On the Unity of the Catholic Church

1The Lord warns us and says, “You are the salt of the earth” (Matthew 5:13), and he commands us to be simple unto innocence, yet prudent with simplicity. So what else, dearly beloved brothers, should we do but look ahead, and with watchful hearts stay alert, so that we both understand and avoid the snares of the crafty enemy? For we have put on Christ, the wisdom of God the Father, and we must not seem to lack wisdom in guarding our salvation. Persecution alone is not what we must fear, nor the attacks that rage openly to overthrow and cast down the servants of God. Caution is easier where the danger is plain, and the mind is prepared for battle beforehand when the adversary admits who he is. The enemy we must fear and guard against more is the one who creeps up secretly, who deceives through the appearance of peace and crawls near by hidden approaches. That is where he got the name “serpent.” This is always his cunning; this is the blind and lurking deceit by which he traps a person. So from the very beginning of the world he deceived, flattering the untried soul with lying words and catching it by careless trust. So too he tried to tempt the Lord himself, approaching secretly as if he could creep up and deceive him again. But he was recognized and repulsed, and therefore thrown down, because he was known and exposed.

2From this we have been given an example: to flee the way of the old man, to press on in the footsteps of Christ who conquers, so that we may not be caught off guard and fall back into the snare of death, but may be watchful in danger and, having received immortality, gain possession of it. How can we gain possession of immortality unless we keep the commandments of Christ, by which death is defeated and overcome? He himself warns and says, “If you want to enter life, keep the commandments” (Matthew 19:17), and again, “If you do what I command you, I no longer call you servants but friends” (John 15:14-15). These are the ones he calls strong and steadfast, founded upon the rock with a solid mass, made firm with unmovable and unshaken stability against every storm and whirlwind of the world. “Whoever hears my words and does them,” he says, “I will compare to a wise man who built his house upon the rock. The rain fell, the rivers came, the winds blew and beat against that house, and it did not fall, for it was founded upon the rock” (Matthew 7:24-25). We must therefore press on in his words, learning and doing whatever he both taught and did. Otherwise, how can someone say he believes in Christ if he does not do what Christ commanded him to do? Or how will he reach the reward of faith if he refuses to keep the faith of the commandment? He must waver and wander, carried off by the spirit of error like dust that the wind shakes loose and scatters, and he will make no progress toward salvation by walking, because he does not hold the truth of the saving way.

3But we must avoid not only what is open and obvious, but also what deceives through the subtlety of cunning fraud. What could be more cunning or more subtle than this? After the enemy was exposed and laid low by Christ's coming, after light came to the nations and the saving radiance shone forth to rescue humanity—so that the deaf might receive the hearing of spiritual grace, the blind might open their eyes to the Lord, the weak might grow strong with eternal health, the lame might run to the Church, and the mute might pray with clear voices and petitions—he saw the idols abandoned and his seats and temples deserted because of the great number of believers, and so he devised a new fraud: to deceive the unwary under the very title of the Christian name. He invented heresies and schisms, by which he might overthrow faith, corrupt truth, and split unity. Those whom he cannot hold in the blindness of the old way, he circumscribes and deceives with the error of a new journey. He snatches people from the Church itself, and while they seem to have already drawn near to the light and escaped the night of the world, he pours other darkness upon them unawares. So they do not stand with the gospel of Christ and with his observance and law, yet they call themselves Christians; they walk in darkness and think they possess light, because the adversary flatters and deceives them. According to the apostle's word, he transforms himself into an angel of light and equips his ministers as ministers of righteousness, asserting night for day, destruction for salvation, despair under the guise of hope, faithlessness under the pretext of faith, antichrist under the name of Christ—so that while he lies with plausible things, he frustrates truth by subtlety. This happens, most beloved brothers, as long as there is no return to the origin of truth, the head is not sought, and the teaching of the heavenly master is not kept.

