The churches separated from Rome

Front matter

Mscets ee

THE INTERNATIONAL CATHOLIC LIBRARY

Edited by Rev. J. Wingeum, D.D., Ph.D. Joint Author of the Manual of Catholic Theology

Contents

CHAP. PAGE I. THe Cuurcu oF ENGLAND . ‘ ; . ; |

II. THe EASTERN ScHISMS—

1. Tue NATIONAL CHuRCHES EAST OF THE ROMAN

Chapter I The Church Of England I Origins Of The Anglican Church

ENGLAND is, of all the countries of the world, the one where ecclesiastical origin 1s most visibly connected with the Holy Apostolic See of Rome. Deep obscurity envelops the primitive times of the Churches of Africa, Spain, and France. In a celebrated letter, Pope Innocent I. declares that these countries received their first pastors from Rome, and that, at any rate, it is impossible to prove the contrary. No established fact can deny this positive assertion, while historical probability is in its favour. Details, however, are not forthcoming. Putting aside unauthorised legends, we have no documents relating to the first evangelisation of these countries. On the contrary, the history of the foundation of the English Church is known to us; firstly, by the writings of the Venerable Bede, a conscientious Anglo- Saxon historian, who possessed more knowledge than any of his contemporaries, and who wrote only one century after the first missions; secondly, by the original letters of Pope St. Gregory the Great and A

_ his successors. We can scarcely demand more evidence than this.

The evangelisation of Germany is also clearly known. Like that of England, it was the result of pontifical solicitude. There is, however, this difference. In Germany the initiative is Anglo-Saxon and not Roman. The Popes intervened, doubtless, but only to further and direct a work undertaken by others than themselves. The Erwalds, Willibrords, and Bonifaces set, themselves independently to their own tasks. At an early period, it is true, the two latter solicited the Roman patronage, which was most readily granted to them. But one cannot give to the Popes Sergius, or Gregory II., or Gregory III., or Zachary the title of “ Apostle” of the Frisians or 'Teutons, whereas no Englishman will refuse to consider St. Gregory the Great as the Apostle of the English nation. It is to this great Pope that the honour reverts of having conceived and put into execution the project of evangelising the Anglo-Saxons, owing to his having sent across the Channel, missionaries, chosen from the circle of monks who were his intimate disciples. Who is there among the Christians of England who can approach without emotion the solitary avenues of the Cluus Scaurt where the memory of this celebrated Pope still flourishes? Among those ruins of an ancient monastery, in that basilica, in those gardens and oratories, he seems to be gazing on the cradle of his religion—almost on that of his nation :—

Thus was the conversion of England commemorated in the epitaph of St. Gregory. This triumph of the “Consul of God” has never been contested.

Like all works of this kind, the English mission met with many difficulties. The first contingent of monks found their ranks diminishing. New missionaries had to be sent, new leaders especially, for labourers for the Lord’s vineyard began to flock in from Ireland and France. It was Pope Vitalian who gave to the English Church its definite organisation in the person of Theodore. It was under the guidance of this great bishop that the elements composing evangelisng communities were gathered together; that ecclesiastical formalism was arrested; that law, instruction, and the administration of religious rites were solidly established.

The Church of England was, then, a colony of the Church of Rome. This relationship was exhibited even in the architecture and the nomenclature of the churches. In the metropolitan town of Canterbury the principal church was called after the Lateran Church of Rome, St. Saviour’s. At a little distance from it one finds, as in Rome, a church erected in honour of the Forty Martyrs. Beyond the walls of the town there was a church, named after the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, which contained the tombs of the archbishops and kings of Kent. Canterbury was a miniature Rome; the English Church a daughter of the Church of Rome—perchance a better-loved one than those already in existence, certainly bearing a nearer resemblance to her and nestling closely under the maternal wings. Such, in rough outline, is undoubtedly the history of the origin of the Christian Church among the Anglo- Saxons. Such the starting-point of the great ecclesiastical development which produced, in the sixteenth century, that Church upon which the so-called reforming experiments of Henry VIII., Edward VI., and Elizabeth were practised. Separated at length from unity with the Church of Rome, she has kept up her establishment and office as the “ National Church of England.” She may suppose, indeed, that the changes brought about in the sixteenth century have, from a Protestant point of view, re-established her in “ primitive Christianity,” but she cannot deny that her origin is other than what has been shown, and that her present attitude towards the Roman Church is peculiarly inexplicable. One is able to understand that Christian Churches which can claim apostolic founders such as St. John, St. Thomas, and St. Andrew may have a colourable excuse for claiming, from such a circumstance, a pretext for individualism, and that they boast of their antiquity and apostolical descent; but in England, historical evidence is clear. ‘The English Church can claim to be apostolic only in so far as she is Roman.

