a>). Yet he points out on the other hand that the relation of husband to wife is not that of a master to his servant, but one involving the tenderest and most self-sacrificing <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a>. He bids husbands <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> their wives, "as Christ also <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">loved</a> the Church, and delivered himself up for it" (<a href="../bible/eph005.htm#vrs25">Ephesians 5:25</a>). Man and wife are one flesh; and in this the husband has a powerful motive for <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> towards the wife, since "no man ever <a href="../cathen/07149b.htm">hated</a> his own flesh". This physical union is but the <a href="../cathen/15107a.htm">antitype</a> of that <a href="../cathen/10662a.htm">mysterious</a> bond in virtue of which the Church is so truly one with Christ, that "we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. 'For this cause shall a man leave his <a href="../cathen/11478c.htm">father and mother</a>, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh'" (<a href="../bible/eph005.htm#vrs30">Ephesians 5:30 sq.</a>; <a href="../bible/gen002.htm#vrs24">Genesis 2:24</a>). In these words the <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">Apostle</a> indicates the <a href="../cathen/10662a.htm">mysterious</a> parallelism between the union of the <a href="../cathen/01129a.htm">first Adam</a> with the <a href="../cathen/05646b.htm">spouse</a> formed from his body, and the union of the <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">second Adam</a> with the Church. She is "bone of his bones, and flesh of his flesh", even as <a href="../cathen/05646b.htm">Eve</a> was in regard to our first father. And those only belong to the <a href="../cathen/05782a.htm">family</a> of the second Adam, who are her children, "born again of <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">water</a> and of the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Ghost</a>". Occasionally the metaphor assumes a slightly different form. In <a href="../bible/rev019.htm#vrs7">Apocalypse 19:7</a>, the marriage of the Lamb to his spouse the Church does not take place till the last day in the hour of the Church's final triumph. Thus too <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a>, writing to the Corinthians (<a href="../bible/2co011.htm#vrs2">2 Corinthians 11:2</a>), compares himself to "the friend of the bridegroom", who played so important a part in the Hebrew marriage <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremony</a> (cf. <a href="../bible/joh003.htm#vrs29">John 3:29</a>). He has, he says, espoused the <a href="../cathen/04363b.htm">Corinthian</a> community to Christ, and he holds himself responsible to present it spotless to the bridegroom.</p> <p>Through the medium of these metaphors the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> set forth the inward <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a> of the Church. Their expressions leave no <a href="../cathen/05141a.htm">doubt</a> that in them they always refer to the actually existing Church founded by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> on earth  the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a>. Hence it is instructive to observe that <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> divines find it necessary to distinguish between an actual and an ideal Church, and to assert that the teaching of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> regarding the <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Spouse</a>, the <a href="../cathen/14499a.htm">Temple</a>, and the Body refers to the ideal Church alone (cf. Gayford in Hastings, "Dict. of the Bible", s.v. Church).</p> <h2 id="section6">The necessary means of salvation</h2> <p>In the preceding examination of the <a href="../cathen/13635b.htm">Scriptural</a> <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> regarding the Church, it has been seen how clearly it is laid down that only by entering the Church can we participate in the <a href="../cathen/12677d.htm">redemption</a> wrought for us by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. Incorporation with the Church can alone unite us to the <a href="../cathen/05782a.htm">family</a> of the <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">second Adam</a>, and alone can engraft us into the true Vine. Moreover, it is to the Church that Christ has committed those means of grace through which the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gifts</a> He earned for <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> are communicated to them. The Church alone dispenses the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a>. It alone makes <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">known</a> the light of <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revealed</a> <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>. Outside the Church these <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gifts</a> cannot be obtained. From all this there is but one conclusion: Union with the Church is not merely one out of various means by which <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> may be obtained: it is the only means.</p> <p>This <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the absolute <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessity</a> of union with the Church was taught in explicit terms by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">Baptism</a>, the <a href="../cathen/01115a.htm">act</a> of incorporation among her members, He affirmed to be <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> to <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a>. "He that <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believeth</a> and is <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptized</a> shall be <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">saved</a>: he that <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believeth</a> not shall be condemned" (<a href="../bible/mar016.htm#vrs16">Mark 16:16</a>). Any <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciple</a> who shall throw off obedience to the Church is to be reckoned as one of the <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">heathen</a>: he has no part in the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a> (<a href="../bible/mat018.htm#vrs17">Matthew 18:17</a>). <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> is equally explicit. "A <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a> that is a <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretic</a>", he writes to Titus, "after the first and second <a href="../cathen/01144b.htm">admonition</a> avoid, knowing that he that is such a one is . . . condemned by his own judgment" (<a href="../bible/tit003.htm#vrs10">Titus 3:10 sq.</a>). The <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> is summed up in the phrase, <em>Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus</em>. This saying has been the occasion of so many objections that some consideration of its meaning seems desirable. It certainly does not mean that none can be <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">saved</a> except those who are in visible communion with the Church. The <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> Church has ever taught that nothing else is needed to obtain <a href="../cathen/08573a.htm">justification</a> than an <a href="../cathen/01115a.htm">act</a> of perfect charity and of <a href="../cathen/04337a.htm">contrition</a>. Whoever, under the impulse of <a href="../cathen/06689x.htm">actual grace</a>, elicits these acts receives immediately the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of <a href="../cathen/06701a.htm">sanctifying grace</a>, and is numbered among the children of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. Should he die in these dispositions, he will assuredly attain <a href="../cathen/07170a.htm">heaven</a>. It is <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> such acts could not possibly be elicited by one who was aware that <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> has commanded all to join the Church, and who nevertheless should willfully remain outside her fold. For <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> carries with it the practical desire to fulfill His <a href="../cathen/04153a.htm">commandments</a>. But of those who die without visible communion with the Church, not all are guilty of willful disobedience to <a href="../cathen/04153a.htm">God's commands</a>. Many are kept from the Church by <a href="../cathen/07648a.htm">ignorance</a>. Such may be the case of numbers among those who have been brought up in <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresy</a>. To others the external means of grace may be unattainable. Thus an <a href="../cathen/05678a.htm">excommunicated</a> <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">person</a> may have no opportunity of seeking reconciliation at the last, and yet may repair his faults by inward acts of <a href="../cathen/04337a.htm">contrition</a> and charity.</p> <p>It should be observed that those who are thus <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">saved</a> are not entirely outside the pale of the Church. The will to fulfill all <a href="../cathen/04153a.htm">God's commandments</a> is, and must be, present in all of them. Such a wish implicitly includes the desire for incorporation with the visible Church: for this, though they <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">know</a> it not, has been commanded by <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. They thus belong to the Church by desire (<em>voto</em>). Moreover, there is a <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> sense in which they may be said to be <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">saved</a> through the Church. In the order of <a href="../cathen/12510a.htm">Divine Providence</a>, <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> is given to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a> in the Church: membership in the Church Triumphant is given through membership in the Church Militant. <a href="../cathen/06701a.htm">Sanctifying grace</a>, the title to <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a>, is peculiarly the grace of those who are united to Christ in the Church: it is the birthright of the children of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. The primary purpose of those <a href="../cathen/06689x.htm">actual graces</a> which <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> bestows upon those outside the Church is to draw them within the fold. Thus, even in the case in which <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">saves</a> <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> apart from the Church, He does so through the Church's <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a>. They are joined to the Church in spiritual communion, though not in visible and external communion. In the expression of <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a>, they belong to the <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">soul</a> of the Church, though not to its body. Yet the possibility of <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> apart from visible communion with the Church must not blind us to the loss suffered by those who are thus situated. They are cut off from the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a> <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> has given as the support of the <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">soul</a>. In the ordinary channels of grace, which are ever open to the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a> <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a>, they cannot participate. Countless means of sanctification which the Church offers are denied to them. It is often urged that this is a stern and narrow <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>. The reply to this objection is that the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> is stern, but only in the sense in which sternness is inseparable from <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a>. It is the same sternness which we find in <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> words, when he said: "If you <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believe</a> not that I am he, you shall die in your <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sin</a>" (<a href="../bible/joh008.htm#vrs24">John 8:24</a>). The Church is animated with the spirit of Christ; she is filled with the same <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> for <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">souls</a>, the same desire for their <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a>. Since, then, she knows that the way of <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> is through union with her, that in her and in her alone are stored the benefits of the Passion, she must needs be uncompromising and even stern in the assertion of her claims. To fail here would be to fail in the <a href="../cathen/05215a.htm">duty</a> entrusted to her by her Lord. Even where the message is unwelcome, she must deliver it.</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p>It is instructive to observe that this <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> has been proclaimed at every period of the Church's history. It is no accretion of a later age. The earliest <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">successors of the Apostles</a> speak as plainly as the <a href="../cathen/10285c.htm">medieval</a> <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a>, and the <a href="../cathen/10285c.htm">medieval</a> <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a> are not more emphatic than those of today. From the first century to the twentieth there is absolute unanimity. <a href="../cathen/07644a.htm">St. Ignatius of Antioch</a> writes: "Be not deceived, my brethren. If any man followeth one that maketh <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schism</a>, he doth not inherit the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom of God</a>. If any one walketh in strange <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>, he hath no fellowship with the Passion" (<a href="../fathers/0108.htm"><em>Philadelphians</em> 3</a>). <a href="../cathen/11306b.htm">Origen</a> says: "Let no man deceive himself. Outside this house, i.e. outside the Church, none is <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">saved</a>" (Hom. in Jos., iii, n. 5 in P.G., XII, 841). <a href="../cathen/04583b.htm">St. Cyprian</a> speaks to the same effect: "He cannot have <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> for his <a href="../cathen/11478c.htm">father</a>, who has not the Church for his mother" (<a href="../fathers/050701.htm"><em>Treatise on Unity</em> 6</a>). The words of the <a href="../cathen/09018a.htm">Fourth Ecumenical Council of the Lateran</a> (1215) <a href="../cathen/04675b.htm">define</a> the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> thus in its <a href="../cathen/04670a.htm">decree</a> against the <a href="../cathen/01267e.htm">Albigenses</a>: "Una est fidelium universalis Ecclesia, extra quam nullus omnino salvatur" (<a href="../cathen/04736b.htm">Denzinger</a>, n. 357); and <a href="../cathen/12134b.htm">Pius IX</a> employed almost identical language in his <a href="../cathen/05413a.htm">Encyclical</a> to the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> of <a href="../cathen/08208a.htm">Italy</a> (10 August, 1863): "Notissimum est catholicum dogma neminem scilicet extra catholicam ecclesiam posse salvari" (<a href="../cathen/04736b.htm">Denzinger</a>, n. 1529).