4If anyone considers and examines these things, there is no need for a long treatment or arguments. The proof is easy for faith, by a summary of the truth. The Lord says to Peter: "I tell you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the underworld will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven: whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven" (Matthew 16:18-19). He builds the Church upon one man. And although after his resurrection he grants equal power to all the apostles and says: "As the Father sent me, I also send you. Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone's sins, they are forgiven; if you retain anyone's sins, they are retained" (John 20:21-23), yet to make unity manifest, he arranged by his own authority that the origin of this same unity should begin from one. Certainly the other apostles were what Peter was, endowed with equal sharing both of honor and of power, but the beginning proceeds from unity, so that the Church of Christ may be shown to be one. The Holy Spirit also designates this one Church in the Song of Songs, speaking in the person of the Lord, and says: "One is my dove, my perfect one; one is she to her mother, chosen to her who bore her" (Song of Songs 6:9). Does someone who does not hold this unity of the Church believe that he holds the faith? Does someone who opposes and resists the Church trust that he is in the Church? For the blessed apostle Paul also teaches this same thing and shows the sacred sign of unity, saying: "One body and one Spirit, one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God" (Ephesians 4:4-6).

5We must hold firmly to this unity and defend it, especially we bishops who preside in the Church, so that we may prove that the episcopate itself is also one and undivided. Let no one deceive the brotherhood with a lie; let no one corrupt the faith of truth by a treacherous violation. The episcopate is one, and each bishop holds his part in solidum. The Church is one, yet she extends into a multitude more widely by the increase of her fruitfulness. Just as there are many rays of the sun but one light, and many branches of a tree but one trunk grounded in a tenacious root, and just as many streams flow from one spring—though the number seems spread out by the abundance of the overflowing plenty, unity is still preserved in the source—so it is with the Church. Tear a ray from the body of the sun: the unity of the light does not admit a division of its light. Break a branch from the tree: once broken, it will not be able to sprout. Cut a stream from the spring: once cut, it dries up. In the same way, the Church of the Lord, flooded with light, stretches out her rays through the whole world. Yet there is one light that is poured out everywhere, and the unity of the body is not separated. She extends her branches over the whole earth in the abundance of her richness, and spreads her flowing streams far and wide. Yet there is one head and one source and one mother, rich in the successes of her fruitfulness. From her womb we are born; by her milk we are nourished; by her Spirit we are given life.

6The bride of Christ cannot be defiled; she is incorruptible and chaste. She knows one home, and she guards the holiness of one bedchamber with chaste modesty. She keeps us for God; she assigns to the kingdom the children she has borne. Whoever is separated from the Church is joined to an adulteress and is cut off from the promises of the Church. No one who abandons the Church of Christ will arrive at Christ's rewards. He is an outsider, he is profane, he is an enemy. He cannot have God as father who does not have the Church as mother. If anyone outside the ark of Noah could have escaped, then someone outside the Church can escape. The Lord warns and says, "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters" (Matthew 12:30). Whoever breaks the peace and harmony of Christ acts against Christ; whoever gathers elsewhere, outside the Church, scatters the Church of Christ. The Lord says, "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30). And again, about the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, it is written, "And the three are one" (1 John 5:7-8). Does anyone believe that this unity, which comes from divine steadfastness and coheres with heavenly sacred signs, can be split in the Church and separated by the divorce of clashing wills? Whoever does not hold this unity does not hold God's law, does not hold faith in the Father and the Son, does not hold life and salvation.

7This sacred sign of unity, this bond of harmony holding inseparably together, is shown in the Gospel when the tunic of the Lord Jesus Christ is not divided or torn at all. Instead, as they cast lots for Christ's clothing to see who would rather put on Christ, the garment is received whole, and the tunic is possessed undamaged and undivided. Divine Scripture speaks and says: "Now the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from the top, so they said to one another, 'Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it will be'" (John 19:23-24). He bore the unity that comes from above—that is, from heaven and from the Father—which could not be torn at all by the one who received and possessed it, but held its whole and solid firmness once for all, inseparably. Whoever tears and divides the Church of Christ cannot possess Christ's garment. Finally, when Solomon was dying and his kingdom and people were being divided, the prophet Ahijah met King Jeroboam in the field and tore his own garment into twelve pieces, saying: "Take ten pieces for yourself, for this is what the Lord says: 'Look, I am tearing the kingdom out of Solomon's hand and will give you ten scepters, and two scepters will remain his for the sake of my servant David and for the sake of Jerusalem, the city I chose to put my name there'" (1 Kings 11:30-32). When the twelve tribes of Israel were being divided, the prophet Ahijah tore his garment. But because the people of Christ cannot be divided, his tunic, woven throughout and holding together, was not divided by those who possessed it. Undivided, joined, connected, it shows the cohering harmony of our people who have put on Christ. By the sacred sign of the garment and its meaning, he declared the unity of the Church.

