A26880:493
Catholic communion defended against both extremes, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ...…Catholick communion defended against both extreams, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ...…
Catholic communion defended against both extremes, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ... / by Richard Baxter ...Catholick communion defended against both extreams, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ... / by Richard Baxter ...
London: printed for Tho. Parkhurst, 1684
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
2. But the Church is called [Communion] from [Communication]: And is Communication no transient act, but a fixed state?
3. If the plain sense be, That all Churches in the World are one Church (as parts in the whole), who differs from you in that? We are all then of one Catholic Communion, and shall believe that all true Christians are of one Church, till the Excommunicators better disprove it.
3. If the plain sense be, That all Churches in the World are one Church (as parts in the whole), who differs from you in that? We are all then of one Catholick Communion, and shall believe that all true Christians are of one Church, till the Excommunicators better disprove it.
4. But have [all the same right and obligation to communicate with each other]? 1. All do actually communicate with each other, 1. In their Union with, and Relation to our Saviour and Head. 2. And in having one holy Spirit. 3. Being the adopted children of one God. 4. Being of that one body formally related to Christ. 5. Believing in the same God and Father, Saviour and holy Spirit. And 6. Consenting to the same Baptismal Covenant. 7. Having the same hope of everlasting life. These are the Instances of Christian Union and Communion, in Eph. 4.3, 4, 5, 6. And 8. They have also Communion in the same common benefits, Pardon and Justification, and right to life. 9. And besides all this, when they may be had, they have Communion in the same species of necessary worship; the use of the same Gospel, and Sacred Scriptures, and Creed, of the same sort of Eucharistical Sacrament, and Prayer, and Praise and Thanksgiving, in all parts of absolute necessity, and holy Assemblies to that end, consisting of several Pastors with their Flocks. 10. Yea, and all true Christians love one another as such, and live in sincere (tho imperfect) obedience to the same holy Laws of Christ. In all this all Christians have Communion.