On the Unity of the Catholic Church 6
Summary: The church is Christ's faithful bride and our mother; outside her, as outside Noah's ark, there is no salvation, for her unity reflects the unity of God.
Latin text · CSEL 3.1:214–215
Adulterari non potest sponsa Christi, incorrupta est et pudica. unam domum nouit, unius cubiculi sanctitatem casto pudore custodit. haec nos Deo seruat, haec filios regno quos generauit adsignat. quisque ab ecclesia segregatus adulterae iungitur a promissis ecclesiae separatur, nec perueniet ad Christi praemia qui reliquit ecclesiam Christi. alienus est, profanus est, hostis est. habere non potest Deum patrem qui ecclesiam non habet matrem. si potuit euadere quisque extra arcam Noe fuit, et qui extra ecclesiam foris fuerit euadit. monet Dominus et dicit: qui non est mecum aduersus me est, et qui non mecum colligit spargit. qui pacem Christi et concordiam rumpit aduersus Christum facit: qui alibi praeter ecclesiam colligit Christi ecclesiam spargit. dicit Dominus: ego et pater unum sumus. et iterum de Patre et Filio et Spiritu sancto scriptum est: et tres unum sunt. et quisquam credit hanc unitatem de diuina firmitate uenientem, sacramentis caelestibus cohaerentem scindi in ecclesia posse et uoluntatum conlidentium diuortio separari? hanc unitatem qui non tenet, non tenet Dei legem, non tenet Patris et Filii fidem, uitam non tenet et salutem.
English · Claude translation
The bride of Christ cannot be made an adulteress; she is undefiled and chaste. She knows one home; she guards the sanctity of one bedchamber with chaste modesty. She keeps us for God; she assigns to the kingdom the sons she has borne. Whoever is separated from the church and joined to an adulteress is separated from the promises of the church; nor will he who has left the church of Christ reach the rewards of Christ. He is a stranger, he is profane, he is an enemy. He cannot have God for his Father who does not have the church for his mother. If anyone who was outside the ark of Noah could escape, then he too escapes who is outside the church. The Lord warns and says: "He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters." He who breaks the peace and concord of Christ acts against Christ; he who gathers elsewhere than in the church scatters the church of Christ. The Lord says: "I and the Father are one." And again it is written of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit: "And the three are one." And does anyone believe that this unity, which comes from the divine steadfastness and coheres with heavenly sacraments, can be split in the church and separated by the divorce of clashing wills? He who does not hold this unity does not hold God's law, does not hold the faith of the Father and the Son, does not hold life and salvation.
About this passage
Notes
Translation notes
- The quotations are Matt 12:30 and John 10:30. "And the three are one" is cited as Scripture about the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; it corresponds to 1 John 5:8 ("the three are one") and to the longer wording of 1 John 5:7 found in some later Latin manuscripts (the "Johannine comma"); which of these Cyprian read is debated. The ark is Gen 7.
Cite this passage
Cyprian, Unit. eccl. 6 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/cyprian-unitate/6/).
Plain text
Cyprian, Unit. eccl. 6 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/cyprian-unitate/6/).
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