8Who, then, is so wicked and faithless, who is so mad with the fury of discord, that he could believe the unity of God can be split, or dare to split it—the garment of the Lord, the Church of Christ? The Lord himself warns and teaches in his Gospel, saying: "And there will be one flock and one shepherd" (John 10:16). Does anyone think that in one place there can be either many shepherds or many flocks? The apostle Paul likewise, insinuating this same unity to us, entreats and urges, saying: "I entreat you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all say the same thing and that there be no schisms among you; but be composed in the same mind and in the same judgment" (1 Corinthians 1:10). And again he says: "Sustaining one another in love, making every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Ephesians 4:2-3). Do you think you can stand and live while departing from the Church, building other seats and different dwellings for yourself? For it was said to Rahab, in whom the Church was prefigured: "You will gather your father and your mother and your brothers and the whole house of your father to yourself in your house, and everyone who goes out the door of your house outside will be guilty for himself" (Joshua 2:18-19). Likewise, the sacred sign of the Passover in the law of Exodus contains nothing other than that the lamb, which is killed as a figure of Christ, is eaten in one house. God speaks, saying: "It will be eaten in one house; you will not throw the flesh outside the house" (Exodus 12:46). The flesh of Christ and the holy thing of the Lord cannot be thrown outside, and there is no other house for believers except the one Church. This house, this lodging of unanimity, the Holy Spirit designates and declares in the Psalms, saying: "God, who makes the unanimous dwell in a house" (Psalm 68:6). In the house of God, in the Church of Christ, the unanimous dwell, and the harmonious and simple persevere.

9That is why the Holy Spirit came as a dove: a simple and joyful creature, not bitter with gall, not fierce with bites, not violent with tearing claws. It loves human dwellings, knows the sharing of one house, and when they have young they eat together. When they travel in flight they cling to one another, they pass their life in common company, they recognize the harmony of peace with the kiss of the beak, and they fulfill the law of unanimity in all things. This is the simplicity to be recognized in the Church; this is the love to be maintained, so that the love of the brotherhood may imitate doves, so that gentleness and mildness may equal lambs and sheep. What place does the ferocity of wolves, the madness of dogs, the deadly venom of serpents, and the bloody savagery of beasts have in a Christian heart? We should rejoice when such people are separated from the Church, so that they do not prey upon the doves and sheep of Christ with their savage and poisonous contagion. Bitterness cannot cling and be joined to sweetness, darkness to light, rain to fair weather, battle to peace, barrenness to fruitfulness, dryness to springs, storm to calm. Let no one think that the good can depart from the Church: the wind does not carry away the wheat, nor does a gale overturn a tree founded on a solid root. Empty chaff is tossed by the storm; weak trees are overturned by the blast of the whirlwind. The apostle John curses and strikes these, saying: "They went out from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us, they would have remained with us" (1 John 2:19).

10This is why heresies have both frequently arisen and still arise: a perverse mind has no peace, and discordant faithlessness does not hold to unity. The Lord permits and allows these things to happen while the choice of one's own freedom remains, so that when the test of truth examines our hearts and minds, the whole faith of the proven may shine with clear light. The Holy Spirit warns us beforehand through the apostle and says: "There must also be heresies, so that those who are proven may be evident among you" (1 Corinthians 11:19). In this way the faithful are tested, and in this way the faithless are exposed. Even before the day of judgment, the souls of the just and the unjust are already divided here, and the chaff is separated from the wheat.

