Tempore Cornelii Papae / S. CYPRIANI EPIST. SYNOD. DE LAPSIS

The Councils of Carthage Held in the Time of Saint Cornelius I, Pope, in the Matter of the Lapsed, under Saint Cyprian. In the Year of the Lord 251. The First Council of Carthage under Cyprian. (From the collection of Councils, edited by Giovanni Domenico Mansi, vol. I.) This Council of Carthage was held at Carthage after Easter, in the year of the Lord, and was convoked on the authority of Cyprian the bishop. At its beginning, the legates whom Novatian had sent with letters written to the African church are excommunicated by Cyprian. The Fathers, however, assembled in synod, reject their letters, which they themselves, full of calumnies and falsehoods against Saint Cornelius, were urging to be read publicly in the council; the cause of the schism having been fully known from the letters of Cornelius and from the report of certain bishops of that same church returning from Rome, they reject them as unworthy to be read and heard in so sacred a gathering of priests (Cyprian, Epistles 41 and 55). Felicissimus, the unhappy author of the African schism, and those five Carthaginian presbyters, deserters of the faith and schismatic sectaries, concerning whom Cyprian (Epistle 40) had already twice excommunicated them, are present in this sacred assembly of bishops to plead their cause, are heard, and are finally excommunicated a third time. This is clearly evident from Cyprian’s Epistles 41 and 55, as well as from the synodal letters written to Cornelius, which indeed Saint Cyprian mentions in Epistle 42, but which have perished through the injuries of time.

It was decreed in this council that the lapsed, while doing penance, should indeed be received into the communion of the Church, but should not be admitted before the completion of the time of satisfaction, except in urgent necessity. Cyprian, in his Epistle 52 to Antonianus, signifies this in these words: "According, however, to what had been previously determined, when the persecution had subsided, and the opportunity was given of coming together, a large number of bishops, whom their faith and the protection of the Lord had kept whole and unharmed, assembled together; and after long discussion of the Scriptures on both sides, we balanced the matter with a wholesome moderation, so that neither should hope of communion and peace be altogether denied to the lapsed, lest they should fail the more through despair, and because the Church was closed to them, should follow the world and live as pagans; nor, on the other hand, should evangelical discipline be so relaxed that they should rashly leap to communion, but their penance should be prolonged, and the fatherly clemency should be sorrowfully entreated, and the causes, wills, and necessities of each one should be examined." See Baronius, year of Christ 254, number 83, up to and including. Labbaeus.

In the year of the Lord 252, the Council of Carthage under Cyprian, the second, concerning the case of the schismatics Felicissimus and Novatian. This council was celebrated in the year of the Lord 255, on the Ides of May, at Carthage in Africa, in the case of two schismatics, namely Felicissimus and Novatian, of whom the former pertinaciously defended that all the lapsed without exception ought to be received immediately without penance. Novatian, however, declining to the other extreme, asserted with no less pertinacity that none of those who had lapsed ought to be received into the Church. Therefore, to determine this controversy, by the authority of Bishop Cyprian, forty-two bishops of the African Church were assembled, who, proceeding by the middle way, defined that for the lapsed seeking return to the Church, peace and reconciliation were to be granted if they had fulfilled the penance imposed upon them: and they established that this be ordinarily observed, unless either imminent danger of death, or an impending persecution by tyrants, which the Holy Spirit had revealed to Cyprian would come, demanded indulgence, relaxation, and dispensation from penances already imposed or even yet to be imposed.

Privatus, a veteran heretic, attempted to enter this synod with his followers to plead his own case, but because he had often been condemned before, he was repulsed. On account of this, having gathered certain associates, he creates a certain Fortunatus, a fugitive and excommunicate, as a pseudo-bishop against Cyprian, and afterwards immediately through Felicissimus and a great crowd of schismatics sent to Pope Cornelius, they eagerly seek communion with the Apostolic See in order to avert suspicion of schism and heresy. But when they had sailed to Rome and had demanded to be heard and received several times by Pope Cornelius, and had attempted to offer him complaints against Cyprian, they were immediately rejected by him, since he had already sufficiently learned through letters written by Cyprian that these men were authors and champions of schism and heresy, fugitives and excommunicates. See Baronius in the year 255, number 5, and following. The synodal letter sent to Cornelius exists among Cyprian's letters, as his 54th, which we have conveniently transferred here.

