Ecclesia

“ The combination of this idea with that of clerical sacerdotalism completed the Catholic theory of the Church and the clergy. Saving grace is recognized as apostolic grace, and the bishops as successors of the apostles become its sole transmitters. Bishops are therefore necessary to the very being of the Church, which without them is without the saving grace for the giving of which the Church exists (cf. Cyprian, Ep. 33, “ecclesia super episcopos constituitur”; 66, “ecclesia in episcopo”; also Ep. 59, and De unitate eccles. 17) . ”

“ The Church by its very existence is a body of men and women set apart for a holy use. The New Testament word for Church, ecclesia, means a society "called out" from among other men. It exists not for common purposes, but to witness for God and for Christ, to maintain before the eyes and in all the common ways and works of men the ideal life realized in Christ and the presence and holiness of God. ”

“ Believers had been saved, and the influences of the Spirit had been manifested to men in all previous dispensations from Adam to Christ. But now an ecclesia, an outgathering, was to be made to constitute the mystical body of Christ, incorporated into him the Head and indwelt by him through the Holy Ghost. The definition which we sometimes hear, that a church is "a voluntary association of believers, united together for the purposes of worship and edification" is most inadequate, not to say incorrect. ”

“ The prelates and theologians of the church will no doubt give them the full and ample treatment which they deserve. We simply note the fact that the whole ground of discussion is reduced in fact, by Dr. Pusey, to the nature and extent of the Papal supremacy, on which depends the definition of the body actually constituting the Ecclesia Docens or teaching church, and the dogmatic value of the decisions made by the Roman Church with the concurrence of the bishops in her communion. ”

“ The apostles, or their immediate disciples, had founded congregations in most of the great cities of the Empire; and every society thus instituted, now distinguished by the designation of the principal [564:2] or apostolic Church, became a centre of ecclesiastical unity. Its presiding minister sent the Eucharist to the teachers of the little flocks in his vicinity, to signify that he acknowledged them as brethren; [564:3] and every pastor who thus enjoyed communion with the principal Church was recognized as a Catholic bishop. ”

“ Although many things are introduced here in the topic of Ecclesiastical Power, with greater bitterness than is just, yet it must be declared that to most reverend bishops and priests, and to the entire clergy, all ecclesiastical power is freely conceded that belongs to them by law or custom. ”

“ The clergy, the lords of God's heritage, have crowned themselves with the rulership of earth, in the person of the pope and in the general desire of clergymen to rule in the affairs of men, a lordship based upon their supposed righteousness (mitre) . This great crisis will not be like the temporary setbacks of ecclesiasticism in past centuries. The lowly, revolutionary, anarchistic masses will exalt themselves to power in the Time of Trouble, and the lofty clergy shall be utterly abased.—Matt. ”

“ His theory, which marks the culminating point of English sacerdotalism, represents the episcopate and episcopally ordained clergy as a spiritual power co-ordinate with the temporal power, and associated with it in a federal union, the regal supremacy in matters ecclesiastical being treated as a mere derivative from the papal usurpation. ”

“ Origen, in the preface to his work De Principiis, states the principle of the Apostolate in the Church in the following pregnant terms: “There being many who fancy that they think the things of Christ, and some of them think differently from those who have gone before, let there be preserved the ecclesiastical teaching which, transmitted by the order of succession from the Apostles, remains even to the present day in the churches: that alone is to be believed to be truth which in nothing differs from the ecclesiastical and apostolical tradition.” ”

“ We have hitherto been considering ecclesiastical persons as viewed by the theory of the Reformation, and our conclusion is, that that theory regards all Christians as ecclesiastical persons, and the ministry as not more so than others; the only difference between the ministers of religion and other ecclesiastics being, that there is added to their ecclesiastical status, by human authority, a highly honourable and responsible profession. ”

“ But as regards the clerical members on one side and the other, they shall compose the clergy of the churches which shall fall to their share. As to the wealth of the churches, care will be taken to distribute to the ecclesiastics as much as will be sufficient to provide honourably for them, and to the churches as much as will be requisite to maintain them properly. ”

“ The divine benefits, beloved brethren, should be acknowledged and embraced, wherewith the Lord has condescended to embellish and illustrate His Church in our times by granting a respite to His good confessors and His glorious martyrs, that they who had grandly confessed Christ should afterwards adorn Christ’s clergy in ecclesiastical ministries. ”

“ Wherefore, as in the days when Christ walked on the earth and companied with the clergy, the high priests, priests and Pharisees—the different grades of the priesthood—observing the traditions of their own making, and asserting that they had God for their Father and that they were of Abraham's seed, and at no time served any man and enjoying a reputation among the people, did not do all these things, so that the clergy might by antonomasia and truly be called the holy church, inasmuch as Christ himself said of them, Matt. ”

“ Hence, it is evident that the universal holy church is Christ's one and only bride, the virgin to be in the end most chaste, whom the Son of God bound to himself in matrimony out of eternal love and by the grace of adoption, and the church we firmly believe, saying with the Creed, "I believe one holy catholic church," and about which the word is added in the second Creed, "and apostolic [church] ." ”

“ How, then, do the doctors, without any Scripture proof, teach that the pope is head of holy church and the college its body? Since it is enough for the faithful Christian with inwrought faith and perseverance to believe the article of faith concerning the catholic church that it is the one totality of all the predestinate faithful who are to be saved by virtue of the merit of Christ—who is the head of the catholic church—it is not permissible for us expressly to descend to any particular vicar whom the Christian might recognize as the chief—capitalis. ”

