Maclear and Williams on Article XIX: Of the Church

i. Connection. The transition from the Third to the Fourth Group of the Articles is a natural one. After declaring that our everlasting salvation is to be referred solely to the merciful Grace of God, and that He has revealed only One Person, in Whom this salvation is to be attained, we are led on to think of the Church, into which it is God’s will that men should be brought, and which He has appointed “as the earthly home of those who embrace the Gospel and would be saved.”

ii. Title. The Title of Article xix. has remained the same since the first draft in 1553. In that draft it was preceded by another, the old xixth, the title of which was, “All men are bound to keep the moral commandments of

the Law1.” The greater part of this Article has been incorporated with the present Seventh Article.

iii. The Object of the Article is a twofold one : —

(i) To give a definition of what constitutes a visible branch of the Universal or Catholic Church ;

(ii) To refute the doctrine persistently urged in many quarters as to the infallibility and in- errancy of one particular branch of it, viz., the Church of Rome2.

iv. Source. The Article is based on the Seventh Article of the Augsburg Confession, the language of which was with some considerable modification introduced into the Thirteen Articles of 1538. It also resembles very nearly the language of the Institution of a Christian Man and similar formularies.

v. The word Church is represented in the original of the New Testament by the Greek ‘E/c^X^crta3. This term, which originally denoted an assembly of persons at Athens called out by the voice of a herald for the purpose of legislation, was used in the Septuagint Version of the Old Testament to describe the entire assembly or congre-

• This portion of the Articles finds a parallel in the Reformatio Legum, where we read, ” Etiam illorum in- sania legum vinculis est constringenda, qui Romanam ecclesiam in hujusmodi

petra fundatam esse existimant, ut nec erraverit, nec errare possit ; cum et multi possint ejus errores ex su- periore majorum memoria repeti, et etiam ex hac nostra proferri, partim in his quibus vita nostra debet inlor- mari, partim etiam in his quibus fides debet institui.” De Iteesibus, c. si, quoted in Hardwick, Hist. Art. p. 387, ed. 1859.

gation of the Israelites1. The word was subsequently adopted by our Lord to describe the great Society2, which He came on earth to found, and into which He bade His Apostles invite members not from one nation only, namely, the Jewish, but from the whole world.

vi. The Church Visible. It is remarked in the Fifth of the Thirteen Articles of 1538 that the word “Ecclesia,” Church, has two significations in Holy Scripture : —

(a) First it denotes the congregation of all saints and true believers, who truly believe in Christ their Head, and are sanctified by His Spirit. ” This,” it says, ” is the living and truly holy mystical Body of Christ, but it is known to God alone, Who alone seeth the hearts of men ” ;

(/8) Secondly it denotes ” the congregation of all men, who have been baptized in Christ, and have not openly denied Christ, or been justly and by His word excommunicated3.” Respecting the Church in its double aspect, as Visible and Invisible, the Articles have already spoken by im- plication. They accept the Creeds, which deal not only with the Church “militant here in Earth,” but also4 with the

1 Who were called out from the rest of the world to bear witness to His Unity, to preserve His Laws, to keep alive the hope of redemption, and to exhibit the pattern of a people living in righteousness and true holi- ness. Comp. Deut. xxxi. 30 ; 3 Kings viii. 14, I.xx. ; 1 Chron. xiii. 2 ; xxix. 20, lxx. See also Acts vii. 38.

2 It is used by Him for the first time on the occasion of S. Peter’s memorable confession, Matt. xvi. 18, and again, Matt, xviii. 17.

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gregatione omnium sanctorum et vere fidelium, qui Christo capiti vere cre- dunt, et sanctificantur Spiritu ejus. Haec autem vivum est et vere sanctum Christi corpus mysticum, sed soli Deo cognitum, qui hominum corda solus intuetur. Altera acceptio est qua Ecclesia accipitur pro congrega- tione omnium hominum qui baptizati sunt in Christo et non palam abnega- runt Christum, nec juste el per ejus verbum sunt excommunicati.” Hard- wick, Hist. Art. p. 263, ed. 1859.