</p> <h2 id="section7">Visibility of the Church</h2> <p>In asserting that the Church of Christ is visible, we signify, first, that as a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> it will at all times be conspicuous and public, and second, that it will ever be recognizable among other bodies as the Church of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. These two aspects of visibility are termed respectively "material" and "formal" visibility by <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a>. The material visibility of the Church involves no more than that it must ever be a public, not a private profession; a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> manifest to the world, not a body whose members are bound by some secret tie. Formal visibility is more than this. It implies that in all ages the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> Church of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> will be easily recognizable for that which it is, viz. as the Divine <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of the <a href="../cathen/14142b.htm">Son of God</a>, the means of <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> offered by <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>; that it possesses certain attributes which so evidently postulate a Divine origin that all who see it must <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">know</a> it comes from <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. This must, of course, be understood with some <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> qualifications. The power to recognize the Church for what it is presupposes certain <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">moral</a> dispositions. Where there is a rooted unwillingness to follow <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> will, there may be spiritual blindness to the claims of the Church. Invincible prejudice or inherited assumptions may produce the same result. But in such cases the incapacity to <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">see</a> is due, not to the want of visibility in the Church, but to the blindness of the <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individual</a>. The case bears an almost exact <a href="../cathen/01449a.htm">analogy</a> to the evidence possessed by the <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proofs</a> for the <a href="../cathen/06608b.htm">existence of God</a>. The <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proofs</a> in themselves are evident: but they may fail to penetrate a <a href="../cathen/10321a.htm">mind</a> obscured by prejudice or ill will. From the time of the <a href="../cathen/12700b.htm">Reformation</a>, <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> writers either denied the visibility of the Church, or so explained it as to rob it of most of its meaning. After briefly indicating the grounds of the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">Catholic doctrine</a>, some views prevalent on this subject among <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> authorities will be noticed.</p> <p>It is unnecessary to say more in regard to the material visibility of the Church than has been said in sections III and IV of this article. It has been shown there that Christ established His Church as an organized <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> under accredited leaders, and that He commanded its rulers and those who should succeed them to summon all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> to secure their <a href="../cathen/05551b.htm">eternal</a> <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> by entry into it. It is manifest that there is no question here of a secret union of believers: the Church is a worldwide corporation, whose <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">existence</a> is to be forced upon the notice of all, willing or unwilling. Formal visibility is secured by those attributes which are usually termed the "notes" of the Church  her <a href="../cathen/15179a.htm">Unity</a>, <a href="../cathen/13428b.htm">Sanctity</a>, <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholicity</a>, and <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a> (see below). The <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proof</a> may be illustrated in the case of the first of these. The <a href="../cathen/15179a.htm">unity of the Church</a> stands out as a fact altogether unparalleled in human history. Her members all over the world are united by the profession of a common <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>, by participation in a common worship, and by obedience to a common authority. Differences of class, of nationality, and of race, which seem as though they must be fatal to any form of union, cannot sever this bond. It links in one the civilized and the uncivilized, the <a href="../cathen/12025c.htm">philosopher</a> and the peasant, the <a href="../cathen/15571a.htm">rich</a> and the <a href="../cathen/12327a.htm">poor</a>. One and all hold the same <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">belief</a>, join in the same religious ceremonies, and acknowledge in the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">successor of Peter</a> the same supreme ruler. Nothing but a <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> power can explain this. It is a <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proof</a> manifest to all <a href="../cathen/10321a.htm">minds</a>, even to the simple and the unlettered, that the Church is a Divine <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. Without this formal visibility, the purpose for which the Church was founded would be frustrated. Christ established it to be the means of <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> for all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a>. For this end it is <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> that its claims should be authenticated in a manner evident to all; in other words, it must be visible, not merely as other public <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a> are visible, but as being the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of the <a href="../cathen/14142b.htm">Son of God</a>.</p> <p>The views taken by <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestants</a> as to the visibility of the Church are various. The <a href="../cathen/12652a.htm">rationalist</a> critics naturally reject the whole conception. To them the religion preached by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a> was something purely internal. When the Church as an institution came to be regarded as an indispensable factor in religion, it was a corruption of the primitive message. (See Harnack, <em>What is Christianity</em>, p. 213.) Passages which deal with the Church in her corporate unity are referred by writers of this school to an ideal invisible Church, a mystical communion of <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">souls</a>. Such an interpretation does violence to the sense of the passages. Moreover, no explanation possessing any semblance of probability has yet been given to account for the genesis among the <a href="../cathen/05029a.htm">disciples</a> of this remarkable and altogether novel conception of an invisible Church. It may reasonably be demanded of a professedly critical <a href="../cathen/13554b.htm">school</a> that this phenomenon should be explained. Harnack holds that it took the place of <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> racial unity. But it does not appear why <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">Gentile</a> <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">converts</a> should have felt the need of replacing a feature so entirely proper to the Hebrew religion.</p> <p>The <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the older <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> writers is that there are two Churches, a visible and an invisible. This is the view of such standard <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican</a> divines as Barrow, Field, and Jeremy Taylor (see e.g. Barrow, Unity of Church, Works, 1830, VII, 628). Those who thus explain visibility urge that the <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> and vital element of membership in Christ lies in an inner union with Him; that this is necessarily invisible, and those who possess it constitute an invisible Church. Those who are united to Him externally alone have, they maintain, no part in His grace. Thus, when He promised to His Church the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of indefectibility, declaring that the gates of <a href="../cathen/07207a.htm">hell</a> should never prevail against it, the promise must be understood of the invisible, not of the visible Church. In regard to this theory, which is still tolerably prevalent, it is to be said that <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> promises were made to the Church as a corporate body, as constituting a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. As thus understood, they were made to the visible Church, not to an invisible and unknown body. Indeed for this distinction between a visible and an invisible Church there is no <a href="../cathen/13635b.htm">Scriptural</a> warrant. Even though many of her children prove unfaithful, yet all that Christ said in regard to the Church is realized in her as a corporate body. Nor does the unfaithfulness of these professing <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholics</a> cut them off altogether from membership in Christ. They are His in virtue of their <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a>. The <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a> then received still stamps them as His. Though dry and withered branches they are not altogether broken off from the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> Vine (<a href="../cathen/02411d.htm">Bellarmine</a>, De Ecciesiâ, III, ix, 13). The <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican</a> High Church writers explicitly teach the visibility of the Church. They restrict themselves, however, to the consideration of material visibility (cf. <a href="../cathen/11430b.htm">Palmer</a>, Treatise on the Church, Part I, C. iii).</p> <p>The <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the visibility in no way excludes from the Church those who have already attained to bliss. These are united with the members of the Church Militant in one <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">communion of saints</a>. They watch her struggles; their <a href="../cathen/12345b.htm">prayers</a> are offered on her behalf. Similarly, those who are still in the cleansing fires of <a href="../cathen/12575a.htm">purgatory</a> belong to the Church. There are not, as has been said, two Churches; there is but one Church, and of it all the <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">souls</a> of the just, whether in <a href="../cathen/07170a.htm">heaven</a>, on earth, or in <a href="../cathen/12575a.htm">purgatory</a>, are members (Catech. Rom., I, x, 6). But it is to the Church only in so far as militant here below  to the Church among <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>  that the property of visibility belongs.</p> <h2 id="section8">The principle of authority</h2> <p>Whatever authority is exercised in the Church, is exercised in virtue of the commission of Christ. He is the one <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">Prophet</a>, Who has given to the world the <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> of <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>, and by His spirit preserves in the Church the <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> once delivered to the <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saints</a>. He is the one <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">Priest</a>, ever pleading on behalf of the Church the sacrifice of Calvary. And He is the one King  the chief Shepherd (<a href="../bible/1pe005.htm#vrs4">1 Peter 5:4</a>)  Who rules and guides, through His Providence, His Church's course. Yet He wills to exercise His power through earthly representatives. He chose the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Twelve</a>, and charged them in His name to teach the nations (<a href="../bible/mat028.htm#vrs19">Matthew 28:19</a>), to offer sacrifice (<a href="../bible/luk022.htm#vrs19">Luke 22:19</a>), to govern His flock (<a href="../bible/mat018.htm#vrs18">Matthew 18:18</a>; <a href="../bible/joh021.htm#vrs17">John 21:17</a>). They, as seen above, used the authority committed to them while they lived; and before their death, they took measures for the perpetuation of this principle of government in the Church. From that day to this, the <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchy</a> thus established has claimed and has exercised this threefold office. Thus the <a href="../cathen/12473a.htm">prophecies</a> of the <a href="../cathen/14526a.htm">Old Testament</a> have been fulfilled which foretold that to those who should be appointed to rule the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Messianic kingdom</a> it should be granted to participate in the <a href="../cathen/10212c.htm">Messias'</a> office of <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophet</a>, <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priest</a>, and king. (See II above.)</p> <p>The authority established in the Church holds its commission from above, not from below. The <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a> and the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> exercise their power as the <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">successors</a> of the men who were chosen by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> in person. They are not, as the <a href="../cathen/12392b.htm">Presbyterian</a> theory of Church government teaches, the delegates of the flock; their warrant is received from the Shepherd, not from the sheep. The view that ecclesiastical authority is ministerial only, and derived by delegation from the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a>, was expressly condemned by <a href="../cathen/12131a.htm">Pius VI</a> (1794) in his Constitution <a href="../cathen/02068b.htm">"Auctorem Fidei"</a>; and on the renovation of the <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">error</a> by certain recent <a href="../cathen/10415a.htm">Modernist</a> writers, <a href="../cathen/12137a.htm">Pius X</a> reiterated the condemnation in the <a href="../library/docs_pi10pd.htm">Encyclical on the errors of the Modernists</a>. In this sense the government of the Church is not democratic. This indeed is involved in the very <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a> of the Church as a <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>, leading <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> to a <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> end. No man is capable of wielding authority for such a purpose, unless power is communicated to him from a Divine source. The case is altogether different where civil <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> is concerned. There the end is not <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a>: it is the temporal well-being of the citizens. It cannot then be said that a special endowment is required to render any class of men capable of filling the place of rulers and of guides. Hence the Church approves equally all forms of <a href="../cathen/02137c.htm">civil government</a> which are consonant with the principle of <a href="../cathen/08571c.htm">justice</a>. The power exercised by the Church through sacrifice and <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacrament</a> (<em>potestas ordinis</em>) lies outside the present subject. It is proposed briefly to consider here the <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a> of the Church's authority in her office (1) of teaching (potestas magisterii) and (2) of government (potestas jurisdictionis).