By Very Rev. THOMAS S. PRESTON, V.G.,
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| Michaelerkirche, Wien/Vienna detail of the main altar |
The church established by our Lord is not only one by constitution as He was pleased to form it; but it is one by necessity, and He could have formed it in no other way. Unity is an essential of any. organisation, and without it there is not a semblance of order. If the divine founder of the church did not make it one, how did He make it ?
He could not make it two or three, for this is a contradiction in terms. It is, in fact, making one two; and God cannot do this, since He cannot contradict Himself. He could have made three or a thousand different societies, but they would have borne different characteristics, and would have been constituted for different ends. A church, in the true meaning of the term, is a body of visible men authorised to represent Christ upon earth and to teach His Gospel. There can be but one such church, as there cannot be more than one God. So the unity of the church is a necessity in the plans of redemption. Disunion destroys, misleads, and ruins all. If that disunion were the work of God, which is impossible, He would be responsible for it. He is essentially one, and all His operations bear the likeness of this unity, especially His greatest work after the Incarnation—"the church, which is His body and the fullness of Him, who is filled all in all." eph i.23