A divine and sacred provincial synod, gathered at Carthage, called the new city of Africa, under the holy martyr Cyprian, who was its bishop, and eighty-four other bishops: which synod repudiated Novatus, as one who denied penance to the lapsed. Synodal Letter of Saint Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, and His Colleagues to Saint Cornelius the Pope, concerning the Lapsed. Argument. That an impending persecution is forewarned by God through frequent manifestations: and therefore they, the African bishops, explain to Cornelius that they have judged that peace should not be deferred for those who have not ceased to perform penance. Cyprian, Liberalis, Caldonius, Nicomedes, Caecilius, Junius, Marrutius, Felix, Successus, Faustinus, Fortunatus, Victor, Saturninus, another Saturninus, Rogatianus, Tertullus, Lucianus, Eutyches, Amplus, Sattius, Secundinus, another Saturninus, Aurelius, Priscus, Herculanus, Victoricus, Quintus, Honoratus, Montanus, Hortensianus, Verianus, Iambus, Donatus, Pompeius, Polycarpus, Demetrius, another Donatus, Privatianus, another Fortunatus, Rogatus, and Monulus, to their brother Cornelius, greetings.

We have indeed long since determined, dearest brother, in a counsel shared mutually among us, that those who had been overthrown by the adversary in the onslaught of persecution and had fallen, and had defiled themselves with unlawful sacrifices, should perform a full and lengthy penance, and if the danger of illness pressed, they should receive peace at the point of death. For it was not lawful, nor did paternal piety and divine clemency permit, that the Church be closed to those knocking, and that the grieving and suppliant be denied the aid of saving hope, so that those departing from the world should be sent to the Lord without communion and peace; since He Himself permitted and gave the law (Matthew 16:19) that what is bound on earth is bound in heaven, but that those who are saved may be loosed there, which things were first loosed in the Church. But now, since we see the day of another onslaught beginning to approach, and we are warned by frequent and constant revelations to be armed and prepared for the contest which the enemy declares against us, and also to prepare the people entrusted to us by divine favor through our exhortations, and to gather all the soldiers of Christ without exception, who desire arms and demand battle, within the Lord's camp: compelled by necessity, we have decreed that peace is to be given to those who have not withdrawn from the Lord's Church, and who have not ceased from the first day of their fall to perform penance and lament and implore the Lord; and that they ought to be armed and equipped for the impending battle.

We must indeed obey the just revelations and admonitions, so that the sheep are not abandoned by the shepherds in danger; but the whole flock is gathered into one, and the army of the Lord is armed for the contest of heavenly warfare. For the penitence of the grieving was rightly drawn out over a longer time, so that help might be given to the weak at the point of death, as long as peace and tranquility were at hand, which could long delay the tears of the mourners and belatedly bring aid to the dying in their infirmity. But now peace is necessary not for the weak, but for the strong; and communion is to be given by us not to the dying, but to the living: so that those whom we rouse and urge to battle we do not leave unarmed and naked, but fortify with the protection of the blood and body of Christ; and since the Eucharist is given for this purpose, that it may be a safeguard for those who receive it, let us arm with the protection of the Lord's fullness those whom we wish to be safe against the adversary. For how do we teach or urge them to shed their blood in confession of the name, if we deny the blood of Christ to those who are about to fight? Or how do we make them fit for the cup of martyrdom, if we do not first admit them by right of communion to drink the cup of the Lord in the Church?

III. There must be a distinction, dearest brother, between those who have either apostatized and, having returned to the world which they had renounced, live in a pagan manner, or who have become fugitives to the heretics and daily take up parricidal arms against the Church; and those who, not withdrawing from the threshold of the Church, and continually and sorrowfully imploring divine and paternal consolations, now declare themselves ready for battle, and profess to stand firmly and fight for the name of their Lord and for their own salvation. At this time we grant peace not to the sleeping, but to the vigilant; we grant peace not for pleasures, but for arms; we grant peace not for rest, but for the battle line. If, according to what we hear and hope and believe, they stand firmly and, together with us, lay low the adversary in the conflict, we will not repent having granted peace to such brave men; rather, it is a great honor and glory to our episcopate to have granted peace to martyrs, so that we, priests who daily celebrate the sacrifices of God, may prepare offerings and victims for God. But if, which may the Lord avert from our brothers, any of the lapsed should deceive us, so that he seeks peace deceitfully and, at the time of the impending battle, receives communion without fighting, he deceives and tricks himself, who hides one thing in his heart and declares another with his voice. As for us, as far as it is granted to us to see and judge, we see the faces of individuals; we cannot scrutinize the heart and perceive the mind.

