Further Thoughts on Donatism

St. Augustine Condemns Donatus Magnus at the Council of Carthage, Oil on Canvas, by Charles Andre Van Loo, 1750's

By Bishop Joseph (Ancient Church of the West) 

The objection that rejecting the orders of heretic bishops is "Donatism" allows me to see a difference in soteriology and the foundation of the Protestant and Catholic ecclesiologies. Many who object are still working off of a Lutheran paradigm of "gold covered excrement", which they believe to be Biblical, but with which the Early Church strongly disagreed, and which was primarily convoluted by poor Bible translation. "Justification" was translated by Jerome from the Greek word "Dikaiosis", "to be made righteous", as the Latin legal term "iustificario", "to be declared righteous." This introduced a legal concept which was not present in the underlying text, and that implies a kind of salvation that strikes against the core reason God revealed Himself to man and gave us His Law in the first place, so that we could know, love and follow Him with our wills, to set our hearts on Him and love Him in freedom.

Where Scripture said that Christ would actually make righteous, Protestants now believe that God would merely declare righteous, leaving Christians and their works "unchanged in fact" or "unrighteous in reality." Christ's death is misconstrued as a mask of our evil, hidden from an Angry Father by a compassionate Son, rather than a way in which our lives our linked with God's Life and transformed into God's righteousness and works. The all-knowing God pretends not to see, and the children of God are transformed in name but not in fact, making God willingly contradict His own attributes.

This later interpretation introduces many contradictions in Scripture, such as Christ giving us laws and telling us what we must do to follow Him, or St. Paul instructing us to do good works, all of which Protestants believe are not only unnecessary but also detracting from the True Gospel, which is a grace of "unmerited favor" rather than the presence and energy of God to live and do God's work on earth.

Based on this view, many Protestants have misidentified what Donatism is, somehow thinking that it was the mistaken idea of keeping grace (validity) by the keeping canon law. As the many accusations I received about the article Fr. Steve and I wrote on the necessity of Old Catholic Orders prove, many believe that requiring conformity to works of righteousness is the religion of the Pharisees.

“Then spake Jesus to the multitude, and to his disciples, saying, 'The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat: All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye after their works: for they say, and do not.'” – Matthew 23:1-3 KJV

The Pharisaical false Gospel was not keeping the Law that God gave, but believing that they had found exceptions to the law of God that justified bad behavior, calling evil good and exempting them from the actual things God told them to believe and do. They did this because they thought that, as God's chosen people, they were innately good and did not need to actively participate in the Covenant that God established with them. Rather, they were good because they were Jews, because they were chosen. They thought God was indebted to save them because of God's Law, not because of their actual, living, personal and obedient relationship with Him. In other words, I believe Reformed Theology to be the most accurate reincarnation of Pharisaic Theology of any in Christian History, up and against the free and loving grace that God made available in His One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. That so many have swallowed the poison of monergism and teachings based on the doctrine of men, and have forgotten the Biblical and Early Church doctrine of synergy is truly regretful. This is why adherence to all Seven Councils of the Undivided Church is so important. Stopping at the Fourth, because the Fifth declared monergism a heresy, thus preempting Calvin's favorite doctrine, is disingenuous at best.

What Donatism denied was forgiveness to those who repented. The actual controversy was over whether or not those who recanted Christ in times of persecution could be let back into the Church. It was the heresy of limited forgiveness. What we are saying is like those who stood against this heresy. Those who believe they have nothing to repent about, especially when in clear contradiction to Scripture and Tradition, are living outside of the grace of God. They rob themselves and others of forgiveness, which is the essential element of receiving grace and being saved. They deny forgiveness by denying sin in some way, when that sin, self-will or heresy is explicitly dealt with within the Scriptures and Church History.

Salvation is the relational process of unity with Christ, Who is perfect, Who commanded us to be perfect, and Who commands us to follow Him. This understood, salvation is the process of becoming perfect. We are not to be willfully unchanging in our sins, but confessing and repenting of our sins for spiritual growth and Life in Christ (this is what I John means when Scripture says, "He that sins hath not eternal life" means to "continually sin" as St. Paul says in Romans 6, "God forbid!")  If this is the case, then a refusal to confess and repent, the mechanisms whereby we are sanctified, we know that we or those who claim to be of the household of God, are outside of salvation. "By their fruits ye shall know them." And, since there is no ordination of those who are not in faith, for those not being saved and manifesting works of repentance through the indwelling Grace of the Holy Spirit, we do not maintain that these wolves in sheep's clothing hold valid orders. To recognize such would be to forfeit the integrity of the faith, the vessel into which the consecration of Holy Orders are received. Of course, God can save those He knows are sincere, and even make valid the sacraments of counterfeits for those simple and faithful people who have been lied to, if He sees fit. This does not imply that the orders of heretics, unbelievers and unrepentant sinners are effective, or that they can be passed on in perpetuity.

Therefore, the demand of the Church and Canon Law is willingness to repent, confess, submit, receive and be sanctified by God's divine power, which is our only evidence of the Work of God, the Fruits of the Spirit, and the marks of validity. It is a call to perfection and the willingness to be perfected, not a demand for already acquired perfection.