From this come those who, without divine appointment, set themselves over reckless gatherings on their own initiative. They establish themselves as leaders without any law of ordination, and with no one granting them the episcopate they take the name of bishop for themselves. The Holy Spirit points them out in the Psalms as those sitting in the chair of pestilence (Psalm 1:1)—plagues and pestilences of the faith, deceiving with the serpent's mouth, contrivers of truth's corruption, vomiting deadly poisons from their pestilent tongues. Their talk creeps like cancer (2 Timothy 2:17), and their teaching pours a fatal venom into the breasts and hearts of individuals.

11Against people like these the Lord cries out. He restrains his wandering people and calls them back from such men, saying: "Do not listen to the words of the false prophets, because the visions of their hearts deceive them. They speak, but not from the mouth of the Lord. They say to those who cast away the word of God: 'Peace will be yours, and to all who walk according to their own desires. Everyone who walks in the error of his own heart—no evil will come upon you.' I did not speak to them, yet they prophesied. If they had stood in my substance and heard my words, and if they had taught my people, I would have turned them from their evil thoughts" (Jeremiah 23:16-17, 21-22). The Lord points these same people out again and marks them, saying: "They have abandoned me, the fountain of living water, and dug for themselves worn-out cisterns that cannot hold water" (Jeremiah 2:13). Since there can be no baptism other than the one, they suppose they can baptize. With the fountain of life abandoned, they promise the grace of life-giving and saving water. People are not washed there but rather made filthy, nor are their sins cleansed but instead heaped up. That birth produces children not for God but for the devil. Born through a lie, they do not receive the promises of truth; begotten from faithlessness, they lose the grace of faith. They cannot come to the reward of peace, because they have broken the peace of the Lord by the fury of discord.

12Nor should certain people deceive themselves with a false interpretation of what the Lord said: "Wherever two or three are gathered in my name, I am with them." Corrupters of the Gospel and false interpreters put the last words forward and pass over what comes before, remembering part and slyly suppressing part. Just as they themselves have been cut off from the Church, so they split the meaning of a single passage. For when the Lord was urging unanimity and peace upon his disciples, he said: "I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be granted to you by my Father who is in heaven. For wherever two or three are gathered in my name, I am with them" (Matthew 18:19-20). He was showing that much is given not to the number of those praying but to their unanimity. "If two of you," he says, "agree on earth": he put unanimity first and set the harmony of peace before all else. He taught faithfully and firmly that we should agree together. But how can someone agree with another person when he does not agree with the body of the Church itself and with the whole brotherhood? How can two or three be gathered in the name of Christ when it is clear that they have been separated from Christ and from his Gospel? For we did not withdraw from them; they withdrew from us. And since heresies and schisms were born afterward, while they set up various conventicles for themselves, they abandoned the head and source of truth. The Lord, however, speaks about his Church and speaks to those who are in the Church, so that if they are in harmony, if according to what he commanded and urged two or three, however few, pray with one mind, then two or three, however few they are, can obtain from God's majesty what they ask. "Wherever two or three are," he says, "I am with them"—that is, with the simple and the peaceful, with those who fear God and keep God's commandments. He said he is present with these two or three, however few, just as he was with the three young men in the fiery furnace, and because they remained simple toward God and unanimous among themselves, he refreshed them in the midst of the surrounding flames with the spirit of dew (Daniel 3:49-50). So too he was present with the two apostles shut up in prison, because they were simple, because they were unanimous; he himself loosed the prison bars and placed them again in the forum, so that they might hand on to the crowd the word they were faithfully preaching (Acts 5:17-21). Therefore when he lays down in his commands and says, "Where there are two or three, I am with them," he does not divide people from the Church—he who established and made the Church. Rather, reproaching discord to the faithless and commending peace to the faithful by his own voice, he shows that he is more present with two or three praying in unanimity than with a great many who are divided, and that more can be obtained by the harmonious prayer of a few than by the discordant prayer of many.