</p> <h3 id="A">Infallibility</h3> <p>As the Divinely appointed teacher of <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revealed</a> <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>, the Church is <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallible</a>. This <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of inerrancy is guaranteed to it by the words of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>, in which He promised that His Spirit would abide with it forever to guide it unto all <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> (<a href="../bible/joh014.htm#vrs16">John 14:16</a>; <a href="../bible/joh016.htm#vrs13">16:13</a>). It is implied also in other passages of <a href="../cathen/13635b.htm">Scripture</a>, and asserted by the unanimous testimony of the Fathers. The scope of this <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallibility</a> is to preserve the deposit of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> revealed to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a> by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> and His <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> (see <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">INFALLIBILITY</a>.) The Church teaches expressly that it is the guardian only of the <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a>, that it can teach nothing which it has not received. The <a href="../cathen/15303a.htm">Vatican Council</a> declares: "The <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Ghost</a> was not promised to the successors of Peter, in order that through His <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> they might manifest new <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>: but that through His assistance they might religiously guard, and faithfully expound the <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> handed down by the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>, or the deposit of the <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>" (Conc. Vat., Sess. IV, cap. liv). The <a href="../cathen/11189a.htm">obligation</a> of the natural moral law constitutes part of this <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a>. The authority of that <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">law</a> is again and again insisted on by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> and His <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>. The Church therefore is <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallible</a> in matters both of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> and <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">morals</a>. Moreover, <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a> are agreed that the <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">gift of infallibility</a> in regard to the deposit must, by <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> consequence, carry with it <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallibility</a> as to <a href="../cathen/05092a.htm">certain matters intimately related to the Faith</a>. There are questions bearing so nearly on the preservation of the <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">Faith</a> that, could the Church <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">err</a> in these, her <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallibility</a> would not suffice to guard the flock from <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">false doctrine</a>. Such, for instance, is the decision whether a given book does or does not contain teaching condemned as <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretical</a>. (See <a href="../cathen/05092a.htm">DOGMATIC FACTS</a>.)</p> <p>It is needless to point out that if the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian Faith</a> is indeed a revealed <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>, which <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> must <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believe</a> under pain of <a href="../cathen/07207a.htm">eternal loss</a>, the <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">gift of infallibility</a> was <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> to the Church. Could she <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">err</a> at all, she might <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">err</a> in any point. The flock would have no guarantee of the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> of any <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>. The condition of those bodies which at the time of the <a href="../cathen/12700b.htm">Reformation</a> forsook the Church affords us an object-lesson in point. Divided into various sections and parties, they are the scene of never-ending disputes; and by the nature of the case they are cut off from all <a href="../cathen/07465b.htm">hope</a> of attaining to <a href="../cathen/03539b.htm">certainty</a>. In regard also to the <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">moral law</a>, the need of an <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallible</a> guide is hardly less imperative. Though on a few broad principles there may be some consensus of opinion as to what is right and what is wrong, yet, in the application of these principles to concrete facts, it is impossible to obtain agreement. On matters of such practical moment as are, for instance, the questions of private <a href="../cathen/12462a.htm">property</a>, marriage, and liberty, the most divergent views are defended by thinkers of great ability. Amid all this questioning the unerring voice of the Church gives confidence to her children that they are following the right course, and have not been led astray by some specious fallacy. The various modes in which the Church exercises this <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a>, and the prerogatives of the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Holy See</a> in regard to <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallibility</a>, will be found discussed in the article dealing with that subject.</p> <h3 id="B">Jurisdiction</h3> <p>The Church's <a href="../cathen/11537b.htm">pastors</a> govern and direct the flock committed to them in virtue of <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> conferred upon them by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. The authority of <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> differs essentially from the authority to teach. The two powers are concerned with different objects. The <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to teach is concerned solely with the manifestation of the revealed <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>; the object of the <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">power of jurisdiction</a> is to establish and enforce such <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">laws</a> and regulations as are <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> to the well-being of the Church. Further, the <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> of the Church to teach extends to the whole world: The <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> of her rulers extends to her members alone (<a href="../bible/1co005.htm#vrs12">1 Corinthians 5:12</a>). <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> words to St. Peter, "I will give thee the <a href="../cathen/08631b.htm">keys of the kingdom of heaven</a>", distinctly express the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a>. Supreme authority over a body carries with it the <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to govern and direct. The three elements which go to constitute <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a>  legislative power, judicial power, and coercive power  are, moreover, all implied in <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> directions to the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> (<a href="../bible/mat018.htm">Matthew 18</a>). Not merely are they instructed to impose <a href="../cathen/11189a.htm">obligations</a> and to settle disputes; but they may even inflict the extremest ecclesiastical penalty  that of <a href="../cathen/05678a.htm">exclusion from membership in Christ</a>.</p> <p>The <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> exercised within the Church is partly of Divine <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a>, and partly determined by ecclesiastical law. A supreme <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> over the whole Church  <a href="../cathen/04049b.htm">clergy</a> and <a href="../cathen/08748a.htm">laity</a> alike  belongs by Divine appointment to the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a> (Conc. Vat, Sess. IV, cap. iii). The government of the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a> by <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> possessed of ordinary <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> (i.e. a <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> that is not held by mere <a href="../cathen/04696b.htm">delegation</a>, but is exercised in their own name) is likewise of Divine ordinance. But the system by which the Church is territorially divided into <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">dioceses</a>, within each of which a single <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> rules the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a> within that district, is an ecclesiastical arrangement capable of modification. The limits of <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">dioceses</a> may be changed by the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Holy See</a>. In <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a> the old pre-Reformation <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">diocesan</a> divisions held good until 1850, though the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchy</a> had become extinct in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. In that year the old divisions were annulled and a new <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">diocesan</a> system established. Similarly in <a href="../cathen/06166a.htm">France</a>, a complete change was introduced after the <a href="../cathen/13009a.htm">Revolution</a>. A <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> may exercise his power on other than a territorial basis. Thus in the East there are different <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a> for the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a> belonging to the different <a href="../cathen/13064b.htm">rites</a> in communion with the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Holy See</a>. Besides <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a>, in countries where the ecclesiastical system is fully developed, those of the lower <a href="../cathen/04049b.htm">clergy</a> who are <a href="../cathen/11499b.htm">parish</a> <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priests</a>, in the proper sense of the term, have ordinary <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> within their own <a href="../cathen/11499b.htm">parishes</a>.</p> <p>Internal <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> is that which is exercised in the tribunal of penance. It differs from the external <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> of which we have been speaking in that its object is the welfare of the individual penitent, while the object of external <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> is the welfare of the Church as a corporate body. To exercise this internal <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a>, the power of orders is an <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a>: none but a <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priest</a> can <a href="../cathen/01061a.htm">absolve</a>. But the power of orders itself is insufficient. The <a href="../cathen/10326a.htm">minister</a> of the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacrament</a> must receive <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> from one competent to bestow it. Hence a <a href="../cathen/12406a.htm">priest</a> cannot hear <a href="../cathen/11618c.htm">confessions</a> in any locality unless he has received <a href="../cathen/05749a.htm">faculties</a> from the <a href="../cathen/11284b.htm">ordinary</a> of the place. On the other hand, for the exercise of external <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> the power of orders is not <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a>. A <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a>, duly appointed to a see, but not yet <a href="../cathen/04276a.htm">consecrated</a>, is invested with external <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> over his <a href="../cathen/05001a.htm">diocese</a> as soon as he has exhibited his letters of appointment to the chapter.</p> <h2 id="section9">Members of the Church</h2> <p>The foregoing account of the Church and of the principle of authority by which it is governed enables us to determine who are members of the Church and who are not. The membership of which we speak, is incorporation in the visible body of Christ. It has already been noted (VI) that a member of the Church may have forfeited the <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">grace of God</a>. In this case he is a withered branch of the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> Vine; but he has not been finally broken off from it. He still belongs to <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. Three <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">conditions</a> are requisite for a man to be a member of the Church.</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ol><li>In the first place, he must profess the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">Faith</a>, and have received the <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">Sacrament of Baptism</a>. The <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessity</a> of this <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a> is apparent from the fact that the Church is the kingdom of <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>, the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of those who accept the <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> of the <a href="../cathen/14142b.htm">Son of God</a>. Every member of the Church must accept the whole <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a>, either explicitly or implicitly, by profession of all that the Church teaches. He who refuses to receive it, or who, having received it, falls away, thereby excludes himself from the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a> (<a href="../bible/tit003.htm#vrs10">Titus 3:10 sq.