UNION
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UNION
F. Divisions uyithin the Catholic Church. — We ought,
not, perhaps, to conclude this survey of the history of
religious divisions without touching on what some
might consider to be such within the bosom of the
Roman commimion itself. There are and always
have been opposite parties in this communion, whose
adherents disagree on points of doctrine the importance
of which may be estimated by the bitterness of their
controversies. Thus there have been Jansenists and
Molinists, Galileans and Ultramontanes, Liberals
and InfaUibili.sts, Modernists and Anti-!\Iodernists.
It is true that a time has come for some of these
parties when their pecuhar tenets have been con-
demned, and a portion of their adherents have passed
from the Church into schism. But this has not
happened in all eases of party divisions; and even
where it has happened, tho.se ejected had for a long
time previously been tolerated in the Church, holding
their distinctive views, and yet not being denied the
sacraments and other privileges of communion.
Again, there have been, many times over, rival popes
each gathering round himself a following and denounc-
ing that of his rival; and during one notorious period
of forty years' duration the Church was rent by the.sc
rivalries into two, and even into three, parts, to
the grave scandal of Christendom. Do not these
divisions show that the Catholic Church is as unable
as the separated communions to claim unity of faith
and government as her perpetual note? In two re-
spects, however, there is an essential difference
between the sort of dissensions that may arise in the
CathoUc Church and those which constitute heresy
and schism in the separated conniiunions.
First, in the Catholic Church the points in dispute round which the.se di.ssensions gather are not the Church's accepted doctrines, but further points which the course of .study within or without the Church has forced into prominence, and which one parly thinks to be compatible with the accepted Catholic doctrine and to make for its vindication, but another thinks to be incompatible with it and dangerous. Secondly, on both sides the combatants embrace the formal principle of Church unity, the ynngixlcrium of the Holy See, and, should the Holy See think fit to inter- vene, they .are prepared to submit to its <letermination of their controversy. So far there is nothing to justify the imputation of schism but only an illustration of the error of tho.se who imagine that inside the Church thought and speculation must be stagnant. For these domestic controversies, though sometimes rendered harmful by the defective spirit of those engaged in them, have their useful side, as conducing to the fuller, deeper, and more precise comprehension of the meaning and limits of the accepted doctrines. It may happen, however, that when the cour.«e of a controversy ha,s made clear what is involved in the new opinions advanced, the supreme authority in the Church will feel the necessity of intervening by some decree. In that ca.se a crucial moment often arises for the side whose tenets are now condemned. If they have the true Catholic spirit, falling back on their formal principle of unity, they will submit to the voice of authority, .abandon their former opinions, and in so doing act with the truest consistency. If, on the other hand, they attach themselves .so stubbornly to the condemned opinions as to prefer, rather than ab.andon (hem, to abandon their form.al principle of unity, there is no longer .a place for them in the Church, and they become schismatics in the ordinary sense.
.■\ similar distinction applies to the case of schisms in the papacy. It is true that many anti-popes have sprung up and caused division in their time. They were mostly the creatures of some despot who had set them up by his own will, in defiance of the lawful method of appointment, and it is, and invariably was, easy to tell which was the true pope, which the anti- XV.— 10
pope. The one exception to this general statement is
that referred to in the objection, the ca.se of the
schism which lasted from i;57S to 1417. (For the
fuller history of this distressing episode see Schism,
Western; Urban VI; Boniface IX; Gregory XII;
Robert op Geneva; Lona, Pedro de.)
What concerns us here is that the Concl.ave of 1378 was disturbed by the Roman mob, which, anxious lest the popes should go back to Avignon, demanded the election of a Roman or an Italian, that is to say, not a Frenchman. Urban VI, till then Archbishop of Bari, was elected and enthroned, and for some weeks was recognized by all. Then the main body of the cardinals (iissalisHed with theadministration of Urban, who certainly behaved in an extraordinarily t.actlcss manner, retired to Anagni, declared that, owing to the pressure of the mob upon the Conclave, Urban's election had been invalid, and elected Robert of Geneva, who called himself Clement VII. This latter was soon ctmipelled by circumstances to with- draw to Avignon, and so the schism resolved itself into a papacy at Rome and another at .Avignon. Of the Roman line there were four popes before the schism was finally healed, Urban VI, Boniface IX, Innocent VII, and Gregory XII; of the Avignon line there were two, Clement VII and Benedict XIII. The effects were terrible and world-wide, some countries, through their .sovereigns, ranging them- selves on the side of Rome, others on the side of Avignon, politics in some degree determining their choice. But earnest efforts were made from the first to repair the evil, the kings appointing commissions to ascertain the facts, and the canonists writing learned treatises to expound the questions of law involved. Proposals were also made from the first, recommending alternative plans for .solving the difficulty, namely (hat both popes should simultane- ously resign and another be (hen elected, that both should agree to go by the decisicm of .arbitrators, or that a general council .should be called which both popes should combine to authorize, and that the decision .should be left to this. All these plans failed for the time, because neither pope would trust the other, and this prevented (heir meciingand arranging. Hence, in 1408, the cardinals of both obediences abandoned their chiefs and mee(ing together con- voked a council to be held the following year at Pisa and end the schism. When i( me( it declared both Gregory XII and Benedict XIII to have forfeited their claims by their conduct, which, it was suggested, was uninteUigible save on the supposition that they had an heretical disbelief in the unity of the Church. It then elected Peter Philargi, who took the name of Alexander V. But this only made matters worse, for the Council of Pisa, not having been convoked by a pope, had no standing. Thus the sole effect of its action was to increase the confusion by starting a third line of popes. The end of the schism did not come till 1417. By that time John XXIII, the suc- cessor of .Mexander V, had been deposed by the Council of Constance, a council of the same irregular kind as that of Pisa; and had also resigned. Benedict XIII had lost his following almost entirely, which was taken .as a sign that he could not be the true pope, and Oegorv XII, whose title is now generally held to have been the best founded, resigned af(er firs( legal- izing the Council of Constance by a formal act of convocation, and authorizing it to elect a new pope. Then the council elected Martin V, who was forth- with universally acknowledged.
These are the leading facts of the histor>'. It is of course difficult to exaggerate the injury done (o the Church by this unfortunate schism, for, apart from the harm it wrought in its o^\'n age, it provided a dangerous precedent for future disturbers of the Church to cite, and, by diminishing the reverence in which the papacy had hitherto been held, it went
