Church unity a
First, the concept of Catholicism.
Roman Catholicism usually only recognizes the church as a "teaching organization". The unity of the church is reflected in the universal institutions of churches all over the world. Her real center is not the believers, but the "teaching organization" and its small circle. The lower level is junior priests, priests and other junior staff; Above it is a smaller circle of bishops, above it is a smaller circle of bishops, and above it is the smallest circle of cardinals (or members of the Vatican cabinet)-and the Pope covers the entire top of the "pyramid" and is the tangible head of the Catholic Church, with absolute jurisdiction over his subordinates.
Second, the concept of Christianity.
Christianity emphasizes the unity of the church, which is not external at all, but internal spiritual characteristics. This is the unity of the mysterious body of the Lord Jesus Christ, and all believers are members of this body, which is controlled by a head of state, the Lord Jesus Christ; He is also the king of the church; The life of the church comes from a holy spirit-the spirit of Christ. The meaning of unity means that all people who belong to the church have the same faith, and believers are bound by the same kindness and love. They have a brilliant future and hope for the future. This internal unity is also manifested in the external behavior of believers. They openly worship the God in Christ and attend the same Eucharist. There is no doubt that the Bible clearly tells us that we are all one in the invisible or tangible church. As I Corinthians said in section 12-3 1 ... although there are many members, they are still an institution; "So is Christ. Whether we are Jews, Greeks, slaves or free men, we are all baptized by one Holy Spirit and become one body. ..... "It means the unity of the church. The apostle Paul said in Ephesians 4: 4- 16, "There is only one body and one Holy Spirit, and you have the same hope as when you were called. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God, the father of all things, is above everything, permeates everything and lives in everything. ..... He gave us apostles, prophets, evangelists, priests and teachers; In order to complete the saints, we should do our duty and build the body of Christ until we are all one in truth, know the Son of God and grow up to be full of Christ. ..... even the Fuehrer Christ ... "What Paul said is to pay attention to the unity of the church; He obviously has a tangible church in his heart, because he mentioned the names of various positions in the church. Because of the unity of the church, he exhorted everyone, "always take care of each other;" "If one member suffers, all members suffer together; If one member is honored, all members will be happy together. He also encouraged local churches to provide each other with what they need.
The unity of Roman Catholicism to the church is the unity of the tangible church that respects their "faculty class organization" After the split between the reformists and Roman Catholicism, they did not deny the unity of the visible church, but maintained it. But they can't see the real unity in the "teaching class organization". It is not an external organization that maintains the unity of the church, but a real way to spread the pure gospel and the correct Eucharist. This is consistent with the Belgian creed. The creed goes on to say, "We believe that a holy and open church is a sacred gathering of true believers, and we are all looking forward to salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ, whose precious blood has washed away sins and the Holy Spirit has anointed him. The characteristics of the real church are: "to preach the truth of the gospel; Perform all kinds of sacraments in the way set by the Lord Jesus Christ; Enforce discipline and punish crimes; In short, everything should be done according to the holy word of God; Otherwise, we must resolutely refuse, and we must not favor one over the other; Respect for the Lord Jesus Christ is the only head of the church. Therefore, we can know that the real church, no one has the right to leave it. After the Reformation, reformed theologians also preached the truth of the unity of tangible churches. The Scottish theologian Yujia attached great importance to this. Walker said: "The Christian church has a separate organization only for temporary convenience, otherwise this will never be tolerated by Scottish theologians." In Holland, due to the diversity of churches, the theory of church unity was once lost. The church is divided for two reasons. One is because of regional and dialect differences. This does not hinder unity. One is due to the deviation of doctrine and the misuse of sacraments. The former is due to the care and guidance of God, and the latter is due to the influence of sin, so that the heart is dark and the truth is unknown; In other words, because of its rigid mind, the church should try its best to defend the truth and overcome it. But an invisible church does not have to be represented by a single organization. Moreover, it has been proved that uniting all churches into a huge organization will not produce good results, but will only be a formalism, etiquette and legalism. Again, if the polymorphic church is guided by the care of God, this is the essence of Christianity, which conforms to the law of differentiation. According to this law, when an organism develops, it changes from homogeneous to heterogeneous. Therefore, the inherent richness of the church body is likely to be more beautiful and richer in its polymorphism than in a single external organization. But this does not mean that the church should not strive to achieve a more unified country. There is now a strong church alliance movement. They make a hullabaloo about and run around, but if there is no internal unity, it is a waste of time, even in vain. Seeking unity, compromise, and sacrificing truth, especially against biblical lessons; Although you may get temporary results at work, you won't get tangible benefits mentally, which is not worth the candle. Karl barth said, "The problem of church unity is the same as that of the Lord Jesus Christ. The blessing of unity cannot be separated from the blessed Lord Jesus Christ. Because in him, there is the source and truth of blessing, which is inspired by his words and spirit and becomes our truth through our faith. 」
B the sanctity of the church
First, the concept of Catholicism.