II

I am aware that efforts have been made to avoid the consequences of this fact. I have read, with much benefit, remarkable works on Celtic Christianity, with which distinguished members of the Anglican clergy strive to connect the existing establishment. Their efforts to throw light on the history of ancient books, and on English and Irish customs, are much to be commended; but it would be chimerical to believe that they will ever draw from these studies any serious argument bearing on the present discussion. ‘The English Church, it is true, succeeded a Celtic one in Great Britain. But the succession was a purely material one. There was no bond of union between the two. The Hungarian Church of the eleventh century is established in the same country as the Pannonian Church of the fourth and fifth centuries. Can it be said, however, that the archbishoprics of Gran or Colocza have succeeded those of Guirinus of Siscia, of [renzus or of Anemius of Sirmium? Can a succession be shown in ecclesiastical matters from the Church in -the fifth century to the Church in the eleventh ? Surely not. Between the old Latinised Christianity of the Danubian provinces and the Christianity propagated about the year 1000 among the newly arrived pagan Hungarians, there is identity of doctrme truly, but at the same time historical discontinuity. In England the situation is not less evident. The ancient British Church is not the mother of the Church of England—she is an older but an unfriendly sister. ‘The situation is a well-recognised one.

‘The conquering Anglo-Saxons drove those of the Christian population whom they did not slay westward. Teutonic paganism established itself in place of Roman Christianity in the dominion occupied by the conquerors. Neither the English authors, Gildas, nor Nennius, nor the Anglo-Saxon Bede have given any indication of the persistence of Christianity anywhere in the invaded territories. The documents treating of the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons only speak of the pagans and the Roman missionaries. No bishop, clerk, or layman appears in these recitals to cast even a shadow of the modern idea of a transmission or continuity, however slight, of British Christianity in England. Moreover, the Church of Britain is mentioned, indeed, but only as having formally and solemnly refused to associate itself with the work of evangelismg the pagan conquerors. The few British Christians who survived in Wales seem to have lived in dread of meeting their hated spoliators in heaven! ‘They may be passed over. But once the Roman missionaries and the Irish monks had founded the English Church, a distinct and complete schism separated this new foundation from the old British one. This situation is too well known for it to be insisted upon here. I would only point to one fact. St. Chad had been appointed to the archbishopric of Northumbria at a moment when the episcopal See was vacant and the Anglo- Saxon Church was disorganised. His consecration was at Wessex, by Wini, an Anglo-Saxon bishop, assisted by two British bishops. In the trying position in which he found himself, Wini had thought he might appeal to the clergy of the neighbouring country. ‘This act sufficed to produce the following result. ‘The primate Theodore, having entered on his primatial duties, declared Chad’s consecration to be null and void. Then, not wishing to lose the services of so capable an ecclesiastic, he actually re-ordained him for the Church of Mercia and the archbishopric of Lichfield.

Even in those days the validity of ordinations was discussed on principles evidently different from, and even more strict than those of the present day. In whatever way the change may be regarded, the re-ordination of St. Chad demonstrates the hostility of the relations between the British and the English Churches. But, it may be remarked, surely the Anglo-Saxon Church is Celtic—that is, Irish—if not British in her origin. No one is more desirous than I am not to diminish the importance of the part played in Northumbria, and in other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, by the saintly apostles of Lindisfarne. To the venerable figures of St. Aidan, St. Finian, St. Colman, and St. Cuthbert I yield deep and almost patriotic respect. I acknowledge their work for the evangelising of England after the time of St. Augustine and St. Paulinus. But can it possibly be denied that their efforts were entirely absorbed in the general movement emanating from Rome and Kent? It is impossible to admit that the English Church, definitely organised under the government of Theodore, with his chosen and accepted staff, ever saw in them her real directors. Zealous missionaries, renowned ascetics, preachers by their example even more than by their words, they have been, and always will be, venerated and invoked by the Christians of England. But from the very beginning the English were remarkable for that spirit of order which even now distinguishes their descendants. Between Irish enthusiasm and Roman discipline there was but brief hesitation. By the year 664 the Scottish rite had been abandoned in Northumbria, only thirty years after the arrival of the first Scottish missionaries. The primatial See of Canterbury represents the primitive Roman colony. The patrons of the other metropolitan See, that of York, are Paulinus, the Roman missionary, and Wilfrid, the ultramontane Englishman, to whom Theodore himself appeared to be the very essence of moderation.

