Church and State as Seen in the Formation of ChristendomAllies, T. W. (Thomas William)
Religion
Church and State as Seen in the Formation of Christendom
Allies, T. W. (Thomas William)
Church and state; Church history -- Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600; Religion and state
The second is that of the Teacher. A principal part of His ministry while
on earth certainly was to teach. He was the Prophet that was to come into
the world, and all that He taught bore reference to the two acts just
dwelt upon, that He came forth from God and was going to God. Not a
sentence of His teaching but presupposes His Incarnation and His Passion.
That whole body of truth, therefore, which He did not write down
Himself, but committed to the living ministry of His Apostles, proceeds,
as it were, out of His Pontificate, and rests upon it. It is the truth of
the Word made flesh, and of God sacrificed for His creatures. The gift of
teaching, as the illuminating power in His Church, corresponds to the
virtue of faith in the taught, and implies the possession of truth in the
teacher. As the priesthood has a perpetual sacrifice stored up within it,
and a perpetual gift of grace accompanying it, so the teaching has a
perpetual gift of truth. The fountain of truth, therefore, in this Power,
can be no more discoloured and polluted than the fountain of grace in the
priesthood can be turned into sin. By virtue of it Christ remains for
ever the one Teacher and Master whom all His people have to follow.
Theology is an outcome of this Power. The issuing of doctrinal decrees is
grounded upon it, and the censure of writings and of all false opinions
on whatever subject which may impair Christian doctrine.
The third direction of the one Power is that of ruling and ordering, not
to be separated from the former two, since it consists, in fact, in the
free, legitimate, and ordered use of them, and has, therefore, been
termed Jurisdiction, inasmuch as it is government in the whole domain of
grace and truth. In every government there is a power which administers,
a power which legislates, a power which judges, and all these in the
sovereign degree; that is, in a degree not liable to revision and
reversal in the respective subject-matter. If we apply these three acts
to the full domain of grace and truth, which is the domain of the
Incarnate Son (John i. 14), set up in the world, we express that royalty
which is the third attribute of the priesthood. It comprehends supreme
pastorship in all its range; legislation in the kingdom of truth; and
judgment, whether external or internal, in the spiritual tribunal.
This was the Power, one and indivisible in itself, triple in its
direction, which Christ took from His own Person as part of the all-power
given to Him, and delegated to the Ruler of His Church, that in the
exercise of it He might fulfil all prophecy concerning Himself, and be at
once Priest, Prophet, and King: and out of this He made and makes His
people.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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