13So when he gave the rule for praying, he added these words: “And when you stand to pray, forgive whatever you have against anyone, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins” (Mark 11:25). And he calls back from the altar the one who comes to sacrifice while at odds with a brother, and orders him first to be reconciled with his brother, and then to return in peace and offer his gift to God (Matthew 5:23-24). For God did not even look upon Cain’s gifts (Genesis 4:5), since no one who lacked peace with his brother through the discord of envy could have God at peace with him. What peace, then, do the enemies of brothers promise themselves? What sacrifices do rivals of priests believe they are celebrating? Do those who are gathered outside the Church of Christ imagine that Christ is with them when they assemble?

14Even if such people are killed while confessing the name, this stain is not washed away even by blood. The inexpiable and grave guilt of discord is not cleansed even by suffering. He cannot be a martyr who is not in the Church. He will not be able to reach the kingdom who has abandoned her who is going to reign. Christ gave us peace; he commanded us to be in harmony and of one mind; he charged us to keep the covenants of affection and love uncorrupted and inviolate. He cannot show himself a martyr who has not held to brotherly love. The apostle Paul teaches and bears witness to this when he says: “If I have faith so as to move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I distribute all my goods as food, and if I hand over my body so that I may burn, but do not have love, I gain nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:2-3). “Love is patient, love is kind, love is not jealous, is not puffed up, is not provoked, does not act wrongly, does not think evil, loves all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love will never fall away” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8). “Never,” he says, “will love fall away.” For this will always be in the kingdom; this will endure forever in the unity of a brotherhood that holds together. Discord cannot reach the kingdom of heaven. No one who has violated Christ’s love by faithless dissension will be able to attain the reward of Christ, who said: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12). He who does not have love does not have God. This is the voice of the blessed apostle John: “God,” he says, “is love, and he who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him” (1 John 4:16). They cannot remain with God who have refused to be of one mind in the Church of God. Though they may burn, handed over to flames and fires, or throw their lives to beasts, that will not be the crown of faith but the punishment of faithlessness, nor the glorious outcome of religious virtue but the ruin of despair. Such a person can be killed, but cannot be crowned. He professes himself a Christian in the same way that the devil often pretends to be Christ, as the Lord himself warns and says: “Many will come in my name, saying: I am Christ, and they will deceive many” (Mark 13:6). Just as that one is not Christ, though he deceives in the name, so neither can he be seen as a Christian who does not remain in Christ’s gospel and in the truth of the faith.

15To prophesy, to cast out demons, and to do great works of power on earth is certainly a lofty and wonderful thing, but no one who is found in all these things attains the kingdom of heaven unless he walks by the observance of the right and just way. The Lord declares and says: “Many will say to me on that day: Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do great works of power in your name? And then I will say to them: I never knew you; depart from me, you who work iniquity” (Matthew 7:22-23). Righteousness is needed so that anyone may merit God as judge; his commands and warnings must be obeyed, so that our merits may receive their reward. In the Gospel, when the Lord directed the way of our hope and faith by a short summary, he said: “The Lord your God is one Lord,” and: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” “This is the first, and the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” “On these two commandments the whole law and the prophets hang.” By his teaching he taught unity and love together, and he enclosed all the prophets and the law in two commandments.

16But what unity does he preserve, what love does he keep or even consider, who is driven mad by the fury of discord, splits the Church, destroys faith, disturbs peace, scatters love, and profanes the sacred sign?

This evil, most faithful brothers, had begun long ago, but now the hostile disaster of that same evil has grown, and the venomous ruin of heretical perversity and schisms has begun to rise up and spring forth more and more. For so it had to be at the setting of the world, as the Holy Spirit forewarned and admonished us through the apostle: “In the last days troublesome times will come. People will be lovers of themselves, proud, puffed up, greedy, blasphemous, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, impious, without affection, without loyalty, accusers, without self-control, unkind, not loving what is good, traitors, reckless, swollen with stupor, loving pleasures more than God, holding a form of religion but denying its power. From these come those who creep into houses and prey on weak women loaded down with sins, led by various desires, always learning and never arriving at knowledge of the truth. And just as Jannes and Jambres resisted Moses, so these also resist the truth, but they will not get very far. For their folly will be plain to everyone, as theirs also was” (2 Timothy 3:1-9).