Ill

The “bonds of union” between Celtic Christianity and the English Church can now be clearly seen. Need we probe further? Let us admit for a moment, and for the sake of argument, that these “bonds” are historically proved, instead of being, as indeed they are, historically inadmissible. Let us look at that British Church from which, it is true, Irish Christianity was derived, through St. Patrick. What do we know of its history, and above all of its hierarchical rule? Little or nothing. Passing over the first three centuries of Christianity, of which the history of Britain gives us no account, we can only at the most trace back to a persecution anterior to that of Diocletian the martyrs mentioned by Gildas, St. Alban of Verulam, St. Aaron and St. Julian of Caerleon. In the fourth century three or four English dioceses were represented at the Council of Arles in 314; the English bishops protested, in 357, against the introduction of an Arian creed; many of them assisted, in 859, at the Council of Rimini, where, if they failed like the rest, they nevertheless gave great edification by their apostolic poverty and independence of character. In the fifth century, when the Roman authorities had left the island, Pelagianism, of which the author was a British monk, broke out in the country, and necessitated the sending of an orthodox legation. St. Germanus of Auxerre, designated by the bishops of Gaul, but delegated by Pope Celestine, arrived in Great Britain, and succeeded, during the course of two successive missions, in bringing back the British clergy to orthodoxy.

Palladius, a British or Roman deacon, was ordained bishop by Pope Celestine, and sent by him to govern the converted Scots. In 455, the year in which the Paschal computation gave rise to special difficulties, the Knglish Church, at the request of Pope Leo, altered the date which had been previously fixed for the observance of Faster. And this is all, excepting of course legends, which, though ancient, are untrustworthy from the historian’s point of view. Can any special independence towards the See of Rome be traced in this series of facts? Personally I observe in this meagre information several very distinct points to be noticed concerning the relations between the ancient British Church and the Apostolic See. The British bishops, together with the bishops of Constantine’s empire, signed, in 3814, the synodical letter addressed to Pope Sylvester, wherein the Pope figures, categorically, not only as the Chief Bishop of the West, but as the Superior of the whole western episcopacy. In the fifth century the Pope makes efforts to maintain the British Church in orthodoxy and to increase it by furthering the progress of the missionaries. He _ takes precise measures for both causes, delegating and authorising special persons. Bearing in mind the - customs of these ancient times and the rarity of known facts, can we reasonably ask for further proofs? The Church of Great Britain resembled, in her relationship with Rome, the French and Spanish Churches, and, indeed, all the western Churches in union with the Holy See.

IV

This resemblance is willingly admitted, and in order to escape from having to acknowledge the Roman supremacy, refuge is taken by some in French tradition. It is, moreover, quite natural that the relationships of the Church of Britain should be found to be identical with those of the French

Church. Unless we accept the improbable legends on the evangelising of Great Britain by Joseph of Arimathea, or the accounts, not quite accurate, perhaps, but more authentic, of the relations between Pope Eleutherius and King Lucius, we must admit that Christianity was propagated, only by slow degrees, in those distant western regions, and that it was carried over from Gaul to England. These conditions of origin include the hierarchical conditions of the Church of Britain with that of Gaul; possibly the Church of Gaul may have been subordinate to that of Great Britain. Now, what do we know of the relations between the Gallic Church and the Church of Rome? Of the period before Constantine the Church of Gaul can produce only three documents, and nomore. ‘l'wocome from Lyons, the third from Africa, but this last presupposes other Lyonese writings. The first document is a compendium of histories of the martyrs of the year 177, and partly emanating from them. ‘The second is the literary work of St. Irenzus; the third is a letter [the sixtyeighth] of St. Cyprian, written at the instigation of Faustin, Bishop of Lyons.

