De Ecclesia Christi

« Having made the distinction between belonging to the Church of Christ on earth simply and in full, and belonging to her or being referred to her in some respect and from some part, it must be held that all those whom we have named cohere with the Church from some part. For, first: those who are only materially involved in some sect are, in the internal forum and in the judgment of God, through true faith and the character of baptism, members of the one catholic Church of Christ; yet in the external forum and in the judgment of the Church, adults among them are presumed to be heretics or schismatics. Formal heretics and schismatics, by the baptismal character itself, remain subject to the jurisdiction and laws of the Church, and by that same character and by all the institutions of the Church proper to them which they have kept for themselves, are the more strictly bound to return to the fold whose sign they bear impressed; just as, conversely, the Church seeks the straying sheep bearing the sign all the more diligently. Second: excommunicated persons are excluded, by the very intention and nature of the penalty, medicinally and not mortally, so that by satisfying as soon as possible they may seek reconciliation; and by the force of the penalty they are deprived of the visible goods of the visible Church, but not of spiritual goods in themselves, except insofar as these cohere with those. Third: catechumens, however much they can be united by faith, hope and charity with the spirit of the Church, and so by the desire of the will with the visible Church itself on earth, yet since they have not been incorporated into it in act, and by the character of the sacrament of faith, therefore they can neither participate in the visible mysteries of the Church nor are they subject to its jurisdiction and laws; but by divine and natural law they are bound to the teaching of the Church and to the discipline of that teaching.»

I. What has been demonstrated in the preceding thesis holds indeed when heresy, schism and excommunication in the strict sense are considered together with a persevering obstinacy of mind, and when, conversely, the predicates to belong to the Church and to be members of the Church are taken in the proper and fuller sense and, as we said above, simply speaking. On the other hand, there are many bonds by which these same heretics, schismatics, excommunicated persons, and unbaptized catechumens cohere with the Church in some respect, or may cohere according to their differing dispositions, so that without distinguishing this matter a clear declaration cannot be made. And indeed the diversity of opinions and the ambiguous views of theologians in this dispute seem to derive from these distinctions being neglected.

Generally, a) the distinction holds that it is one thing to belong simply to the Church and to be as a member in the body of the Church, as a citizen in the visible kingdom of God; and it is another thing to belong in some respect and, as Augustine says, to belong from some part, to this Church and to this kingdom of God on earth. But this very thing we call belonging in some respect to the Church requires explanation. Therefore b) it is one thing to be subject by right to the lawmaking, judicial and coercive power of the Church; and it is another to be a participant in the goods which Christ conferred on the Church « as a rich storehouse » (cf. Iren. III. 4. n. 1; 24. n. 1.). Further, c) a distinction must be made between those who both are and are considered members of the Church even in the external forum, in which the Church judges by external social judgment, and others who, if any, belong to the Church in the internal forum alone before God, in which the Church does not judge except sacramentally. Lastly, d) it is one thing to be a participant in the goods and visible gifts which Christ instituted in his Church and for the members of the Church alone, for the sake indeed of the invisible graces and charisms and of eternal blessedness itself; and it is another thing to be able to become a participant in these graces and eternal blessedness without actual participation in those visible gifts. This latter can indeed happen, but (on account of the very connection of visible and invisible gifts ordained by Christ) only with reference to those visible gifts, and so to the Church to which they are proper; and therefore only through a desire, at least implicit, of visible union, in the here-and-now inculpable defect of the visible gifts.

In accordance with these distinctions let us now examine how those whom we demonstrated in the preceding thesis not to be actually members of the Church, and therefore not simply belonging to it, can nevertheless be said to belong to it according to something; and how that something, and therefore that very belonging to the Church, is related differently in different cases.

II. The sacraments were indeed instituted by Christ in and for his Church; indeed they are one of the principal elements by which the Church of Christ is founded and built up on earth (th. XIX. n. II. 2.). Hence the sacraments, even if conferred by a heretical or schismatic minister outside the Catholic Church, and so unlawfully and sacrilegiously, nevertheless remain sacraments of Christ their institutor and principal dispenser, and sacraments of the Catholic Church, for which and in which they were instituted ¹ (see the treatise On the Sacraments in general, th. X., XV.). By these sacraments, therefore, and by the other institutions of Christ, if as rebels they have carried off any of them from the Catholic Church, to which they are proper, as from their mother's house, they have a relation to the Church itself ².