Church ” at rest ” behind the veil, whose members have departed this life, and whom God ” hath knit together in one communion and fellowship with the living members of Christ’s mystical Body1.” The present Article deals with the Church as in any given country she is a visible” society of men, and has a visible order of living ministers dispensing her means of Grace3.

vii. Analysis. The definition of a visible branch of the Catholic Church is that it is

” A congregation of faithful men4, in which

(a) The pure Word of God is preached, and (/3) The Sacraments be duly ministered5 according to Christ’s ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same6. ”

1 See the Collect for All Saints’ Day.

s “It is certain that the Article confines itself to the consideration of the visible Church, and gives us no authoritative statement concerning the invisible Church.” Bp Browne, Ar- tides, p. 453.

3 We find the word “Church” applied in the Scriptures, sometimes (i) to the whole collective body of Christians scattered throughout the world (Acts xx. 28 ; 1 Cor. x. 32 ; Eph. v. 23) ; sometimes (ii) to a community of Christians in a particular town or country, as Jerusalem (Acts viii. 1), Antioch (Acts xiii. 1), Ephe- sus (Acts xx. 17), Corinth (1 Cor. i. 2) ; sometimes (iii) to a single body of ChrUtians meeting or living in a private house, as that of Priscilla and Aquila (Rom. xvi. j), that of Nymphas (Col. iv. 15), that of Philemon (Phil.

4 Fidelium. Fidelis here does not denote, as in Classical Latin, trusty, faithful men (comp. Livy xxii. 37, 4,

“boni fidelesque socii”), but men professing faith, i.e. in our Lord

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s Bishop Ridley adds to the above marks of a branch of the Church “charity” and “faithful observance of ecclesiastical discipline, according to the Word of God.” Ridley’s Works, Park. Soc. Ed. p. 123; Nowel’s Catechism mentions besides sound doctrine and right use of the Sacraments “the use of just disci- pline.”

6 That the Article does not define the Catholic or Universal Church, but rather indicates certain conditions necessary in order to constitute any given National Chinch a branch of the Universal Church, is clear from (a) the use of the word “Church” in the context as applied to National Churches, (/3) the implied reference to some canonical authority supreme in respect alike of a “Norma Praxli- cationis,“and of the administration of the Sacraments.

viii. The Church a Visible Society. That the Church would form a visible company or Society is the uniform teaching of prophecy and of our Lord Himself. Thus

(i) (a) Isaiah says, It shall come to pass in tlie latter

days, that the mountain of the Lord’s hoitse shall be established in the top of tlie mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills ; and all nations shall flozv unto it (Isai. ii. 2) ; (/3) Again, Daniel prophesies, The God of Jieaven shall set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed, nor shall the sovereignty thereof be left to another people ; but it sluill break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever (Dan. ii. 44).

(ii) Again, our Lord speaks of the Society He was about to establish as a kingdom visible as any earthly kingdom, and He compares it to

(a) A field in which good seed and bad grow

together until the harvest (Matt xiii. 24 — 30); (/3) A net enclosing good and bad fish, which are

not separated till the net is drawn ashore

(Matt. xiii. 47 — 50); (7) A marriage-feast, where all the guests are not

provided with wedding-garments (Matt. xxii.

1— 14).

All these passages indicate that the Church, wherever found, is not merely a spiritual and mystical communion, but a visible body1 of professed believers in the Gospel which Christ proclaimed.

1 “Tlie Church is always a visible society of men.” Hooker, Eccl. Pol. iii. 1, 14

