Ecclesiastical Unity

What makes a plurality of things a unity, how does a pile of particulars form itself under one universal? What is the metaphysical status of such a unity, that is, how real is this unity? Is its reality merely formal or conceptual, or is it ontological? Another way to put this last question: does the unity have what we might call "real existence"? There are any number of connections that a once disparate bunch of things could have that groups them together into a class. Color: all the brown things on my desk. Use: all the things with which to write in my apartment. Place: all the cars in the parking lot, all the books on my shelf. And so on. But are there really, in actual existence, tangibly so, these classes in the world? In addition to all the brown things on my desk, is there another entity in the room, namely, the set of all the brown things on my desk? Is it only the particulars that have real existence, while the classes that we form of them are diminished in their degree of existence, being our mental or conceptual constructs, classes that we create rather than find in the world, classes that exist dependent on us rather than independently from us?

The old philosophical debate about the ontological status of universals (or classes) rears its head. Is a class a real thing, something over and above the particulars that make it up, that bring them together in their unity? Or is it, as Ockham would have it, merely a sound in the throat, or, as contemporary nominalists would have it, a concept that we impose upon the particulars (and is thus devoid of independent, or real, existence)? This is not a merely academic debate, either in medieval philosophy or now. As it did then, so now it has theological implications. In particular, it has ecclesiological implications.

The visible church, which is also catholic or universal under the gospel (not confined to one nation, as before under the law), consists of all those throughout the world that profess the true religion, together with their children.... (WCF, 25.2)

Here we have a plurality of particulars, "all those throughout the world that profess the true religion, together with their children," forming a unity or class, "the visible church." The question now is: how "real" is the visible church? Is it a merely formal or conceptual unity, or could the unity be said to be institutional or ontological? A further germane question: what is the source of the unity of the visible church?

I ask these questions after having come across a Catholic (big C) objection to the Protestant notion of the visible church, basically, that it is a merely conceptual unity without institutional or ontological bite. The implication is that there could be no schism within the Protestant church, since to be in the church one would still be a professor of the true religion and so would not be breaking off from anything but would still be bound to all the other particulars in the class. Adding to this the claim that any ecclesiological position that would make schism conceptually impossible is a bad ecclesiological position, we come to the conclusion that the Protestant ecclesiological position is untenable. On the other hand, so the discussion goes, the Catholic position has it that particular believers are baptized into the institution of the Catholic Church, which is, somehow, an actual unity that the Protestant "visible Church" is not.

This Catholic objection, I think, has some weight, though it is not without its own problems, namely, why the Catholic Church gets to be an actual unity while the visible Church does not. Aside from that, I am nervous about basing the unity of believers on a profession of what is believed. I'm all for the profession part, but that just kicks the basis of unity back to what is professed; it puts the source of unity, at least potentially, in a set of propositions. So, to maintain unity, the set of propositions which one must profess must itself be maintained, listed, clearly set out, etc. This makes me very nervous. How long should the list be? What should its contents be? Yet, there is such a thing as heresy, which constitutes a denial of something central that the particular believers in the unity of the visible church must profess, which assumes that there are certain things that all must profess to remain in the unity.

There are different ways in which scripture, and Paul in particular, describes or symbolizes the unity of believers. But as symbols, they point to a deeper source of unity: Christ himself. Not the institution of the Catholic Church, not a profession of the true religion alone, but Christ. The sacrament of the Lord's Supper is one indication of unity:

The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. (1 Cor. 10:16-17)

That there is one bread symbolizes the unity of those particulars who partake of it. What do the cup and bread symbolize, what do they point to? The real source of unity: Christ. Paul talks about the sacrament of baptism as an indication of unity:

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body--Jews or Greeks, slaves or free--and all were made to drink of one Spirit.... Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. (1 Cor. 12:12, 27)

By what are we baptized into one body? The Spirit, sent by Christ after his death and resurrection. In other places Paul points outright to the source of unity:

And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. (Eph. 1:22-23)

There is one body and one Spirit--just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call--one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. (Eph. 4:4-6)

But not to forget the words of Christ himself, he says in his high priestly prayer:

Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. (John 17:11)

In these passages, we see the Godhead as the ultimate source of the unity of all believers, a unity that shows itself outwardly in many ways: profession of the true religion, partaking of the Lord's Supper, receiving baptism. It is true that these things connect us; we must, I think, have a high view of them and not fall into an empty nominalism in their regard. They do real unifying work in our midst, but not apart from what they point to, not apart from Christ. When we are baptized, we are baptized into Christ and united to him thereby (Rom. 6:3-5). When we take the Lord's Supper, we are participating in Christ. When we profess the true religion, we are professing Christ.

With Christ as the source of the unity, it is no mere conceptual or formal unity, for its basis is in something outside of our own conceptual creations. It is surely conceptual or formal in some sense, but this sense is not dependent on us; it is created by Christ himself, which, as far as I'm concerned, gives it a good enough reality to hold on to. It is not a merely institutional unity, though it certainly has institutional structure to it: within the church, there are hierarchies (elders, deacons, congregants, etc.), ceremonies (worship), and rites (sacraments) that rule the local bodies. It is a covenantal unity, a unity imposed unilaterally by God in his dealings with his people, a unity that he creates, maintains, and relates to on both corporate and individual levels, but being covenantal does not make the unity any less real or actual.

How does this relate to schism? It depends on a number of things, foremost perhaps being what "schism" means. Taking it to mean separation, there are different levels of schism that correspond to different levels of unity. I have only been talking about unity at the most general level, and schism in this regard would be separation from Christ himself. But, interestingly, this comes about from within the level of the unity of the local church, say, in the form of excommunication resulting from continued unrepentant sin or from apostasy.

It is as if the local bodies are more strongly actual unities than the greater unity that they make up, the visible Church, for it is in these and through these that the hierarchy of unities takes place. Particular individuals are united to one another in a local body through profession of faith, baptism, or both, and the unity is maintained through partaking in the Lord's Supper. These outward expressions find their ultimate source in the unity of the particulars to Christ himself, a connection which unifies all local bodies of professors and the partakers of the sacraments into a broader unity, the visible Church. All of this is going on at once, and it is, quite amazingly, going on right before our eyes!

Churches can also be divided within themselves, as the Corinthian church was (which is why Paul spoke so much in his first letter to them about unity), and this kind of division also happens at the level of the unity of the local church (rather than at the level of the universal or visible church). For the Corinthians, the division springs out of professions of others than Christ:

What I mean is that each one of you says, "I follow Paul," or "I follow Apollos," or "I follow Cephas," or "I follow Christ." Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? (1 Cor. 1:12-13)

Here, Paul points them back to the source of their unity in their baptism: Christ. Christ is not divided, so neither should they be since they are one body in Christ by virtue of their baptism in the name of Christ. Paul uses the institutional aspects of the local body at Corinth, specifically, their baptism, to point them to how they are really united and to encourage them in their unity with one another.

I'm not sure how much better the Catholic Church fares in this regard. Could schism occur within the Catholic Church? No. Unless the person recanted their Catholic baptism, they would still be united to the Catholic Church, no matter that the unity is institutional. But being institutional, it seems to me a diminished degree of real unity than the covenantal unity to the Godhead, which has been the mainstay of the Protestant church.