The Ultimate Florilegium on the Indefectibility of the Church
The Church's indefectibility is a somewhat noncontroversial, if interesting, topic. For our purposes, we will take two of the elements of indefectibility as they appear in Faith Seeking Understanding for our definition: (i) the Church will never perish and (ii) the Church will never fail in her mission. As I see it, based on the clear passages from Sacred Scripture (most notably Matthew 16:18 and Matthew 28:20), the issue has been largely settled throughout history: the Church is indefectible. Regardless of this consensus, it still seems important to establish that the Church cannot perish or fall away from her mission of spreading the Gospel, not least because an indefectible Church is a prerequisite of an infallible Church.
Because of this, I've decided to compile a large florilegium, or collection of quotations from tradition, to show the consensus in favor of ecclesiastical indefectibility. This collection comes from the best of Catholic theologians such as Gerardus Cornelis Van Noort, Richard Challoner, Patrick Murray, and Henry Edward Manning. They appear in no particular order. For this florilegium, I will also give hyperlinks to websites with the same English translation. In places where no other English translation exists, I have linked the volume of Migne which includes that work. Please enjoy.
"As I have already observed, the Church, having received this preaching and this faith, although scattered throughout the whole world, yet, as if occupying but one house, carefully preserves it. She also believes these points of doctrine just as if she had but one soul, and one and the same heart, and she proclaims them, and teaches them, and hands them down, with perfect harmony, as if she possessed only one mouth. For, although the languages of the world are dissimilar, yet the import of the tradition is one and the same...But as the sun, that creature of God, is one and the same throughout the whole world, so also the preaching of the truth shines everywhere, and enlightens all men that are willing to come to a knowledge of the truth. Nor will any one of the rulers in the Churches, however highly gifted he may be in point of eloquence, teach doctrines different from these (for no one is greater than the Master); nor, on the other hand, will he who is deficient in power of expression inflict injury on the tradition. For the faith being ever one and the same, neither does one who is able at great length to discourse regarding it, make any addition to it, nor does one, who can say but little diminish it." (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book I, Chapter 10)
“Since therefore we have such proofs, it is not necessary to seek the truth among others which it is easy to obtain from the Church; since the apostles, like a rich man [depositing his money] in a bank, lodged in her hands most copiously all things pertaining to the truth: so that every man, whosoever will, can draw from her the water of life. For she is the entrance to life; all others are thieves and robbers. On this account are we bound to avoid them, but to make choice of the thing pertaining to the Church with the utmost diligence, and to lay hold of the tradition of the truth.” (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book III, Chapter 4)
"For where the Church is, there is the Spirit of God; and where the Spirit of God is, there is the Church, and every kind of grace; but the Spirit is truth. Those, therefore, who do not partake of Him, are neither nourished into life from the mother's breasts, nor do they enjoy that most limpid fountain which issues from the body of Christ; but they dig for themselves broken cisterns out of earthly trenches, and drink putrid water out of the mire, fleeing from the faith of the Church lest they be convicted; and rejecting the Spirit, that they may not be instructed. Alienated thus from the truth, they do deservedly wallow in all error, tossed to and fro by it, thinking differently in regard to the same things at different times, and never attaining to a well-grounded knowledge, being more anxious to be sophists of words than disciples of the truth. For they have not been founded upon the one rock, but upon the sand, which has in itself a multitude of stones." (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book III, Chapter 24)
"Where, therefore, the gifts of the Lord have been placed, there it behooves us to learn the truth, [namely,] from those who possess that succession of the Church which is from the apostles, and among whom exists that which is sound and blameless in conduct, as well as that which is unadulterated and incorrupt in speech. For these also preserve this faith of ours in one God who created all things; and they increase that love [which we have] for the Son of God, who accomplished such marvellous dispensations for our sake: and they expound the Scriptures to us without danger, neither blaspheming God, nor dishonouring the patriarchs, nor despising the prophets." (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book IV, Chapter 26)
