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D e f i n i t i o n s
“CATHOLIC”
By JAMES AKIN
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This Rock
Volume 4, Number 11
 November 1993 
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THE word "Catholic" provokes a
storm of controversy among Christians, alternately being coveted and
reviled by different groups of non-Catholics. Some non-Catholics revile
the term because they hate the Church with which it is associated,
and a few loathe the very term itself.[For example, Landmark Baptists
claim that there is no such thing as a general or universal church,
even an invisible one which only God sees. Landmarkism claims there
is only a collection of individual, local Churches, but no overall,
worldwide Church which incorporates these local churches into a single
body. This differs from the traditional Protestant claim that there
is a single, worldwide Church made up of the invisible union of all
believers]. Some Protestants have even refused to apply
the term Catholic to the Church, calling it instead "the Roman
Church" or "the Church of Rome." Rather than referring
to "Catholicism," they refer to "Romanism." Instead
of speaking of the Catholic position, they will speak of the "Roman"
position.[This practice is carried through with childish consistency
in the writings of James White, a contemporary anti-Catholic who has
a hang-up about the word Catholic. He never once uses it in an unmodified
form for the Church but appends the word "Roman" to it or
else drops it entirely and just uses "Roman."].
But other Protestants have a positive attitude toward the term. Many
Evangelical Protestants proclaim themselves to be "catholics"
(catholics-with-a-small-"c"). They do this based on the
original meaning of the word (Greek, katholikos), which was
"general" or "universal." Since they view Christ's
Church as an invisible union of all believers, a church visible only
to God, membership in any particular visible communion is not necessary
to be a full-fledged member of Christ's church, hence many Protestants
consider themselves to be catholic. This argument commits what is
known as the etymological fallacy, the attempt to establish the meaning
of a word based on its origins. Linguists have long recognized that
the meaning of a word is established by its use, not by its original
source. An often-cited illustration is the English word "nice,"
which is derived from the Latin word nescius.
If one tried to establish the meaning of "nice" by looking
at its etymology, one would conclude that it means ignorant since
that is what nescius means. Thus to tell a woman she was wearing
a nice hat would be to tell her that she was wearing an ignorant hat.
Protestant Bible scholars themselves often point out the danger of
committing the etymological fallacy.
The term "Catholic" was applied to the Church at the beginning
of the second century by Ignatius, the third bishop of Antioch. During
the reign of Emperor Trajan (98-117) Ignatius was taken to Rome to
be executed. The exact year of the journey is uncertain, but most
scholars estimate it was around 107 or 110. On the way to his death,
Ignatius wrote letters to churches he was passing by or through. In
his letter to the church of Smyrna, he wrote:
"Wherever the bishop appears, let the people be there, just as
wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church."[Epistle
to the Smyrneans 8:2.]. This is the first recorded use of the phrase
"Catholic Church," but its usage almost certainly precedes
Ignatius's letter. He assumed his readers would be familiar with the
term, and he uses it in an off-handed manner, suggesting he was not
coining a new term, but picking up one already in use.
Protestants often see such early references as teaching nothing more
than that there is a "universal church" that is not necessarily
identified with any particular body of believers. While this could
be claimed for Ignatius's reference, it cannot be
true for all early references. The term "Catholic" very
quickly became a designation for a particular body of Christians.
One Protestant author who is honest about this is the renowned early-Church
historian J. N. D. Kelly, who has written, "As regards `Catholic,'
its original meaning was `universal' or `general' ... As applied
to the Church, its primary significance was to underline its universality
as opposed to the local character of the individual congregations.
Very quickly, however, in the latter half of the second century at
latest, we find it conveying the suggestion that the Catholic is the
true Church as distinct from heretical congregations. . . . What these
early Fathers were envisaging was almost always the empirical, visible
society; they had little or no inkling of the distinction which was
later to become important between a visible and an invisible Church"
(J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, 5th ed. [San Francisco:
Harper, 1978], 190f).
The attempt by non-Catholics to claim "catholic" for themselves
is not new. Heretics and schismatics in the fourth century tried to
claim the term, yet their attempts proved unsuccessful. In 397 Augustine
pointed this out using an illustration from everyday life. "[T]he
very name of Catholic . . . belongs to this Church alone . . . so
much so that, although all heretics want to be called `catholic,'
when a stranger inquires where the Catholic Church meets, none of
the heretics would dare to point out his own basilica or house"
(Against the Letter of Mani Called `The Foundation' 4:5).