1°. For the reason just stated, the sacraments of the Church, wherever they are validly conferred, have all those effects which an obstacle in the recipient does not impede. If, then, we speak specifically of baptism, that conferred by a heretical or schismatic minister on infants, in whom no obstacle can exist, has all the same essential effects as if it had been conferred by a Catholic minister. Thus they are not only marked with the character of Christ, but are also regenerated as sons of God through grace and incorporated into holy Mother Church; and they remain her members, at least in the internal forum and before God, for as long as they have not adhered to heresy or schism by their own act (which would be mortal sin). Concerning those who are called heretics or schismatics materially (that is, in the external forum only), what Augustine teaches in many places holds in the full sense, about the sacrament by which Mother Church generates sons not only through her own womb but also through the womb of the handmaids. « There is one Church, which alone is called catholic; and whatever it has of its own in the communions of diverse persons separated from its unity, through what it has of its own in them, it, certainly, generates, not they. For their separation does not generate, but what they have kept with them of this one; but if they also give that up, they do not generate at all. So she generates in all, she whose sacraments are retained, whence such a thing can be generated anywhere; although not all whom she generates belong to her unity, which will save those who persevere to the end... Therefore she herself generates both through her own womb and through the wombs of the handmaids, from the same sacraments, as from the seed of her husband... But those who are proud and are not joined to their lawful mother are like Ishmael, of whom it was said: cast out the handmaid and her son, for the son of the handmaid shall not be heir with my son Isaac. But those who peacefully love the lawful wife of their father, by whose lawful right they were born, are like the sons of Jacob, who, though born of handmaids, nevertheless take up the same inheritance » Aug. de Baptism. l. I, c. 10, n. 14.

Therefore those who « are proud, » or who through any wicked desires and culpable negligence do not seek the truth as they ought, or refuse to embrace the truth sufficiently proposed, these already adhere formally or equivalently to error; and so, rebels against God and his Church, they are cut off from it as formal heretics or schismatics, not only in the external forum but also before God and in the internal forum, and are altogether outcasts. On the other hand, even adults are to be judged merely material heretics or schismatics, that is, by reason only of external profession and not of culpable adherence of mind, if in them there truly exists that disposition of good faith which Augustine supposes in certain Donatists. « Those who defend their opinion, however false and perverse, with no stubborn animosity, and especially one which they did not beget by the audacity of their own presumption but received from parents who were seduced and had fallen into error, and who seek the truth with cautious care, ready to be corrected when they have found it, are by no means to be counted among heretics. Unless I believed you to be such, I would perhaps send you no letters » Aug. ep. 43 (al. 142), n. 1. It is easily evident that this good faith, which equals invincible ignorance, has no place in apostates (see the Vatican Council, Constitution Dei Filius, ch. 3, and among the canons, n. III, can. 6). But in those who were brought up in heresy from tender years we can seldom fix the limits where invincible ignorance ceases; the guilt of conscience must be left to the judgment of God, the searcher of hearts, though from the circumstances of things and of persons those who are of bad faith can often be discerned, even by human estimation, more easily than those who are of good faith. « It must indeed be held from faith that no one can be saved outside the Apostolic Roman Church... but nevertheless it must be held equally as certain that those who labour under ignorance of the true religion, if that ignorance is invincible, are not bound by any guilt in this matter before the eyes of the Lord. But now who would presume so much as to be able to mark the limits of such ignorance according to the variety of peoples, regions, talents and other very many things? » Pius IX, Allocution Singulari quadam, 9 Dec. 1854.

In the external forum all who, having attained full use of reason, persist in a heretical sect are presumed and held by the Church to be heretics. « Although one who was baptized in infancy and brought up among heretics and in false doctrine may, once grown to adulthood, for some time not sin against the Catholic faith, as long as the faith is not sufficiently proposed to him so that he is bound to embrace it; yet after the Catholic faith has been sufficiently proposed to him, and the obligation to embrace it and to abandon the contrary errors, if he still persists in them, he will be a heretic » Lugo, de Fide, disp. 20, p. 2, n. 149. Hence Albit. (de inconst. in fide, c. 14, n. 58.) testifies that those under fourteen years of age were usually received into the Church from the sects by profession of faith alone, and those who were older by abjuration of heresy.

