The Church historical Society. President:-THE Rt. Reverend M. Creighton, D.D., LORD BISHOP OF PETERBOROUGH. The Teaching Power of the Church (II). BY THE REV. W. E. COLLINS, M.A., PROFESSOR OF ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY AT KING'S COLLEGE, LONDON. PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE TRACT COMMITTEE. LONDON: SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE, NORTHUMBERLAND AVENUE, W.C.; 43, QUEEN VICTORIA STREET, E.C. BRIGHTON: 129, NORTH STREET. NEW YORK: E. & J. B. YOUNG & CO. I. THE CHURCH MUST GUARD THE DEPOSIT' II. WITNESS THE PRIMARY FUNCTION CHURCH Illustrated by the fact that OF THE 59 (a) Innovators have tried to claim antiquity. Source. The true function of the Judge. IV. Two PRACTICAL CONCLUSIONS (1) Comparatively unimportant by whom (2) Wrong decisions may be given in V. THE INFALLIBILITY OF THE CHURCH. Due to her Head, not to her members. 67 75 79 To be found in the whole mind of the Church. VI. THE ROMAN DOCTRINE OF PAPAL INFALLIBILITY AND ITS CONSEQUENCES (a) It gives a new meaning to the term (b) The Church regarded as a body contain- VII. THE AUTHORITY OF THE WHOLE CHURCH Commends itself to our experience. 86 89 THE TEACHING POWER OF THE CHURCH. Ὑμεῖς μάρτυρες τούτων.—S. Luke xxiv. 48. WE have to-day to deal more particularly with the teaching power of the Church. It will be granted on all hands that it is the divinely appointed function of the Church to teach: but many questions still remain to be asked with regard to the nature of this magisterium or teaching power. What are its limitations? its safeguards? How can we be sure of its authenticity? Above all, how is it expressed? Now, some of these questions will be dealt with in the lectures which follow. To-morrow, for instance, the magisterium of the Ecclesia diffusa will be considered; and it will be shown that the episcopate throughout the world forms the normal organ of the Church's teaching power. The following lecture will deal with the authority of General Councils, i.e. the magisterium of the Ecclesia congregata; and the last will be concerned with the claims which have been put forth on behalf of the Bishop of Rome (and exercised by him) to speak in the name of the whole Church-i.e. it will deal with the usurped magisterium of the Pope. It may be that this method of studying the subject will involve some slight amount of repetition; but this will be amply compensated for if the result be to place in clearer light the fundamental bearings of the whole question, by insisting and re-insisting upon them 1. To-day, then, we are concerned more particularly with the nature of this teaching authority-this magisterium—in itself, apart from the particular manner in which it may happen to be expressed. 1 "I have no doubt that both in these lectures and elsewhere many things will be found which have been already said both by myself and by other writers. Probably many things will be found which both myself and other writers may find occasion to say again, as often as it may be needful to put forth correct views of matters about which popular errors and confusions are afloat. There is a large class of persons who pay little heed to a thing which is said only once, but on whom, when it is said several times, and put in several shapes, it has at last an effect. I believe that this class is more numerous-its needs are certainly better worth attending to-than those fastidious persons who are disgusted if they are ever called upon to hear the same thing twice" (Freeman, Comparative Politics, page v). |