Nevin on Catholic Unity

June 12, 2007
Bryan Cross

There is much to applaud in John Nevin's "Catholic Unity". Here is a sample of some of the beautiful statements in his article:

"Such distraction and division can never be vindicated, as suitable to the true conception of the Church. They disfigure and obscure its proper glory, and give a false, distorted image of its inward life....

The whole Church then must be regarded as inwardly groaning over her own divisions, and striving to actualize the full import of this prayer; as though Christ were made to feel himself divided, and could not rest till such unnatural violence should come to an end. And so if any man be in Christ, he cannot fail, so far as this union may reach, to pray and work for the same object, the Catholic Unity of the Church, as the most important interest in the world....

The Church ought to be visibly one and catholic, as she is one and catholic in her inward life; and the want of such unity, as it appears in the present state of the protestant world, with its rampant sectarianism and individualism, "is a lamentation, and shall be for a lamentation," until of God's mercy the sore reproach be rolled away....

Our various sects, as they actually exist, are an immense evil in the Church. Whatever may be said of the possibility of their standing in friendly correspondence, and only stimulating the whole body to a more vigorous life, it is certain that they mar the unity of this body in fact, and deprive it of its proper beauty and strength....

The present state of the Church involves the sin of schism, to a most serious extent.... But this much it most certainly does require, that the middle walls of partition as they now divide sect from sect should be broken down, and the whole Christian world brought not only to acknowledge and feel, but also to show itself evidently one....

I would not for the world be the founder of a new sect, though assured that millions would at last range themselves beneath its shadow; but if I might be instrumental with the humblest agency in helping only to pull down a single one of all those walls of partition, that now mock the idea of catholic unity in the visible Church, I should feel that I had not lived in vain, nor labored without the most ample and enduring reward." (p. 202-205, 209)

Concerning effecting the unity of the Church, however, I wish to consider only three of the statements in Nevin's article. First, he writes:

"Still the Church is not on this account subverted, or shut up to the precincts of some single sect, arrogantly claiming to be the whole body." (p. 202)

What if the so-called 'sect' never split off from anything, but is the original institution (and thus not a 'sect')? And what if this original institution does not claim to be "the whole body", but to be the original institution, in which, whether in perfect communion or imperfect communion, the whole body subsists? Does that make it arrogant? Are such claims arrogant because they are a priori impossible or necessarily false? If so, how so? How could we know a priori that it is necessarily false that the original institution Christ founded still exists and is that in which the whole body subsists?

Second, Nevin writes:

"The "one body," most unfortunately, is wanting for the present; but the "one Spirit," reigns substantially as a greater spiritual whole. Joined together in the common life of Christ, in the possession of one faith, one hope, and one baptism, the various divisions of the Christian world, are still organically the same Church. In this form, we hold fast to the idea of Catholic Unity, as the only ground in which any true Christianity, individual or particular can possibly stand." (p. 202)

It is indeed "organically the same Church", but that is only possible if one of the institutions is the visible Church in which all believers, either perfectly or imperfectly, are united. If none of the existing institutions is the visible Church, then we are only "spiritually the same Church", not "organically the same Church".

Third, Nevin writes:

"We do not suppose indeed that the visible unity of the Church demands a single visible head, like the pope of Rome, who is justly styled Antichrist for this very pretension." (p. 204)

Presumably he would not think that having twelve visible heads would imply twelve Antichrists, and thus implicate the twelve Apostles who are the foundation stones of the Church (Rev 21:14). Was Noah the Antichrist of the Church during the flood? Was Abraham the Antichrist of the Church while it wandered in the land of Canaan? Was Moses the Antichrist of the Church when he led the people out of Egypt and through the desert? Was David the Antichrist of the Church when he reigned over Israel in Jerusalem? If the answers to these questions are negative, then how does it follow that a single visible head of the Church during the New Covenant must therefore be the Antichrist?