2°. From the principles laid down we understand what is to be concluded about a purely internal heresy, if certain persons profess that they remain in the visible Church of Christ without any manifestation of a heretical mind. Such persons are indeed considered members of the Church in the external forum and before the militant Church; they are not bound by excommunication or other ecclesiastical penalties, since the judicial and penal sentences of the Church do not refer to purely internal sins. But just as they are bound by guilt and penalty before God, so such internal sins in the Church belong only to that sacramental judgment which was instituted by Christ, the judge of infinite mercy, for « remitting and retaining sins » (Jn XX. 23). But before God and the triumphant Church the guilt of sin binds according to its whole own nature, and, if it is lawful to speak so, according to its whole intensity of guilt and the corresponding extent of penalty. « By guilt alone one is bound, as to God, before the triumphant Church; but by sentence alone (judicial) one is bound, as to men, before the militant Church; » Innocent III, cited below. Now whoever denies divine faith in his mind subverts entirely, in himself, the first essential condition of a member of the Church, a citizen in the kingdom of truth, the foundation of the whole religious and ecclesiastical life before God and in the forum of his conscience. Therefore, although he is not bound by sentence, and so does not cease to be counted among the members of the Church as to men, before the militant Church in the external forum; yet the guilt of heresy, as long as a man is obstinate in it, is by its own nature such that, as to God before the triumphant Church and in the forum of conscience, he has fallen away from the unity of faith, and by this very fact from the unity of the kingdom of truth, which is the Church. This doctrine is set forth most clearly in the dogmatic Constitution Ineffabilis Deus, and I do not know why some have found difficulty in understanding it. « If any should presume to think otherwise than as we have defined (concerning the immunity of the Blessed Virgin from every stain of original guilt), which God forbid, let them know and further understand that they are condemned by their own judgment, have suffered shipwreck in the faith, and have fallen from the unity of the Church; and moreover, by that very deed, subject themselves to the penalties established by law, if they have dared to signify by word, writing, or any other external means what they feel in their heart. » Cf. Aug. de unitate Eccles. n. 74, which passage we cite below.

3°. In the very followers of sects, who are formal heretics or schismatics either at the reception of baptism or by culpable assent in the course of time, the sacrament is not wholly without effect, and through this very effect it begets some relation to the Church. For Christ instituted the sacrament of faith and regeneration to form the members of the Church in such a way that by its efficacy there is at the same time imprinted an indelible character, as a seal marking the members of the Church; which character, in itself and in its reality, is independent of the disposition, and therefore of the faith and charity, not only of the minister who confers it but also of the man who receives it (see de Sacr. in genere th. XII.). For someone to be actually constituted a member of the Church, a citizen of the kingdom of God on earth, there are required faith, social charity, that is, through acknowledgment of and submission to the power of government of the Church, union with the communion of the saints, and the seal of faith and charity, that is, the baptismal character. Adults, however, who are baptized while knowingly in a heretical or schismatic sect, or who afterwards fall away to it, deprived of faith and social charity (as heretics) or at least of this charity (as schismatics), are by that very fact excluded from the Church. Nevertheless, through the indelible character of baptism, before God and the angels and men, they bear the impressed sign by which they are bound to the Church forever; and so the relation of the Church's jurisdiction toward them, and therefore the corresponding relation of theirs toward the Church, to whose laws, judgments and penalties they are bound however rebellious, remains, together with the character and by the force of the character, unchangeable for this life, for which indeed the power of the kingdom of God on earth is instituted.

Moreover, the character is not merely a seal of union with the Church in just any way, and therefore, where by the guilt of man this holy union is not achieved or has been broken off, a token of obligation to the Church remaining perpetually, branded as it were by the fire of the Holy Spirit; but besides this it is by its essence a participation in the priesthood of Christ, not indeed as in the sacrament of Order, actively to offer sacrifice and administer the mysteries of God, but for divine worship as it is instituted in the Church of Christ, and for the valid reception of the sacraments. « The whole rite of the Christian religion derives from the priesthood of Christ. And therefore it is manifest that the sacramental character is specifically the character of Christ, by whose priesthood the faithful are configured according to the sacramental characters, which are nothing other than participations in the priesthood of Christ, derived from Christ himself. » St. Thomas, 3, q. 43, a. 3. This « configuration » to Christ the great priest, and the ontological deputation to Christian worship and to the mysteries of Christ which he instituted for and in his Church, the Fathers call a perpetual consecration, which remains even when it is separated from sanctification by grace, even in heretics. « The sacrament of Christian baptism, when it is one and the same, is valid even among heretics and suffices for consecration, although it does not suffice for participation in eternal life; which consecration makes indeed a heretic guilty, having the Lord's character outside the Lord's flock; but sound doctrine admonishes that he is to be corrected, not consecrated again in the same way » Augustine, ad Bonifac. ep. 98, n. 4. ³

