522 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A.D. 1517 To 1580.
church and the communion of saints among the articles of faith, and do not limit them by the Greek, Roman, or any other nationality or age. ‘ Catholic” means universal, and is as wide as humanity. It indicates the capacity and aim of the church; but the actualization of this universalness is a process of time, and it will not be completed till the whole world is converted to Christ.
The medieval schoolmen distinguished three stages in the catholic church as to its locality, —the militant church on earth (ecclesia militans), the church of the departed or the sleeping church in purgatory (ecclesia dormiens), and the triumphant church in heaven (ecclesia triumphans). This classification was retained by Wiclif, Hus, and other forerunners of Protestantism; but the Reformers rejected the intervening purgatorial church, together with prayers for the departed, and included all the pious dead in the church triumphant.
In the militant church on earth, Augustin made an important distinction between “the true body of Christ” (corpus Christi verum), and “the mixed body of Christ” (corpus Christi miatum or simulatum). He substitutes this for the less suitable designation of a “twofold body of Christ ” (corpus Domini bipartitum), as taught by Tichonius, the Donatist grammarian (who referred to Cant. 1: 5). These two bodies are in this world externally in one com-
1 Yet not in the strict and deeper sense in which the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are articles of (saving) faith; hence the preposition εἰς, in, is omitted before ecclesiam, and the following articles, at least in the Latin forms (the Greek Nicene Creed has εἰς).
2 The term ‘catholic’? (καθολικός, from κατά and ὅλος, whole, entire, complete) does not occur in the New Testament (for the inscriptions of the Epistles of James, Peter, John, and Jude, ἐπιστολαὶ καθολικαΐ, or simply καθολικαί, are no part of the apostolic text, but added by transcribers), and is first used as an epithet of the Church by Ignatius of Antioch, the enthusiast for episcopacy and martyrdom (Ad Smyrn., c. 8), and in the Martyrium of Polycarp (in Eusebius, H. E., TV. 14). It was applied also to faith, tradition, people, and became equivalent with Christian, in distinction from Jews, sdolaters, heretics, and schismatics.
ὃ 85. ENLARGED CONCEPTION OF THE CHURCH. 6523
munion, as the good and bad fish are in one net, but they will ultimately be separated.1. To the true or pure church belong all the elect, and these only, whether already in the Catholic Church, or outside of it, yet predestinated for it. “Many,” he says, “who are openly outside, and are called heretics, are better than many good Catholics; for we see what they are to-day; what they shall be to-morrow, we know not; and with God, to whom the future is already present, they already are what they shall be hereafter.”2 On the other hand, hypocrites are in the church, but not of the church.
It should be added, however, that Augustin confined the true church on earth to the limits of the visible, orthodox, catholic body of his day, and excluded all heretics, — Manicheans, Pelagians, Arians, etc.,— and schismatics, — Donatists, etc., —as long as they remain outside of fellowship with that body. In explaining the article “the holy church,” in his version of the Creed (which omits the epithet “ catholic,” and the additional clause “the communion of saints”), he says that this surely means “the Catholic Church;” and adds, “ Both heretics and schismatics style their congregations churches. But heretics in holding false opinions regarding God do injury to the faith itself; while schismatics, on the other hand, in wicked separations break off from brotherly charity, although they may believe just what we believe. Wherefore, neither do the heretics belong to the Church Catholic, which loves God; nor do the schismatics form a part of the same, inasmuch as it loves the neighbor, and consequently readily forgives the neighbor’s sin.” ? It is well known that this great and good man even defended the principle of forcible coercion of schismatics, on a false interpretation of Luke 14: 23, “*Constrain them to come in.”
1 De Doctr. Christ., III. 32 (in Schaff’s ‘‘ Nicene and Post-Nicene Library ;”’ Works of St. Augustin, vol. 11. 509).
2 De Bapt. contra Donat., IV. 5. For a fuller exposition of his doctrine of the church, see his Donatist writings, and Reuter’s Augustin. Studien
(1887). ὃ De Fide et Symbolo, c. 10 (in Schaff’s ed., III. 331).