Summa de Ecclesia

Against the aforesaid error of the adversaries, who deny that blessed Peter was the head of the holy Catholic universal Church, we shall proceed in this order. First we shall refute it by several arguments. Second, we shall recall some testimonies of the holy fathers. Third, we shall show that the responses given by the adversaries to the said sayings of the holy fathers are worthless. Fourth, in the following chapter, the arguments of the said adversaries will be answered.

¹

First, the folly of the aforesaid error, in that it says that blessed Peter was the head of individual churches and of all the faithful, but not of the universal Church, is shown by many things.

²

First, indeed, because the adversaries, in saying that Peter is one head, yet assigning him no one body of which he is head, but several bodies, namely the individual faithful or the individual particular churches, seem to make the Church a monster, which is most unfitting. Second, because in saying that Peter was head of the individual particular churches and not of the universal Church, they seem to imply a contradiction, since the universal Church is nothing other than all the Catholic churches united in the one faith of Christ. Hence in ch. Quamvis, dist. 21, Pope Pelagius says that the churches of the whole Catholic world are one bride-chamber of Christ. Third, because the universal Church is one body, as the Apostle says, and a body ought to have one immediate head, homogeneous, that is, of the same nature and of the same state and condition, namely visible and living together with the body of which it is the head. The adversaries, by denying that blessed Peter, after Christ's bodily absence from the Church, was head of the universal Church, necessarily seem to confess that the body of the universal Church is acephalous, since it is without a visible head living together with it; which is heretical. Hence Marsilius of Padua, for saying that Christ left no head to the Church, was condemned by the Apostolic See, as is plain in the Extravagant of John XXII which begins "Licet iuxta doctrinam apostoli." Likewise at the Council of Constance John Hus was condemned by Pope Martin for asserting that there was not a spark of evidence that there must be one head ruling the Church in spiritual matters, ever abiding with her.

Fourth. The unity of the Church is not only as regards the Gospel in relation to Christ, as the Greeks, Armenians and several other heretics and schismatics wish; but also in relation to one vicar of Christ, namely the supreme pontiff, to whom the whole body must be bound and tied, as the Gloss on Matt. 16 says thus: "Therefore Christ granted the power of binding and loosing specially to Peter, so as to invite us to unity, and to make him the principal vicar to whom the diverse members of the Church would have recourse if perhaps they disagreed among themselves; for if there were diverse heads in the Church, the bonds of unity would be broken." So the Gloss. And blessed Augustine, expounding Ps. 46 on the verse "God of gods has spoken and called the earth," speaking of Christ, says thus: "Then, on the fortieth day, namely the day of the Ascension, he commended the Church to St Peter, that is, the earth called from the rising of the sun to its setting, lest those who wish to perish in schism should have an excuse."

Fifth, against this error is the manifest word of Christ saying: "You shall be called Cephas." For Cephas, as was said a little before, means head in Greek. That Peter was here described as the future head of the whole Church is attested by the venerable Bede in the Gloss, saying thus: "Christ, looking upon Peter, saw the simplicity of his heart and the loftiness of his mind, by whose merit he was to be preferred to all the Church." So Bede.

³

Sixth, against this error is what is read as said by the Lord to Peter: "I have appointed you prince over my people." He does not say "particular peoples," but the people itself, that is, the universal Church, which is the people of God.

⁴

Seventh, against this error it seems that blessed Peter was appointed shepherd of the universal Church, John, last ch.: "Feed my sheep." If, therefore, he is shepherd of the whole Church, then he is also head. As for what some adversaries of the truth said at Basel within our hearing, and left in their most damnable writings that blessed Peter was not appointed shepherd of the Church, because Christ did not say "Feed my Church" but "Feed my sheep," this is foolishly said. First, because the universal Church is nothing other than the Lord's flock itself, or the fold of Christ, as blessed Peter is called shepherd of the Lord's flock, so also of the universal Church. Second, because to the contrary is the very prayer of the Church, which is proclaimed throughout the whole world in church, where it is said thus: "O God, shepherd and ruler of all the faithful, your servant N., whom you willed to preside over your Church as shepherd, etc." Third, because to the contrary is blessed Gregory, in the homily on the Lord's resurrection, as found in ch. Considerandum, dist. 1, who says thus: "We must consider why almighty God, who had disposed to set him over the whole Church, permitted him, frightened at the voice of a maidservant, to deny Him; which we recognise as done, indeed, by a great dispensation of mercy: that he who was to be the shepherd of the Church might learn in his own fault how he ought to have mercy on others." So he says. To the same effect are the words of St Augustine cited above in ch. 20. It is therefore plain that they manifestly and grievously err who deny that blessed Peter, and his successor the Roman pontiff, is the head of the universal Church.

⁵

Second, where the testimonies of the holy fathers were to be recalled for the reprobation of the aforesaid error, it suffices that in the chapters immediately above there are testimonies of St John Chrysostom, Jerome, Augustine, Anacletus, Marcellus and Gregory, enlightened by whose judgments the Council of Constance condemned the aforesaid error among the errors of John Hus, that Peter was not the head of the holy Catholic Church; and the reason is as follows. "Catholic" is the same as "universal," for in Greek "catholicos" is called common or universal.

⁶

Third, it must be seen how the response of the adversaries, which they give to the sayings of the holy fathers, is of no strength or power. On this it must be known that to all the authorities saying that Peter was, or that the Roman pontiff is, head of the universal Church, the adversaries respond under this distinction: they say that the universal sign is to be taken distributively, namely that it distributes over the individual members of the Church, and not collectively over the universal Church itself. But that this response is vain, and in a way foolish, and savours of error, although every wise man clearly understands it from what has been said above, nevertheless we show it thus. The aforesaid response is indeed vain, because although the universal sign, when it falls upon a common, non-collective noun, can admit of this distinction. For example: "All the apostles of Christ are twelve," is true collectively; taken distributively with the universal sign it is false, and conversely the other. "Socrates is stronger than all men" can be true distributively, and false collectively. Yet when the universal sign falls upon a collective noun, of the kind that Church, people, nation, family, flock, college, council, synod and the like are, this distinction does not seem to have a place, because it is against the nature of a collective noun that it be held distributively and not collectively. Moreover, the falsity of the said distinction is shown from the profession of the fathers of the Council of Chalcedon, who, as is gathered from the acts of the same council, writing to Pope Leo, professed in the council through their envoys that he presided over them as head. There it is plain that those holy fathers of the Council of Chalcedon thought more highly of the authority of the Roman pontiff than the new masters of Basel do, for those have come to such folly that they do not recognise the Roman pontiff as head of the council, but only as a partial member, though principal. Secondly, that the pope is said to be head of the individual members of the body of the Church and not of the body itself, which results from the multitude of those members, seems foolish to us; as if a bishop were said to be head of the faithful of his diocese and not of the diocese itself, or a king head of all his subjects and not of the kingdom. Thirdly, it seems erroneous, since it is against the Gospel and the doctrine of the holy fathers, and because it was expressly condemned, as we have said, at the Council of Constance among the articles of John Hus.