Apologeticae sive Theologiae Fundamentalis, Tomus II (Pars Altera): Demonstratio Catholica

The indefectibility of the Church having been vindicated, the question is raised whether the Church is visible by the institution of Christ. On this question there is bitter controversy between Protestants and Catholics.

The Reformers, following in the footsteps of certain heresies of the Middle Ages,¹ declared the Church now invisible, now visible. For when the Catholic innovators were asked where their little church had been before the sixteenth century, they replied that the Church is invisible.² They affirmed that this Church consists in justice and predestination alone and embraces none but the just and the predestined.³

Since, however, other sectaries also maintained that they too had the Spirit of God, Luther, Calvin, and other heresiarchs suddenly set over against them a visible Church.⁴ Their disciples followed the ambiguity of the Reformers,⁵ and to the present day Protestants waver uncertain between a visible and an invisible Church. They indeed teach an invisible Church; yet they admit a visible one, whenever it has been necessary or opportune. They teach, quite commonly, that the "mass of the faithful" forms a visible Church, though less correctly so called; but that the just and holy faithful constitute the invisible Church, which alone is the Church strictly so called.⁶

Catholics, however, constantly hold that the Church is visible by the institution of Christ. By this affirmation they do not insist that the members of the Church are visible, since no one denies that the faithful are visible men; but they contend that the Church of Christ as such is visible or conspicuous, so that it may easily be established where it is, what it is, and who belong to it. This visibility of the Church is proved by an argument both direct and indirect.

1. Christ himself indicates that the Church founded by him is visible: a) By the form which he gave to the Church. From the thesis on the institution of the Church¹ it is clear that Christ founded the Church in the form of a true society. But no society worthy of the name can be conceived among men unless it is visible. Therefore. b) By the end which he fixed for the Church.² The end of the Church consists in this, that it render the work of redemption perennial (proximate end) and save individual men (remote end). But this twofold end is attained only by visible acts, namely by the acts of preaching, ministering and directing on the part of superiors, as well as by the acts of professing the faith, receiving the sacraments and obeying the commandments on the part of subjects. Therefore. c) By the parables with which he describes the Church. He describes the Church as: the kingdom of heaven, which throughout the whole Old Testament is understood as conspicuous, and which indeed by its very diffusion is conspicuous to all nations and times; a field, in which the weeds grow and are seen together with the wheat;³ a net;⁴ a wedding feast;⁵ a sheepfold of sheep under the shepherd Peter;⁶ a house to be built upon a rock foundation;⁷ a city set upon a mountain.⁸ All these parables denote a visible Church.

2. The Apostles likewise teach that the Church of Christ is visible: a) By the metaphors with which they describe the Church: a flock, in which the Holy Spirit placed bishops as pastors;⁹ a body, in which there are many members joined together and mutually dependent upon one another;¹⁰ a household, of which the apostles were divinely appointed ministers and stewards;¹¹ the house of God, in which the bishops are bound to conduct themselves worthily.¹² All these things plainly proclaim a visible Church. b) By the acts with which they propagate the Church. For they themselves, going into the whole world, preached the Gospel everywhere; they united believers into visible particular churches; they set elders and ministers over the churches; they sent letters to the ministers and to the churches themselves; they cast unworthy men out of the Church. And by these and very many other acts they bear witness to the visibility of the Church.

3. Christian antiquity excludes an invisible Church both by its manner of speaking and by its manner of acting. a) By manner of speaking. The ancient writers extol the visibility of the Church in many ways. Thus Cyprian: "The Church of the Lord, bathed in light, extends its rays throughout the whole world."¹³ Athanasius: "The Church of Christ, shining and illuminating the world and abiding forever like the sun and the moon."¹⁴ Chrysostom: "Where is the Church? It shines more brightly than the sun."¹⁵ Ambrose: "Above all assemblies the Church of God shines forth."¹⁶ Augustine: "The true Church is hidden from no one."¹⁷ b) By manner of acting. Heretics were always separated by excommunication from the visible Church. Schism, i. e. a severing from the visible Church, was always and everywhere regarded as the worst crime. Finally, the history of almost all religious bodies that declared themselves to be the Church of Christ was written down, although only the fortunes and deeds of a visible institution can be written down. Therefore the consensus of Christians knows nothing of an invisible Church, or of that congregation of the saints known to God alone, such as the adversaries dream of.

To the direct argument thus far proposed there is added an indirect argument, by which are in fact blunted the reasons by which the adversaries wish to defend their opinion concerning an invisible Church.

The defenders of the invisible Church themselves appeal to certain texts from the mouth of Christ, the apostles, and Christian antiquity. And indeed:

1. From the mouth of Christ they cite these words: Mt 13, 44: "The kingdom of heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field." But it is not the external organism of the Church, but the internal worth of the Church or of the messianic kingdom that is compared to a hidden treasure. That the Church herself is visible is evident from the antecedent and consequent context, where the kingdom of heaven is likened to the grain of mustard seed and to the net.¹ But even in the text the kingdom of heaven is presupposed to be a visible treasure, albeit hidden; for in what way could it be found, if it were invisible?

Lc 17, 20. 21: "The kingdom of God does not come with observation (μετὰ παρατηρήσεως); neither shall they say: behold here, or behold there. For behold, the kingdom of God is within you (ἐντὸς ὑμῶν)." The meaning is that the kingdom of God was not to come with that external apparatus with which the Jews expected the messianic-political or -eschatological kingdom; rather, Christ announces that the messianic kingdom had already come without noise and was in the midst of the Jews, since the Messiah stood among them, as John the Baptist had already affirmed: "There has stood one in the midst of you, whom you know not."²

Io 18, 36: "My kingdom is not of this world." Pilate thought that Christ was thinking of founding a political messianic kingdom. That Christ denies with the cited words, without, however, saying so much as a word about an invisible kingdom or Church.

2. From the mouth of the apostles they bring forward these words: Hebr 12, 18. 22. 23: "For you have not come to a palpable mountain, but you have come to Mount Sion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem ..." In these words Paul certainly opposes the Church to the synagogue; yet not as the invisible to the visible, but as the spiritual to the earthly, as the perfect to the imperfect.

1 Petr 2, 5: "Be you also as living stones built up, a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ."³ With these words Peter inculcates only this, that Christians should be bound to Christ not only by the external bond of society, but by the internal bond of love, and so build themselves up not only into a material house, but into a spiritual one, offering not bloody and carnal sacrifices, but spiritual sacrifices of virtues.

3. From the mouth of Christian antiquity they object with that article of the Creed: "I believe in the holy Church." If it is believed, it is not seen, they say, following Luther. Yet unjustly. For the Church is believed in one respect and seen in another. It is believed with regard to its divine nature (the invisible soul of the Church); but it is seen with regard to its external organism (the visible body of the Church). In exactly the same way man is visible with respect to his body, invisible with respect to his soul.⁴ But just as man, although he has an immediately invisible soul, is nevertheless simply called visible, so the Church is rightly called wholly visible, although it is not visible according to the whole.