“ Si umquam Dei Spiritus illuxit Ecclesiae, certe illud est tempus immitendi Numinis, quum omnium ecclesiarum, quae sunt in terris patentissimae, religio, maturitas, scientia, sapientia, dignitas, unam in urbem confluxerint, adhibitisque modis omnibus divinis et humanis, quibus indagari veritas possit, promissum implorent Spiritum, [32] quo salutariter et prudenter sanciat. ”

“ Lastly comes Christus creat ecclesiam, in which the church, at first simply a medium for communicating the conceptions of God and Christ, is reflexively considered and explained, embracing all the means and institutions ordained by Christ for the instruction and sanctification of the human race, in order to the attainment of its final end. In the conception of God the Creator, we have the natural or intelligible order and the rational basis of revelation. ”

“ The education of clerics destined to ecclesiastical functions is the exclusive right of the church. She alone regulates everything connected with it, whether the erection of seminaries, or their interior discipline, or the appointment of masters, or the instruction in letters and science, or the good [736] education of the pupils, or their admission into the ecclesiastical body. ”

“ The episcopate and priesthood were established by Jesus Christ Himself, and are absolutely essential to the very existence of the Church. Religious congregations are of ecclesiastical institution, and are only auxiliary to the pastoral office. The multiplication of churches and of priests engaged in parochial duties is the most pressing need, and in no other way can the spiritual wants of the people be adequately provided for. ”

“ That the Holy Catholic Church is artfully constituted to subjugate all secular and ecclesiastical power under its authority, and that its object is not to advance the interests of moral goodness, but to acquire temporal dominion, must be admitted by every one that fully comprehends the principles upon which its religious Orders are organized. These Orders were founded by Catholic saints and Bishops. ”

“ But Christ's clergy labors diligently for Christ's laws and his rights, whereby spiritual good is acquired that it may be shown, and it flees pride and the pleasure of this world, and seeks to live in conformity with Christ, giving itself up most zealously, following the Lord Jesus Christ. ”

“ If, therefore, every man is of necessity subjected by this declaration to the Roman pontiff, the aforesaid proposition will follow as true, and, on the other hand, the proposition that the Roman church is the church, whose head is the pope and whose body the cardinals, and these together constitute that church. ”

“ The ecclesiastical functions of the bishops were here the same as elsewhere. To them belonged the ordination of priests and deacons, the hallowing of chrism, the ceremonies of confirmation, the consecration of churches and churchyards, nuns and monks; they had a right to regulate the lives and conversation of their clergy, to superintend the monastic foundations, and in general to watch that every detail of the ecclesiastical establishment was duly regarded and maintained. In their peculiar synods they could frame canons of discipline, to be enforced in the several dioceses. ”

“ Now that is the sacrament of ecclesiastical unity, according to the Apostle (1 Cor. 10:17) : "We, being many, are one bread, one body, all that partake of one bread and one chalice." Moreover, by Baptism a man becomes a participator in ecclesiastical unity, wherefore also he receives the right to approach our Lord's Table. ”

“ Likewise in the Church where nearly all its staff, the whole of the lower and middle-class clergy, curés, vicars, canons and collegiate chaplains, teachers or directors of schools, colleges and seminaries, more than sixty-five thousand ecclesiastics, formed a healthy, well organized body, worthily fulfilling its duties. ”

“ For every practical purpose, it is one and united: it is furnished with an army of clergy admirably organized, and set peculiarly loose for movement at the will of the general ecclesiastical body by their law of celibacy. ”

“ But the health of a Church depends, not merely on the creed which it professes, not even on the wisdom and holiness of a few great ecclesiastics, but on the faith and virtue of its individual members. ”

“ Behold how Christ is the foundation of the church and the apostles are the foundations! Christ is by a figure of speech—antonomastice—the foundation because the edifice of the church begins from him and is finished in him and through him. But the prophets and apostles are the foundations because their authority bears up our weakness. ”

“ The admission of the Thetes to the Ecclesia was an important step in the direction of democracy (for the powers which Solon gave to the Ecclesia, see Ecclesia) . But the greatest reform of Solon was undoubtedly the institution of the Heliaea (or courts of justice) . The jury were appointed by lot from all the citizens (including the Thetes) , and thus the same people elected the magistrates in the Ecclesia and subsequently tried them in the Heliaea. Hence Solon transferred the sovereign power from the areopagus and the magistrate to the citizens as a whole. ”

“ In general it had no powers of originating negotiation, but merely carried out the psephism of the Ecclesia. It was their relation to the empire which gave the strategi their authority. It was they who took the oath on behalf of Athens when an alliance was concluded, and their advice would have special weight in settling the terms of the treaty and the amount of tribute to be paid. They were not, indeed, compelled to submit a budget, nor did an adverse vote by the Ecclesia involve their resignation. ”

“ Many historians in dealing with the strategia have been misled by modern analogies. The strategia was, for example, by no means analogous to the British cabinet, which (1) has collective responsibility and (2) is executive in the sense that its members are heads of state departments. The strategi had no such characteristics; their influence over the Ecclesia in voting was merely that of a private citizen ”

“ Council of Nicæa.
An ecumenical council was a new experiment. Local councils had long since grown to be a recognised organ of the Church both for legislation and for judicial proceedings. But no precedent as yet prescribed, no ecclesiastical law or theological principle had as yet enthroned, the ‘General Council’ as the supreme expression of the Church’s mind. ”

“ Three convictions under this law, however, involved a certain loss of rights; the loser could no longer move a resolution in the Ecclesia. After the lapse of a year the mover of a resolution could not be attacked. In the 4th century the Graphē Paranomōn took the place of Ostracism (q.v.) . In the 5th century it was merely an arrangement whereby the people sitting as sworn juries ratified or annulled their own first decision in the Ecclesia. ”