There has been great controversy concerning the Power of Bishops, in which some have awkwardly confounded the power of the Church and the power of the sword.And from this confusion very great wars and tumults have resulted, while the Pontiffs, emboldened by the power of the Keys, not only have instituted new services and burdened consciences with reservation of cases and ruthless excommunications, but have also undertaken to transfer the kingdoms of this world, and to take the Empire from the Emperor.These wrongs have long since been rebuked in the Church by learned and godly men.Therefore our teachers, for the comforting of men's consciences, were constrained to show the difference between the power of the Church and the power of the sword, and taught that both of them, because of God's commandment, are to be held in reverence and honor, as the chief blessings of God on earth.
But this is their opinion, that the power of the Keys, or the power of the bishops, according to the Gospel, is a power or commandment of God, to preach the Gospel, to remit and retain sins, and to administer Sacraments.For with this commandment Christ sends forth His Apostles, John 20, 21 sqq.: As My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you.Receive ye the Holy Ghost.Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them;and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained.Mark 16, 15: Go preach the Gospel to every creature.
This power is exercised only by teaching or preaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments, according to their calling either to many or to individuals.For thereby are granted, not bodily, but eternal things, as eternal righteousness, the Holy Ghost, eternal life.These things cannot come but by the ministry of the Word and the Sacraments, as Paul says, Rom.1, 16: The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.Therefore, since the power of the Church grants eternal things, and is exercised only by the ministry of the Word, it does not interfere with civil government; no more than the art of singing interferes with civil government.For civil government deals with other things than does the Gospel.The civil rulers defend not minds, but bodies and bodily things against manifest injuries, and restrain men with the sword and bodily punishments in order to preserve civil justice and peace.
Therefore the power of the Church and the civil power must not be confounded.The power of the Church has its own commission to teach the Gospel and to administer the Sacraments.Let it not break into the office of another; Let it not transfer the kingdoms of this world; let it not abrogate the laws of civil rulers; let it not abolish lawful obedience; let it not interfere with judgments concerning civil ordinances or contracts; let it not prescribe laws to civil rulers concerning the form of the Commonwealth.As Christ says, John 18, 33: My kingdom is not of this world; also Luke 12, 14: Who made Me a judge or a divider over you? Paul also says, Phil.
3, 20: Our citizenship is in heaven; 2 Cor.10, 4: The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the casting down of imaginations.
After this manner our teachers discriminate between the duties of both these powers, and command that both be honored and acknowledged as gifts and blessings of God.
If bishops have any power of the sword, that power they have, not as bishops, by the commission of the Gospel, but by human law having received it of kings and emperors for the civil administration of what is theirs.This, however, is another office than the ministry of the Gospel.
When, therefore, the question is concerning the jurisdiction of bishops, civil authority must be distinguished from ecclesiastical jurisdiction.Again, according to the Gospel or, as they say, by divine right, there belongs to the bishops as bishops, that is, to those to whom has been committed the ministry of the Word and the Sacraments, no jurisdiction except to forgive sins, to judge doctrine, to reject doctrines contrary to the Gospel, and to exclude from the communion of the Church wicked men, whose wickedness is known, and this without human force, simply by the Word.Herein the congregations of necessity and by divine right must obey them, according to Luke 10, 16: He that heareth you heareth Me.But when they teach or ordain anything against the Gospel, then the congregations have a commandment of God prohibiting obedience, Matt.7, 15: Beware of false prophets; Gal.1, 8:
Though an angel from heaven preach any other gospel, let him be accursed; 2 Cor.13, 8: We can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth.Also: The power which the Lord hath given me to edification, and not to destruction.So, also, the Canonical Laws command (II.Q.VII.Cap., Sacerdotes, and Cap.
Oves).And Augustine (Contra Petiliani Epistolam): Neither must we submit to Catholic bishops if they chance to err, or hold anything contrary to the Canonical Scriptures of God.
If they have any other power or jurisdiction, in hearing and judging certain cases, as of matrimony or of tithes, etc., they have it by human right, in which matters princes are bound, even against their will, when the ordinaries fail, to dispense justice to their subjects for the maintenance of peace.