Everything that was foretold is being fulfilled, and now that the end of the age is drawing near, the testing of people and times alike has come. As the adversary rages more and more, error deceives, stupor puffs up, envy burns, greed blinds, impiety corrupts, pride inflates, discord embitters, and anger hurls people down.

17But let the excessive and abrupt faithlessness of many not move or disturb us. Instead, let it strengthen our faith by the truth of the thing foretold. Just as certain people have begun to be this way because these things were predicted beforehand, so let the rest of the brethren beware of such people, because these things too were predicted beforehand, with the Lord instructing and saying: "But you, beware; behold, I have foretold everything to you" (Mark 13:23). I beg you, avoid people of this kind, and keep their destructive conversations away from your side and from your ears like the contagion of death, as it is written: "Fence your ears with thorns, and do not listen to a wicked tongue" (Sirach 28:24). And again: "Bad conversations corrupt good minds" (1 Corinthians 15:33). The Lord teaches and warns that we must withdraw from such people. "They are blind," he says, "leaders of the blind. And if a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit" (Matthew 15:14). Whoever has been separated from the Church is to be turned away from and fled. Such a person is perverse, and he sins, and he is condemned by himself. Does someone who acts against the priests of Christ, who cuts himself off from the fellowship of his clergy and people, think that he is with Christ? He bears arms against the Church; he fights against God's ordering. He is an enemy of the altar, a rebel against the sacrifice of Christ, faithless in place of faith, sacrilegious in place of religion, a disobedient servant, an impious son, a hostile brother. Despising the bishops and abandoning the priests of God, he dares to set up another altar, to make another prayer with unlawful words, to profane the truth of the Lord's victim through false sacrifices, and does not know that whoever strives against God's ordinance is punished by divine judgment for the audacity of his rashness.

18So Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, who tried to claim for themselves the license of sacrificing against Moses and Aaron the priest, paid the penalty for their attempts at once. The earth, its joints broken, opened into the depth of its bosom; the gaping of the ground as it gave way swallowed them standing and alive. Nor did the anger of an indignant God strike only those who had been the instigators, but the other two hundred and fifty who shared in the same madness and were their companions, joined together with them in the same audacity, were consumed by fire that went out from the Lord in swift vengeance. This warns and shows that whatever wicked people have attempted by human will to destroy God's ordering is done against God. So also King Uzziah, when he carried a censer and violently took the sacrifice to himself against the law of God, refused to obey and yield to Azariah the priest who resisted him. He was confounded by divine indignation and marked on his forehead with the variety of leprosy, marked on that part of the body where those who merit the Lord are signed, because he had offended the Lord. And the sons of Aaron, who placed on the altar strange fire that the Lord had not commanded, were extinguished at once in the sight of the avenging Lord.

19Those who despise God's tradition and seek after foreign doctrines, introducing teachings of human institution, are clearly imitating and following these men. The Lord rebukes and reproaches them in his Gospel, saying: "You reject the commandment of God, so that you may establish your own tradition" (Mark 7:9). This crime is worse than the one the lapsed seem to have committed—yet they, having been placed in repentance for their sin, entreat God with full satisfactions. In the one case the Church is sought and asked for; in the other the Church is fought against. In the one case there could have been necessity; in the other the will is held fast in wickedness. The one who lapsed harmed only himself, but the one who has tried to create heresy or schism has deceived many by dragging them along with him. In the one case there is the loss of a single soul; in the other there is danger for many. Certainly the one who lapsed both understands and laments and mourns that he has sinned, but the other, swelling in his sin and pleasing himself in his very offenses, separates children from their mother, entices sheep away from the shepherd, and disturbs the sacred signs of God. And while the lapsed person has sinned once, the other sins daily. Finally, the lapsed person who afterward obtains martyrdom can receive the promises of the kingdom; but if the heretic is killed outside the Church, he cannot arrive at the rewards of the Church.