"It follows, then, as a matter of course, that these heretics aforementioned, since they are blind to the truth, and deviate from the [right] way, will walk in various roads; and therefore the footsteps of their doctrine are scattered here and there without agreement or connection. But the path of those belonging to the Church circumscribes the whole world, as possessing the sure tradition from the apostles, and gives unto us to see that the faith of all is one and the same, since all receive one and the same God the Father...And undoubtedly the preaching of the Church is true and steadfast, in which one and the same way of salvation is shown throughout the whole world...For the Church preaches the truth everywhere, and she is the seven-branched candlestick which bears the light of Christ." (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book V, Chapter 20)
“From this, therefore, do we draw up our rule. Since the Lord Jesus Christ sent the apostles to preach, (our rule is) that no others ought to be received as preachers than those whom Christ appointed; for ‘no man knoweth the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him.’ Nor does the Son seem to have revealed Him to any other than the apostles, whom He sent forth to preach—that, of course, which He revealed to them. Now, what that was which they preached—in other words, what it was which Christ revealed to them—can, as I must here likewise prescribe, properly be proved in no other way than by those very churches which the apostles founded in person, by declaring the gospel to them directly themselves, both viva voce, as the phrase is, and subsequently by their epistles. If, then, these things are so, it is in the same degree manifest that all doctrine which agrees with the apostolic churches—those moulds and original sources of the faith must be reckoned for truth, as undoubtedly containing that which the (said) churches received from the apostles, the apostles from Christ, Christ from God. Whereas all doctrine must be prejudged as false which savours of contrariety to the truth of the churches and apostles of Christ and God. It remains, then, that we demonstrate whether this doctrine of ours, of which we have now given the rule, has its origin in the tradition of the apostles, and whether all other doctrines do not ipso facto proceed from falsehood. We hold communion with the apostolic churches because our doctrine is in no respect different from theirs. This is our witness of truth.” (Tertullian, The Prescription Against Heretics, Chapter 21)
"From what has been said, then, it is my opinion that the true Church, that which is really ancient, is one, and that in it those who according to God's purpose are just, are enrolled. For from the very reason that God is one, and the Lord one, that which is in the highest degree honorable is lauded in consequence of its singleness, being an imitation of the one first principle. In the nature of the One, then, is associated in a joint heritage the one Church, which they strive to cut asunder into many sects. Therefore in substance and idea, in origin, in pre-eminence, we say that the ancient and Catholic Church is alone, collecting as it does into the unity of the one faith— which results from the peculiar Testaments, or rather the one Testament in different times by the will of the one God, through one Lord — those already ordained, whom God predestinated, knowing before the foundation of the world that they would be righteous. But the pre-eminence of the Church, as the principle of union, is, in its oneness, in this surpassing all things else, and having nothing like or equal to itself." (Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, Book VII, Chapter 17)
"The spouse of Christ cannot be adulterous; she is uncorrupted and pure. She knows one home; she guards with chaste modesty the sanctity of one couch. She keeps us for God. She appoints the sons whom she has born for the kingdom. Whoever is separated from the Church and is joined to an adulteress, is separated from the promises of the Church; nor can he who forsakes the Church of Christ attain to the rewards of Christ. He is a stranger; he is profane; he is an enemy. He can no longer have God for his Father, who has not the Church for his mother. If any one could escape who was outside the Ark of Noah, then he also may escape who shall be outside of the Church." (Cyprian of Carthage, On the Unity of the Church, Chapter 6)
"Nor let any one wonder that the servant placed over them should be forsaken by some, when His own disciples forsook the Lord Himself, who performed such great and wonderful works, and illustrated the attributes of God the Father by the testimony of His doings. And yet He did not rebuke them when they went away, nor even severely threaten them; but rather, turning to His apostles, He said, 'Will you also go away?' manifestly observing the law whereby a man left to his own liberty, and established in his own choice, himself desires for himself either death or salvation. Nevertheless, Peter, upon whom by the same Lord the Church had been built, speaking one for all, and answering with the voice of the Church, says, 'Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life; we believe, and are sure that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,' signifying, doubtless, and showing that those who departed from Christ perished by their own fault, yet that the Church which believes on Christ, and holds that which it has once learned, never departs from Him at all, and that those are the Church who remain in the house of God; but that, on the other hand, they are not the plantation planted by God the Father, whom we see not to be established with the stability of wheat, but blown about like chaff by the breath of the enemy scattering them, of whom John also in his epistle says, 'They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, no doubt they would have continued with us.'" (Cyprian of Carthage, Epistle 54, Chapter 7)