Therefore, by this obligation to the Church, by this configuration to Christ the priest whose baptism it is, and by this consecration to Christian worship, which is true and lawful only in the Church alone (relations which are constituted essentially and indelibly by the character itself), it does not follow that formal heretics and schismatics are in the Church in act; but it certainly follows that, like a thing carried off by the theft of heresy or schism, it cries out to its owner, that is, to the Church, the lawful mother, outside whose flock of the Lord they wander astray, having the Lord's character. Hence, conversely, the bowels of the Church's charity are directed to them no less than the power of jurisdiction, so that, on account of the « character of Christianity » (Innocent III, ch. Maiores), as for a special reason she calls back her rebellious sons all the more diligently to her bosom. « Those who are outside, held in various errors, let them run while there is time to the lawful mother, who, as she contains and diligently nourishes the sons born from her own womb, so she does not reject those born from the handmaid when they return; but even with the bowels of mercy she seeks the wanderers, and with tender feeling invites them unceasingly, that she may lead them into the fellowship of the paternal inheritance. For she does not regard the condition of the handmaid's womb, but recognizes the truth of the father's seed. For what is the truth of the paternal seed, if not the baptism received in the name of the Trinity? Wherever she finds this, she, as the lawful mother, knows it to be her own by right. For she knows, like Rachel, to bring forth sons not only from her own womb, but also to claim in her own name those begotten of the handmaid, as begotten of the lawful wife. » Fulgentius, de remiss. peccator. l. I, c. 23. With these bowels of mercy Augustine in many places addresses heretics and schismatics. « You answer and say to me: but I have the sacrament. You have it, I acknowledge; on that account I seek you. You have added a great reason why I should seek you more diligently; for you are a sheep of my Lord's flock, though you strayed with the sign; therefore I seek you the more, because you have the sign itself.... We have one sign; why are we not in one fold?..... Therefore I seek you, that you may not perish with the sign; for the sign is of salvation, if you have salvation, if you have charity; for this sign can be in you outside, but cannot profit you » Aug., sermon to the people of Caesarea, n. 4. « They (the Donatists) must observe how devotedly the Catholic root seeks the branch broken from itself with such zeal... Therefore we sweat, therefore we labour... while the tree seeks its branch, while the flock seeks the lost sheep from the fold of Christ. If we are endowed with pastoral bowels ⁴, we must squeeze ourselves through hedges and thorns; with the limbs torn, let us seek the sheep, and bring it back with joy to the Shepherd and to the Prince of all » Id., Gesta cum Emerito, n. 7, 12. In the heretics and schismatics who have been baptized, therefore, there is, compared with those not baptized, a new kind of « title of peace » (as Augustine calls the character, l.c. ad pleb. Caesar.), so that they may return, and the Church may seek them the more. For as a sign impressed on soldiers admonishes them to return to the camp of the emperor, so the character of the King Christ, wherever it is impressed, remains, by which you are made « manifest to God and the angels and the Church, even if you flee as a deserter » (κἂν λειποτακτήσῃς, κατάδηλος γίνῃ πᾶσιν, even if you desert, you are manifest to all) (Chrys. in 2 Cor. hom. 3, n. 7, at the end). See de Sacr. in genere th. XII. n. II; XIII. n. II. III.

III. Excommunicated persons who (as is supposed) retain the Catholic faith, although by what has been demonstrated in the preceding thesis they too are excluded from the Church, the kingdom of God on earth, are nevertheless referred to the Church by more bonds, and by more interior relations, than heretics and schismatics.

1°. In this matter the very nature and purpose of excommunication must above all be noted. This penalty is, by its institution and by the aim of the legislator and judge, not a « killing blow » to root out, but a « medicinal cautery » to heal, so that the sinner, moved by the very gravity of the penalty, may repent, and be reconciled more quickly to God and to the Church. So, by its very nature and its aim, unless the obstinacy of the sinner stands in the way, it is a temporary exclusion. « When any one of the brethren, that is, of the Christians who are established within the society of the Church, is caught in some such sin that he deserves anathema, let this be done where there is no danger of schism... but admonish him as a brother, for not to root out but to correct.... For thus he is both corrected with peace preserved, and is not struck as by a killing blow, but is cauterized medicinally... That, by the correction of separation, every evil man is to be taken away from the congregation of the brethren, but with the aim of healing, not of destroying out of hatred, no one will doubt that it must be done » Aug., against the letter of Parmenian, l. III, n. 13–15. In the same sense the holy Doctor speaks elsewhere: « That very thing which is called condemnation, which the episcopal judgment pronounces, than which no penalty is greater in the Church, can, if God wills, turn to most salutary correction and profit..... Yet pastoral necessity has it that, lest dire contagions creep through many, the diseased one should be separated from the healthy sheep; from him to whom nothing is impossible, perhaps healable by that very separation » Aug., de corr. et grat. c. 15, n. 46 (also cited by Gratian, Causa 24, q. 3, can. 17). Boniface VIII comprehended the whole matter in this decree: « Since excommunication is medicinal, not mortal, disciplining not eradicating, as long as the one against whom it has been pronounced does not despise it ⁵, let the ecclesiastical judge take care, in pronouncing it, to show that he pursues what is proper to one who corrects and heals » On the sentence of excommunication, in the Sixth Book of the Decretals (bk. VI, tit. IX, ch. 1).