20And let no one wonder, most beloved brothers, that even some of the confessors proceed to these things, and that from that group too certain people sin so wickedly and so gravely. For confession does not make a person immune from the snares of the devil, nor does it defend with perpetual security someone still placed in the world against temptations and dangers and the attacks and assaults of the age. Otherwise we would never see in confessors the deceits and debaucheries and adulteries that we now see in some and groan and grieve over. Whatever confessor he is, he is not greater or better than Solomon or more dear to God. Yet as long as Solomon walked in the ways of the Lord, so long he held the grace which he had obtained from the Lord; after he abandoned the way of the Lord, he lost also the grace of the Lord. And therefore it is written: Hold what you have, so that no one else takes your crown (Revelation 3:11). Surely the Lord would not threaten that the crown of justice could be taken away unless, when justice departs, the crown also must necessarily depart.

21Confession is the beginning of glory, not already the merit of the crown; it does not complete the praise but initiates the dignity. And since it is written, “Whoever perseveres to the end will be saved” (Matthew 10:22; 24:13; Mark 13:13), whatever comes before the end is a step by which one ascends to the summit of salvation, not the endpoint where the height of the summit is already held. He is a confessor, but after confession the danger is greater, because the adversary has been provoked more. He is a confessor, and for this reason he ought to stand all the more with the Lord’s gospel, since through the gospel he has obtained glory from the Lord. To whom much is given, much is required from him (Luke 12:48), and to whom more of dignity is ascribed, more of service is demanded from him. Let no one perish through the example of a confessor; let no one learn injustice, insolence, or faithlessness from the conduct of a confessor. He is a confessor: let him be humble and quiet, let him be modest in his behavior with discipline, so that the one who is called a confessor of Christ may imitate the Christ he confesses. For since he says, “Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted” (Matthew 23:12), and since he himself was exalted by the Father because the word and power and wisdom of God the Father humbled himself on earth, how can he love arrogance who both commanded humility to us by his law and himself received from the Father the most exalted name as the reward of humility? He is a confessor of Christ, but only if the majesty and dignity of Christ is not afterward blasphemed through him. Let the tongue that has confessed Christ not be abusive, not turbulent, not heard clamoring with insults and quarrels, not hurling the poisons of the serpent against brothers and God’s priests after words of praise. But if he afterward becomes blameworthy and detestable, if he squanders his confession by evil conduct, if he stains his life with shameful filth, if he finally abandons the Church where he became a confessor, tears apart the harmony of unity, and changes his first faith by later faithlessness, he cannot flatter himself through his confession as though he were chosen for the reward of glory, when from this very thing the merits of his punishment have grown all the more.

22For the Lord also chose Judas among the apostles, and yet Judas afterward betrayed the Lord. But the firmness and faith of the apostles did not fall for that reason, because the traitor Judas withdrew from their company. So here too the holiness and dignity of confessors was not immediately diminished, because the faith of some was broken. The blessed apostle speaks in his letter, saying: "What then if some of them fell away from faith? Does their unfaithfulness nullify the faithfulness of God? Far from it. For God is true, but every man is a liar" (Romans 3:3-4). The greater and better part of the confessors stands firm in the strength of their faith and in the truth of the Lord's law and discipline, and those who remember that they obtained grace in the Church by God's favor do not depart from the Church's peace. By this very thing they obtain greater praise for their faith, because they have been separated from the faithlessness of those who were joined with them in the fellowship of confession, and have withdrawn from the contagion of the crime. Truly enlightened by the light of the gospel, radiant with the pure and bright light of the Lord, they are as praiseworthy in preserving the peace of Christ as they were victorious in the contest with the devil.

23I wish, dearly beloved brothers, and I counsel and urge you as well, that if it can be done, none of the brothers should perish, and that the mother, rejoicing, should enclose the one body of the agreeing people in her bosom. But if the saving counsel cannot recall certain leaders of schisms and authors of division who persist in blind and obstinate madness to the way of salvation, then the rest of you—whether captured by simplicity, led astray by error, or deceived by the cunning of some fraudulent cleverness—free yourselves from the snares of deceit, free your wandering steps from error, and recognize the straight road of the heavenly way.