Roman Catholicism's concept of the sanctity of the church is also external. This is not a miracle of the sanctification of the Holy Spirit, which makes the members of the church have inner holiness; But put the sacred etiquette of the church first. According to Father Devine, the church must be sacred first, so that it can be "clean and blameless in her teachings, her moral concepts, her worship and her discipline", ... so that it can have the ability to eliminate evil and carry forward lofty virtues. Father Dehar Bay also said: "The church is sacred, because there are always saints in the church, and their holiness is confirmed by God with miracles and extraordinary grace. 」
Second, the concept of Christianity.
However, Christianity's concept of the sanctity of the church is completely different from that of Catholicism. They oppose religious subjectivism, but in an objective sense. The church is absolutely sacred, which is entirely from the perspective of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because of his redemptive contribution, the righteous replaced the unjust, and because of his righteous nature, the church was regarded as sacred before God. In a relative sense, it is also considered to be subjectively sacred, that is to say, it is truly sacred in the inherent expression of life, and it should be completely sacred. Therefore, she is a group called saints. Sacred righteousness is first of all an inner person, but it is also an external life. Post is the reason, and sacredness also belongs to the tangible church. The holiness of the church means leaving the world, wholeheartedly converting to God and being used by God. In the ethical sense, it is necessary to have a sacred contract with the Lord Jesus Christ. Tangible local churches are composed of believers and their descendants, so all unbelievers and evil elements should be excluded, so as to become a real church of saints.
Universality of the church
First, the concept of Catholicism.
Roman Catholicism owes the Catholic nature of the church to them. It seems that only they have the right to be called the universal church, so Catholicism is also called the Catholic Church. Like the attributes of other churches, they apply universality to their tangible organizations. And they also believe that only the Catholic Church is truly universal. They claim that this is because their churches are all over the world and can adapt to the systems of various countries and governments, and because they have existed since the beginning, and other sects have ups and downs, but their churches always have their "subjects" and loyal "children". This is because they have perfect truth and grace, and they want to spread truth and grace to all mankind, and also because their total number of friends exceeds the sum of all separatist sects.
Second, the concept of Christianity.
Christianity mainly belongs to the invisible church, and the universality of the invisible church is far more real than all existing tangible organizations, and Catholicism cannot compare with it. They are dissatisfied with the arrogant attitude of Roman Catholicism and use this attribute in their own "teaching organization" to the exclusion of all other churches. Christianity insists that the invisible church is fundamentally a true universal church, because it includes believers all over the world at any time, without exception; But also because she is a member of churches that spread the gospel all over the world; Because she has a sense of controlling the life of the whole world in that respect, which is universal. Secondly, they attribute universality to the tangible church. When we talked about the unity of the tangible church above, we have clearly seen that the creed of reformists and orthodoxy shows their belief in the universal tangible church; Reformed theologians in Holland, Scotland and America have repeatedly expressed this belief. However, we can't deny that there are many difficult problems in this theory now, which need to be solved. It is not easy to point out the exact location of this universal tangible church. In addition, there are the following questions: (1) Should sectarianism be thoroughly refuted as advocated by Dr. Henry Van Derwick? (2) Does this mean that one sect is the real church, while other sects are illusory? (3) From what angle can it be decided that a local church or sect no longer constitutes a part of the tangible church? (4) Is it necessary to have a separate system or organization for the unity of the visible church? These problems need further study.