2°. Excommunicated persons are indeed bound, for the very aim of the medicinal penalty, to seek reconciliation through penance and satisfaction to the Church and by other means which are sometimes necessary or fitting. Until they have been duly absolved, they remain, even before God and in conscience, deprived of those external and visible goods from which excommunication excludes, and likewise of those internal and spiritual goods which are necessarily connected with those same external ones. But excommunication, although it takes away certain external means to grace, does not of itself take away or impede the charity and grace of God. Whence it can truly be that one who is absolved from guilt before God and the triumphant Church remains bound, as to the communion of the goods we have mentioned, before the militant Church ⁶. Those who are so disposed, on their own part sincerely seeking reconciliation and absolution, although not yet actually, certainly by desire belong to the Church, and so are not outside the way of salvation. For of these what Augustine and others write holds almost in the same way, concerning those whom it may happen that an unjust, but nevertheless valid, sentence excommunicates ⁷. « The purpose of such men is either to return when the storms have subsided; or, if they are not permitted to do so, either while the same tempest persists, or lest by their return a similar or greater one should arise, they hold the will to consult even those to whose agitations and disturbances they yielded, defending without any separation into conventicles, unto death, and helping by testimony that faith which they know is preached in the Catholic Church. The Father crowns these in secret, seeing in secret. This kind seems rare, but examples are not lacking; indeed they are more numerous than can be believed » (in Augustine's time in Africa, and elsewhere in other times, when God permitted certain great disturbances in the Church) Aug., de vera religione, c. 6, n. 11; cf. de Baptismo contra Donatistas, l. I, c. 17, n. 26. To the same effect St. Gregory warns: « The pastor should fear either to absolve indiscriminately or to bind; and he who is under the hand of the pastor should fear to be bound even unjustly, and not rashly reprehend the judgment of his shepherd, lest, although he is unjustly bound (yet validly, for otherwise he would not be bound), he become guilty of a fault that was not there, from the swelling pride of reproach » Gregory, in Evang. hom. 26, n. 6. ⁸.

IV. Just as excommunication is indeed the most grave penalty from justice, to keep the vigour of discipline for the common good, but at the same time has the character of medicine for healing from charity toward individuals; so whatever the Church does with catechumens is wholly from charity alone. And if some severity intervened, especially in ancient times, this had the character not of penalty but of penance, from the solicitude and maternal care toward infants ⁹, whom the pious mother formed, as if still in the womb not yet born, that they might come to the sacrament of regeneration as well disposed as possible.

This maternal care shows itself in many ways, and partly constitutes and partly demonstrates the very disposition and nearness of these catechumens to the Church, although, by what has been demonstrated in the preceding thesis, they are not yet members of the body of the Church and citizens of the visible kingdom of God on earth.

1°. From the very faith by which they already believed in Christ, ¹⁰ from ancient times they even had the name of Christians. « Whoever has been a catechumen... If any of the clergy know him to be a Christian, or if some faithful witnesses have appeared, it has seemed good that baptism should not be denied to him » Council of Illiberis, can. 45. The same appellation appears in can. 7, ascribed to the second Ecumenical Council. In the Gothic and Gallican Sacramentary a prayer is prescribed « for making a Christian: I sign you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, that you may be a Christian » (Assemanius, Cod. liturg., vol. I, pp. 29, 43; and among the Greeks, from the aforesaid canon 7, in the same work, p. 108). Nay, even in the distribution of the orders of the Church, the Fathers list the catechumens last among these grades. For there are three orders of the Church: the first indeed of rulers (τῶν ἡγουμένων), « and two (orders) are of subjects (τῶν ὑποβεβηκότων), since the people of the Church of Christ is divided into two orders, namely of the faithful and of those who have not yet been deemed worthy of regeneration through baptism » (τῶν πιστῶν καὶ τῶν μηδέπω τῆς διὰ λουτροῦ παλιγγενεσίας ἠξιωμένων). Eusebius, Demonstratio evang. l. VII, c. 3; Origen, hom. V in Ezech. n. 4. In the same sense Augustine said that catechumens are already of the great house, yet not as free children and members of the family, but as servants, who are not partakers of the goods of the family. « Because the catechumens have the sign of the cross on their foreheads, they are already of the great house; but let them become sons from servants. For they are not nothing who already belong to the great house... Let them pass through the Red Sea, let them eat the manna, so that as they believed in the name of Jesus, so Jesus may entrust himself to them » Aug. in Jn, tract. 11, n. 4.