The voice of the apostle is a solemn warning: “We command you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to withdraw from all brothers who walk disorderly and not according to the tradition they received from us” (2 Thessalonians 3:6). And again he says: “Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not be partakers with them” (Ephesians 5:6–7).

We must withdraw from those who sin—or rather, we must flee from them—so that no one who joins himself to those who walk badly and travels along the paths of error and crime may wander from the way of the true path and be held guilty of the same crime himself. There is one God and one Christ and one Church of his and one faith and one people joined into the solid unity of the body by the glue of harmony. Unity cannot be split, nor can one body be separated by the breaking of its structure, torn apart into pieces by the laceration of its organs. Whatever has departed from the mother will not be able to live and breathe on its own; it loses the substance of salvation.

24The Holy Spirit warns us and says: “Who is the person who wants life and loves to see good days? Keep your tongue from evil, and do not let your lips speak deceit. Turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it” (Psalm 34:12–14). A child of peace ought to seek and pursue peace. Whoever knows and loves the bond of love ought to keep his tongue from the evil of dissension. Among his divine commands and saving teachings, the Lord, already near to his passion, added these words: “I leave you peace; I give you my peace” (John 14:27). He gave us this inheritance. He promised all the gifts of his pledge and all his rewards in the preservation of peace. If we are heirs of Christ, let us remain in Christ’s peace. If we are children of God, we ought to be peacemakers. “Blessed,” he says, “are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God” (Matthew 5:9). God’s children ought to be peacemakers, gentle in heart, simple in speech, harmonious in affection, faithfully clinging to one another by the bonds of unanimity.

25This unanimity once existed under the apostles. So the new people of believers, keeping the Lord's commands, held fast to its love. Scripture proves this when it says: "The crowd of those who had believed acted with one soul and mind" (Acts 4:32). And again: "They were all persevering with one mind in prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus and his brothers" (Acts 1:14). That is why they prayed with effective prayers; that is why they were able to obtain with confidence whatever they asked from God's mercy.

26But among us this unanimity has so diminished that the generosity of good work has also been broken. Back then they used to sell houses and lands, and they offered the proceeds to the apostles to be distributed for the needs of the poor, storing up treasure for themselves in heaven. But now we do not even give tithes from our patrimony, and although the Lord commands us to sell, we instead buy and increase our holdings. So the vigor of faith has withered among us; so the strength of believers has grown weak. And therefore the Lord, looking upon our times, says in his Gospel: "When the Son of Man comes, do you think he will find faith on earth?" (Luke 18:8). We see happening what he foretold. There is no faith in the fear of God, in the law of justice, in love, in good work. No one thinks about the fear of things to come; no one considers the day of the Lord, the wrath of God, the punishments that are to come upon the unbelieving, and the eternal torments appointed for the faithless. Whatever our conscience would fear if it believed, it does not fear at all because it does not believe. But if it believed, it would also be on guard; if it were on guard, it would also escape.

27Let us rouse ourselves as much as we can, dearly beloved brothers, and break off the sleep of old sloth, so that we may keep watch to observe and do the Lord's commands. Let us be the kind of people he himself commanded us to be when he said: "Let your loins be girded and your lamps burning, and be like men waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding, so that when he comes and knocks, they may open to him. Blessed are those servants whom the Lord finds watching when he arrives" (Luke 12:35-37). We must be girded, so that when the day of departure comes, it does not find us hindered and entangled. Let our light shine and blaze in good works, so that it may lead us from this night of the world to the light of eternal glory. Let us wait, always anxious and careful, for the sudden coming of the Lord, so that when he knocks, our faith may wake up and receive from the Lord the reward of watchfulness. If these commands are kept, if these warnings and precepts are held fast, we cannot be overwhelmed while sleeping by the deceiving devil; as watchful servants, we shall reign with Christ as Lord.