“And in addition to this pious belief respecting the Father and the Son, we confess as the Sacred Scriptures teach us, one Holy Ghost, who moved the saints of the Old Testament, and the divine teachers of that which is called the New. We believe in one only Catholic Church, the apostolical, which cannot be destroyed even though all the world were to take counsel to fight against it, and which gains the victory over all the impious attacks of the heterodox; for we are emboldened by the words of its Master, ‘Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.’” (Alexander of Alexandria, Epistle to Alexander of Constantinople, apud The Ecclesiastical History Of Theodoret, Book I, Chapter 3)
"But now, after this, the firmament deserves also to be adorned with lights. For God says: 'Let there be lights in the firmament of heaven, that they may give light on the earth and divide between day and night.' As in that firmament which had already been called heaven God orders lights to come into existence that 'they might divide between day and night,' so also it can happen in us if only we also are zealous to be called and made heaven. We shall have lights in us which illuminate us, namely Christ and his Church. For he himself is 'the light of the world' who also illuminates the Church by his light. For just as the moon is said to receive light from the sun so that the night likewise can be illuminated by it, so also the Church, when the light of Christ has been received, illuminates all those who live in the night of ignorance... Christ, therefore, is 'the true light which enlightens every man coming into this world.' From his light the Church itself also having been enlightened is made 'the light of the world' enlightening those 'who are in darkness,' as also Christ himself testifies to his disciples saying: 'You are the light of the“world.' From this it is shown that Christ indeed is the light of the apostles, but the apostles are 'the light of the world.' For they, 'not having spot or wrinkle or anything of this kind,' are the true Church, as also the Apostle says: 'That he might present it to himself a glorious Church not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing.' ...Moreover, just as the sun and the moon enlighten our bodies so also our minds are enlightened by Christ and the Church. We are enlightened in this way, however, if we are not blind in our minds." (Origen, Homilies on Genesis, Homily I, Chapters 5-7)
“And in like manner each one of those who are the authors of any evil opinion has become the architect of a certain gate of Hades; but those who co-operate with the teaching of the architect of such things are servants and stewards, who are the bond-servants of the evil doctrine which goes to build up impiety. And though the gates of Hades are many and almost innumerable, no gate of Hades will prevail against the rock or against the church which Christ builds upon it.” (Origen, Commentary on Matthew, Book XII, Chapter 12)
"But all of these, ensnared by frauds of demons, which they ought to have foreseen and guarded against, by their carelessness lost the name and worship of God. For when they are called Phrygians, or Novatians, or Valentinians, or Marcionites, or Anthropians, or Arians, or by any other name, they have ceased to be Christians, who have lost the name of Christ, and assumed human and external names. Therefore it is the Catholic Church alone which retains true worship. This is the fountain of truth, this is the abode of the faith, this is the temple of God; into which if any one shall not enter, or from which if any shall go out, he is estranged from the hope of life and eternal salvation. No one ought to flatter himself with persevering strife. For the contest is respecting life and salvation, which, unless it is carefully and diligently kept in view, will be lost and extinguished.” (Lactantius, Divine Institutes, Book VI, Chapter 30)
“When after the Apostles heresies had burst forth, and were striving under various names to tear piecemeal and divide the Dove and the Queen of God, did not the Apostolic people require a name of their own, whereby to mark the Unity of the people that were uncorrupted, lest the error of some should rend limb by limb the undefiled virgin of God? Was it not seemly that the chief head should be distinguished by its own peculiar appellation? Suppose, this very day, I entered a populous city. When I had found Marcionites, Apollinarians, Cataphrygians, Novatians, and others of the kind who call themselves Christians, by what name should I recognize the congregation of my own people, unless it were named Catholic? ...Certainly that which has stood through so many ages was not borrowed from man. This name ‘Catholic’ sounds not of Marcion, nor of Apelles, nor of Montanus, nor does it take heretics as its authors.” (Pacian, Epistle 1, Chapter 5)
"The Church, ordained by the Lord and established by His Apostles, is one for all; but the frantic folly of discordant sects has severed them from her. And it is obvious that these dissensions concerning the faith result from a distorted mind, which twists the words of Scripture into conformity with its opinion, instead of adjusting that opinion to the words of Scripture. And thus, amid the clash of mutually destructive errors, the Church stands revealed not only by her own teaching, but by that of her rivals" (Hilary of Poitiers, On the Trinity, Book VII, Chapter 4)