ix. The First Mark, according to the Article, of such a visible body or society is that in it ” the pure Word of God is preached.” With this Scripture agrees. For our Lord promised the Apostles that when the Spirit of truth was came, He would guide them into all the truth1 (John xvL 13), and He bade them go… and make disciples of all the nations… teaching them to observe all things whatsoever He luxd commanded t/iem ( Matt, xxviii. 19, 20). Hence S. Paul recognises it as the most important part of his mission to preach the Gospel (1 Cor. i. 17); he sternly rebukes any who dared to preach any Gospel other than that which they Iiad received (Gal. i. 9); and he affirms that the Church is l/ie pillar and ground of the truth1 (1 Tim. iii. 15). Now we may believe that in the Church “the pure word of God is preached ” wherever the main doctrines contained in the Holy Scriptures and the Creeds3 are taught. Thus the Church justifies her title to be an Ecclesia decerns when she communicates to her children the truths which God has re- vealed respecting alike the Person. Nature, and Work of our Lord, and the destinies of Creation ; when ” she impresses on the intellects of men the true doctrine of Christ — by oral instruction, by the development of a school of theology, by symbolical and suggestive rites, by catechetical teach- ing, by preserving and interpreting Holy Writ4.” For not

1 ” The order of the original is remarkable ; the truth in all its parts (rfj» d\ij&ta» rdcor, according to the true reading).” Christ is the Way and the Truth. The Spirit of Truth leads men into the way and thus mto all the truth. Comp. Westcott in Uc

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M.

there no Church, there would be no witness, no guardian of archives, no basis, nothing whereon acknowledged truth could rest.” Bp Eilicott in Ux.

• The fact that the first five Articles of the Thirty-nine are almost a repe- tition and enforcement of the chief truths c^-Mir.ei ir. the three Cree-is. and that the Eighth treats of the Creeds themselves, has no unimportant bear- ing on this point.

merely is the abiding conviction of these truths important as regards the leading a holy life, and the attainment of salvation hereafter, but their acceptance belongs to that supernatural life, which, begun on earth, receives its fulness in the eternal world that is to come.

x. The Second Mark of a Church visible is that therein ” the Sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ’s ordinance in all things that of necessity are requisite to the same.” For the Sacraments are essential to the existence of the Church. They are the ordained means whereby the virtue that proceedeth from Christ the Head flows into His Body, the Church Universal and its members in particular1. This is only analogous to what had already been recognised under the Jewish Dispensa- tion. God declared Circumcision and the celebration of the Passover to be essential to membership of the congre- gation of Israel, and he who neglected or rejected either was to be cut off from the people of Israel (Gen. xvii. 14; Exod. xii. 15). Hence, when our Lord founded His Church, He appointed two Sacraments to take the place of the two great ordinances of Judaism, (i) Baptism, for the initiation of the adult or the child into the Church, and (ii) the Holy Eucharist, for maintaining the communion thus begun between Himself and the members of His mystical Body2 (Matt, xxviii. 19; xxvi. 26 — 29). These two Sacraments, ordained by Christ Himself, are as essen-

1 “That saving grace which Christ originally is or hath for the general good of His whole Church by Sacra- ments He severally deriveth into every member thereof.” Hooker, Eccl. Pol. v. lvii. 5.

2 << We receive Christ Jesus in bap- tism once as the first beginner, in the Eucharist often, as being by continual degrees the finisher of our life…

Each sacrament having both that which is general or common, and that also which is peculiar unto itself, we may hereby gather that the parti- cipation of Christ which properly belongeth to any one sacrament is not otherwise to be obtained but by the Sacrament whereunto it is proper.” Hooker, Eccl. Pol. V.

tial1 to the existence of the Christian Church as Circum- cision and the observance of the Passover were to that of the Jewish Church, and as such were steadily administered by the Apostles and those who succeeded them from the earliest times.

xi. Due Administration. It is to be observed, how- ever, that in mentioning the mark of a visible Church, the Article does not speak of the bare administration of the Sacraments. It says they must be “dufy ministered2,” that is, in their celebration the conditions of a valid Sacrament must be observed. Thus

(a) In the administration of Holy Baptism there must be the element of water, and the repetition of the Baptismal Formula3;

(/S) In the Holy Eucharist there must be a definite materies, bread and wine, and the recitation of a definite form of the words of consecration by one duly ordained to pronounce them4.

xii. The Second Part of the Article deals with the claims of one particular Branch of the Church, viz. the Church of Rome, to be free from error. In dealing with this plea of inerrancy the Article does not merely take up a polemical position, it treats the question historically also. Instead of barely stating that the Roman Church has

