All Christians would agree that Christ would never divorce his Church, which is his Bride. But I will argue here that Protestantism’s tenets require just that to be true.
In a true Christian marriage, vows are made between the man and woman to love each other no matter what. Once God has joined the couple as one flesh in marriage, man cannot separate them; they are married until death parts them.
But what if one of them is unfaithful to the other?
Getting into Jesus’ teachings on marriage and whether infidelity is grounds for divorce is beyond the scope of this post; here we will assume the Catholic teaching that infidelity is not grounds for marriage dissolution but rather Christ was speaking of a marriage that was “unlawful,” meaning invalid or null, one that never took place because of an obstacle of some sort.
So even if one of the spouses is unfaithful, the fact that God has joined the couple as one in marriage remains. The union cannot be broken. That’s the set-up, and here’s the payload.
Protestants all hold to a form of the (4th – 5th century) Donatist heresy, which made the authority and grace of God contingent upon some degree of holiness or faithfulness within man, specifically, within a priest or bishop administering the sacraments. If you got unlucky and a lukewarm or unfaithful priest baptized you, tough luck! your baptism is invalid; you did not receive the Holy Spirit; you are not joined to the Body of Christ, the Church.
Protestants believe that, due to the unfaithfulness of some of the Church’s bishops and priests during the 2nd – 11th centuries, the Church lost the authority that Christ gave her and went apostate. The Church was unfaithful to Christ, and so he divorced her. Instead, he married a new “Church,” one that was purely spiritual and invisible. (This idea is analogous to a middle-aged man divorcing his wife, the mother of his children, who is getting on in years and looks kind of ho-hum, and marrying a younger and less care-worn woman.)
The modern conception of marriage is similar: “we’re getting married, but with the understanding that if you quit meeting my needs, if you are unfaithful, if you do not meet a certain level of holiness, I can call this thing off and divorce you.”
Protestants believe that the Church, which had always been a visible society, was like an unfaithful spouse and that God divorced her. This belief fits the modern conception of marriage but not the Christian one, where spouses remain true to each other “in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, for better or for worse, forsaking all others, til death do us part.”
Qualification: By making these statements, I do not mean to imply that Protestants intentionally believe that Christ divorced his Church but that their beliefs, which they implicitly accepted from their Protestant forefathers, require this unpleasant idea to be true.
Thoughts?
This post is inconsistent.
First, you say Protestants believe that the validity of baptism depends on the authority/holiness of the administrator.
Then, you say that Protestants believe in an invisible church. But since it’s invisible, the invisible church can’t be organized hiearchically or authoritatively.
I would say you’re probably right on the second point, but not on the first, in general. Most Protestants don’t set any particular requirements on the person who administrates baptism. But most do set certain requirements on the prerequisites and the form of baptism.
As for the point of your article, can you say whether any Protestants believe the Church was “invisible” (flat hierarchy) from the beginning? e.g. Christ as head with no human authority. Or do all Protestants believe in some sort of apostasy?
Hi Devin
It’s not donatism, it is an expectation in the Scriptures that we are to use. If we are to watch for false teachers, how are we to detect that and protect ourselves? The only reliable touchstone to the beliefs of the Apostles is the Scriptures. All else, history shows, is subject to drifting from the Scriptures, adding to them, and ultimately, overriding them with Church authority. Your Church hasn’t kept true to the Word.
This is not a matter of divorce, its a matter of identifying the bride. Christ has His bride, and it is those that are faithful to the Scriptures above the traditions of men.
God bless,
Garret
Protestants generally fall under two categories:
Classic: they tend to believe that they are the continuation of the Church based on the Augustinian tradition which Trent anathema’d. In the same way that the Eastern Orthodox church split with Rome over the Papacy and retained their status, so many Classic Protestants believe they can split from the Church and retain their status as being faithful to Scripture ultimately, but also to Tradition. (in the case of Augustine, specifically predestination & original sin, they make a strong case)
American Baptist/Non-denom/Evangelicals: these folks tend to believe the Church as the visible bride of Christ never existed at all. It was always an invisible reality. From a Catholic mindset it’s easier to look at issues like Baptismal validity and Donatism, they generally don’t know what this is though, and in most cases don’t have a theology of the sacraments at all except what they aren’t.
I know what you were trying to do in the post though, but really our apologetics doesn’t work on Evangelicals/American Prots – unless they’re into Church history. The Canon argument is much better, and if you’re looking for ancient heresies, there’s alot of christological ones they fall under because of their views on the Eucharist. But again, most of them are too poorly read to understand what a christological heresy is anyway.
Hi guys,
I’m gratified that fellow Catholic convert Andrew knew where I was going!
Jonathan, I was careful to say in the post that Protestants hold to “a form of” Donatism, which conditions God’s authority and action upon the faithfulness of the leaders of the Church, rather than say they believe in Donatism precisely. So you are right that Protestants don’t think anything happens in the sacraments anyway, so the holiness of the minister is irrelevant. Instead, I am focusing on their claim that the Church and her leaders lost the authority which Christ had entrusted to them through the Apostles and their successors when they became “unfaithful to the Scriptures/the Gospel” as Garret affirms above.
Andrew answered better than I would have about what Protestants believe on your question. What is he, a history major of some sort? Daaaang!
Devin,
You are completely wrong about Protestantism. We don’t believe that the church was once faithful to Christ and then became unfaithful. We believe that the chuch was NEVER faithful in the first place! But God remains faithful to us nonetheless.
The church is analogous with Israel: Israel was never faithful to God but God remained faithful to his chosen people. You are hung up on this idea of God conferring “authority” upon the church, and that the role of the church is to use this authority to teach people about God. But did Israel have inerrant authority to teach about God? No! They constantly did and taught the wrong things, and God raised up prophets to bring them back in line.
Then what is the mission of Israel and the church? To witness to God’s faithfulness to humanity, and to be a sign, foretaste, and firstfruit of the Kingdom. Teaching about God is an important part of this, but so is living as if the weakness of God is truly stronger than the strength of men. Like Israel, we Christians will always fail. But, also like Israel, through the grace of God we will witness to his kingdom anyway.
Hi guys,
This post is pretty polemical, and I don’t like that. Please forgive me for the harsh way it comes across.
Phil, I would ask you how you square your claim that the Church is and always was faithless with the words of Scripture which describe the Church as Christ’s spotless bride (Ephesians 5:25)?
Devin-
You so polemic! I’m not (-;
In Christ
Garret
In response to Phil, I would say that the analogy between the Church and Israel isn’t exactly right. Israel knew the commandments, but they disobeyed anyways. Israel knew the law that was given to Moses – that law was passed on through the Jewish priests. Despite knowing the law, Israel continued to disobey God.
But we are not disagreeing whether disobedience happens in the Church. I think it is indisputable that disobedience has happened, whether or not the Church is a visible hierarchical institution.
The question is how we can know the new Law at all (Christ’s revelation given to the apostles), and what is the living authority that propagates that revelation? Is it scripture alone, or is it apostolic succession?
If we cannot know the New Law of Christ with any confidence, then that reduces Christ’s revelation to less than that of Moses. And that’s not a hopeful conclusion.
Jonathan,
You have hit the nail on the head and stated it trenchantly.