"Now then let me finish what still remains to be said for the Article, 'In one Holy Catholic Church', on which, though one might say many things, we will speak but briefly. It is called Catholic then because it extends over all the world, from one end of the earth to the other; and because it teaches universally and completely one and all the doctrines which ought to come to men's knowledge, concerning things both visible and invisible, heavenly and earthly...But since the word 'Ecclesia' is applied to different things (as also it is written of the multitude in the theatre of the Ephesians, 'And when he had thus spoken, he dismissed the [Ecclesia]'), and since one might properly and truly say that there is a Church of evildoers, I mean the meetings of the heretics, the Marcionists and Manichees, and the rest, for this cause the Faith has securely delivered to you now the Article, 'And in one Holy Catholic Church'; that you may avoid their wretched meetings, and ever abide with the Holy Church Catholic in which you were regenerated." (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, Lecture 18, Chapters 23 and 26)
"I will tell you my opinion briefly and without reserve. We ought to remain in that Church which was founded by the Apostles and continues to this day. If ever you hear of any that are called Christians taking their name not from the Lord Jesus Christ, but from some other, for instance, Marcionites, Valentinians, Men of the mountain or the plain, you may be sure that you have there not the Church of Christ, but the synagogue of Antichrist. For the fact that they took their rise after the foundation of the Church is proof that they are those whose coming the Apostle foretold. And let them not flatter themselves if they think they have Scripture authority for their assertions, since the devil himself quoted Scripture, and the essence of the Scriptures is not the letter, but the meaning. Otherwise, if we follow the letter, we too can concoct a new dogma and assert that such persons as wear shoes and have two coats must not be received into the Church." (Jerome, The Dialogue Against the Luciferians, Chapter 28)
"If you find someone who is said to be a heretic, beware of even reading his books, lest the poison of death enter your heart. Remain in the doctrine you have learned in the holy Church; persist in it, and if anything else is taught, reject it. Avoid even the appearance of false knowledge, which falsely bears the name of wisdom. For, as the Apostle says, many have gone astray from sound doctrine." (Isaiah the Solitary, Oration IV, Chapter 6)
"'We will make you likenesses of gold, with studs of silver; while the King is at his repose.' For those who are from the Law and the Prophets believed only moderately in the glory of the Lord Jesus; but now that His truths have been spread among the peoples and more frequently examined, they are all the more firmly established. The frequent persecutions of the Church have brought honor to the righteous, and the victories of the martyrs have given us glorious titles. Thus, just as good aroma spreads further when it is crushed, so too the Church, though afflicted, does not wither but shines forth all the more brilliantly. When Christ comes into His kingdom, and lays His head to rest in His Church, then the lost sheep of the house of Israel — which once had no place to rest its head — returns to its Lord, who now finds a fragrant faith. And so the Church says: 'My nard gave its fragrance.' And she says it while awaiting her reward with confidence." (Ambrose, Sermon 3 on Psalm 117, Chapter 7)
“For this reason therefore have they gone astray from the belly, because ‘they have spoken false things’? Or rather have they not for this reason spoken false things, because they have gone astray from the belly? For in the belly of the Church truth abideth. Whosoever from this belly of the Church separated shall have been, must needs speak false things: must needs, I say, speak false things; whoso either conceived would not be, or whom when conceived the mother hath expelled. Thence heretics exclaim against the Gospel (to speak in preference of those whom expelled we lament).” (Augustine, Expositions on the Book of Psalms, Psalm 58, Chapter 5)
“But the Church of Christ, the careful and watchful guardian of the doctrines deposited in her charge, never changes anything in them, never diminishes, never adds, does not cut off what is necessary, does not add what is superfluous, does not lose her own, does not appropriate what is another’s, but while dealing faithfully and judiciously with ancient doctrine, keeps this one object carefully in view,—if there be anything which antiquity has left shapeless and rudimentary, to fashion and polish it, if anything already reduced to shape and developed, to consolidate and strengthen it, if any already ratified and defined, to keep and guard it.” (Vincent of Lerins, Commonitory, Chapter 23)