Augustine also remarked that the Church "is called Catholic not
only by her own members but even by all her enemies. For when heretics or
the adherents of schisms talk about her .. with strangers
. . . they call her nothing else but Catholic. For they will not be
understood unless they distinguish her by this name which the whole
world employs in her regard." [The True Religion 7:12, ca.
A.D. 390]. Thus the fact that the Church is generally or universally
(catholically) called "Catholic" forms part of its title
to that name.
That "Catholic" very early acquired its modern sense of
denoting a particular group of churches united in a single, visible
communion is important for how we read the writings of the Church
Fathers and how we read early creeds. Protestants accept the Apostles'
Creed and the Nicene Creed, which make reference to the Catholic Church.
The Apostles' Creed states, "I believe . . . in the Holy Catholic
Church"; the Nicene creed states, "I believe . . . in One,
Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church." Both of these statements
were written after "Catholic" had acquired its current meaning.
The portion of the Nicene creed that contains the reference was written
in 381.[The first part of the creed, which deals with the Father
and the Son, was written at the council of Nicea in A.D. 325. The
second part of the creed, which begins by affirming the deity of the
Holy Spirit and contains the reference to the Catholic Church, was
written at the council of Constantinople I in A.D. 381. The new creed
came to be called the Nicene Creed, though it would be more proper
to call it the Nicean-Constantinopolitan Creed, a name so long as
to demand abbreviation]. "Catholic" was added to the Apostles'
Creed in the fourth century, specifically to distinguish the Catholics
who recited it from the heretics who also did so. In both creeds "Catholic"
is used in its modern sense.
This is significant because Protestants emphasize the importance of
reading a document in its original context. They insist on this for both
sacred and secular documents. We are told that the Bible means exactly
what its human authors meant, and that the U. S.
Constitution must be understood based on the intentions of its framers.
This is quite true. [In the case of the Bible there may be an additional
layer of meaning since the divine author of Scripture may have placed
meaning in the text that was not immediately obvious to the human
though which he was writing. Daniel tells us the contents of a vision
which he does not understand (see Dan. 12:8-10). In Gal. 4:21-31,
Paul offers the allegory of Sarah and Hagar based on the text of Genesis,
despite the fact that it would not be obvious to anyone reading Genesis
that the text contained such an allegory. While Scripture does mean
what the human author intended, it does not always mean only what
the human author intended, since it had a divine author as well.].
It is a universal law of literature that the meaning of a document
is established by the author's intentions at the time he wrote it.
This principle is called the grammatical-historical method when applied
to the Bible, and it is called "Constitutional originalism"
or "strict constructionism" when applied to the U. S. Constitution.
It is a principle which should be applied to all documents, including
the creeds of the early Church. Since "Catholic" already
had its modern meaning when it was placed in the creeds, the creeds
must be taken to affirm belief in a single, visible communion of believers
known as the Catholic Church.
Although some "non-confessional churches" in the Baptist
and Pentecostal movements have rejected the creeds, most Protestants
have wished to use them. As a result, they have been forced to abandon
their principle of interpreting a text based on the intentions of
its authors. They have had to reinterpret the creeds to fit their
own particular views, which is the very thing they revile liberal
theologians and liberal Supreme Court justices for doing with the
Bible and the Constitution.
It would be more intellectually honest if Protestants who wish to
use these creeds would simply mutilate them by dropping the offensive
clauses, instead of reinterpreting them and claiming that the faith
of modern Protestants is the same as the faith of those who formulated
the creeds.
This creed mutilation is already engaged in by some Protestants. Some
Evangelicals now confess belief in "the Holy Christian Church"
when they say the Apostles' Creed. Some liberal Protestants have gone
so far as to drop offensive supernatural elements from the creeds
(such as belief in the resurrection of the body). Conservative Protestants
might find this anti-supernaturalistic creed mutilation offensive,
but at least the liberals have the courage to drop what they don't
believe in rather than reinterpreting it so that it means something
completely different.
James Akin is a contributing editor to This Rock.
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