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

1. The Greeks indeed from the beginning cultivated the unity of creedal confession in this sense, that, while preserving the other Catholic dogmas, they denied only the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son (Filioque), as well as the primacy of the Roman Pontiff. But in rejecting the primacy they rejected the head of the magisterium instituted by Christ, and consequently the principle of the unity of faith. They proclaimed, to be sure, that ecumenical councils remain the supreme tribunals of orthodox faith. But ecumenical councils without the pope they could neither celebrate, nor did they ever attempt to celebrate them after their separation from the Roman Church. Hence in the course of so many centuries countless dissensions have invaded the orthodox communion. Today the more cultivated orthodox, and even the clergy itself, are more and more immersed in scepticism, rationalism, and nihilism; the people, however, are composed of a few believers, very many indifferentists, countless heretics, indeed atheists, whom the "official" Church can neither expel nor wishes to expel.¹ Those also who preserve the ancient confession, for the most part, do not know what they profess, since the orthodox Church labors under a gross ignorance of religious matters.

There is no need for us to speak of the unity of the orthodox social communion. Once the primatial head was lost, the truncated body gradually dissolved into many parts. Today there exist at least fifteen "autonomous" Churches, or, as the orthodox say, "autocephalous" Churches,² which are united among themselves by no bond. From these autocephalous Churches many little churches have again seceded, which, although not by right, are nevertheless in fact independent; thus e. g. in the Ruthenian or Russian Church before the year 1914 more than two hundred groups were independent of the "holy synod" of St. Petersburg. Once this caesaropapistic synod was suppressed by the Russian revolution, atomism dissolves the Ruthenian Church more and more from day to day.

2. Protestants neither have nor can have unity of confession. They do not have unity of confession. For not only do the greater Protestant groups, namely the Lutherans, the Reformed (i. e. the Zwinglians and the Calvinists), and the Anglicans, differ most widely in doctrine, but each of these groups abounds in an excessive variety of religious profession; indeed, of the members of all Protestant sects it holds: "As many heads, so many minds." Nay, they even glory in the multiplicity of doctrines and of sects daily springing up, and even boast that the intimate essence of Protestantism consists in this, that it simultaneously cherishes diverse and opposed Christian confessions, or even mixes the Christian religion with the Jewish.³ Nor can they have unity of confession. For, as will be shown in another place,⁴ the supreme Protestant principle of faith is this, that each one may, according to his own pleasure, build up or destroy the faith. Protestants, to be sure, keep repeating that sacred Scripture is the sole norm and rule of believing for all the faithful; but in fact each one interprets and tears apart Scripture itself according to his own judgment. The discord of faith born from this they have indeed tried to dissimulate by publishing many symbolical books or even by employing political force; but these symbolical books and the ordinances of civil governments were diverse according to the diversity of regions, and moreover they were unable to win any authority for themselves. Nay, Protestants, having entirely rejected all religious authority, boast of a bare atomism and subjectivism. Hence it is no wonder that they, imperceptibly, have continually varied and diminished the faith and at length have arrived more and more at pure rationalism or even nihilism.

That the communion of Protestants has no unity is evident. Already from the beginning the Lutherans, the Zwinglians, the Calvinists, and the Anglicans existed utterly torn apart and separated from one another. Soon each of these groups broke up into several sects. Today the Protestant little churches, which hold together by no bond, can scarcely be numbered; e. g. in England, which nevertheless, having still preserved the episcopate and the priesthood, to some extent retains a certain social bond, at the beginning of this century more than three hundred sects were publicly enumerated. And although the disparate sects have entered into certain covenants, e. g. the "Prussian territorial church", these covenants are not religious but political, since they were effected and are held together only by civil force.

Hence, with the covenant standing, the individual sects, e. g. the orthodox and the liberals, fight most fiercely among themselves.

All non-Catholic groups are united only by hatred of the pope. And for that reason they are deservedly and necessarily disunited in all things, because they repudiate the principle and center of all ecclesiastical unity.