2°. The manner in which catechumens belong to the order of Christians and to the great house appears from the discipline observed in them. This is wholly directed to the induction of faith through instruction in the elements of Christian doctrine (whence the name τῶν κατηχουμένων is also derived; cf. Acts XVIII. 25; Gal. VI. 6); to the attainment of charity through holiness of conversation and morals; and to the preparation for the baptism of regeneration and for insertion into the Church, through faith itself and holiness of life, and also through many sacred ceremonies which refer to the sacrament of baptism itself and as it were prepare the way for it. These sacred rites are described in the sacramentary books, and some of them, and among these « the sacrament of catechumens, » Augustine mentions. « I think catechumens too are, in a certain manner of their own, sanctified by the sign of Christ and by the prayer of the laying on of hands; and what they receive, although it is not the body of Christ, is nevertheless holy (namely the salt, which he elsewhere calls « a blessed form », de catechizandis rudibus c. 23; cf. Confessions l. I, c. 2), and holier than the food by which we are sustained, because it is a sacrament.... ¹¹ The sanctification of a catechumen, if he has not been baptized, is not valid for him to enter into the kingdom of heaven, or for the remission of sins » Aug. de peccat. merit. et remiss. c. 26, n. 42.

The rigour of discipline was sometimes observed more severely, especially in the last stage of the catechumenate (of those to be enlightened, τῶν φωτιζομένων, or among the Latins competentes, that is, those who seek baptism together with others). « Let those who are to be baptized give their names, and be examined for a long time with abstinence from wine and meat, and frequent laying on of hands, and then receive baptism » (can. 85, in the « Statutes of the ancient Church, » which were wrongly ascribed to the Council of Carthage IV; Harduin, I, p. 984). Augustine records the same of the days « on which, having given their names, those about to receive the grace (of baptism) are purified by abstinence, fasts, and exorcisms » Aug. de fide et operib. c. 6, n. 8. In the same place, however, he shows that all these things lead finally to inducing repentance and the amendment of vices, « lest what is holy be given to dogs. » « What else, indeed, does the whole time in which they hold the place and name of catechumens do, but that they may hear what faith and what kind of life a Christian ought to have, so that, when they have proved themselves, then they may eat from the table of the Lord and drink from the cup? (the reception of the Eucharist is, indeed, joined with baptism)... What is done throughout the whole time in which it is wholesomely established in the Church that the grade of catechumens receives those who approach the name of Christ (al. accipiant), this is done much more diligently and urgently in these days, in which they are called competentes, when they have given their names to receive baptism. » Ibid. n. 11.

Therefore, if we ask how catechumens were and are subjects of the Church, since (as Eusebius says) « the people of subjects is divided into two orders, of the faithful and of the not yet baptized, » that is, of the catechumens, there is a difference between the two. For the baptized (even those excluded from the Church), by the sacramental character itself (as we demonstrated above), are subject not only to the teaching authority but to the properly so-called power of jurisdiction, lawmaking, judicial, coercive or punitive. But catechumens too are indeed bound to the teaching authority, and therefore to all those dispositions of the Church which refer to instruction and to the fitting preparation for baptism, not strictly by force of ecclesiastical and human law, but from the obligation of divine law and, that being supposed, of natural law, by which they are bound to faith, to penance, to baptism, and to morals conforming to these laws: « Repent, and let each one of you be baptized. » Acts II. 38.

By the same principle must be explained, and to the same end were ordered, the penalties also to which the catechumens were subjected. For all those penalties which are said to be imposed on catechumens are finally referred to the prolongation of the catechumenate and to the deferment of baptism, so that those who, having committed graver sins, seemed not yet sufficiently disposed, might more carefully prepare themselves for baptism and for the Christian life. Thus, in the 5th canon of Neocaesarea, for sins committed ¹², and in the 14th Nicene canon ¹³ for lapse in persecution, catechumens are relegated to the first stage of the catechumenate, which was that of hearers. In the Council of Illiberis, in which also many other matters are obscure or abnormal, for adultery and infanticide (can. 68), baptism of a catechumena is deferred until the end of life: « it has pleased that she be baptized at the end. » Moreover, that only those who show that they are unwilling to renounce sins, either by deeds or even by open profession, are to be repelled from baptism, and that the whole discipline of catechumens refers to this « renunciation, » St. Augustine demonstrates throughout the whole book On Faith and Works. Persons of this kind, who after a suitable probation give no hope of amendment, are obviously to be cast out even from the order of catechumens, as the cited Neocaesarean canon prescribes.