“ Nothing is better fitted than these writings for showing the close union which existed between Rome and the Churches of Gaul, notably those of Lyons and Arles. ‘The martyrs of 177 are in correspondence with Pope Eleutherius; they write to him about the Montanists’ prophecies, calling him their Father, Pater Eleutherius, and recommending to him the bearer of the letter, the priest Ireneeus, in terms which presuppose former relations and mutual esteem. As to St. Irenzeus himself, connected as he was with the interior affairs of the Roman Church, he is perhaps, of all the Fathers, the one who has spoken most strongly on the necessity of being in union with the Apostolic See. In the middle of the third century a letter of St. Cyprian proves the existence of this union ; if any serious disorder arose in the Church of Gaul, care was taken that the Pope should be informed, the responsibility was considered to devolve upon him, and it was to him that the duty and the right were attributed of dismissing and replacing a bishop who had gone astray.” ?

The above facts are not new; the relations which they prove are very clear, and in no way appear to have been interpreted in a contrary sense to that which would naturally result from Roman origin in each case. We may then admit that, whatever were the national elements of which they were composed, the old Christian communities on Gallic soil considered themselves to be daughters of the Roman Church. Thus, even admitting the very problematical relationship with the British Church, the Anglican Church finds herself, from her most remote origin, in the same hierarchical position as the one so clearly deduced from the documents relating to her real foundation in the time of St. Gregory and under his care.

This situation is surely a very different one from that which results for the Church of France, in her present relations, or from that in which the schism of the sixteenth century found the Anglican Church. Between these two extremities of the chain there is what may be termed ecclesiastical centralisation. It. would take too long to enter here on an examination of the history of this centralisation. Let us be satisfied with affirming that its development is easily traced to

1 Duchesne, Fastes épiscopaue de Uancienne Gaule, vol. i.

its source, and that if, in its successive stages, it shows great variety of form and intensity, it is inspired on the whole, throughout, with the same principles, and tends towards the same goal. Principles and end may be described in one word: Unum sint. Centralisation is the organisation of unity, and is also its safeguard. Now and again it has been reproached for narrowness and for over-minuteness. Like all institutions in this world, it is subject to abuses and to reform. If occasion for criticism presents itself, let us not forget the essential services it has rendered. Neither must we lose sight of the higher aims which are the goal of its existence. Unity is the church’s ideal; it is her distinctive mark in the Creed: Credoim unam .. . Licclesiam. Whether we arrive by one or another path, the essential point is to attain to unity. Our one duty, then, is to maintain it.

Chapter II The Eastern Schisms I

THE NATIONAL CHURCHES EAST OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

In studying the origins of Christianity, the Roman Kmpire alone is usually taken into consideration. It was on its eastern frontier that Christianity was born, and the light of the Gospel moved westward, conquering those provinces subject to the Roman Kmpire. At all events, this is the principal feature of its progress dwelt upon by historians.

Nevertheless there were, outside the Roman Empire, important States bounding it on the east ; first of all the Empire of Parthia, then the kingdoms of Armenia and Ethiopia. This latter kingdom, curious to relate, subsists, at the present day, much in the same condition as it was known to the contemporaries of Justinian. There is now neither a Roman emperor nor a king of Armenia known, save by a few coats of arms—the Shah of Persia is quite another being from the “ King of Kings”; but there is still a Negus, a Christian king of Ethiopia, who may yet survive many centuries, although at this moment he has at his heels a nation both powerful and contemptuous of the antiquities of political rights.

Sooner or later all these kingdoms were reached 13 by the preaching of the Gospel. Christian centres were formed and grouped themselves into churches, practically, that is for all ordinary purposes, independent of the Byzantine Church. In Armenia and Ethiopia these Churches very soon acquired an official position. ‘The sovereign became a Christian. As protector of the Church he concurred in the choice and direction of its principal representatives, in the same respects as in the Roman Empire.

