Catholicity and Sectarianism

I want to say a few things about the phrase "We believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church" (Nicene Creed) and in "holy catholic Church" (Apostle's Creed). Sometimes it is claimed that the term 'catholic' in this phrase simply means "the whole", as though by this term the bishops who drafted the Creeds were saying that they believed in all believers, or believed in the simple sum of all the communities of believers. Since, on this view, the "holy catholic Church" just is the sum of all believers, and since believers exist in many institutions, therefore, goes the argument, no institution could be the "one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church". Furthermore, according to this position, there are two reasons why the institutional Catholic Church (with a capital 'C') is not the "one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church". First, because the Catholic Church is one institution, and as shown above, the "only, holy, catholic and apostolic Church" cannot be one institution, for that would violate its catholicity. Sectarianism is incompatible with catholicity. Second, because the leader of the Catholic Church is based in Rome, which is a particular place, but catholicity means universality, which is the opposite of a particular place.

This entire chain of reasoning is based on a mistake at the very beginning, a misunderstanding of the meaning of the term 'catholic' so as to make it apply only to the invisible Church. But the bishops who drafted the Creeds did not believe that the Church was only (or even primarily) invisible; they believed that the Church was one visible institution, organically unified as one body, not a mere collection of particular Churches. The institutional disunity of contemporary Christendom is only a modern phenomenon, utterly beyond the imagination of the authors of the Apostle's and Nicene Creeds. And we should not read our presently fragmented condition back into the meaning of terms in the Creeds, whether the term "unam" or the term "catholicam". Those who believe that there should be many sects, should not deceive themselves into thinking that they mean what the bishops meant by the term 'unam' in the Creed. Similarly, if the term 'catholic' (in the Creeds) meant "the whole [body of believers]", then catholicity would have been quite unhelpful as a mark of the Church, depending on some other criterion to tell us who counts as a believer. The term 'catholicam' meant not "the whole", but "according to the whole". The "one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church" was catholic in two ways: (1) in retaining the whole deposit of faith, that is, the entirety of Christ's gospel, and (2) in being sent out to all peoples.

With this understanding of 'catholicam', we see that it is perfectly compatible with the Church being one institution. How many institutions were present in the upper room on the day of Pentecost? Given that catholicity is perfectly compatible with the Church being one institution, it follows that having a unified visible head is perfectly compatible with catholicity. Moreover, the Church referred to in the Creeds was the only institution there was when these Creeds were written, i.e. the Catholic Church. One can question whether the bishop of Rome always had the authority over the Catholic Church that he has now; but there is no question that the Church referred to in the Creeds is the Catholic Church, not merely the invisible Church. The charge of "sectarianism" when applied to the Catholic Church presupposes that there no longer remains one true [institutional] Church. But the fact that many sects have falsely claimed to be the one true Church does not mean that there is no institution that remains that one true Church. The Catholic Church claims to be just that, the very institution that Christ founded and that remains today the one true Church.

When we confess that we believe in one, holy catholic and apostolic Church, we are not merely confessing that we believe that such a thing exists, just as our three credos in the earlier parts of the Creeds did not merely state our belief in the existence of the three Persons of the Trinity. Even the demons believe that the Church exists. Just as with the earlier three credos, we are here again stating that we trust in this Body, for it is the mystical Body of Christ.