"The Lord has said to his prophet: 'See, I have this day set you over the nations and over the kingdoms to root out and to pull down and to destroy and...to build and to plant.' In every age, He bestows the same grace upon his church, that His Body may be preserved intact and that the poison of heretical opinions may nowhere prevail over it. And now also do we see the words fulfilled. 'For the Church of Christ not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing' has with the sword of the gospel cut down the Origenist serpents crawling out of their caves, and has delivered from their deadly contagion the fruitful host of the monks of Nitria." (Theophilus of Alexandria, Epistle 90 among the Epistles of Jerome)
"Those who embrace orthodoxy and join the number of those who are being saved from the heretics, we receive in the following regular and customary manner: Arians, Macedonians, Sabbatians, Novatians, those who call themselves Cathars and Aristae, Quartodeciman or Tetradites, Apollinarians -- these we receive when they hand in statements and anathematise every heresy which is not of the same mind as the holy, catholic and apostolic church of God." (Council of Constantinople I, Canon 7)
"Having, as we have said, received this message and this faith, the Church, though dispersed over all the world, guards them as carefully as though it lived in one house, believes them as with one soul and the same heart, and preaches, teaches and transmits them in unison, as with one mouth. For even if the languages of the world are different, the meaning of the tradition is one and the same. The churches founded in Germany have not believed differently or transmitted the tradition differently—or the ones founded among the Iberians, the Celts, in the east, in Libya, or in the center of the earth. As the sun, a creature of God, is one and the same the world over, so the light of the mind, the proclamation of the truth, shines everywhere and illumines all who are willing to come to a knowledge of truth. The ablest speaker of the church’s leaders will say nothing different from these things, for no man is above his master nor will the feeble speaker diminish the tradition. For as faith is one and the same, he who has much to say of it cannot enlarge it, and he who has little to say has not diminished it." (Epiphanius, Panarion, Heresy 31, Chapter 31)
"And thus I have written for the one who wishes <to know> the ordering of our life and steadfast confession, that which has been preserved without defilement in the catholic Church, from the law and the prophets and Gospels and apostles, and from the times of the apostles until our own times. But against a malice of confusion of the one and true faith, season after season, because of the heresies, [I have written concerning] our same faith (and hope and salvation) which was persecuted, but abided in its truth, while the heresies of each age defiled themselves and were estranged from the church." (Epiphanius, Ancoratus, Chapter 82)
"For when the city began to be rebuilt again, many from all sides attacked it, exulting with envy—not just once or twice, but repeatedly. The same thing happened also in the Church. For when it began to emerge, all attacked it constantly: at first kings, peoples, and tyrants; later, the snares of heretics. And a great, varied, and manifold war was stirred up on all sides; yet it did not prevail. Rather, the enemies were defeated, and the Church flourishes." (John Chrysostom, Commentary on the Psalms, Psalm 128, v. 4)
"'That you may know,' he says, 'how you ought to behave yourself in the house of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.' Not like that Jewish house. For it is this that maintains the faith and the preaching of the Word. For the truth is the pillar and the ground of the Church." (John Chrysostom, Commentary on First Timothy, Homily 11)
"“We come next in the order of belief to the Holy Church. We have mentioned above why the Creed does not say here, as in the preceding article, ‘In the Holy Church.’ They, therefore, who were taught above to believe in one God, under the mystery of the Trinity, must believe this also, that there is one holy Church in which there is one faith and one baptism, in which is believed one God the Father, and one Lord Jesus Christ, His Son, and one Holy Ghost. This is that holy Church which is without spot or wrinkle. For many others have gathered together Churches, as Marcion, and Valentinus, and Ebion, and Manichaeus, and Arius, and all the other heretics. But those Churches are not without spot or wrinkle of unfaithfulness. And therefore the Prophet said of them, ‘I hate the Church of the malignants, and I will not sit with the ungodly.’ But of this Church which keeps the faith of Christ entire, hear what the Holy Spirit says in the Canticles, ‘My dove is one; the perfect one of her mother is one.’” (Rufinus of Aquileia, A Commentary on the Apostles’ Creed, Chapter 39)
"'For just as lightning comes out of the east and appears as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of man.' Do not go out; do not believe that the Son of man is either in the desert of the Gentiles or in the inner rooms of the heretics. Believe rather that faith in him shines in the Catholic churches from the east as far as the west. The following should also be said: that the second coming of the Savior will be manifested not in humility, as the first, but in glory. And so, it is foolish to look in a small or hidden place for him who is the light of the whole world." (Jerome, Commentary on Matthew, Chapter 24, v. 27)
I shall talk about the infallibility of the Church in the next few posts.
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