</a>). The <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">Sacrament of Baptism</a> is rightly regarded as part of this <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a>. By it those who profess the <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">Faith</a> are formally adopted as children of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> (<a href="../bible/eph001.htm#vrs13">Ephesians 1:13</a>), and an habitual <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> is among the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gifts</a> bestowed in it. Christ expressly connects the two, declaring that "he who <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believeth</a> and is <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptized</a> shall be <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">saved</a>" (<a href="../bible/mar016.htm#vrs16">Mark 16:16</a>; cf. <a href="../bible/mat028.htm#vrs19">Matthew 28:19</a>).</li><li>It is further <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> to acknowledge the authority of the Church and of her appointed rulers. Those who reject the <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> established by Christ are no longer members of His <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">kingdom</a>. Thus St. Ignatius lays it down in his <a href="../fathers/0109.htm">Letter to the Church of Smyrna (no. 8)</a>: Wheresoever the <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishop</a> shall appear, there let the people be; even as where <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus</a> may be there is the universal Church". In regard to this <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a>, the ultimate touchstone is to be found in communion with the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Holy See</a>. On Peter Christ founded his Church. Those who are not joined to that foundation cannot form part of the house of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>.</li><li>The third <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a> lies in the canonical <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to communion with the Church. In virtue of its coercive power the Church has authority to <a href="../cathen/05678a.htm">excommunicate</a> <a href="../cathen/11126b.htm">notorious</a> sinners. It may inflict this punishment not merely on the ground of <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresy</a> or <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schism</a>, but for other grave offences. Thus <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul</a> pronounces <a href="../cathen/13720b.htm">sentence</a> of <a href="../cathen/05678a.htm">excommunication</a> on the <a href="../cathen/07717a.htm">incestuous</a> <a href="../cathen/04363b.htm">Corinthian</a> (<a href="../bible/1co005.htm#vrs3">1 Corinthians 5:3</a>). This penalty is no mere external severance from the <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">rights</a> of common worship. It is a severance from the <a href="../cathen/10663a.htm">body of Christ</a>, undoing to this extent the work of <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a>, and placing the <a href="../cathen/05678a.htm">excommunicated</a> man in the <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a> of the <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">heathen</a> and the <a href="../cathen/12553d.htm">publican</a>". It casts him out of <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">God's kingdom</a>; and the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a> speaks of it as "delivering him over to <a href="../cathen/04764a.htm">Satan</a>" (<a href="../bible/1co005.htm#vrs5">1 Corinthians 5:5</a>; <a href="../bible/1ti001.htm#vrs20">1 Timothy 1:20</a>).</li></ol></div> <p>Regarding each of these <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">conditions</a>, however, certain distinctions must be drawn.</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ol><li>Many <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptized</a> <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretics</a> have been <a href="../cathen/05295b.htm">educated</a> in their <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">erroneous</a> <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">beliefs</a>. Their case is altogether different from that of those who have <a href="../cathen/15506a.htm">voluntarily</a> renounced the <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">Faith</a>. They accept what they <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believe</a> to be the <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">Divine revelation</a>. Such as these belong to the Church in desire, for they are at heart anxious to fulfill <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> will in their regard. In virtue of their <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a> and <a href="../cathen/06642a.htm">good will</a>, they may be in a state of grace. They belong to the <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">soul</a> of the Church, though they are not united to the visible body. As such they are members of the Church internally, though not externally. Even in regard to those who have themselves fallen away from the <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">Faith</a>, a difference must be made between open and <a href="../cathen/11126b.htm">notorious</a> <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretics</a> on the one hand, and secret <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretics</a> on the other. Open and <a href="../cathen/11126b.htm">notorious</a> <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresy</a> severs from the visible Church. The majority of <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a> agree with <a href="../cathen/02411d.htm">Bellarmine</a> (de Ecclesiâ, III, c. x), as against <a href="../cathen/14319a.htm">Francisco Suárez</a>, that secret <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresy</a> has not this effect.</li><li>In regard to <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schism</a> the same distinction must be drawn. A secret repudiation of the Church's authority does not sever the sinner from the Church. The Church recognizes the <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schismatic</a> as a member, entitled to her communion, until by open and <a href="../cathen/11126b.htm">notorious</a> rebellion he rejects her authority.</li><li><a href="../cathen/05678a.htm">Excommunicated</a> <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">persons</a> are either <em>excommunicati tolerati</em> (i.e. those who are still tolerated) or <em>excommunicati vitandi</em> (i.e. those to be shunned). Many <a href="../cathen/14580a.htm">theologians</a> hold that those whom the Church still tolerates are not wholly cut off from her membership, and that it is only those whom she has branded as "to be shunned" who are cut off from <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">God's kingdom</a> (see <a href="../cathen/10646c.htm">Murray</a>, De Eccles., Disp. i, sect. viii, n. 118). (See <a href="../cathen/05678a.htm">EXCOMMUNICATION</a>.)</li></ol></div> <h2 id="section10">Indefectibility of the Church</h2> <p>Among the prerogatives conferred on His Church by Christ is the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of indefectibility. By this term is signified, not merely that the Church will persist to the end of <a href="../cathen/14726a.htm">time</a>, but further, that it will preserve unimpaired its <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> characteristics. The Church can never undergo any constitutional change which will make it, as a social organism, something different from what it was originally. It can never become corrupt in <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> or in <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">morals</a>; nor can it ever lose the <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchy</a>, or the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a> through which Christ communicates grace to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>. The <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of indefectibility is expressly promised to the Church by Christ, in the words in which He declares that the gates of <a href="../cathen/07207a.htm">hell</a> shall not prevail against it. It is manifest that, could the storms which the Church encounters so shake it as to alter its <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> characteristics and make it other than Christ intended it to be, the gates of <a href="../cathen/07207a.htm">hell</a>, i.e. the powers of <a href="../cathen/05649a.htm">evil</a>, would have prevailed. It is clear, too, that could the Church suffer <a href="../cathen/14322c.htm">substantial</a> change, it would no longer be an instrument capable of accomplishing the work for which <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> called it in to being. He established it that it might be to all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> the <a href="../cathen/13554b.htm">school</a> of <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holiness</a>. This it would cease to be if ever it could set up a <a href="../cathen/05781a.htm">false</a> and corrupt <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">moral</a> standard. He established it to proclaim His <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> to the world, and charged it to warn all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> that unless they accepted that message they must perish everlastingly. Could the Church, in defining the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truths</a> of <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">err</a> in the smallest point, such a charge would be impossible. No body could enforce under such a penalty the acceptance of what might be <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">erroneous</a>. By the <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchy</a> and the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a>, <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>, further, made the Church the depositary of the <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a> of the Passion. Were it to lose either of these, it could no longer dispense to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> the treasures of grace.</p> <p>The <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of indefectibility plainly does not guarantee each several part of the Church against <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresy</a> or <a href="../cathen/01624b.htm">apostasy</a>. The promise is made to the corporate body. <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">Individual</a> Churches may become corrupt in <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">morals</a>, may fall into <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heresy</a>, may even <a href="../cathen/01624b.htm">apostatize</a>. Thus at the time of the <a href="../cathen/10424a.htm">Mohammedan</a> conquests, whole populations renounced their <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>; and the Church suffered similar losses in the sixteenth century. But the defection of isolated branches does not alter the <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a> of the main stem. The <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a> remains endowed with all the prerogatives bestowed on it by its Founder. Only to One particular Church is indefectibility assured, viz. to the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">See of Rome</a>. To Peter, and in him to all his <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">successors</a> in the chief pastorate, Christ committed the task of confirming his brethren in the <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">Faith</a> (<a href="../bible/luk022.htm#vrs32">Luke 22:32</a>); and thus, to the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Roman Church</a>, as <a href="../cathen/04583b.htm">Cyprian</a> says, "faithlessness cannot gain access" (<a href="../fathers/050654.htm">Epistle 54</a>). The various bodies that have left the Church naturally deny its indefectibility. Their plea for separation rests in each case on the supposed fact that the main body of <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christians</a> has fallen so far from primitive <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>, or from the purity of <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">morals</a>, that the formation of a separate organization is not only desirable but <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a>. Those who are called on to defend this plea endeavour in various ways to reconcile it with <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> promise. Some, as seen above (VII), have recourse to the hypothesis of an indefectible invisible Church. The Right Rev. Charles Gore of <a href="../cathen/15703a.htm">Worcester</a>, who may be regarded as the representative of high-class <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglicanism</a>, prefers a different solution. In his controversy with Canon Richardson, he adopted the position that while the Church will never fail to teach the whole <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> as revealed, yet "<a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">errors</a> of addition" may exist universally in its current teaching (see Richardson, Catholic Claims, Appendix). Such an explanation deprives <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> words of all their meaning. A Church which at any period might conceivably teach, as of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>, doctrines which form no part of the deposit could never deliver her message to the world as the message of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">Men</a> could reasonably urge in regard to any <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> that it might be an "<a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">error</a> of addition".