Concerning these, the investigator and knower of hidden things, who will come quickly, will judge, and he will judge concerning the secrets of the heart and the hidden recesses. But the evil ought not to harm the good; rather, the evil ought to be helped by the good. Nor, for this reason, should peace be denied to those who are about to undergo martyrdom, because there are some who will deny [the faith]; since, for this reason, peace is to be given to all who are about to fight, lest through our ignorance that one begin to be passed over who is to be crowned in the battle. IV. And let no one say: He who undergoes martyrdom is baptized by his own blood; nor is peace from the bishop necessary for him, who is about to have the peace of his own glory, and who is about to receive a greater reward from the Lord’s condescension. First, he cannot be fit for martyrdom who is not armed for battle by the Church; and the mind fails which is not raised and kindled by the received Eucharist. For the Lord says in his Gospel: “But when they have handed you over, do not think about what you will say; for at that hour it will be given to you what you will say: for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you” (Matthew 10:19). But when he says that the Spirit of the Father speaks in those who are handed over and who are established in the confession of the name, how can he be found prepared or fit for confession who has not first, by receiving peace, received the Spirit of the Father, who, strengthening his servants, himself speaks and confesses in us?

Then, if, having abandoned all his possessions, he flees and, hidden in hiding places and solitude, happens to fall among robbers, or dies of fevers or illness, will it not be imputed to us that such a good soldier, who left everything behind, despised his home, parents, or children, and chose to follow his Lord, departs without peace and without communion? Will not either sluggish negligence or cruel harshness be ascribed to us on the day of judgment, because we, as shepherds, neither cared for the sheep entrusted and committed to us in peace, nor were willing to arm them in battle? Will it not be charged against us by the Lord, who cries out and says through his prophet: "Behold, you consume the milk, you cover yourselves with the wool, and you kill the fat; but you do not feed my sheep. You have not strengthened the weak, you have not fortified the sick, you have not comforted the afflicted, you have not recalled the wandering, you have not sought the lost, and what was strong you have worn out with labor. And my sheep are scattered because there are no shepherds, and they have become prey for all the beasts of the field. And there was no one to seek them, nor to call them back. Therefore, the Lord says this: 'Behold, I am over the shepherds, and I will reclaim my sheep from their hands, and I will turn them away so that they no longer feed my sheep, and they will no longer pasture them, and I will take my sheep from their mouths, and I will feed them with judgment.'

Let it not be, therefore, that from our mouth, by which we deny peace, by which we set forth more the harshness of human cruelty than divine and fatherly mercy, the sheep entrusted to us be demanded back by the Lord. It has pleased us, with the prompting of the Holy Spirit and with the Lord admonishing through many and manifest visions—because the enemy is announced and shown to be imminent—to gather the soldiers of Christ within the camp, and after examining the cases of each, to give peace to the lapsed, or rather to supply arms to those about to fight. We believe this will also please you, out of consideration for fatherly mercy. But if any of our colleagues should arise who, with the contest pressing, does not think peace should be given to brothers and sisters, he will render an account on the day of judgment to the Lord for his untimely severity or his inhuman hardness. We have set forth what was consistent with faith, charity, and solicitude, which were in our conscience: that the day of battle has drawn near, that a violent enemy will soon rise against us, and that a fight not like the previous one, but much more severe and bitter, is coming; that this has been frequently shown to us by divine means; that we are often admonished concerning this by the providence and mercy of the Lord. By whose help and mercy, we who trust in him can be secure, because he who in peace foretells to his soldiers the future battle will give victory to those fighting in the engagement. We wish you, dearest brother, always to be well.