In Persia it was otherwise. There, there was another official religion which would, without doubt, have ended in yielding to Christianity, without much violence, that place from which Islamism ultimately forced it; but in point of fact, as long as the Sassanide dynasty lasted, it remained the religion of King and State. Christianity was only tolerated.

But let us go more into detail, beginning with Persia.

The boundary between the Roman and the Parthian or Persian Empires crossed the Euphrates in an almost desert region, traversed only by nomadic Arabs. ‘Towards the north, in the direction of the Tigris, it ran through a more thickly populated country of the Syriac tongue. Edessa was still, in the first century, the capital of a selfgoverning State, more or less a vassal of Rome, but in the third century it was incorporated into the provincial territory.

At Nineveh the boundary came under the dominion of the Iranian monarch. Between Edessa and Assyria the fortress of Nisibis changed masters several times. For a long period it belonged to the Romans, who, in 368, relinquished it to the Persians, and they retained possession of it.

To the west as well as .to the east of the frontier the same language was spoken, which facilitated religious intercourse. Edessa was won over to Christianity at an early date, and sent missionaries into the neighbouring countries, who, little by little, converted all the pagans on the banks of the Tigris, on the southern slopes of the tableland of Armenia, and in the fertile plains of Chaldea and Suzon. The Parthian kings seem not to have put a single obstacle in the way of this propaganda; their successors, who were Persians, from a.p. 226, were more strict in their attachment to “ Mazdeism,’ but they still allowed the Christians to multiply and organise. However, about a.p. 340, war broke out between Persia and the now Christian Roman Empire. The faithful of the Armenian or frontier provinces, crossed by the routes of invasion, were suspected of being in league with the enemy. Persecution consequently broke out in its turn, and was both long and cruel. The King of Persia at that time was the famous Sapor II. ‘Towards the middle of the following century there were troublous times, after which the relations between Church and State became tolerable. It was, it is true, forbidden to proselytise the Mazdeists ; but, so long as the faithful addressed themselves only to pagans and Jews, they had not much to fear.

It was under these conditions that the Church in Persia was organised. From the beginning of the fourth century 1t was governed by numerous bishops, and, a little later on, this episcopate was divided into ecclesiastical provinces, governed by metropolitans, precisely after the manner established in the empire. The supreme head was bishop of the royal town of Aramenia, the double city of Seleucia-Ctesiphon, to whom was given the Greek title “Catholicos,” which signifies “‘ Charge of all.”

The Syriac territories of Assyria and Chaldea, with the mountainous dependencies of Kurdistan, were nearly, if not entirely, Christian. The faithful were less numerous in the eastern provinces of Media, Khorassan, and Persia, properly so called. Nevertheless, in all these countries there were bishoprics, extending even to the deserts of Turkestan and the oasis of Merv. ‘The metropolitan of Persia had suffragans on both shores of the Persian Gulf, and even beyond it, in the islands of Socotra, Ceylon, and on the coasts of Malabar. ‘These ramifications were, doubtless, more missions than Christian communities firmly established, and the same may be said of still farther distant affiliations in Tartary, and onwards into the very heart of China.

The dominion of the “Catholicos” of Seleucia was of no mean dimensions, and by the extension of his jurisdiction this high ecclesiastical dignitary figures in the same light as the greatest of the Byzantine Patriarchs. We might almost go farther and say that, inasmuch as we can compare the Persian Empire to the Roman, the Persian Church may be compared to the Church of the great westerh power.

Between these two branches of the Christian world the relations were of the easiest, united as they were by one faith, one morality, and the same general discipline, and governed by the same institutions ; but communication was rare owing to political difficulties. There was nearly always a _ breach between the two empires, and when not actually fighting, they were usually preparing for war. ‘The

Persian bishops hardly ever showed themselves at the Byzantine Councils, except in very exceptional cases. Nevertheless, the decisions of these Councils, and even the religious regulations of the Roman Emperors, entered into the ecclesiastical code of the Persian Church. They possessed the sentiment of unity, and expressed it as best they could.