</p> <p>It was said above that one part of the Church's <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a> of indefectibility lies in her preservation from any <a href="../cathen/14322c.htm">substantial</a> corruption in the sphere of <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">morals</a>. This supposes, not merely that she will always proclaim the perfect standard of <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">morality</a> bequeathed to her by her <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Founder</a>, but also that in every age the lives of many of her children will be based on that sublime model. Only a <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> principle of spiritual life could bring this about. <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">Man's</a> natural tendency is downwards. The force of every religious movement gradually spends itself; and the followers of great religious reformers tend in time to the level of their environment. According to the <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">laws</a> of unassisted <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a>, it should have been thus with the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> established by <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. Yet history shows us that the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> Church possesses a power of reform from within, which has no parallel in any other religious organization. Again and again she produces <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saints</a>, <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> imitating the <a href="../cathen/15472a.htm">virtues</a> of Christ in an extraordinary degree, whose influence, spreading far and wide, gives fresh ardour even to those who reach a less heroic standard. Thus, to cite one or two well-known instances out of many that might be given: <a href="../cathen/05106a.htm">St. Dominic</a> and <a href="../cathen/06221a.htm">St. Francis of Assisi</a> rekindled the <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> of <a href="../cathen/15472a.htm">virtue</a> in the <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> of the thirteenth century; <a href="../cathen/12018b.htm">St. Philip Neri</a> and <a href="../cathen/07639c.htm">St. Ignatius Loyola</a> accomplished a like work in the sixteenth century; <a href="../cathen/11590a.htm">St. Paul of the Cross</a> and <a href="../cathen/01334a.htm">St. Alphonsus Liguori</a>, in the eighteenth. No explanation suffices to account for this phenomenon save the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">Catholic doctrine</a> that the Church is not a natural but a <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>, that the preservation of her <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">moral</a> life depends, not on any <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">laws</a> of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a>, but on the life-giving presence of the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Ghost</a>. The <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> and the <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> principles of reform stand in sharp contrast the one to the other. <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> reformers have one and all fallen back on the model set before them in the <a href="../cathen/11726a.htm">person</a> of Christ and on the power of the <a href="../cathen/07409a.htm">Holy Ghost</a> to breathe fresh life into the <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">souls</a> which He has <a href="../cathen/12714a.htm">regenerated</a>. <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> reformers have commenced their work by separation, and by this <a href="../cathen/01115a.htm">act</a> have severed themselves from the very principle of life. No one of course would wish to deny that within the <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> bodies there have been many <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> of great <a href="../cathen/15472a.htm">virtues</a>. Yet it is not too much to assert that in every case their <a href="../cathen/15472a.htm">virtue</a> has been nourished on what yet remained to them of <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">belief</a> and practice, and not on anything which they have received from <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestantism</a> as such.</p> <h3>The Continuity Theory</h3> <p>The <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the Church's indefectibility just considered will place us in a position to estimate, at its <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> value, the claim of the <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican Church</a> and of the <a href="../cathen/12493a.htm">Episcopalian</a> bodies in other English-speaking countries to be continuous with the ancient pre-Reformation Church of <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a>, in the sense of being part of one and the same <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. The point to be determined here is what constitutes a breach of continuity as regards a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. It may safely be said that the continuity of a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> is broken when a radical change in the principles it embodies is introduced. In the case of a Church, such a change in its <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchical</a> constitution and in its professed <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> suffices to make it a different Church from what it was before. For the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a> we term Churches exist as the embodiment of certain <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">supernatural</a> <a href="../cathen/05089a.htm">dogmas</a> and of a Divinely-authorized principle of government. when, therefore, the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truths</a> previously field to be of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> are rejected, and the principle of government regarded as sacred is repudiated, there is a breach of continuity, and a new Church is formed. In this the continuity of a Church differs from the continuity of a nation. National continuity is independent of forms of government and of <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">beliefs</a>. A nation is an aggregate of <a href="../cathen/05782a.htm">families</a>, and so long as these <a href="../cathen/05782a.htm">families</a> constitute a self-sufficing social organism, it remains the same nation, whatever the form of government may be. The continuity of a Church depends essentially on its government and its <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">beliefs</a>.</p> <p>The changes introduced into the English Church at the time of the <a href="../cathen/12700b.htm">Reformation</a> were precisely of the character just described. At that period fundamental alterations were made in its <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchical</a> constitution and in its <a href="../cathen/05089a.htm">dogmatic</a> standards. It is not to be determined here which was in the right, the Church of <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> days or the Reformed Church. It is sufficient if we show that changes were made vitally affecting the <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a> of the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. It is <a href="../cathen/11126b.htm">notorious</a> that from the days of Augustine to those of <a href="../cathen/15554a.htm">Warham</a>, every <a href="../cathen/01691a.htm">archbishop</a> of <a href="../cathen/03299b.htm">Canterbury</a> recognized the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a> as the supreme source of <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">ecclesiastical jurisdiction</a>. The <a href="../cathen/01691a.htm">archbishops</a> themselves could not exercise <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> within their <a href="../cathen/12514a.htm">province</a> until they had received <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">papal</a> confirmation. Further, the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">popes</a> were accustomed to send to <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a> <a href="../cathen/09118a.htm">legates</a> <em>a latere</em>, who, in virtue of their legatine authority, whatever their personal status in the <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">hierarchy</a>, possessed a <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> superior to that of the local <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a>. <a href="../cathen/01652a.htm">Appeals</a> ran from every <a href="../cathen/04447a.htm">ecclesiastical court</a> in <a href="../cathen/05445a.htm">England</a> to the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a>, and his decision was recognized by all as final. The <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a>, too, exercised the <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> of <a href="../cathen/05678a.htm">excommunication</a> in regard to the members of the English Church. This supreme authority was, moreover, regarded by all as belonging to the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a> by Divine <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a>, and not in virtue of merely <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> institution. When, therefore, this <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">power of jurisdiction</a> was transferred to the king, the alteration touched the constitutive principles of the body and was fundamental in its <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a>. Similarly, in regard to matters of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>, the changes were revolutionary. It will be sufficient to note that a new <a href="../cathen/05766b.htm">rule of faith</a> was introduced, <a href="../cathen/13635b.htm">Scripture</a> alone being substituted for <a href="../cathen/13635b.htm">Scripture</a> and <a href="../cathen/15006b.htm">Tradition</a>; that several books were expunged from the Canon of Scripture; that five out of the seven <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a> were repudiated; and that the <a href="../cathen/13309a.htm">sacrifices</a> of Masses were declared to be "<a href="../cathen/02595a.htm">blasphemous</a> fables and dangerous deceits". It is indeed sometimes said that the official <a href="../cathen/06141a.htm">formularies</a> of <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglicanism</a> are capable of a <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> sense, if given a "non-natural" interpretation. This argument can, however, carry no weight. In estimating the <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a> of a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>, we must judge, not by the strained sense which some <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individuals</a> may attach to its <a href="../cathen/06141a.htm">formularies</a>, but by the sense they were intended to bear. Judged by this criterion, none can dispute that these innovations were such as to constitute a fundamental change in the <a href="../cathen/05089a.htm">dogmatic</a> standpoint of the <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Church of England</a>.</p> <h2 id="section11">Universality of the Church</h2> <p>The Church of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> has from the first claimed to transcend all those national differences which divide <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>. In it, the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a> asserts, "there is neither <a href="../cathen/06422a.htm">Gentile</a> nor <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jew</a> . . . Barbarian nor Scythian" (<a href="../bible/col003.htm#vrs11">Colossians 3:11</a>). <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">Men</a> of every race are one in it; they form a single brotherhood in the <a href="../cathen/08646a.htm">Kingdom of God</a>. In the <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">pagan</a> world, religion and nationality had been coterminous. The boundaries of the State were the boundaries of the <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> which the State professed. Even the <a href="../cathen/08399a.htm">Jewish</a> Dispensation was limited to a special race. Previous to the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> the <a href="../cathen/07630a.htm">idea</a> of a religion adapted to all peoples was foreign to the conceptions of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>. It is one of the <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> features of the Church that she should be a single, worldwide <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> embracing all races. In it, and in it alone, is the brotherhood of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a> realized. All national barriers, no less than all differences of class, disappear in the City of God. It is not to be understood that the Church disregards the ties which bind <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> to their country, or undervalues the <a href="../cathen/15472a.htm">virtue</a> of <a href="../cathen/03794b.htm">patriotism</a>. The division of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> into different nations enters into the scheme of Providence. To each nation has been assigned a special task to accomplish in the working out of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> purposes. A man owes a <a href="../cathen/05215a.htm">duty</a> to his nation no less than to his <a href="../cathen/05782a.htm">family</a>. One who omits this <a href="../cathen/05215a.htm">duty</a> has failed in a primary <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">moral</a> <a href="../cathen/11189a.htm">obligation</a>. Moreover, each nation has its own character, and its own special gifts. It will usually be found that a man attains to high <a href="../cathen/15472a.htm">virtue</a>, not by neglecting these gifts, but by embodying the best and noblest ideals of his own people.</p> <div class="CMtag_300x250" style="display: flex; height: 300px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; "></div> <p>For these reasons the Church consecrates the spirit of nationality. Yet it transcends it, for it binds together the various nationalities in a single brotherhood. More than this, it purifies, develops, and perfects national character, just as it purifies and perfects the <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a> of each <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individual</a>. Often indeed it has been accused of exercising an anti-patriotic influence. But it will invariably be found that it has incurred this reproach by opposing and rebuking what was base in the national aspirations, not by thwarting what was heroic or just. As the Church perfects the nation, so reciprocally does each nation add something of its own to the <a href="../cathen/06585a.htm">glory</a> of the Church. It brings its own type of <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">sanctity</a>, its national virtues, and thus contributes to "the fullness of Christ" something which no other race could give. Such are the relations of the Church to what is termed <em>nationality</em>. The external unity of the one <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> is the visible embodiment of the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the brotherhood of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a>. The <a href="../cathen/14004b.htm">sin</a> of <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schism</a>, the Fathers tell us, lies in this, that by it the <a href="../cathen/09053a.htm">law</a> of <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> to our neighbour is implicitly rejected. "Nec hæretici pertinent ad Ecclesiam Catholicam, qæ diligit Deum; nec schismatici quoniam diligit proximum" (Neither do <a href="../cathen/07256b.htm">heretics</a> belong to the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> church, for she loves <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>; nor do <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schismatics</a>, for she loves her neighbour  Augustine, <a href="../fathers/1304.htm"><em>On Faith and the Creed</em> 10</a>). It is of importance to insist on this point. For it is sometimes urged that the organized unity of <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholicism</a> may be adapted to the Latin races but is ill-suited to the Teutonic spirit. To say this is to say that an <a href="../cathen/05543b.htm">essential</a> characteristic of this <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> is ill-suited to one of the great races of the world.