Writings in Connection with the Donatist ControversyAugustine, of Hippo, Saint
ReligionChristian
Writings in Connection with the Donatist Controversy
Augustine, of Hippo, Saint
Donatists; Donatists -- Controversial literature
CHAP. II.--3. And so the Donatists in some matters are with us; in
some matters have gone out from us. Accordingly, those things wherein
they agree with us we forbid them not to do; but in those things in
which they differ from us, we earnestly endeavour that they should come
and receive them from us, or return and recover them, as the case may
be. We do not therefore say to them, "Abstain from giving baptism,"
but "Abstain from giving it in schism." Nor do we say to those whom
we see them on the point of baptizing, "Do not receive the baptism,"
but "Do not receive it in schism." For if any one were compelled by
urgent necessity, being unable to find a Catholic from whom to receive
baptism, and so, while preserving Catholic peace in his heart, should
receive from one without the pale of Catholic unity the sacrament
which he was intending to receive within its pale, this man, should he
forthwith depart this life, we deem to be none other than a Catholic.
But if he should be delivered from the death of the body, on his
restoring himself in bodily presence to that Catholic congregation
from which in heart he had never departed, so far from blaming his
conduct, we should praise it with the greatest truth and confidence;
because he trusted that God was present to his heart, while he was
striving to preserve unity, and was unwilling to depart this life
without the sacrament of holy baptism, which he knew to be of God, and
not of men, wherever he might find it. But if any one who has it in his
power to receive baptism within the Catholic Church prefers, from some
perversity of mind, to be baptized in schism, even if he afterwards
bethinks himself to come to the Catholic Church, because he is assured
that there that sacrament will profit him, which can indeed be received
but cannot profit elsewhere, beyond all question he is perverse, and
guilty of sin, and that the more flagrant in proportion as it was
committed wilfully. For that he entertains no doubt that the sacrament
is rightly received in the Church, is proved by his conviction that it
is there that he must look for profit even from what he has received
elsewhere.
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