3°. It is clear that catechumens can conceive, and especially the sincere competentes have already conceived, the true faith and the desire of union with the Church, outside which there is no salvation. Faith being supposed, especially along with so many external helps to which inner grace is joined, they can also advance to acts of perfect charity, and so be justified before God before the real reception of the sacrament. This is still more evident in martyrdom for Christ, which catechumens, before they could be baptized, sometimes underwent. Whence theologians customarily distinguish baptism of water, of blood, and of the Spirit or of penance, as St. Thomas (3, q. 66, a. 11) and Alexander of Hales (P. IV, q. 8, m. 9, a. 4) call them; or, as others speak with St. Bonaventure (4, dist. 4, P. II, a. 1, q. 1), baptism of water, of the Spirit and of blood. These two (desire and martyrdom) are called baptism not properly but metonymically, insofar as they have a relation to baptism through the implicit desire for it; and so there always remains in this life the obligation to the sacrament of baptism itself ¹⁴. But it has received the name of baptism principally insofar as it is substituted in the place of baptism properly so called, not indeed for all its effects, but for the effect of justification. Martyrdom, indeed, is also called baptism metaphorically, from the likeness. « As many of us as have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death (εἰς τὸν θάνατον αὐτοῦ)... for if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also (planted together in the likeness) of his resurrection. » Rom. VI. 3, 5. But this similitude, which is symbolic in baptism, is perfected as a real likeness in martyrdom, through the imitation of the passion and bloody death of Jesus Christ, which he himself called baptism: « with the baptism with which I am baptized, you shall be baptized. » Mark X. 39; cf. Luke XII. 50. St. Thomas explains the likeness and efficacy of the death of Christ: « the passion of Christ's death works indeed in the baptism of water through a certain figurative representation... but in the baptism of blood through imitation of the act » St. Thomas, 3, q. 66, a. 12.

Hence the effect of justification is entirely certain, both in the baptism of the Spirit, « or (St. Thomas, l.c. a. 11) of the Holy Spirit, insofar, namely, as the heart of someone is moved by the Holy Spirit to believe and to love God and to repent of sins, » and still more in the baptism of blood, which indeed has efficacy ex opere operato even in infants (see Suárez, On the Sacraments, disp. 29, sect. 1).

« They object the catechumens to us: if any of these, before being baptized in the Church, has been apprehended in confession of the name and killed, whether he loses the hope of salvation and the reward of confession, because he was not previously reborn of water. Let them know, then... that those catechumens are not deprived of the sacrament of baptism (that is, of its effect), since they are baptized with the most glorious and greatest baptism of blood, of which the Lord also said that he had another baptism to be baptized with » (Luke XII. 50). St. Cyprian, ep. 73, ad Jubaianum, p. 136.

Although the Fathers at times mention only martyrdom, by which salvation can be obtained without actual reception of baptism ¹⁵; it is nevertheless certain that inchoate salvation or justification is also attributed to an act of charity, which by its nature, namely by the will to observe all divine precepts, includes the desire of baptism. Already in the third century the author of the book On Rebaptism, contemporary with Cyprian, deliberately distinguishes three kinds of the one baptism (as he says): baptism of the Spirit, of water and of blood. Citing Acts X. 44, he first demonstrates the effect of baptism of the Spirit. « And there will be no doubt that men can be baptized in the Holy Spirit without water, as you notice these (Cornelius and his people) were baptized before they were baptized with water... since these too received the grace of promise without the laying on of hands of the Apostles and without the washing which they later obtained; and so God, by their faith, also granted them the remission of sins at the same time, their hearts having been cleansed a little before. » Then he discusses baptism of blood from Matt. X. 32, thus: « But what will you decide concerning a man who hears the word, who, perhaps seized in the name of Christ, immediately confessed, and was punished before he was permitted to be baptized with water? Will you pronounce that he has perished, because he was not baptized with water?... It makes no difference whether this man who confesses to the Lord is a hearer of the word or one of the faithful » (namely by confession of martyrdom). Anonymous, among the works of Cyprian, ed. Baluzius, pp. 356, 361. Very well known is Ambrose's « consolation on the death of Valentinian » the younger, who while still a catechumen perished by the treachery of Count Arbogast in Gaul. « Or if this disturbs you because the mysteries were not solemnly celebrated; then neither would martyrs be crowned if they were catechumens, for they are not crowned if they are not initiated. But if they are washed in their own blood, this man too his piety and his will have washed. » Ambrose, de obitu Valentiniani, n. 53; cf. n. 30, 51, 52, 75. Augustine teaches the same doctrine. « I find that not only passion for the name of Christ can supply what was lacking of baptism, but also faith and conversion of heart, if perhaps help cannot be given in the straits of time to celebrate the mystery of baptism..... but then it is fulfilled invisibly, when the ministry of baptism is excluded not by contempt of religion but by the necessity of the moment. » Aug. de Baptismo, l. IV, n. 29; cf. in Leviticum q. 84. St. Bernard demonstrates this truth excellently in his treatise on baptism and in other questions to Hugh of St. Victor, ch. 2. Finally, the Council of Trent, sess. VI, c. 4, after defining that justification is a translation into the state of grace and of adoption of the sons of God, adds: « which translation after the promulgation of the Gospel cannot be made without the laver of regeneration or its desire, as it is written: unless one is born again of water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. » To this belongs the condemnation of the propositions of Baius 31, 32, 33, 43, 71.