</p> <p>The union of different nations in one <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> is contrary to the natural inclinations of fallen <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">humanity</a>. It must ever struggle against the impulses of national <a href="../cathen/12405a.htm">pride</a>, the desire for complete independence, the dislike of external control. Hence history provides various cases in which these <a href="../cathen/11534a.htm">passions</a> have obtained the upper hand, the bond of unity has been broken, and "National Churches" have been formed. In every such case the so-called National Church has found to its cost that, in severing its connection with the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Holy See</a>, it has lost its one protector against the encroachments of the secular Government. The <a href="../cathen/06752a.htm">Greek Church</a> under the <a href="../cathen/03096a.htm">Byzantine Empire</a>, the autocephalous <a href="../cathen/13253a.htm">Russian Church</a> today, have been mere pawns in the hands of the <a href="../cathen/02137c.htm">civil authority</a>. The history of the <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican Church</a> presents the same features. There is but one institution which is able to resist the pressure of <a href="../cathen/02137c.htm">secular powers</a>  the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">See of Peter</a>, which was set in the Church for this purpose by Christ, that it might afford a principle of stability and security to every part. The <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">papacy</a> is above all nationalities. It is the servant of no particular State; and hence it has strength to resist the forces that would make the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">religion of Christ</a> subservient to secular ends. Those Churches alone have retained their vitality which have kept their union with the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">See of Peter</a>. The branches which have been broken from that stem have withered.</p> <h3>The Branch Theory</h3> <p>In the course of the nineteenth century, the principle of National Churches was strenuously defended by the High Church <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican</a> divines under the name of the "Branch theory". According to this view, each National Church when fully constituted under its own <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">episcopate</a> is independent of external control. It possesses plenary authority as to its internal <a href="../cathen/05030a.htm">discipline</a>, and may not merely reform itself as regards <a href="../cathen/09306a.htm">ritual</a> and <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremonial</a> usages, but may correct obvious abuses in matters of <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>. It is justified in doing this even if the step involve a breach of communion with the rest of <a href="../cathen/03699b.htm">Christendom</a>; for, in this case, the blame attaches not to the Church which undertakes the work of reformation, but to those which, on this score, reject it from communion. It still remains a "branch" of the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> Church as it was before. At the present day the <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican</a>, <a href="../cathen/13121a.htm">Roman Catholic</a>, and Greek Churches are each of them a branch of the Universal Church. None of them has an exclusive <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to term itself the Catholic Church. The defenders of the theory recognize, indeed, that this divided state of the church is abnormal. They admit that the Fathers never contemplated the possibility of a church thus severed into parts. But they assert that circumstances such as those which led to this abnormal state of things never presented themselves during the early centuries of <a href="../cathen/07365a.htm">ecclesiastical history</a>.</p> <p>The position is open to fatal objections.</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul><li>It is an entirely novel theory as to the constitution of the Church, which is rejected alike by the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> and the Greek Churches. Neither of these admit the existence of the so-called branches of the Church. The <a href="../cathen/11329a.htm">Greek schismatics</a>, no less than the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholics</a>, affirm that they, and they only, constitute the Church. Further, the theory is rejected by the majority of the <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican</a> body. It is the tenet of but one <a href="../cathen/13554b.htm">school</a>, though that a distinguished one. It Is almost a <em>reductio ad absurdum</em> when we are asked to <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">believe</a> that a single <a href="../cathen/13554b.htm">school</a> in a particular <a href="../cathen/13674a.htm">sect</a> is the sole depositary of the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> theory of the Church.</li><li>The claim made by many <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglicans</a> that there is nothing in their position contrary to ecclesiastical and <a href="../cathen/11560a.htm">patristic</a> <a href="../cathen/15006b.htm">tradition</a> in quite indefensible. Arguments precisely applicable to their case were used by the Fathers against the <a href="../cathen/05121a.htm">Donatists</a>. It is <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">known</a> from the "Apologia" that <a href="../cathen/15670a.htm">Cardinal Wiseman's</a> masterly demonstration of this point was one of the chief factors in bringing about the <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">conversion</a> of <a href="../cathen/10794a.htm">Newman</a>. In the controversy with the <a href="../cathen/05121a.htm">Donatists</a>, <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine</a> holds it sufficient for his purpose to argue that those who are separated from the Universal Church cannot be in the right. He makes the question one of simple fact. Are the <a href="../cathen/05121a.htm">Donatists</a> separated from the main body of <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christians</a>, or are they not? If they are, no vindication of their cause can absolve them from the charge of <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schism</a>. "Securus judicat orbis terrarum bonos non esse qui se dividunt ab orbe terrarum in quâcunque parte orbis terrarum" (The entire world judges with security that they are not good, who separate themselves from the entire world in whatever part of the entire world  Augustine, contra epist. Parm., III, c. iv in P.L., XLIII, 101). <a href="../cathen/02084a.htm">St. Augustine's</a> position rests through out on the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> he assumes as absolutely indubitable, that Christ's Church must be one, must be visibly one; and that any body that is separated from it is <em>ipso facto</em> shown to be in <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schism</a>. <br>The contention of the <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican</a> controversialists that the English Church is not separatist since it did not reject the communion of <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a>, but <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> rejected it, has of course only the value of a piece of special pleading, and need not be taken as a serious argument. Yet it is interesting to observe that in this too they were anticipated by the <a href="../cathen/05121a.htm">Donatists</a> (<a href="../fathers/14092.htm"><em>Against Petilian</em> 2.38</a>).</li><li>The consequences of the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> constitute a manifest <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proof</a> of its <a href="../cathen/05781a.htm">falsity</a>. The unity of the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> Church in every part of the world is, as already seen, the sign of the brotherhood which binds together the children of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. More than this, <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> Himself declared that it would be a <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proof</a> to all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> of His Divine mission. The unity of His flock, an earthly representation of the unity of the Father and the Son, would be sufficient to show that He had come from <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> (<a href="../bible/joh017.htm#vrs21">John 17:21</a>). Contrariwise, this theory, first advanced to justify a state of things having <a href="../cathen/07222a.htm">Henry VIII</a> as its author, would make the Christian Church, not a witness to the brotherhood of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God's</a> children, but a standing <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proof</a> that even the <a href="../cathen/14142b.htm">Son of God</a> had failed to withstand the spirit of discord amongst <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>. Were the theory <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a>, so far from the <a href="../cathen/15179a.htm">unity of the Church</a> testifying to the Divine mission of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a>, its severed and broken <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a> would be a potent argument in the hands of unbelief.</li></ul></div> <h2 id="section12">Notes of the Church</h2> <p>By the notes of the Church are meant certain conspicuous characteristics which distinguish it from all other bodies and <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">prove</a> it to be the one <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a>. Some such distinguishing marks it needs must have, if it is, indeed, the sole depositary of the <a href="../cathen/02599b.htm">blessings</a> of <a href="../cathen/12677d.htm">redemption</a>, the way of <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> offered by <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a>. A Babel of religious organizations all proclaim themselves to be the Church of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. Their doctrines are contradictory; and precisely in so far as any one of them regards the doctrines which it teaches as of vital moment, it declares those of the rival bodies to be misleading and pernicious. Unless the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> Church were endowed with such characteristics as would <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">prove</a> to all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> that it, and it alone, had a <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to the name, how could the vast majority of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">mankind</a> distinguish the <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a> of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> from the inventions of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a>? If it could not authenticate its claim, it would be impossible for it to warn all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> that to reject it was to reject Christ. In discussing the visibility of the Church (VII) it was seen that the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> Church points to four such notes  those namely which were inserted in the <a href="../cathen/11049a.htm">Nicene Creed</a> at the <a href="../cathen/04308a.htm">Council of Constantinople</a> (A.D. 381): <a href="../cathen/15179a.htm">Unity</a>, <a href="../cathen/13428b.htm">Sanctity</a>, <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholicity</a>, and <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a>. These, it declares, distinguish it from every other body, and <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">prove</a> that in it alone is to be found the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> religion. Each of these characteristics forms the subject of a special article in this work. Here, however, will be indicated the sense in which the terms are to be understood. A brief explanation of their meaning will show how decisive a <a href="../cathen/12454c.htm">proof</a> they furnish that the <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a> is none other than the Church in communion with the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Holy See</a>.</p> <p>The <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> reformers endeavoured to assign notes of the Church, such as might lend support to their newly-founded <a href="../cathen/13674a.htm">sects</a>. <a href="../cathen/03195b.htm">Calvin</a> declares that the Church is to be found "where the word of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> is preached in its purity, and the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a> administered according to <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ's</a> ordinance" (Instit., Bk. IV, c. i; cf. Confessio August., art. 4). It is manifest that such notes are altogether nugatory. The very reason why notes are required at all is that <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> may be able to discern the word of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> from the words of <a href="../cathen/05781a.htm">false</a> <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophets</a>, and may <a href="../cathen/08673a.htm">know</a> which religious body has a <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to term its <a href="../cathen/03538b.htm">ceremonies</a> the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a> of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. To say that the Church is to be sought where these two <a href="../cathen/06612a.htm">qualities</a> are found cannot help us. The <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglican Church</a> adopted <a href="../cathen/03195b.htm">Calvin's</a> account in its official <a href="../cathen/06141a.htm">formulary</a> (Thirty-Nine Articles, art. 17); on the other hand, it retains the use of the <a href="../cathen/11049a.htm">Nicene Creed</a>; though a profession of <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a> in a Church which is One, <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">Holy</a>, <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a>, and <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a>, can have little meaning to those who are not in communion with the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">successor of Peter</a>.