1 Sacraments are the powerful in- definite words. There must be the struments of God to eternal life. For proper materies and the proper forma. as our natural life consisteth ” in the As regards the minister of this Sacra- union of the body with the soul, so merit the Church holds, as laid down our life supernatural in the union of in A.D. 1439 at ‘he Council of Flo- the soul with God.” Hooker, Eccl. renee, that “in casu necessitatis licere Pol. v. lvii. 1. laico, seu viro, seu feminae, seu Chris-

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there be any words, but only certain

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erred, it declares that freedom from error did not distinguish certain even of the most ancient Churches of the East. It mentions the Churches of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch, before it speaks of Rome at all. It selects these Churches, because the Church of Jerusalem was in historical order the mother Church of Christendom ; because Alex- andria and Antioch were always recognised as standing in the first rank amongst the primitive Churches, and being the most distinguished of those founded by Apostles or Apostolic men were in this respect on a par with the Church of Rome. None of these Churches claimed in- errancy any more than those spoken of in the Apocalypse of S. John1.

xiii. Points of Error. The Article does not distinctly state what are the errors to which allusion is made. It simply states that as the Patriarchates of Jerusalem, Antioch, and Alexandria have erred, so the Church of Rome hath erred in mode of life, ceremonial, and matters of faith, and therefore cannot claim inerrancy any more than these Patriarchates2. The term “living” probably alludes to the low moral tone and the corruptions which had crept into the Papal curia in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries ; the ’* manner of ceremonies ” to the denial of the chalice to the laity, and the superstitious veneration of relics and images ; and the ” matters of

1 Thus the Church of Kphesus is nor hot, but lukewarm, and deserving

charged w ith having left Iter first love to be spnucd out of the mouth of her

(Rev. ii. 4) ; the Church of Pergamum Lord (Rev. iii. 16). with holding the doctrine of Balaam - It is noticeable that the word

and of the Nicolaitans (Rev. ii. 14, “their” is only found in the English

15); the Church of Thyatira with version of the Article. In the draft

tolerating the errors of the woman of 1553, it ran “not only in their

Jezebel, and with moral deterioration living, but also in matters of their

(Rev. ii. 20); the Church of Sardis faith”; while “creremoniarum ritus”

with having no works of hers fulfilled was inserted in the Latin version of

before God (Rev. iii. 2); the Church 1 553, it was lacking in the English

of Laodicea with being neither cold version of the same date.

faith” to the additions1 made to the primitive Creeds by that of Pope Pius IV., which additions the Council of Trent declares to be binding on all the Churches of the Roman obedience2. But whatever be the object of the Article, whether to state that the corruptions which had crept in were the ground of the need of a Reformation, or to protest against the claim to infallibility by itself on the part of the Roman Church, in neither case does it militate against the inerrancy of the whole Church collectively3. The fact that practical corruptions had crept in was virtually owned in the Roman Church by the attempts at reform, which were instituted again and again, but without effect.

2 These include, amongst other

Notes

• It had reference to the teaching of a branch of the Anabaptists, who “by putting forth the plea of preter- natural illumination, made themselves superior to the moral law, and circu- lated opinions respecting it ‘most evidently repugnant to the Holy Scrip- ture.’ ” Hardwick, Hist. Articles, p. 103, ed. 1859.
• On the etymology of the English word Church, see Introduction to the Creeds, p. 218, n. 2, and Appendix 11. p. 311.
• See Introduction to the Creeds, pp. 223—238.
• Bp Forbes On the Artida, p.
• For the water alone or the words 4 See Bp Browne, p. 466 ; Bp alone are not sufficient. Nor must Forbes, 269, 270.
• By “matters of faith” it is not points, Seven Sacraments, Transub- intended to express Articles of the stantiation, Denial of the Cup to the Creeds, or the fundamental doctrines Laity, Invocation of Saints, Veneration in them. To reject these would in- of Relics, the Roman Church the volve heresy and not merely error. mother and mistress of all Churches. See Bp Browne On the Articles, p. 3 See Pusey’s Eirenicon, pp. 33,