4°. Undoubtedly, those who are already imbued with the true faith, and still more those already justified by charity, and who seal the true faith by the blood of martyrdom, even if they could not be initiated into the sacrament of faith, would pertain to the Church of God taken in the wider sense, of which we spoke in thesis II, if such a Church on earth existed now, in the time of the New Testament. But since Christ founded his universal Church on earth in its own visible form, with its own institutions and laws, there is no other Church of Christ on earth besides this visible one (th. XXI.). All those, therefore, who are not initiated by baptism, which is the gate to the Church, cannot be said simply to belong to the visible Church of Christ, nor are they participants in its visible mysteries, nor subject to its laws (formally, as the laws of the Church are). Hence catechumens, whether martyrdom is imminent or whether they are justified by charity without it, are bound by divine precept to be « incorporated into the Church » (these are Augustine's words), as far as is in their power. If they knowingly and willingly refused to fulfil this, the necessary condition of charity, and therefore of justification, would already be lacking. Therefore Augustine said that the effect of the sacrament is then fulfilled invisibly in the conversion of heart, « when the ministry of baptism is excluded not by contempt of religion but by the necessity of the moment. » But in the same place the holy Doctor warns that a catechumen, however much already justified, like Cornelius who had already received the Holy Spirit (Acts 2. 4. 44.), is not yet in the Church until he is baptized. « We ought not to disapprove the righteousness of the man, which began before it was joined to the Church, just as the righteousness of Cornelius had begun before he himself was in the Christian people » Aug., l.c., n. 28. ¹⁶ Concerning the same Cornelius he declares elsewhere the necessity of baptism for this effect, that he might be incorporated into the Church; and therefore, if baptism is neglected through the catechumen's own fault, the antecedent righteousness does not suffice to obtain the kingdom of heaven, because that very justification would be abolished through the fault. « In some there is so much grace of faith as does not suffice for obtaining the kingdom of heaven: as in catechumens (unless, namely, the conditions are present of which we heard Augustine's teaching above), as in Cornelius himself (the obligation of baptism remaining), before he was incorporated into the Church by participation in the sacraments » Id., l. I, q. 2, n. 2, to Simplician.

What the Apostle said, therefore, of the members of the Church, « one body, one Spirit... in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism » (Eph. IV. 4), is verified in those justified persons of whom we speak according to all that is spiritual. For there is one spirit, and therefore one charity, in one faith and in one hope of calling, and therefore they adhere to one Lord (cf. 1 Cor. VI. 17). Yet that visible element which the Apostle joins with the invisible, and which by itself, by the institution and law of Christ, ought to be joined, is not verified in them in act, but only by the desire of the will: « one body and one baptism. » For since, as the Apostle teaches, « we were baptized into one body, » those who lack baptism belong not in act but only by desire, and so not simply but in some respect to one body; yet by charity itself and by the very desire of the will they are in one Spirit. This is what is commonly said, distinguishing the body and soul of the Church. Therefore those who die in that state, whether by martyrdom or without martyrdom, joined with the Lord and with the Spirit whom he gave to his Church, although without fault of their own they lack the visible element and its character, are united to the triumphant Church and the communion of all the Saints (see th. II.). Hence it is understood that, just as the martyrs of the Old Testament, so too martyrs who were catechumens, no differently from baptized martyrs, are to be honoured by the militant Church; for they are recognized and acknowledged, from the visible act of martyrdom, by the militant Church itself as its members in some respect, by perfection of disposition (which we shall declare in the following thesis), and by that same disposition simply as members of the triumphant Church ¹⁷.