</p> <h3>Unity</h3> <p>The Church is <a href="../cathen/15179a.htm">One</a> because its members;</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ol><li>Are all united under one government</li><li>All profess the same <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a></li><li>All join in a common worship</li></ol></div> <p>As already noted (XI) <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> Himself declared that the unity of his followers should bear witness to Him. Discord and separation are the <a href="../cathen/04764a.htm">Devil's</a> work on the earth. The unity and brotherhood promised by Christ are to be the visible manifestation on the earth of the Divine union (<a href="../bible/joh017.htm#vrs21">John 17:21</a>). <a href="../cathen/11567b.htm">St. Paul's</a> teaching on this point is to the same effect. He sees in the visible unity of the body of Christ an external sign of the oneness of the Spirit who dwells within it. There is, he says, "one body and one Spirit" (<a href="../bible/eph004.htm#vrs4">Ephesians 4:4</a>). As in any living organism the union of the members in one body is the sign of the one animating principle within, so it is with the Church. If the Church were divided into two or more mutually exclusive bodies, how could she witness to the presence of that Spirit Whose name is Love. Further, when it is said that the members of the Church are united by the profession of the same <a href="../cathen/05752c.htm">faith</a>, we speak of external profession as well as inward acceptance. In recent years, much has been said by those outside the Church, about unity of spirit being compatible with differences of <a href="../cathen/04478a.htm">creed</a>. Such words are meaningless in reference to a <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">Divine revelation</a>. Christ came from <a href="../cathen/07170a.htm">heaven</a> to reveal the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a>. If a diversity of <a href="../cathen/04478a.htm">creeds</a> could be found in His Church, this could only be because the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a> He revealed had been lost in the quagmire of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> <a href="../cathen/05525a.htm">error</a>. It would signify that His work was frustrated, that His Church was no longer the pillar and ground of the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">truth</a>. There is, it is plain, but one Church, in which is found the unity we have described  in the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> Church, united under the government of the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">supreme pontiff</a>, and acknowledging all that he teaches in his capacity as the <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">infallible</a> guide of the Church.</p> <h3>Sanctity</h3> <p>When the Church points to <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">sanctity</a> as one of her notes, it is manifest that what is meant is a <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">sanctity</a> of such a kind as excludes the supposition of any natural origin. The <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holiness</a> which marks the Church should correspond to the <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holiness</a> of its <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Founder</a>, of the Spirit Who dwells within it, of the <a href="../cathen/06689a.htm">graces</a> bestowed upon it. A <a href="../cathen/12589c.htm">quality</a> such as this may well serve to distinguish the <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> Church from counterfeits. It is not without reason that the Church of <a href="../cathen/13164a.htm">Rome</a> claims to be <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holy</a> in this sense. Her <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holiness</a> appears in the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> which she teaches, in the worship she offers to <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>, in the fruits which she brings forth.</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul><li>The <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the Church is summed up in the imitation of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Jesus Christ</a>. This imitation expresses itself in good <a href="../cathen/01115a.htm">works</a>, in self-sacrifice, in <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> of suffering, and especially in the practice of the three <a href="../cathen/04435a.htm">evangelical counsels</a> of <a href="../cathen/11665b.htm">perfection</a>  <a href="../cathen/12324a.htm">voluntary poverty</a>, <a href="../cathen/03637d.htm">chastity</a>, and obedience. The ideal which the Church proposes to us is a Divine ideal. The <a href="../cathen/13674a.htm">sects</a> which have severed themselves from the Church have either neglected or repudiated some part of the Church's teaching in this regard. The <a href="../cathen/12700b.htm">Reformers</a> of the sixteenth century went so far as to deny the value of good <a href="../cathen/01115a.htm">works</a> altogether. Though their followers have for the most part let fall this anti-Christian <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>, yet to this day the self-surrender of the religious state is regarded by <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestants</a> as folly.</li><li>The <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holiness</a> of the Church's worship is recognized even by the world outside the Church. In the <a href="../cathen/14133a.htm">solemn</a> renewal of the <a href="../cathen/13309a.htm">Sacrifice</a> of Calvary there lies a <a href="../cathen/10662a.htm">mysterious</a> power, which all are forced to own. Even enemies of the Church realize the <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">sanctity</a> of the Mass.</li><li>Fruits of <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holiness</a> are not, indeed, found in the lives of all the Church's children. <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">Man's</a> will is <a href="../cathen/06259a.htm">free</a>, and though <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> gives grace, many who have been united to the Church by <a href="../cathen/02258b.htm">baptism</a> make little use of the <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gift</a>. But at all times of the Church's history there have been many who have risen to sublime heights of self-sacrifice, of <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a>, and of <a href="../cathen/09397a.htm">love</a> to <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. It is only in the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> Church that is found that type of <a href="../cathen/03584b.htm">character</a> which we recognize in the <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saints</a>  in men such as <a href="../cathen/06233b.htm">St. Francis Xavier</a>, <a href="../cathen/15434c.htm">St. Vincent de Paul</a>, and many others. Outside the Church men do not look for such <a href="../cathen/07386a.htm">holiness</a>. Moreover, the <a href="../cathen/04171a.htm">saints</a>, and indeed every other member of the Church who has attained to any degree of <a href="../cathen/12748a.htm">piety</a>, have been ever ready to acknowledge that they owe whatever is good in them to the grace the Church bestows.</li></ul></div> <h3>Catholicity</h3> <p>Christ founded the Church for the <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">salvation</a> of the <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human race</a>. He established it that it might preserve His <a href="../cathen/13001a.htm">revelation</a>, and dispense His grace to all nations. Hence it was <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> that it should be found in every land, proclaiming His message to all <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>, and communicating to them the means of grace. To this end He laid on the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> the Injunction to "go, and teach all nations". There is, notoriously, but one religious body which fulfills this command, and which can therefore lay any claim to the note of <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholicity</a>. The Church which owns the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">Roman pontiff</a> as its supreme head extends its ministrations over the whole world. It owns its <a href="../cathen/11189a.htm">obligation</a> to preach the Gospel to all peoples. No other Church attempts this task, or can use the title of <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> with any appearance of justification. The <a href="../cathen/06752a.htm">Greek Church</a> is at the present day a mere local <a href="../cathen/13529a.htm">schism</a>. None of the <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> bodies has ever pretended to a universal mission. They claim no <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">convert</a> to their <a href="../cathen/02408b.htm">beliefs</a> the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christianized</a> nations of <a href="../cathen/05607b.htm">Europe</a>. Even in regard to the <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">heathen</a>, for nearly two hundred years missionary enterprise was unknown among <a href="../cathen/12495a.htm">Protestant</a> bodies. In the nineteenth century, it is <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a>, many of them displayed no little <a href="../cathen/15753a.htm">zeal</a> for the <a href="../cathen/04347a.htm">conversion</a> of the <a href="../cathen/11388a.htm">heathen</a>, and contributed large sums of money for this purpose. But the results achieved were so inadequate as to justify the conclusion that the <a href="../cathen/02599b.htm">blessing</a> of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> did not rest upon the enterprise. (See <a href="../cathen/10375a.htm">CATHOLIC MISSIONS</a>; MISSIONS; PROTESTANT.)</p> <h3>Apostolicity</h3> <p>The <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a> of the Church consists in its identity with the body which Christ established on the foundation of the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>, and which He commissioned to carry on His work. No other body save this is the Church of <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a>. The <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> Church must be <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> in <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> and <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a> in mission. Since, however, it has already been shown that the <a href="../cathen/07790a.htm">gift of infallibility</a> was promised to the Church, it follows that where there is <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a> of mission, there will also be <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a> of <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a>. <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a> of mission consists in the power of <a href="../cathen/11279a.htm">Holy orders</a> and the <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">power of jurisdiction</a> derived by legitimate transmission from the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a>. Any religious organization whose <a href="../cathen/10326a.htm">ministers</a> do not possess these two powers is not accredited to preach the Gospel of Christ. For "how shall they preach", asks the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostle</a>, "unless they be sent?" (<a href="../bible/rom010.htm#vrs15">Romans 10:15</a>). It is <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a> of mission which is reckoned as a note of the Church. No historical fact can be more clear than that <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a>, if it is found anywhere, is found in the <a href="../cathen/03449a.htm">Catholic</a> Church. In it there is the power of <a href="../cathen/11279a.htm">Holy orders</a> received by <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">Apostolic succession</a>. In it, too, there is <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolicity</a> of <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a>; for history shows us that the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">Roman bishop</a> is the successor of Peter, and as such the centre of <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a>. Those <a href="../cathen/12386b.htm">prelates</a> who are united to the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Roman See</a> receive their <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> from the <a href="../cathen/12260a.htm">pope</a>, who alone can bestow it. No other Church is <a href="../cathen/01648b.htm">Apostolic</a>. The <a href="../cathen/06752a.htm">Greek church</a>, it is <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a>, claims to possess this <a href="../cathen/12462a.htm">property</a> on the strength of its valid <a href="../cathen/01641a.htm">succession</a> of <a href="../cathen/02581b.htm">bishops</a>. But, by rejecting the authority of the <a href="../cathen/07424b.htm">Holy See</a>, it severed itself from the <a href="../cathen/04112a.htm">Apostolic College</a>, and thereby forfeited all <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a>. <a href="../cathen/01498a.htm">Anglicans</a> make a similar claim. But even if they possessed valid orders, <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> would be wanting to them no less than to the Greeks.</p> <h2 id="section13">The Church, a perfect society</h2> <p>The Church has been considered as a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> which aims at a spiritual end, but which yet is a visible polity, like the secular polities among which it exists. It is, further, a "perfect <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>". The meaning of this expression, "a perfect <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>", should be clearly understood, for this characteristic justifies, even on grounds of pure <a href="../cathen/12673b.htm">reason</a>, that independence of secular control which the Church has always claimed. A <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> may be defined as a number of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> who unite in a manner more or less permanent in order, by their combined efforts, to attain a common good. <a href="../cathen/02001c.htm">Association</a> of this kind is a <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">condition</a> of civilization. An isolated <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individual</a> can achieve but little. He can scarcely provide himself with <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> sustenance; much less can he find the means of developing his higher <a href="../cathen/10321a.htm">mental</a> and <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">moral</a> <a href="../cathen/06553a.htm">gifts</a>. As civilization progresses, <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> enter into various <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a> for the attainment of various ends. These organizations are perfect or imperfect <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a>. For a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> to be perfect, two <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">conditions</a> are <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a>:</p> <div class="bulletlist"><ul><li>The end which it proposes to itself must not be purely subordinate to the end of some other <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. For example, the cavalry of an army is an organized association of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a>; but the end for which this association exists is entirely subordinate to the good of the whole army. Apart from the success of the whole army, there can properly speaking be no such thing as the success of the lesser association. Similarly, the good of the whole army is subordinate to the welfare of the State.