These relations became troubled towards the end of the fifth century by theological disputes, of which I shall speak later on. Let us, first of all, say a word about the actual state of things. What remains now of this immense development? Very little indeed. Islamism overran the Persian Empire about the middle of the seventh century, and in the eighth and ninth the invasions of the Mongols completed the state of ruin, and the old religion of Zoroaster ended by being extirpated in the land of its birth; it no longer exists, save in the colonies of refugees, among the Parsees of Bombay. Christianity held out a little longer, and is now represented by the Nestorian or Chaldean communities of Kurdistan and Mesopotamia. The Chaldean Catholics represent those Christians of the ancient Persian Church who, in recent ages, have made their submission to the Holy See. The Nestorians are those who have remained in schism, or rather, who have reverted to it after an interval of union. They live amongst the Mussulmans of Kurdistan on the high mountains of Hakiari, and are in a state of semi-barbarism. Among them is to be found the traditional successor of the “ Catholicos” of Seleucia, who, for some long time, has always adopted the name of Simon (Mar Schimoun) which has thus become a sort of title.

Outside these two colonies we must also mention

B the important communities on the coast of Malabar, who are separated on the ground of doctrinal differences and heresy, but they are all the descendants of the ancient missions sent out from the Persian Empire in the sixth century, and even in the fourth, if not still earlier.

I said just now that Armenia had also its national Church, whose origins are very clearly explained by the legend of St. Gregory the Illuminator, but from a strict historical standpoint they are somewhat obscure. In any case, they do not seem to go back further than the time of Constantine, in whose family the movement began—every one was converted after the example of the sovereign, and organisation was thus made easy. Here, as in other places, the prevailing tongue was made the liturgical language, and the supreme direction of the Church was confided to a bishop-in-chief—a “Catholicos,” under whom were ranged the other prelates, distributed according to the circumscriptions of the different provinces. This hierarchy maintained its unity throughout the kingdom, and adapted itself to its boundaries. When, in 440, the Armenian kingdom disappeared, the Armenian Church was strong enough to survive it, and retain its nationality. The kingdom was divided between the two great neighbouring empires, and there arose a Roman and a Persian Armenia, but neither the Byzantine nor the Persian Churches benefited by this division. The Armenian bishops neither entered the fold of the Patriarch of Constantinople nor that of the Catholicos of Seleucia, but remained grouped around the national primate, despite the change of frontiers. And yet, at this time, no dogmatic differences existed. The ecclesiastical monophysitism was yet to come, the Persian Church was not yet

Nestorian. Nothing seemed to stand in the way of fusion, yet it did not take place. Furthermore, for the Greek colonies, which were founded in Roman Armenia, new bishoprics were formed, like that of Theodosiopolis (Erzeroum), dependent on the metropolitan of Caesarea. In the Persian district Syriac bishoprics arose, attached to the metropolitan Sees of Adiabene or Media. Neither the Greeks of Pontus nor the Araminians of Mesopotamia found themselves at home in the Armenian Church. This seems to me a very remarkable circumstance, and one that is not appreciated as it ought to be. I need scarcely remind my readers that the Armenian Church still exists, full of life, counting its faithful by several millions, still grouped, at all events in theory, around the national primate, the Catholicos of Etchmiadzin. This residence, or at all events the canton in which it is situated, corresponds to the ancient capital. There were situated in ancient days the royal burghs of Artaxasa, Valarschapat and Dovin.

The isolation of the Church of Ethiopia is guaranteed by its geographical situation. Between Egypt and Abyssinia the distance is great, whilst the population is small and scattered. There were, without doubt, missions in these countries, but strangely enough, they came directly from Constantinople, and not from Egypt or Ethiopia. In this latter country the Gospel did not attain complete success—that is to say, the conversion of the monarch and the bulk of the nation—till about the beginning of the sixth century. The successful missions came from the patriarchate of Alexandria, to which also belonged the earlier attempts at missionary enterprise. This was the situation of the Church in the

Kast, before it was modified by the monophysite heresy. ‘There were, within the Roman Empire, the four patriarchates, Constantinople (Thrace and Asia Minor), Antioch (Syria, Silicia, and Mesopotamia), Jerusalem (Palestine), and Alexandria (Egypt) ; outside the empire, the national Churches of Persia, Armenia, and Ethiopia. All these were united in one faith, and held more or less frequent intercourse with each other. They concurred, with the remembrance of their evangelisation, in maintaining exterior union, in so far as the difference of language and political events permitted.