</li><li>The <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> in question must be independent of other <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a> in regard to the attainment of its end. Mercantile <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a>, no matter how great their <a href="../cathen/15571a.htm">wealth</a> and power, are imperfect; for they depend on the authority of the State for permission to exist. So, too, a single <a href="../cathen/05782a.htm">family</a> is an imperfect <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. It cannot attain its end  the well-being of its members  in isolation from other <a href="../cathen/05782a.htm">families</a>. Civilized life requires that many <a href="../cathen/05782a.htm">families</a> should cooperate to form a State.</li></ul></div> <p>There are two <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a> which are perfect  the Church and the State. The end of the State is the temporal welfare of the community. It seeks to realize the <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">conditions</a> which are requisite in order that its members may be able to attain temporal <a href="../cathen/07131b.htm">felicity</a>. It protects the <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">rights</a>, and furthers the interests of the <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individuals</a> and the groups of <a href="../cathen/07762a.htm">individuals</a> which belong to it. All other <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a> which aim in any manner at temporal good are necessarily imperfect. Either they exist ultimately for the good of the State itself; or, if their aim is the private advantage of some of its members, the State must grant them authorization, and protect them in the exercise of their various functions. Should they prove dangerous to it, it <a href="../cathen/08571c.htm">justly</a> dissolves them. The Church also possesses the <a href="../cathen/04211a.htm">conditions</a> requisite for a perfect <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. That its end is not subordinate to that of any other <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> is manifest: for it aims at the spiritual welfare, the <a href="../cathen/07170a.htm">eternal felicity</a>, of <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a>. This is the highest end a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> can have; it is certainly not an end subordinate to the temporal <a href="../cathen/07131b.htm">felicity</a> aimed at by the State. Moreover, the Church is not dependent on the permission of the State in the attaining of its end. Its <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to exist is derived not from the permission of the State, but from the command of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>. Its <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to preach the Gospel, to administer the <a href="../cathen/13295a.htm">sacraments</a>, to exercise <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> over its subjects, is not conditional on the authorization of the civil Government. It has received from <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Christ</a> Himself the great commission to teach all nations. To the command of the civil Government that they should desist from preaching, the <a href="../cathen/01626c.htm">Apostles</a> replied simply that they ought to <a href="../cathen/11181c.htm">obey</a> <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> rather than <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> (<a href="../bible/act005.htm#vrs29">Acts 5:29</a>). Some measure of temporal goods is, indeed, <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> to the Church to enable it to carry out the work entrusted to it. The State cannot <a href="../cathen/08571c.htm">justly</a> prohibit it from receiving this from the benefactions of the <a href="../cathen/05769a.htm">faithful</a>. Those whose <a href="../cathen/05215a.htm">duty</a> it is to achieve a certain end have a <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> to possess the means <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessary</a> to accomplish their task.</p> <p><a href="../cathen/09169a.htm">Pope Leo XIII</a> summed up this <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> in his <a href="../cathen/05413a.htm">Encyclical</a> "Immortale Dei" (1 November, 1885) on the <a href="../cathen/03712a.htm">Christian</a> constitution of States: "The Church", he says, "is distinguished and differs from civil <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>; and, what is of highest moment, it is a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> chartered as of <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> divine, perfect in its <a href="../cathen/10715a.htm">nature</a> and its title to possess in itself and by itself through the will and loving kindness of its <a href="../cathen/08374c.htm">Founder</a>, all needful provision for its maintenance and action. And just as the end at which the Church aims is by far the noblest of ends, so is its authority the most excellent of all authority, nor can it be looked on as inferior to the <a href="../cathen/02137c.htm">civil power</a>, or in any manner dependent upon it." It is to be observed that though the end at which the Church aims is higher than that of the State, the latter is not, as a <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>, subordinate to the Church. The two <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">societies</a> belong to different orders. The temporal <a href="../cathen/07131b.htm">felicity</a> at which the State aims is not essentially dependent on the spiritual good which the Church seeks. Material prosperity and a high degree of civilization may be found where the Church does not exist. Each <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a> is Supreme in its own order. At the same time each contributes greatly to the advantage of the other. The church cannot appeal to <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">men</a> who have not some rudiments of civilization, and whose savage mode of life renders <a href="../cathen/10559a.htm">moral</a> development impossible. Hence, though her function is not to civilize but to <a href="../cathen/13407a.htm">save</a> <a href="../cathen/14153a.htm">souls</a>, yet when she is called on to deal with savage races, she commences by seeking to communicate the elements of civilization to them. On the other hand, the State needs the <a href="../cathen/14336b.htm">Supernatural</a> <a href="../cathen/13428a.htm">sanctions</a> and spiritual motives which the Church impresses on its members. A civil order without these is insecurely based.</p> <p>It has often been objected that the <a href="../cathen/05075b.htm">doctrine</a> of the Church's independence in regard to the State would render <a href="../cathen/02137c.htm">civil government</a> impossible. Such a theory, it is urged, creates a State within a State; and from this, there must inevitably result a conflict of authorities each claiming supreme dominion over the same subjects. Such was the argument of the Gallican Regalists. The writers of this <a href="../cathen/13554b.htm">school</a>, consequently, would not admit the claim of the Church to be a perfect <a href="../cathen/14074a.htm">society</a>. They maintained that any <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> which it might exercise was entirely dependent on the permission of the <a href="../cathen/02137c.htm">civil power</a>. The difficulty, however, is rather apparent than real. The scope of the two authorities is different, the one belonging to what is temporal, the other to what is spiritual. Even when the <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">jurisdiction</a> of the Church involves the use of temporal means and affects temporal interests, it does not detract from the due authority of the State. If difficulties arise, they arise, not by the <a href="../cathen/10733a.htm">necessity</a> of the case, but from some extrinsic reason. In the course of history, occasions have doubtless arisen, when <a href="../cathen/07322c.htm">ecclesiastical authorities</a> have grasped at power which by <a href="../cathen/13055c.htm">right</a> belonged to the State, and, more often still, when the State has endeavoured to arrogate to itself <a href="../cathen/08567a.htm">spiritual jurisdiction</a>. This, however, does not show the system to be at fault, but merely that <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">human</a> perversity can abuse it. So far, indeed, is it from being <a href="../cathen/15073a.htm">true</a> that the Church's claims render government impossible, that the contrary is the case. By determining the just limits of liberty of <a href="../cathen/04268a.htm">conscience</a>, they are a defence to the State. Where the authority of the Church is not recognized, any enthusiast may elevate the vagaries of his own caprice into a Divine command, and may claim to reject the authority of the civil ruler on the plea that he must <a href="../cathen/11181c.htm">obey</a> <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a> and not <a href="../cathen/09580c.htm">man</a>. The history of John of Leyden and of many another self-styled <a href="../cathen/12477a.htm">prophet</a> will afford examples in point. The Church bids her members see in the <a href="../cathen/02137c.htm">civil power</a> "the minister of <a href="../cathen/06608a.htm">God</a>", and never justifies disobedience, except in those rare cases when the State openly violates the <a href="../cathen/09076a.htm">natural</a> or the revealed law. (See <a href="../cathen/03794b.htm">CIVIL ALLEGIANCE</a>.)</p> <div class='catholicadnet-728x90' id='cathen-728x90-bottom' style='display: flex; height: 100px; align-items: center; justify-content: center; '></div> <div class="cenotes"><h2>Sources</h2><p class="cenotes">Among the writings of the Fathers, the following are the principal works which bear on the doctrine of the Church: ST. IRENÆUS, <a href="../fathers/0103.htm"><em>Adv. Hæreses</em></a> in <em>P.G</em>., VII; TERTULLIAN, <em>De Prescriptionibus</em> in <em>P. L</em>., II; ST. CYPRIAN, De Unitate <em>Ecclesie</em> in <em>P.L</em>., IV; ST. OPTATUS, <em>De Schismate Donatistarum</em> in <em>P.L</em>., XI; ST. AUGUSTINE, <em>Contra Donatistas, Contra Epistolas Parmeniani, <a href="../fathers/1409.htm">Contra Litteras Petiliani</a></em> in <em>P.L</em>., XLIII; ST. VINCENT OF LÉRINS, <em>Commonitorium</em> in <em>P.L</em>., L.  Of the theologians who in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries defended the Catholic Church against the Reformers may be mentioned: STAPLETON, <em>Principiorum Fidei Doctrinalium Demonstratio</em> (1574; Paris, 1620); BELLARMINE, <em>Disputationes de Controversiis Fidei</em> (1576; Prague, 1721); SUAREZ, <em>Defensio Fidea Catholicoe adversus Anglicanoe Sectoe Errores</em> (1613; Paris, 1859).  Among more recent writers: MURRAY, <em>De Ecclesiâ</em> (Dublin, 1866); FRANZLIN, <em>De Ecclesiâ</em> (Rome, 1887); PALMIERI, <em>De Romano Pontifice</em> (Prato, 1891); DÖLLINGER, <em>The First Age of the Church</em> (tr. London, 1866); SCHANZ, <em>A Christian Apology</em> (tr. Dublin, 1892).  The following English works may also be noticed: WISEMAM, <em>Lectures on the Church</em>; NEWMAN, <em>Development of Christian Doctrine</em>; IDEM, <em>Difficulties of Anglicans</em>; MATHEW, ed., <em>Ecclesia</em> (London, 1907). In special relation to recent rationalist criticism regarding the primitive Church and its organization, may be noted: BATIFFOL, <em>Etudes d'histoire et de la théologie positive</em> (Paris, 1906); important articles by Mgr. Batiffol will also he found in the <em>Bulletin de littérature ecclésiastique</em> for 1904, 1905, 1906, and in the <em>Irish Theological Quarterly</em> for 1906 and 1907; DE SMEDT in the <em>Revue des questions historiques</em> (1888, 1891), vols. XLIV, CL; BUTLER in <em>The Dublin Review</em> (1893, 1897), vols. CXIII, CXXI. The following works are by Anglican divines of various schools of thought: PALMER, <em>Treatise on the Church</em> (1842); GORE, <em>Lux Mundi</em> (London, 1890); IDEM, <em>The Church and the Ministry</em> (London, 1889); HORT, <em>The Christian Ecciesia</em> (London, 1897); LIGHTFOOT, the dissertation entitled <em>The Christian Ministry</em> in his <em>Commentary on Epistle to Philippians</em> (London, 1881); GAYFORD in HASTING, <em>Dict. of Bible</em>, s.v. <em>Church</em>. Amongst rationalist critics may be mentioned: HARNACK, <em>History of Dogma</em> (tr. London, 1904); IDEM, <em>What is Christianity?</em> (tr. London, 1901), and articles in <em>Expositor</em> (1887), vol. V; HATCH, <em>Organization of the Early Christian Churches</em> (London, 1880); WEISZÄCKER, <em>Apostolic Age</em> (tr. London, 1892); SABATIER, <em>Religions of Authority and the Religion of the Spirit</em> (tr. London, 1906); LOWRIE, <em>The Church and its Organization</em>  an <em>Interpretation of Rudolf Sohm's 'Kirchenrecht"</em> (London, 1904). With these may be classed: LOISY, L'Evangile et l'Église (Paris, 1902).</p></div> <div class="pub"><h2>About this page</h2><p id="apa"><strong>APA citation.</strong> <span id="apaauthor">Joyce, G.</span> <span id="apayear">(1908).</span> <span id="apaarticle">The Church.</span> In <span id="apawork">The Catholic Encyclopedia.</span> <span id="apapublisher">New York: Robert Appleton Company.</span> <span id="apaurl">http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03744a.htm</span></p><p id="mla"><strong>MLA citation.</strong> <span id="mlaauthor">Joyce, George.</span> <span id="mlaarticle">"The Church."</span> <span id="mlawork">The Catholic Encyclopedia.</span> <span id="mlavolume">Vol. 3.</span> <span id="mlapublisher">New York: Robert Appleton Company,</span> <span id="mlayear">1908.</span> <span id="mlaurl"><http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03744a.htm>.</span></p><p id="transcription"><strong>Transcription.</strong> <span id="transcriber">This article was transcribed for New Advent by Douglas J. Potter.</span> <span id="dedication">Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary.</span></p><p id="approbation"><strong>Ecclesiastical approbation.</strong> <span id="nihil"><em>Nihil Obstat.</em> November 1, 1908. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor.</span> <span id="imprimatur"><em>Imprimatur.</em> +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.</span></p><p id="contactus"><strong>Contact information.</strong> The editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is webmaster <em>at</em> newadvent.org. Regrettably, I can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback — especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.</p></div> </div> <div id="ogdenville"><table summary="Bottom bar" width="100%" cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0><tr><td class="bar_white_on_color"><center><strong>Copyright © 2023 by <a href="../utility/contactus.htm">New Advent LLC</a>. 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